Sedalia Democrat

To: moccw@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Full text of Eric Cramer's Pro-Gun Editorial from Saturday's Sedalia Democrat

Saturday, May 26, 2001 -- Opinion, Sedalia Democrat, Sedalia, Missouri

NRA Convention Highlighted Issues

Eric Cramer, Sedalia Democrat's city editor

'Close the loophole,' is current mantra of the Million Mom March and other gun controllers, as though making it illegal for one person to sell a gun to another will stop crime. We don't hate children. We do hate big government. I spent most of Friday and Saturday last week looking at the exhibits at the National Rifle Association Convention in Kansas City.

Because I wanted to attend the Lions Club Blues and BBQ Fest here in Sedalia Saturday night, I was unable to attend the NRA convention banquet. The NRA gets a lot of criticism these days. It is criticized first and foremost because of its political power. Well, naturally, it is politically powerful. It has 4.2 million members, and a powerful number of past members and grass roots support.

The NRA's political action committee, the NRA Institute for Legislative Action, lobbies to prevent the passage of gun laws. Such laws are unconstitutional. I think it is inconsistent to think that the rights to free press, religion, assembly, etc., listed in the first amendment of the constitution are meant to apply to individuals, but the Second Amendment isn't (that's the current legal argument).

I also think it is ridiculous to think that a bunch of guys who just fought a war, fought by volunteers rather than trained troops, meant it to be possible for individuals to be disarmed. Face it, the Second Amendment wasn't put into the constitution to protect either duck hunters or the National Guard. The National Guard, in its current guise, didn't exist until after World War I. The "militia" referred to in the Second Amendment were those military units like those formed during the revolution, where a group of locals banded together and offered their services to the Continental Congress, disbanding and returning home at the end of the conflict (and sometimes before). These units sometimes received issued guns, and sometime carried their own.

During last week's convention, I wandered outside to watch part of the demonstration by the Million Mom March. There were not a 'million,' and unless my knowledge of genders is seriously flawed, a lot of them aren't moms, either. They were outnumbered about five-to-one by pro-gun demonstrators led by the Western Missouri Shooters Alliance.

Unlike many gun owners, I don't hate the MMM. These are nice people, who feel they have a legitimate concern. I think they're misguided and don't understand firearms. I don't feel, as some acquaintances of mine do, that they should be called "The Commie Mommies."

Having said that, the MMM has misrepresented the issues. Their current call is "close the loophole," meaning the so-called "gun show loophole" in federal law. Under current law I, as an unlicensed individual, can go to a gun show and sell a gun to you, and there is no background check (in Missouri, we'd have to register the sale of a handgun). The MMM, among others, wants these individual transactions stopped.

The background check itself is not what most gun owners object to, although there is a niggling dispute over whether it must be done at the gun show or within three business days. The real issue is the definition of "gun show." As originally offered, the legislation that would "close the loophole," said any gathering at which there were at least 75 guns that could be sold is a gun show, even if the guns are not offered for sale. Any such gun show required a federal permit, issued in advance, and a high permit fee.

It doesn't take much of a shooting match, no matter the shooting sport, to attract 75 shooters, most of whom are using more than one gun. Every Wednesday-night trap league, Sunday-afternoon skeet club or Cowboy Action Match would be defined as a gun show, and be illegal without a federal permit.

You can see why gun owners, whose guns have killed no one, are upset about this. They know the "close the loophole" movement is a sham, especially as it does not and cannot address a sale from one person to another in any non-gun-show environment (say, I advertise a shotgun in the classifieds and you want to buy it. No gun show, no background check).

According to the "million moms," if you disagree with the MMM, you're a vicious, right-wing nut. You care more about gun-company profits than lives (I saw signs saying exactly that at the MMM protest last weekend.) You're also claimed to not care about "the children." I have no children. If I ever have them, I want them to grow up in a society that is safe. Big government, of which gun control is an example, is unsafe for the rights of individuals

It scares me much more than any firearm.

I'm a life member of the NRA.

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