GOA Activists Make Big Splash On Capitol Hill
-- Gun rights report for 2007
Gun Owners of America
8001 Forbes Place, Suite 102
Springfield, VA 22151
(703)321-8585
http://www.gunowners.org/a121307.htm
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Thursday, December 13, 2007
When people look back on 2007, they may remember the several, notable
shootings that took place: the massacre at Virginia Tech in April,
the slayings at the Nebraska and Utah malls, and the most recent
killings in Colorado -- a shooting that could have eclipsed all of
the previous ones if one courageous lady, Jeanne Assam, had not been
armed with a gun.
Gun Owners of America has been there each step of the way, sometimes
serving as the only national gun group which has regularly appeared
on national television, arguing for the right to keep and bear arms.
Just this week, GOA's Larry Pratt appeared on Fox News to debate the
Brady Campaign in the aftermath of the Colorado-church shooting.
Pratt hailed Assam as a hero and called for the elimination of gun
free zones which leave victims defenseless.
While GOA considers it very important to inform the general public on
the practical value of the Second Amendment, there's much more that
we have done to defend our freedoms in the legislative and judicial
halls around the country. The following is just a glimpse of what
GOA has been able to accomplish this year with YOUR HELP. So let's
take a look at our work together, month by month.
January
* As the year dawns, Gun Owners of America is headed for the U.S.
Supreme Court! GOA begins preparing its amicus brief in the FEC v.
Wisconsin RTL case -- a case that became important to gun owners
shortly after last year's elections when the Brady Campaign asked the
Federal Election Commission to shut down GOA's ability to post its
candidate ratings on the Internet.
In this amicus brief, Gun Owners of America led a coalition of
organizations to argue before the Supreme Court, realizing that a
victory at the nation's highest court would take the wind out of
Brady's sails and protect the right of GOA members and the public to
read our candidate ratings on the Internet. (See "June Part 2" for
the final resolution of this case.)
* In Congress, GOA wins an early battle against legislation
introduced by Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) that would have required GOA to
monitor and report on its communications with its members and friends
(like you). GOA helps produce an outpouring of calls against this
anti-speech language (S. 1), and the pernicious text is subsequently
dropped from the bill.
February -- March
* GOA spends a lot of time in the state legislatures during the early
part of the year lobbying for bills that would protect the right of
self-defense (a.k.a., the Castle Doctrine) and would allow
law-abiding gun owners to carry firearms without getting permission
from the government (known as Vermont-style carry).
* GOA also begins lobbying for bills that would outlaw gun
confiscations during declared emergencies. Gun Owners helps citizens
of Arizona and Montana to become the most recent states to outlaw the
type of gun thefts that occurred in New Orleans after Hurricane
Katrina. More than a dozen states have now enacted such laws.
* In the nation's capital, GOA begins its campaign against the
Veterans Disarmament Act and activates its members all over the
country to oppose the legislation introduced by the Queen of Gun
Control, Rep. Carolyn McCarthy (D) of New York. (More on this
below.)
April -- May
* As the nation watches the horrifying images coming from Virginia
Tech on April 16, gun control advocates heighten their calls for
greater restrictions. GOA spokesmen spend countless hours on Capitol
Hill and in the media. In just the first two weeks following the
shooting, GOA appeared in several hundred news outlets across the
country (newspaper articles, radio talk shows and TV debates).
* The April shooting jumpstarts anti-gun legislation sponsored by
Rep. McCarthy and Senator Chuck Schumer. In the name of stopping bad
guys like the Virginia Tech gunman, the Veterans Disarmament Act
would disarm hundreds of thousands of military veterans who are
suffering the ailments that frequently follow combat stress.
* Gun Owners of America begins activating its grassroots network on a
weekly basis (sometimes more), generating thousands upon thousands of
e-mails and phone calls into the House of Representatives in
opposition to the Veterans Disarmament Act.
June (Part 1)
* Betrayal! The House Democrat leadership secretly conspires to
bring up the Veterans Disarmament Act. Republicans find out the bill
is coming to the floor with only a couple of hours lead time. On
June 13, the bill passes without a recorded vote, and very few
Representatives are even present on the floor of the House.
As the bill moves to the Senate, GOA continues fighting the bill and
works to get other groups to join the battle. On June 18, the
Military Order of the Purple Heart takes a strong position against
the McCarthy-Schumer text.
* In other legislative battles, GOA helps kill an anti-gun
immigration bill that was introduced by Senator Ted Kennedy (D-MA).
The bill contains harmful language which, in the hands of a future
anti-gun administration, would allow gun shops to be shut down and
classified as "criminal gangs."
