First I'm not in favor these embargo approaches nor opposed to them. But I
have problems with ignoring the legal implications of them.
As a private citizen I might refuse to sell a firearm to a person I find
suspicious. As a manufacturer of firearms my customers are approved federally
licensed firearms dealers. Can I refuse to sell to one? If a licensee is
supplying firearms illegally to criminals, why hasn't the government taken
action to revoke his license? Who am I to take action as judge and jury of
this licensee? What is my legal liability for this unilateral action?
Of course there are issues of effectiveness -- businesses can easily change
their names and the licensees they employ. For that matter the action of one
firearms manufacturer might not be duplicated by another. To urge a common
boycott of a particular licensee I would think opens the advocates to liability
for defamation.
I've long been troubled by issues related to being placed on a "list" of bad
behaving people -- I have in mind, in particular, the no-fly list, the
terrorist-watch list, and now, I suppose, the unapproved-wholesaler-for-guns
list. Society has a moral obligation to act against bad behaving people, but
the laws allowing society to act should have clear standards of proof required,
such as in our courts of law, in order to allow society to act. While I'm sure
that an illuminary such as the late Sen. Kennedy can find a way to deal with
his name being placed on the no-fly list, I don't like the difficulty some
common people find trying to deal with similar problems.
How is it consistent with our constitutional rights that a government is
unaccountable for its action to impede an innocent private citizen?
In any case, I'm not proposing to promote or oppose such boycotting action as
given in the article quoted by Olson below. I would like to urge that when
such an approach is brought to this list that the legal basis for the approach
be outlined in addition to any discussion of the effectiveness of the approach.
Phil Lee
--- On Sun, 5/22/11, Joseph E. Olson <[email protected]> wrote:
From: Joseph E. Olson <[email protected]>
Subject: Good to remember
To: "List Firearms Reg" <[email protected]>
Cc: "Dan Gifford" <[email protected]>
Date: Sunday, May 22, 2011, 11:25 AM
[quote]…[Anti-gun a]dvocates argue that gun manufacturers and distributors are
aware of these illegal practices and could stop them, if they chose to, by
refusing to supply guns to the problematic dealers. This theory has been
embraced by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives,
the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence and even some scholars. They argue
that disrupting trafficking operations can have a substantial impact on rates
of criminal gun possession and gun violence. Unfortunately, there is little
evidence to support this set of interconnected claims… Because the "newness" of
crime guns and out-of-state origins are regarded as indicators that the guns
were trafficked, trace data provide a misleading picture of the sources of guns
used in crimes, exaggerating the share that appears to have been trafficked. As
Kevin Wang and I concluded, trafficking levels have no measurable effect on the
incidence of gun possession by
criminals or the rate of violent crime. It is hard to avoid the conclusion
that strategies aimed at reducing gun trafficking are unlikely to have any
measurable effect on gun violence in the U.S. or Mexico. Criminals have plenty
of other ways to get guns.[quote]
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704904604576333443343499926.html?mod=djemLifeStyle_h
*****************************************************************************************
Professor Joseph Olson, J.D., LL.M. o-
651-523-2142
Hamline University School of Law (MS-D2037) f-
651-523-2236
St. Paul, MN 55113-1235 c-
612-865-7956
[email protected] http://law.hamline.edu/constitutional_law/joseph_olson.html
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