Posted on 05/05/2005 2:18:30 PM PDT by BCR #226
PLEASE PASS THIS ONTO OTHER WEBSITES, YOUR FRIENDS, CLUB BULLETIN BOARDS, EMAIL, ETC. THIS WILL SPREAD IF IT IS NOT STOPPED NOW. IT'S A SURE BET IT WILL BE INTRODUCED INTO CONGRESS EVEN IF IT FAILS TO PASS IN CALIFORNIA.
SAAMI - Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturer's Institute, Inc.
TO: ALL MEDIA April 26, 2005 FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT: Lawrence G. Keane, General Counsel (Cell: 203/526-6773)
RESPONSE TO ATTORNEY GENERAL LOCKYER'S PRESS CONFERENCE AND TESTIMONY IN SUPPORT OF SB 357 (SEN. DUNN) BULLET SERIALIZATION
Question: Was Attorney General Lockyer correct when he claimed today that it would only cost manufacturers "one quarter of one cent" in additional cost in order to laser engrave a serial number on the base and side of a bullet of "handgun ammunition", as required by SB 357?
Was the Attorney General's office accurate when it stated other costs (i.e. handling) would bring the increase to approximately one half of one cent.
Was the bill sponsor, Sen. Dunn, correct when he claimed that the "cost is negligible" and that it was "easy to implement" bullet serialization into the ammunition manufacturing process?
Answer: No. The Attorney General and Senator Dunn's cost estimates are seriously WRONG and without any basis in fact. Unfortunately, the Attorney General's office and Sen. Dunn are willfully uninformed about modern ammunition manufacturing processes.
Had the Attorney General's office, Sen. Dunn or the sole-sourced, skateboard company with this technology, Ravensforge, bothered to contact the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers' Institute, Inc. (SAAMI), the technical trade association of the nation's leading manufacturers of sporting firearms and ammunition, or any of the major ammunition manufacturers, they would have learned that it would cost each ammunition manufacturer tens of millions of dollars to manufacture serialized ammunition. In order to comply, ammunition manufacturers would need to build a new factory.
The cost of ammunition would increase from pennies now to several dollars per cartridge. It is sheer, uninformed fantasy to suggest that costs would only increase by half a cent.
The ammunition industry is a high-volume, low-profit margin business. The three largest ammunition manufacturers (Federal Cartridge, Winchester and Remington Arms) produce more than 15 million cartridges a day! Even if it took just a fraction of a second to laser engrave a bullet with a serial number, ammunition production would be slowed down dramatically. SAAMI estimates that it would take as much as three weeks to make what is now manufactured in a single day! No manufacturer can withstand such a massive slow-done in production. They would cease to be profitable. Instead manufacturers would have no alternative but to abandon the California market. This is because the tens of millions of dollars needed to comply with SB 357 far exceeds the reasonable profit a manufacturer could ever hope to make selling ammunition in the California market. The cost to comply would bankrupt any manufacturer that tried. Even abandoning the California market comes at a cost. Manufacturers will suffer lost sales and profits; but the lesser of two evils remains to abandon the market.
SAAMI offered to take members of the Legislature, including Sen. Dunn, and the Attorney General's office, on a tour of an ammunition manufacturing plant. Regrettably, neither Sen. Dunn, nor the Attorney General's office availed themselves of this opportunity to learn first-hand why this proposal is infeasible.
Question: Is it accurate, as the Attorney General's office argued today, that putting serial numbers on bullets is no different than what other product manufacturers, like drug companies, do in putting a serial number on the product packaging?
Answer: No. Drug companies, for example, may put a lot number or other identifying code on their product packaging, but they do not put a unique serial number on individual aspirin tablets. Placing lot numbers on product packaging is not done to identify and record in a government-run database the identity of law-abiding consumers. Major ammunition manufacturers, like other product manufacturers, already put lot numbers on their product packaging to identify when the product was made. Imagine what would happen to the price of a bottle of aspirin if drug companies had to place a unique serial number on each aspirin tablet?
Question: Was it accurate when the Attorney General's office said "industry" test fired bullets to determine whether the technology worked?
