ATF Comments and Form Letters/Emails.

JohnKSa · Jun 3, 2022

Did anyone read through the ATF Bump Stock Final Rule document?

https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2018-12-26/pdf/2018-27763.pdf

There was some important information in there in terms of how effective activism is done.

Of the 119,264 comments received in support of the rule, 14,618 used one form letter in support of the proposed rule...

A total of 66,182 comments were received that opposed the rule. Approximately 40,806 of those comments were form submissions by the National Association for Gun Rights (NAGR) on behalf of its members, with 25,874 submitted on paper petitions and 14,932 submitted by facsimile. ... Of the 25,376 comments individually submitted, 12,636 used one of three form letters; the remaining 12,740 were unique comments.

A total of 16,051 of the commenters opposed the rule on the ground that it violates the Second Amendment. Of these, 11,753 used a form letter...

The document gives the distinct impression that form submissions are not considered to have the same impact as "unique comments".

Second, and more importantly, the ATF took time to address the issues raised in the comments. Form submissions allowed them to collectively respond to literally tens of thousands of comments at once since identical submissions can all be responded to as if there were only one of them.

My takeaway:

If you are going to take the time to send a request/comment/opinion to an official or organization in the name of activism you need to make it unique. You can get ideas from form letters, but make the response your own. I'm not talking about changing a few words here and there--I'm talking about using the ideas in the form letter as seeds from which your own submission will grow into something obviously unique.

As always, these submissions should be clearly written and succinct. Not to the point of being a collection of one-liners, but it is critical to keep things to a few paragraphs. Don't ramble, hit your points, use the words you need to make your positions clear, then you're done.

DoubleMag · Jun 4, 2022

I remember that was suggested before and possibly (?) it was with the so-called ghost gun proposal? Take a form letter, personalize it.

Anyways, it'll be Ok if the (D's) get their way with current law proposals, , I guess they think bumpstocks are still available and therefore can be added to the machine gun registry

jmorris · Jun 4, 2022

JohnKSa said:
The document gives the distinct impression that form submissions are not considered to have the same impact as "unique comments".

No surprise to me.

DoubleMag said:
Anyways, it'll be Ok if the (D's) get their way with current law proposals, , I guess they think bumpstocks are still available and therefore can be added to the machine gun registry

That was closed May 19, 1986. From the “summary” of the linked document.

The bump-stock-type devices covered by this final rule were not in existence prior to the effective date of the statute, and therefore will be prohibited when this rule becomes effective. Consequently, under the final rule, current possessors of these devices will be required to destroy the devices or abandon them at an ATF office prior to the effective date of the rule.

hso · Jun 5, 2022

JohnKSa said:
form submissions are not considered to have the same impact as "unique comments".

It is important to recognize that personalizing any submission will have more value than what looks too much like mass spam.

Craig_AR · Jun 5, 2022

JohnKSa said:
If you are going to take the time to send a request/comment/opinion to an official or organization in the name of activism you need to make it unique. You can get ideas from form letters, but make the response your own. I'm not talking about changing a few words here and there--I'm talking about using the ideas in the form letter as seeds from which your own submission will grow into something obviously unique.

+1
This advice applies equally when writing your CongressCritter or state legislator on pending bills trying to become law.

DeepSouth · Jun 5, 2022

What I’ve done in the past on many occasions is take a form letter in one tab and my email in the other and use the form letter as a template, basically put it in my own words. Not sure how that’d count that but I’ve been guilty of it before. Especially if I’m a little ignorant or unsure about the issue.

Also, in this case and nearly all others the outcome is (I believe) predetermined. We may make it harder for them, or easier for the courts to overturn but I don’t think anything that could have been put in the comments by us little people would affect a change in their ruling. Maybe….. hopefully, I’m wrong about that but it’s certainly my belief.

rbernie · Jun 5, 2022

JohnKSa said:
The document gives the distinct impression that form submissions are not considered to have the same impact as "unique comments".

That's an inference that I don't see. It's far more likely that the number of unique submissions versus form letters were tallied for the specific purposes of identifying the number of responses needed to be drafted (e.g. how much work staff and contractors had to be paid to do).

JohnKSa said:
Form submissions allowed them to collectively respond to literally tens of thousands of comments at once since identical submissions can all be responded to as if there were only one of them.

Exactly so. The inference that a unique input generated more impact isn't supported by the report - it only points out that they had to do more work to respond when there were more unique letters.

ETA - this observation doesn't mean that I disagree with the notion that putting in the effort to craft an actual personalized response isn't a good thing. It just means that we cannot say with authority that it has a quantifiable impact.

SKILCZ · Sep 4, 2022

JohnKSa said:
Did anyone read through the ATF Bump Stock Final Rule document?

https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2018-12-26/pdf/2018-27763.pdf

There was some important information in there in terms of how effective activism is done.

The document gives the distinct impression that form submissions are not considered to have the same impact as "unique comments".

Second, and more importantly, the ATF took time to address the issues raised in the comments. Form submissions allowed them to collectively respond to literally tens of thousands of comments at once since identical submissions can all be responded to as if there were only one of them.

My takeaway:

If you are going to take the time to send a request/comment/opinion to an official or organization in the name of activism you need to make it unique. You can get ideas from form letters, but make the response your own. I'm not talking about changing a few words here and there--I'm talking about using the ideas in the form letter as seeds from which your own submission will grow into something obviously unique.

As always, these submissions should be clearly written and succinct. Not to the point of being a collection of one-liners, but it is critical to keep things to a few paragraphs. Don't ramble, hit your points, use the words you need to make your positions clear, then you're done.

This will be of particular importance given the coming changes announced/leaked on pistol braces. Stay active and alert on this, even if you don't own one. Some of us who didn't own or desire bump stocks still saw the writing on the wall of where that would lead if allowed through, which is where we are today with door-to-door ATF visits and pending rule changes that would create at least tens of millions of felons in the U.S. overnight with no legislative authority to do so.

wgp · Nov 24, 2022

Years ago I worked for a Congressman, and one of my duties was opening and sorting mail (no email or texting then). I can tell you that we had no trouble spotting form letters, and while we did not throw them away they carried somewhat less weight. Should not have, but they did.

ATF Comments and Form Letters/Emails.

JohnKSa

Administrator

DoubleMag

Member

jmorris

Member

hso

Moderator

Craig_AR

Contributing Member

DeepSouth

Random Guy

rbernie

Contributing Member

SKILCZ

Member

wgp

Member

Similar threads