Date: Wed, 3 May 1995 12:36:03 -0400 From: "Christopher W. Knox" To: Multiple recipients of list Subject: FCO 5-2-95 -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- ======================================================================== Online Report to the F I R E A R M S C O A L I T I O N Box 6537, Silver Spring, MD 20916 ======================================================================== May 2, 1995 Vol. 2, No. 4 ======================================================================== In this issue: Shotgun News columns: * 4-22. Bombing Gun Law Reform? OK City blast pushes back vote * 4-7. Repeal Bill Filed -- Before bombing intervened * 4-1. Hearings on self-defense begin Legislative Hotline scripts - Call 301.871.3006 for the latest news March 29 Hard Corps Report ======================================================================== A note from Chris The bloody wake of the Oklahoma City bombing is being used as an excuse for all manner of damage to the Constitution in the name of "anti- terrorism" legislation. The Schumer bill, which was introduced weeks before the Oklahoma City atrocity, focusses on foreign-based terrorism. Among other things, it allows the President to declare any group or organization a terrorist organization and provides no process of appeal. American citizens can be charged with a crime for financially supporting such organizations. The bill's intended target is supposedly foreign organizations such as Hamas or the Irish Republican Army. But there is room for interpretation. The Schumer bill would also subject foreign nationals to deportation and secret tribunals at which evidence would not be provided to the defense. Speaking in support of banned organizations would subject a foreign national to deportation. I've been told that the Supreme Court has consistently held that the First Amendment is viewed as a fundamental human right. We'll see. All this, of course was proposed before Oklahoma City. Post- Oklahoma measures include loosening the already thin requirements for wire-taps, infiltration and domestic surveillance -- all that stuff Spiro Agnew and J. Edgar Hoover liked so well. I fear we are in for more interesting times. I believe the American would prefer the policeman's truncheon to the anarchist's bomb. -- Spiro T. Agnew ### Buried behind the Oklahoma City bombing and the O.J. trial, there was a landmark decision in the Supreme Court last week. Lopez v. U.S. involved a prosecution under the Gun-Free School Zones Act. Briefly, Lopez was a young gang-banger who brought a pistol to school in anticipation of a gang fight. He first arrested under Texas law, but the state charges were dropped and he was charged with the federal law which prohibited possession of a firearm within a thousand feet of a school. The court held in a five to four decision that the Gun-Free School Zone Act oversteps the jurisdiction of Congress. This is a major victory for those of us who believe that federal power is growing too large. It was instructive to listen to the arguments offered by Justice Breyer in a minority opinion. In the brief bits that I read and have heard reported, Breyer seemed to ignore the Constitutional issues and focussed instead on the political issue of guns, seemingly convinced that only the federal government could keep gang-bangers from packing heat into the classroom. About what one would expect from Ted Kennedy's lawyer. ### National Public Radio's Cokie Roberts expressed doubt that the "assault weapon" ban repeal would come to vote, much less pass in the wake of the bombing. She commented further that the Republicans have not always played straight with NRA, running and winning with NRA's help, but failing to deliver the goods when bills came to a vote. My first thought was that Cokie hit the nail on the head. My second thought was to wonder what Cokie Boggs Roberts (daughter of the late Louisiana Senator Hale Boggs) was up to. Maybe I've been watching this game too long. The theory of a hysterical Congress doesn't always hold, though. We won a vote the day after the Killeen, Texas massacre. Only one vote changed then. The connection between the semi-auto ban and the bombing is pretty tenuous, even though our friends in the media do try to build it up. ### ======================================================================== PGP Users: Be sure to remove the leading asterisks before using this key. Key also available via finger. cknox@crl.com *-----BEGIN PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----- *Version: 2.6.2 * *mQCNAy8Q4mIAAAEEALKdSCTF6BvTg4luk1IOYtiQyxPotnTjjijSawo9htwZeFS/ *KU0WAPkeDuhgKSN3H5242irpkfUu8g84fAPBH6a6joaFN7OchRa49WXnz2dReT0V *iT9xeec9rPSASH04dz+lEONeDZ17yh/JGt+tjYq0CIenFZ9JMCGz4I2lBJDFAAUR *tCdDaHJpc3RvcGhlciBXYXJyZW4gS25veCA8Y2tub3hAY3JsLmNvbT6JAJUDBRAv *pxqvIbPgjaUEkMUBAS8BA/9PP4teu4vja6dTXkOMhVN8xgf1fl66VCc2V4A0/lli *uRdf75GS1uQd+pzPIZoIReU440uuLfNSMqAAjCLHDja9ViAUllTk7YIKJMe53+nZ *UnQndT2a6ikeQgh/kFxFM1z4NHgTBZ/KMg3td45WzEA3XpjWACrXWNAtYplaQ0hg *Iw== *=VDsh *-----END PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----- Disclaimer: Christopher Knox wrote and is solely responsible for everything above this line (except where explicitly noted below). ======================================================================== Bombing Gun Law Reform? By NEAL KNOX WASHINGTON, D.C. (April 22) -- Words can't express our contempt for the scum who committed the horror at Oklahoma City. If the maggots who set the bomb thought they were defending liberty -- as the media is claiming -- they aren't merely crazy, they're insane. I pray that any and all who did it are quickly caught, quickly tried and quickly hung. What greater madness than to avenge the killing of children at Waco by killing children at Oklahoma City. If that's what it was, it's beyond insanity. It's impossible to predict how that bombing will affect the future of the gun law fight -- and of reforms in Federal law enforcement -- particularly the tentatively scheduled May 16 House vote on the semi-auto and magazine repeal, H.R. 1488. But it won't be good. The anti-gun crowd is doing everything they possibly can to link NRA and the pro-gun rights movement to the explosion. Former Crime Subcommittee Chairman Charles Schumer (D-N.Y) is telling the press that although the Oklahoma City blast didn't have anything to do with "gun control," it was NRA which had led the opposition to adding identification "taggants" to explosives. If it hadn't been for NRA, he's saying, authorities would have known the source of the Oklahoma City explosives. Schumer is lying. Schumer's taggants bill would not have applied to any Class B "blasting agents" such as explosives grade ammonium nitrate -- and it sure would not have applied to ammonium nitrate fertilizer. The taggants bill which Schumer co-sponsored would have required coded identifiers to be placed in only commercial "Class A" explosives -- dynamites and the like -- plus smokeless propellants and black powder. All high-powered military explosives were excluded from the taggants bill because the military won't allow the addition of any foreign matter in its carefully formulated explosives. NRA -- and I as editor of "Handloader" magazine -- opposed the inclusion of taggants in propellants because the addition of a foreign ingredient would have required all reloading data to be revised, an expense which would have caused marginally profitable smokeless propellants to be withdrawn, potentially eliminating most handloading. An additional safety problem was that taggants would segregate from the propellant if vibrated or shaken, for they could not be made the same size and weight as propellant grains - -- which vary from coarse "sticks" to tiny flakes. If the inert taggants sank to the bottom of a powder measure's hopper, the charge dropped into a case would develop low power, or might not fire at all. But if the taggants floated to the top of the hopper, "pure" propellant would be dropped into the cartridge case, possibly resulting in a gun blow-up. The most critical safety problem -- one discovered by the explosives manufacturers and verified by government testing (and a taggant-caused plant explosion) -- was that under certain circumstances the supposedly inert plastic tags would react with nitroglycerin, causing an unintended fire or explosion. Nitroglycerin is used in most Class A commercial explosives and in many smokeless propellants -- which may contain up to 50 percent NG. The possibility of explosives warehouses and trucks blowing up, and of normally safe propellants triggering fires in handloaders' homes is what finally killed the taggants legislation -- that and greatly improved detection and identification technology that does not require addition of a foreign substance. However, Rep. Schumer has periodically tried to resurrect taggants. Now he is trying to use that issue as an excuse to condemn NRA, so he can once again dance in the blood of fresh victims to advance his "gun control" agenda. That's how the opponents of gun rights have always passed their laws. This time, they're mainly concerned about blocking any reform of last year's gun laws, but looking for a way to turn the nation's sorrow into support for even greater governmental power -- including more-repressive gun laws. ======================================================================== Repeal Bill Filed By NEAL KNOX WASHINGTON, D.C. (April 7) -- The Republican House wrapped up its "Contract with America" today, and introduced H.R. 1488 -- in effect the Republican leadership's "Contract with Gun Owners." The bill, the "Citizens' Protection From Violent Crime Act," repeals last year's ban on military-look guns and over-10-shot magazines, broadens prosecution of armed violent felons, and reaffirms the right to use a firearm for self-defense within one's home -- allowing civil suits against individuals or government agencies that deny that right. The bill is tentatively scheduled for a House floor vote May 16 -- when there will be both a full-scale effort to defeat the repeal and to add or substitute as many provisions from "Brady II" as possible. Speaker Newt Gingrich told the nation on ABC's "This Week" essentially what he told NRA leaders during our January meeting - - - the day after Bill Clinton's State of the Union speech promising to veto any repeal of the gun ban. Mr. Gingrich said that if the bill is vetoed, as he expects, he intends to put it -- and other vetoed measures -- on the debt ceiling bill, which Clinton must sign to keep the government running. But it must first pass the Senate. Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole told ILA Director Tanya Metaksa in a letter last month that he intended to put a gun ban repeal on the President's desk this summer -- a pledge that has caused him to be brutalized by the media elite. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) immediately promised "the mother of all filibusters," but Mr. Dole must have anticipated that when he reversed his earlier view that he didn't think the Senate would pass it. The test could come quickly; there have been rumbles that the Senate repeal vote could also occur in May. On Wednesday, April 5, there was a second day of Second Amendment hearings, with testimony from police organizations opposed to the repeal, and line cops from all over the country asking for the repeal and for prosecution of the often-ignored laws against violent criminals. The House Judiciary Crime Subcommittee also heard from law professors Robert Cottrol of Rutgers, Nicholas Johnson of Fordham, and Daniel Polsby of Northwestern; and historian Dr. Joyce Malcolm, Bentley College, that the Second Amendment was intended to guarantee an individual right. A third day of hearings is tentatively scheduled for May 2, with the primary focus on law enforcement abuses of firearms owners and firearms law. Regardless of the outcome