MSI fighting G&S circa 1973.

SPQM said:

Interested, yes.

Actually having enough time to turn all this into a coherent narrative? Not sure.

I've already made a few stabs at making a semi coherent timeline for a debate on another board:



Something like that but a bit more in detail -- like the 1972 entry would now have a lot more of the information I uncovered; like the 1971 rifle murders leading to Mandel calling for handgun permits.

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The Washington Post
Apr 1, 1994
Page AA1

As Sales Soar, Maryland Bans Assault Pistols
By Charles Babington
Washington Post Staff Writer

ANNAPOLIS, March 31—Maryland became the fifth state to enact curbs on assault weapons today, even as state police reported that gun sales soared during the first two months of this year.

The House of Delegates passed a measure to ban the sale of 18 types of assault pistols and gun magazines that hold more than 20 rounds of ammunition. Gov. William Donald Schaefer, who has fought to restrict assault weapons for years, said he will sign the measure into law effective June 1.

As gun-control proponents hailed their biggest victory in six years, state police reports showed that about 8,675 Marylanders applied to buy handguns or assault rifles in the first two months of this year, a 74 percent increase over the same period last year. Police Sgt. Bernard Shaw attributed the rise to publicity about proposed gun restrictions and to people's fear of crime.

"There's definitely no recession in gun sales," Shaw said.

Another sobering fact also dampened the joy of gun-control advocates: the recognition that the types of firearms used in the vast majority of crimes remain legal and easily available in Maryland.

Gun-control supporters acknowledged they are far from restricting the ordinary types of handguns that most criminals favor, because they are the same weapons often purchased by law-abiding residents who want to safeguard their homes and businesses.

Despite grueling victories over the gun lobby in 1988 and this year, Maryland's gun-control groups have made inroads only against a relatively small number of cheap handguns and exotic semiautomatic assault pistols such as Uzis.

Today, gun-control supporters sounded almost apologetic about their victory in the House.

“I'd rather have something than nothing,” Del. Elijah Cummings (D-Baltimore) said during the three-hour debate. "Maybe we can do more next year."

Coupled with Maryland's 1988 referendum to ban cheap handguns known as Saturday night specials, today's action makes Maryland one of the leading states in handgun restrictions.

Only California, Hawaii, Connecticut and New Jersey have enacted assault-weapon bans, according to Handgun Control Inc.

But advocates on both sides of the debate agree that Maryland has merely nibbled at the edges of its estimated arsenal of 2 million handguns, a figure that grows larger every month in a state with almost 5 million people.

The 1988 action has prevented more than two dozen styles of cheap, largely unreliable handguns from being sold legally.

And today's vote will ban sales of military-style semiautomatic pistols that are used in only a fraction of crimes, according to police.

Nonetheless, Schaefer hailed today's vote, saying:

"This is a great day for the citizens of Maryland, as we take another step toward eliminating guns that don't belong on our streets. Other states still struggling for meaningful gun control should not give up hope, because, while it took us four years, we did prevail."

Some legislative supporters of the package appeared less enthusiastic, and could not promise that it would reduce crime in the near future.

"This is not a panacea, but it's a start," said Del. Joel Chasnoff (D-Montgomery), floor leader for the bill, which received a 81-60 vote of approval.

Liberals sometimes joined conservatives in noting that the measure would affect only a fraction of the more than 1.2 million registered handguns in Maryland and the 750,000 unregistered guns that state police believe exist.

"This bill does not touch the 2 million handguns that currently are in use in Maryland," said Del. Peter Franchot (D-Montgomery), who drew only one visible supporter in the 141-member House on Wednesday when he proposed banning the possession of all handguns.

He said the assault-pistol bill also will not affect 98 percent of the guns used in the approximately 700 annual firearms deaths in Maryland, including homicides, suicides and accidents.

"Until we view gun control as a public health issue instead of a criminal justice issue ... we will pass legislation that has meritorious but minuscule effect," Franchot said.

Conservatives, including most House Republicans, were harsher. Minority Leader Ellen R. Sauerbrey (R-Baltimore County), said children in Baltimore have been killed by stray bullets "because this body has refused to get tough on criminals who use guns."

She endorsed a proposed amendment to require a 25-year, no-parole prison sentence for anyone who uses an assault pistol in a crime.

The House defeated the amendment after backers of the assault-pistol bill warned that any change in the legislation would send it back to the Senate where pro-gun lawmakers could kill it in a filibuster.

Police say that fewer than 5 percent of firearm crimes can be traced to assault pistols, while more familiar weapons, such as .38-caliber revolvers, are frequently used in homicides.

There's virtually no support in Maryland for banning such guns, however, because they are the most likely type to be bought by people seeking personal protection.

"It's ordinary, run-of-the-mill, plain-vanilla handguns that are used in most crimes," said Robert McMurray, spokesman for the Maryland State Rifle and Pistol Association. "But that's no reason to ban them."

McMurray said gun owners will be furious about the assault-pistol sales ban, and will hold lawmakers accountable in this fall's elections.

But Vincent DeMarco, director of Marylanders Against Handgun Abuse, said:

"Anybody who voted against banning assault pistols has got a lot of explaining to do."

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The Washington Post
Apr 11, 1971
Page A16

Summary of Actions by Maryland General Assembly

Here is a summary of the major actions taken so far by the Maryland General Assembly at its 1971 session. A few measures that remain to be acted on in the legislature's final day, Monday, are listed as "undecided."

....(snip).....

COURTS AND LAW

...(snip)....

Defeated

A bill that would have required a one-week waiting period before the purchaser of a handgun could actually obtain the weapon. The bill was supported by legislators who viewed it as a way to discourage impulsive suicides and murders, opposed by those who saw it as an unnecessary bureaucratic addition. An existing waiting period applies only to sales by gun dealers.

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Washington Post
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 1970
Page C1

Poll in MD Backs Controls on Guns
But Mandel Doesn't Plan New Laws
By John Hanrahan
Washington Post Staff Writer

A statewide poll said to have been taken by friends of Gov. Marvin Mandel and being kept under wraps by the administration shows that Marylanders support additional gun controls by a margin of more than 2 to 1.

However, the administration apparently has no plans to seek gun control legislation this year.

Although Mandel refuses to talk about the poll, several members of his administration, including Secretary of State Blair Lee III and press secretary Frank A. DeFilippo, have confirmed one or more of its aspects:

Responding to questions through an aide, Mandel said over the weekend, "I don't know anything about it." DeFilippo said Mandel personally "had nothing to do with" commissioning the poll.

