Ammunition bans
Robert Sheridan
bobsheridan at earthlink.net
Tue Apr 17 22:42:23 PDT 2007
Clearly we need a different approach than to try to prevent the tide
coming in, or going out.
We do prohibit police officers, as well as civilians, from possessing
firearms when they become the subject of a TRO in a domestic dispute.
If we can restrain civilians and cops, then why not people taking
certain anti-depressant medication as prescribed by licensed physicians?
If a person suffers from seizures, blackouts, or other medical
conditions that make him a dangerous person to have on the road, not
only does the DMV suspend or revoke the driving license when it finds
out, but the physician is required to report the patient and his
condition to the DMV, and forget about patient-physician
confidentiality.
Any good constitutional reason why we couldn't have such a system of
licensing, reporting, and control for the law-abiding gun owners of
the land, as for the law-abiding drivers?
rs
sfls
On Apr 17, 2007, at 10:24 PM, Volokh, Eugene wrote:
> 1) Back when I went target-shooting, I'd buy ammunition in lots
> of 500 or so -- it's cheaper that way. I probably have a couple of
> hundred rounds in my closet still. If it looked like an ammunition
> ban
> were near passing, I'd probably buy a couple of thousand more just in
> case.
>
> 2) If I'm at all representative, and if you assume roughly
> 50-80 million gun owners (33-50% of all households contain at least
> one
> gun), each owning a couple of hundred rounds, we're talking over 10
> billion rounds of ammunition out there. If even 10% of those make
> their
> way onto the black market, that will satisfy criminals' needs for a
> very
> long time. (There are about 500,000 gun crimes in the country each
> year; some involve no rounds fired, some involve several, some involve
> more.) The main consequence will simply be that very few people
> will go
> to the shooting range any more; that's the only activity that "use[s]
> up" ammunition at any serious rate.
>
> 3) Of course, law-abiding citizens who want to get guns for the
> first time will find it much harder to get ammunition; they'd have to
> buy it illegally. The most law-abiding will thus not have guns; on
> the
> other hand, those who are willing to break some laws will be quite
> able
> to get what they need. On the margins, you'll have fewer gun
> owners --
> and at the same time have more gun owners who feel that the law has
> made
> them into criminals, and who will become alienated from the legal
> system
> as a result.
>
> 4) Ammunition may well deteriorate over 20-30 years, so though
> it doesn't get used up, it may stop working. But of course even today
> there are many thousands of people who reload their own ammunition for
> fun or to save a bit of money; see, e.g., http://
> www.reloadersnest.com/,
> one of many sites catering to this hobby. It's not hard to do, I'm
> told. It's hard to imagine how future gangbangers, common
> criminals, or
> would-be mass murderers would be unable to pick up freshly loaded
> ammunition on the black market. Sure, there'd be a War on Ammo for
> them
> to deal with; somehow I doubt it would make much of a dent, especially
> given the ammo falling off the back of the military and law
> enforcement
> tracks.
>
> Eugene
>
>
> ________________________________
>
> From: conlawprof-bounces at lists.ucla.edu
> [mailto:conlawprof-bounces at lists.ucla.edu] On Behalf Of Douglas
> Laycock
> Sent: Tuesday, April 17, 2007 7:40 PM
> To: conlawprof at lists.ucla.edu
> Subject: RE: What Kind of People We Are
>
>
>
> I'm inclined to the view that the Second Amdt. means something,
> and that disregarding one amendment we don't like endangers the
> enforcement of all the others. What if we some day decide we don't
> like
> them either.
>
> Having said that, Senator Moynihan had at least a partial a
> answer to Eugene's practicality argument. You don't have to
> confiscate
> 200 million guns. You only have to ban the manufacture and sale of
> ammunition. Confine manufacture of ammunition for the military and
> law
> enforcement needs to a small number of licensed government
> contractors.
> People with existing supplies of ammunition would gradually use
> them up,
> and this guy would not have been able to buy his clips. Could we
> control import of ammunition? Who knows?
>
> Quoting "Volokh, Eugene" <VOLOKH at law.ucla.edu>:
>
> > Two thoughts:
> >
> > (1) 44 of the state constitutions have
> right-to-bear-arms
> > provisions. Virginia's reads, in relevant part, "That a well
> regulated
> > militia, composed of the body of the people, trained to arms,
> is the
> > proper, natural, and safe defense of a free state, therefore,
> the right
> > of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed";
> but note
> > that the last clause, starting "therefore," was added in 1971.
> It's
> > hard for me to see how such a provision in a state bill of
> rights,
> > enacted in 1971, "has to do with government sponsored,
> government
> > protective militias."
