Posted on 12/19/2012 12:49:45 PM PST by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
Maryland lawmakers likely will consider several bills aimed at tightening restrictions on gun sales and ownership as a result of Friday's school shooting in Newtown, Conn., Gov. Martin O'Malley told reporters Tuesday.
"And the likelihood is that there will be a bill from this administration," he added, though he said he was not sure what the specifics will be.
Among the measures legislators probably will consider are bans on the sale of assault weapons and accompanying large magazines, ways to make sure that people suffering from mental illnesses do not have access to firearms, and improvements to safety policies at schools, O'Malley said. "It is work that I would guess every state in the union is going to be taking ever since this horrible tragedy."
In fact, four Democratic state senators from Montgomery County and Baltimore are already planning to introduce some of these measures.
The group -- Sens. Jamie Raskin, D-Silver Spring; Brian Frosh, D-Bethesda; Bill Ferguson, D-Baltimore, and Lisa Gladden, D-Baltimore -- plans to reintroduce an assault weapons ban that failed in committee in 2010.
The bill would prohibit the sale of assault long guns and pistols and magazines that hold more than 10 rounds.
Among the guns whose sale would be banned is the Bushmaster semi-automatic rifle, including the Bushmaster AR-15 that shooter Adam Lanza used to kill his elementary school victims. Lanza's AR-15 used a 30-round magazine.
"It's hard to conclude that these guns should be in the hands of anyone who isn't a soldier on a battlefield or a law enforcement officer sent into a tactical situation," O'Malley said of guns like the AR-15 Lanza used.
The four senators also plan to introduce a measure that would give the Maryland State Police the same authority that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has to regulate gun retailers. The goal is to prevent the "under the table" sale of weapons to known criminals, Raskin said.
That measure previously failed in the House of Delegates.
Although the bills failed in the past, the sponsors are confident that the massacre of 20 first-graders has changed the political landscape.
"Before, politicians were afraid to act because of the power of the gun lobby. Now I think politicians are afraid not to act because of the power of public opinion," Raskin said, referring specifically to the powerful National Rifle Association.
Even those who have expressed doubts in the past about the effectiveness of new gun control measures in preventing violence could support them in the coming term, O'Malley said. "I think there has been a change of heart and a greater open-mindedness in the wake of the murder of the innocent in Connecticut."
Maryland “Freak State” PING!
Well, I guess Baltimore will be a City of Peace soon.
Is it even possible for MD to restrict the 2nd A even further?
When did it become an AR-15?
Beats me.......
***The bill would prohibit the sale of assault long guns and pistols and magazines that hold more than 10 rounds. ***
We have come a long way from the days when they “only wanted to register handguns. Rifles and shotguns will not be affected.”
Well, now they are affected. As Nelson P Shields said...One step at a time.
Nelson T. ‘Pete’ Shields
Founder of Handgun Control, Inc.
“I’m convinced that we have to have federal legislation to build on. We’re going to have to take one step at a time, and the first step is necessarily — given the political realities — going to be very modest. Of course, it’s true that politicians will then go home and say, ‘This is a great law. The problem is solved.’ And it’s also true that such statements will tend to defuse the gun-control issue for a time.
So then we’ll have to strengthen that law, and then again to strengthen that law, and maybe again and again. Right now, though, we’d be satisfied not with half a loaf but with a slice. Our ultimate goal — total control of handguns in the United States — is going to take time. My estimate is from seven to ten years. The problem is to slow down the increasing number of handguns sold in this country. The second problem is to get them all registered. And the final problem is to make the possession of all handguns and all handgun ammunition — except for the military, policemen, licensed security guards, licensed sporting clubs, and licensed gun collectors — totally illegal.”
-Pete Shields, Chairman and founder, Handgun Control Inc., “A Reporter At Large: Handguns,” The New Yorker, July 26, 1976, 57-58
“Yes, I’m for an outright ban [on handguns].”
-Pete Shields, Chairman emeritus, Handgun Control, Inc., 60 Minutes interview
Good question, it stunk even in the 80’s. Never had the 10-day State Police check take less than 2 weeks.
I’ve heard that we have some Freepers who actually choose to live in Maryland.
I worked at Fort Meade on and off for 33 years, but that was before I became a gun owner. I knew a lot of guys in my ‘hood with shotguns and pistols. I’d never go back there except to visit family.
The Beretta products I have owned are first class.
Yet if I have to contact them for some reason there is that address in anti-gun Maryland.
Choose? It’s more of a sentence.
I was born in Massachusetts back when the Kennedys were taking over, so late one cold dark night, my family packed our few meager belongings, swam the river and escaped south. As I was only two weeks old, they didn’t listen to me when I cried “Don’t Stop Here!” in Maryland. In their defense, it didn’t look quite so Stalinist back then.
Regardless, I am trapped here until retirement.
You’re much better off now, Hal, unless you’re living in North Korea.
I like the way you presented your family history. Very clever.
Sorry to hear about your sentence. May retirement come soon.
I would brag on my home state of Virginia but the way it’s going it’s in the process of falling apart, too.
By way of fallback, I suppose that I could return to the state of my birth, Alabama. Things there seem under control.
I plan to leave when my mother passes (she lives with me), whenever that is.
Also the pump action is quite equivalent to lever action when it comes to rerunning the John Henry test against gas operated semi-autos.
And what is frightening is you can send 9 bullets out with one pull of the trigger!
I think when the bayonet lug was removed and the flash suppressor was changed the rifle model designation was reduced by one. ;>)
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.