January 20, 2001
New Year, New Gun Laws And Problems with Reforms
by Joseph P. Tartaro
Executive Editor
It’s one thing for elected officials to make laws, but it’s quite another to get people to comply—especially if the new laws run counter to their political and philosophical beliefs.
New gun registration laws went into effect on Jan. 1, 2001 in California, Canada and elsewhere. The ones in California and Canada, however, both of which mandate new registration of guns that people had legally owned before the law was enacted, seem to have run into the most problems.
In California, the registration requirement is an expansion of the 1989 Roberti-Ross Act which banned certain firearms defined as “assault weapons.” In Canada, where handguns were already registered, the new law requires registration of all shotguns and rifles—the kind of firearms possessed and used by most hunters.
The deadline has come in both cases, and no one is sure of what the level of compliance is.
California
On Dec. 27, The Los Angeles Daily News reported that with just three days left to register “assault weapons” under California’s new state law, only 10,000 gunowners had done so. Many gunowners said they planned to move their firearms out of state. Others indicated that they were moving their families, homes and businesses out of the state—because of the gun law.
As the deadline neared, the newspaper claimed that several gun groups, including the National Rifle Association, said they plan to go to court to seek a delay in enforcement of the law, saying it is vague and has not been publicized well enough.
But Attorney General Bill Lockyer said he is confident the law would survive a court challenge.
“We didn’t have any expectations because no one knows exactly how many of these types of guns are in private hands,” Lockyer revealed. “We estimate there are a larger number (than already registered), though.”
Enforcing the law depends wholly on gunowners’ cooperation. Failure to register could bring a fine of $500 or more and from 16 months to three years in state prison.
“No one’s planning to go knock on doors and search for something. We recognize the owners have pre-existing property rights,” Lockyer said.
The California law, authored by state Sen. Don Perata (D-Oakland), defines “assault weapons” as semi-automatic rifles, pistols and shotguns with detachable magazines, that also have other features, including:
In absence of registering an “assault weapon,” an owner must disable it permanently, surrender it to law enforcement, sell it to a licensed “assault weapon” dealer or move it out of state.
While some are registering their guns and others are moving them out of state, still others are trying to figure out exactly what the law means to them.
“We’ve been getting about a dozen calls a day. This law is vague. It’s political symbolism at its worst,” said Steve Helsley, spokesman for the NRA.
An attorney for the NRA said the law is confusing, and that gunowners should have another year to register.
“Firearms laws are becoming as complicated as tax and environmental laws,” said Chuck Michel, a Los Angeles lawyer representing various gun advocacy associations, business owners and gunowners, according to The Daily News.
“The difference is that the average gunowner doesn’t have a lawyer in the closet standing by to give advice like a corporation that is subject to environmental and tax laws does. The result is accidental felons.”
Pennsylvania
But gun laws can make accidental felons of people, even if registration is not the issue. A story in The Philadelphia Inquirer recently focused on that very issue as it reviewed what was happening to many Pennsylvanians because of that state’s laws.
The Inquirer story begins with an all too familiar case:
“Firearms have been part of George Bellum’s life for most of his 51 years. He got a hunting license as a teen-ager, he collects antique weapons, and he enjoys target shooting with his children on his central Pennsylvania farm.
“Today, Bellum, a law-abiding tree farmer from Bloomsburg, PA, cannot touch his guns. In fact, he cannot even legally own one—because he was convicted of drunken driving more than 20 years ago.
“Bellum, like hundreds of others, is trapped in a netherworld that may be unique to Pennsylvania: People who once got caught drag racing or stealing a loaf of bread are being swept into a net cast for dangerous felons,” The Inquirer continued.
Federal law prohibits anyone who was ever convicted of a crime that carried a penalty of more than one year in prison from buying or possessing a gun.
When Bellum pleaded guilty to driving under the influence in 1975, the crime was punishable by up to three years in prison. The law was changed in 1976, but that did not help Bellum.
“People can’t believe that something that happened so long ago can keep them from hunting or buying a weapon for protection,” said Ronald Stanko, a deputy attorney general and administrative law judge who ruled on Bellum’s case.
He said the state Attorney General’s office had handled 300 petitions in the last 18 months from people who tried to purchase guns and were rejected after background checks turned up old crimes.
“We are inundated,” Stanko said.
Drag racing, larceny, and driving under the influence are the three main offenses that once carried sentences of more than a year in prison in Pennsylvania. Penalties for first offenses for these crimes are now greatly reduced and would not prohibit gun ownership, according to The Inquirer.
Stanko and other judges who have heard these cases say the law is unfair, but they believe their hands are tied.
“There is no flexibility in the way we can rule,” Stanko said. “The problem with the current law is the way it’s written: There are no exceptions.”
Bellum discovered that old crimes can come back to haunt you when he tried to buy a gun in 1998—the same year Pennsylvania state police began conducting criminal background checks under the federal law.
The check turned up Bellum’s 1975 DUI conviction, and his purchase application was denied.
He has gone to court twice in two years petitioning to be allowed to purchase a firearm, and twice he has lost. Unfortunately, while federal law supposedly allows relief of disability on application to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, the ATF is prohibited in appropriations bills from spending money to conduct relief investigations.
In November, when an appeals court panel turned down Bellum, judges saw the inequity in the law. “Arguably, this result is unfair to those individuals convicted of DUI prior to 1976,” Judge Joseph McCloskey of the Commonwealth Court wrote.
By contrast, the maximum penalty today for first-time drunken drivers is 48 hours in jail.
Though the Board of Pardons does not keep records by type of crime, filings doubled after 1998, when the background checks went into effect.
At this point, only legislation could fix the problem faced by Bellum and perhaps thousands of other Pennsylvanians. When such laws are made, the news media seems to focus on the spin of the sponsors, and fails to explain to the public the kind of problems decent people will face.
As a result of the media’s reporting on restrictive new gun proposals, reopening this issue in Pennsylvania or in Congress will be like throwing sparks into a tinderbox. The pro-rights reformers won’t get any help from the media, including The Philadelphia Inquirer.