Urge US Senate to block HR 2640 (MH gun ban)
A "voice vote" is how NRA covered up the tally on the 1986 Class 3 weapon freeze. NRA can always get a SINGLE legislator to demand a roll call vote IF they want to. When NRA doesn't, you know the shaft is in.
Here is another good analysis.
HR 2640 must be STOPPED in the US Senate! It only takes 41 votes to block a bill.
###
Why NRA is nuts to expand background checks
By Corey Graff
Executive Director
Wisconsin Gun Owners
June 13, 2007
<http://www.wisconsingunowners.org/June%2013%202007_Why%20NRA%20is%20nuts%20to%20expand%20background%20checks.cfm>
"I'm very sorry we can't sell you this handgun," the gun dealer tells
you as he snatches what was to be your new hunting revolver from your
hand. "FBI denied your background check. Said something about you being
'mentally defective.' Sorry."
As you leave the gun shop you're confused, infuriated and empty-handed.
You've never committed a crime in your life. You're a hunter education
safety instructor, a father, a life-long sportsmen, a military veteran
and are active in your church. Yet somehow a bureaucrat who knows
nothing about you claims you're a mental case. Finally you remember:
almost two decades ago, your family doctor sent you to see a
"specialist" who prescribed anti-depressants for a temporary bout of
depression you were dealing with after your father passed away. In
hindsight, the pills didn't help much and it all seemed so innocent at
the time.
But that was then and this is now -- when law-abiding gun owners get
entangled in the nets of the NRA's new-and-improved federal gun control
scheme: NICS.
Recently Wisconsin Republican State Senator Alberta Darling (River
Hills) announced she will sponsor a post-Virginia-Tech gun control bill
in the state legislature. Her bill will dump mental health data at the
state level into the federal National Instant Check System (NICS)
database. Darling claims these records will be used to disqualify those
"adjudicated mentally defective" from buying guns.
Darling's bill is a response to federal legislation introduced by Rep.
Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY) -- formerly HR 297 which has now morphed into HR
2640, the "National Instant Check System (NICS) Enhancement Act" --
which would expand the scope of point-of-sale background checks to
survey the new influx of mental health records provided by states. The
Federal Department of Justice (DOJ) has issued letters to state attorney
generals requesting they voluntarily supply court-held health record
data to the feds. So far only 23 states comply with those outlandish
demands.
This all came about when it was discovered that Virginia-Tech shooter
Cho Seung-Hui had been known to have had received psychological
treatment in his past and later legally purchased a handgun through NICS
-- a gun he used to kill 33 people. Representatives from both sides of
the aisle in congress "began negotiations" with NRA leadership to ram a
gun control bill into law to "close the loophole."
NRA Chief Lobbyist Chris Cox claimed, "We've been on record for decades
for keeping firearms out of the hands of the mentally adjudicated. It's
not only good policy, it's good politics," he said.
Not so fast, Mr. Cox. An honest examination of this multifaceted issue
reveals that an expansion of NICS buys into a dangerous false premise
for all gun owners concerned about their liberty and is not sound policy
or good politics for the Second Amendment community or anyone else.
Here's why gun owners must not only oppose expanding the NICS background
check system, they must fight to repeal it.
NO OBJECTIVE STANDARD FOR DIAGNOSING MENTAL ILLNESS
Since 1952, the American Psychiatry Association (APA) has utilized the
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) as its
standard for defining, diagnosing and treating mental health disorders.
Since its first printing, the manual has undergone five revisions, the
most recent being the DSM-IV, which was finalized in 1994. Currently a
fifth version is being prepared and is due out by 2012.
Each new version contradicts the previous version; new authors with new
perspectives and agendas write each new release. The standard keeps
changing, shifting, sometimes radically so -- the result is that mental
illness is never clearly or objectively defined. It is a moving target
shaped by political and social pressures.
