Cases that could bring the incorporation of the 2nd Amendment to the SCOTUS

Via Instapundit we have this story from the Volokh Conspiracy:

In this week’s Second Amendment podcast on iVoices.org, Jon Caldara and I discuss three different cases which could give the Supreme Court an opportunity to decide whether the Second Amendment is incorporated in the Fourteenth: the Chicago handgun ban; the Alameda County, California, gun show ban on county property; and the New York nunchaku ban. The MP3 is ll minutes.

Interesting. Especially the “New York nunchaku ban.” I’ll see what I can find about that.

Override after-action report

Watching the General Assembly today was certainly instructive. The phrase has been attributed to a number of people but whoever said it was right: Laws, as with sausage, should not be watched in the making.

In my previous post I did a sort-of live blogging of event up to around 6:15 PM or so. Feel free to read that post but I’m going to recap the pertinent stuff here. As you know if you’ve read this blog I was an advocate for several bills passing through the Assembly and, when Governor Kaine vetoed them, I was also an advocate for the override of those vetoes. Well, here’s how it shook out today:

Bill	Descrip.	Vote		Override?
		House (Y/N)	Senate (Y/N)	House (Y/N)	Senate (Y/N)
HB1851	Military > 1 gun/mo.	73/26	26/14	Yes	No
HB2528	Gun “buyback”	71/28	24/16	Yes	No
SB877	Retired LEO CCW in restaurant	76/22	30/10	Yes	Yes
SB1035	CCW in restaurant	n/a	24/16	n/a	No
SB1528	CCW safety course online	73/23	28/12	Yes	Yes

You’ll note that the Senate actually had a majority vote to override the veto in each case. The ones that failed did so because they needed 2/3rds of the Senate to vote for the override, which means they needed 27 Yes votes to get the job done. Cynic that I am, I am convinced the Democratic majority in the Senate  contrived to allow a number of their own to vote yes to the override so they could go home and say they voted “yes” but there just wasn’t enough votes to complete the override. Be as that may, this is what it is. Of the 5 bills I was hoping to see an override on, 2 of them managed to get through. Of the others, the House voted to override but the Senate did not.

The big bill, so far as I was concerned, was SB1035 which sought to remove the inconsistency of being a trustworthy enough citizen to carry a concealed weapon in the street and the sidewalk outside a restaurant but not enough so as to carry it past the threshold of that restaurant. Irrational fears and hyped-up hypotheticals is all that the opponents of this bill have had for over 2 years, now. This law has been passed twice by the Commonwealth’s elected representatives by quite large margins only to be dismissed by a handful of people. Truly incredible.

The good news is that this will be the last time Kaine gets to use Virginia’s legislative process to pad his national resume. He’s out in November, period. Those of us who have tried to work with him and his party must now put our efforts into electing Bob McDonnell to the governorship and as many Delegates and Senators as we can who offer the trust and respect to Virginia’s citizens that we’ve clearly been asking for.

In case any of my nearby neighbors were wondering, Delegate Dave Poisson (House 32nd District) and Senator Mark Herring (Senate 33rd District) voted like this:

Bill	Poisson	Herring
HB1851	No	No
HB2528	No	No
SB877	Yes	Yes
SB1035	n/a	No
SB1528	Yes	Yes

Note that Poisson didn’t vote on SB1035 because the Senate failed to override making the House vote moot. I would like to point out to my fellow Loudouners that the votes of these 2 gentlemen make it clear they trust a retired cop slamming down brews at the local pub with a concealed weapon far more than they trust you stone-cold sober. Keep that in mind.

I’d also like to hear them explain themselves regarding HB1851 where they think our military personnel and Guardsmen aren’t worth the consideration of being able to buy more than 1 handgun a month. With the deployments going on a soldier with orders to ship out might very well get caught having to decide between buying a sidearm for his own use overseas or getting one for his wife to keep at home to defend themselves here. I don’t understand how they can claim to trust and honor our military personnel – and depend on them to fulfill their missions, I might add – and not allow them this latitude. I hope members of our military and Guard will keep that in mind, as well.

Time to turn our eyes toward the future, my friends, and work to show Virginians everywhere that we’ve got the ideas and solutions to a better way and the people who know how to get them implemented.

