INDIANAPOLIS (AP) - Indiana State Police are seeing a surge in gun permit requests amid the national gun-control debate sparked by December's deadly Connecticut school shooting.
The Indianapolis Star reports (http://indy.st/XmRnig ) State Police are now seeing up to 4,000 permit requests each week. That's three times the number the agency was handling at the same time last year.
And the more gun-control debate there is, the more people who have been sitting on the fence about owning a gun will jump off the fence. So even more guns will be added to the 300 million already out there, which will make gun control even less effective. The Second Amendment foes don't get this, I suspect.
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Oh, the Second Amendment foes know it, they just don't care. It's never really about the provable and obvious end results (see electric cars that require more carbon to make, ethanol that actually pollutes more than gas, new school lunches that just get thrown away or don't sell, the list is virtually endless) it's about the CONTROL.....
How about a tax on every firearm to pay for all the extra cops and armed teachers we want so the right to no background checks or limits on magazines and semi-auto weaoons is respected?
Andrew, an answer to your question on why not tax guns. As an attorney I would argue that the government cannot punitively tax Constitutional rights. Gun rights- or any right- cannot be circumscribed by appeal to countervailing government interests.
Arms are different from other items that are taxed -automobiles, alcohol, tobacco- because individuals have a guaranteed right to possess arms. Any tax that intereferes with that right is unconstitutional.
The "Constitutionally -protected" theory has been used successfully in many federal cases.
Only the Court could decide such a case, but I believe that there would be substantial grounds for striking down a punitive tax on firearms, magazines, or ammunition.
Bow does that differ from sales tax attached to weapons sales?
Andrew, the answer is simple: the sales tax is not a punitive tax. What you are suggesting is a punitive tax.
What's really funny is that your solution is so stereotypical, just tax it...
Not punitive. Just whatever tax is taken for gun sales even sales tax use the revenue to pay for gun related indrasteucture like gas taxes which r meant for roads.
Andrew, The radical leftists of the Chicago City Council hatched the same idea .On advice of their attorneys, they dropped the idea. The Supreme Court in a case from Minnesota ruled that taxes which interfere with the free exercise of Constitutional rights are not permitted.
The Court ruled that a unique tax on ink and newsprint could interfere with free speech rights and struck it down. A unique tax on firearms is likely to bring the same result.
I know that liberals love taxes, but taxes on Rights are an "iffy" proposition. You can't tax people who go to church, nor people who send a letter to the editor, nor people who congregate. These rights are protected from government intrusion ; so is firearm ownership.
"Arms are different from other items that are taxed -automobiles, alcohol, tobacco- because individuals have a guaranteed right to possess arms. Any tax that intereferes with that right is unconstitutional."
The first amendment confers a similar right, No abridgement on freedom of speech or of the press, yet many srares tax books, magazines, and internet access.
It also guarantees the right of the people peaceably to assemble and petition for redress of their grievances, and yet if you want to do that, many communities require a permit, and in some cases, the fee is exorbitant, and in others, the permit application is denied. Take a look at the number of times the KKK have been denied permits for rallies and marches, which is reasonable if you want to maintain the peace and not attract every racist dingaling in a seven state radius, but it sorta tramples on the constitutional rights of those racist dingbats.
You don't need constitutional protections for the popular things everybody likes. They are there strictly because the people who inserted them into the constitution remembered when they were on the outs, and they could imagine being on the outs again.