Although acknowledging that Mandel has seen the poll, DeFilippo said the governor does not have a copy of it in his possession. It was commissioned by friends of the governor, DeFilippo said.

No administration figure contacted said he knew who commissioned the poll or who conducted it or how many persons were polled. But various administration officials said it was their understanding that the poll was conducted by a reputable firm in every county and the city of Baltimore. In Montgomery and Prince George's counties and Baltimore, selected model precincts were polled, they said.

Several sources close to the governor said the margin seeking gun control legislation actually was 3 to 1 or slightly more; one said it was "more than 2 to 1."

Administration sources said the question on gun control does not mention specific legislation, but merely asks if the person favors additional control of firearms.

A similar statewide poll, commissioned by Montgomery County Councilman William W. Greenhalgh just before Mandel became governor in January, 1969, showed that more than 70 per cent of those polled favored additional gun control legislation.

Various administration sources said Mandel is unwilling to push on gun control legislation this year because it would be a volatile issue in an election year. They said the rest of his legislative program might suffer during the current session of the General Assembly if Mandel became involved in such a controversial issue.

One administration figure said that "the lack of enthusiasm in the legislature for further gun controls" indicates to the governor that no new firearms legislation would pass this year.

Also, such an issue could hurt Mandel with some of the moderate to conservative voters whose support he is counting on in the coming election, another said. The issue is not believed to be of such paramount importance that it would cost him the backing of liberals who now support him, he added.

The poll has been kept under close wraps for weeks. Many administration figures have not seen it. Mandel, one administration aide said, attempts to remain as aloof as possible from poll-taking efforts.

Mandel has commissioned no polls himself, but instead is letting "friends" take the polls and inform him of the results, the source said.

Two weeks ago, DeFilippo and Lee acknowledged to a reporter that the poll existed and that it showed that those polled overwhelmingly backed gun controls. DeFilippo said he would seek more information on it from the governor. The reporter made several more requests for information during the following two weeks before being told that Mandel said he didn't know anything about the poll.

The poll deals not only with various issues, but also attempts to assess the relative strengths of various Senate and gubernatorial candidates.

Among the poll's other reported results:

• Seventy-seven per cent favor some form of taxation on church property.

• There is almost a 50-50 split on the issue of governmental aid to the state's nonpublic schools.

• Mandel is much better known than any of his potential competitors. Baltimore Mayor Thomas J. D'Alesandro III is a distant second to Man-del in "voter recognition." Ambassador to France R. Sargent Shriver, regarded as a likely challenger to-Mandel in the Democratic primary, reportedly was known by less than 10 per cent of those polled. (The Greenhalgh poll showed that Shriver was known by more than 40 per cent of those polled).

• Sen. Joseph D. Tydings (D-Maryland) appears to be unbeatable by any Republican or Democrat according to those who have knowledge of the poll.

Del. Richard Rynd (D-Baltimore County) who, along with Del. Leonard S. Blondes (D-Montgomery), has attempted unsuccessfully for four years to strengthen Maryland's gun control law, said yesterday he was "very happy" to hear about the poll.

Rynd said he will introduce legislation this year to toughen the existing law, but that he sees little hope for any gun registration measure passing the legislature in an election year. As a result, he said, he will not reintroduce handgun registration legislation this year.

The present law requires a person to wait for seven days after he applies for purchase of a handgun while state police run a check on him for a possible criminal record, mental illness or drug addiction, among other things.

The bill Rynd will introduce would increase the waiting period to 10 days and would extend the law to cover individual sales, as well as those made by dealers.

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The Washington Post
Apr 17, 1951
pg. B1

Firearms Transfer Plan Handicaps Citizen, Aids Crime, Spokesman Claims

The National Rifle Association yesterday went on record as opposing a proposed change in the District law regulating the transfer of firearms.

Maj. Gen. Milton A. Reckord, a member of the association's executive committee, told the House District Committee the association feels the change will only "harass and eventually disarm the honest citizen, thereby playing directly into the hands of the lawbreaker and the thug."

The proposed change is included in the section on dangerous weapons of the District Law Enforcement bill introduced by Representative James C. Davis (D., Ga.), and now before the House District Committee.

It would amend the present Dangerous Weapons Act in this manner:

1. The prospective purchaser of a pistol would be required to secure a purchase permit from the chief of police instead of applying to a dealer, as is now required.

2. An applicant for a purchase permit would be required to the chief of police his photograph and fingerprints, which is not necessary now, and also would have to submit such other information as the police chief requires by regulation, instead of furnishing specified information to the dealer, as is now done.

3. Any applicant for a purchase permit who was not a bona fide resident of the District for one year would be denied the permit.

4. The minimum age of an applicant would be raised from 18 to 21 years.

Objects to Two Points

Specifically the association, through General Reckord, objects to the first two points. A police permit to purchase a pistol or revolver will simply be ignored by the criminal, while the law-abiding citizen, unwilling to undergo photographing and fingerprinting in a police station, will purchase his firearms elsewhere, General Reckord declared.

The requirement of a police purchase permit would be just another step to the police permit to possess a pistol or revolver, as is required by New York's Sullivan law, which the association opposes, he added.

Other Amendments

General Reckord did not go into other parts of the section of the Davis bill dealing with dangerous weapons. It provides these other amendments, however, to the Dangerous Weapons Act:

1. Broadening the section which prohibits the possession of a pistol by any person who has been convicted of a crime of violence to include drug addicts, persons convicted of a felony, those convicted of the following misdemeanors: soliciting for immoral purposes, keeping a bawdy house, vagrancy, assault, gambling, sell-ing indecent publications, petit larceny and laceny after trust, and for those convicted of violating the Dangerous Weapons Act.

2. Making it a crime to keep a pistol for or make one available to any person known to be in the above classifications.

3. Raising the maximum penalty from 1 to 10 years' imprisonment for anyone convicted twice or more of such a violation.

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The Washington Post
Aug 18, 1966
Page K1

Book on Guns Under Fire
Rifle Group Brands Work on 'Death by Shooting' As Full of 'Inaccuracies and Innuendoes'
By Willard Clopton Jr.
Washington Post Staff Writer

Franklin L. Orth, the chief official of the National Rifle Association, was thinking dark thoughts about Carl Bakal.

"We ought to charge him royalties," Orth grumbled with a wry smile.

Bakal is a New York writer whose new book, "The Right To Bear Arms," has made him the Ralph Nader of the firearms industry.

Bakal finds that death by shooting has become a "plague" in America because of the easy availability of guns. He accuses the Association of spearheading the fight to scuttle all legislative efforts to curb the abuse of firearms.

