Why many gun owners shouldn't be allowed to have guns

First, that's not true. Most gun owners have guns for sporting or hunting purposes.
And yes, there are many gun owners who have a gun so that they could kill (or incapacitate) if they wanted to. What is wrong with that?
Why do you think police carry guns? Why do you think soldiers carry guns? Why do you think the common people should be deprived of the means of force and the ability to stop something bad from happening in an emergency?

 

I'm merely stating a fact. I'm not adding anything to it, or demanding all guns be confiscated, (it's y'all that always puts THOSE words in my mouth, not me)

 

What you are stating is not a fact, it is your opinion and desire that it be true.

Big difference.

 

Oh please, if you keep a gun for self defense, you are going to have each scenario completely meticulously planned out beforehand to ensure that you are on the right side of the law and don't end up in prison. The only thing you are missing is the victim, but that doesn't matter, it's anyone who triggers the first domino in your thrill kill scene that you have in your head.

 

Same thing applies to those working in law enforcement, though they are usually given the benefit of the doubt.

 

Then perhaps you should explain why you live in the state of Florida, rather than a state such as New York or Massachusetts, where concealed carry permits are difficult to obtain by members of the general public.

 

Wrong. It is because you can't planning each scenario that you keep a gun. BTW, it is not the "victim" you are missing, it is the illegal aggressor.

As a combat veteran, I can tell you that there is no "thrill" to fire at someone, it is self defense and guarding yourself.

It is someone like you that claims each weapon discharge is a thrill. Until you are in that situation that you would realize what you claim is nonsense.

 

Is that how it is for the thousands of people who successfully use their firearm for self defense each year?

 

that's as stupid as saying because I have a fire alarm and an extinguisher I stay up late at night hoping someone torches my house or its is struck by lightning

you really have no clue about gun owners do you? I shot someone because I had to, not because I was hoping to

 

Thanks for your courtesy, it's very refreshing to see on this forum.
In this case, you're assumption is correct. I do believe, as you suggested, that it was largely intended to preserve an effective militia system.

I have a hard time understanding - if a potential buyer's background check demonstrated a criminal record - how that buyer would 'dupe' a seller, or how that seller could be unsuspecting.

In other words, they'd find another criminal to purchase from...? But that criminal would have to get his firearms as well (in order to have them to sell), right? If criminals could only easily purchase from other criminals (rather than from sources that currently outnumber grocery stores), the available supply would dramatically decrease. With decreasing supply (to criminals only) comes an increase in cost (to criminals), which would prevent every 13 year old gangbanger from having access to "a gat".

I totally agree, which is why the concept of catching sellers in the current system is improbable, if not impossible.

 

Lawful owners who performed the background checks on buyers would have created a paper trail demonstrating that they had dealings with the buyer - and were intending to sell the firearm - prior to the alleged theft. That piece of evidence would be significant.

If you're suggesting most owners are not lawful, that's a different discussion entirely.

 

I hope you never have to defend yourself. You will find out in a very real sense why the ability to do so is a human right.

 

scumbag reporters are upset

Too bad but there is no legitimate reason for them to engage in harassment of gun owners. Their purpose was to cause harassment or unease among gun owners. yeah some gun owners over reacted but those "journalists" are evil

 

Wellll . . . what the offended gun owners should have done was get together, hire a PI, discover where every journalist lives and then publish his or her address and the names of all his or her family members. Tit-for-tat.

 

Uhm IIRC they did, well not hire a PI but do the research and post it online.

 

Good for them!

 

You are assuming that everyone knows how to accurately, and correctly, perform a criminal background check, and maintain paperwork in the correct manner.

Unless you have familiarized yourself with the various complexities present, you cannot speak with any authority as to whether or not a seller could produce accurate records.

You assume incorrectly. The statement by the member Bryan is that a criminal looking to acquire a firearm, and forced to go through the purchasing channels, would simply locate an individual who was willing to make the sale without performing the mandated check.

Are you suggesting that there are more stored licensed to sell firearms, than there are grocery stores in the united states?

There are between three and five hundred million firearms already in circulation in the united states. Thousands more are being added daily.

The phrase "good luck" is warranted in the belief that such a number could be meaningfully reduced by even as much as one percent.

Unless said gang bangers stole the firearms from their parents, rather than purchasing them in some back alley.

And yet they are being caught with the system as is. As has been shown already.

You continually worry about the supply matter. Instead you should worry about the issue of demand.