GOA gins up the grassroots in favor of a killer amendment that brings
the huge debate over the amnesty bill to a screeching halt. That one
amendment is credited by Capitol Hill insiders as being the biggest
reason this anti-gun bill was defeated by a 53-46 vote in the Senate.
June (Part 2)
* Big news. GOA's Political Victory Fund raises thousands of dollars
for GOA Life Member Dr. Paul Broun, who is running to replace the
late Charlie Norwood in Georgia. The Republican Broun wins the
special election by 373 votes and is now a member of the U.S. House
of Representatives!
* More big news. The Supreme Court rules in favor of GOA in the FEC
v. Wisconsin RTL case! This victory makes it almost certain that GOA
will receive a favorable ruling from the Federal Election Commission
in August, thus allowing GOA to continue posting its candidate
ratings on the Internet.
July -- August
* As the Congress prepares to go on recess, GOA registers its
complaints with an executive agency (Occupational Safety and Health
Administration) after it proposed regulations that could bring the
sale and transportation of ammunition in this country to a halt.
Less than two weeks later, the Labor Department (which oversees OSHA)
withdraws the regulations and states that, "OSHA is taking prompt
action to revise [and] clarify the purpose of the regulation."
* GOA beats the Brady Campaign in the battle at the Federal Election
Commission! The FEC dismisses the Brady Bunch's complaint against
Gun Owners and states that we have broken no laws in posting our
candidate ratings which educate the public.
September
* With Congress returning from their summer break, GOA continues to
generate a flood of e-mails, postcards, letters and faxes into
Senatorial offices -- all in opposition to the Veterans Disarmament
Act.
* The fight against the McCarthy-Schumer bill is gaining steam, and
GOA announces two key allies are joining the fight against the
Veterans Disarmament Act. First, Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) places a
hold on the Schumer bill -- a "hold" being a parliamentary maneuver
which stalls the legislation and keeps it from easily advancing. The
Coburn hold has continued to bottle up the bill until this very day.
Second, the American Legion informs Senator Coburn that it is opposed
to the Veterans Disarmament Act, as it would "abrogate the rights of
certain service-connected disabled veterans to own firearms, a right
guaranteed by the Second Amendment."
* In other issues, GOA works closely with Senator David Vitter (R-LA)
to craft language which stipulates that no U.S. funds can be used by
the United Nations -- or organizations affiliated with the UN -- to
restrict or tax our gun rights. Sen. Vitter pushes the pro-gun
language through the U.S. Senate on an 81-10 vote, as an amendment to
the Department of State appropriations bill.
October
* GOA's founder and chairman, Sen. H.L. "Bill" Richardson (ret.),
issues an open letter to the gun community urging them to encourage
ALL PRO-GUN groups to stand united in opposition to the Veterans
Disarmament Act. You can see the letter at
http://www.gunowners.org/a100407.htm on the GOA website.
The letter states unequivocally that no compromise is acceptable on
the McCarthy-Schumer legislation.
* GOA activates its supporters in opposition to the Law of the Sea
Treaty (LOST), as it could allow the UN to force the closing of
firing ranges based on the bogus argument that runoff from these
ranges pollutes the world's oceans.
November -- December
* Gun Owners Foundation begins preparing an amicus brief for the U.S.
Supreme Court after the justices decide to take up Washington, D.C.'s
appeal after its gun ban is declared unconstitutional. An appellate
court ruled in March that the city's draconian gun ban violated the
Second Amendment of the Constitution. The DC v. Heller case will
likely be heard next spring.
* Gun Owners Foundation is also continuing its defense of Ignacio
Ramos and Jose Alonso Compean -- the two border patrol agents who
were convicted of shooting a Mexican drug smuggler on the U.S. side
of the border. GOF attorneys filed an amicus brief earlier in the
year which argued that Ramos and Compean were falsely convicted of
"firing a gun during the commission of a crime" -- a crime that
doesn't even exist in federal law.
While the "firing a gun" charge can serve as a sentence enhancement
to an underlying crime, the prosecutor would have to show that the
two border agents were unlawfully carrying firearms -- a ludicrous
idea! It became very clear in December that two of the three judges
hearing the agents' appeal were very familiar with GOF's arguments,
as their questions to the prosecutor repeatedly focused on this
particular area of federal law. Prospects look good for a decision
reversing their conviction next year.
* When the Senate recently came within a couple of hours of
unanimously approving the anti-gun Michael Sullivan for the position
of BATFE Director, GOA sent an emergency fax to every Senate office,
urging them to oppose the Sullivan nomination. Thankfully, one
senator filed an official objection to Sullivan, and his nomination
was temporarily stalled.
GOA then generated a massive outpouring of opposition from its
activists, which resulted in yet another Senator placing a
"hold" on
the Sullivan nomination. The anti-gun appointment has now been put
off until next year.