"Following controversy and protests from gay activists at APA annual
conferences from 1970 to 1973, the seventh printing of the DSM-II, in
1974, no longer listed homosexuality as a category of disorder. After
talks led by the psychiatrist Robert Spitzer, who had been involved in
the DSM-II development committee, a vote by the APA trustees in 1973,
confirmed by the wider APA membership in 1974, replaced the diagnosis
with a milder category of "sexual orientation disturbance."[1]
In today's politically correct climate, the most recent version of the
DSM-IV contains "no reference to homosexuality."[2]
Which DSM was correct or were both wrong? One can easily see the danger
this contradiction raises if these diagnoses were synced up with a gun
owner database that acts as an automated judge, jury and executioner for
the gun buyer. Such variance also calls into question the credibility of
those who define mental illness. Psychiatrists can't even agree amongst
themselves over a relatively short period of time on how to precisely
define mental illness on any given issue. Thirty years ago no one heard
the term "attention deficit disorder" or "post-traumatic stress
disorder" -- today diagnoses for these new mental illnesses are commonplace.
If NICS is expanded, expect entire groups of Wisconsinites to be denied
their right to purchase a firearm. Legislation like this paints with a
broad brush and will disarm many good people who should be able to buy
handguns. One such group is veterans.
"[NICS Expansion] could have a significant impact on American
servicemen," wrote Gun Owners of America recently, "especially those
returning from combat situations and who seek some type of psychiatric
care. Often, veterans who have suffered from post-traumatic stress
disorder have been deemed as mentally 'incompetent' and are prohibited
from owning guns under 18 U.S.C. 922(g)(4). Records of those instances
certainly exist, and, in 1999, the Department of Veterans Administration
turned over 90,000 names of veterans to the FBI for inclusion into the
NICS background check system."[3]
In addition to political pressures shaping the subjective nature of the
mental health field, biases influence the outcome of psychiatrists'
opinions, too. "Furthermore the potential of conflict of interest has
also been raised. Roughly 50% of the authors [of DSM] who previously
defined psychiatric disorders have had or have financial relationships
with drug companies." [4]
While good science conducted objectively can yield good psychological
evaluation and diagnosis, bad science fuels bad psychology rampantly and
happens when the entire basis of diagnosis ebbs and flows with the
political flavor of the day. The danger for misapplication here cuts
across the spectrum.
On one side of the spectrum: someone could be diagnosed today as
"mentally defective" who would later be undiagnosed tomorrow based on
which way the political or societal winds blow. In terms of the
psychiatric standards themselves, which DSM was right? Before the
politically correct movement gained steamed or after -- and which DSM
will the NICS system rely upon -- the one that may disarm you, or the
other that may not?
NICS TRUMPS DUE PROCESS
On the other end of the spectrum, there are cases where someone is
guiltless and becomes guilty. For example, there are gun owners sitting
in prison right now who are well familiar with the 1996 Lautenberg Act
-- a federal gun control monster that essentially said that anyone who
had been charged with misdemeanor domestic violence -- this could
include an unsubstantiated allegation that you raised your voice to a
family member who called 911 on you -- would result in your being
disarmed for life.
Like Lautenberg, the expansion of the NICS system involving mental
health determinations for gun purchase disqualifications relies upon the
mere assertion by a psychologist who must rely upon standards that do
not remain constant when they adjudicate you "mentally defective." Once
that diagnosis is made, you will not be able to buy a gun.
This top-down approach establishes a federal system that automatically
red flags based on a shocking amount of highly subjective data (as we
have seen). The result is that you are instantly presumed guilty by the
system without there having been any determination being made in a court
of law to prove that -- a gross injustice and mockery of American
jurisprudence.
Certainly there are disturbed individuals that can be objectively
determined to be incapable of possessing or buying guns; but that should
be determined on a case by case basis, objectively, and by affording the
individual their right to due process in a court of law.
This is why we say that NICS itself is based on a dangerous false
premise that paints with a broad brush, acts in a cold, robotic fashion
that stomps due process. For this reason alone, NICS should be repealed,
not expanded.
Even if NICS could stop a minority of cases that were misdiagnosed, we
would still have a larger issue in which our opponents would be pushing
forward an agenda that strips away from that minority its due process.
