Schumer's 'Background Check' Bill Criminalizes Most Gun Loans and Registers Firearms

[Lucille]

"Our past becomes our future in the rush to pass new Intolerable Acts (http://www.backwoodshome.com/blogs/ClaireWolfe/2013/02/15/vanderboegh-the-long-roll-of-william-diamonds-drum/)."
--Claire Wolfe

Schumer's 'Background Check' Bill Criminalizes Most Gun Loans and Registers Firearms
http://reason.com/blog/2013/03/14/schumers-background-check-bill-criminali


When I go shooting with friends, we head out into the desert and inevitably we admire each other's firearms and swap 'em for a try to compare their accuracy, feel and overall abilities. That makes us criminals under the "background check" bill currently under consideration in the U.S. Senate. Sen. Charles Schumer, who proposed the measure, has packed his legislation full of legal snares virtually guaranteed to turn gun owners into lawbreakers. That's an impressive little sleight of hand for legislation considered to be the only sort of gun control with a chance to make it through Congress.

Ed Stone at the Examiner actually read the "Fix Gun Checks Act of 2013," for which he deserves credit, and warns that, "[i]n short, the bill is designed to land you in federal prison." Unfortunately, that's really not an exaggeration in a bill that most of the press, like CNN, is simply billing as "legislation ... that would expand background checks covering all U.S. firearms sales." But Schumer's S. 374 does so much more. It requires background checks through the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) via a federally licensed dealer, with some exceptions, for any transfer that "shall include a sale, gift, loan, return from pawn or consignment, or other disposition." Exempted are gifts within a family, such as by grandparents to grandchildren, and other very specifically defined circumstances in which somebody else is allowed to touch your firearm. Pretty much anything else flirts with prison time.

I cited my practice of shooting with friends on public land because that's very common in much of the country, and it doesn't win Sen. Schumer's favor. If you want to try a buddy's gun, it has to be:


at a shooting range located in or on premises owned or occupied by a duly incorporated organization organized for conservation purposes or to foster proficiency in firearms and the firearm is, at all times, kept within the premises of the shooting range
or


at a target firearm shooting competition under the auspices of or approved by a State agency or nonprofit organization and the firearm is, at all times, kept within the premises of the shooting competition
[...]
By the way ... Are you planning a vacation in the future? It's a two-week trip to Europe? Uh oh. Better not leave your guns with your roommate. Schumer's bill criminalizes such a loan if it lasts longer than seven days because ... I guess your roommate goes psycho on the eighth?

Oh, and if a gun is lost or stolen you're required to report that to the feds and local authorities within 24 hours. Or else.

By the way, the point has been made that background checks make sense only if they include registration of firearms and owners, otherwise the provision is unenforceable. Ah, yes. The legislation specifies:


Regulations promulgated under this paragraph—

shall include a provision requiring a record of transaction of any transfer that occurred between an unlicensed transferor and unlicensed transferee accordance with paragraph (1)

Hmmm ...

Of course, the restrictions in this legislation are so intrusive and petty, requiring people to change private behavior regarding the use and exchange of guns that are not yet (and probably never will be) known to the government, that I would expect casual and often unwitting defiance of its provisions to be more common than compliance (I know that I have no intention of obeying the damned thing). Which will turn the law, should it pass, into one more legal booby trap to be used at the discretion of the authorities.

You can follow the progress of the "Fix Gun Checks Act of 2013" here.

[HOLLYWOOD]

"Fix Gun Checks Act of 2013"

This is an important issue... It's the usual suspects taking all the rights away and any defense against their authoritarian rule. Leahy, Feinstein, Schumer... the elitists want themselves protected well, with complete rule over the masses. These are the same people militarizing arming of the POLICE STATE at all levels. These are the same people who basically have given the Judicial Branch the 'GREEN LIGHT' to jail & kill Americans across the country with impunity.

[jkr]

FILL THOSE PRIVATE PRISONS FOR US SO WE CAN HAZ MOAR MONIES ( EVENT THOUGH WE PRINT SAID MONEY INTO EXISTENCE)

WE WANT YOUR MONEY (TIME)!!!!

