General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsQuestion about background checks
I have no problems with a background check when buying a gun, regardless of where you are buying it from.
In many , many states, when buying from a private seller, it's cash and carry. It's this way in MI for long guns only. All handguns are registered with the State and local police.
My question is what about all of the guns in the possession of people who bought a gun where a background check was not required?
I, myself, have several long guns that were bought from a private seller. No one in an official capacity knows about my ownership. I'd speculate that most guns owners have similarly owned guns. I've read that up to 40% of guns are bought without a background check being performed. That puts the total count of guns that the authorities are unaware of ownership at one hundred million.
The debate currently underway is about background checks for new transactions. No mention of registration of guns is currently in the works.
What about all of these guns that were bought in a cash and carry transaction? What's to stop the owners of these guns to just carry on as business as usual?
Who would know?
former9thward
(31,805 posts)Absolutely nothing. That is why the debate over 'background checks' is most heat with very little light. Like most gun control debates.
CreekDog
(46,192 posts)wercal
(1,370 posts)The ffl dealer has to keep records....but the federal government is not supposed to. In many states there is no registration whatsoever.
michreject
(4,378 posts)If background checks become law, what's to stop owners of unregistered guns from selling them to whomever they want to without a BG check?
wercal
(1,370 posts)premium
(3,731 posts)There's really nothing to stop someone from selling an unregistered gun to a private citizen.
Here in NV., the only county that requires the registering of handguns is Clark County and that's going away soon.
No matter how many laws are passed, there will always be a way to get around it.
hack89
(39,171 posts)especially when you consider there is no paper trail associated with a gun after it is first sold by a gun dealer. All subsequent transfers are off the record.
MH1
(17,537 posts)It is right there in the Manchin-Toomey p.o.s. thing they call a gun control bill (which it really, truly, is not).
Says it will be illegal and a felony to ever try to create a national registry of gun ownership.
Doesn't specifically mention states, but I suspect any sharing of info between states is tantamount to "attempting to create a national registry."
So there you have it.
And that bill doesn't even really close the loophole. It's just a way for Toomey to get name recognition for 2016. If he gets the dumbshits to pass it and he gets to claim some credit, so much the better for him.
We've all been had.
michreject
(4,378 posts)Then we would have been better off with a filibusterer.
All we have now is an official vote of who is for and who is against gun control. Pardon the pun, but that gives some pro gun politician ammunition in a pro gun state.
99Forever
(14,524 posts)No law is perfect or has perfect compliance, but we still have them, don't we?
Making the perfect the enemy of the possible is an argument for fools.
Robb
(39,665 posts)We don't pass laws against heroin smuggling and expect smugglers to check the law and then alter their behavior. We pass them so when heroin smugglers are caught, we can put them in jail and stop them from smuggling heroin.
I mean yeah, you don't get a ticket every time you speed, either. But when you're caught, you pay for it because it's against the law.
michreject
(4,378 posts)The illegal heroine smugglers are in the business of turning over their product for a profit.
The owners of legal unregistered guns may or may not sell them. Profit is not a motivation.
Robb
(39,665 posts)Both things are illegal. Both will be enforced when people are caught. Neither expects criminals to change their behavior based solely upon the law being written.
Words mean things.
michreject
(4,378 posts)I guess you missed to part where I said the the owners of legally unregistered gun may NOT sell them.
Their possession would not be illegal.
Robb
(39,665 posts)a law regulating their sale.
I'm not sure what you're driving at here.
rdharma
(6,057 posts)Then you wouldn't have to do anything as a pre-mandatory background check firearms owner....... UNLESS you were going to sell that gun. Then you would be required to have the buyer undergo a background check.
Could you get away with selling an unregistered gun to a private citizen? Probably...... unless the person you sold it to gets into some sort of trouble involving the gun and they find out who he bought it from. Then "you've got some 'splainin' to do, Lucy"!
Or you sell it to an agent of the law...... then you've got a WHOLE bunch more "'splainin' to do"!
In any case, I'll bet you'll be a whole lot more careful to not sell that to any Tom, Dick or Harry you meet on the street. And that's the purpose (one of them at least) of the law.