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The Firearm Industry Trade Association (NSSF) is calling out Massachusetts lawmakers for a controversial bill that aims to downgrade Second Amendment rights to mere state privileges, bypassing industry input and ignoring criminal accountability in firearm misuse.
The Massachusetts House and Senate hammered out the contentious legislation behind closed doors, ignoring the firearm industry and rushing to pass a 111-page bill as the session winds down.
This “compromise” infringes on citizens’ rights to keep and bear arms by imposing unconstitutional age restrictions, magazine limits, and rigorous licensing, along with searchable databases that threaten personal privacy.
SEE ALSO: Warren Calls for Nationwide Ban
Jake McGuigan, NSSF’s Managing Director for Government Relations – State Affairs, criticized the bill’s hasty push.
“The legislature had the opportunity to do something truly special with a strong bill to address violence. Instead, the bill aims to suppress the exercise of the Second Amendment by implementing onerous training requirements just to purchase a firearm, bans all of the most commonly-used guns in America and implements a draconian gun registration scheme that criminals will ignore,” he said in a press release obtained by GunsAmerica.
“It even makes it illegal for a 15-year-old Boy Scout to use a .22 caliber rifle to earn a merit badge. Judges continue to set free criminals in the Commonwealth while the legislature makes law-abiding citizens immediate felons,” he added.
Provisions of the bill include:
- Full registration of ALL guns.
- Onerous licensing and administrative requirements on retailers. For example, all guns in inventory need to be registered with the state before they are even sold.
- Bans all legally-owned magazines with a capacity greater than 10 rounds. Those standard-capacity magazines already lawfully owned would be barred from transfer.
- State police would create a roster of banned semi-automatic rifles and database of all guns.
- Commissions to study “technologies” like microstamping that has already been proven by independent peer review research to be flawed and unreliable.
- Live-fire requirement despite the fact there are very few public ranges where this can be done.
- Publicly searchable in database of all lawful firearm owners.
- Creates another government database to issue serial numbers for all firearms.
- Small, independent retailers will be saddled with inventory they can no longer sell.
Retailers, particularly small businesses, face the challenge of holding unsellable inventory under these regulations. Noncompliance with the registration mandate could lead to hefty fines or imprisonment, with penalties escalating for repeated offenses.
This legislative move follows the Supreme Court’s Bruen decision, reaffirmed by Justice Clarence Thomas, emphasizing that the right to bear arms publicly for self-defense is a robust individual right, not a privilege contingent on government approval.
The proposed Massachusetts legislation blatantly violates constitutional protections for adults under 21 and represents an overt assault on the rights of Massachusetts’ law-abiding citizens, treating them unfairly in the eyes of the law while doing little to address actual criminal behavior.
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Taxachussetts realize that the courts move very slowly so this unconstitutional law will be in effect for 7 to 10 years because that bill will be into law by that gubbernor.
Gee, I think that Massachusetts is part of the United States of America where’s this thing called the Constitution that contains a Bill of Rights…that are God given…and cannot be revoked nor infringed upon…because they are God given. Ah, can anyone explain to me how, after taking an oath to this Constitution thing, anyone or thing can chisel away at these rights without being sued into oblivion?