Last year, Nevada legislators made dramatic improvements to gun control laws in the state. Signed by Governor Sandoval in June, SB 175 and SB 240 were two of the most prominent pieces of legislation (although there were several) and applauded by gun owners statewide. By way of refresher, SB 175 abolished handgun registration in Clark County, expanded the already in place “Stand Your Ground” self-defense statutes and expanded the list of out-of-state permits recognized for conceal carry. SB 240, among other agenda items, removed the fees on volunteer background checks and provided provisions to help target straw purchasers.
Both measures were steps in the right direction for gun owners and made vast improvements to the Silver State’s gun laws. However, in a classic “one step forward, two steps back” scenario, this year may reverse the strides to protect Second Amendment rights in the Battle Born state and add unnecessary restrictions to firearm transfers. If you’re not sure what I’m referring to, let me have the unpleasant task of introducing you to Question 1, which will appear on Nevada’s November ballot. The initiative would require that an unlicensed person who wants to sell or transfer a firearm to someone else would have to do so through a licensed gun dealer who runs a background check. Sound familiar? It should, the proposal was vetoed by Governor Sandoval in 2013.
To be fair, the initiative does provide certain exemptions. For example, transfers between immediate family members or temporary transfers for hunting or self-defense would be legal. But, let’s say you decide to go target shooting on public lands and you ask a buddy if you can borrow a gun and he/she doesn’t go with you. Even if you abide by all safety, local and federal rules, it could be illegal under Question 1. A first offense of this law would put a gross misdemeanor on your record; get convicted of it more than once and you can call yourself a felon.
Proponents for the ballot measure will tell you that it would prevent unlicensed firearm dealers or those conducting a private gun sale to sell a gun without running mental health and criminal background checks on purchasers. Unfortunately for that assertion, guns that are legally sold face-to-face have never presented a crime problem. Gun related crimes are a result of several issues including criminals that pass background checks, street deals, unlawful dealers, stolen guns and straw purchasers. None of those issues are addressed, and certainly wouldn’t be stopped, by Question 1. Simply put, Question 1 makes it more difficult for legal transfers to be made, prohibiting law-abiding citizens from selling, loaning, leasing or gifting weapons to other law-abiding citizens.
If it’s ineffectiveness in preventing crime weren’t enough of an issue, consider the fact that the initiative would be virtually unenforceable without gun registration, which was recently abolished in Clark County. The National Institute of Justice, the research arm of the Department of Justice, released a report in 2013 that made a number of conclusions regarding background checks. One of which was that the effectiveness of the universal background check, “depends on the ability to reduce straw purchasing, requiring gun registration.” So, if the goal behind Question 1 is to bring back gun registration, it’s a solid first step. If, however, the goal is as claimed, to ultimately protect citizens from gun-related crime, it fails without even being enacted.
Call to Action: Question 1 is a waste of taxpayer time and money and would only hamper legal gun transfers while doing nothing to prevent crime or protect public safety. Preserve the strides made in 2015 for gun owners and vote NO on Question 1 this November. Additionally, tell your family, friends and colleagues and get the word out so we can collectively defeat this already vetoed proposal.
2 Chronicles 7:14 (NKJV) “If my people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.”
By Whose Authority?
For more information on my Commentary and to see some of the backup research, or if you wonder why I take the position I take, go to www.LyleBrennan.com.
Dan Mac says
But, but, we just HAVE to do something! After all, gun crime has reached “epidemic” proportions, hasn’t it? And this bill will close the dreaded “gun show loophole”. Or is it the “terrorist loophole”? The “domestic violence loophole”? Oh well, as long as it closes SOME loophole!
It’s sad that the gun-grabbers resort to deception to pass these ineffective “gun-control” laws. Rather than tell the truth, they lie, and then they wrap their lie in deceptive packaging. The liberal media hammers away at every gun-related incident, then repeats the gun-grabber’s deception ad nauseam in an attempt to indoctrinate the ill-informed. The end result are laws that do nothing to prevent crime, but instead attack the law-abiding citizen. After all, “gun control” has noting to do with controlling guns. It has everything to do with controlling people.