The solution is to let the State decide on a case by case basis from the
ground up in a court of law, contingent upon a charge at the local
level. This is good politics, good policy -- consistent with American
liberty and yet still deals with the issue of preventing people with
genuinely severe mental instabilities from buying guns (buying them
illegally remains another matter).
This stands in stark contrast to Mr. Cox's federal NICS gun control
scheme -- a system that imposes itself upon State jurisdiction and
enforces broad standards that infringe due process across the board.How
many rights tantamount to proper jurisprudence are we willing to give up
to continue to feed the belly of this federal leviathan, which will only
further subvert due process for thousands, perhaps millions of gun owners?
NICS IMPROPERLY SUBVERTS JURISDICTIONS
One maxim of good political strategy is that we never allow the enemy to
define the terrain of political battle. So let's back up: Are we gun
owners asking the wrong question in the first place? Why are state
representatives handing over our health record information here at home
in Wisconsin to distant Washington, D.C., bureaucracies -- agencies that
are coming in to steal not only your individual gun rights but the right
of your State to protect you?
It seems our state representatives are caving in to the federal bully --
betraying their oath of office openly -- oaths sworn to uphold our State
Constitution, which enumerates our right to keep and bear arms. The
federal government's powers are enumerated in the Constitution and Bill
of Rights and hence are limited by it.
“This bill violates…Mack v USA (95-1503) which states that ‘State
legislatures are not subject to federal direction,’” said Sheriff
Richard Mack, who won that landmark case after he refused to allow the
feds to compel him against his oath to conduct unconstitutional
background checks.
“The real irony here,” said Mack, “is that the NRA actually supported
and helped fund this suit and now clearly supports Schumer and McCarthy
as they violate the ruling the NRA helped pay to obtain in the first
place. HR 2640 directs the states to take action and such laws run afoul
of the separation of powers as set forth in the Tenth Amendment. I quote
again from Mack v USA, ‘But the Constitution protects us from our own
best intentions.’ I pray for the day when Congress and the NRA will
abide by the law of the land as established by our Founders! How do you
know the NRA is wrong on this law? When you notice that its primary
supporters are Schumer and McCarthy.”
Remember, that Supreme Court ruling on NICS remains in force. According
to Larry Pratt, Executive Director of Gun Owners of America, it
essentially said, "Congress cannot commandeer the resources of a state
to do its anti-gun bidding. This decision breathes new life into the
10th Amendment and our Republican form of government. The court ruled
that the states cannot be compelled to perform background checks on gun
purchasers," he wrote. Wisconsin Gun Owners (WGO) concurs.
Knowing that the states cannot be forced to operate the unconstitutional
NICS scheme, the federal agencies that are pushing NICS and its
expansion are using a carrot-and-stick approach to threaten states that
they will withhold federal funding and other federal handouts. Our
state representatives should do their jobs by standing up to the feds,
instead of groveling at their feet.
GUN RIGHTS ORGANIZATIONS OPPOSED TO NICS
Perhaps Chris Cox and NRA leadership need their heads checked, as they
are walking in lockstep with notorious anti-gun Democrats in congress on
this issue. Their PR machine is revving up to sell NICS and its
continued expansion to NRA members packaged as a reasonable way to stop
the insane from buying handguns. [Remember NICS was Wayne LaPierre's idea. It was supposed to block the Brady Bill - which, of course, it didn't. Wayne has too much "political capital" invested in NICS to be able to impartially evaulate it.]
But Cox is divisively out of accord with most gun owners and most other
national and state gun rights organizations in our nation -- and in our
view willfully neglecting the wishes of NRA members who want to
preserve, rather than destroy, the Second Amendment. In our opinion, NRA
leadership's support of NICS is almost certainly out of touch with the
views of NRA members who, upon hearing the truth about this issue, will
see NICS as the proverbial "Emperor with no clothes" that it is --
compelling them to oppose it vehemently.
