ATF Tries to Revoke "Montana Made" State Sovereignty Laws

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ATF Tries to Revoke "Montana Made"
State Sovereignty Laws

We all predicted this would happen.

In a move typical for that fear-mongering organization with an ever-swelling acronym, the BATFE has written gun dealers in the states of Montana and Tennessee to let them know the BATFE will be disregarding the states' sovereign gun laws.

The "Montana Made" law, just like Tennessee's Firearms Freedom Act, is very simple.

Much of the claimed federal authority to regulate firearm sales and transfers stems from a liberal interpretation of every American tyrant's favorite subterfuge, the "interstate commerce" clause. In essence, this is whatgives the BATFE its nasty teeth.

With this in mind,Montana correctly understood that any weapon made in Montana by Montana residents and sold in Montana to Montana residents is Montana's business and Montana's business alone.

Montana thus sought to take charge of its firearms industry with the application ofa simple truism:

Any gun made in Montana by Montana residents and sold in Montana to Montana residents is intrastate commerce, not "interstate commerce," and thus does not full under the purview of the federal government.

Potentially, the state would be able to say goodbye to NICS checks; Brady background checks; NFA taxes, bans and NFA databases -- and most importantly, federal "assault weapons" bans, which Montana and Tennessee rightly anticipated.

In effect, the "Montana Made" law would have permitted Montana gun companies to manufacture any kind of weapon banned byfederal law -- including so-called "assault weapons" --and sell them to fellow Montana residents.

Moreover, in this scenario, no one -- neither the manufacturer nor the dealer nor the buyer -- would have to kowtow to the BATFE by paying them a $200 tax and surrendering one's privacy to their notoriously inaccurate and oft-abused National Firearms Registry.

It was a new day for freedom -- and other states besides Tennessee were thinking of following suit:Alaska, Colorado, Oklahoma and Texas.

Well, the BATFE -- never one to have its power downplayed (or acronym belittled)-- has written letters to both Montana and Tennessee gun dealers letting them know that they proceed at their own risk.

We can only guess what new horrors those words portend -- probably more dead housewives and children as disgruntled ATF thugs shoot-to-kill anyone suspected of perhaps owning a firearm not properly taxed and regulated by Washington, D.C., power brokers.

What else would be new.

A few of our members expressed interest in contacting the BATFE to vent some righteous anger --the same thingwe did when the Department of Defense said they were going to ban all once-fired military brass for resale.

Remember how the DoD reneged on that commitment after just a few days due to the widespread backlash from gun owners and law enforcement?

Well, this is a bit different. Writing the ATF and providing them with your information is akin to giving thieves your home address and the hours you won't be home.

We're going to take a different, less dangerous approach.

We've been talking to state officials from both Montana and Tennessee today to try to figure out the best way we can help these state laws succeed.





In Liberty,

Dudley Brown
Executive Director
National Association for Gun Rights


So now the BATFE is threatening Montana Gun dealers & Gun owners. Could this be a prelude to Revolution ? Will the big reset begin in Montana ?

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The problem with all these efforts is the liberal interpretation of the Commerce Clause in Wickard v. Filburn back in 1942 which gave the Feds a green light to apply the Clause to just about anything. Unless that decision gets over-turned or something is done to properly restrict the application, these are merely symbolic resolutions.

And I doubt, with today's Courts and Politicians along withhow intertwined modern commerce is, that ever happening except with a reset.

Gary

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PoppaGary wrote:

The problem with all these efforts is the liberal interpretation of the Commerce Clause in Wickard v. Filburn back in 1942 which gave the Feds a green light to apply the Clause to just about anything. Unless that decision gets over-turned or something is done to properly restrict the application, these are merely symbolic resolutions.

And I doubt, with today's Courts and Politicians along withhow intertwined modern commerce is, that ever happening except with a reset.

Gary

Click to expand...

Not contradicting; just expanding horizons.

These are more than symbolic resolutions. States have been nullifying the fedgov for ages.

A very recent nullification event occurred over RealID. As I understand it, RealID is dead, or nearly so.

But, state nullification goes way back, at least to the Alien and Sedition Acts--attacks on the 1st and 10th Amendments.

Imagine the resistance that must existwhen contemporary state legislatures populated by members of the two main national parties are sufficiently fed up to pass nullification laws and resolutions against their own party members in the fedgov.

Needless to say, time will tell who will back down first. Will the states with 10A gun mnaufacturing resolutions come to the aid of gun dealers? Will it even be a gun dealer attacked and kidnapped by BATmen? Or, a small machine shop operator making his own so-called NFA stuff for intra-state sale?

I think BATFE had to send a letter. The next question would have been to whom to send such a letter? They couldn't very well send one to ever adult citizen in the US (all the potential intra-state makers and buyers), so it naturally would have been sent to gun dealers--a mailing list that would have been handy in any event.

Of course, the federal courts will support their own Commerce Clause precedent. The legality within the fedgov probably wouldn't really be in question.

The issue, I think,will be whether the fedgov's individual members have the stomach, and persistance to fight over, through, and around state resistance if the states support the gun dealers. What are the various fedgov individuals going to do? Spend vast amounts of time and energy getting state legislatures elected to support the fedgov on this matter?

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As I understand it, said letters were sent to BATFEces LICENSED dealers...those who have petitioned the government for the privilege of doing INTERSTATE business in firearms, and therefore placed themselves under the auspices of BATFEces control.

BATFEces would have zero authority over a manufacturer who has not crawled on his knees to beg permission to manufacture and/or sell firearms so long as said activity is constrained the borders of Montana, and Montana residents.

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I love Dudley, and he always has his hand on what is going on.

There are two legal issues here:

1) It's already been determined in US vs. Stewart that the US Government can not regulate a machine gun manufactured interstate.
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data2/circs/9th/0210318p.pdf

2) I believe the letter was written to FFL license holders, and refers only to license holders not to anyone else. It's still overstepping, but the content is regarding these license holders loosing their license because of this. It has nothing to do with preventing anyone else selling manufactured guns within the state to others. The FFL license holders have to follow certain rules to have their license, and thus might loose this privilege.

This is not as serious as it sounds.

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I'd love to see this issue provide the SCOTUS with an opportunity to revisit Wickard.