Tragic: Every Single Bump Stock In Nation Suddenly Lost In Boating Accident

[TerryMiller]

Just to point out something, even the freedom of speech has been limited. After all, one can't holler, "Fire" in a crowded theater, even if one has free speech. I think the courts have even upheld this restriction. I would venture to say that each, and maybe every, right guaranteed by the Bill of Rights can be restricted in some way and it be "legal."

 

[Dave70968]

Just to point out something, even the freedom of speech has been limited. After all, one can't holler, "Fire" in a crowded theater, even if one has free speech. I think the courts have even upheld this restriction. I would venture to say that each, and maybe every, right guaranteed by the Bill of Rights can be restricted in some way and it be "legal."

You refer, of course, to Schenck v. United States, 249 U.S. 47, 1919. Decided unanimously, the opinion was written by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. That case is commonly misunderstood in current context, and in fact, even Justice Holmes ultimately backed away from it (which is telling, since Holmes was tremendously deferential to governmental power--this is the guy who gave us Buck v. Bell, 274 U.S. 200 (1927), upholding the government's power to forcibly sterilize people for eugenic reasons six years before Hitler came to power).

https://www.popehat.com/2012/09/19/...hackneyed-apologia-for-censorship-are-enough/ . The money quote:

After Holmes' opinions in the Schenck trilogy, the law of the United States was this: you could be convicted and sentenced to prison under the Espionage Act if you criticized the war, or conscription, in a way that "obstructed" conscription, which might mean as little as convincing people to write and march and petition against it. This is the context of the "fire in a theater" quote that people so love to brandish to justify censorship.​

(Popehat, Ken White, is a noted First Amendment and criminal defense lawyer, and a former Assistant United States Attorney. He knows from whence he speaks.)

Ultimately, it took fifty years to get Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. 444 (1969), to overrule the steaming turd that was Schenk and give us the modern "clear and present danger" test. Schenck is no longer good law, and we're better off for it. As Popehat puts it:

Holmes' shocking callousness in [Buck v. Bell] is different than his language in Schenck, but his casual and colloquial approach to endorsing government power over individuals is the same. As in Schenck, he offers a catchy slogan where a meticulous and principled standard is called for.

Bear all of that in mind the next time someone name-drops Holmes and cites Schenck as part of a broad endorsement of censorship. The problem isn't that they're incorrectly citing Holmes. The problem is that they are citing him exactly right, for the vague, censorious, and fortunately long-departed "standard" he articulated. Justice Holmes, three generations of hearing your sound-bite are enough.​

 

[Glocktogo]

Get most of your exercise by jumping to conclusions? Learn more about yourself by putting words into other people's mouths?

For the record, this is what I said about bump stocks: "If every single one of them were dumped in the Pacific Ocean, the world would not be a whit poorer for it." See the word "ban" in there somewhere? Reading is fundamental.

Yes you did say that. But when asked, you went further:

I haven't banned anything. Machine guns have been regulated since 1934. Devices like the bump-fire stock, which mimic full auto fire while attempting to circumvent Federal law, have just been banned by Mr. Trump's DOJ. My fingerprints cannot be found on any of this.

Congress, even back in '34, is empowered to pass legislation. The NFA of 1934 is Federal law. Should we celebrate ingenuity used to circumvent Federal law? I don't think so.

So what? Whether I "condone" it or not is beside the point. You asked me what else I'd like to ban. I'm not in the business of banning things.

First of all, mimicry is NOT a circumvention of federal law. A bump stock does not in any way, shape or form meet the criteria that the federal law explicitly describes to be a machinegun, regardless of what bureaucrats say. Nowhere in the NFA Act does it authorize the administrative branch to ban a "machinegun like" object.

Second, the major federal gun control laws are in fact usurpations of powers not granted to either the legislative or administrative branches of the government by the Constitution. Not a circumvention, a flat out illegal usurpation.