"Calling NICS a background check is simply a deception: the Brady system
is an elaborate scheme to register gun owners," said Dudley Brown,
Executive Director of the National Association for Gun Rights (NAGR)
"And it's the foothold the gun-grabbers need to enact even further
restrictions on our Second Amendment rights."Asking permission for a
right -- which is what the Brady Registration Check does -- turns it
into a government-administered privilege. How any 'gun rights group'
could support it, or its expansion, is beyond me," Brown said.[5]
In addition to national gun groups like NAGR and GOA opposing the NICS
mental health expansion, Wisconsin Gun Owners, Inc. (WGO) is unified
with other state no compromise gun rights groups in our opposition. "The
NRA will open a can of worms about what mental health is and who gets to
decide who is mentally ill," said Ken Rineer, President of Gun Owners of
Arizona. "In today's 'politically correct' society, do you really want a
single judge deciding your mental competence to own a firearm? What is
mental illness? Is it someone who is depressed and on meds? Our courts
are not friendly to those who wish to own firearms and I would not want
my right to own one left to a single person wearing a black robe!"
New Hampshire gun owners killed a similar piece of legislation to the
one Wisconsin State Senator Alberta Darling intends to foist upon us
Badger State gun owners. "The bill in question was a blanket gun ban for
anyone who had gone to a shrink for any reason," wrote Alan Rice,
Treasurer of the New Hampshire Firearms Coalition. "The definition and
diagnosis of mental illness is so subjective."
CONCLUSION
Expanding the National Instant Check System is wrong for gun owners and
dangerous for everyone else. We're the ones who are insane if we think
the subjective field of diagnostic psychiatrics can be trusted to
accurately define or diagnose mental illness in the first place. Once
that dangerous premise is established, linking these spurious diagnoses
with a federalized database scheme that trumps due process will only
lead to more injustice for gun owners while criminals continue to
subvert the system. Indeed, if we expand NICS to subsume all our private
medical records into a state and national gun owner database, we gun
owners aren't just nuts -- we've completely lost our minds.
Corey Graff is the Executive Director of Wisconsin Gun Owners (WGO)
(wisconsingunowners.org), a registered Wisconsin lobbyist,
nationally-published author, outdoor writer, photographer and Active
Member of the Outdoor Writers Association of America (OWAA).
OBJECTIONS TO NICS OPPOSITION REFUTED
OBJECTION: Even though criminals and mentally-defective individuals will
avoid NICS to get their guns, since we have the system in place
shouldn't we try to improve it? Shouldn't we try to stop the mentally
ill from buying guns?
RESPONSE: You just answered your own question, tacitly admitting that a
diagnosis of mental illness will not necessarily prevent that individual
from getting around the NICS system, thus conceding the worthlessness of
NICS in the first place. How could a mentally-ill person buying a gun
outside of a background check system use that gun to commit a crime if
they are surrounded at all times by competent citizens with guns who
know how to defend themselves? An armed society is a polite society. Gun
control doesn't prevent crime, it facilitates it. The question you
should be asking is, why have we disarmed our competent citizens to
begin with?
OBJECTION: Without the National Instant Check System, criminals could
legally buy guns. The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence claims that
since its inception in 1994, NICS has stopped "more than 600,000
criminals and other prohibited people from purchasing firearms from
FFLs."[6]
RESPONSE: "The most comprehensive study of the Brady Act finds the law
has not cut handgun killings.In fact, the law's main result is increased
violence against women... 'We weren't able to see any effect on the
homicide rate,' study author Philip Cook told UPI Tuesday. 'In
retrospect we would not expect Brady to be effective against violent
crime. Increasingly homicides are committed by career criminals who do
not get their guns in legal ways,' said the Duke University researcher."[7]
OBJECTION: NRA supports NICS and its expansion. If you're opposed to
this 'reasonable' measure, does that mean you want someone diagnosed
with severe schizophrenic disorder to be able to buy a handgun?
RESPONSE: We don't want schizophrenics to buy handguns, and that's not
the issue. We want a localized court of law to make that determination
on a case by case basis through objective analysis and diagnosis -- to
ensure the person's due process is upheld. NRA leadership appears to
have lost their marbles -- standing shoulder to shoulder with anti-gun
Democrats to expand an unconstitutional gun control law they themselves
know by their own arguments can and will be subverted by those
"adjudicated mentally defective" who are intent on committing a crime.