 

You either misunderstand, or you deliberately misinterpret to better support your own position. The question was never about those who intend to lawfully engage in the sale of a firearm. Rather the question was about how, in a system where all firearms are registered, and all transfer involve a background check, would it be gone about proving that the person suspected of supplying firearms to criminals, was not the victim of theft whose firearms were stolen?

If a false report of a stolen firearm is called in, to cover the fact that it was sold illegally, how would you propose disproving the report?

 

This is a procedural issue that would depend on the way legislation was written. Asserting that any solution would just be too complicated for "common folk" to understand or perform correctly is invalid.

If there was a mandated check, and a seller chose not to undertake the check, that seller would be knowingly committing a crime (ie: be a criminal).
Therefore, criminals wanting to purchase would have to purchase from other criminals. Not sure what you don't understand about that.

That hasn't been new news for some time...
http://www.businessinsider.com/more-gun-stores-in-america-than-grocery-stores-2012-12

In the first year, the impact would be minimal, but the number of guns taken from criminals each year would finally outpace the rate at which they get into their hands - so it's the only solution I can think of that would make long-term progress without impacting lawful citizens' ability to purchase.

Sounds like you're making a good case for mandating safe storage capabilities and holding parents legally accountable for crimes committed by their gun-toting offspring. You must be a "banner".

I vaguely recall two links, only one of which had any specific case in which a straw purchaser was actually convicted of anything... What does that singular example prove?

Yeah, we should just make criminals not want guns any more. That's totally realistic.

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I would suggest that mandating safe storage would also be a good idea... Then the viability of "it must have been stolen" would be negligible.

 

I agree the operative clause of the Amendment “the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed” recognized an individual RKBA, and compelled the federal government to respect this right. A byproduct of this right was to prevent Congress from having total domination of the instruments of war. To that extent it preserved a source of arms which could be used in an emergency to arm a militia. I also agree the militia clause was a policy statement indicating that relying on a militia rather than a standing army was the best way to protect against domestic tyranny.

However, beyond this I submit the Amendment did nothing to preserve a militia. If this was the true purpose of the Amendment—to preserve an effective militia system—then it is an absolute failure. What’s more, the men who drafted and ratified it had to know this was true. I welcome your thoughts on how the amendment was intended to preserve an effective militia system, and I am willing to share my reasons for why I disagree.

My words were perhaps imprecise. I agree there are instances today where a private seller who would never intentionally sell to a felon can be duped by a criminal into selling him a gun because there is no background check requirement to test the veracity of the criminal’s statement “sure I am allowed to have a gun…” However, a universal background check will not prevent the “criminal” from obtaining a gun.

I would say don’t confuse “criminal conduct” with “criminal record.” There are all too many people today who have no “criminal record”—people who will go pass a background check to buy a gun—who will later engage in the “criminal conduct” of selling or giving that gun to a known felon for a profit, or as a favor, or for some other private motive. You yourself have acknowledged the near impossibility of disproving such an unscrupulous private seller’s claim: “I never sold him that gun. I have not looked at the gun in months, it must have been stolen.” If you push background checks into the secondary market, and make all lawful transfers from private sellers to another person go through a background check just like if the sale happened by a FFL dealer, then the unscrupulous private seller can still sell his gun under the table and later claim it was stolen.

Let me further explain what I see are the difficulties that exist regardless of whether we have universal background checks or not. All of this assumes that we recover the gun in the first place—for you can’t begin to trace a gun until you recover it. The vast majority of shooting incidents do not involve a “criminal” conveniently dropping his gun at the crime scene for us to trace. But assume we recover the gun (dropped at the scene and linked by DNA evidence to a shooter, or recovered in the shooter’s house during a search warrant raid). The first obstacle you encounter is the shooter’s right to remain silent. He will have no incentive to even acknowledge possessing the gun, much less telling you who he got it from—for to do so would incriminate him in the shooting.

Secondly, assume he did incriminate himself (yes, it happens) and he tells the police “I bought the gun out of the back of a car at a flea market from Mr. Smith for more than it was worth. Mr. Smith knew I was a felon and charged me a higher price.” The police go to Smith who says ”no the gun was stolen.” So say we put Mr. Smith on trial. Only two people know the truth of the matter—the shooter and Mr. Smith. You can’t call Mr. Smith as a witness—he has a right to remain silent, and would deny it even if you could call him as a witness. You can’t just use the statement of the shooter to the police—Mr. Smith has a 6th Amendment right to confront and cross examine his accuser. Therefore, the shooter is going to have to agree to testify. Set aside the witness credibility issue for a moment. The Shooter has no incentive to help you. Indeed, his help could harm him by incriminating him. You either have to offer him immunity from prosecution to force him to testify (and that would be immunity from not only having the gun but for any crime the gun he admits buying and having could be linked to—including our shooting); OR, you have to sweeten the deal enough for him to agree to testify. In effect, you have to offer a plea bargain to the devil to get him to testify against a worshiper. It’s just not something a responsible prosecutor would do absent an extraordinary reason for doing so.

