THIS is What’s Wrong with Universal Background Checks

Numerous members of TTAG’s Armed Intelligentsia chimed-in on the CapArms Question of the Day: What’s Wrong With Universal Background Checks? My turn . . .

There are three major concerns regarding UBCs. First and foremost is, of course, the fact that the freedom to own and carry the weapon of your choice is a natural, fundamental, and inalienable human, individual, civil and Constitutional right — subject neither to the democratic process nor to arguments grounded in social utility.

The freedom to own must necessarily include the right to purchase. There is no other fundamental right in the Constitution which any court in the country would allow to be subjected to background checks. Think about it:

• Want to sell a book at a yard sale? Please undergo the UBC (and for those who say “but books don’t kill” I would direct your attention towards Mein Kampf, Manifesto of the Communist Party (aka The Communist Manifesto), The Turner Diaries, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, Guerrilla Warfare (the murderous sociopath Che Guevara’s epistle), and so on).
• Want to buy a book at a garage sale? Please undergo the UBC.
• Want to go to church? Please undergo the UBC.
• Want to preach at church? Please undergo the UBC.
• Want to publish a blog? Please undergo the UBC.
• Want to read a blog or buy a newspaper? Please undergo the UBC.
• Want to speak in public, buy birth control, travel across state lines, join the Fraternal Order of Button Collectors? Please undergo the UBC.

My second major reason for opposing UBCs: the antis are never satisfied. Whatever “common sense” restrictions on Second Amendment rights they manage to pass, it’s just a “good first step.” Their job is never finished (and won’t be) until they achieve full and complete civilian disarmament.

Lest someone out there accuse me of slippery slope-ism, let me remind you what happened in New York State back in 2011 (complete story here) a decade after New York State passed their UBC law.

New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman’s office conducted an eight-month gun show investigation, uncovering “serious violations,” leading to ten arrests. This inevitably led the AG’s office to call for “a stronger law to hold show operators liable and increase penalties.”

That may sound reasonable, unless you dig into the meat of the story and discover that those “unlawful sellers” were actually show attendees, not dealers, and that the gun show operators had meticulously followed New York’s UBC law. They had signs posted at all entrances, at all ticket sale locations and at least four places within the show to make sure that everyone knew the law.

Read at The Truth About Guns