of the vote on H.R. 1488, another round of House hearings will be held in June or July concerning BATF and FBI actions at the Branch Davidian Church in Waco, Texas, and at Randy Weaver's cabin at Ruby Ridge, Idaho. H.R. 1488 was introduced by Rep. Bob Barr (R-Ga.) and three members of Speaker Gingrich's Firearms Legislative Task Force: Reps. Roscoe Bartlett (Md.), Helen Chenoweth (Id.) and Steve Stockman (Tex.). Original Democrat co-sponsors are Reps. Harold Volkmer (Mo.) and Bill Brewster (Okla.). In keeping with the Speaker's pledge to focus on criminals who misuse guns, rather than denying firearms to gun owners, the bill creates a new Federal crime with penalties of 5, 10 and 15 years for possessing, brandishing or discharging a firearm while committing a "serious violent felony or drug offense" -- defined as murder, rape, armed robbery and trafficking in large quantities of narcotics. A significant provision directs the Attorney General to establish an "armed violent criminal apprehension program" with each U.S. Attorney's office to assign one attorney to prosecute Federal laws pertaining to "armed violent criminals." The pro-gun rights professors were among the constitutional scholars who had participated in NRA's blue ribbon Second Amendment Symposium Monday and Tuesday. For balance, NRA attempted to have at least one gun rights foe on each panel. Keynote speaker was Majority Leader Dole. The second day was opened by Senate Judiciary Chairman Orrin Hatch. Meal speakers were Sen. and Presidential Candidate Phil Gramm, Sen. Larry Craig and Senate Whip Trent Lott. ======================================================================== Hearings Begin By NEAL KNOX WASHINGTON, D.C. (April 1) -- There's never been anything like the panel of eight ordinary Americans who calmly and succinctly told the House Judiciary Crime Subcommittee how they had used guns and magazines banned by last year's crime bill to defend themselves, their co-workers, their children, their friends and a wounded lawman. This self-defense hearing was the first of three Second Amendment-related hearings leading to a mid-May vote on a bill expected to include repealing the ban. The committee heard retired Illinois University sociology professor David Bordua describe his research, which shattered the myth that there is more crime where there are more guns. Dr. Bordua also outlined the research of his former student, Dr. Gary Kleck of Florida State University, who has estimated private citizens use firearms in self-defense up to 2.5 million times per year. Dr. Jim Wright of Tulane discussed his 20 years of research into the effect of firearms laws -- which he summarized as having had NO effect -- and the illogic of attempting to control the acts of a tiny percentage of society by restricting firearms to the half of U.S. households which own guns. Former Chairman Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) was his usual sneering self in his opening statement about the self-defense hearings merely being an NRA smokescreen to torpedo all the Federal gun laws, and in his attacks upon Dr. Kleck's research. But he was uncharacteristically quiet after hearing the witnesses who had defended themselves. They showed none of the macho bravado that he had claimed for "would-be Rambos" who wanted guns for self-defense. Rep. Fred Heineman (R-N.C.), a former policeman, pointed out that the lead-off witness, tiny Sharon Ramboz of Maryland, "is no Rambo." Mrs. Ramboz told how she had been reared to dislike guns, had been brutally attacked and beaten by an intruder when she was a teenager, and how fear that it could happen again caused her to learn to shoot after she became a mother. She used an AR-15 to drive intruders out of her home early one morning when she and her three children were alone. The intimidating sound of her now-banned AR-15 slamming a round into the chamber had been enough. Sharon said that she was Jewish, that Hitler had taken away the right of Jews to own guns before committing the Holocaust, and that she was going to do everything she could to prevent that happening here. The stories told by each of the witnesses were mind-boggling - -- and had such an impact that the Washington Post said not a word about the hearings, nor did the major networks, though they had run advance stories. Other witnesses included: David Joo, Korean manager of a Los Angeles gun store who used a now-banned riot shotgun and high-capacity Beretta 92F to protect his store and rescue two women employees of a nearby jewelry store after they had been shot by looters -- as police fled; Bryan Rigsby, who used a Mini-14 and 30-round magazine to defend himself and a wounded friend from two shotgun-wielding robbers, killing one and wounding another, during a camping trip in Georgia; Todd Bridges, who used an AR-15 to shoot a burglar in one of the Wichita, Kan., muffler shops he manages; Charmaine Klaus, who used her handgun to wound an assailant who had shot and killed another clerk in her Michigan store; Phil Murphy, who used an AR-15 to hold a would-be burglar of his parent's Arizona home; Gary Baker, Richmond, Va., jeweler who with two employees defended themselves and a customer in a shootout which killed two shotgun-wielding repeat offenders, one with a record dating back to 1942; And disabled Korean War combat veteran Travis Neel, who fired three now-banned 15-round clips during a ten-minute shootout with a gang of car thieves who had shot a Houston deputy sheriff five times (he was named Houston Citizen of the Year and "Hero of the Hispanic Deputies' Association"). ======================================================================== Legislative Updates April 29 update The truck bomb which killed so many people in Oklahoma City had absolutely nothing to do with so- called "gun control" but every effort is being made to link those two unrelated matters. William Randolph Hearst, one of the most powerful newspaper owners