THESE PEOPLE THINK WE ARE THEIR $LAVE$ 4 REEL

[Todd]

http://lewrockwell.com/rep4/gun-bills-advance.html

the committee passed Sen. Schumer’s S. 374


Sharing a gun for self-defense anywhere outside the home, no matter how extreme the situation. For example, imagine that two women are driving at night and break down on a deserted road. The younger woman, whose handgun was in the car, walks a few miles to the nearest gas station. She gives her handgun to the older woman, so that the older woman can protect herself. That would be a "transfer" under S. 374, so not doing a background check through a dealer would be a federal crime.


Lending a friend your gun while the two of you go target shooting on a farm, on public land, or in any other informal setting that isn’t on a range owned by an incorporated conservation or marksmanship group.


Teaching an NRA firearms safety class or hunter safety class in a classroom. Despite anti-gunners’ attempt to wrap themselves in the flag of gun safety, and their efforts in some states and localities to pass mandatory training requirements, the bill has no exception for training classes that don’t occur on a range.


Lending a firearm to a friend for hunting in any location where hunting is not permitted. A person living in a suburban or urban area where no hunting is allowed would break the law if he lent a gun to a friend who was going to use it for hunting in a permissible area in the countryside.


http://onlygunsandmoney.blogspot.com/2013/03/s-374-protecting-responsible-gun.html

[Lucille]

GOA email:


Sen. Reid Beefs up “Base Bill” to
Destroy Gun Ownership

"Unholy alliances" could become a concern

We now know a lot more about what's going to happen with gun control legislation than we did a few days ago.

First, the number of the bill we are fighting is S. 649. Harry Reid introduced it on Thursday and brought it directly onto the Senate calendar. This means the bill can now come up at any time — probably soon after the Easter recess is over.

Second, the bill is a lot worse than even we anticipated.

We expected it to contain the Veterans Gun Ban, which would mean that you would sell, gift, or raffle a gun in America at the risk of a 15-year prison sentence because of something you didn't know about the veteran/buyer.

But, surprisingly to us, the Far Left has convinced Reid to include the original Schumer version of the Universal Registry Bill. This would ban private sales of firearms, unless purchasers first get the permission from the government. If Senators can pass this de facto registration bill, they will be well on the way to confiscation (see, for example, Governor Andrew Cuomo in New York, who has a gun owner registry and has called for gun confiscation). If this bill is passed, Senators will claim that they "broke the back" of gun owners in America.

Third, there is still every evidence that Reid will move to proceed to the bill under "regular order," which means he will need 60 votes to advance to the "gun control buffet."

GOA has been talking and making our case with a host of Senate Republicans, and we would hope that everyone in the Senate understands the importance of stopping the "motion to proceed" to Reid's gun control legislation.

Fourth, as we predicted, anti-gun zealots have begun to use the "ObamaCare Paradigm" to threaten, bribe, and coerce senators into submission on the most far-reaching aspects of gun control, including Feinstein's proposal to ban shotguns, rifles and handguns that millions of Americans legally own. So if the "motion to proceed" to S. 649 is adopted with 60 votes, then Feinstein's ban could be passed in the Senate with only 50 votes (plus Biden). Click here for a more technical explanation as to how this would occur.

Already, articles are being published to intimidate any Democratic Senator who votes against any gun control and threatening them with the prospect of facing an anti-gun primary challenger — just like we saw on ObamaCare.

Fifth, there may be unholy alliances at work which could succeed in achieving a dangerous gun control compromise. One Capitol Hill newspaper is now reporting that "Sen. Joe Manchin and the National Rifle Association are quietly engaged in private talks on a proposal to broaden background checks on purchasers of firearms." We hope this is not true, however you should be aware of this report and use whatever contacts you have to prevent this from happening. Be assured, you can rely on Gun Owners of America to never engage in any compromises!

ACTION: The strategy remains: We need to defeat this bill by filibustering and voting down the "motion to proceed" to S. 649. Please contact your senators and distribute this alert far and wide.

Click here to send your Senators a prewritten email. (http://capwiz.com/gunowners/issues/alert/?alertid=62542476)

Show up at their offices with a delegation during the congressional recess. Rally and conduct demonstrations and call-a-thons and writing campaigns. Know that the anti-gun Left will be doing the same.