Fwd: Confiscation is here, Make the most of it. (fwd)

--- begin forwarded text Mime-Version: 1.0 Date: Tue, 20 Jan 1998 10:06:17 -0800 To: Robert Hettinga From: <snip> Subject: Fwd: Confiscation is here, Make the most of it. (fwd) Status: U

Date: Tue, 20 Jan 1998 07:45:01 -0800 (PST) From: <snip><snip> Subject: Confiscation is here, Make the most of it. (fwd) Mime-Version: 1.0 To: <snip>

Daryl Davis, author of the letter forwarded by Schrader, is the range- master for the Santa Clara County Corrections Department and <snip>

---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Mon, 19 Jan 1998 09:46:37 -0800 From: Mike Schrader To: ca-firearms@lists.best.com Subject: Confiscation is here, Make the most of it.

The following text was written to be presented to our (Santa Clara County's) Republican Central Committee, to wake up the moderates, that bad laws have unintentended consequences. Feel free to use it to do similar work.

Also see the advice at the end, and add my own that now is the time to turn the heat up on both Lungren the candidate and your local representatives to the state houses that voting for more bad laws will never get them reelected. Neither party will be safe from the backlash on this one. Neither party can distance themselves from those consequences.

Don't let them.

Yours, Mike Schrader

Confiscation Comes to California Lungren fulfills Feinstein's fantasy

By Daryl N. Davis

They said it would never happen. Any suggestion that it would was derided as "NRA paranoia." They told us they only wanted "reasonable controls."

Well, it has happened. Gun confiscation is now the law in California. Thank you, Dan Lungren!

In a letter dated November 24, 1997, The Man Who Would Be Governor declared that SKS rifles with detachable magazines, unless the owners can prove they acquired the rifles prior to June 1, 1989, are illegal "and must be relinquished to a local police or sheriff's department." This is a reversal of the opinion held by Mr. Lungren from the time he took office in January 1991, and which has been conveyed in numerous training sessions for peace officers, criminalists and prosecutors during the past four years.

When the Roberti-Roos Assault Weapons Control Act (AWCA) became law in January 1989, it included "SKS with detachable magazine." At that time, there were two distinct models-one with a fixed magazine (Type 56) and one with a detachable, AK-47 magazine (Type 84). President Bush banned importation of the Type 84 in 1990. Later that year, aftermarket detachable magazines (which are not interchangeable with the AK-47 magazine) became available for SKS rifles originally designed to use only a fixed magazine.

Until September 1997, Mr. Lungren's position had been that only the Type 84 was an "assault weapon." He allowed the sale of the aftermarket detachable magazines and of SKS rifles equipped with them. He also allowed the sale of the SKS Sporter, basically a Type 84 that, in compliance with the import restrictions imposed by President Bush, had its bayonet lug ground off and was fitted to a sporting stock rather than a military stock.

In September 1996, the Attorney General's office asked the state Supreme Court to "on its own motion order review of the Court of Appeals decision..." in the Dingman case. James Dingman had been convicted of possession of an unregistered assault weapon (Type 56 with detachable magazine) and his conviction was upheld by the Court of Appeals for the Sixth District. Chief Deputy Attorney General (now candidate for Attorney General) David Stirling wrote:

"The impact of the court's opinion cannot be over stated because of the millions of SKS rifles and after-market magazines currently in circulation. Tens of thousands of California citizens may become criminals simply by using a perfectly lawful rifle with a lawfully purchased magazine without adequate notice that such activity brings them within the proscriptions of the AWCA."

In October 1996, in response to the "unprecedented" request by the Attorney General, the Supreme Court granted review of the Dingman case. In February 1997, the Attorney General's office filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court in support of Dingman; they asked that the opinion of the Court of Appeals be "reversed."

In September 1997, in response to a series of blatantly biased and aggressively uninformed hit pieces in the Los Angeles Times, Mr. Lungren reversed himself. He withdrew his amicus brief in the Dingman case, stating that it "inaccurately reflects the view of the Attorney General." Deputy Attorney General Paul Bishop, who had worked on the AWCA project since 1989, was transferred.

Thanks to Mr. Lungren, "tens of thousands of California citizens" must either surrender their lawfully acquired property without compensation or become felons. Gun dealers throughout the state face felony prosecution, on individual counts, for each detachable magazine SKS they sold during the six years Mr. Lungren assured them it was legal to do so. Furthermore, the opinion does nothing to clarify what constitutes a "SKS with detachable magazine." Must the magazine be affixed to the rifle? With the rifle? The rifle in the owner's gun safe and the magazine buried somewhere in a box of miscellaneous parts in his/her garage?

On CBS's "60 Minutes" on February 5, 1995, Senator Dianne Feinstein declared, "If I could have gotten 51 votes in the Senate of the United States for an outright [firearms] ban, picking up every one of them, Mr. and Mrs. America turn them all in, I would have done it." Thanks to Dan Lungren, Feinstein's fantasy is well on its way to becoming reality. Whether Mr. Lungren's fantasy of currying favor with the loony Left at the Los Angeles Times becomes reality, remains to be seen.

What Should I Do?

1. If a law enforcement officer attempts to confiscate your SKS, live to fight another day. DO NOT RESIST! Do get a receipt, though.

2. Contact Governor Wilson and firmly but politely express your outrage at this situation. In addition to infringing the Second Amendment, the AG's position creates a taking of private property without just compensation (Fifth Amendment) and an ex post facto application of the Assault Weapons Control Act (Article I, Section 9, Paragraph 3). Gov. Pete Wilson State Capitol Sacramento, CA 95814 Phone: 916-445-2864 FAX: 916-445-4633

3. Become active in your local NRA Members Council. You may call the Silicon Valley Members Council at 408-235-9175, 24 hours a day, for up to date legislative information or for information on contacting a Members Council in your area.

<snip> --- end forwarded text ----------------- Robert Hettinga (rah@shipwright.com), Philodox e$, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire' The e$ Home Page: http://www.shipwright.com/ Ask me about FC98 in Anguilla!: http://www.fc98.ai/