> >
> > (2) It's hard to see what gun control measure would
> prevent a
> > mass murderer from engaging in mass murder. A handgun ban?
> That would
> > leave rifles and shotguns, which are more deadly than
> handguns. A ban
> > on noncitizens' owning guns? It seems only an accident that
> this
> > particular killer was a noncitizen. A ban on all guns,
> coupled with
> > confiscation of the 200+ million guns out there in private
> hands. If
> > there's to be an argument in favor of reading the Second
> Amendment as
> > protecting states' rights, or the rights of state-selected
> armed groups,
> > I just don't see how an argument based on this particular
> crime would
> > cut it.
> >
> > Eugene
> >
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From: conlawprof-bounces at lists.ucla.edu
> >> [mailto:conlawprof-bounces at lists.ucla.edu] On Behalf Of
> >> Robert Sheridan
> >> Sent: Tuesday, April 17, 2007 5:12 PM
> >> To: guayiya
> >> Cc: ConLaw Prof
> >> Subject: Re: What Kind of People We Are
> >>
> >> I appreciate the reaction.
> >>
> >> The Constitution has allowed any number of practices that
> were later
> >> found wanting. Call it 'evolving standards' if you'd care
> >> to relate
> >> their abolition to some constitutional law type language that
> >> I think Justice Frankfurter used.
> >>
> >> During the period in which those practices flourished, anyone
> >> describing what kind of a people we were as a constitutional
> >> matter, would have to include the practices we allowed by
> >> law, perhaps noting that there were some objectors.
> >>
> >> We're a kind of people who, in the interest of free speech,
> >> tolerates the sort of notions and speech that provided the
> >> radio commentator or 'shock jock,' Don Imus, with a
> >> comfortable living for quite some time. I understand that he
> >> had his own program for some three decades and generated
> >> anywhere from $10-50 million in revenue depending on what's
> >> included in the accounting since his show was
> >> broadcast and rebroadcast by larger networks, as I understand
> it.
> >> In respect of Imus, it was notable that it was not the
> >> government which brought him down for his execrable 'ideas,'
> >> but private
> >> individuals, that is broadcasting companies and their
> advertisers.
> >> In the separate Janet Jackson accidental breast-baring
> >> incident, nationally televised at the Superbowl a few years
> >> ago, it was government which imposed punishment, thru the
> >> FCC. This juxtaposition says a lot about us,
> constitutionally.
> >>
> >> When it comes to the First Amendment we seem to have a
> >> government- regulated marketplace of ideas, or at least of
> >> some words, in the broadcast context, in which the direst of
> >> consequences, that is, being thrown off the air, is/was
> >> imposed by the private, not government sector. The Imus case
> >> thus appears to involve a subject embraced by this list.
> >> Good ideas are supposed to drive out bad, as I understand
> >> Justice Holmes's famous analogy, in a sort of Gresham's law
> >> of free speech, I'm sure I'm not the first to observe. Only
> >> with Imus, it seems to work in reverse, at least until some
> >> 'critical mass' or 'tipping point' is reached, or maybe it's
> >> just 'the straw that broke...'
> >>
> >> Further to the kind of people we are, which I've suggested is
> >> the fundamental question of Conlaw, whether we bother to
> >> state it or not, since it seems so obvious that we tend to
> >> take it for granted, yesterday we had the worst massacre, the
> >> slaughter of innocents, since Wounded Knee, in this country.
> >> A private individual purchased, apparently lawfully, at least
> >> one handgun which he used, perhaps with another (at least one
> >> was reported to be a semiautomatic Glock 9mm which holds a
> >> considerable number of rounds in each clip), to kill 32
> >> college students and wound sixteen more. That is a lot of
> >> blameless people.
> >>
> >> However we also seem to have a relatively free marketplace of
> >> guns in this country, as well as ideas. Almost anyone not
> >> under some legal disability may walk into a gun store,
> >> identify himself, and within two weeks obtain a handgun and
> >> thereafter wipe out innocent people simply because he was mad
> >> in the clinical sense and concealed it, or went mad later.
> >>
> >> If this happened only once, one might say that this has
> >> nothing to do with us as a people. But given the long
> >> track-record of senseless shootings, or shootings that, upon
> >> investigation do make sense in the way Shakespeare described
> >> it, "there's-method-in-his-madness,' it seems fair to say
> >> that we're the kind of people who would rather see
> >> office-building shootings by angry men, postal shootings by
> >> angry workers, Columbine-type shootings by angry high school
> >> students, and Virginia Tech type shootings by angry
> >> college-age men, to pick a few examples that readily come to
> >> mind, than to adopt more stringent gun control laws.
