A federal judge on Monday blocked California from enforcing a state law requiring new semiautomatic handguns to have certain safety features, finding it violates the right to bear arms under the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
The 2001 law, known as the Unsafe Handgun Act, requires new semiautomatic handguns to have an indicator showing when there is a round in the chamber and a mechanism to prevent firing when the magazine is not fully inserted, both meant to prevent accidental discharge. It also requires that they stamp a serial number onto bullets they fire, known as microstamping.
What part of that leads you object to them using the word safety?
I’m trying to figure out how a handgun would microstamp a bullet. My understanding of guns is that the magazine pushes the ammo up and the slide pushes it in the chamber. Then, the striker sets off the powder. The only place the bullet(the projectile) might come in contact with the gun would be as it’s pushed into the chamber.
It’s a proprietary technology. I’m sure Todd Lizotte hasn’t made any massive financial contributions to the politicians who want him to make money off of every handgun sold in the state.
In defense of this awful law, it would at least help catch anyone careless enough to leave their casings at the crime scenes and get caught with the weapon.
Optimistically, maybe everyone who’s been put in jail because of the pseudoscience of forensic ballistics could get a retrial, when the state admits that actually forensic ballistics is fake and we need serial numbers stamped on the bullets in order to identify them
It would be trivial to attach something that would catch the casings to collect them.
The point of this isn’t to actually work. No company does this right now, and no company has plans to do this. The point of this law is to effectively ban guns without outright calling it a gun ban. That’s just not the right way to attempt to do it.
My problem with it is basically the same as OP’s: it makes guns more expensive, which means only wealthier people can legally own them. On top of that, the technology is presently only available from a single company, making it even more expensive.
No cars were made with catalectic converters until laws were passed mandating them.
Every computer printer sold in the last 30 years prints an invisible code on the paper uniquely identifying the printer. None did this until a national security law was passed.
Surely a gun manufacturer would see this as a USP if they were the only ones able/willing to implement the requirement.
The technology behind microstamping is the priority work of Taclabs any company that wanted to implement it would need to pay that company in order to do so. Currently the technology isn’t mature enough to be practical used.
Plus there’s a litany of problem like the fact that any components that could be used to microstamp could be replaced with a different set of parts bearing no or different stamps.
I’m not an engineer, so take this with a grain of salt, but it would massively raise costs (think poll tax), the engraving would wear out in a few hundred rounds, we don’t even bother with rape kits so why would we bother with brass, and it can easily be defeated in about a minute by sticking a sanding stone in there. There is no benefit, only extra costs.
The current system has the state certifying a specific SKU, meaning to other wise identical firearms could have one legal and one illegal because the second one differentiated by what finish it was sold with & the SKU hadn’t been specifically approved.
They also implemented a policy of restricting additional firearms to the approved roster unless others were removed.
Every year pistols would have to be recertified and if fees were not paid to recertify them they would be removed from the approved list.
“Safety” is definitely a word, not the one I’d use.
The 2001 law, known as the Unsafe Handgun Act, requires new semiautomatic handguns to have an indicator showing when there is a round in the chamber and a mechanism to prevent firing when the magazine is not fully inserted, both meant to prevent accidental discharge. It also requires that they stamp a serial number onto bullets they fire, known as microstamping.
What part of that leads you object to them using the word safety?
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I’m trying to figure out how a handgun would microstamp a bullet. My understanding of guns is that the magazine pushes the ammo up and the slide pushes it in the chamber. Then, the striker sets off the powder. The only place the bullet(the projectile) might come in contact with the gun would be as it’s pushed into the chamber.
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microstamping
It’s a proprietary technology. I’m sure Todd Lizotte hasn’t made any massive financial contributions to the politicians who want him to make money off of every handgun sold in the state.
The real problem is that all of those parts would print on the shell casing, not the bullet. What good would that do?
I guess they’re assuming most hoodlums don’t pick up their brass. Jury’s out on revolver users.
In defense of this awful law, it would at least help catch anyone careless enough to leave their casings at the crime scenes and get caught with the weapon.
Optimistically, maybe everyone who’s been put in jail because of the pseudoscience of forensic ballistics could get a retrial, when the state admits that actually forensic ballistics is fake and we need serial numbers stamped on the bullets in order to identify them
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It would be trivial to attach something that would catch the casings to collect them.
The point of this isn’t to actually work. No company does this right now, and no company has plans to do this. The point of this law is to effectively ban guns without outright calling it a gun ban. That’s just not the right way to attempt to do it.
Technical feasibility is a valid (but separate) issue but it does not negate my question.
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It is definitely possible, and has been done
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microstamping
My problem with it is basically the same as OP’s: it makes guns more expensive, which means only wealthier people can legally own them. On top of that, the technology is presently only available from a single company, making it even more expensive.
The microstamping. As far as I know, no gun does this. What it effectively is, is a way to ban guns without outright calling it a ban.
Microstamping. No gun made has it. Afaik, no gun has ever been made with microstamping.
Its a ban by another name.
No cars were made with catalectic converters until laws were passed mandating them.
Every computer printer sold in the last 30 years prints an invisible code on the paper uniquely identifying the printer. None did this until a national security law was passed.
Surely a gun manufacturer would see this as a USP if they were the only ones able/willing to implement the requirement.
The technology behind microstamping is the priority work of Taclabs any company that wanted to implement it would need to pay that company in order to do so. Currently the technology isn’t mature enough to be practical used.
Plus there’s a litany of problem like the fact that any components that could be used to microstamp could be replaced with a different set of parts bearing no or different stamps.
I’m not an engineer, so take this with a grain of salt, but it would massively raise costs (think poll tax), the engraving would wear out in a few hundred rounds, we don’t even bother with rape kits so why would we bother with brass, and it can easily be defeated in about a minute by sticking a sanding stone in there. There is no benefit, only extra costs.
Its the NRA, but they know a lot of things I don’t. https://www.nraila.org/get-the-facts/micro-stamping-and-ballistic-fingerprinting/
The current system has the state certifying a specific SKU, meaning to other wise identical firearms could have one legal and one illegal because the second one differentiated by what finish it was sold with & the SKU hadn’t been specifically approved.
They also implemented a policy of restricting additional firearms to the approved roster unless others were removed.
Every year pistols would have to be recertified and if fees were not paid to recertify them they would be removed from the approved list.