###
A "voice vote" is how NRA covered up the tally on the 1986 Class 3 weapon freeze. NRA can always get a SINGLE legislator to demand a roll call vote IF they want to. When NRA doesn't, you know the shaft is in.
Here is another good analysis.
HR 2640 must be STOPPED in the US Senate! It only takes 41 votes to block a bill.
###
Why NRA is nuts to expand background checks
By Corey Graff
Executive Director
Wisconsin Gun Owners
June 13, 2007
<http://www.wisconsingunowners.org/June%2013%202007_Why%20NRA%20is%20nuts%20to%20expand%20background%20checks.cfm>
"I'm very sorry we can't sell you this handgun," the gun dealer tells
you as he snatches what was to be your new hunting revolver from your
hand. "FBI denied your background check. Said something about you being
'mentally defective.' Sorry."
As you leave the gun shop you're confused, infuriated and empty-handed.
You've never committed a crime in your life. You're a hunter education
safety instructor, a father, a life-long sportsmen, a military veteran
and are active in your church. Yet somehow a bureaucrat who knows
nothing about you claims you're a mental case. Finally you remember:
almost two decades ago, your family doctor sent you to see a
"specialist" who prescribed anti-depressants for a temporary bout of
depression you were dealing with after your father passed away. In
hindsight, the pills didn't help much and it all seemed so innocent at
the time.
But that was then and this is now -- when law-abiding gun owners get
entangled in the nets of the NRA's new-and-improved federal gun control
scheme: NICS.
Recently Wisconsin Republican State Senator Alberta Darling (River
Hills) announced she will sponsor a post-Virginia-Tech gun control bill
in the state legislature. Her bill will dump mental health data at the
state level into the federal National Instant Check System (NICS)
database. Darling claims these records will be used to disqualify those
"adjudicated mentally defective" from buying guns.
Darling's bill is a response to federal legislation introduced by Rep.
Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY) -- formerly HR 297 which has now morphed into HR
2640, the "National Instant Check System (NICS) Enhancement Act" --
which would expand the scope of point-of-sale background checks to
survey the new influx of mental health records provided by states. The
Federal Department of Justice (DOJ) has issued letters to state attorney
generals requesting they voluntarily supply court-held health record
data to the feds. So far only 23 states comply with those outlandish
demands.
This all came about when it was discovered that Virginia-Tech shooter
Cho Seung-Hui had been known to have had received psychological
treatment in his past and later legally purchased a handgun through NICS
-- a gun he used to kill 33 people. Representatives from both sides of
the aisle in congress "began negotiations" with NRA leadership to ram a
gun control bill into law to "close the loophole."
NRA Chief Lobbyist Chris Cox claimed, "We've been on record for decades
for keeping firearms out of the hands of the mentally adjudicated. It's
not only good policy, it's good politics," he said.
Not so fast, Mr. Cox. An honest examination of this multifaceted issue
reveals that an expansion of NICS buys into a dangerous false premise
for all gun owners concerned about their liberty and is not sound policy
or good politics for the Second Amendment community or anyone else.
Here's why gun owners must not only oppose expanding the NICS background
check system, they must fight to repeal it.
NO OBJECTIVE STANDARD FOR DIAGNOSING MENTAL ILLNESS
Since 1952, the American Psychiatry Association (APA) has utilized the
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) as its
standard for defining, diagnosing and treating mental health disorders.
Since its first printing, the manual has undergone five revisions, the
most recent being the DSM-IV, which was finalized in 1994. Currently a
fifth version is being prepared and is due out by 2012.
Each new version contradicts the previous version; new authors with new
perspectives and agendas write each new release. The standard keeps
changing, shifting, sometimes radically so -- the result is that mental
illness is never clearly or objectively defined. It is a moving target
shaped by political and social pressures.