in history, used to tell his reporters to use any tragedy to attack his political enemies. That is precisely what President Clinton did with his attempt to blame the bombing on conservative talk radio hosts; that is what Rep. Charles Schumer has done repeatedly, bringing up NRA every time he discusses the bombing; and that is what most of the major newspapers are doing. The Washington Post had major articles this morning and yesterday trying to blame NRA for the bombings. Clinton and Schumer are pushing so-called anti-terrorism legislation which would hire more Federal investigators, give Federal law enforcement agencies more powers, and resurrect the obsolete explosives tagging scheme. Both conservative Congressmen and civil liberties organizations are highly dubious, and NRA shares those concerns. The House leadership has decided to consider that legislation Tuesday in the Crime Subcommittee, instead of the scheduled third day of hearings on the Second Amendment. That will push the tentatively scheduled May 16 House vote on repealing the semi-auto ban back about a month. That's probably the wisest thing to do both because of the public concern about terrorism and because the present emotional climate isn't when gun legislation should be considered. However, most Congressmen and Senators aren't buying the effort to link the bombing and guns; I don't think we've lost any votes but the object is to pass legislation, and this isn't the best time to do it. Even in Oklahoma the concealed carry legislation is still on track, though it's been delayed. We'll have votes this week on concealed carry legislation in the House of Missouri, North Carolina, South Carolina and Texas. If you live in those states, get another phone call in to your representative. This week's U.S. v. Lopez decision striking down the "Gun Free Schools Act" has the left wing in a panic -- not because it allows kids to take guns to school -- 40 states have laws specifically prohibiting that -- but because it applied the brakes to 60 years of broadening Federal power. It puts a lot of Federal gun laws, criminal laws and environmental laws into question -- and it will certainly cause an amendment to NRA's lawsuit against last year's semi-auto and magazine ban. That law was also presumably based on the now-limited Congressional power to regulate interstate commerce. But as in Lopez, the Constitution's Commerce clause was not mentioned, nor was there any mention of how those guns and magazines affect interstate commerce. April 23 update The networks reported this afternoon and evening that vital information concerning the Oklahoma City bombing had been faxed to a freshman Congressman who sent it to NRA, but who didn't pass it on to authorities "for three days." In fact, a Congressional staffer called an NRA attorney and personal friend at home Wednesday night, told him of a strange fax that they had received concerning the Oklahoma bombing. The Hill staffer didn't have a copy of the fax at his home, but explained the gist of and said it seemed to be the work of a crank. The fax merely sketched the same information that was being reported on the television and radio networks. It says: "First update. Bldg 7 to 10 floor only military people on scene -- BATF/FBI. Bomb threat received last week. Perpetrator unknown at this time. Oklahoma." The NRA attorney, Jim Warner, a true American hero who spent five years in a Viet Cong prison, asked if the fax had been given to the FBI -- just in case it was of value. The Hill staffer told him "I think it has been." As Jim had requested, the following afternoon a copy of the fax was sent to NRA. Jim and the staffer again talked and Jim again asked if the FBI had been given a copy, and was told that it had been. The following day, Friday, after again discussing the fax with the Hill staffer, who seemed less certain that it had gone to the FBI, Jim called BATF and sent a copy to the BATF command center. He twice talked to the person in charge, Stewart Allen, pointing out certain key items about the fax and urging him to take a close personal look. We still do not know if the FBI received a copy Wednesday, but it is obvious that someone in BATF decided to further the anti-NRA rhetoric by misrepresenting what happened to the news media. Jim Warner and NRA acted properly. We NRA members grieve over the Oklahoma City victims, and we resent the demagogues who are trying to dance in the blood of those victims in order to promote their political agendas -- which includes destroying the NRA. We also resent the implication -- restated by President Clinton on CBS 60 Minutes tonight -- that only the right wing is concerned about what happened at Waco. More than a year ago the NRA joined with the ACLU and a half-dozen other groups of all political shades to call for a thorough investigation of the Waco tragedy. ======================================================================== April 21 update -- Oklahoma Reaction The Oklahoma City blast apparently wasn't caused by international terrorists calling themselves Warriors of God but by home grown terrorists supposedly calling themselves Defenders of the Constitution. It makes no difference what they call themselves, they're scum. There are no words in the English language to properly describe or define those who kill innocent men, women and children. CBS claims that the arrested men were "at one point" members of the Michigan Militia. We don't know that to be true; the head of that group says they had nothing to do with the bombing and never heard of the men. We do know that the news media are eager to link the arrested men to "anti-government groups," to "right-wing extremists," to "White supremacists" and to "opponents of the assault weapon ban." That's just rhetorical sleight of hand. I am opposed to the gun ban. Does that make me a "right-wing extremist" or "White supremacist." No, but that's what you and I will be called in the coming days and