Action in Richmond; House votes to override Governor’s veto on 2 bills (Updates)

I’ve mentioned that the General Assembly has convened today to consider actions on several vetoes and amendments returned to them by the Governor. I have taken notice of the House minutes today and find that the House has overridden vetoes on 2 of the bills I was speaking of.

HB1851, which would allow members of the US military and the VA National Guard to be exempt from Virginia’s “1 handgun a month” limitation was vetoed by the Governor. The House has voted 72-26 to override. It now goes to the Senate.

HB2528 which requires localities wishing to perform a “gun buyback program” to pass a specific ordinance authorizing it and to sell guns received in this manner to federal firearms licensed dealers whenever possible was also vetoed. The House overrode that veto by a vote of 71-28. It will also go to the Senate.

More to come as I hear more.

Update: Interestingly, there’s a real kerfuffle going on over in the Senate around SB1070. The issue doesn’t appear to be the Governor’s amendments to this bill but, rather, the question of whether the amendments offered are “severable.” I came in a little late on the matter but the Republican caucus appears to be arguing that the Governor’s stance that these amendments are not severable (which means considered separately, I’m guessing) is a breach of the Constitutional duties assigned to the Senate. They are arguing that the Constitutional matter should be considered and dealt with before the amendments to the bill are considered. The Democrat caucus is merely trying to force the amendments through.

More to come as I hear more.

Update 2: The House has completed it’s 1st set of business which was dealing with the House bills vetoed or amended by the Governor. They stand in recess for the moment. (Until 5:00 pm EDT, as of now.) They are awaiting the Senate to complete their run of bills. The Senate’s calendar dealt with the Senate bills that were amended first and they appear to be stuck on SB1495, again over whether or not the amendments offered by the Governor are to be considered “separate and severable” and, therefore, subject to being debated separately. Counting SB1495, they have 4 more bills to consider before moving to the issues vetoed by Gov. Kaine. There are 7 of those bills, including SB877, SB1528, and SB1035 which I’ve written about before. The Senate needs to act on those bills before the House can consider them. More to come, folks.

Oh, by the way, the Senate’s minutes are here. If you’re extremely bored and want to go watch either session in progress, go to the G.A.’s web site and click on one of the links for video. There’s audio-only links, too.

Update 3: OK, apparently the issue was a matter of whether the amendments are separate and severable meaning that if they were not, the whole bill had to go back to committee. The Senate has voted along party lines to say that they are and, therefore, are moving ahead to determine whether to accept the Governor’s amendments again.

Update 4: The Senate has finished the amendments phase and is now taking up the Governor’s vetoes. At 5:50PM they overrode the veto on SB877.

Update 5: SB971, the “Triggerman” veto has been sustained in the Senate. SB1035 is being discussed now. (6:12PM)

…And as of 6:15PM, the Senate has failed to override the veto of SB1035. The vote was 24-16 in favor of the override, but that’s not the 3/4ths 2/3rds vote necessary to get it done.

I’ll have more on that later but, for now, I’m headed to dinner.

(Edited my Update 5 to correct the passage ratio required for a veto override. It’s 2/3rds or 27 of 40 Senators.)

Update 6: The House is starting on the Senate responses to the Kaine vetos. They’ve passed by SB877 and are working on SB1528, the issue of permitting on-line instruction for the purposes of qualifying for a concealed carry permit.

Repeat Traffic: VA General Assembly meeting again April 8th to consider overrides of Kaine vetoes.

This is a repeat message. Please take a moment today or early tomorrow to contact your Virginia General Assembly Delegate and Senator!

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As is the procedure in Virginia, the General Assembly is reconvening on April 8th to consider responses to Governor Kaine’s actions regarding the bills passed in the session that was just completed. According to Virginia law, the Governor has 4 options open to him when a bill is sent to his desk.

1. Sign the bill. It becomes law either immediately or on a certain date as described in the law.
2. Veto the bill. He then returns the bill to the General Assembly.
3. Modify the bill. The Governor can make modifications to any bill sent to him. He then returns the bill to the General Assembly so they can vote on whether to accept his modifications.
4. Do nothing. In the absence of action on the Governor’s part, the bill becomes law just as if he’d signed it.