"Following controversy and protests from gay activists at APA annual
conferences from 1970 to 1973, the seventh printing of the DSM-II, in
1974, no longer listed homosexuality as a category of disorder. After
talks led by the psychiatrist Robert Spitzer, who had been involved in
the DSM-II development committee, a vote by the APA trustees in 1973,
confirmed by the wider APA membership in 1974, replaced the diagnosis
with a milder category of "sexual orientation disturbance."[1]
In today's politically correct climate, the most recent version of the
DSM-IV contains "no reference to homosexuality."[2]
Which DSM was correct or were both wrong? One can easily see the danger
this contradiction raises if these diagnoses were synced up with a gun
owner database that acts as an automated judge, jury and executioner for
the gun buyer. Such variance also calls into question the credibility of
those who define mental illness. Psychiatrists can't even agree amongst
themselves over a relatively short period of time on how to precisely
define mental illness on any given issue. Thirty years ago no one heard
the term "attention deficit disorder" or "post-traumatic stress
disorder" -- today diagnoses for these new mental illnesses are commonplace.
If NICS is expanded, expect entire groups of Wisconsinites to be denied
their right to purchase a firearm. Legislation like this paints with a
broad brush and will disarm many good people who should be able to buy
handguns. One such group is veterans.
"[NICS Expansion] could have a significant impact on American
servicemen," wrote Gun Owners of America recently, "especially those
returning from combat situations and who seek some type of psychiatric
care. Often, veterans who have suffered from post-traumatic stress
disorder have been deemed as mentally 'incompetent' and are prohibited
from owning guns under 18 U.S.C. 922(g)(4). Records of those instances
certainly exist, and, in 1999, the Department of Veterans Administration
turned over 90,000 names of veterans to the FBI for inclusion into the
NICS background check system."[3]
In addition to political pressures shaping the subjective nature of the
mental health field, biases influence the outcome of psychiatrists'
opinions, too. "Furthermore the potential of conflict of interest has
also been raised. Roughly 50% of the authors [of DSM] who previously
defined psychiatric disorders have had or have financial relationships
with drug companies." [4]
While good science conducted objectively can yield good psychological
evaluation and diagnosis, bad science fuels bad psychology rampantly and
happens when the entire basis of diagnosis ebbs and flows with the
political flavor of the day. The danger for misapplication here cuts
across the spectrum.
On one side of the spectrum: someone could be diagnosed today as
"mentally defective" who would later be undiagnosed tomorrow based on
which way the political or societal winds blow. In terms of the
psychiatric standards themselves, which DSM was right? Before the
politically correct movement gained steamed or after -- and which DSM
will the NICS system rely upon -- the one that may disarm you, or the
other that may not?
NICS TRUMPS DUE PROCESS
On the other end of the spectrum, there are cases where someone is
guiltless and becomes guilty. For example, there are gun owners sitting
in prison right now who are well familiar with the 1996 Lautenberg Act
-- a federal gun control monster that essentially said that anyone who
had been charged with misdemeanor domestic violence -- this could
include an unsubstantiated allegation that you raised your voice to a
family member who called 911 on you -- would result in your being
disarmed for life.
Like Lautenberg, the expansion of the NICS system involving mental
health determinations for gun purchase disqualifications relies upon the
mere assertion by a psychologist who must rely upon standards that do
not remain constant when they adjudicate you "mentally defective." Once
that diagnosis is made, you will not be able to buy a gun.
This top-down approach establishes a federal system that automatically
red flags based on a shocking amount of highly subjective data (as we
have seen). The result is that you are instantly presumed guilty by the
system without there having been any determination being made in a court
of law to prove that -- a gross injustice and mockery of American
jurisprudence.
Certainly there are disturbed individuals that can be objectively
determined to be incapable of possessing or buying guns; but that should
be determined on a case by case basis, objectively, and by affording the
individual their right to due process in a court of law.
This is why we say that NICS itself is based on a dangerous false
premise that paints with a broad brush, acts in a cold, robotic fashion
that stomps due process. For this reason alone, NICS should be repealed,
not expanded.
Even if NICS could stop a minority of cases that were misdiagnosed, we
would still have a larger issue in which our opponents would be pushing
forward an agenda that strips away from that minority its due process.
The solution is to let the State decide on a case by case basis from the
ground up in a court of law, contingent upon a charge at the local
level. This is good politics, good policy -- consistent with American
liberty and yet still deals with the issue of preventing people with
genuinely severe mental instabilities from buying guns (buying them
illegally remains another matter).
