WHAT REALLY HAPPENED: S.1805 & the AWB

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Bud Wiser

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Good info from GOA.

I don't share the "Oh boy we defeated that there AWB renewal today" attitude some seem to have.

The object here was to pass a law that would stop Frivolous Law Suits against Gun manufacturers.

Feinstein, Schummer, and assorted others loaded up the Bill with all kinds of Poison Pills & killed it.

The Stinking Democrats moved in force to Kill it.

The Stinking Republicans let it die.

Are the Stinking Republicans now going to do right by Gun Owners and try to sneak the Gun manufacturers law suit protection Bill through at some other date & time? 3 a. m. in the morning just before the entire Senate adjourns for the next public holiday would be a great time. And why not? There will be only a handful of Senators around at that time to object. The Stinking Democrats pull this Cr*p all the time and get away with it.

And to the 'Heroes' at the NRA: You Klowns are ????????! You couldn't pass your way out of a paper bag let alone pass a Bill in Congress! Morons! I'll remember their Failure today in the Senate the next time they phone and hustle me for cash...

Other than that, GOA reports on what went down....

---------------------------------------------------------------

Great News!
-- Feinstein semi-auto ban is dead, as Senate shoots down gun control bill
Gun Owners of America
8001 Forbes Place, Suite 102
Springfield, VA 22151
(703)321-8585
Tuesday, March 2, 2004

It got quite ugly today in the U.S. Senate.

First, the U.S. Senate voted to renew the Feinstein semi-auto ban. Then it voted for the McCain gun show ban. All this in addition to the "Lock Up Your Safety" requirement that Senators tacked on to the lawsuit protection bill last week.

You will remember that Gun Owners of America had warned senators last week to oppose S. 1805 if it was loaded down with gun control provisions. Thankfully, pro-gun senators heeded the call to kill the bill once it was turned into an anti-gun abomination. These senators were joined by their anti-gun counterparts who opposed the underlying bill because they still want to bankrupt the gun makers.

The final vote on defeating S. 1805 was 90-8.

You can see how your Senators voted on the control amendments. The following describes the critical provisions that were tacked on to the lawsuit protection bill before it was soundly defeated:

Lock Up Your Safety Requirement. Senator Herb Kohl (D-WI) offered this gun control amendment last week. It would require all handgun purchasers to pay an implicit "gun tax" by requiring them to buy a trigger lock when they purchase their handgun, irrespective of need. In addition, the amendment would create a broad and implicit cause of action against gun owners who fail to actually use the storage device to lock up their firearms. Of course, a locked gun then becomes unavailable for self-defense. The Senate passed the Kohl amendment 70-27.

Feinstein Semi-auto Ban. The Senate voted 52-47 in favor of the Feinstein semi-auto amendment. This amendment would extend the ban that was signed into law by President Clinton in 1994 -- a ban which outlaws certain magazines and more than 180 types of semi-automatic firearms. Unless Congress authorizes such an extension, the ban will sunset in September 2004.

McCain Gun Show Ban. Senator John McCain (R-AZ) offered this amendment to outlaw the private sale of firearms at gun shows, unless the buyer agrees to submit to a background registration check. The language could effectively eliminate gun shows because every member of an organization sponsoring a gun show could be imprisoned if the organization fails to notify each and every "person who attends the special firearms event of the requirements [under the Brady Law]." Thus, if the person responsible for handing out "Brady pamphlets" took a break to go to the bathroom, everyone responsible for the event could be sent to prison. The McCain amendment passed 53-47.

Ammunition Restriction Study. This amendment, offered by Senators Bill Frist (R-TN) and Larry Craig (R-ID), passed the Senate 85-12. Among other things, the language of this provision would commission the Attorney General to determine whether the ban on so-called "cop killer" ammunition should include superior performance bullets in popular hunting calibers such as the 30-06.

The good news is that the attempt to renew the Feinstein semi-auto ban is dead... for now. Of course, there are still semi-auto ban bills pending in the House and Senate, and we can expect Feinstein to again offer her gun ban as an amendment to some other "must pass" bill.

The bad news is that the prospects for getting any kind of legislation to the President's desk this year to protect gun makers is very slim.

