22nd Annual Gun Rights Policy Conference

by Dave Workman
Senior Editor

Our GRPC 2007 report is divided into sessions for easier reading.
Click on the desired section to read.

October 6, 2007
October 7, 2007

“We’ve had it with this creeping gun control...”

Federal Affairs
NRA’s Cunningham led the federal affairs panel briefing, providing an overview of legislation now being considered on Capitol Hill. He said legislation that would repeal the District of Columbia gun ban is on hold, pending some decision from the Supreme Court on whether to accept the Parker case.

He said legislation to reform the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) made it through the House but not the Senate.

“It is still part of our agenda to reform ATF,” he said.

He also noted that work continues to keep the Tiahrt Amendment, which protects sensitive gun trace data from being abused and misused by anti-gun mayors and others, intact. It is working through the legislative process.

Anti-gun Democrat Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California was pushing S-456, a bill that would expand the prohibition against legal gun ownership to anyone with a so-called “gang related” misdemeanor conviction. However, Feinstein was forced to remove that provision, and NRA lobbyists are keeping an eye on it.

Cunningham went to great lengths to explain the NRA’s position on the NICS Improvement Bill, which has generated much debate on pro-gun Internet forums. Noting that NRA opposed the 1993 Brady Law, and its initial waiting period before the National Instant Check System went fully operational five years later, he said there is now a chance to improve the NICS system.

“This is not an anti-gun legislation juggernaut,” Cunningham insisted.

He said the legislation allows for the elimination of duplicate records, provides for expungement of records, requires a General Accounting Office audit to determine whether the money for NICS has been spent effectively, and most importantly, it provides a relief from disabilities mechanism.

However, GOA’s Pratt—who has been highly critical of the NRA for its involvement in crafting the NICS legislation—disagreed.

“I think we could go into a very dangerous direction,” Pratt insisted.

He worked with Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn in an attempt to roadblock the NICS bill. Pratt is concerned about language in the bill that defines “mental defectives” and the process by which people are found to be mentally defective. He contended that a psychiatrist, acting on his own, can find someone to be a danger to himself or others, and that opinion could be enough to disqualify a person from having a firearm. He said the definitions keep changing, making it easier for bureaucrats to disqualify people from owning guns.

“We’ve had it with this creeping gun control,” he declared.

Pratt observed that “it was gun control that contributed to the tragedy at Virginia Tech.” He noted that some students and faculty members at that institution have concealed carry permits, but the Virginia legislature effectively disarmed them by not allowing guns on the campus.

“The gun free zone is what we’re talking about,” Pratt said. “That has to go.”

He complained that anti-gun legislation is traditionally offered as a “helpful” measure in fighting or preventing crime.

“What is helpful,” he said to a roar of applause, “is arming the population so we can shoot crooks.”

Jake McGuigan, director of government relations for NSSF, told the audience that NSSF is working to change the way gunmakers pay federal excise taxes. He added that hunters and shooters “are the largest supporters of conservation” in the country, paying more than $279 million to conservation efforts.

NSSF, he noted, supports the Tiahrt Amendment and is working with gun rights groups to keep that legislation on the books. He accused New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and others of wanting access to sensitive gun trace data only for the purpose of litigating against gun dealers across the country.

John Snyder, CCRKBA director of federal affairs, alluded to an effort that is now gathering momentum to cut federal funding from colleges and universities that prohibit carrying concealed firearms on campus by legally-licensed students and faculty members. This is a reaction to the Virginia Tech massacre in April.

“The crime was caused at least partially by the fact that the school has a policy against carrying concealed firearms on campus,” Snyder asserted.

Adding to others’ comments on the Tiahrt Amendment, he said there was an effort to make that requirement permanent, and that is ultimately the goal of gun rights organizations and industry. Until that happens, he said, attempts to eliminate protections for sensitive gun trace data will be “a perennial issue.”

Ralph Walker, treasurer of NMLRA, and also a college administrator, noted that the Virginia Tech massacre was personally important to him.

“I would love to be able to exercise my right to carry,” he said. “I have a carry permit issued in Tennessee and it doesn’t say ‘concealed’ anywhere.”

He said the NMLRA is represented at the conference because this group uses blackpowder, an explosive, as its propellant and there are myriad regulations and international issues that affect blackpowder shooters.

“We represent the ‘E’ in ‘B-A-T-F-E’,” Walker said.

While muzzleloaders are not firearms by federal law, blackpowder is “highly regulated,” Walker noted.

“I can legally own and possess 50 pounds of black powder at any one time,” he remarked, “and I guarantee my (powder) magazine is constantly full.”

But there are fire codes and other restrictions at the state level that can interfere with that, and he is also concerned about bans on .50-caliber rifles that would not only encompass the .50 BMG rifle shooters, but also muzzleloading enthusiasts because statutes creating such bans are so poorly-worded.

Likewise, international problems could have a significant impact on blackpowder shooters.

“Believe it or not,” Walker revealed, “the United Nations could have a significant impact on our sport. There is currently no blackpowder being produced in the United States.”

All blackpowder is now produced off-shore, and the UN can pass regulations that would interfere with transport of blackpowder.

“If they can get ours (propellant), what’s next,” he wondered.

Walker closed his remarks by reminding the audience of what Thomas Jefferson said about being citizens in the United States.

“We must be ever vigilant,” he said.

Second Amendment Case
A highlight of the conference was a presentation by attorneys Robert Levy and Alan Gura who brought the Parker suit against the District of Columbia’s gun ban. Levy is financing the case personally, and Gura is the lead attorney.

Levy called the Mar. 9 ruling by the District of Columbia Court of Appeals—considered to be the second most important court in the nation—a significant victory. It was the first time a federal court of appeals had overturned a gun law on Second Amendment grounds.

He picked the District of Columbia for the lawsuit because it is unique. It is not a state, it has one of the highest rates of violent crime in the nation, and the most restrictive gun law. Nobody can possess a functional firearm in the city, handguns are banned, and “the federal government lives there.”

Levy noted that the plaintiffs in the Parker case are racially and gender diverse, and that they are responsible citizens with no criminal records. Unlike other challenges to the gun ban, which were typically filed by criminals already serving sentences, the Parker plaintiffs had not been charged with crimes, and they filed a civil action.

The strategy with this case, Levy said, is to follow what the late Justice Thurgood Marshall applied in other civil rights cases: an incremental approach. The idea is to pursue a case on narrow grounds, thus gradually eroding gun laws that, as they were adopted, gradually eroded the gun rights of American citizens.

“The other side has a lot more to lose than we do,” Levy stressed.

Should the Supreme Court take the case and uphold the DC Court ruling, written by Senior Judge Laurence Silberman, it could have a stunning impact on gun laws around the country.

Progress on the case can be followed, he said, by visiting his website: www.dcguncase.com.

Gura felt the Parker case was an excellent candidate for Supreme Court review. He was very critical of how the District wrote its brief to the high court, noting that the city argued that no Second Amendment violation would exist even with a handgun ban, because citizens are allowed to keep rifles and shotguns. The District, however, requires that long guns be functionally disabled, making it impossible for them to be used for self-defense in an emergency.

But Gura noted that allowing long guns is not what the Parker case is about.

He said the most astonishing argument from the city in its appeal is that the 31-year-old gun ban works. The city has argued that it “does not have to stand by and do nothing while our citizens die,” he noted.

However, when it litigates other cases about lack of police services, the city argues that it does not have an obligation to provide police protection, Gura said. Courts have upheld that position.

Gura expressed confidence of a favorable Supreme Court ruling, if the case is heard.
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