This stands in stark contrast to Mr. Cox's federal NICS gun control
scheme -- a system that imposes itself upon State jurisdiction and
enforces broad standards that infringe due process across the board.How
many rights tantamount to proper jurisprudence are we willing to give up
to continue to feed the belly of this federal leviathan, which will only
further subvert due process for thousands, perhaps millions of gun owners?
NICS IMPROPERLY SUBVERTS JURISDICTIONS
One maxim of good political strategy is that we never allow the enemy to
define the terrain of political battle. So let's back up: Are we gun
owners asking the wrong question in the first place? Why are state
representatives handing over our health record information here at home
in Wisconsin to distant Washington, D.C., bureaucracies -- agencies that
are coming in to steal not only your individual gun rights but the right
of your State to protect you?
It seems our state representatives are caving in to the federal bully --
betraying their oath of office openly -- oaths sworn to uphold our State
Constitution, which enumerates our right to keep and bear arms. The
federal government's powers are enumerated in the Constitution and Bill
of Rights and hence are limited by it.
“This bill violates…Mack v USA (95-1503) which states that ‘State
legislatures are not subject to federal direction,’” said Sheriff
Richard Mack, who won that landmark case after he refused to allow the
feds to compel him against his oath to conduct unconstitutional
background checks.
“The real irony here,” said Mack, “is that the NRA actually supported
and helped fund this suit and now clearly supports Schumer and McCarthy
as they violate the ruling the NRA helped pay to obtain in the first
place. HR 2640 directs the states to take action and such laws run afoul
of the separation of powers as set forth in the Tenth Amendment. I quote
again from Mack v USA, ‘But the Constitution protects us from our own
best intentions.’ I pray for the day when Congress and the NRA will
abide by the law of the land as established by our Founders! How do you
know the NRA is wrong on this law? When you notice that its primary
supporters are Schumer and McCarthy.”
Remember, that Supreme Court ruling on NICS remains in force. According
to Larry Pratt, Executive Director of Gun Owners of America, it
essentially said, "Congress cannot commandeer the resources of a state
to do its anti-gun bidding. This decision breathes new life into the
10th Amendment and our Republican form of government. The court ruled
that the states cannot be compelled to perform background checks on gun
purchasers," he wrote. Wisconsin Gun Owners (WGO) concurs.
Knowing that the states cannot be forced to operate the unconstitutional
NICS scheme, the federal agencies that are pushing NICS and its
expansion are using a carrot-and-stick approach to threaten states that
they will withhold federal funding and other federal handouts. Our
state representatives should do their jobs by standing up to the feds,
instead of groveling at their feet.
GUN RIGHTS ORGANIZATIONS OPPOSED TO NICS
Perhaps Chris Cox and NRA leadership need their heads checked, as they
are walking in lockstep with notorious anti-gun Democrats in congress on
this issue. Their PR machine is revving up to sell NICS and its
continued expansion to NRA members packaged as a reasonable way to stop
the insane from buying handguns. [Remember NICS was Wayne LaPierre's idea. It was supposed to block the Brady Bill - which, of course, it didn't. Wayne has too much "political capital" invested in NICS to be able to impartially evaulate it.]
But Cox is divisively out of accord with most gun owners and most other
national and state gun rights organizations in our nation -- and in our
view willfully neglecting the wishes of NRA members who want to
preserve, rather than destroy, the Second Amendment. In our opinion, NRA
leadership's support of NICS is almost certainly out of touch with the
views of NRA members who, upon hearing the truth about this issue, will
see NICS as the proverbial "Emperor with no clothes" that it is --
compelling them to oppose it vehemently.