Today's vote makes it very difficult for a pro-gun senator to offer this bill as an amendment to another bill. After all, anti-gunners can demand that any provision to protect the gun industry now be offered as a "package" with the anti-gun amendments that were attached to the bill over the last couple of days.

It would have been far better for Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) to have brought this Senate bill to the floor in such a way that NO gun control amendments could have been offered. Doing so would have involved using parliamentary tactics that are somewhat difficult to detail in an e-mail alert. But the Senate has often used these tactics in the past. A vote to pass a "clean bill" could very well have succeeded, as almost 60 Senators had cosponsored the underlying legislation.

GOA wants to thank all of its members and activists for calling and e-mailing their Senators over the last several days. The outpouring of opposition from grassroots gun owners kept phones ringing off the hook in Senate offices, and to be sure, contributed to pulling several "fence sitters" to our side on the Feinstein amendment.

Again, you can see that vote along with all the others.

****************************
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Answer: A Gun Owners of America lobbyist.

Just ask Rep. John Hostettler, Republican Congressman from Indiana:

"Gun Owners of America is the pit bull of the Second Amendment. They are relentless and never give any ground whatsoever to the gun grabbers."

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http://www.gunowners.org/a030204.htm
 
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10 rotten stinking republican traitors put the AWB amendment on OUR legislation. The Republicans let the Democrats defile OUR legislation. The result was a bill so crappy, noonr wanted it. And it is a victory for us that when push comes to shove we roll over and go back to business as usual? Whatever.
A waste of a week of senate debate and my tax dollars and my time popping antacids watching the gun ban brigade on cspan.
 
Some simple questions, Bud Wiser...

Did you want the AWB to be extended another 10 years? Did you want a private gun sale at a gunshow to undergo government scrutiny? So why was it a bad thing to kill a poisoned piece of legislation? Would the additional two bad riders being passed offset the one good anti-lawsuit bill being passed? :scrutiny:
 
98, You're missing the point. The Dems were going to try to kill this Bill and they did.

The Repubs were not interested in keeping it clean to begin with. If the Repubs and the Traitors at the NRA really wanted to pass this Bill they would have sent it over to the House of Representatives where a similar Bill giving Protection to Gun Manufacturers from Law Suits has already been passed. That's right a Bill has been passed in the House giving protection to Gun Manufacturers from Frivolous Lawsuits has already passed, and with Flying Colors.

This damn Bill should have been sent over to the House where all the Poison Pills put in by Feinstine and Schummer could quietly be removed and be made clean again.

But Oh NO! That was all too complicated for the NRA and the Republicans in the Senate! :cuss:

Here's what Neal Knox had to say about it on Monday:
____________

March 1 Neal Knox Update -- The anti-gun crowd’s sole focus right now is
killing S. 1805, the renumbered S. 659 gun industry liability protection
bill.

So why on Earth are so many panicky gun rights defenders (or people
claiming to be) doing everything they can to help the enemy?

Yes, S. 1805 is in danger of being loaded up with anti-gun amendments in
the Senate. But anyone with two brain cells to rub together knows that
the Senate is overloaded with anti-gunners and has been for several
years.

The only way to get the bill passed is to get it back to the House, where
it can be cleaned up or killed.

The identical House version, H.R. 1036, passed last April 285-140.

The Senate bill has 55 co-sponsors -- five more than necessary for
passage. Last week the Schumer-Lautenberg, et al, filibuster failed by
75 votes -- fifteen more votes than the two-thirds necessary to bring it
to the floor.

The day the voting started, the White House sent Congress a Statement of
Administration Policy calling for a "clean bill" -- one without
amendments. That's what President Bush has said he will sign -- which
greatly improves the chances of a cleaned Conference Committee bill
getting through the Senate.

Sen. Schumer fumed the Bush position will cost 10 or eleven Republican
votes against his and Dianne Feinstein's amendments. Let's hope he's
right, but I doubt it. Three or four might be enough.

With everything stacked against them, the only way the anti-gunners can
kill the bill is to load it down with a bunch of killer amendments --
causing the gun rights people to do what the anti-gun crowd can't do.
Kill it -- like our Nervous Nellies are already clamoring to do.

Schumer's "useful idiots" -- some of our people -- are in a panic because
Sen. Larry Craig and other pro-gunners signed a "Unanimous Consent
Agreement" allowing a series of anti-gun (and pro-gun) amendments to be
considered without a string of filibusters.

