wiki: In a letter that was sent to President Abraham Lincoln) and published in The New York Times , R.G. Moulton and R.B. Perry recommended forming an organization similar to the British National Rifle Association, which had formed a year and a half earlier. They suggested making a shooting range, perhaps on the base on Staten Island], and were offering Whitworth rifles for prizes for the first shooting competition with those rifles. They suggested a provisional committee to start the Association which would include: President Lincoln, Secretary of War, officers, and other prominent New Yorkers.
The National Rifle Association was first chartered in the State of New York on November 16, 1871 by Army and Navy Journal editor William Conant Church and Captain George Wood Wingate On November 25, 1871, the group voted to elect its first corporate officers. Union Army Civil War General Ambrose Burnside, who had worked as a gunsmith was elected president.
In other words, in 1871 New york was pro NRA to help future Army recruits be better shots.
The NRA was non-partisan until the 1970’s, when it reacted to increasing gun control bills.
I realize this is a fool’s errand, but let’s try a thought experiment for a moment. Let’s imagine that the AG of NY gets wind of possible fraud and self-dealing from a non-profit org, say the National Telemarketers Association. This info comes from published articles and lawsuits the NTA is involved in. Should the AG investigate? This is a Yes or No question, by the way. The AG does investigate and uncovers massive (alleged) fraud. Should the AG bring charges? This is also a Yes or No question.
The state of NY, without question, has authority and the duty to investigate and, if necessary, sue the pants off a corrupt corporation that was formed in the state and under the laws of the state.
That’s a good point, Pantastic, the NRA and their PR flacks had done an excellent job at taking credit for being the biggest most active defenders of gun rights but a lot of that was often more in the role as electoral “influencers” rather than actually going out there and fighting on the lines.
And as to how come the NRA did not do the sensible thing years ago to reconstitute itself in a friendlier jurisdiction when it could… No idea, but one could speculate that someone may have thought of it, but then someone else realized that closing the books of the former National Rifle Association, NY nonprofit, and opening the books of NRA of America, Texas nonprofit, would involve having those books looked at by third parties.
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BTW last year I visited the NRA Museum at their HQ in Chantilly VA (free entry). They have a quite impressive collection, sure, but design, presentation and curation were IMO inconsistent and not really at 2019 standards, and frankly gave me a vibe of that it’s not a high budgetary priority. Some of it hit me like one of those projects where the team starts very detailed and thorough and going for the best and then at some point it’s like “OMG we’ve consumed two thirds of the budget, the space and the time allotted, and we still have two thirds of the work to do!”. One of the staff admitted that shoehorning it into a not-purpose-built commercial property didn’t help.
I’m curious how you think this is supposed to work?
Generally law enforcement thinks they see someone is breaking the law so they bring a case and it gets sorted out in the courts.
Given how big and powerful the NRA is I would be shocked if the NY AG didn’t already have the goods on them. But still, the NRA will get their day in court to defend themselves.
How else would you have it? An AG who perceives rampant illegal activity and ignores it because she really likes the NRA? That, to me, is the politically motivated move.
Trying to prosecute them is upholding the law.
If this turns out to be, as you suspect, a politically motivated attack then we will find out in court. Again, I can not imagine this case was brought without the NY AG having all her ducks in a row and buy-in from loads of higher-ups which suggests to me she has a really, really good case.
But maybe you are right and she’s got nothing, went after one of the most powerful organizations in the country with nothing more than an agenda to make a few headlines.
It may still be the case that the individuals get charged criminally. Legal actions related to the same facts don’t always get taken simultaneously. Since LaPierre & close deputies would have to have been overseen by the Board of the corporate body, it is understandable that the corporate body be sued for redress to the membership/donors for failing to detect and stop the misdeeds. Hell, if LaPierreists drove out out independent Board members and executives and packed it with cronies, that would itself be a strategy so that it is the organization and not themselves who takes the hard hit.
Supposedly Oliver North, former NRA president, cooperated in the investigation, and he was raising the alarm about the issues set forth in the New York complaint last year. Despite the fact that it was a Democratic attorney general who brought the charges, there is something here.
I’m going to move this over to GD. It could be a part of MPSIMS under the ‘breaking news’ rule but I figure this might go a few directions MPSIMS isn’t equipped to deal with.
Cite for this claim, please? I don’t know that that is generally the case. This NY Times article about the dissolution of the Trump Foundation by the NY AG (an analog to what is happening here) says:
The Trump Foundation is hardly the first charity dissolved by the state — Mr. Schneiderman previously shut down a sham breast cancer charity, for example.
I don’t think the NRA had a lot to do with the Heller decision. They weren’t involved in filing the initial suit against the District of Columbia and actually didn’t want the case to go all the way to the Supreme Court. The most important gun control cases protecting the rights of individuals to own firearms were not instigated by the NRA.