"Calling NICS a background check is simply a deception: the Brady system
is an elaborate scheme to register gun owners," said Dudley Brown,
Executive Director of the National Association for Gun Rights (NAGR)
"And it's the foothold the gun-grabbers need to enact even further
restrictions on our Second Amendment rights."Asking permission for a
right -- which is what the Brady Registration Check does -- turns it
into a government-administered privilege. How any 'gun rights group'
could support it, or its expansion, is beyond me," Brown said.[5]
In addition to national gun groups like NAGR and GOA opposing the NICS
mental health expansion, Wisconsin Gun Owners, Inc. (WGO) is unified
with other state no compromise gun rights groups in our opposition. "The
NRA will open a can of worms about what mental health is and who gets to
decide who is mentally ill," said Ken Rineer, President of Gun Owners of
Arizona. "In today's 'politically correct' society, do you really want a
single judge deciding your mental competence to own a firearm? What is
mental illness? Is it someone who is depressed and on meds? Our courts
are not friendly to those who wish to own firearms and I would not want
my right to own one left to a single person wearing a black robe!"
New Hampshire gun owners killed a similar piece of legislation to the
one Wisconsin State Senator Alberta Darling intends to foist upon us
Badger State gun owners. "The bill in question was a blanket gun ban for
anyone who had gone to a shrink for any reason," wrote Alan Rice,
Treasurer of the New Hampshire Firearms Coalition. "The definition and
diagnosis of mental illness is so subjective."
CONCLUSION
Expanding the National Instant Check System is wrong for gun owners and
dangerous for everyone else. We're the ones who are insane if we think
the subjective field of diagnostic psychiatrics can be trusted to
accurately define or diagnose mental illness in the first place. Once
that dangerous premise is established, linking these spurious diagnoses
with a federalized database scheme that trumps due process will only
lead to more injustice for gun owners while criminals continue to
subvert the system. Indeed, if we expand NICS to subsume all our private
medical records into a state and national gun owner database, we gun
owners aren't just nuts -- we've completely lost our minds.
Corey Graff is the Executive Director of Wisconsin Gun Owners (WGO)
(wisconsingunowners.org), a registered Wisconsin lobbyist,
nationally-published author, outdoor writer, photographer and Active
Member of the Outdoor Writers Association of America (OWAA).
OBJECTIONS TO NICS OPPOSITION REFUTED
OBJECTION: Even though criminals and mentally-defective individuals will
avoid NICS to get their guns, since we have the system in place
shouldn't we try to improve it? Shouldn't we try to stop the mentally
ill from buying guns?
RESPONSE: You just answered your own question, tacitly admitting that a
diagnosis of mental illness will not necessarily prevent that individual
from getting around the NICS system, thus conceding the worthlessness of
NICS in the first place. How could a mentally-ill person buying a gun
outside of a background check system use that gun to commit a crime if
they are surrounded at all times by competent citizens with guns who
know how to defend themselves? An armed society is a polite society. Gun
control doesn't prevent crime, it facilitates it. The question you
should be asking is, why have we disarmed our competent citizens to
begin with?
OBJECTION: Without the National Instant Check System, criminals could
legally buy guns. The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence claims that
since its inception in 1994, NICS has stopped "more than 600,000
criminals and other prohibited people from purchasing firearms from
FFLs."[6]
RESPONSE: "The most comprehensive study of the Brady Act finds the law
has not cut handgun killings.In fact, the law's main result is increased
violence against women... 'We weren't able to see any effect on the
homicide rate,' study author Philip Cook told UPI Tuesday. 'In
retrospect we would not expect Brady to be effective against violent
crime. Increasingly homicides are committed by career criminals who do
not get their guns in legal ways,' said the Duke University researcher."[7]
OBJECTION: NRA supports NICS and its expansion. If you're opposed to
this 'reasonable' measure, does that mean you want someone diagnosed
with severe schizophrenic disorder to be able to buy a handgun?
RESPONSE: We don't want schizophrenics to buy handguns, and that's not
the issue. We want a localized court of law to make that determination
on a case by case basis through objective analysis and diagnosis -- to
ensure the person's due process is upheld. NRA leadership appears to
have lost their marbles -- standing shoulder to shoulder with anti-gun
Democrats to expand an unconstitutional gun control law they themselves
know by their own arguments can and will be subverted by those
"adjudicated mentally defective" who are intent on committing a crime.
###
They must be really hurting for members.