That's the only way the Senate ever can consider a controversial bill --
but many of those screaming about "Unanimous Consent" think it means the
pro-gun side has consented to evil amendments. They haven't.

Sen. Barbara Boxer added an amendment requiring all dealer-sold handguns
to be delivered with a safety lock, as most already are.

The Internet is being flooded with emails from people I never heard of --
forwarded by people who should know better -- demanding that S. 1805 be
killed because it "contains gun control."

Let me assure you: S. 1805 WILL CONTAIN A LOT MORE GUN CONTROL --
probably including the Feinstein "Assault Weapon" ban and the McCain gun
show-killer bill -- before the Senate's final vote.

But I want the Senate to hold their noses and send it back to the House,
warts and all.

The letters going out right now from misled gun owners to their Senators,
telling them to vote against S. 1805, were probably drafted in the
offices of "Americans for Gun Safety" and Handgun Control Inc.

If not, they might as well have been.

As most of you know, I have been personally involved in every Federal gun
rights battle since 1966 -- as founding editor of Gun Week, editor of
Handloader and Rifle, Executive Director of NRA-ILA, legislative
columnist for Guns & Ammo, Shotgun News and other publications, and Vice
President of NRA for three years, until Charlton Heston beat me 38-34.

In short, I've been around this block twice. I have never seen such a
well-orchestrated campaign to kill a pro-gun bill.

Every Senator who voted FOR the Boxer/Schumer/Feinstein /Kennedy
amendments will vote AGAINST the bill. I want to see every Senator who
voted AGAINST those amendments to vote FOR an anti-gun bill, and we
should let them know that we'll never hold that vote against them.

Because that's the only way we can get the bill to the House, where those
amendments can be stripped -- so the United States Arms Industry can
survive, and prices on the guns they produce won't continue to skyrocket.

Am I absolutely certain that every anti-gun amendment can be stripped off
in the House-Senate Conference? Or else knocked off in House votes?

No, I'm not.

But I AM certain that if they aren't WE CAN KILL THE BILL IN THE HOUSE.

And from what I've been personally told, NRA will lead the effort to kill
their own bill if the corruption remains.

Yes, it's dangerous. Passing legislation when the Senate is against us
is always dangerous -- and it's difficult, but with the House and White
House on our side, it's doable.

Let's show a little courage, friends.


http://nealknox.com/alerts/msg00194.html
 
Consider this. All of us used to have the right to buy the firearms restricted by the AWB, but those rights were taken away. After today's events, it would appear that we may once again enjoy gun rights that should never have been abrogated.

No individual or business entity has ever enjoyed immunity from lawsuits involving the criminal use of firearms. As worthy and appealing as that policy may be, the fact of the matter is that this is a theoretical concept that gun owners/manufacturers have been able to survive without so far.

Given the above, what would you rather live without? A freedom that you once enjoyed that was taken away, or an immunity that you never enjoyed but wanted?

That is a heady question, but my personal preference is the restoration of my firearm ownership rights.
 
I guess the NRA can't win no matter what it does - if it kills the bill before a conference committee then it gets blamed as above. If it tries to move the bill to conference committee then it is part of the much reported NRA/GOP sellout.

I just wish all the NRA haters would at least have the decency to get on the same page so that the NRA would at least have the chance to try and please them.
 
this is what someone on ar-15.com posted. Does this seem right as far as the current status of the awb?



"The Senate voted 52-47 in favor of attaching the AWB extension (another 10 years) to S. 1805 (the so-called "Gun Liability Bill"). They also voted in favor of attaching a bill to close the so-called "gunshow loophole", as well as a host of other crap. Senator Craig then got on the floor of the Senate, and advised everyone to vote against S.1805 (the entire bill, AND amendments attached to it). He said that it was a good piece of legislation, that had been turned into a monster with all the amendments.

The Senate then voted 90-8 AGAINST approving the bill. S.1805, and all its amendments, died right there. Good news, the AWB and "gunshow loophole" didn't get thru (this time anyway). Bad news: the truly GOOD legislation to protect gun manufacturers and sellers from junk lawsuits got shot down too."
 
The manufacturer's immunity can be brought back later. The AWB extension will be real hard to bring back from the dead.