To conclude, we know you dislike bump stocks. A lot of us don't like them and would never own one. But where we differ is that we will defend them. Why? Because the rule of law is also under attack. Property rights are under attack. Due process is under attack. Separation of powers is under attack. This one single act being carried out by a temporarily installed bureaucrat, under the express directive of the president, is a multi-faceted attack on the very foundations of our Republic.


So stop with the coy deflections and own your beliefs on the matter. Either you do or you do not support the actions of the President, as condoned by the legislative branch and the NRA, to ban bump stocks in contradiction of the law and Constitution. No fence straddling here, which is it?

 

[SMS]

Doesn't do any good to keep your bumpstock and say you lost it in a boating accident. Why keep it when you can't use it?

The enforcement mechanism being easily avoided doesn't make the rule any less unconstitutional.

 

[mightymouse]

A bump stock does not in any way, shape or form meet the criteria that the federal law explicitly describes to be a machinegun, regardless of what bureaucrats say.

Second, the major federal gun control laws are in fact usurpations of powers not granted to either the legislative or administrative branches of the government by the Constitution. Not a circumvention, a flat out illegal usurpation.

To begin with, the reason we are having this discussion is because the bureaucrats have ruled that a bump stock is a machine gun, regardless of what the Internet experts say. Second, federal gun control laws are in fact federal gun control laws. You don't like 'em, anymore than I like bump-stocks, but you and I both have to live with them.

And, yes, I am aware that the future of the Republic is once again in grave danger. The sky is falling literally every damn day on OSA, but I'm used to it.

 

[tRidiot]

To begin with, the reason we are having this discussion is because the bureaucrats have ruled that a bump stock is a machine gun, regardless of what the Internet experts say. Second, federal gun control laws are in fact federal gun control laws. You don't like 'em, anymore than I like bump-stocks, but you and I both have to live with them.

He's saying the actual LAW provides a DEFINITION of an automatic weapon (aka machine gun)... and bureaucrats can't change that, as they can't change the law. Only Congress can change it, or the courts can throw it out. Unelected bureaucrats can do neither.

 

[Dave70968]

To begin with, the reason we are having this discussion is because the bureaucrats have ruled that a bump stock is a machine gun, regardless of what the Internet experts say. Second, federal gun control laws are in fact federal gun control laws. You don't like 'em, anymore than I like bump-stocks, but you and I both have to live with them.

No, we don't have to live with them. That interpretation is not a law. We can challenge that interpretation...which I'm given to understand is being done. Time will tell whether or not the courts do the right thing, but given what I've seen of them elsewhere (notably, in a R/C model airplane case), I have some faith that the courts will get it right. What Congress does with that afterward, I don't know.

 

[mightymouse]

No, we don't have to live with them.

We will until they are changed or overturned. Lots of opinions in this thread--these laws are "illegal usurpations", and so forth, but the fact remains that the NFA of 1934, the GCA of 1968, and the recent ruling by Trump's DOJ on bump-stocks are things that we may not like, but at the same time are things that will stand until they are overturned, or not.

 

[mightymouse]

He's saying the actual LAW provides a DEFINITION of an automatic weapon (aka machine gun)... and bureaucrats can't change that, as they can't change the law. Only Congress can change it, or the courts can throw it out. Unelected bureaucrats can do neither.

Again, that does not matter in the context of this discussion. Unelected bureaucrats have ruled that bump-stocks are the same as machine guns. Internet experts don't like that interpretation, and the courts can in fact over-turn it. It remains to be seen if they will.

 

[dennishoddy]

Again, that does not matter in the context of this discussion. Unelected bureaucrats have ruled that bump-stocks are the same as machine guns. Internet experts don't like that interpretation, and the courts can in fact over-turn it. It remains to be seen if they will.

That was my point in another thread.
Unelected bureaucrats have made a ruling that any freshman in law school could easily defeat with the wording they wrote it with.
The same bureaucrats tried to take over puddles of water in my wheat fields as federal waters that was just recently rescinded.
We need to fear and challenge the Bureaucrats as the ones that are usurping the Constitution.