"Bakal spent several days around here gathering data. We were glad to provide it," recalled Orth, the Association's executive vice president, during an interview in his office.

"Of course, we didn't know how he was going to use it. His book is full of inaccuracies and innuendoes."

Orth believes strongly that Bakal has stacked the deck against the Association and American sportsmen and munitions makers.

"He talks about 17,000 shooting deaths a year, and the implication is that they were all violent murders.

"Actually, 9500 of these are suicides and another 2500 were accidents. That leaves about 5000 homicides and probably many of these were justifiable," Orth said.

He also believes the gun has been exaggerated as a crime symbol.

"According to the FBI, there are about 2.5 million crimes a year in this country. Only about 3 per cent involve the use of a gun.

"In 1964," he went on, "there were 184,900 aggravated assaults. Only 15 per cent were carried out with guns. The rest involved knives, blunt instruments, other objects or fists."

What most bothers Orth is the suggestion that the Association is unconcerned about reckless gunplay and has rigidly blocked all efforts at firearms controls.

"It just isn't true," he declared. "We certainly decry any kind of crime with a gun or any other instrument.

"We definitely favor legislation to keep guns out of the hands of such classes of people as felons, fugitives, the mentally incompetent, drug addicts and habitual drunkards. We also favor a seven-day waiting period between the time a purchaser orders a gun and when he picks it up, so the police can check on his background."

Orth said the Association gave full support to the recently passed Maryland law establishing a seven-day wait on the purchase of handguns.

He also said the organization is supporting three proposals now before Congress.

One would amend the Federal Firearms Act to prohibit interstate shipment of firearms in violation of any state law. Another would provide mandatory prison terms for persons who commit certain crimes while armed with a gun. The third would extend the National Firearms Act, which controls sale and transfer of machine guns to cover such items as mortars, bazookas, mines, bombs and field artillery.

Orth said the Association opposes the Dodd bill, now before the Senate. It would prohibit all interstate mailing of handguns.

"We believe the desired goals can be attained at the state level, without interfering with the rights of law-abiding gun users," he said.

Orth contended that the oft-suggested plan to register all firearms would be of little value.

"It wouldn't prevent crimes. It wouldn't have kept that man Whitman from shooting those people in Austin." Since 9 out of 10 guns used in crimes are stolen, tracing the ownership in most cases does no more than cause problems for the real owners, he argued.

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WASHINGTON POST
Tuesday, June 23,1970
Page B10

THE DISTRICT LINE...... By Bill Gold
Words Mean What We Say They Mean

PROPAGANDISTS for the gun industry are distributing among Maryland voters some bumper stickers that say: "Gun Registration Means Confiscation."

They're out to defeat Sen. Joseph Tydings in his bid for re-election because Tydings favors such gun control measures as registration of firearms. From the industry's viewpoint, registration of firearms is unnecessary, un-American, unconstitutional and maybe a few other things. Besides, it might be bad for their business.

The gun industry's propagandists have done such an effective job of selling their viewpoint that the average reader of gun magazines now honestly believes that men like Tydings are out to end all private gun ownership.

"Gun registration means confiscation" they chant with a unison that gives their performance an Alice-in-Wonder-land quality. Unfortunately, they do not make it clear whether "registration" and "confiscation" are synonymous in meaning because they say so, or because the words rhyme, or what.

Fortunately, we are not reduced to judging by Alice-in-Wonderland standards. In real life, automobiles have been registered for decades, and registration has not meant confiscation. It has simply meant that the government has, in an orderly manner, regulated an activity that needed regulating.

Every column of this kind that I have ever written has resulted in a flood of incoming mail from gun buffs who say more or less the same things. "Don't you realize," they ask earnestly, "that if a dictator ever takes over in this country, the first thing he would do would be to use the gun registration lists to confiscate every privately held firearm?"

I used to write laborious (I have no secretary) letters of reply. I'd point out that most registration proposals deal with handguns only; dictators would be more interested in long guns that can already be spotted from hunting licenses. Besides, dictators don't need lists. They go from door to door and search every house.

I have finally grown weary of trying to answer all those letters, so let me repeat some of the statements I have made in previous gun columns:

I own guns, and have owned guns all my adult life. I think the police ought to know which guns are mine.

When I had the time for it, I enjoyed target shooting. Hunting for sport is not my idea of sport, but I would not question the right of others to engage in it.

I do not support or oppose any specific bill. I support only the general principle that we need better regulation of the traffic in guns; the details should be worked out by our legislators. Gun ownership should be denied to those under a specific age, to those convicted of certain types of crime, to those adjudged addicted to drugs or alcohol, to the mentally incompetent, and to those untrained in the use of guns.

That final point seems to me to be one on which we could all agree. But we haven't. In recent days, Rep. Andrew Jacobs Jr. (D-Ind.) helped apprehend some supermarket robbers. Jacobs happened to be passing by as the store's private policeman fired a volley of shots that hit parked cars but no bandits. Afterward, Jacobs said, he would introduce a bill requiring armed guards to have adequate training in marksman ship.

This is just plain common sense, and it ought to apply to everybody who wants permission to own a gun. Yet we have never enacted it into law.

If we want permission to drive a car we have to demonstrate that we know how, but if we want to own a gun all we have to show is enough money to pay for it.

The arms industry has long discouraged even mild gun controls by whipping up phony fears among law-abiding gun enthusiasts. The result is a tendency to judge political candidates solely on the gun issue, and a warning that any candidate who suggests control legislation will he marked for reprisal. What a pity!

I think this country is sick of seeing its Presidents and other public figures gunned down by assassins, sick of being victimized by gunmen indoors and out, sick of facing death on every routine airline flight if an armed crackpot elects to hijack it.

And as I noted earlier, I personally am tired of corresponding with people who call me a nut because I think .the arms industry should be regulated, just as we regulate the industries that supply us with milk, canned goods, electric power, transportation, tele phones, meat, medicine and many other things.

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The Washington Post
Aug 1, 1974
Page C1

Agnew Gets Handgun Permit Under Waiver of Federal Law
By Richard M. Cohen
Washington Post Staff Writer

Former Vice President Spiro T. Agnew, stating he needs a gun for personal protection, received permission yesterday from the federal government to own handgun.

It was also learned yesterday that the state of Maryland granted Agnew similar permission last April despite a provision of state law banning persons sentenced to more than a year from carrying handguns.

In a routine announcement published in the Federal Register, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms of the Treasury Department announced it had granted Agnew and 15 other persons relief: from a provision of the federal Gun Control Act of 1968 that forbids persons under a sentence of more than one year from possessing firearms.

