My Turn: New gun law a confused, unconstitutional overreach

Hunting and competition shooting guns on display for sale in Hempstead, N.Y.

Hunting and competition shooting guns on display for sale in Hempstead, N.Y. AP

By HUSSAIN A. HAMDAN

Published: 08-20-2024 5:41 PM

A State House News Service article in the Recorder on Aug. 13, “Gun law opponents start repeal campaign,” contains factual inaccuracies and evident bias.

The article claims the recent firearms legislation from July added schools to the list of places guns are prohibited. However, per M.G.L. Ch. 269 Sec. 10, schools were already prohibited areas; the new statute does not even reference them. It does reference courthouses and correctional facilities, (also already prohibited areas, complete with metal detectors), government administration buildings, and polling places. This misstatement about schools confuses readers into thinking this legislation was needed to resolve a problem it didn’t — and didn’t need to.

The article also barely discusses the actual reasons opponents want the legislation repealed.

This law conditions new licenses on a training curriculum that has yet to be developed. There remains significant ambiguity as to how license applications between now and when that training is available will be handled.

Since the Legislature has failed to fund many mandates, there are questions about how they will be implemented.

Those with Firearms Identification Cards (FIDs) — the lowest level license and the only one available to those under age 21 — now face legal trouble for owning semiautomatic firearms. FIDs previously authorized ownership of low-capacity semiautos, for example the M1 Garand. These now require a higher level License to Carry (LTC). The statute’s language potentially “grandfathers” continued possession of anything a person’s license permitted when it was last issued or renewed; but if your FID is about to expire, you presumably must upgrade to an LTC, (with the new, as yet nonexistent, training requirements), or surrender these guns.

There is apparently no compensation, (constitutionally mandated under the Fifth Amendment), for lawfully acquired property thereby confiscated.

Most semiautomatic rifles are now “assault-style firearms” (formerly “assault weapons”), because forward hand guards meant to prevent burns are now an assault “feature.” The authors of such provisions are clearly either unfamiliar with guns or unconcerned for the safety of gun users. As if this weren’t enough, unelected bureaucrats now wield unlimited discretion to define anything not already specifically banned as an assault weapon if they feel it should be.

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The law contains convoluted language about high-capacity magazines, (you can own pre-1994 ones, but apparently cannot carry, load, or transfer them in-state except to a dealer or via inheritance), 3D printers, and computerized milling equipment. Overzealous officials may persecute folks carrying older guns that these magazines feed, as well as 3D printer and milling equipment suppliers who aren’t even manufacturing firearms.

Then, there is the procedural atrocity by which this law was enacted. The conference committee that authored the 116-page bill met behind closed doors for months. Less than 24 hours after being made public, both chambers voted for it. Citizens had no time to read it, let alone express opposition. This same Legislature requires town governments to post agendas two business days in advance of meeting publicly.

The law’s supporters claim it is a response to the Supreme Court’s 2022 Bruen decision. More accurately, anti-gun activists used misinformation and manufactured hysteria about Bruen to justify restrictions they wanted all along. Bruen itself had minimal impact on Massachusetts laws, while it ended discretionary (discriminatory) firearms licensing in New York.

Under Bruen, someone who passes a background check and meets objective criteria is entitled to a license to carry firearms outside their home, without needing to demonstrate “proper cause” to exercise this right. Massachusetts already issued such licenses before Bruen. Although police chiefs had some discretion, it was limited, with judicial procedures that effectively already made the state a “shall issue” jurisdiction. Bruen couldn’t uproot laws we never had, and anything it did overturn cannot be reenacted. It has no relationship to this legislation and invoking it as justification is misleading and irrelevant.

Massachusetts permit holders already face among the strictest requirements in America. They aren’t the ones committing gun crimes. This legislation has only made lawful gun ownership more difficult, without improving safety. Murderers who never had licenses will not be deterred by enhanced licensing standards. They won’t care that their high-capacity magazine isn’t unloaded. The penalties for the crimes guns are used to commit exceed those for such violations, and felons couldn’t care less about obeying such rules.

Firearms owners would likely have supported sensible, actionable, fully funded measures targeting mental health and illicit trafficking. The repeal effort is about pushing back against an unprecedented, unconstitutional, un-transparent overreach that has criminalized the innocuous to an extent entirely deserving of its nickname: “the Lawful Citizen’s Imprisonment Act.”

Hussain A. Hamdan is an attorney, firearms enthusiast and member of local government in Hawley.