weeks. The media implies that the April 19 blast was in retribution for the Waco horror two years ago, and commemoration of the shot at Concord that started the American revolution over 200 years ago. If the maggots who set the bomb thought they were defending liberty, they aren't merely crazy, they're insane. But I pray that the FBI and BATF quickly catch those who did it, that they are quickly tried and quickly hung. What greater madness than to avenge the killing of children at Waco by killing children at Oklahoma City. If that's what it was, it's beyond insanity. My heart bleeds for the innocents -- and for our nation. ======================================================================== April 20 update It is rather foolish to comment on still-breaking news stories, but I can't ignore the Oklahoma City blast. First, I grieve for every dead and injured soul and their families and loved ones. It infuriates me that anyone would do such a thing. It also infuriates me that many reporters immediately pointed the finger of blame at the surviving members of the Branch Davidian Church, because it occurred on the second anniversary of that tragedy. I'm not a Seventh Day Adventist nor a follower of David Koresh, but he never preached hatred. The people at his Waco church were never a threat to anyone except to those who attacked them -- and the babies there were a threat to no one. Though the President and Janet Reno have rightfully condemned those murders, and grieved for the 17 children initially reported killed, where was the pity and outrage for the similar number of innocent children who were tortured and killed as a direct result of the poisonous and inflammable CS gas attack ordered by Janet Reno's Justice Department? I was shocked when the FBI spokesman at Oklahoma City was Bob Ricks, who was also the spokesman at Waco. Who caused the Oklahoma City blast? Probably international terrorists who struck at the nation's heartland by putting their finger on the center of the country and moveing to the nearest large city. The ruthlessness and technique is their style. What was the weapon? Probably a mix of ammonium nitrate fertilizer and another commonly available explosive -- the same ingredients used in the destruction of the mathmetics research building at the University of Wisconsin two dozen years ago. That blast was also a car bomb created with 1,700 pounds of fertilizer and an ingredient that makes the mix more powerful and more easily detonated than common ammonium nitrate and fuel oil. By chance, just two weeks before I had described that easily made explosive to the House Judiciary Committee -- during an off-the- record section of my testimony. The Wisconsin bombing was done by the left-wing Weather Underground organization as part of their protests against the Viet Nam war. Unlike the Oklahoma City bombers, they didn't want to kill anyone; the bomb went off in the middle of the night. But a graduate student was working late and was killed. How can we be protected from such attacks? We can't be -- not in a free society. ======================================================================== April 15 update -- A couple of weeks ago, when the New York Times and Washington Times put the House Judiciary firearms self-defense hearings on Page 1, The Washington Post completely ignored them. The House hearings were an embarrassment to the Post because eight ordinary men and women told gripping tales of how they had saved themselves, their families, their friends and their neighbors with the so-called "assault weapons" that the Post has repeatedly claimed are useless for self-defense. This morning's Washington Post editorial finally acknowledges those hearings, but explains why they were unimportant: The Post doesn't think citizens have a right to self defense. They say, correctly, that one provision of the bill, H.R. 1488, would "allow anyone who believes his or her 'right' to self-defense is being violated by state or local laws to bring action in a federal district court to have those laws struck down." Every time the editorial mentions "a citizen's 'right' to protect himself," they put the word "right" in quotations. Doesn't the Declaration of the Independence say that each of us has an inalienable right to "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness." Doesn't Blackstone, the Constitution and every court case on the topic declare or guarantee that we have a right to self- defense? The Washington Post is able to find all sorts of "rights" that aren't named in any of those documents. But they find the right of self-defense intolerable, because if you defend yourself, your family or your community with a firearm you might injure or even kill a rapist, robber, would-be murderer or some other "victim of society" who deserves to be killed before committing his depredations. As made clear by the Founding Fathers, that right to defend self, family and community is the principal underlying the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. It's not enough for the Post to scoff at the Second Amendment; they now see that they must also deny the underlying right of self-defense. Like the rights to free speech, the press, religion and assembly, those rights must not be put in quotes for they are very real -- and they are the very core of this nation. ================================================================== Sarah Brady and Rep. Charles Schumer have a new hero: PLO Chief Yasser Arafat. According to Wednesday's newspapers Arafat has issued an ultimatum: "Register your guns by May 11 or Palestinian police will forcibly collect the firearms." Could it be that Arafat wants them registered so he can go get them? Isn't gun registration a key element of "Brady II?" If we're not talking about the same thing for the same ultimate reason, What's different, Chuck and Sarah? ================================================================== A triumphant NRA First Vice