If you all haven’t heard, there’s most likely going to be another Assault Weapons Ban bill up in the House of Representatives soon. (See here) As I’m adamantly opposed to any such law, I was quick to write a preliminary email to my representative in the house, and since odds are a bill will be raised in the Senate to go with it, I sent a quick email to each of the CT state senators also. Nothing in depth, just what I was writing to them about, and that I wanted to make my position clear that I was opposed to it. Well, the other two I got automatic response emails indicating they get a lot of emails, and they try to read and reply to them all but that it may take some time. Lieberman (or more likely his staff obviously) sent a response out today though. I’m going to go ahead and post it here.
Dear Mr. Koziara:
Thank you for contacting me to express your opposition to additional gun control laws. I am sorry that we see this issue from different points of view.
I have long believed the Second Amendment to the Constitution of the United States guarantees law-abiding Americans the right to own a gun. The Supreme Court recently said the same; but, like every other constitutional right, it is not unlimited in all circumstances.
Current federal law (the Gun Control Act of 1968; P.L. 90-618) bans the possession of a firearm by persons convicted of any non-business related felony, minors, users of illegal drugs, and persons found to be mentally incompetent. I supported the Brady Law, which mandates background checks to ensure that those seeking to buy guns are lawfully allowed to do so; and I have cosponsored legislation that would close the gun show loophole – which allows convicted felons and people on terrorist watch lists, among others, to evade the Brady background checks. You will also be interested to know that I have voted to reauthorize the assault weapons ban.
Gun crime remains a critical public safety problem. For too long, it has unnecessarily divided the Congress; and the American people have been left to suffer the consequences. However, the reality is that many Americans agree on most of the critical questions: that the laws on the books should be enforced, the rights of law-abiding gun owners should be protected but unnecessarily dangerous weapons banned, and guns should be kept out of the hands of those who cannot use them responsibly.
Thank you again for sharing your views and concerns with me. I hope you will continue to visit my web site at http://lieberman.senate.gov for updated news about my work on behalf of Connecticut and the nation. Please contact me if you have any additional questions or comments about our work in Congress.
Sincerely,
Joseph I. Lieberman
UNITED STATES SENATOR
Now, I’m okay with some parts, like “Current federal law (the Gun Control Act of 1968; P.L. 90-618) bans the possession of a firearm by persons convicted of any non-business related felony, minors, users of illegal drugs, and persons found to be mentally incompetent.” Though I have more specific feelings on that, the general idea I’m good with.
However, aside from the fact that he supports AWB’s, the one part that really stands out to me is this “but unnecessarily dangerous weapons banned,” What is an ‘unnecessarily dangerous’ weapon? Short of spending several thousand dollars, most people aren’t getting a machine gun, and other then that, all other firearms function semi-automatically, or by manual action. What’s to stop the government from saying that a .308 or larger caliber is now ‘unnecessarily dangerous’?
I’m very dissapointed in the Senator personally, but ah well. When he’s up for re-election, I guess I’ll have to be sure to vote against him is all.
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