Checking the buyer without the gun. I could buy that.

I see here all kinds of proposals - but in Washington there is only one on the table, which is:

Make all private sales or transfers go through an FFL.

Period!

They don't care what you think, or what you might find to be acceptable. To them your counter-proposals are meaningless. They look at the polls and say, "Yes! The time has come." Not one among them has even whispered the word "compromise."

As Ben Franklin said, "If we don't hang together we'll end up being hung separately."

Some folks need to wake up and smell the coffee.

Of course we could always go back to the old way and brand felons

Click to expand...

That was a terrible idea for many reasons, practiced by harsh regimes that were not pleasant to live under.

In my state (Oklahoma) the NICS check does not involve the firearm's serial number, only whether it's a long gun or hand gun. I was recently at a shop and did my NICS check for a handgun and pistol. After that was done I found another pistol that I liked and bought it too, the owner simply added the information to the 4473 that he's required to keep for x amount of time. Nothing is going to the govt. saying that I own this that and the other.

I don't have a problem with NICS. I think it's a good thing. Sure, criminals will still get guns but at least this way you limit their selection/ease of access. We have to have some kind of measure in place like this. I am also for measures to increase communication between mental health professionals and NICS. A free 5 minute phone call while I'm browsing the gun store is no skin off my back.

National registration and records of firearms owned by individuals? Absolutely not, it serves no legitimate purpose. Checking the buyer with minimal delay and intrusion? Yeah, makes easy sense to me.

Now, should the government or anyone else be involved when I'm selling my personal property? I don't think so.

I started a similar thread about a week ago, asking if it was possible to set up a system where you just check the buyer. I didn't think it was, and the responses confirmed it.

The bottom line is, if a system doesn't retain the name of the buyer and the information about the gun somewhere, it is useless.

In the last 2 mass shootings the nics sytem failed. Holmes passed the nics check, Lanza shot his mother and took her guns.Bypassing it.So why do people on this forum keep trying to come up with ubcs that will work. If you want to use the nics check to sell a firearm go to your lgs and pay the transfer fee.Geez so tired of these post.We are our own worst enemy. COMPRMISE, give a little.Open your eyes these people dont want to fix anything they want to take all your guns. DUH

CapnMac: "Rather than turning a presumption of innocence upon its head--which is what background checks do--why not just label or flag the ID of those who are prohibited?"

Sounds like a good idea. But it would last only until the ACLU found out about it because it would discriminate against criminals.

Folks use DL's for a lot more things than buying guns. A negative flag (visible on a DL) would inevitably have consequences unrelated to whether or not you were permitted to own a gun or not. Not to mention modifying it or forging a fake.

How in the world are we going to get the power back from the pols?

There is a way to check the buyer ONLY and do it with a one year permit. The state of Iowa has been using this so it is well vetted. This could be a model for the rest of the states / feds.

http://www.dps.state.ia.us/asd/weapon_permits.shtml

I like it knowing if I sell a firearm to someone I don't know, or know well that the person is Legally eligible to own a firearm (not a felon). Some may call this a comprimise. I think it is an improvement IF the state SHALL issue unless the background check says no.

Channeling all gun sales through a single choke point is an exceedingly bad idea. Then we are just one executive decision away from a one-gun-a-month rule, or whatever other restrictions they care to impose.

How would this method be enforced? The problem with universal background checks, short of all going through an FFL, is that enforcement is extremely difficult. Aside from sting operations there is no way to enforce this idea.

MErl said:

find a way to make criminals follow any such system and I'd consider it.

Click to expand...

If the "criminals won't follow it" argument was worth a dime we never would have passed laws against treason, sedition, murder, rape, burglary, robbery, embezzlement, child endangerment, insert your crime of choice here.

I suppose we should rescind all those laws because it's been proven that criminals don't follow them either.

To the OPs point: combined with post #2. I can see merit in this.

Realistically speaking: "we" are not going to be rid of background checks any more than "they" are ever going to be rid of guns. It's not going to happen.

Why does a background certification have to be specifically tied to weapons purchases only? Better yet, why does it have to be an affirmative system at all?

"__JOHN DOE ___ is not declined in the NICS database" is merely an answer to a binary question of "Is this person adjudicated mentally defective, a felon or, or, or?"

