We don’t have gun registration - Colorado doesn’t care what I carry once I get the permit. I’m not afeared of some mugger coming after me for my custom Colt & I’d much rather carry openly so the criminals would go pick on the unarmed, but I don’t particularly like the thought that some theoretical anti-gun company could quietly check up on me before making a hiring decision (or something), or that some nutball from the Brady Bunch might decide to adopt the anti-abortion freaks tactics and come make a scene in front of my house.
But I’d really much rather someone point out to criminals “Hey, Bobo has a carry permit and several advanced firearm defense classes. You might want to leave him alone.”
That way I don’t have to waste ammo on non-edible targets
I do know folks who won’t put an NRA sticker on their car or home because they think that’ll encourage thieves to come after their guns. These are the people that had a fit about the records being available - They tend to have sections of PVC buried in the backyard too, so there’s more going on in their heads than most of us care to know.
Er, for non-conspiracy inclined, large PVC pipe with waterproof caps stuffed full of a weapon and ammo can be buried in the yard so when they come for your guns, they only get what you have in the safe. link
But, at some place along the chain of custody, that gun had to change hands from a legitimate owner (the manufacturer, a licensed dealer, a private citizen) to a person who should not have a gun (the black market dealer, the felon).
What a registry allows is for the police to determine where this happened, and who the last legal keeper of the gun was. They can then attempt to determine how that gun made its way from a legitimate to an illegitimate owner. And if the legitimate owner failed to take appropriate steps to ensure that the purchaser was legit, then the legitimate owner should face some tough questions.
Every single gun that gets used in a crime must, at some stage, transfer from a legitimate owner to the criminal who uses it. If we can work out where that happens, we stand a better chance of reducing the guns that get used in crimes. This works for things like cars; i don’t see why it can’t work for guns. And if it so far hasn’t worked, it doesn’t mean that it couldn’t, if properly implemented.
You realize that this is one of the reasons that gun owners like me are opposed to registries, don’t you? Because this is exactly what happened to law-abiding citizens of Chicago, Washington DC and California.
Bans were passed and registries were used as round up lists. We just don’t usually get the anti-gun people to admit that this is their aim.
Do you have a cite that doesn’t come from a fictional TV show? Any cite that a registry has done more good than harm?
What? You actually thought you were going to pass off a fairy tale of Hollywood as a fact to back your point up with?
It’s quite a lot harder to smuggle cars into the country. It’s a lot easier to dispose of a gun than it is to dispose of a car. It won’t do a damn thing about criminals who use guns. Instead of focusing on burdening the lawful gun owner, why aren’t you focusing on what you can do about the criminals?
I am by no means an “anti-gun” person. I think you should need a permit to carry a handgun. I dopn’t think the government should destroy all trace of the information you gave them when you apply for one. I think the government should take away your guns if you discharge a weapon illegally, or commit a felony. All of them. I don’t think the honor system is the way to do that. If that makes me “anti-gun” then OK, but then the alternative is “active militia member.”
catsix, just for the record, I’m actually on your side. Y’know, friendly fire and all that?
In any event, here is an excerpt and a cite. I’ll cast around in our pond some more when I have the time. Please note that my views upthread were thoughts, and therefore by definition theories.
You will note that I originally said something along the lines of *encouraging * responsible gun ownership. How I arrived at this theory is contained in the bolded section. In my view, the 0,1% rate of legal gun criminalism suggests that legal gun owners are less inclined to perform criminal acts. I’m suggesting that the possibility that they can somehow be traced perhaps makes them less inclined to pull the trigger indiscriminately. Again, these are just my thoughts, my theory.
Is there empirical evidence of a highly efficient ballistic capability in the hands of the authorities, while linked to a gun register? I don’t know, but the theory does seem appealing.
I believe there are times when the government ought to take an individual’s guns away. All his guns. If the government has no record of how many guns the individual has, they pretty much have to rely on his honesty.
Anything that would cause a person’s guns to be taken away but still allow you to be free would also result in some sort of probation. POs are allowed to search the parolee’s house regularly as a condition of that probation. The government has adequate opportunity to find anything and everything they need to find. Besides, your system presumes guilt, which is antithetical to the way it should be. The implicit assumption in your statement is that guns are nothing more than an instrument of crime, and that when they are used they should be confiscated, else why would we keep track of them unless we’re expecting crimes to be committed?
Or you could have the Police Department have a record of which and how many guns you have. If a gun is taken off of a criminal, they’ll know it’s yours, whether that’s good for you or not. If you’re convicted of a crime, they can say “Congressman, following your arrest for kidnapping, false imrisonment menacing and reckless endangerment, and your conviction for disorderly conduct, the court has instructed you to produce and surrender the following handguns: … Warmest regards, The Steuben County Sherrif’s Department.”
Couldn’t the guns come in across the border or from overseas and not have ever been in the database? It’s much easier to sneak in a gun than it is a car.
There’s already hundreds of millions of guns in the US. There’s no way to track them all. It’s just not possible. You would be lucky if after ten years 10% of the guns were in the system.
Even if it were possible, it’s still a bad idea anyway because of the dangers of giving the government that information. It would just be too tempting to start collecting them up once you know where they all are.
He worded it in such a way as to imply that guns encouraged criminal activity in their owners when Bobo was talking about gun owners being cautious about their guns being stolen by criminals.
If you don’t see the difference, then that’s your problem.
I have a license to carry a concealed weapon, like a lot of other people around here do, and the state has a record of it. What they do not have, and never should have, is a list of firearms that I own. They’ve proven that such lists are merely tools for confiscation by doing exactly that with gun registries in Chicago, California, and DC.
Bobo also slyly implied that those who oppose gun registries are nutters who bury things in their yards.
I think the only reson I wouldn’t be putting NRA stickers around my house is that it would cause hostility from my anti-gun neighbors. I’m not worried about a criminal knowing I have guns, if anything it’ll probably make a burglar more likely to rob someone else. Then again, I’ve got a Nosler patch on my backpack along with my Hunter Safety patch.