As I mentioned a few days ago, Governor Kaine vetoed several firearms-related bills that passed the GA pretty handily. The Assembly will now consider whether to override the Governor’s veto. Among those bills being considered (summaries from a Grassroots Bulletin from the NRA-ILA):

SB1035 would permit a Right-to-Carry permit holder to carry concealed in a restaurant, provided he or she does not consume alcohol. The House amended SB1035, improving it by removing the requirement that Right-to-Carry permit holders notify the alcohol beverage manager when they carry concealed in their establishment.

After vetoing SB1035, Governor Kaine said, “Allowing concealed weapons into restaurants and bars that serve alcohol puts the public, the employees, and our public safety officers at risk. I take seriously the objections of law enforcement to this measure.”  Last year, the Governor signed a bill permitting Commonwealth Attorneys to carry concealed in restaurants even while consuming alcohol.  It should be noted that SB1053 prohibited the consumption of alcohol while carrying concealed by licensed Right-to-Carry permit holders.
 
SB877 would allow “retired” law enforcement officers to carry concealed in a restaurant that serves alcoholic beverages. Unlike SB1035, this bill applies only to retired law enforcement officers.
 
HB1851 would exempt active duty military personnel or Virginia National Guardsmen from Virginia’s “one-gun-a-month” law on handgun purchases.
 
SB1528 would have allowed a safety course conducted by a state-certified or National Rifle Association-certified firearms instructor required for obtaining a concealed handgun permit to be done electronically or online.
 
HB2528 would establish that no locality or entity may participate in a gun “buyback” program where individuals are given anything of value or money in exchange for surrendering a firearm to the locality unless the governing body first passes an ordinance authorizing the gun “buyback.”  The legislation also requires that any locality holding gun “buybacks” sell the firearms to a federally licensed dealer “or be disposed of in any appropriate manner” if they could not be sold.

One of our local members of the GOP and of several pro-2nd Amendment organizations, Greg Stone, put out an e-mail calling for concerned citizens to take a moment and make their voices heard to their members of the General Assembly, particularly those who had voted “no” during the floor vote. He writes:

If YOUR Senator is one of the following:

Blevins, Colgan, Herring, Lucas, Norment, Northam, or Petersen

And/Or YOUR Delegate is one of the following:

Albo, Amundson, Caputo, Dance, Hamilton, Hargrove, Mathieson, May, Melvin, Paula Miller, Poisson, Rust, Shannon, Sickles, Tata, Tyler, Vanderhye, or Watts

You need to call them NOW and let them know that since they supported RETIRED police officers carrying concealed in restaurants, even if they are drinking alcohol, they NEED to change their vote and override the Governor’s veto to SUPPORT concealed handgun permit holders carrying concealed in restaurants if they don’t drink!

These legislators simply cannot justify what they have done by their contradictory votes.  We MUST call them and let them know we expect them to make it right by overriding the veto.

His e-mail included phone contacts for these Senators and Delegates. I’ll include them here and toss in e-mail addresses, too.

Harry Blevins (district), 757-546-2435

Chuck Colgan, 703-368-0300

Mark Herring, 703-729-3300

Louise Lucas (district), 757-397-8209

Thomas Norment, 757-259-7810

Ralph Northam (district), 757-818-5172

Chap Petersen, 703-349-3361

Delegates:

Dave Albo, 703-451-3555

Kristen Amundson, 703-619-0444

Chuck Caputo, 703-476-6944

Rosalyn Dance, 804-862-2922

Phillip Hamilton, 757-249-2480

Frank Hargrove, 804-550-2900

Bobby Mathieson, 757-470-3000

Joe May, 703-777-1191

Ken Melvin, 757-397-2800

Paula Miller, 757-587-8757

David Poisson, 703-421-6899

Thomas Rust, 703-437-9400

Stephen Shannon, 703-281-5200

Mark Sickles, 703-922-6440

Bob Tata, 757-340-3510

Roslyn Tyler, 434-336-1710

Margi Vanderhye, 703-448-8018

Vivian Watts, 703-978-2989

It’s important to contact your Senator or Delegate and ask them to vote to override the Governor’s veto of these bills. It is crucial that you do so for 1 of these bill especially, SB1035 and to show you why, I’ll quote from Greg Stone’s e-mail again:

SB 1035, the restaurant ban repeal, needs 5 more votes to be overridden in the Senate …  The House only needs 1 more vote to override the veto. (Senate 22 to 16, House 66 to 33) …

SB 877, the restaurant ban repeal for retired police, passed by a large veto proof margin. (Senate 40 to 0, House 84 to 15)

SB 1851, One Handgun A Month exemption for active duty military, passed by a large veto proof majority. (Senate 31 to 8, House 86 to 13)

SB 1528, internet training for CHPs, passed by  a large veto-proof majority. (Senate 29 to 10, House 99 to 0)

HB 2528, gun buy-up bill, passed by a large veto-proof majority. (Senate 28 to 12, House 85 to 11)

Emphasis mine. All 4 of the other bills already passed by a margin capable of overriding the veto. We need to ask those who voted “no” on them to reconsider but all that really needs to happen is for all of the Assembly to vote again as they voted before. SB1035, however, is a different situation. We need 5 Senators and 1 Delegate to change from a “no” to a “yes” and that’s where you come in.

Note that all 40 Senators voted to permit retired police officers to carry concealed in those same restaurants and bars and they voted to permit those same people to drink while doing so. In other words, these Senators who voted for that bill but against SB1035 are saying they trust a drunk retired cop to carry a gun but they don’t trust you stone cold sober. I don’t recommend you actually say that in your correspondence with them, but definitely keep it in mind as you decide whether you’ve got the time to call them.

I’d also remind everyone that Gov. Kaine already signed a bill last year that permits Commonwealth Attorneys to carry concealed and drink while doing so. Perhaps they can argue that police training means something where their current inconsistencies are concerned but Attorneys are no more trained regarding firearms than are regular citizens like us. Again, something to keep in mind.

Your action is needed. Your efforts do matter. Make a couple of calls, please.

Bogus Mexican gun statistics finally getting called out

I’ve listened with disgusted amazement at the people getting on TV and talking about the Mexican drug war going on making the statement that the guns and other weapons being used are coming into Mexico from the United States. It’s almost invariably linked to more gun control advocacy. I knew there was something very, very wrong in all of this when I started hearing about the types of weapons and seeing the pictures. They included fully-automatic weapons, mortars, and various explosive missiles – none of which are available in the US civilian market that’s being blamed for the guns.

Now, Fox News has done some exclusive reporting that shows this often-repeated claim is at best the repetition of dead wrong info and an outright lie at worst. Speaking of the claim repeated by Secretary of State Clinton, CA Senator Dianne Feinstein, members of the MSM and even officials at BATFE that 90% of the guns found in Mexico came through the US:

There’s just one problem with the 90 percent “statistic” and it’s a big one:

It’s just not true.

In fact, it’s not even close. The fact is, only 17 percent of guns found at Mexican crime scenes have been traced to the U.S.

You see, the fact is that of the guns Mexico turned over to us to see if they were from the US, 90% of those were, in fact, ID’d as coming from the United States. The problem for the statistic comes when you find out that during the collection period where those guns were found at Mexican crime scenes, the Mexican police recovered 4 times as many guns that weren’t sent to us:

In 2007-2008, according to ATF Special Agent William Newell, Mexico submitted 11,000 guns to the ATF for tracing. Close to 6,000 were successfully traced — and of those, 90 percent — 5,114 to be exact, according to testimony in Congress by William Hoover — were found to have come from the U.S.

But in those same two years, according to the Mexican government, 29,000 guns were recovered at crime scenes.

In other words, 68 percent of the guns that were recovered were never submitted for tracing. And when you weed out the roughly 6,000 guns that could not be traced from the remaining 32 percent, it means 83 percent of the guns found at crime scenes in Mexico could not be traced to the U.S.