Answer: No. The Attorney General's office was misleading if it was trying to suggest that any major ammunition or firearm manufacturer assisted in conducting any testing of this technology. Certainly the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers' Institute, Inc. was never contacted by the California Department of Justice or the sole-source vendor of this technology, Ravensforge, which primarily manufactures products to protect property from skateboards.
SAAMI remains concerned that there has been insufficient objective, independent testing of this technology on the hundreds of different types of ammunition that exist. We have significant questions about whether a micro-laser engraved serial number placed on the side of a bullet (projectile) would still be readable after the bullet has traveled down the rifled-surface length of a barrel at a very high velocity (1,200 feet per second) while at the same time rotating at a high RPM rate. The Legislature should require more testing than the extremely limited, non-scientific testing done by the sole-sourced vendor, Ravensforge.
SAAMI, as it has in the past with other technologies like "ballistic imaging," supports further independent, objective, peer-reviewed testing of this technology.
Question: Was the Attorney General's office accurate when it said this bill would not impact rifles?
Answer: No. The bill applies to so-called "handgun ammunition," which the bill fails to define. The bill would apply, for example, to .22 caliber rimfire ammunition because there are handguns chambered in that caliber. However, there are tens of millions of rifles that are also chambered in .22 caliber, which is the single must common caliber ammunition for target shooting.
There are many, many other examples of rifles that are chambered in calibers that are also common for handguns. This has become increasingly common as Cowboy Action Shooting has become very popular, including in California.
Question: Was the Attorney Generals office correct in stating that this bill would not impact non-serialized ammunition owned by consumers after the effective date of the bill.
Answer: No. In fact, this bill, when coupled with the certain abandonment of the California market place by ammunition manufacturers, becomes a de facto ammunition ban and confiscation. Consumers may possess non-serialized ammunition in their home, but the moment they walk outside their house to drive to their local shooting range for an afternoon of target shooting they become a criminal. The only realistic option for consumers is to turn over to local enforcement any non-serialized ammunition in their possession. We agree with the Attorney General's office that hundreds of millions of rounds of ammunition are purchased each year by consumers in California. A conservative estimate would be that law enforcement would confiscate at least 500 million rounds of non-serialized ammunition from law-abiding Californians, but not a single cartridge from a criminal.
Question: Was Senator Dunn's comparison of bullet serialization to a DNA database valid?
Answer: No. California does not fingerprint or take DNA samples of every person residing or visiting California, although it is technically feasible to do so and many more crimes would be solved. This is because the vast, overwhelming majority of citizens are not committing crimes. Similarly, the vast, overwhelming majority of gun owners are, as even the Attorney General's office acknowledged today, law-abiding. Collecting the identity of law-abiding consumers when they legally purchase ammunition for lawful purposes will not, SAAMI believes, materially assist law enforcement. This is because criminals do not and will not walk into a firearm dealer and provide identification when they purchase ammunition. They acquire ammunition the same place they obtain firearms; they steal them or they get them on the illegal black market. This bill will simply create overnight an illegal black market for non-serialized ammunition.
Question: Is it accurate that this bill will not impact law enforcement?
Answer: No. This bill will have a substantial adverse impact on law enforcement and municipal budgets.
The bill does not exempt law enforcement from its requirements. Therefore, state and local law enforcement will not be able to purchase non-serialized ammunition from manufacturers. As explained above, manufacturers cannot incur the massive costs to make serialized ammunition. Therefore, it remains unclear from whom law enforcement will purchase ammunition for training and use in the field. If they are able to secure serialized ammunition, the price of such ammunition will be substantially higher than current prices. This will likely lead to deleterious consequences, like a marked decline in law enforcement training to improve and retain officers' marksmanship because a municipality or the state will not be able to afford the price of training ammunition.
As always, for more information, please contact me at 203-426-1320 or visit www.saami.org.
I believe that the bill was amended to exempt law-enforcement agencies. Personally, I think that the ammunition manufacturers should simply refuse to do business with any of them if this passes.
Hey, it worked in Maine - the AW bill was voted down after Bushmaster told the legiscritters that it would cut off LE if it could no longer sell its products in state. This is no different.
Reloading without using approved serialized bullets will be a felony for EACH round.
Even I don't believe the bastards are crazy enough to write a law that requires everyone in the country to scrap or "turn in" all their pre-Law unserialized ammo?
I don't even want to think about the folks that would want to return it with "extreme prejudice"...