Without the shooter’s co-operation, you are left with trying to talk a confession out of Mr. Smith, or trying some other avenue to find evidence to prove the transfer was not the result of theft. Listen, most straw purchase convictions involve either an outright confession (easy enough case) OR eyewitness/video—where the “criminal” goes to the store with his background check certifiable buddy, and where the criminal picks out and handles the gun, only to get the buddy to buy the gun for him OR a sting where LE gets word a guy is readily buying for criminals, and they pose as one to see if he will get them the gun.

It is extremely difficult to prosecute a straw man sale. Nothing about universal background checks will solve this issue. Nothing about a universal registration system could solve this issue.

 

Meh, let's see how happy you would be if newspapers started printing your address and all of the valuables you own based on sales receipts.

 

If I may butt in....

This depends entirely on how you define the militia. There are two sides to the militia, organized and unorganized. You would be correct in saying that the organized militia is a complete failure as it no longer exists in any effective way. This is a failure of the government, one the founders were concerned about, organized militia has an inherent fault in that it relies on government. However then there's the unorganized militia, this is well everyone capable of bearing arms, this is a moderate success that is getting better. This is every AR, AK, handgun, precision rifle, and ammo stockpile in civilian hands.

"A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of the free state". Regulated is organized, this part refers to organized militia and is a failure, thus the second clause becomes even more important. "The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed", This is unorganized militia, this is a moderate success but getting better.

 

And an eighty year old firearms owner who wishes to sell some of his collection, can be reasonably expected to not only comprehend, but also comply with new procedural forms?

Because knowingly supplying a firearm to a criminal is not currently a crime already, correct?

Your point being what precisely?

The accuracy of such findings are debatable in and of themselves.

The number of firearms currently held by the general public is three to five hundred million. Thousands of new firearms are being added to that amount daily. Do you truly believe that number could be reduced by any meaningful degree, when there would be no way of enforcing a mandate for universal background checks on private sales?

Which would be of no use when even the parents are not in legal possession of a firearm.

You cannot mandate that criminals keep their illegally procured firearms locked up, and inaccessible by their children.

That the system in place does indeed work. The prosecutor simply needs to do their job, and prove that a crime was committed.

Again, you either misunderstand, or deliberately misinterpret.

Why should those who have proven themselves untrustworthy, and most likely to misuse a firearm to harm others, be allowed to remain in society where they can do the most harm?

Which could easily be rendered useless the moment the seller claimed the prospective buyer grabbed the firearm during the inspection period, and fled the scene with it in tow.

 

Very good explanation!

 

Not only domestic tyranny, but also foreign invaders (keeping in mind this was a real concern to a newly-established country whose Founders did not support maintaining a standing military unless war was declared).

Lacking a military, preservation of "the security of a free state" was to be the function of the militia. The Militia Act clearly spelled out the format the Founders had in mind.

The lawful seller knowing that a potential buyer is a criminal would prevent that lawful seller from providing the firearm.
This means criminal buyers would only have other criminals to purchase from.
Since the vast majority (if not all) firearms start off in the hands of "lawful sellers" (unless we want to claim manufacturers are criminals), this would limit criminal supply of firearms to those that can be smuggled internationally. This is a significant reduction in the ability of criminals to arm themselves, with no material impact on lawful purchasers.

I didn't mean to imply that UBCs alone would form a total solution (though it'd have a dramatic effect). I also believe that safe storage of firearms when not being carried would be a major benefit, as it would make the "I leave my gun laying around and it must have been stolen" defense less viable.

If, to use one of your examples, police exercise a search warrant on a shooting suspect's home and locate a weapon that they can confirm (through ballistics) was the weapon used in the crime being investigated... They had enough evidence to obtain a warrant, and found the "smoking gun" in the suspect's home... Do you really believe there isn't enough material evidence and a full confession is required?
Besides, how is this situation improved with no background checks being performed in firearm sales?

Statements made to the police can be presented as evidence. In your specific example, the shooter has admitted to purchasing the weapon - and that admission can be introduced at the shooter's trial. Also in your specific example, "Mr Smith" admitted that the gun was not stolen - and the fact it was used in a crime, as well as his admission it was not stolen, can be raised at his trial. Not responding to these points would send a pretty clear message to any "reasonable" jury.