Agnew pleaded nolo contendere last Oct. 10 to a tax evasion charge and resigned as Vice President. He was fined $10,000 and sentenced to three years of unsupervised probation. He was allowed to remain under the protection of the Secret Service until last February when his Secret Service detail was withdrawn by Treasury Secretary George P. Shultz.

A spokesman for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms said he could not divulge the reason Agnew gave in asking that the provision of the gun act be waived. However, it was learned that the former Vice President said he needed a gun for personal protection and Rex D. Davis, director of the bureau, told the Associated Press that Agnew reported seeing trespassers on his property and had received threats.

The spokesman said such waivers are common and are published from time to time in the Federal Register, the official government publication that carries government regulations and announcements.

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[FR DOC.74-17458 Filed 7-30-74:8:45 am]

DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY
Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms
FIREARMS; GRANTING OF RELIEF

Notice is hereby given that pursuant to 18 U.S.C. section 925(c), the following named persons have been granted relief from disabilities imposed by Federal laws with respect to the acquisition, transfer, receipt, shipment, or possession of firearms incurred by reason of their convictions of crimes punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year.

It has been established to my satisfaction that the circumstances regarding the convictions and each applicant's record and reputation are such that the applicants will not be likely to act in a manner dangerous to public safety, and that the granting of the relief will not be contrary —to the public interest.

Agnew, Spiro T., 6415 Shadow Road. Chevy Chase, Maryland, convicted on October 10, 1973, in the United States District Court, District of Maryland.

Federal Register. VOL 39, NO. 148—WEDNESDAY-, JULY 31, 1974

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He said the only persons convicted of felonies involving the use of guns are barred under the law from regaining their right to carry or possess a handgun. He said the waivers are granted after a review in which the applicant record and his position in the community is reviewed.

Although Agnew had to request a waiver from the federal government, his application for a gun permit from the state of Maryland was approved last April 10, a spokesman said, because he had pleaded nolo contendere (no contest) to the tax charge, and never admitted guilt.

"You have to realize that nolo and a plea of guilty arc not the same," said Sgt. Nor-man Pepersack of the Mary-land State Police handgun permits section. For that reason, he said, Agnew's application was approved.

Maryland law forbids the possession or carrying of handguns to persons convicted of a felony or misdemeanor for which a sentence or imprisonment had been imposed for more than one year. Pepersack said that despite Agnew's sentence to three years of unsupervised probation, the state police did not consider him convicted of any crime and therefore issued the handgun permit.

At the time he pleaded to the tax charge, Agnew was informed by Federal District Court Judge Walter E. Hoffman that a nolo contendere plea was "the full equivalent of a plea of guilty" and a common plea in tax cases. Hoffman said that he was sentencing Agnew for "willful" failure to pay income taxes, "which charge is a felony in the eyes of the law."

Agnew could not be reached for comment and it could not be determined if he intends to keep a handgun on his person, or retain it in his home. The Maryland State Police refused to divulge the reasons Agnew gave them for applying for a gun permit.

The federal gun application did not say what type of weapon Agnew was intending to buy. He would be permitted any kind of gun that the government considers legal.

Since his resignation. Agnew has reportedly been writing a novel and attempting to develop a business as middleman between American firms and foreign governments. He has moved from Chevy Chase, the address listed in the Federal Register, to Indian Hills, just north of Annapolis He has opened an office in Crofton, Md., a nearby town. Agnew was disbarred by the Maryland Court of Appeals and can no longer practice law.

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The Washington Post
Apr 9, 1976
Page 54

Md. Gun Laws Apply To Taser, Official Says

BALTIMORE, April- 8 (AP) — Maryland Attorney General Francis Burch has said state handgun laws apply to the portable electronic protective device called the "Taser public defender."

The Taser is a small, hand-held device that looks like a flash light — and can operate as one. When fired, the Taser propels two small, barbed electrical contacts as far as 18 feet into a victim. The fine wires connected to the barbs can conduct a 50,000-volt charge between the victim and the weapon, Burch said.

He said the electrical current, which is capable of passing through 1.5 inches of clothing, "dominates the neuromuscular, system of the victim in that the muscles contract involuntarily, rendering the victim helpless, possibly in pain, and almost immediately unconscious." The charge can be reapplied as long as the barbs are imbedded.

The attorney general said the barbed contacts are missiles — even though they are connected with the weapon itself by wires.

Burch also cited a Florida gas station attendant's account of being "zapped" with a Taser during a robbery:

"I fell on the floor and couldn't move," the attendant said. "It was the worst pain I ever felt. My whole right side was jumping. I couldn't control my muscles. It was like sticking your finger in a wall socket."

Burch's ruling places the Taser under the Maryland handgun permit law, other handgun purchase laws, and concealed weapon laws, as well as the law against robbery with a dangerous or deadly weapon.

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Washington Post
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 29, 1970
C1

Gun Curbs Favored By Shriver
By Peter A. Jay
Wellington Post Staff Writer

Sargent. Shriver, bringing his undeclared campaign for the Maryland governorship to the friendly territory of the state university, said yesterday he favors confiscation of firearms in heavily populated areas.

Before a cordial and interested audience of about 1,000 students packed into the University of Maryland's Student Union on the College Park campus, Shriver said that "in areas of high urban density" there should be "not only registration, but confiscation" of firearms.

By urban areas, Shriver said, he meant Baltimore and Maryland's Washington suburbs. He said his position differs from that advocated by Sen. Joseph D. Tydings (D-Md.) another advocate of tighter gun controls, because he favors no change in firearms regulations for rural areas.

Tydings, who has taken pains to spell out his opposition to any confiscation of firearms, is backing legislation that would provide for licensing and registration of all guns—rifles and shotguns as well as handguns—except for antiques. Maryland law now requires handgun registration. Shriver, a former ambassador to France and Peace

Corps director, won frequent applause from his young audience for barbed comments aimed at Maryland Gov. Marvin Mandel—his potential rival in the September Democratic primary- and President Nixon.

Shriver backers on the campus were busily passing out literature and buttons yesterday. The student newspaper, The Diamondback, quoted an unidentified Shriver worker as saying "Shriver radiates the Kennedy Image. Mandel is too serious, too old."

The newspaper gave Mandel's age as 49 and Shriver's as 43. Shriver actually is 54. Mandel, who is scheduled to speak at the university today, is 50.

Shriver spoke yesterday from a prepared text, liberally laced with quotations from Dylan Thomas, T. S. Eliot, Tom Lehrer and Pogo, and then fielded questions from the audience.

State government, he said, should be "an advocate for the people, for the consumer and for the citizen" and should "enlist students in a real crusade" to correct the wrongs of 20th century society.