Semper Fi
Well, it's been written.
You can read it here:
http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/bill/sen/sb_0351-0400/sb_357_bill_20050504_amended_sen.html
My prediction:
language will be added to exempt CA LE agencies
The amended bill will pass both Assembly and Senate
Arnie will veto.
Getting Arnie to veto this "crime prevention" measure is the real reason that Lockyer pushed for this while he was planning a run for Governor. Now that he's out of that race, he's just trying to get some free publicity.
Because when the sh$% comes down (and I'm thinking more and more that it eventually will), the populace will opt for the much-more-fun activity of hanging the bastards from lampposts.
As a deterrant to other tyrants, ya see.
Same, same !.......don't forget to grab a brick of 22 rimfire at wally world whenever ya grab yer grub and goobers !
Then, thanks to the PATRIOT Act, they'll be able to go through your bank records and credit card purchases. So, I sure hope you didn't buy any of that stuff mail order and put it on your Visa card.
Before you know it, there'll be 'safety checks' for folks coming across the Nevada border. You know, just to make sure you ain't smuggling in any Bullseye or IMR products.
But, what do I know...
L
Each year new 'abuses and usurpations' are written into law and debuted around New Years. Likewise, each year it becomes more difficult to remain law abiding. Outlawism is beginning to look more and more attractive, and from a purely economic perspective, the better choice.
From the experts, SAAMI.
This is exactly what the Kali polidiots want: No ammo in Kali. It has been their stated goal all along. I forget who the polidiot was who said that if they cannot ban guns, they will ban the ammunition. I believe that was Sarah Brady of Handgun Control, Inc.
I just hope that the ammunition guys do as Barrett rifles has: Forbids sales to the Kali government. "If we can't sell to the people, we won't sell to you."
"The bill does not exempt law enforcement from its requirements. "
It will for the bill to pass.
There will be a small fortune to be made running ammo into Kali.
Yep, and the bill has been amended to exempt government and LEO...
I urge everyone to contact the ammo makers and ask that they pull out of California if this bill becomes law. Ask that they not recognise the LEO exemption and ask that they put out public letters on the matter.
Mike
And here, in 10 words, is the real reason they seek to require it. No ammunition? No guns!
This technique is bassackward. The engraving should be done as hologrammed rifling where a machining process layers the rifle grooves with proportions to the weapon's serial number. Beginning with a common identifier groove, the serial number could be determined by the width and depth of rifles groove which corresponds to the digits 0-9.
This would work much like a radial version of a combined Moorse code and Braille. With laser cutting techniques, the cost per weapon could be roughly 2-5$ and it's by far easier, less expensive, and less paperwork to track a weapon by a serial number imprinted onto ammo than it is to log serial numbers for every round of ammo.
Therein lies a quandry. What could the government do to assure compliance? fine every legally registered owner for not complying? confiscate non-compliant weapons, a direct violation of the Second Amendment? or offer incentives to the legal for having this done?
Really, I don't know. But right now, I don't believe the unsolved cases warrant a breach of S.A. rights of current law abiding citizens and I believe any attempt to criminalize those who rather not comply with "new laws" would make the government guilty of violating the "ex-post de-facto" provisions of the Constitution, so if we continue the breach by breach steps on this path government tends to follow, we might as well throw the whole document to the trash.
I expect bullet manufacturers to refuse to sell into Kali.
" Here in Kalifornicate -- you can't be too careful.."
Why don't they just change the state's name to.....
"BANANDFORNICATE"?
Well, it's worked just fine so far. Why not just keep on pushing? Gun owners have been remarkably patient so far, and I think they're banking on a continuation of that patience.
Exactly what CA legislators want.
What they expect to have take its place (black market boom in ammo, alienation of otherwise profoundly law-abiding citizens) is up for grabs.
This, despite the fact that it would make more sense to require police to carry serialized ammo in their duty weapons than to require the general public to use such ammo. Police are more likely than normal persons to find themselves in a situation where more than one person is shooting at someone. Having serialized and tracked ammunition would make it easier to resolve such cases (including those where a stray round injures an innocent bystander).
Exempting police from such a requirement for their duty ammo while subjecting everyone else to such a requirement for their range ammo shows the real intention of the bill.
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