Short & sweet, the “90% of guns recovered in Mexican crime scenes came out of America” claim is sheer crap, as bogus as the day is long. Enough, already. I have no issue with helping the Mexican government out but their problems with crime didn’t start with the US and they’re not being supported by our firearms market. I would suggest that those persons concerned with what’s going on down there stick to the facts and work to resolve the real issues. Leave the “blame America for the guns” meme behind.

VA General Assembly meeting again April 8th to consider overrides of Kaine vetoes.

As is the procedure in Virginia, the General Assembly is reconvening on April 8th to consider responses to Governor Kaine’s actions regarding the bills passed in the session that was just completed. According to Virginia law, the Governor has 4 options open to him when a bill is sent to his desk.

1. Sign the bill. It becomes law either immediately or on a certain date as described in the law.
2. Veto the bill. He then returns the bill to the General Assembly.
3. Modify the bill. The Governor can make modifications to any bill sent to him. He then returns the bill to the General Assembly so they can vote on whether to accept his modifications.
4. Do nothing. In the absence of action on the Governor’s part, the bill becomes law just as if he’d signed it.

As I mentioned a few days ago, Governor Kaine vetoed several firearms-related bills that passed the GA pretty handily. The Assembly will now consider whether to override the Governor’s veto. Among those bills being considered (summaries from a Grassroots Bulletin from the NRA-ILA):

SB1035 would permit a Right-to-Carry permit holder to carry concealed in a restaurant, provided he or she does not consume alcohol. The House amended SB1035, improving it by removing the requirement that Right-to-Carry permit holders notify the alcohol beverage manager when they carry concealed in their establishment.

After vetoing SB1035, Governor Kaine said, “Allowing concealed weapons into restaurants and bars that serve alcohol puts the public, the employees, and our public safety officers at risk. I take seriously the objections of law enforcement to this measure.”  Last year, the Governor signed a bill permitting Commonwealth Attorneys to carry concealed in restaurants even while consuming alcohol.  It should be noted that SB1053 prohibited the consumption of alcohol while carrying concealed by licensed Right-to-Carry permit holders.
 
SB877 would allow “retired” law enforcement officers to carry concealed in a restaurant that serves alcoholic beverages. Unlike SB1035, this bill applies only to retired law enforcement officers.
 
HB1851 would exempt active duty military personnel or Virginia National Guardsmen from Virginia’s “one-gun-a-month” law on handgun purchases.
 
SB1528 would have allowed a safety course conducted by a state-certified or National Rifle Association-certified firearms instructor required for obtaining a concealed handgun permit to be done electronically or online.
 
HB2528 would establish that no locality or entity may participate in a gun “buyback” program where individuals are given anything of value or money in exchange for surrendering a firearm to the locality unless the governing body first passes an ordinance authorizing the gun “buyback.”  The legislation also requires that any locality holding gun “buybacks” sell the firearms to a federally licensed dealer “or be disposed of in any appropriate manner” if they could not be sold.

One of our local members of the GOP and of several pro-2nd Amendment organizations, Greg Stone, put out an e-mail calling for concerned citizens to take a moment and make their voices heard to their members of the General Assembly, particularly those who had voted “no” during the floor vote. He writes:

If YOUR Senator is one of the following:

Blevins, Colgan, Herring, Lucas, Norment, Northam, or Petersen

And/Or YOUR Delegate is one of the following:

Albo, Amundson, Caputo, Dance, Hamilton, Hargrove, Mathieson, May, Melvin, Paula Miller, Poisson, Rust, Shannon, Sickles, Tata, Tyler, Vanderhye, or Watts

You need to call them NOW and let them know that since they supported RETIRED police officers carrying concealed in restaurants, even if they are drinking alcohol, they NEED to change their vote and override the Governor’s veto to SUPPORT concealed handgun permit holders carrying concealed in restaurants if they don’t drink!

These legislators simply cannot justify what they have done by their contradictory votes.  We MUST call them and let them know we expect them to make it right by overriding the veto.

His e-mail included phone contacts for these Senators and Delegates. I’ll include them here and toss in e-mail addresses, too.