The question the transferor/seller is seeking to answer is not "Is s/he permitted to own a weapon?" Instead the question is "Is s/he on a list of felons/mentally ill/etc.?" And in this way the transferor is no different than thousands of other people in this country who may want an answer to this question.

The answer to this question should not be specific to buying guns: because it applies to many things in our society: to baby sitting, driving a school bus, working in a school, being a security guard, getting a job at my company, etc.. I get that not all of these are rights so much as they are privileges. And many of them apply to at-will situations. Which brings us back to the point earlier: we are never going to be rid of background checks. Period.

So what is a better way of conducting them overall? Personally, I see that the 4473 form containing information on guns is tracking. It should be done away with. This will not happen unless some other method of checking is in it's place. For that reason I agree with the posters who say that a better system is one in which the answer to "yes or no" is one not specific to guns but specific to an overall system used in other places besides weapons.

hogshead said:

In the last 2 mass shootings the nics sytem failed. Holmes passed the nics check, Lanza shot his mother and took her guns.Bypassing it.So why do people on this forum keep trying to come up with ubcs that will work. If you want to use the nics check to sell a firearm go to your lgs and pay the transfer fee.Geez so tired of these post.We are our own worst enemy. COMPRMISE, give a little.Open your eyes these people dont want to fix anything they want to take all your guns. DUH

Click to expand...

Wait? Wayne LaPierre wanted to take my guns back in the 90s when he testified before Congress that background checks were okay and the NRA supported them?

Why not just a national id card with a common access card chip similar to my military ID. You could use it for multiple things. Whoever just checks the ID to make sure it is the owner, pops it into a card reader and goes to a national database site, the person who owns the ID enters their pin and then the info pops up with something like:

Vote: Eligible
Firearm: Eligible
Social Security # XXX-XX-XXXX

Then you do your business or vote or whatever.

Click to expand...

Great! I can tie my own noose?!?? the upside is I can make sure it fits properly around my neck and I can use something soft yet strong. (tic)

After reading all of these replies, two things come to mind:

1. "shall not be infringed" doesn't fit very well with any system that requires government involvement and approval in the buying or selling of a legal piece of merchandise.

2. "innocent until proven guilty" somehow gets lost in the approval process to buy or sell a legal piece of merchandise.

I fully agree, until we find a way to keep any criminal from violating existing laws, no approval system is going to do the least bit in the way of keeping firearms out of the hands of those inclined to do violence to others, or deprive others of their property.

Come to think of it, a system that allows me to check on any potential buyer's legal/medical history might be good. I have this neighbor I'm not too sure about, and I'd like to know about his mental health history..............see where this can go?

NICS works

For those that pose the argument, "Why a background check? Criminals will never use it?" Based on FBI data, in 2008 NICS denied over 60,000 ineligible purchases! I'd say that is working pretty good.

If the "criminals won't follow it" argument was worth a dime we never would have passed laws against treason, sedition, murder, rape, burglary, robbery, embezzlement, child endangerment, insert your crime of choice here.

I suppose we should rescind all those laws because it's been proven that criminals don't follow them either.

Click to expand...

The laws don't seem to be stopping be acts. We still have all of the above. The laws stay because there is little drawback to having a law against burglary. Of your list there are drawbacks to a couple of them, sedition vs free speech for example.

There are drawbacks to universal checks for firearm transfers. Large ones for some of the proposals, smaller ones for the OP. Considering checks cannot actually stop prohibited persons from getting firearms, the drawbacks aren't worth it.

no

since two character is too shot - hell no

Ragnar Danneskjold said:

That doesn't solve the inherent problem of background checks. There's still a "can buy guns" group and a "can't buy guns" group, and the government is still in charge of who fits into what group. That's tyrannical.

Click to expand...

It also does nothing about the "will follow the law" and "criminal" groups. Doesn't matter how many background checks you put in place, how onerous or farcical they may be, a criminal is a criminal is a criminal...they won't follow any of the rules.

cluck said:

Great! I can tie my own noose?!?? the upside is I can make sure it fits properly around my neck and I can use something soft yet strong. (tic)

Click to expand...

Yep, I remember when my DL had my SS# on it... that turned out to be a seriously dumb idea and even after realizing how dumb of an idea that alone was, it took quite a few years for the practice to cease.

