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If the goal of legislation is to prevent crime or punish criminals, there are no more gun control laws to write. They have already been written, over 20,000 of them. Any evil or mischievous deed that can be done with a gun has already been outlawed, often several times over. So any further gun control law is really an infringement law, one that can only limit the rights of good people instead of stopping criminals. That reality has not prevented the California legislature from trying to pass a handgun owner licensing law. Both houses will likely pass AB 273 this week, sending it to Governor Davis' desk for enactment into law or veto.
Under current law, a California citizen who wants to buy a handgun must submit to a background investigation by the California Department of Justice, take a test of firearm safety knowledge, and, sign a sworn statement that he or she is not a felon or mentally unfit or otherwise disqualified. For this they will pay fees to the state of California. But that is just for starters. The purchaser also has to get permission from the FBI, through the instant background check, to buy the gun. Extensive and duplicated records of the transaction are sent to California and federal criminal justice authorities. The record provides law enforcement agencies with the buyer's name, address, phone number, birthplace, and detailed identifying information on the gun. Then he or she has to wait 10 business days to finally take possession.
Californians might think that with all the above restrictions, records, and monitoring — restrictions that traditional civil libertarians would have found utterly intrusive — no further scrutiny would be necessary. After all, these laws, and this new legislation, is not targeted at criminals who can't buy guns legally anyway. What then could be the purpose of more laws targeted at law-abiding citizens?
Concerned Californians might ask Assemblymember Jack Scott of Pasadena. Before people can lawfully acquire a handgun, Mr. Scott wants to fingerprint them, make them pass a shooting proficiency test, and force them to undergo and pay for a Department of Justice background check in addition to any subsequent background checks required if they make a future purchase. Only then would the applicant be eligible to purchase a handgun.
The whole purpose of this law, however, is not to stop crime in the traditional sense. It appears its purpose is to make firearm ownership so burdensome, so expensive, and so legally ambiguous, i.e. dangerous, that the average citizen will not even attempt it. It is to stigmatize those who would dare to buy a gun as would-be criminals, if not criminals in fact. The proposed bill by Assemblymember Scott imposes 83 pages of onerous new law, "new" crimes, and new ways for gun owners to become "status" criminals--criminals by definition, not by wrongdoing. Instead of, "use a gun, go to jail," it will be, "own a gun, go to jail."
Such legal ambiguity appears to be intentional. For example, most law enforcement officers don't know any more what constitutes an "assault weapon" under California's maddeningly unclear and ever-changing law. If they see an "ugly gun" in someone's possession, they are likely to arrest the owner and let the courts sort out whether the gun is legal or not. Such legal risks of gun ownership in California are escalating, and it is no wonder that the current spate of gun laws leave both law enforcement confused and honest citizens angry.
Defenders of Assemblymember Scott's gun owner licensing bill counter that it will reduce gun violence. But given all the information that authorities already possess about legal gun owners there is little evidence to suggest how this will be done. What evidence we do have overwhelmingly confirms that handguns in the possession of honest citizens actually reduces violence in the millions of cases they are used for self-defense. In fact Mr. Scott's bill is not intended to punish real criminals or to reduce handgun violence but is intended to lead to the outlaw of guns of any kind.
Witness the recent, and chilling, experience of owners of the SKS Sporter rifle. Collectors and target shooters were assured that these rifles were not considered "assault weapons" under California's assault weapon ban. After Sporter rifle owners went to the bother of checking the law and dutifully registering their legal guns, the Department of Justice did a flip-flop and declared the rifles illegal after all. Officials then gave owners the options of destroying their rifles, surrendering them, or being charged with a felony.
Handgun owners are fooling themselves if they think California's present attorney general couldn't someday do the same with lists of handgun owners generated by Mr. Scott's bill. All that is necessary is a ripening of today's fashionable anti-gun owner sentiment. Despite the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and the California Constitution's guarantee to the right of self defense, if this current bill becomes law, the machinery for handgun confiscation will be in place. Should this sorry day come to pass, citizens will have Assemblymember Scott to thank for it.