I keep hearing this sentiment, but I don't understand it. Why is it now so much more dificult to pass AWB #2? They weren't serious about extending the AWB today. They only attached the AWB ammendment to get the bill's supporters to defeat their own bill.

Feinstein can push her new ban all she likes from now until September or beyond. Unless I'm missing something, todays events make that no more difficult than it's ever been
 
Let the AWB sunset and then let's tackle the mfg liability issue. We'll have a better chance that way.
 
A good thing is a bunch of RINOs got outted and a few Dems showed themselves worthy. Gun owners have driven elections before, there`s no reason it can`t be done again.
 
Thanks NRA!

You guys who bad mouth the NRA make me sick. You ramble on about how the NRA sold out the gun owners....and the truth is they are the ones getting things done and it kills you wannabees. If it weren't for a last minute effort by the NRA, Schumer,McCarty, and the rest of the "usual suspects" (along with 9 traitor Republicans) would have had their "Assault Weapons" ban AND their "Gun Show Loophole" Crap passed attached to the "Anti-Lawsuit" bill!!!!! You need to call La Pierre And thank him! They were contacting the law makers on their palm held message boards in the final minutes and SQUASHED this abomination to the horror of the anti gun crowd.
 
I'm with Bud on this. Looking at it objectively, this is a victory for anti-self-defense goons. Why? Because 1) They proved they could squash pro-gun legislation (and tort reform in general). 2) They proved they have the Senatorial support to extend the "AWB." And 3) They were able to give the finger to Bush and create a very un-clean bill.

Also, Headless Thompson Gunner (and I thought I had an interesting THR name ;) ) wrote:

I keep hearing this sentiment, but I don't understand it. Why is it now so much more dificult to pass AWB #2? They weren't serious about extending the AWB today. They only attached the AWB ammendment to get the bill's supporters to defeat their own bill.

I'm with ya, Headless, and I've been asking the same question. The answer so far seems to be that it is simply harder for the minority party to bring a bill to the floor. Perhaps I don't know Parliamentary procedure well enough, but it doesn't seem that difficult to do so. If someone has better knowledge than me about this I'm willing to learn.
 
The"Anti-Lawsuit" bill would have been a good thing but in reality a gun company should stand on its merits. The problem is that juries have gone nuts in a lot of liability cases. I'm not trying to be one of the "first kill all the lawyers" types but in many cases they have a vested interest in getting huge settlements. This is in no way meant to say that all lawsuits aren't justified. The one that comes to mind was the minivan where the children were killed but they hadn't even been seat-belted in. The jury found Chrysler I think liable. I agree with other posters that one good thing about the whole fiasco was that some supposed friends were outed. my 2 centavos.
 
We think the house is on our side, but given the support the AWB extention found in the Senate the NRA didn't want to risk it. I think it was the right decision to kill the bill there rather than risk a second nasty surprise from the house.

Why are you so worked up over manufacturer's immunity anyway? It would have been nice, but it's not the holy grail of gun rights. Be reasonable.
 
No individual or business entity has ever enjoyed immunity from lawsuits involving the criminal use of firearms.

That's literally true, but misses the point. Nobody had enjoyed such immunity as a matter of explicit law, but everybody had enjoyed it as a matter of simple fact, because until recently, nobody ever filed such lawsuits, and if they had the courts would have thrown them out as frivolous, and probably even sanctioned the lawyers who brought them.

After all, we don't have a law explicitly prohibiting suing garlic growers for the third party effects of the bad breath eating raw garlic induces. But we don't (yet) need one, because nobody is filing such suits.

The sad thing is that a law IS needed to restore the former status quo.

The reason why it will be much harder after this to bring the renewal of the '94 ban up, is that by coupling it to a piece of pro-gun legislation, they partially cancelled the anti-gun aspect of it out. Some members could rationalize that while part of the bill was anti-gun, part of it was pro-gun, and thus the whole bill was a justifiable tradeoff. But as a stand alone bill, nobody could rationalize it as not being anti-gun, and they lose some of the marginal supporters.
 