Harry Blevins (district), 757-546-2435

Chuck Colgan, 703-368-0300

Mark Herring, 703-729-3300

Louise Lucas (district), 757-397-8209

Thomas Norment, 757-259-7810

Ralph Northam (district), 757-818-5172

Chap Petersen, 703-349-3361

Delegates:

Dave Albo, 703-451-3555

Kristen Amundson, 703-619-0444

Chuck Caputo, 703-476-6944

Rosalyn Dance, 804-862-2922

Phillip Hamilton, 757-249-2480

Frank Hargrove, 804-550-2900

Bobby Mathieson, 757-470-3000

Joe May, 703-777-1191

Ken Melvin, 757-397-2800

Paula Miller, 757-587-8757

David Poisson, 703-421-6899

Thomas Rust, 703-437-9400

Stephen Shannon, 703-281-5200

Mark Sickles, 703-922-6440

Bob Tata, 757-340-3510

Roslyn Tyler, 434-336-1710

Margi Vanderhye, 703-448-8018

Vivian Watts, 703-978-2989

It’s important to contact your Senator or Delegate and ask them to vote to override the Governor’s veto of these bills. It is crucial that you do so for 1 of these bill especially, SB1035 and to show you why, I’ll quote from Greg Stone’s e-mail again:

SB 1035, the restaurant ban repeal, needs 5 more votes to be overridden in the Senate …  The House only needs 1 more vote to override the veto. (Senate 22 to 16, House 66 to 33) …

SB 877, the restaurant ban repeal for retired police, passed by a large veto proof margin. (Senate 40 to 0, House 84 to 15)

SB 1851, One Handgun A Month exemption for active duty military, passed by a large veto proof majority. (Senate 31 to 8, House 86 to 13)

SB 1528, internet training for CHPs, passed by  a large veto-proof majority. (Senate 29 to 10, House 99 to 0)

HB 2528, gun buy-up bill, passed by a large veto-proof majority. (Senate 28 to 12, House 85 to 11)

Emphasis mine. All 4 of the other bills already passed by a margin capable of overriding the veto. We need to ask those who voted “no” on them to reconsider but all that really needs to happen is for all of the Assembly to vote again as they voted before. SB1035, however, is a different situation. We need 5 Senators and 1 Delegate to change from a “no” to a “yes” and that’s where you come in.

Note that all 40 Senators voted to permit retired police officers to carry concealed in those same restaurants and bars and they voted to permit those same people to drink while doing so. In other words, these Senators who voted for that bill but against SB1035 are saying they trust a drunk retired cop to carry a gun but they don’t trust you stone cold sober. I don’t recommend you actually say that in your correspondence with them, but definitely keep it in mind as you decide whether you’ve got the time to call them.

I’d also remind everyone that Gov. Kaine already signed a bill last year that permits Commonwealth Attorneys to carry concealed and drink while doing so. Perhaps they can argue that police training means something where their current inconsistencies are concerned but Attorneys are no more trained regarding firearms than are regular citizens like us. Again, something to keep in mind.

Your action is needed. Your efforts do matter. Make a couple of calls, please.

Kaine vetoes gun bills

Well, I’m obviously not surprised by the news that Virginia Governor Tim Kaine has decided to thumb his nose at the clear wishes of the citizens of the Commonwealth as expressed by our elected representatives; Kaine vetoed several firearms-related bills that were sent to his desk by the General Assembly.

Kaine vetoed bills Friday that would have expanded the death penalty to accomplices in murders and to those who kill on-duty fire marshals or auxiliary police officers.

Kaine also rejected legislation that would have allowed those with concealed carry permits and retired law enforcement officers to carry firearms into restaurants that serve booze.

Clearly, Kaine has decided to put furthering his political career ahead of what’s in the interest of the people of Virginia and, let’s be honest, no one expected him to sign the bill extending legal concealed carry into restaurants. Given the passage ratio of this bill (both times) it’s obviously something a majority of Virginians either actively want or don’t have a problem with. It’s just Kaine peddling to the gun-ban lobby to shine up his resume that landed a veto on this bill.

I would also like to think that our reps in the General Assembly could see that and muster an override. Given the difficulty in getting them to work together on the normal business in Richmond, however, I’m not holding my breath. At this point it appears the best bet we have of seeing the will of the majority carry in the Commonwealth is to elect a Governor who has a clue.

