by Dave Workman
Senior Editor

Congress dealt the anti-gun lobby a devastating bipartisan blow on Oct. 19 when the US House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed, by a vote of 283-144, the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, which will derail so-called junk lawsuits against gun makers and retailers.

Since 1998, the firearms industry had been plagued by a series of lawsuits filed by municipal governments, all claiming that gunmakers, distributors and dealers were somehow responsible for gun violence in their communities. The lawsuits had been supported by gun control groups, primarily the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, and critics asserted all along that these legal actions were designed primarily to harass and financially drain the gun industry.

Over the past six years, the lawsuits have cost the industry hundreds of millions of dollars to fight, and yet the municipal plaintiffs have consistently lost their court battles.

While many in the press portrayed the passage of S-397—which President Bush has promised to sign—as a victory for the gun lobby at the hands of the Republican-controlled Congress, in fact, there was considerable Democrat support for the measure. Fifty-nine Democrats joined the majority of Republicans in voting for the measure.

The bill was supported by organizations outside the gun industry, including: the US Chamber of Commerce, United Mine Workers of America, National Association of Manufacturers, National Federation of Independent Businesses, National Association of Wholesalers-Distributors and others, including other unions. It was also supported by the National Association of Sporting Goods Wholesalers. The Department of Defense, stating national security concerns over the health of the small arms industry, also supported the measure.

Passage of the bill was hailed by gun rights leaders.

“This important legislation will stop the anti-gunners cold in their attempts to bankrupt firearms manufacturers, distributors and retailers,” said Alan M. Gottlieb, chairman of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA). “It closes an important loophole through which extremist gun grabbers have been trying to use the courts to crush gun ownership in this country, when they could not get Congress or state legislatures to do their bidding.”

“This common sense legislation,” added CCRKBA Executive Director Joe Waldron, “is long overdue. It sends a clear signal to the anti-gun lobby that mainstream America has had enough of their attempts to have their political agenda forced on us all by the courts.

According to The Washington Post, National Rifle Association (NRA) Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre, said passage of the bill was “a historic day for the NRA and also for the Second Amendment.”

He said Congress had “saved the firearms industry” and that “the people that want to ban guns in this country have not been able to win in the political arena” so they had tried to push their agenda through the courts.

LaPierre, Gottlieb and Waldron all concurred that the lawsuits were an attempt to litigate gun makers into bankruptcy.

However, not all gun organizations supported the legislation. Bitterly fighting S-397 due to a couple of amendments—one requiring that dealers make trigger locks available with each gun they sell, though there is no requirement that the locks be used, and another calling for a study of so-called armor piercing ammunition—was the Gun Owners of America (GOA). That organization had been holding out for passage of the original House version of the bill that did not contain the two provisions, contending that the trigger lock and ammunition study tenets amounted to more gun control.

Some gun rights activists, posting on KeepAndBearArms.com, were also critical of the NRA and CCRKBA for supporting the measure, arguing that it amounted to a compromise, and support for gun control.

However, in a statement from the Firearms Coalition, founded by the late Neal Knox, this was the perspective:

“The House of Representatives today passed the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act with amendments added by the Senate to require trigger locks be sold with all guns sold by dealers (current law requires trigger locks be sold only with new guns). The bill also redefines armor-piercing ammunition in a manner that amounts to no substantial change, and calls for a study by the Attorney General of performance standards of body armor and ammunition. Such standards already exist (that’s where the vest classifications, Type II, Type IIA and so on come from).

“Some of our friends worked very hard against passage of the bill because they considered the amendments cause for killing the bill. We disagree.

“While we don’t like the amendments, the bill is a net gain for gunowners.

“This is a case where, as my late, lamented father Neal Knox used to say, ‘the perfect is the enemy of the good.’ It is only the most recent example the other side adapting while the pro-gun side has remained stuck.”

Antis Appalled
At the other end of the political spectrum, spokespersons for the anti-gun Brady Center and Violence Policy Center (VPC) were fuming.

Dennis Henigan, director of the Brady Center’s legal Action Project, who had been a key figure in the municipal lawsuit effort, threatened to go to court again, this time to have the law overturned. He called the legislation “an unprecedented attack on the due process rights of victims injured by the misconduct of an industry that seeks to escape the legal rules that govern the rest of us. We believe state and federal courts across this nation are prepared to strike it down.”

VPC’s Kristin Rand asserted that the bill “is built on a corrupt foundation of lies that will leave a legacy of pain and suffering.”

“Proponents lie when they claim the gun industry is the most heavily regulated industry in America when, in fact, they are one of only two industries—the other being the tobacco industry—exempt from federal health and safety regulation,” she claimed. “Now the unregulated gun industry will also enjoy protection from legitimate lawsuits by individuals like victims of the Washington, DC-area snipers, injured by the reckless and negligent actions of gun manufacturers and dealers. This legislation will make the unregulated gun industry the most pampered industry in America.”

And Rand somewhat concurred with the arguments of some critics in the gun rights movement, when she insisted that the legislation “included . . . gun control measures.”

Anti-gun New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg called the bill “a disgraceful piece of legislation that will give gun manufacturers immunity from acting negligently.”

He contended that “Granting the gun industry immunity will make it easier for criminals to get firearms and put our law enforcement officers at greater risk.”

Bloomberg and others urged President Bush to veto the legislation.

‘War Not Over, Yet’
Lawrence Keane, vice president and general counsel for the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), cautioned Gun Week that the battle is far from over. He said NSSF and the industry “fully expected” anti-gunners to threaten, and file, lawsuits to overturn the Act.

“They will try to litigate, unsuccessfully eventually, whether the Act is unconstitutional,” Keane said. “We anticipate that they will also try to find cases or file cases to try to argue that the case fits within the exception (to the law).”

Keane said the Act is “clearly constitutional” under the commerce clause.

He also fired back at gun industry critics, arguing that the firearms industry is “already heavily regulated.”

Keane likened the on-going battle over gun rights to a war of attrition, in which anti-gunners will continue revising their strategies with the ultimate goal of putting gunmakers out of business.

“They remain committed to their long term strategic goal to destroy the industry by whatever means necessary,” he said.

Keane said it was “curious timing” that the bill passed in the same week that Michael Barnes announced his resignation as president of the Brady Campaign.

He also said that this bill passed because former South Dakota Sen. Tom Daschle, who had obstructed the legislation last time around, was “taken out” by voters in the 2004 election.

“That’s the seminal event that got the bill passed,” Keane stated.

As for what lies over the horizon in the battle over gun rights, Keane told Gun Week that anti-gunners “will figure out new and different ways to attack us.” While he believes the gun control lobby is “demoralized” and that “the public is clearly on our side,” he also said the gun ban movement is committed to its goals.