Shriver said he is "still in the process of making up my mind" about challenging Mandel. "If what I believe in is what you believe in," he told the students, "then I'm ready to run."

He was applauded when he told a questioner that he believes abortions should be legally available to "those people whose moral principles, allow them to accept" termination of a pregnancy.

But he qualified this, as he has in the past, by reiterating his personal opposition to abortion and criticizing as inadequate the proposed Maryland abortion law now before Mandel. "We've got to change society and make (unwanted) babies wanted and possible," financially and otherwise, Shriver said.

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GUNS Magazine
September 1963
“CROSSFIRE” Letter Section

Do It Yourself!

In Robert Broussard's letter in (June '63), he said he "found things difficult" when he tried to purchase a handgun because he's in the service.

I know exactly how he feels!

When I was stationed in Maryland, I tried to purchase a revolver, and immediately came up against insurmountable red tape. First, I had to have written permission from my commanding officer, which I couldn't get. (It seemed that such requests were rare and therefore suspicious, and besides enlisted men weren't allowed to have handguns unless they lived off the base.) Second, I would then have to register with the local police for a permit to buy the handgun. If they didn't like my reasons for wanting the permit, it would be turned down.

I was brought up in a shooting, hunting, gun·loving family. To us, guns were not only a pleasure but a symbol of our freedom, and the thought of having to register to buy a firearm, and then register the gun after it was bought, would have my father turning in his grave.

Even though I was trusted to be in charge of a million and a half dollars of electronic equipment, and the lives and value of every plane that used it to land with, I still was not to be trusted to buy and have a handgun.

My enlistment was about up at the time, so I didn't sign up for a second four years of "the benefits." I didn't get out because of guns, but it very definitely was a factor.

A car by itself never committed a crime or killed anyone. The same is true with a gun. The only way we'll get rid of these outmoded laws, and keep uninformed legislators from enacting more of them, is to write to our representatives, speak before groups, and join gun associations. Like salesmen, we have an idea. In order to sell it, we have to get it in front of the public. Don't wait for George to do it; it'll only get done if you do it

Victor D. Powell
Oak Hill, W.Va.

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GUNS Magazine
January 1964
"CROSSFIRE" Letter Section

Correction

As a dealer and gunsmith, I would like to correct the letter by Victor D. Powell of Oak Hill, W. Va., in relation to permits to purchase handguns in the state of Maryland.

Permits to purchase handguns are required only in Baltimore City and County, and not in the rest of the State. If Mr. Powell had to apply for a permit to purchase, he was either in Baltimore or close to the District of Columbia and applied for a handgun in the D.C. without realizing he had left the state of Maryland. This is possible, as his reference to planes, suggests that he may have been located at Andrews Field Air Base which is just a few minutes from D.C.

The registration of handguns is required by dealers on purchase, but there is no waiting period, and there is no permit to purchase required. On the registration form, description and address of purchaser, and make, model, serial number, caliber, barrel length is required, along with purchasers statement that he has never been convicted of a felony.

We Marylanders are very much alert to the type of restrictions Mr. Powell described but we will not let it happen here, as we prize our constitutional right to keep and bear arms.

Robert M. Dolby
Silverdale, Maryland

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GUNS MAGAZINE
September 1957

TRIGGER TALK
Cover Headliner

"Why Not Have A Pro-Gun Law," is possibly the longest article we have ever published. It may well be also the most important article we have ever published.

The "call to arms" which ends the story, urging all firearms enthusiasts to write to the Director of the Alcohol & Tobacco Tax Unit, Treasury, Washington 25, D. C., to protest new revised federal regulations in the gun law field is a little like Paul Revere's "one if by land, two if by sea." Only now it isn't the "British are coming," it is the bureaucrats.

There has been some serious thought among Congressmen and Senators as to the activities of this branch of the Treasury which administers the federal gun laws. Some congressmen have been outspoken in expressing the view that the Treasury has been attempting actually to alter law, to make law, which is a privilege jealously guarded by the Congress. In "Why Not A Pro-Gun Law," the author brings up to date the present situation in anti-firearms legislation. We are now at a crossroads. For decades shooting enthusiasts have been complacent while lawmakers, directed by people who are not all well-intentioned by any means, have been chipping away at the edges of American freedom. Restrictive firearms laws are but one face of restrictive federal interference into American private affairs. We exist in a republic which is supposed to guarantee liberty under law. When laws become destructive of these liberties, it is the right and duty of the people to alter or to abolish those laws, and to institute new forms of law which shall best effect their safety and happiness. . Old militiaman Tom Jefferson would doubtless applaud this paraphrasing of his immortal document, the Declaration of Independence.

Fortunately, it is not too late. The revised regulations are not yet in effect as of press-time. A public hearing on the new revised regulations is scheduled for Tuesday, August 27, 1957, at 10:00 AM, room 3313, Internal Revenue Bldg., 12th and Constitution Avenue NW, Washington, D. C. Any protests can be made in person there, and eastern-area readers of GUNS may find their interests best served if they obtain complete copies of the regulations, read and understand their implications, and appear to register their protests in person.

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GUNS MAGAZINE
September 1957

ANTI-GUN LAW PROPONENTS ARE NOT ALL DO-GOODERS.
LAWS THAT STRIKE AT CIVIL LIBERTIES THREATEN BUSINESS AS WELL AS OUR AMERICAN WAY OF LIFE.
IF WE MUST LEGISLATE, THEN . . . Why Not Have a PRO Gun Law?
By WILLIAM B. EDWARDS

THE ANTI-GUN LAWMAKERS are having a brisk season for 1957. With the practical nature of Andrew Volsteads and the subtlety of Carrie Nations they have attacked the root of all evil and the ills of mankind by the simple expedient of trying to take away all guns. Recently proposed Treasury regulations came close to this ideal; they could have destroyed the firearms industry and the shooting sport. Under the guise of protecting the people, these makers of rules who push anti-gun bills such as these are forging weapons, not into ploughshares, but into an iron collar of restraint, worthy of a fascist state. Year by year more anti-gun laws are proposed. Meanwhile, pro-gun collectors and shooters are mollified by the excuse "these laws are thought up by well-meaning, innocent do-gooders." Certainly a few anti-gun advocates may seem to be well-intentioned, but let's look at "well meaning" legislators in the forefront of anti-gun legislation.

