Undercover Operations May "Sting" Bloomberg

Friday, May 11, 2007

In an effort to end the illegal, covert “Simulated Straw Purchase” stings that anti-gun New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg (R) has been misguidedly promoting of late, Virginia Attorney General Robert McDonnell (R) recently sent a letter to Bloomberg reminding him that Virginia’s House Bill 2653 - which prohibits gun dealer entrapment schemes such as those orchestrated by the Mayor - will go into effect this summer.

With the new law going into effect in July, Bloomberg and his agents could face legal action and be charged with a felony if they do not cease their dubious “sting” operations.

“While I understand that you are attempting to take steps that you believe may enhance the public safety of the citizens of New York City, such laws are Virginia’s duty to enforce,” said McDonnell in his letter to the Mayor. “This new law strikes the proper balance between ensuring effective law enforcement and protecting the rights of law-abiding firearms dealers and those of Virginia citizens under the Second Amendment.”

In a May 10, Washington Times article, Tucker Martin, a spokesman for Mr. McDonnell’s office, said, “Law-abiding Virginia gun dealers certainly do not deserve to be targeted by private agents intentionally misleading them as to their intentions and motives. This is a courtesy to the mayor. Prior actions of his are now felony offenses in the commonwealth, and he knows this.”

Virginia’s state House and Senate overwhelmingly approved the measure, which was signed into law by Virginia Governor Tim Kaine (D) on March 23, 2007.

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Armed with the Truth

By Fred Thompson
Friday, May 11, 2007

If you care about Constitutional law, and everybody should, the big news is that it looks as if the Supreme Court is going to hear a Second Amendment case some time next year. The event that sparked this legal fuse was a case brought by six D.C. residents who simply wanted functional firearms in their homes for self-defense. In response, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit struck down the District’s 31-year-old gun ban — one of the strictest in the nation.

Our individual right to keep and bear arms, as guaranteed by the Bill of Rights, may finally be confirmed by the high court; but this means that we’re going to see increasing pressure on the Supreme Court from anti-gun rights activists who want the Constitution reinterpreted to fit their prejudices. The New York Times has already fired the first broadside.

A few days ago, the Gray Lady published a fascinating account of the case — fascinating but fundamentally flawed. In it, the central argument about the Second Amendment is pretty accurately described. Specifically, it is between those who see it as an individual right versus those who see it as a collective states’ right having more to do with the National Guard than the people.

Unfortunately, the article falsely portrays the individual right argument as some new interpretation held only by a few fringe theorists. The truth is very different, as civil rights attorney and gun law expert Don Kates has pointed out recently.

From the enactment of the Bill of Rights in 1791 until the 20th Century, no one seriously argued that the Second Amendment dealt with anything but an individual right — along with all other nine original amendments. Kates writes that not one court or commentator denied it was a right of individual gun owners until the last century. Judges and commentators in the 18th and 19th century routinely described the Second Amendment as a right of individuals. And they expressly compared it to the other rights such as speech, religion, and jury trial.

The Times has simply replayed theories invented by the 20th century gun control movement. Their painting of the individual right interpretation as a minority view is equally fanciful.

Kates writes that, “Over 120 law review articles have addressed the Second Amendment since 1980. The overwhelming majority affirm that it guarantees a right of individual gun owners. That is why the individual right view is called the ’standard model’ view by supporters and opponents alike. With virtually no exceptions, the few articles to the contrary have been written by gun control advocates, mostly by people in the pay of the anti-gun lobby.”

Kates goes further, writing that “a very substantial proportion” of the articles supporting individual gun rights are by scholars who would have been happy to find evidence that guns could be banned. When guns were outlawed in D.C., crime and murder rates skyrocketed. Still, the sentiment exists and must be countered with facts. All of this highlights why it is so important to appoint judges who understand that their job is to interpret the law, as enacted by will of the people, rather than make it up as they go along.

Fred Thompson is an actor and former Senator. His radio commentary airs on the ABC Radio Network and be blogs on The Fred Thompson Report.

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