In an attempt to further punish Massachusetts’s beleaguered gun owners, on January 20, Massachusetts State Senator Cynthia S. Creem filed SD.1884.
The legislation includes a raft of gun control measures, not the least
of which is a 4.75 percent “sin tax” on all lawful firearms-related
activity.
SD.1884 requires, “an additional
surcharge of 4.75 percent shall be imposed on sales at retail of all
ammunition, rifles, shotguns, firearms or parts thereof.” Contemplating
that law-abiding gun owners would seek to avoid this surcharge by
purchasing goods in neighboring states, the legislation also makes
clear, “an additional surcharge of 4.75 percent shall be imposed on the
storage, use or other consumption of ammunition, rifles, shotguns,
firearms or parts thereof… purchased from any vendor or manufactured,
fabricated or assembled from materials acquired either within or outside
the commonwealth for storage, use or consumption within the
commonwealth.”
Massachusetts already has a sales and use
tax of 6.25 percent. Therefore, a Massachusetts gun owner would be
subject to an 11 percent state tax on the purchase of firearms,
ammunition, and related accessories. All gun owners are already subject
to an 11 percent federal excise tax on firearms and ammunition under the
Pittman-Robertson Act. The mere idea of a 22 percent tax on the
exercise of the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms is shameful
in a state so critical to the founding of this great nation.
Of course, the Pittman-Robertson 11
percent federal excise tax on firearms and ammunition is for the benefit
of the shooting sports, and is used to provide hunting and shooting
opportunities for all Americans. Conversely, the surcharge imposed by
SD.1884, would be used to fund a “Firearms Violence Prevention Trust
Fund,” which state officials would employ to “establish an annual
municipal grant program to support municipal violence prevention
programs.” It does not take a pessimist to imagine how, under the
stewardship of the Massachusetts state government, such a fund might
devolve into a vehicle under which the state’s gun owners would be
forced to directly finance the abrogation of their own rights.
In explaining her tax to the Salem News,
Creem likened the exercise of the constitutional right to keep and bear
arms to tobacco use, noting, “It's like the tobacco tax, which is used
for smoking cessation programs.” Creem added, “To me, it's the same
thing as paying a toll on the bridge for using the roads.”
Creem’s defense of her legislation has been disjointed. At one point she told Wicked Local Newsbank,
“I look at this as a way to still enjoy the lawful use of firearms.”
However, at another she admitted that her intent with SD.1884 is to
curtail both legal and illegal gun ownership, stating, “I've filed gun
legislation every session. I want to make it harder and harder to get
guns in and get guns into the hands of people who shouldn't have them.”
As an attorney, Creem should know that
the U.S. Supreme Court has frowned upon attempts to curtail
constitutionally-protected behavior through targeted taxation. In Minneapolis Star Tribune Co. v. Minnesota Commissioner of Revenue,
the Court held that a Minnesota use tax on paper and ink used in
publishing violated the First Amendment. The Court explained, “A power
to tax differentially, as opposed to a power to tax generally, gives a
government a powerful weapon against the taxpayer selected.”
The Court came to this decision despite
the fact that there was “no legislative history and no indication, apart
from the structure of the tax itself, of any impermissible or censorial
motive on the part of the legislature.” With SD.1884, Creem has been
explicit about her motive of reducing lawful gun ownership.
And that is all that Creem could hope to
accomplish with her tax, as criminals procure firearms outside the
normal stream of commerce. A Department of Justice survey
of state prison inmates found that the overwhelming majority (nearly 80
percent) obtained firearms through a “street/illegal source” or through
“family or friend[s].” Drug dealers and armed robbers don’t typically
file 1040s, and any firearm sales or use tax can expect a similar level
of underworld compliance.
Moreover, such taxes wouldn’t affect
criminal firearm use even in the unlikely event that the criminal
element subjected themselves to it. In his widely-celebrated 1994 essay
for the Atlantic Monthly, titled, “The False Promise of Gun Control,”
George Mason University School of Law Professor Daniel D. Polsby
pointed out that criminals are the least likely segment of the
population to be affected by gun controls that raise the cost of
firearms ownership.
Polsby noted,
Where
people differ is in how likely it is that they will be involved in a
situation in which a gun will be valuable. Someone who intends to engage
in a transaction involving a gun—a criminal, for example—is obviously
in the best possible position to predict that likelihood. Criminals
should therefore be willing to pay more for a weapon than most other
people would… The class of people we wish to deprive of guns, then, is
the very class with the most inelastic demand for them—criminals—whereas
the people most likely to comply with gun control laws don’t value guns
in the first place.
Of course, all gun controls in some
manner raise the cost of lawful firearm ownership, with taxation of
firearms and ammunition merely being one of the more direct and visible
methods. As for less direct - but even more substantial - costs, Creem’s
legislation provides several.
The bill would require gun owners to
conduct all firearm transfers through a licensed dealer pursuant to a
background check. Massachusetts gun owners are already required to
obtain a Firearms Identification Card, which is issued only after the
applicant has been found to have met the state’s onerous licensing requirements and passed a background check.
The legislation also imposes a “smart
gun” mandate on future handgun sales. The bill requires that in six
months from “commercial availability” of handguns “equipped with
personalized firearm technology,” the state’s approved handgun roster
shall not include “any newly manufactured” handguns that are not
equipped with such technology. The more intelligent gun control
advocates have abandoned this approach, contending that a similar New Jersey mandate has stifled development of this technology.
SD.1884 would make it unlawful to “sell,
purchase, rent, lease or possess a .50 BMG rifle or .50 BMG cartridge.”
To justify the proposed ban, Creem relied on her feelings, telling a
media outlet, “I can't see a credible reason why a civilian needs that
kind of firearm.” The proposal prompted the Massachusetts Gun Owners
Action League’s Jim Wallace to point out that .50-caliber rifles are
often used in the shooting sports, and ask, “Has there ever been a crime
committed with a .50 caliber firearm in Massachusetts? What's the
problem we're trying to solve?”
This is apt question, given that crime
committed using rifles is exceedingly rare in Massachusetts and the rest
of the country. In 2014 and 2015
a total of one homicide was committed using a rifle of any kind in
Massachusetts. Unfortunately, these figures have not deterred Creem from
pursuing her legislation, and did not deter Massachusetts Attorney
General Maura Healey from perverting existing state law to ban several types of commonly-owned rifles in 2016.
In recent years, gun control advocates
have taken to describing nearly every proposed restriction, as “common
sense.” In describing her bill, Creem told a reporter, “Some of these
are just common-sense thoughts.” Gun control advocates should take issue
with Creem’s use of this rhetoric. Using this language in an attempt to
conceal the aims of such an uncommonly senseless piece of legislation
threatens the little remaining credibility of broader movement’s carefully orchestrated messaging efforts.
The warrant for both special and annual town meetings "shall be open for a minimum of 14 days before closing and posting the warrants." You do the math. Wouldn't be the first time there was a mathematical error in posting the warrants!