Take a good look at genial, charming, personable "Big Tim" Sullivan, who disarmed the citizens of crime-ridden New York in 1911 with the grandaddy of anti-gun laws, then went mad the following year and was confined. Says the biographical dictionary, "Vice and crime were carefully organized in his territory and paid graft to his machine, as did many lines of legitimate business, including push-cart peddlers . . . When charged with grafting, or partnership with crime and vice, he could rise in the [New York state] Assembly or on a campaign rostrum and, by telling the story of his tenement boyhood and the sacrifices of his mother, reduce even hardened political opponents to tears . . ."

"Big Tim" was of the cloth of Adolph Hitler and the spellbinders of the ages. Election fights which stimulated the public pulse in those days hampered Big Tim's grasp on politics. So he pushed through a law requiring everyone in New York state to get a police permit to buy or possess a pistol or revolver. Sullivan knew he could control the police. This meant that when Sullivan's boys went on their ballot-box stuffing sprees, they could be reasonably sure of having no opposition. Big Tim was not a "well-meaning legislator" in his pistol law ideas. The Sullivan law weakened the opposition, sweetened the Tammany kitty. Anti-gun bills are a popular stepping stone to political fame, and many in the anti-gun ranks share "Big Tim's motives.

A most ironic instance of the do-good legislator at work occurred in Connecticut last spring. A brutal murder of two people incensed the public against guns and a fantastic spate of 24 anti-firearms bills was put into the mill, including the demand to register every pistol or revolver in the state. This is a common form of anti-gun bill, though just what it is supposed to accomplish is not clear.

According to Fred A. Roff, Jr., of the Colt's gun company, the criminal committed the murders with a registered revolver. And the criminal was already a convicted felon: Outlawing guns is impossible. The police themselves are often a source of pistols to people who do not bother with licenses and permits. I bought seven revolvers including a Colt DA M1878 .45 revolver and a small engraved Smith & Wesson .32 from one Chicago policeman, who did not want to insult me by asking for a permit. Though I bought them as "collector's items," they had been confiscated by the officer in the normal course of his work. He was logical in selling the guns to me, knowing me to be a gun collector; yet "Confiscated guns must be destroyed according to law," declares Chicago police commissioner T. J. O'Connor.

Another gun which came my way from a policeman violated state and federal law. It was a .38 Smith & Wesson with numbers ground off that once belonged to the famous kidnapper "Machine Gun" Kelly. The gun was taken from one of Kelly's gang by then-detective Charles Zimmerman, later Buffalo, New York, chief of police. When he retired to California, Zimmerman kept the gun in memory of a high point in his career. His widow sold it to me as a collector's item.

According to the Penal Law, section 1899, State of New York, "firearms and other enumerated dangerous weapons (confiscated in criminal proceedings) must be either be destroyed or retained by the Police Department..."

Evidently in New York, as in other places, there are two kinds of law -- one for police, and one for civilians. Federal law was also violated by Zimmerman by retaining a gun from which a number had been erased, and by transporting it across a state line.

While cops claim they can curb crime by taking away all guns, and the pro-gun guys come back with worn-out cliches such as "with what gun did Cain slay Abel," the realities are that not even law enforcement agencies agree on what should be done with confiscated guns.

"The Los Angeles Police Department complies with law by dumping these guns into the deep waters of the Pacific ocean each year on July 1st," says A. C. Hohmann of Los Angeles. But in Boston, the Commissioner of Public Safety "may sell or destroy the same, and in case of a sale . . . shall pay over the net proceeds to the Commonwealth."

In Washington, D. C., "Pistols, machine guns, etc., are either destroyed or transferred to the regular inventories of Federal or District government agencies," reports Inspector Earl Hartmen, property clerk. Yet by stealing from government sources alone, criminals get nearly half the guns used in crime.

Philadelphia police recently made a smart, money saving move, which implicated the city government, common carriers, several gun dealers, and numerous other people, in a violation of the Federal Firearms Act.

Procurement commissioner Michael Sura decided that some confiscated Philadelphia police guns were worth money. He "scooped up up 2,662 weapons which technically belonged as evidence from past trials and arranged. . . with the Courts to offer them at public sale," wrote David O. Moreton in the May issue of Law & Order, the police monthly magazine.

These guns were bid in by a New York gun dealer. Commissioner Sura thriftily saved Philadelphia nearly $10,000 in trade for new police equipment, yet demonstrated strikingly the logical inconsistency of the police attitude toward firearms. And he helped many people violate the federal law.

The 1938 Federal Firearms Act states:

"It shall be unlawful for any person to transport, ship, or knowingly receive in interstate or foreign commerce any firearm from which the manufacturer's serial number has been removed, obliterated, or altered, and the possession of any such firearm shall be presumptive evidence that such firearm was transported, shipped, or received, as the case may be, by the possessor in violation of this chapter."
In this lot of guns were many with numbers ground off, and everybody from Commissioner Sura, to the common carrier, to the New York dealer, to final owner may have violated federal law during their possession, transfer, shipment, or receipt of such firearms as the New Navy .38 Colt revolver illustrated, from which the serial numbers have been erased. Yet the sales and transfers in themselves were lawful transactions.

What, then, of the overall value of federal anti-firearms legislation? Has Congress any reason to make laws restricting the possession and use for lawful purposes of any kind of firearm? The answer is, no. But they are able to restrict guns by exercising a highly valued privilege of Congress, to raise and collect taxes. Congress has tried to "control" guns by excessive taxation.

Most of us agree that to provide for the common defense, to run our government, we must pay taxes. We should naturally expect to give the government considerably more in tax money than the costs of accounting and collecting this money, so there will be a little left over for housing, defense, public works, welfare and social security, veterans' compensation, and other needs. But Congress' anti-gun laws cost the people more to administer than they bring in.

The Treasury handles Congress' gun-taxing laws because Congress has prohibited itself from making gun-restricting laws by saying in the Constitution's second amendment that "A well regulated militia being necessary for the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."

Contrary to what some of the more rabid pro-gun guys claim, this does not mean that everyone can go around carrying a gun. It does not mean that everyone cannot go around carrying a gun either. The application of its meaning is in the expression "well regulated militia."

The National Guard is not a (Constitutional) "well regulated militia;" it is part of our U. S. Army organized reserve forces.

The militia ideas of the framers of the Constitution opposed the existence of a standing army. Formal expression of the militia concept was set forth in "Plan for A Militia" published in London in 1745 by a Colonel Martin. The ideas in this little book had much to do with the phrasing of the 2nd amendment. The army cost too much, said the Colonel; militia would be cheaper. "No mercenary army [Martin's word for "professional" or "standing army"] which this nation can support without becoming bankrupt, is sufficient for its security against foreign invasion; yet a national militia is capable of defending it with great certainty, and little expense." The militia included "the military service of all men capable of bearing arms, from the age of 18 to that of 50 years; except such as may be exempted by law . . ."