Actually folks, this was a political fight that ended in a draw. The pro-gun side tried to get the gun manufacturers protected from the Mayor Daley's of this country. If you want to be upset about spending of tax dollars, here is your case. These cities spend all the public money tying up the Colts and Springfield Armories with lawsuits that the cities can't hope to win other than draining the companies down on cash. On the other hand, the only cards the antis had to play against that was the AWB and background checks on private sales. The two were put together and it sent all the pieces of legislation down.

The antis, with a lot of political support from the trial lawyers, really didn't want the protection bill to go through. Enough so, they were willing to spend the AWB to kill it. Just proves that they really didn't want the AWB to protect the children, just used it for political capital.

This was just the political process in the works. I don't hold the NRA, or any other group, responsible for the defeat of the protection bill. Politics at this level is pure hard-ball.
 
How did that Trojan Horse bill "protect" the firearms industry anyway? It's the job of judges to toss out frivolous suits, and if they don't do it to our liking, does that automatically give Congress the responsibility and authority to do it for them?

Good riddance, S 1805
 
I agree, S1805 was poorly conceived. I believe it was actually started in order to become a horse for riders. I don't think it would stand up in court, so eventually the Supremes might strike it down as unconstitutional (equal protection perhaps), but the riders would live on.

We have a major problem with the legal system, I'm not sure where it started but when they started lawsuits against tobacco companies, McD's for hot coffee..etc.. somewhere along the line the legal system has run wildly over logic.
 
Why is it now so much more dificult to pass AWB #2? They weren't serious about extending the AWB today.
I think things are far different today than they were ten years ago when the Clinton AWB passed. We were blind-sided then and hardly realized what was happening until the fat lady got up to sing.

Today, we have dozens of active forums about guns and gun rights effectively using the internet to discuss, alert, warn, and motivate huge numbers of people. That alone will make it a challenge for the antis to "slip it in" with some other legislation. Not impossible, but much harder.

They bear watching at all times, and we've got to stay alert while Congress is in session.

TC
TFL Survivor
 
I'm with ya, Headless, and I've been asking the same question. The answer so far seems to be that it is simply harder for the minority party to bring a bill to the floor. Perhaps I don't know Parliamentary procedure well enough, but it doesn't seem that difficult to do so. If someone has better knowledge than me about this I'm willing to learn.

Actually, it's simple process that does it. There aren't any other bills in the pipe that they could tack the legislation onto as an amendment, so the only hope of passing the AWB is with a stand-alone bill. The reason why this is not going to happen is that the legislation needs to pass both the House and the Senate. We know now it can pass the Senate, but several AWB bills have been introduced in the House and they are ALL languishing in committee...they'll never reach a floor vote, and even if they did it's doubtful they'd pass. That's why it will be more difficult to pass.

This damn Bill should have been sent over to the House where all the Poison Pills put in by Feinstine and Schummer could quietly be removed and be made clean again.

Would it? Can you prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that all the amendments would have been stripped? I recall hearing that it wouldn't be Delay but Hastert who would pick the members of the committee, and he's made rumblings of not agreeing with Delay's position on the AWB. Two or three foul picks for the committee and we'd be under the AWB for another ten years.

And as I've said before, the whole "the house'll strip 'em all out" mindset is VERY similar to the "the supremes'll just declare it unconstitutional" mindset that gave us campaign finance 'reform'.
 
--------- quote ----------------------------------------------------------------------
Why is it now so much more dificult to pass AWB #2? They weren't serious about extending the AWB today. They only attached the AWB ammendment to get the bill's supporters to defeat their own bill.

Feinstein can push her new ban all she likes from now until September or beyond. Unless I'm missing something, todays events make that no more difficult than it's ever been
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It will be more difficult for Feinstein to introduce a totally new piece of legislation than tacking it on as an add-on ammendment. For one thing, the Republicans control both houses and thus control the committees and they are not going to let a new AWB #2 out of committee. Also, even some wishy-washy Democrats would rather not deal with the issue in an election year. They'd be reluctant to vote against an AWB if it was on the table, but they'd much rather it stay off the table until after the elections.

But you are right as far as after September. If Feinstein gets a Democrat controlled Congress and Kerry in the White House, AWB #2 will be first thing on their agenda and you can bet it will be bigger and meaner and nastier than AWB #1 ever thought about being.
 
The AWB is dead, largely with the help of the NRA.

If you somehow try to convolute that into an NRA failure, either your judgement is poor or your motives are questionable.
 
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