Koba Solzhenitsyn says
Universal Background Checks are the method by which progressives/totalitarians build a firearms registration data base. When they feel the time is right, the confiscation/”Australian” type mandatory buy back diktat will be issued.
It is just that simple.
James Andrews says
And the only thing such unconstitutional legislation will do, in reality, is actually help push even MORE guns onto the underground, black market, thus achieving exactly the opposite of their so called “goal!” What a bunch of morons…..
rktman says
The lie perpetrated on the signatories to push the nannie bloomers funded initiative was an end to ALL “gun violence” and an end to ALL “domestic violence” in NV if you vote for this common sense “gun safety” initiative. I heard the signature gatherers say this to mostly females. Even the reno gazette journal wrote and editorial saying this was a waste of time and taxpayers money. Now that’s a condemnation if I ever heard one.
Trey Brakefield says
“To be fair, the initiative does provide certain exemptions. For example, … temporary transfers for hunting or self-defense would be legal.”
That’s even giving the initiative too much credit. There are only exceptions WHILE hunting, not FOR hunting. This exact language has been copied from every Bloomberg backed version of these universal background checks. This extremely narrow exception has been brought up every time and yet it hasn’t been fixed in later versions pretty much proving it’s intentionally that narrow.
Also, the transfer for self-defense is equally narrow. It is only legal to prevent imminent death or harm and is only valid while that imminent threat exists. Putting a gun in the hands of a stalking victim probably would not qualify unless the stalker was known to be nearby and currently (and specifically) targeting the victim.
What’s more concerning, as the author eludes to, are the many cases of (often responsible) temporary transfers that are NOT exempt and therefore new crimes. Keeping a firearm for safe-keeping for someone else (like storing one for someone while they are on vacation) or even borrowing one for the purpose of teaching firearm safety are NOT legal activities (without first getting government permission) under this law.
Also, the law has no exceptions for existing CPL holders which have already been thoroughly vetted by the state. Double-checking the already vetted is highly redundant and shows this initiative, and others like them, for what they are: burdens and fees targeting the harmless (and often even responsible) activities of gun-owners under the guise of public safety.
Trey Brakefield says
“To be fair, the initiative does provide certain exemptions. For example, … temporary transfers for hunting or self-defense would be legal.”
That’s even giving the initiative too much credit. There are only exceptions WHILE hunting, not FOR hunting. This exact language has been copied from every Bloomberg backed version of these universal background checks. This extremely narrow exception has been brought up every time and yet it hasn’t been fixed in later versions pretty much proving it’s intentionally that narrow.
Also, the transfer for self-defense is equally narrow. It is only legal to prevent imminent death or harm and is only valid while that imminent threat exists. Putting a gun in the hands of a stalking victim probably would not qualify unless the stalker was known to be nearby and currently (and specifically) targeting the victim.
What’s more concerning, as the author eludes to, are the many cases of (often responsible) temporary transfers that are NOT exempt and therefore new crimes. Keeping a firearm for safe-keeping for someone else (like storing one for someone while they are on vacation) or even borrowing one for the purpose of teaching firearm safety are NOT legal activities (without first getting government permission) under this law.
Also, the law has no exceptions for existing CPL holders which have already been thoroughly vetted by the state. Double-checking the already vetted is highly redundant and shows this initiative, and others like them, for what they are: burdens and fees targeting the harmless (and often even responsible) activities of gun-owners under the guise of public safety.
ml_Oath says
As a Washingtonian who just went thru this with the Bloomberg/Gates/Ballmer/Hanauer funded I-594, I cannot stress enough the Nevada must not allow this nonsense to pass. The law is not being enforced, has resulted in zero arrests and zero prosecutions after a year in place and is largely being ignored by the states gun owners. It has expanded the state pistol registry though and now the anti’s want an “extreme risk protection order” law to deprive gun owners of due process. Do not let this camels nose under the Nevada tent.
paradoc2 says
Stump for constitutional carry to be on a ballot measure…there’s one
that I’d love to see in my home state of PA. Works fine in about eight
states already and it’s always entertaining to watch the Bloomberg /
Brady so-called gun safety groups predict all the carnage that
never materializes.