President Marion Hammer called a couple of nights ago to report that the Florida House Appropriations Committee, by a vote of 18-14 had killed a bill to allow communities to ban gun shows on public property The Oklahoma House this week passed an amended version of the Senate-passed carry bill; it now goes back to the Senate. The Oregon House passed a preemption bill. A Carry bill was approved by committee in North Carolina. Votes on right to carry or preemption bills are coming up this week in Illinois, Louisiana, Nevada and the House of the Great State of Texas. ================================================================== A California state court has ruled that survivors of the murders in a San Francisco lawyers office can sue the manufacture of the TEC-DC9 that was used. The judge declared that the gun was dangerous while other guns aren't. As a court-qualified firearms expert, that's news to me. Various anti-gun groups have made repeated efforts to get the courts to uphold liability suits against the makers and sellers of guns on the grounds that they should know the guns are going to be used for criminal acts. But they've never stuck for so few guns are misused. I doubt the higher courts will uphold the San Francisco judge for it would turn tort law on its ear -- making MacDonald's liable because a far higher percentage of their cups and hamburger boxes wind up as trash on streets and highways. ================================================================== Members of the House will be in their districts pressing the flesh and holding town meetings until May 1. Try to see your Congressman and win his vote for H.R. 1488, still scheduled for May 16. MARCH 29 HARD CORPS REPORT -- FIRST DRAFT Second Amendment Hearings Begin This Week Three sets of hearings on aspects of the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms will begin this Friday, March 31, in the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, chaired by Rep. Bill McCollum (R-Fla.). The subcommittee plans a "markup," or voting session, in the first week of May, and the eventual bill -- which will include a repeal of last year's gun and magazine ban -- is expected to be out of the House Judiciary Committee and on the House floor about mid-May. Since the Republicans are allowing numerous germane amendments -- instead of "closed rules" -- it's likely that Rep. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) will attempt to ban or restrict expanding bullets, limit gun purchases, impose owner licensing or add other parts of "Brady II." Without calls from constituents, some of these could pass. Due to a large block of pro-gun rights Democrats -- who plan to push their own repeal bill if the Republican effort stalls -- the repeal is likely to pass the House, but will face tougher sledding in the Senate. In January, Majority Leader Robert Dole said he did not think he could find enough votes to pass a repeal bill. But in a recently released March 10 letter to NRA-ILA Executive Director Tanya Metaksa, Mr. Dole said he would work for the repeal and expected to put it on President Clinton's desk this summer. When Leader Dole made his announcement, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) principal author of the ban, called a press conference to pledge "the mother of all filibusters" to protect the bill. However, Ms. Feinstein tacitly acknowledged on "CBS 60 Minutes" that the bill was mainly symbolic, since pre-existing guns and high-capacity magazines may be kept and manufacturers are able to produce functionally identical guns by "violating the spirit of the law." Sen. Feinstein told 60 Minutes: "If I could have gotten 51 votes in the Senate for an outright ban, picking up every one of them, Mr. and Mrs. America turn them all in, I would have done it." The House hearings, developed by Rep. Bob Barr's (R-Ga.) Firearms Task Force, are the result of a 1 1/2-hour January 25 meeting between Speaker Newt Gingrich's House Republican leadership and NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre, ILA Director Tanya Metaksa and Second Vice President Neal Knox. At the meeting Speaker Gingrich pledged "a coherent Second Amendment strategy to define gun ownership as a Constitutional right, not a duck hunting right." This week's hearing will focus on self-defense -- including those denied a gun with which to defend themselves due to restrictive laws. Tentative witnesses include David Joo, the Korean manager of a Los Angeles gun store who used a now-banned riot shotgun and high-capacity Beretta 92F to successfully protect his store and rescue two women employees of a nearby jewelry store after they had been shot by looters during the riots -- as police fled; Travis Neel, who fired three now-banned 15-round clips in a shootout with car thieves who had shot a Houston deputy sheriff four times, saving the deputy's life; Rhonda Carter, wife of a Paducah, Ky., police officer, who shot and killed a would-be rapist with her carry gun; Bryan Rigsby, who used a Mini-14 and 30-round magazine to defend himself and a friend from two shotgun-wielding assailants in Georgia; Charmaine Klaus, who used her handgun to wound an assailant who had shot and killed another clerk in her Michigan store; Phil Murphy, who used a now-banned Colt AR-15 to hold a would-be burglar of his parent's Arizona home; Gary Baker, Richmond, Va., jeweler who successfully defended his employees and a customer in a shootout which killed two shotgun-wielding repeat offenders, one with a record dating back to 1942; and many others. Firearms law researchers expected to testify include retired University of Illinois sociologist Dr. David Bordua and Dr. James Wright, now of Tulane, who -- with a Carter Administration Justice Dept. grant -- was able to find no evidence that any gun law or combination of laws had reduced crime rates. Former Chairman Schumer will have a panel of opposition witnesses, but unlike in the past, they won't