Over a century later, the militia term held the same meaning. In Wilhelm's Military Dictionary (1881) under "Militia" is the explanation, "The laws of the United States require the enrollment into the militia of all able-bodied males between the ages of 18 and 45 years, with certain exceptions according to law (such as judges, clergymen, doctors)." And at that time, "The organized militia of the United States numbers 125,906 men, the number of men available for military duty unorganized, is 6,598,105." Out of a population in 1881 of 50,000,000, the figure compares well today with our 18,000,000 licensed hunters with a national population of 170,000,000. Our shooters are our "militia;" our hunters, smallbore rifle shooters, target pistol marksmen, shotgunners, gun collectors, all are members of the militia of the United States.

But according to decree of the Courts, "militia" is said to mean only the "National Guard." And the pro-gun guys who smart under the edict that no anti-firearms laws have invaded the rights of citizens as embodied in the second amendment, flinch as the National Guard status is waved in their faces. They can flinch even more, for the term well-regulated, though not relating to the National Guard, did mean that guns were to be kept in an armory. The militia idea definitely regulated guns. When the militia companies were organized, "the government may send to every captain for each man so enrolled a good firelock (smoothbore flintlock musket) . . . and during every captain's possession of the arms, each is to be allowed an armorer to keep them clean . . . The captain, not the individual militiaman, was to keep the "firelock."

These two aspects of the much-mooted Second Amendment have caused conflict. The word "militia" does refer to everyone between 18 and 45 or 50 years of age. But secondly, the amendment does not say that "everybody ought to carry a gun." The first point, that the "militia" includes everyone, is a score for the pro-gun crowd; the second point favors the anti-gun lawmakers by proposing storage of arms in a government armory.

But there is one more point, the heart of the controversy, for the amendment does not really relate to the concept of the "militia," nor to the "security of a free state," but specifically to the "right of the citizen to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." Stress that word "right," for it applies to all citizens. It is not a limitation on the states, as many examiners of constitutional doctrine generally observe. If it were, it would have been written "the right of the states to raise citizen militia to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." The Bill of Rights refers to the citizens. Clearly, the Second Amendment means what it says. Court decisions which affirm that an anti-firearms law is "constitutional" because it doesn't prevent the National Guard from carrying pistols are clearly legalistic nonsense: the National Guard is not "militia."

TIMES CHANGE. The National Guard is indispensible to our pattern of national defense. The "militia" today consists of 20,000,000 gun owners. They face a very real problem, the present and future trend in anti-firearms legislation. Basic rights are infringed, and the national security has been placed in danger by anti-gun laws.

Instead of implementing the Second Amendment, making sure that every man of the "militia" knows how to shoot his, "firelock" -- or Krag, or Springfield, or M-1, or BAR, or full-auto M14 and M15 rifles -- government has used excessive taxation to prohibit using modern military rifles for lawful purposes, and has killed the domestic manufacture of machine guns for defense.

American soldiers are dead today because we did not have enough machine-firing weapons to give them on Bataan and Corregidor. The National Firearms Act (of 1934, amended 1954,) was to blame. Then-attorney general Homer Cummings, after one world war and a dozen minor wars in his lifetime, still believed in 1934 that we would have no more war (it was outlawed by the League of Nations) and there was no need for guns.

Then 1940 found us drilling recruits (who had never seen a gun) to fight a machinegun blitzkrieg, and the army didn't even have guns to give them for drill. The concept of "pre-induction training" in marksmanship was a flame nurtured by a tiny group of shooters in the National Rifle Association, men who knew the truth. Nobody would listen, though they preached the doctrine that rifle shooting is fun, as well as a duty of the citizen.

Even the army has fallen for the anti-gun line. After spending 13 years and great expense in developing a full-auto infantry rifle, the M14, Ordnance has come up with a dilly; the M14 as issued will be semi-automatic only, no advance over the M-1! By substituting a few parts the modem militiaman's "firelock" can be made full-auto -- but how do you convert an ordinary G.I. into a trained automatic rifleman? Will there be time?

There is a way to train 20,000,000 citizen militia. We must have, not anti-gun laws, but pro-gun laws. First step, repeal existing Federal firearms laws. They do not prevent crime. They do not curb crime. They do not give law enforcement officers any tools with which to catch or convict criminals, especially when law enforcement bodies from top to bottom ignore even federal laws regulating firearms. And the high percent of federally owned and registered (U .S. Army) firearms used in crime reveals how ineffective federal control of guns is. In two instances federal firearms laws have been damaging to the national defense. The machine gun act has proved its folly, and prevented the creation of even a sport-shooting program in line with the nation's needs.

In a second instance, the Federal Firearms Act has been so badly written by law cranks (not gun cranks) that petty men with grand visions have seized on it as a stepping stone to power, and the abuse of the public. This mumbo-jumbo of commerce-regulating law hinders the legitimate dealer and manufacturer in guns-would, if proposed regulations went into effect, put gunmakers and dealers out of business. A house of cards, the law regulates the business of firearms making and selling, but carefully avoids the main fact, that of making a criminal's use of a gun unprofitable.

These new regulations include, for example, the requirement that records be kept permanently by the dealer or gunmaker, for the life of the business, or the duration of his successors. Records, in brief, to be kept in perpetuity. Says R. E. Train, assistant to the secretary of the Treasury, in a June 10, 1957 letter to Senator Homer Capehart, "Section 177.51 requires each licensed manufacturer or dealer to maintain records reflecting the receipt and disposition of all firearms. These records are required to be preserved permanently until the licensee or its successor in interest discontinues business. The present regulations provide for the maintenance of such records, but only for six years. The statute itself (15 U.S.C. ff 903 (d) provides that 'dealers shall maintain such permanent records of importation, shipment, or other disposal of firearms and ammunition as the Secretary of the Treasuryshall provide.'

"This section of the proposed regulations which is being widely objected to as imposing a new and unreasonable burden would seem to be clearly required by the words of the statute itself," continues Mr. Train in his opinion to Senator Capehart. "Actually," says Train, "the main difference between the old regulations and the new would seem to be that at the present time these records need only be kept for six years rather than permanently."

Although there is no reasonable explanation offered as to the value of records of a gunmaker kept permanently, nor is it stated who will be able to afford the tremendous cost of searching these records, citizen Train is obviously at fault in his semantic logic.