Prester Kahn says
Let me remind you of US v Hayes (SCOTUS 1968). The finding in that decision was that if you were a prohibited person, you could not be prosecuted for NOT registering a firearm, since the act of registering was the same thing as being forced to testify against yourself – which is prohibited by the 5th Amendment.
So the net result is that only law-abiding folks would have to register – which rather defeats the supposition that this would fight criminal possession in any way.
TeeJaw says
Liberals think that placing restrictions of peaceful law-abiding people will reduce gun crime. it’s completely insane. It’s also possible that they know it won’t have any affect on crime but they just want to hassle gun owners because they don’t like them.
Jim C says
The big picture in all this that I see is that no one would really know who sold what unless there is a list made. It’s against federal law to compose a centrally located list of firearms and their owners. I see it as gun registration by proxy.
Alex Giger says
Dear Readers,
Informed voters are coming to realize that there is a “built-in” de-facto handgun ban in this universal background check referendum. This is the toxic “poison pill” that will kill this referendum.
Why is there a handgun ban?
Because Federal law prohibits gun dealers from transferring a handgun to young adults aged 18, 19, and 20 years old (i.e. under 21). Yet, adults 18 and older can own handguns and open carry in Nevada..
However, this would no longer be possible if the voters approve the referendum, since all private gun transfers would have to go through a gun dealer administered background check. Responsible private sales are the only way these young people can exercise their 2nd Amendment civil rights to own and open carry a handgun.
Sorry, but this “turkey” is not going to fly – especially since the proponents of the referendum have not been open and honest in revealing this aspect of the referendum, and instead have deceptively tried to hide this from the voters.
There are numerous other problems with the referendum, but this handgun ban is one of the most egregious.
West Street says
Sorry but Nevada is not NYC. We will not be treated as children with a nanny watching over us. Lets just call background checks what they are.. “universal registration” You really think the state is not keeping records? You really think that paperwork you fill out when you buy a gun just goes away? Nope.. and no we will never allow you to register our guns so you can take them away later.
Concerned Vegas Citizen says
A question no one can ever answer, why do they need to know anything about the weapon for a background check? (other than to create a registry)
Alex Giger says
Mayor Bloomberg and his proponents of universal background checks are not telling the voters that this proposal would result in a de-facto handgun ban on 18, 19, and 20 year olds (i.e. young voters under 21 years old). This is toxic consequence of the referendum.
Please see the authoritative legal analysis of this issue in the following links for further details.
https://www.examiner.com/article/universal-background-checks-would-strip-18-20-year-olds-of-handgun-rights
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/11/05/gun-bans-for-persons-under-21-a-hidden-problem-in-everytowns-universal-background-checks/
paradoc2 says
It’s definitely a backdoor registration scheme so don’t get fooled like they did in the state of Washington. It will do nothing to stop criminals and affect only those gun owners that virtually never use their weapons to commit crimes – like virtually all new gun control laws conjured up by Bloomberg and likeminded infringement groups. Vote it down…
Jed says
If the government really, really wants universal background checks, they should require police depts to offer the service for free instead of forcing it upon independent businesses.
Kevin Lawson says
@Koba. You hit the nail directly on the head! This is just step one in the process of eliminating our 2nd Amendment Rights. Ask the “Master Lier” herself! Hillary sure wants our guns; so to make it fair.. “something she knows nothing about”. I respectfully ask for HER personal “Security Team” to immediately remit all “Instruments” that may harm, maim or otherwise place any individual at risk of injury or death. How about Heinous Hillary, do you think that you can practice what you preach or does this just open up another can of BS stories. Which by the way, you have told so many lies in your career you can’t even remember what you’ve said without scouring the internet to remind yourself of which position you took and what lies you told with it! I pray that the whole truth about you and you Sexual Predator husband comes to the surface and you are both prosecuted and spend the rest of their days behind bars… and I’m not talking about some freaking summer camp for the Rich Folks. Send them both to Kansas, HARD TIME the whole TIME!!!!
Art Dixon says
It was Turned Down by the Nevada Assembly, and the Nevada Senate Last Session.
Then they presented a Petition that was not Vetted, and Turned in 2 Days Late !
This Should Not Even Be on the Slate !