Posted on 10/13/2011 5:10:16 AM PDT by marktwain
October 12, 2011 Wednesday
(SitNews) - U.S Senators Mark Begich (D-Alaska) and Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) have introduced the Firearms Interstate Commerce Reform Act. The bill allows for the interstate sale of firearms and removes several antiquated and unnecessary restrictions imposed on interstate firearms transactions.
Current laws restricting interstate commerce of firearms not only lag behind common sense and new technology, they are unfair and burdensome, Sen. Begich said. This legislation cleans up decades-old laws that are unnecessarily restricting the rights of Alaskans and other Americans to purchase and sell firearms.
Utahns and Americans everywhere have a right to bear arms, and this legislation ensures that onerous and outdated restrictions on everyones Second Amendment rights are no longer in place, Sen. Hatch said. By removing these restrictions, we can ensure that the constitutional freedoms we seek to protect remain intact.
The National Instant Criminal Background Check System has made many restrictions enacted in 1968 obsolete. Its time to bring the law into the 21st century. This important legislation will modernize and streamline interstate firearms transactions. The NRA and gun owners across the nation thank Senators Hatch and Begich for their leadership on this issue, said Chris W. Cox, executive director of the NRA Institute for Legislative Action.
The Firearms Interstate Commerce Reform Act removes a number of restrictions from the Gun Control Act of 1968, which only allowed licensed dealers to sell rifles and shot guns to residents of a different state under a lengthy series of conditions. The restrictions were supposed to prevent buyers from evading background checks available at the time, which were mainly carried out through state laws requiring local police chiefs to issue firearms permits.
However, since 1998, all people buying firearms from dealers in the U.S. have been subject to computerized background checks under the FBIs National Instant Criminal Background Check System; a system much more sophisticated and advanced than what was available in 1968. As a result, the complex system of state laws currently restricting the interstate commerce of firearms is outdated. In some cases, current law requires citizens to jump through so many hoops, it hinders or even prevents these sales.
The new law would allow:
* Individuals to buy handguns, as well as rifles or shotguns, from licensed dealers in another state, subject to the background check requirement. The buyer and dealer would still have to meet in person and comply with the laws of both states;
* Dealers to engage in their business at gun shows in other states, but would have to comply with the laws in the state where the gun show takes place;
* The bill would reduce theft and loss of firearms during shipment between dealers by getting rid of a provision that says dealers may not transfer firearms to one another face to face, away from their business premises. Currently, dealers who agree on a sale are forced to return to their businesses and ship firearms to one another which involves some risk of theft or loss. The new law would allow an in-person exchange.
Similar legislation has been introduced in the House.
Source of News:
Office of U.S. Senator Mark Begich www.begich.senate.gov
I'm betting that additional records will be added to background checks, additional disqualifiers will be added, a permanent database (like the one they are using and are not supposed to have) of gun owners will be established, and that the "private seller loophole" at gun shows will be "closed". Say good-bye to private transactions...
I smell the stench of "bi-partisan compromise" all over this bill.
I'm not sure that streamlining an unconstitutional process (background check) IS a step in the right direction.
I live and work in North Dakota but my drivers license is a South Dakota license. I wanted to buy a gun in Minot but I couldn’t because I wasn’t considered a resident.
This would end that restriction
I smell it too. The odds of a "clean" bill are insignificant, and such a bill would likely be vetoed by Bam-Bam.
It WOULD be upsetting to DC, which currently bans firearms by the simple expedient of not having any licensed FFLs in DC. The residents of DC deserve their own bill, which simply says that residents of DC are allowed to buy in neighboring states.
bookmark for later, and thanks for the links
Yes. This could be a Pandora's box providing the liberals, by means of amendments, a way to close the "Gunshow Loophole" which would fulfill their long desire to outlaw the transfer of firearms between individual citizens or even family members.
Alas, the bill will have no effect on Marxachusetts, where a series of corrupt Attorneys General took an end run around the law by imposing so-called “safety regulations,” which have effectively prohibited essentially ALL interstate commerce in firearms for better than ten years.
A state’s attorney general single-handedly voiding both the law and the constitution - the irony, at least, is delicious, while the level of bare-faced corruption is Olympian.
I love it, but 0bama will never sign it.
Does this mean that NJ residents can purchase handguns out of state, without having to be burdened by the ridiculous one gun a month program, enacted by that waste of space, Jon Corzine?
It'd be funny if we hadn't gotten burned EXACTLY like this before.
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