testify first. Simply by putting pro-gun rights witnesses last, often after a lunch break or other delay which encourages television and print reporters to leave, anti-gun chairmen have prevented the press and public from hearing the few gun rights spokesmen allowed to testify. The second hearing -- concerning the meaning of the Second Amendment and the Constitutionality of "gun control" -- will be April 5. Not necessarily by coincidence it will follow NRA's April 2- 4 Second Amendment Conference, an educational conference featuring constitutional scholars and intended primarily as continuing education for lawyers and advanced students. Leadoff witnesses at the hearing will be Duke University Law Professor William Van Alstyne; Northwestern University Law Professor Daniel Polsby; Rutgers Law Professor Robert Cottroll, author of Gun Control and the Constitution; Dr. Joyce Malcolm, Bentley College historian and author of To Keep and Bear Arms, The Origin of an Anglo-American Right. Representatives of law enforcement groups who oppose last year's ban will also testify. The third hearing, tentatively set for May 2, will feature law-abiding citizens who have been abusively treated by Federal law enforcement officers, including the BATF, or who faced prosecution for gun law violations after using illegally possessed guns for protection. ======================================================================== Feinstein Ban Challenge Filed NRA-ILA lawyers have filed a lawsuit in a Michigan Federal court seeking to have last year's ban on military-look semi-autos declared "unconstitutionally vague" because the banned guns are not accurately described. A Second Amendment challenge to the law is in the works, but the Michigan suit is an attempt to quickly set aside the law on the already-decided issue of "vagueness." The Sixth Circuit Court, which would hear the appeal, a few months ago struck down the 1989 Columbus, Ohio, ban on "assault weapons." Like last year's crime act, the Columbus ordinance banned guns by specific model, listing them by the already-banned full automatic versions from which the targeted semi-autos were derived. Congress knew it was using inaccurate nomenclature. Governmental firearms expert Harold Johnson testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee that most of the named models were not semi-autos, but the fully automatic models from which they were derived. In the Columbus case the court said: "Nor does the ordinance define 'same action design' or 'slight modifications.' We do not know whether a 'model by the same manufacturer' that fires twice as fast or twice as many bullets, or half as fast with half as many bullets, or some other combination of changes is a 'slight modification' of the 'same action design.'" ======================================================================== BATF Records System Legal? During hearings last month before the House Treasury Appropriations Subcommittee, Rep. Ernest Istook (R-Ok.) accused Treasury officials of violating the long-standing prohibition against using their appropriation to computerize out-of-business dealer records. Last spring BATF Special Agent Pat Hynes gave ABC Day 1 host Forrest Sawyer a tour of their new West Virginia records center. "Right now there's 20 million (out of business gun dealer) records here," he said. "We've already computerized 60 million." Sec. 926 of the 1986-amended Gun Control Act prohibits "records required to be maintained under this chapter or any portion of the contents of such records, (being) recorded at or transferred to a (U.S. or State) facility ... nor that any system of registration of firearms, firearms owners, or firearms transactions or dispositions be established." Further, since 1978 the Treasury appropriations law has declared: "That no funds appropriated herein shall be available for ... expenses in connection with consolidating or centralizing .. the records, or any portion thereof, of acquisition and disposition of firearms maintained by Federal firearms licensees." Treasury Undersecretary Ronald K. Noble had a disingenuous "explanation" for violating BATF's appropriations restriction. The records they are computerizing "by the semi truck load" are no longer gun dealer records, he assured Rep. Istook, but records from former dealers. Rep. Istook didn't buy it: "You're claiming that Congress gave you a loophole that you could drive one of those semis through! ================================================================== 2nd Foundation Sues Clinton Camp The Second Amendment Foundation is one of the lead groups challenging the Federal Election Committee to force President Clinton's 1992 campaign committee for taking $2.9 million too much from the U.S. Treasury. According to an FEC investigation, the campaign deliberately violated regulations but the commissioners deadlocked 3-3 on party lines on whether to charge the campaign some $5.8 million in civil penalties. ================================================================== Four States Pass Concealed Carry Four states -- Utah, Arkansas, Virginia and Idaho -- have passed mandatory issue concealed carry licensing laws, and several more states have passed such legislation through committee or one house and are likely to enact an improved law before the end of the session. Two of the most contentious states are Missouri and Texas, each of whose Senates have passed bills that are not yet acceptable, either because of excessive training requirements, unnecessarily expensive permits or other factors. This nationwide effort has resulted in a flurry of panicky editorials in the major newspapers, but so far has gotten surprisingly even-handed treatment from the television networks. It has also slowed down or killed efforts for more- restrictive legislation; no state to date has enacted any repressive new laws. The personal protection permit offensive has the anti-gun rights forces in a panic. University of