"Permanent records" does not nor has it ever been intended to mean "keeping records permanently, in perpetuity." A permanent record is, if we take Webster for the meaning, one "not subject to fluctuation or alteration." In the statute quoted by Train, the word "permanent" modifies "records" as an adjective. The new regulations twist it into an adverb, "permanently," which modifies the verb of "keep." Now, does the Treasury want records kept in permanent-type ledgers, available for inspection as required for normal income-tax purposes, or does it want records kept on any old scrap of paper, or in the mind of the dealer, but retained by him for all time? One or the other, but not both, is the meaning of the statute. And once "permanent records" is allowed to mean "records kept permanently," every industry in the U. S. which keeps records, every businessman, every tax payer, every citizen, who should keep records in permanent form for, say, the statutory six or seven years, will have to keep records as long as they are in business, as long as they are taxpayers, as long as they are alive. Why?

This Firearms Department is an odd offspring of an abortive push to get rid of all crime, by getting rid of all guns. The pillars on which it is propped are the National Act of 1934 and the Federal Act of 1938. Both are ostensible revenue-raising acts. Under the National act in 1955-6, $11,000 was taken in from transfer and registration fees, penalties and fines. During the same period, the Alcohol & Tobacco Tax Unit of the Treasury (which contains the Firearms Department) spent an amount which the ATU director refused to reveal, though it must have run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars.

In one instance, in downstate Illinois, ATU agents spent five years in "getting" one machine gun collector. When brought to trial, penalties could have totalled 18 years and $45,000. Charitably, the judge gave a token fine of $100, exacted no court costs, thereby apparently expressing his belief that the government's case was a waste of time.

In the Southern District court in California, a Culver City dealer, harassed by ATU agents on direct orders from Washington, spent over $1000 fighting an action brought by the government because he sold antique curio pistols known as "Chicago Protector Palm Pistols." Firing an unobtainable .32 Extra Short Rimfire cartridge, the gun was argued to be a violation of the National machine gun act by other one of those odd twists of meaning which the Treasury seems to enjoy. The court, however, tossed out the case.

Since the Alcohol & Tobacco Tax Unit is supposed to catch bootleggers, and ordered to apprehend criminals engaged in dope peddling, every minute spent on anti-gun foolishness is so much time taken away from their legitimate business. Distilling illegal alcohol is said to be the second largest illegal industry in the U. S. And in the time it takes one ATU man to "get the dope" on an otherwise honest gun-law violator (they don't prove many cases), a narcotics pusher can suborn your boy or your girl into a life-wrecking habit.

Today, right now, there exists crying need to enact constructive legislation in the field of firearms law. Repealing existing laws is a must. Reenacting some provisions of existing laws, together with a look at the "mandatory sentence," should come next.

Judges and juries are reluctant to convict when stiff mandatory sentences are in sight. But let the punishment fit the crime . . . say two to five years in addition to the specific charge, if the crime was committed while carrying a gun, would be workable. Don't exempt shotguns and rifles from penalties for criminal use, but don't aim "anti-gun" laws at any gun just because of its fancied "criminal-type" nature. Yesterday's terror weapon is tomorrow's collector's prize. There should not exist any legislation prohibiting any citizen from using any type of firearm, including machine gun, muffler or silencer, or Buck Rogers ray gun, for any lawful purpose. But if anyone steps out of line with a gun, throw the book at him!

Enact legislation to put some "teeth" into the militia concept, too. Work on that "militia" idea, and while we cut defense spending by the billions, let's up it a few millions in the direction of the citizen soldier. Instead of trying to cut out the Army Director of Civilian Marksmanship's puny appropriation of $300,000 in the false interests of economy, stick a couple of extra zeroes on it, and make military small arms and ammunition available in plenty for rifle club members on approved ranges. Drop some added cash into the federal school aid program, and build decent shooting ranges as elements in the overall sports program. Get the states interested in making the sport of shooting a part of every day of life in the towns, on campus.

The cadre of instructors available, free, from the membership of the National Rifle Association, the U. S. Revolver Association, the National Skeet Shooting Association, the Amateur Trapshooter's Association, the National Muzzle Loading Rifle Association, the National Single Shot Rifle Association, and many more clubs, shooters' and collectors' organizations all over the nation, can really implement that Second Amendment if we have positive firearms legislative thinking, instead of negative, false, destructive attitudes.

What you can do is twofold: first, write immediately to the Director, Alcohol & Tobacco Tax Unit, Bureau of Internal Revenue, Washington 25, D. C., and give him the benefit of your views of the proposed new regulations. Copies of these regulations can be found in any public library in the May 3, 1957 Federal Register. If you are against the rules, say so. Your letter must be in duplicate.

Second, write to your Senators and Congressmen, in Washington and in your State capital. Tell them what kind of gun laws you think are needed to prevent crime, and what kind of laws you want to see enacted to make your sport of guns and shooting one that will not be taken from you. And consider also your rights, as a citizen under this Constitution. Tell your Congressman about those rights, too. He knows about them, but it is always refreshing to a legislator to have matters called to his attention anew by the people who voted for him. Send a copy of your letter to Guns Magazine for reference. We'd like to know your ideas on constructive firearms legislation. Urge the formation of a Congressional committee to recommend good gun laws.

There are plenty of advocates of anti-gun legislation. The results have been many: national weakness and disarmament, increased crime, novel forms of corruption and graft, political hysteria controlled for selfish political purposes, and manifold invasions of the rights of citizens. After all, why not have a pro-gun law?

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I was 13 years old in 1966 and bought a Spanish 1916 short rifle from Monkey Wards [Montgomery Ward's] for $25 about then. It was brand new, but my Dad had to sign for it and gave me hell for "wasting money".

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The 1966 Hunter's Lodge is not the same as today's.

In 1966 it was on the waterfront in Alexandria Virginia and surrounded for blocks around by InterArms warehouses.

At one time I think it may have been the local retail outlet to InterArms.

I remember going down there and the accros the street to the warehouse and helping my father carry Martini Henrys out to the car. They were $6 each if you bought 3. He sold one for $20 and I still have the other two.

He should have gotten the whole case it would have been a better investment that the PEPCO stock.

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Jaybeez said:

Major md gun control passage, crime stats the next year.

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Following national trend, the violent crime rate in Maryland rose steadily after World War II, doubled from 1960 to 1966, again in 1968, and peaked in the 1990s (1,000 violent crimes per 100,000 inhabitants, up from 151 in 1960) before declining again (547 in 2010). The rate remains high relative to the national average (403.6 in 2010); Maryland's violent crime rate exceeded the national average in 1964 and has remained above average since.

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Doctor_M said:

Yep, the waiting period has been around for a long time, but until the 1990s you could still do a F-T-F transfer of handguns, so it didn't have the same weight that it does now. Now there are no other options but to wait.

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