I certainly don't look forward to the day when we are all required to carry our federally issued "national ID card" at all times

More people die every year from vehicle crimes than gun crimes, so why is there no universal background check required for vehicle purchases? Why single out guns?

GDCPony,
You could probably buy into anything that does not invade your comfort zone. The 2d Amendment,as written, makes me feel all worm and fuzzy and ready to stand up for it as written.

cluck said:

Based on FBI data, in 2008 NICS denied over 60,000 ineligible purchases! I'd say that is working pretty good.

Click to expand...

A detailed Justice Department report on 2008 NICS denials suggests a different conclusion. The ATF actually reviewed 7% (5,573) of the denials referred (78,906) by the FBI.

Of the denials referred by the FBI, the ATF conducted 2,154 "unlawful possession" investigations, two-fifths of which were "delayed denials" in which guns had already been sold. In 57% of those cases firearms were retrieved from prohibited persons, but in 30% of the cases the people were found to not be prohibited.

In the small number of cases that the ATF was most confident of investigating and finding real problems, 30% were false denials. How many false denials were in the larger general population?

You can read further in the report about the 39 people (out of more than 70,000 denials) who were prosecuted and pleaded guilty or were convicted of 43 charges.

Working pretty good? In any area other than government, results like those above would be considered a total and abject failure of the system.

The proposal in the OP is interesting, but the check would have to be seller-initiated and not buyer-initiated.

Old Fuff wrote:

I see here all kinds of proposals - but in Washington there is only one on the table, which is:

Make all private sales or transfers go through an FFL.

Click to expand...

You are right, but that's because no serious alternatives were proposed early on by the pro-gun side. By "stonewalling," we're going to be left with the worst possible plan. I think it's too late to make any positive proposals now -- this thing has taken on an almost unstoppable momentum. 2013 is going to take its place alongside 1986 as a year in which the NRA made a serious strategic blunder. (This shouldn't really be surprising, since by maintaining an unreachable "purity," the NRA maximizes its contributions -- the real interests of gun owners be damned.)

MErl said:

The laws don't seem to be stopping be acts. We still have all of the above. The laws stay because there is little drawback to having a law against burglary. Of your list there are drawbacks to a couple of them, sedition vs free speech for example.

There are drawbacks to universal checks for firearm transfers.

Click to expand...

yet somehow I don't see those drawbacks as being nearly as bad as Sedition or Treason.

Considering checks cannot actually stop prohibited persons from getting firearms, the drawbacks aren't worth it.

Click to expand...

The fact is, and the data supports that, the checks DO prohibit the wrong persons from getting firearms. Discounting for "adjudicated mentally deficient", in 2008 alone almost 4,200 people were denied strictly because they were convicted felons, subject to a protective domestic violence order, or convicted of domestic violence. This is in one year.

Assuming the widely accepted (even by the NRA) 60/40% statistical distribution (60% of purchases subject to NICS, 40% not) and permitting for extrapolation that any logical and honest actuarial analysis permits, this means that roughly 1,700 prohibited persons may have acquired their firearm through a non-NICS-subjected transfer. Granted, absent a specific survey we have no way of verifying that these guns did in fact reach the hands of prohibited persons, but we are allowed to interpret data in this way.

In terms of percentages these are a small portion of the overall firearm transfers/purchases; nonetheless, this data shows that the current system does in fact keep guns out of the hands of prohibited persons. And for honest people committed to an honest discussion of facts in this debate, it is an argument that supports the existence of a NICS check on a purchase. (the question of whether or not these 4200 denials are "worth" the other 5.89million checks is purely subjective.

Needless to say, we can point to law abiding firearms purchasers inconvenienced by the NICS check or an outright denial. Likewise the Antis can point to a family who's daughter was killed by an estranged husband who got his gun through a secondary market and killed her. (eg, my very pro-RKBA family. Our niece was killed in the very way.)

The OPs post, and the second post about making it an "affirmative answer" bearing no connection to a firearm purchase allow the current NICS/4473 system to be amended to remove the "gun trace" condition and allow transferors to help prevent their gun from getting into the hands of one of these other 1,700 prohibited persons.

I personally find this a more acceptable, less intrusive method of conducting checks.