What are your thoughts about this?
General jist of the story (taken from the article):
Half a dozen other Colorado counties, including Fremont and Weld, have declared themselves Second Amendment sanctuaries in response to the red flag bill. Teller County commissioners resolved Thursday to “protect the inalienable and individual right to keep and bear arms in Teller County.”
I think this is great. The point they are making is that there’s a right way and a wrong way to do things; Red Flag laws are the wrong way. Although they’re local officials, they are still considered lawmakers. Kudos to them for refusing to uphold a law that is unconstitutional.
MA enacted Red Flag laws last July. The Gun Owners Action League lobbied to have language such as mandatory counseling put in there to address the mental health aspects of the bill that lawmakers insisted was the reasoning for it. No such language made it in there. The law was pushed to cut down on suicides by gun, but at the end of the day it’s “Your license is suspended, turn in your guns or we’ll come and get them, have a nice day. Oh yeah, you should probably get help if you can!”
People also don’t realize that there already are ways to prevent these things. If you even mention harming yourself or someone else, the police here can strongly urge you to go to the hospital in the ambulance while they’re there, or Section 12 you. You’re going either way. Difference is, the police do their job and determine the validity of the complaint; you’re in the middle of an ugly divorce and your ex to be keeps calling just to make life miserable on you may not hold as much water as something else.
Red Flag laws could have the reverse effect. A lot of people have issues out there, very few which lead to harm. Having their guns taken away may will only make their mental health worse. Also many people enjoy going to the range and it is a nice stress reliever. Now that’s gone.
Something we all need to keep in mind when discussing these laws with others is that this isn’t only a breach of the Second Amendment, but also the Fourth (search and seizure) and the Fourteenth (due process). Maybe even more.
The government has proven over and over again that when given the opportunity, they’ll eventually abuse any power given to them, no matter how good of an idea it may look like on paper. I honestly don’t know when people stopped realizing that.
Good point - it will also discourage people who own firearms from getting any sort of mental health care for fear of having their tools for self-defense taken away.
And you make a good point about the ex. Some people will report you because they don’t agree with you having firearms or they are out to harm you in any way possible.
These laws remind me of Nazi Germany where people were encouraged to report on their neighbor if they were Jewish. Scary times we live in.
Funny you mention Nazi Germany. I point out to people that initially, most Germans thought “This is going to be a good thing” Not quite!!
Personal opinion here…
I find it really interesting that the people who are comparing President Trump to Hitler are also the ones who don’t think citizens should have guns. Don’t they want to be able to defend themselves?
That one confuses me.
Again - personal opinion.
I agree 100%. It’s pretty ironic that those people talking dictatorship, etc have no issue with not being able to defend themselves against it. In reality, the average person out there has no clue what’s really going on, just repeats what they’re told, and will hate whoever wins an election if it isn’t who they supported. They don’t think for themselves or have any desire to rise up and fight, and never believe they will need to, so they don’t care.
The true gun grabbers, the ones who know the rhetoric they spew is false but the above mentioned people will believe, are in it to make sure if they ever do get power they’ll be able to do as they please, pass whatever unconstitutional laws they want, and the people will have no recourse. Naturally there will be some special exemption where they can have arms to defend themselves, but we can’t.
People talk about an impending civil war or revolution brewing. The extreme left and their support groups such as Antifa know they can’t let that happen UNTIL they’ve taken away private gun ownership. What they don’t realize is THAT will be the issue that pushes us into said civil war or revolution. Maybe they’re that naive to think that they’ll do away with 2A and we’ll all just turn our arms in and that will be it!
It’s important to point out to people that when they talk about the need to protect ourselves from a tyrannical government in the Constitution, they’re not talking about a foreign government, they’re talking about our own.
They definitely were talking about our own as well as foreign governments, @Kerryman71!
I pray that never happens for the sake of my children and my granddaughter.
They definitely were talking about our own as well as foreign governments, @Kerryman71!
I pray that never happens for the sake of my children and my granddaughter.
A large percentage of Illinois counties have done this. You watch, they will use state police close to retirement to enforce unconstitutional laws. They’ll threaten the loss of pension and health benefits.
This is because they do not have a clue what they are talking about.They do not know how he won over the masses by giving government hand outs. They do not know how he brain washed the children. They do not know and do not want to listen nor educate themselves with the facts.
I lived in Germany for 5 years in the 1980s and most (not all) of the people I can in contact with and got to know felt ashamed of what Germany became under Hitler’s rule.
Those that refuse to learn from history are doomed to repeat the same mistakes.
(Steps down off soap box).
This part of Colorado’s proposed red flag law is really scary: “Weapons then could be held for up to 364 days while the person gets treatment, which can be court-ordered. To recover the guns, the person must prove “beyond a reasonable doubt” that he no longer poses a danger.”
How would a person ever prove that?!?
Not to mention that imposes the need to prove oneself innocent, not the prosecutors need to prove a person guilty. Not to mention we’re now in the realm of enforcement of consequences for the acts that might be committed, but haven’t been.
I really think this stuff is an extremely bad way to address the mental health situation. It needs addressing but this is the world of “Minority Report”. Good for these counties for drawing a line in the sand.