Small Business Against Big Government

We recently notified SBABG members from California about California Assembly Bill 962 which would require face-to-face sales of handgun ammunition in addition to providing the government your fingerprints, copy of ID, signature, residential address, telephone, and age in order to be able to purchase ammunition (full details at bottom of this entry*).

The bill is currently on the desk of Governor Schwarzenegger, and he has until October 11th to sign it into law, or veto it.

We circulated the notice to CA members and encouraged them to contact the Governor and encourage a veto, but thought we’d also share it here on the SBABG blog so that others might share it with their contacts in California.

The right to bear arms, protected by the second amendment, doesn’t just mean the right to bear guns, but also to bear ammunition.  This bill creates burdensome and discriminatory regulations against some citizens by making it harder to obtain the means to defend themselves.

This regulation will drive up the cost of self-defense by reducing distribution efficiencies – thereby reducing supply and driving up cost – and likely lowering the distribution of ammunition amongst law-abiding citizens because of the difficulty of obtaining it.

Online and catalog handgun ammunition sales have helped to drive down the cost of ammunition and, therefore, the cost to arm and defend oneself.  This trend will be reversed if AB 962 is signed into law.

Since handguns are not hunting guns, but self-defense weapons, it means that the cost to defend oneself will increase.

This legislation also directly damages small businesses by not only imposing compliance costs on them, but disallowing many small businesses from selling ammunition online or through catalogs, as they’ve done for years.

Politicians think this measure will keep ammunition out of the hands of criminals, but it won’t. The gangs and cartels already have their black-market supply lines and unlimited access to ammunition.  Moreover, California cannot prevent criminals from going to another state to purchase ammunition and crossing state lines.  And forensics cannot match particular bullets to particular ammunition sales and get the criminals name and address.

This bill will merely hurt law-abiding citizens who do comply with law.

If you wish to comment on AB 962, you may contact Gov. Schwarzenegger by phone at (916) 445-2841, or via fax at (916) 558-3160. To e-mail Gov. Schwarzenegger, visit http://gov.ca.gov/interact

*The SBABG member forwarded us the following information about AB 962:

Among other regulations, AB 962 would:

• Ban all mail-order and Internet sales of handgun ammunition.

• Prohibit the retail sale, the offer for sale or the display of handgun ammunition in a manner that allows ammunition to be accessible to a purchaser without assistance of a vendor or employee.
• Require that the delivery or transfer of ownership of handgun ammunition occur in a   face-to-face transaction, with the deliverer or transferor being provided bona fide evidence of identity of the purchaser or other transferee.

That evidence of identity, which must be legibly recorded at the time of
delivery, includes:

• The right thumbprint of the purchaser or transferee.
• The date of the sale or other transaction.
• The purchaser’s or transferee’s driver’s license or other identification number and the state in which it was issued.
• The brand, type and amount of ammunition sold or otherwise transferred.
• The purchaser’s or transferee’s signature.
• The name of the salesperson who processed the sale or other transaction.
• The purchaser’s or transferee’s full residential address and telephone number.
• The purchaser’s or transferee’s date of birth.