Maryland researchers, funded by taxpayer dollars from the Center for Disease Control, have produced a study claiming murder rates went up in selected cities after their states liberalized carrying laws. The same researchers, headed by David McDowell, declared that the D.C. gun ban had reduced violent crime, though the city's murder rate had tripled under that law. The latest Maryland "study" says that Jacksonville, Florida's homicide rate went up 74 percent after the state's personal protection law went into effect in 1987. But their averaging went back to 1973, when crime was at far lower levels. Though Florida's violent crime rate (most not committed with guns) went up, its state-wide homicide rate went down 22 percent (while the national homicide rate increased 15 percent). Not one of Florida's homicides is known to have been committed by a licensed carrier. Of Florida's 268,000 personal protection permits issued since the law went into effect, only a miniscule 19 have been revoked for a firearms-related offense. None of the dozen states which have enacted "shall-issue" laws -- going back to Georgia's 1976 law -- have experienced the "return to the Wild West" "blood in the streets" scenarios predicted by opponents. ================================================================== Georgia Wipes Out Brady, Atlanta Laws Georgia Gov. Zell Miller this month signed -- with beaming NRA officers looking on -- a preemption law which wipes out the restrictive Atlanta gun ordinance -- but specifically leaves intact the Kennesaw ordinance requiring every household to have a gun. The law also established an instant check system which preempts the Brady waiting period, but provides that if the Federal Brady Act is repealed or found unconstitutional, the state background check will be automatically voided. NRA-ILA and local activists not only "turned the knife in the wound," they broke off the blade! ================================================================== Activist Leaders Leave The Range Three long-time leaders in the gun movement recently died due to illness. The greatest shock, because of his relative youth and apparent fitness, was Bruce Nelson of Tucson, husband of NRA Director Sandra Froman. He was a former policeman and one of the first instructors at Jeff Cooper's Gunsite Ranch. Maurice "Red" Latimer, Bloomington, Ind., was the founder and continued to be a leader of the Indiana Sportsmen's Council. He helped organize the grass roots members in preparation for the 1977 Cincinnati NRA reforms. Bill Grief of New York City was one of the triumvirate of key leaders at Cincinnati; he was responsible for the floor organization. Greif had been an officer of the Greater New York Federation, the Seventh Regiment Rifle Club (which founded NRA in 1871) and had served as an NRA Director. ================================================================== Senate Committee Quizzes Treasury Treasury Undersecretary Ron Noble and BATF Director John Magaw were grilled by Chairman Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) in the March 23 Treasury and Postal Appropriations Committee hearing. Sen. Shelby asked about a string of reported BATF abuses, including the raid on gun show promoter Harry Lamplugh's home, in which the family was held at gunpoint, records and guns taken, but no charges filed. BATF insisted that Lamplugh had an old felony conviction, but he denies it. BATF was instructed to produce evidence, and has been warned by Lamplugh's attorney that they may face a slander suit. Sen. Shelby extensively questioned the officials about a massive, long-planned BATF drug raid on a D.C. public housing project, which had to be aborted due to a press announcement sent out by the public housing authority the day before the raid. Sen. Shelby asked why BATF had such a long record of leaks about raids, including Waco. ================================================================== BATF Bypassed On Loosened Law A Republican "Contract With America" provision loosening the use of illegally seized evidence was amended on the House floor to exclude BATF. Reps. Harold Volkmer (D-Mo.) and John Dingell (D-Mich.) cited BATF's record of smash and grab raids to exclude the agency from the "good faith exception" to the "exclusionary rule." The amendment won with an unusual coalition of pro-gun Congressmen and anti-gunners who have unquestioningly supported BATF, but who opposed any loosening of the exclusionary rule. ================================================================== Reno Definition Of "Cult" A Hoax A rumor with a variety of embellishments claims that Attorney General Janet Reno has defined a cult as essentially any religious and pro-gun rights group. To check it, Rep. Jim Hansen of Utah wrote Miss Reno. The Justice Department's response, dated March 7, states "The plain fact is that the quote is a hoax." ================================================================== Only Four Brady Blocks Prosecuted Attorney General Janet Reno held a press conference to boast that the Brady Bill had blocked the purchase of 40,000 handguns in its first year, supposedly because these were felons or mental incompetents. But a reporter asked how many had been prosecuted for lying on a government form or for attempting to make an illegal gun purchase. Most of the press ignored the answer: FOUR. Either 39,994 were wrongly denied or most were blocked for minor offenses or the Justice Department is woefully negligent in removing bad guys from the street. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQCVAwUBL6ch4iGz4I2lBJDFAQFvKgP8DTW98saz2Gs9sbQxQ/Pr0S0DaPUckruC yGKkhJg3r95Ya4gcHUixyB2ubzJ4f9omYCflnVQmHKHM6YlkaeGfXKpeW8LmHoyp 4jnhdccb1kKcD5bIQKTm2sBgANQA8MgQ60vKZOTZoZPtJy1U9zB1q0v1ext3a/6D 4Ip084sEh+A= =dxYZ -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- To receive the Online Firearms Coalition Bulletin send mail to listproc@mainstream.com containing in the message body: subscribe fco