> >>
> >> There are those who cite the Second Amendment in this regard,
> trying
> >> to make a reality of a disputed claim of right, as I
> understand it.
> >> I believe there's a case that says this right pertains to
> >> armed, government authorized, protective militias. I've read
> >> comments from some of the more modern, informal 'militia'
> >> types that suggests their desire to possess deadly weapons is
> >> to use them against our own government, should it get in
> >> their way. They point to some tyrannical regimes which
> >> disarmed the population before wreaking their depredations.
> >>
> >> It seems to me that we're an undecided country when it comes
> >> to guns, just as we were an undecided country for a long time
> >> before we abolished slavery and for a long time before trying
> >> to abolish Jim Crow. We're the type of people who say, in
> >> effect, that we're willing to tolerate people like John
> >> Hinckley who shot President Reagan to gain the attention of a
> >> Hollywood movie actress, and who shot John Lennon, rather
> >> than take the guns out of the hands of people who don't seem
> >> to need them for any legitimate purpose except that it feels
> >> good to possess them someplace.
> >>
> >> I cant' help it if this is the kind of people we are, for on
> >> balance, politically, and legally, this is what we suffer to
> >> happen without taking effective measures against these
> >> repeated massacres of the innocent. We are, in effect,
> >> saying, that we will expend innocent lives in order to keep
> >> as many guns as the market will bear in the hands of many
> >> thousands of people, of whom it is a statistical certainty
> >> that some terrible percentage will use them to commit
> >> Columbine or Hokie tragedies. Having adopted our present
> >> legal posture, the only question is where and when this will
> >> happen again.
> >>
> >> At some point, I should think, the country is going to have
> >> to make a choice about whether we will continue to tolerate
> >> further senseless killing by unbalanced gunmen in order to
> >> allow all the lawful hunters and hobbyists the pleasure of
> >> their honorable pursuit, and whether the alleged right to
> >> keep and bear arms has to do with government sponsored,
> >> government protective militias, or to allow gunmen to protect
> >> themselves against government authority should government
> >> policies be to their disliking.
> >>
> >> The relatively free market in gun purchase and possession
> >> seems like a high price to pay, when you consider that you
> >> send your kids to college in the hope that they'll be able to
> >> make a contribution to society someday.
> >>
> >>
> >> rs
> >> sfls
> >>
> >>
> >> On Apr 17, 2007, at 4:02 PM, guayiya wrote:
> >>
> >> > The Constitution does more than "allow" things.
> >> > There are things we allow to happen that actually happen
> >> and things we
> >> > allow to happen that don't; things we require to happen
> that always
> >> > happen and things we require to happen that don't always
> happen;
> >> > things we forbid that never happen and things we forbid
> that do
> >> > happen.
> >> > No?
> >> >
> >> > Daniel Hoffman
> >> >
> >> > Robert Sheridan wrote:
> >> >
> >> >> The underlying question which defines the subject of
> >> Constitutional
> >> >> Law, asks what kind of people we are.
> >> >>
> >> >> Constitutional law provides the answer to that question,
> >> at least for
> >> >> the time being, and is, as we know, subject to change over
> time.
> >> >>
> >> >> The kind of people we are is defined by what we allow to
> >> happen over
> >> >> and over again.
> >> >>
> >> >> rs
> >> >> sfls
> >> >>
> >> >>
> >> >> _______________________________________________
> >> >> To post, send message to Conlawprof at lists.ucla.edu To
> subscribe,
> >> >> unsubscribe, change options, or get password, see
> >> >> http://lists.ucla.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/conlawprof
> >> >>
> >> >> Please note that messages sent to this large list cannot
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> >> >>
> >> >>
> >> >> <guayiya.vcf>
> >>
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> To post, send message to Conlawprof at lists.ucla.edu
> >> To subscribe, unsubscribe, change options, or get password,
> >> see http://lists.ucla.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/conlawprof
> >>
> >> Please note that messages sent to this large list cannot be
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> >>
> > _______________________________________________
> > To post, send message to Conlawprof at lists.ucla.edu
> > To subscribe, unsubscribe, change options, or get password,
> see
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> >
> > Please note that messages sent to this large list cannot be
> viewed as
> > private. Anyone can subscribe to the list and read messages
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> >
> >
> >
>
>
> Douglas Laycock
> Yale Kamisar Collegiate Professor of Law
> University of Michigan Law School
> 625 S. State St.
> Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1215
> 734-647-9713
>
> _______________________________________________
> To post, send message to Conlawprof at lists.ucla.edu
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