California Firearms Legislation: Still Crazy After All These Years!

California legislatures are at it again, bringing up tired old laws which are impossible to obey.

California Supreme Court to rule on gun law - SFGate:
March 22, 2017

The state Supreme Court agreed Wednesday to decide whether gun manufacturers have the right to challenge a California law requiring identifying microstamps on bullets fired from semiautomatic pistols, a requirement the manufacturers claim can’t be met with current technology.
A state appeals court had ruled in December that gun groups could present evidence to support their suit seeking to overturn the law, an exception to the usual requirement that statutes can be struck down only if they are unconstitutional.
But the state Supreme Court voted Wednesday to grant a hearing to defenders of the law, which remains in effect while the case is pending. Six of the seven justices, all but Ming Chin, voted to review the appeal by the state’s lawyers.

I've been writing about this bizarre twist of "logic" (ala California) since 1985.

In fact, I've written about 30 articles on the subject, although not all of them referenced California's efforts to impose draconian laws on firearms manufacturers.  Other states (eg: New York) have attempted to strangle the second amendment by fiat.

(Example from 1993: at one time a New York Senator proposed to "tax ammunition out of existence".)



Short history:   California has made several attempts to make firearms more expensive, although not necessarily safer.

Other than "Microstamping Ammunition" (by the firearm), there have been other efforts to require identification of the "owner" of the ammunition.

Among the most notorious  ... and economically impossible.. . is ENCODED AMMUNITION.

In this nefarious plot, each bullet and cartridge case is stamped with unique serial numbers during manufacturing ... all cartridges in the box have the same serial number and the retail seller must report to the state the name, address and driver license number of the purchaser of each box of ammunition).  This imposes huge legal burdens on the manufacturer, the retailer, and the the purchaser.   Imagine buying a case of ammunition, and having to fill out a form for each unique serial number in that case!

Another is The Drop Test:

I'm not sure whether this bill actually was enacted, nor whether it is obeyed, but California legislators decided that no firearm could be sold in California unless it passed The Drop Test.

All manufacturers were required to submit each handgun (by make and model) for destructive testing.  The pistols were dropped (cocked, unloaded, safety off) onto a concrete surface from a height of six feet.  Ten times. From various aspects ... muzzle down, butt down, trigger guard down, hammer down, etc.)  If the hammer dropped once in that testing process, the series was restarted.  The second failure meant the handgun couldn't be sold in California.

And the beat-to-shit handgun was returned to the manufacturer .. who ate the manufacturing costs and scrapped the gun.

Not a lot of gun makers were eager to prove their product.

Some declined to sell to California markets; partly out of outrage, partly out of a reluctance to give a pistol to California testers only  to receive in return a beat up piece of metal.

Perhaps the manufacturers  also felt a sense of outrage.
In California, their legal product was been subject to restrictions which were not supportive of the constitutional rights of their citizens inhabitants.

That reaction from firearms manufacturers met the goal of the California lawmakers (who toil not, nor do they produce).   It became more difficult (or impossible) to purchase legal products of American industry.

You have to give some credit to Democratic State of California.

You may not appreciate their tactics, but they are masters of imposing laws which ... just barely ... infringe the Second Amendment of the Constitution.

We can only hope that some day their chickens will come home to roost.