The Totalitarianism Of Universal Background Checks

Finally, some sanity, and from a somewhat unexpected source. The ACLU is concerned about the civil liberties implications of the new Harry Reid Senate bill to establish so-called “universal background checks” for firearms purchases. The organization has tended toward silence on gun rights, but at least now it recognizes aspects of the problem with this terrible proposal.

Ever since Sandy Hook, the Obama administration and its progressive choir have demanded a new Assault Weapons Ban (AWB). Now it looks like that plan is toast. California Senator Dianne Feinstein blames gun owners and the NRA, and in a sense we should have expected all along that this proposal would get nowhere. Such a ban would mostly target “semi-automatic” rifles—which, despite all the hysterics, simply refers to any standard rifle that fires one round each time the trigger is pulled—that happen to have esthetic elements like the pistol grip that do not in fact add to the weapons’ lethality. This is the nonsensical standard used to ban some classes of weapons instrumentally identical to the ones banned in 1994.

The first AWB devastated the Democrats politically, and probably contributed as much as anything to the Republicans’ crushing victory in the 1994 congressional elections after forty years in the legislative minority. It also hurt Al Gore in his run against George W. Bush in 2000. The ban generally prohibited ordinary but scary looking rifles, which are used in about two percent of violent crimes committed with firearms. The law did not apply to, say, most of the weapons used at the Columbine school massacre in 1999. But it did interfere with Americans’ basic right to own what we can fairly call the modern version of the musket. Millions of Americans own such weapons like the AR-15....

The constitution does not say ‘right to bear arms-subject to background check. Why should I have to get a background check to see if I am eligible to participate in the 2nd amendment?

Do I have to prove anything to exercise my freedom ‘of’ religion? Do I have to prove intelligence to enjoy my right to vote??? Do I have to prove anything to have a speedy trial or be confronted by my accusers?

the right to bear arms is NOT like driving on the roads where you must have a license. Driving is not guaranteed by the Constitution but is in fact a privilege that can be controlled by the government. A criminal can loose his/her rights to bear arms based upon a fair trial and court action. If a criminal possesses a firearm after loosing those rights then they have committed another crime for which they can be prosecuted. I do not believe that a background check prior to purchase of firearms by anyone is legal, moral, ethical, or constitutional. Criminals and crazy people are going to get firearms anyway

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