Today, a number of gun owners were at the first two anti-gun hearings. HB1525 “Repeal the Right of Free Speech”, HB1660 “Elder Care Gun Confiscation.” No committee decisions on those bills yet.
In addition to those two bills, we have alerted on SB469 “The 2020 Sen. Jeanne Dietsch Range Closure Act.” and that hearing is Thursday 1/23 at 10:00am at the State House, room 100.
There are two other bills that we need to alert on for this week. Both of these bills have hearings tomorrow (Wednesday 1/22). If you attend either of these hearings or the one on Thursday SB469, please wear blue or blaze orange as a means to show which side you are on. It seems some anti-gun group has selected “republican red” as their color of choice.
On Wednesday, January 22 at 1:00 pm at the New Hampshire Legislative Office Building (LOB) in Concord, there will be a hearing on bill, HB 1101 (LOB room 210-211), “Buy a Gun, Go Home Without it”. This bill will impose a waiting period between purchase and delivery of a firearm. The bill as introduced is substantially the same as the one introduced in 2019, which was vetoed by our Governor. HB 1101 includes the same issues as in HB514 . A mandated waiting period puts the person seeking a self defense tool at risk. Calling 911 is not a viable answer, as when seconds count, the police are minutes away. The police in many instances arrive in time to mark the crime scene off and call the coroner. Just think what would happened in Texas, had Jack Wilson not been there prepared to act to protect the others.
For those that remember, several years ago Carol Bowne was murdered with a knife in NJ while waiting for her firearm.
No citizen should be deprived of their Second Amendment right to protect themselves. Do you remember the L.A. riots where store owners could not take possession of a firearm for three days to protect themselves and their family/business from looters? That is a real-world example of why waiting periods are bad. Some would say that a waiting period is a “cooling off period” for a person wanting to do harm to another or commit suicide. A prohibited person wanting to do harm to another can acquire a firearm on the black market, and this bill would do nothing to prevent that from happening. Someone wanting to commit suicide could use narcotics, hang themselves, slit their wrist, poison themselves in a car via carbon monoxide. This bill would not prevent or delay these other methods of suicide.
Finally, as a NH resident and taxpayer, I am appalled that this bill which was already debated and vetoed in 2019 was filed again. We should not be diverting valuable leadership time and taxpayer dollars to addressing this subject which our legislative process has already rejected last term.
Please call, e-mail or write to the Criminal Justice & Public Safety committee and let them know how you feel about this bill. A draft letter and contact information for this committee is at the bottom of this e-mail.
What else do you need to know?
On Wednesday, January 22 at 2:30 pm at the New Hampshire Legislative Office Building (LOB, room 210-211) in Concord, there will be a hearing on a proposed bill, HB 1379, “The Gun Registry Creation Act. The purpose of the bill as stated is to require private firearm transfers in New Hampshire to be processed through a licensed firearms dealer, who will conduct a background check and create a record of each sale. A Commercial Firearm Sale means “a transfer of ownership of a firearm, including but not limited to, a sale, exchange, or gift.” Do you have a person well known to you who is not a prohibited person that you want to sell a firearm to?
If HB1379 passes, you could no longer sit at the kitchen table over coffee and complete that transaction. Instead, you would both have to go to a federally licensed dealer to complete the transaction. You would have to surrender your firearm temporarily to the dealer. Your friend would have to submit to a NICS background check, one of you would have to pay whatever arbitrary fee the dealer asks to do the check and other administrative expenses. You would have to wait as long as three days for the NICS results to come back, then you and your friend would have to return to the dealer. You would again surrender your firearm to the dealer who would then complete the transaction for transfer of your firearm to your friend. That sounds reasonable, right? …… Well it is NOT for numerous reasons.
No criminal will obey this law. Criminals are criminals because they don’t obey the law. It is unacceptable to create criminals out of two honest persons well known to each other who wish to transfer a firearm privately. The bill includes few exceptions to the dealer transfer requirement, one being that transfer through a dealer is not required if the seller knows that the buyer is not a prohibited person.
However, the bill is silent on the criteria for the seller making that determination. Is asking the buyer if he is a prohibited person adequate? The bill also requires that the dealer “create a record of each sale” in violation of federal law. This is equivalent to registration for private sales, and registration is the first step to confiscation. NOW is the time to act! Show up at the State House and speak at the hearing, e-mail or call your representatives, notify your friends… We must stop these assaults on our rights!
Here is a sample letter that you can e-mail the committee:
In case the link does not work: email to: HouseCriminalJusticeandPublicSafety@leg.state.nh.us
Dear Committee Members,
As a New Hampshire Resident, a taxpayer and U.S. Citizen, I am writing to you to ask you to oppose both HB1101 “Buy a Gun, Go Home Without it” and HB 1379, “The Gun Registry Creation Act“. Both of these bills are re-runs from the last legislative session, and both were vetoed, and both vetoes were sustained . Wasting time and taxpayer money on these bills is just plain wrong!
I would remind you that Governor Chris Sununu did the correct thing in protecting our Constitutional Rights and he is seen as one of the most popular Governors in America at this point.
Neither of these bills (HB1101 or HB1379) will make New Hampshire citizens safer.
Neither of these bills will help prevent crime. If these types of bills were effective, Chicago, which has these types of laws would be a tourist destination, and not one of the ‘murder capitols’ of the United States.
Furthermore, we have already seen with the Carol Bowne incident in New Jersey, where a waiting period can prevent a law abiding citizen from saving their life.
Please vote Inexpedient to Legislate (ITL) for both of these bills.
Regards,