One of the bills I found more surprising to see him veto was the exception to Virginia’s 1-gun-a-month law for active-duty military people. It’s not hard to see where someone getting deployed might run afoul of that law and these are the people we trust with government-issued fully automatic weapons in any case. I can’t imagine where his thoughts were running that he found something objectionable to that change.

Time for a real Governor to be elected. Time to get Bob McDonnell into the Governor’s office!

Off color: WTOP reporter offers a counter-argument to the latest DC gun flap

Yesterday I wrote about a woman living in DC whose application to register a gun was denied. The story was referenced today in an blog at WTOP called “Malcontent Minute” by Mark Segraves. Segraves was the reporter who jumped through the insane hoops DC set up after getting their collective butt handed to them in the Supreme Court Heller decision so I consider him something of an expert on the DC gun regulations. He contends that the point about this being a denied application over the color of the gun is wrong:

Gun rights activists would have you believe D.C. refused to allow a woman to register a handgun because of the color of the gun. That’s not entirely true. But the lawsuit does bring to light a possible flaw in the District’s new gun laws.

OK, first things first: “gun rights activists” didn’t put the story up on the WTOP web site, which is where I saw this first and is the story I linked in my post yesterday. The editors at WTOP did that. If Segraves is contending they were sloppy in their due diligence put slapping up a story without properly confirming the facts then, as a reporter interested in the facts, he should say that. No where in his post does he mention the fact that the story was up on WTOP the day before. Come to think of it, he doesn’t provide a link to that original story, either. Ummm, Mark? That’s really bad blogging ettiquite. I’d have thought you’d know better by now.

Segraves continues:

According to the lawsuit, one of the three plaintiffs, Tracey Ambeau Hanson, tried to register a Springfield Armory XD-45 Tactical 5″ Bi-Tone stainless steel and black handgun. Her application was denied. The complaint goes on to say under D.C. law, Hanson would have been allowed to register the identical gun in a different color.

True.

If Hanson had tried to register the XD-45 in black, green, or dark earth, she would be home with her handgun right now, and I would be writing about something else.

He then points out that the color isn’t what got the application denied, it was the fact that the steel/black variant of the gun isn’t on the California Safe Hangun Roster. I, on the other hand, would point out in return that the quality of that firearm that makes it not on the list where the exact same weapon in olive drab is on the list is the only physical characteristic that differs between the 2: color scheme.

Except that Segraves correctly points out that the color wasn’t the deciding factor in whether the gun got onto the list. He’s right, and the real reasons are much worse. The reasons are that the California nutjobs that manage this list decided to move the goalposts in determining whether this weapon qualified to be on the list and the fact that the gun manufacturer, Springfield Armory, declined to pay the $200 bribe necessary to get onto the list.

The 3 guns on the list are mechanically identical to the 1 that’s not. All 4 have precisely the same safety features. The 3 guns that are on the list today were on the list before California decided to change the rules so they grandfathered them in. The steel/black variant wasn’t on the list, yet, and the CA people decided this model of gun didn’t meet the safety requirements. So, what that means is that CA’s list people are deliberately approving of a gun type that doesn’t fit their definition of “safe” so long as that gun is the right color: olive drab, dark earth, or black.

Conclusion: CA’s list is completely arbitrary with absolutely no basis in safety or the facts. Yet this is what DC’s Council abdicated their responsibilies and duties to. They have placed the welfare of their citizens and the ability of their citizens to exercise their rights completely at the mercy of bureaucrats thousands of miles away over whom DC’s citizens have no authority and no ability to remove from office. We fought a war over that kind of thing a couple of centuries ago. Come to think of it, “no taxation without representation” was a motto of theirs, too.

Segraves correctly sums things up:

One thing is clear. District leaders are going to have revamp the current gun laws before the courts or Congress do it for them, or prepare themselves for a long battle.

Yes, a very long battle. And it’s going to be a costly one both in terms of dollars spent (that would be far better spent elsewhere in DC) and in terms of their legislative efforts when the courts overturn their ludicrous gun laws. The faster the better.

DC woman sues city for discriminating against her over color

Yeah, and you just know that if I were talking about the woman’s color there’d be riots in the streets by now. No, this woman has been forced to sue the DC government because she has jumped through all of the silly hoops this city has set up that its citizens must negotiate in order to exercise their 2nd Amendment rights and been turned down because her gun is the wrong color. I kid you not:

A D.C. woman has sued the city, claiming officials would not let her register a handgun because of its color.

According to the suit filed Monday in U.S. District Court, Tracey Hanson tried to register a two-tone, stainless steel and black pistol. But the .45-caliber semiautomatic was denied because it doesn’t appear on the California Safe Handgun Roster. The roster only lists that model in olive drab green, dark earth or black.

And if you need any further proof that the DC government is not operating in good faith compliance with the Supreme Court decision in Heller v. DC, you’re just not willing to be convinced.

They denied her application to register a gun that would have passed without further comment had it been olive drab because the color isn’t on the California list. A list, I might add, that DC residents have positively no control over. Absolutely unbelievable. News flash to the alleged professionals in DC: the color of the damn gun doesn’t do a thing to make the gun more or less safe, more or less lethal, and – in a rational world – more or less qualified to be registered. If the members of DC’s council wanted to look any more like the elitist snobs we contend they are, I’m unsure how they’d accomplish it.

This is why Congress should pass legislation taking the decisions over fellow Americans’ exercise of Constitutionally-protected rights out of the hands of the DC Council. They clearly lack the ability to govern in these matters in a coherent, rational manner. The Council should have every responsibility except for managing the city’s snow plows, trash removal, and utilities delivery removed. It’s ludicrous that it comes to this over the color of an item when the color is immaterial to the operation of said item. If they can’t see their way around that, then they don’t need to be in the driver’s seat.

Multiple Pro-2nd Amendment bills headed to Kaine’s desk in VA

I’ve written in the past couple of months of several bills that were making their way through the Virginia General Assembly that were of interest to supporters of the 2nd Amendment. The NRA has helpfully provided a list of those bills in this Action Alert. I’m passing it on here as a public service and with a request that you pop the Governor a note asking him to sign off on it.

Three pro-gun bills (HB1851, HB2144, and SB1035) were approved by the Virginia Senate yesterday and they are now on their way to the desk of Governor Tim Kaine (D) for his consideration.

House Bill 1851, sponsored by Delegate L. Scott Lingamfelter (R-31), passed out of the Senate by a 31-8 vote.  Simply stated, this NRA-backed bill would exempt active duty military personnel or Virginia National Guardsmen from Virginia’s “one gun a month” law on handgun purchases.

House Bill 2144 also passed the Senate by a 40-0 vote.  HB2144, introduced by Delegate David Nutter (R-7), would restrict access to the Virginia concealed carry permit holder list maintained by the Virginia State Police.  This bill would make that information confidential and put a stop to the abuses of the concealed carry permit holder list. As you may recall, the Roanoke Times abused this data by creating a public online database with information about Virginia’s Right-to-Carry permit holders, allowing criminals to target law-abiding gun owners.

The Senate agreed to the House Amended version of Senate Bill 1035, legislation championed by State Senator Emmett Hanger, Jr. (R-24).  This bill would permit a Right-to-Carry permit holder to carry concealed in a restaurant, provided he or she does not consume alcohol. The House amended SB1035, removing the notification requirement of CCW permit holders to the alcohol beverage manager.

Please contact Governor Kaine TODAY and respectfully urge him to sign HB1851, HB 2144, and SB1035.  The Governor can be reached by phone at (804) 786-2211, by fax at (804) 371-6351, or email ima@governor.virginia.gov.

Another one that was passed was HB1655 which was identical to SB1513. This law would allow a court to award reasonable fees, expenses, and court costs to any entity that brought a suit against a local government challenging an ordinance the locality passed that violated the state’s preemption laws. As I mentioned when I 1st wrote about this bill, it would keep a locality from basically bankrupting 2nd Amendment supporters by continually enacting ordinances in violation of the state preemption laws forcing their opposition to sue them in court. After Kaine signs this bill, the cost of overturning those ordinances would fall upon the locality that enacted them. If you would please mention this bill when you write about the other ones, that would be good.

More to come after the Governor makes his decisions.