But this hobby now has powerful enemies in the gun control lobby. These activists want to strip this right away and brands these creations as so-called “ghost guns.”
Pennsylvania is the latest battleground in the fight to maintain this rich heritage for gun owners.
The National Rifle Association corrected noted that the term “ghost guns” is meant to elicit fear in the public. There are already well-established laws on the federal and state levels preventing prohibited persons from owning these or any other weapons.
It is also illegal to knowingly transfer any weapon to such persons.
In other words, this latest effort in Pennsylvania, HB 777, is nothing more than an extension of the inflammatory rhetoric deployed by gun rights opponents. It will not make one American safer and will only attack traditional hobbyists.
The text of the measure reads: “A person who sells or otherwise transfers any of the following, separately or as a part of a firearm kit, not imprinted with a serial number registered with a Federal firearms licensee, commits a felony of the third degree: (i) a firearm frame or receiver; (ii) a firearm muffler or silencer frame or receiver; (iii) a split or modular firearm frame or receiver; or (iv) a partially complete, disassembled or inoperable firearm frame or receiver.”
If enacted, those found in violation of the new state law would face up to seven years in prison and as much as a $15,000 fine.
The NRA observed that there is not even a carveout for antique weapons which were never serialized. This means that the colonial era collector’s item or even your grandfather’s deer rifle could very well be illegal contraband in Pennsylvania.
The venerable gun rights organization blasted the obvious political effort by certain Keystone State lawmakers to rile up their constituency. The NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action (NRA-ILA) posted an alert warning its members, particularly those in Pennsylvania, of this latest threat to their Second Amendment rights.
“With all the issues facing the state, they are obsessed with election-year politics and the need to score cheap political points with their anti-gun base, which has an insatiable appetite for banning guns.”
But the measure squeezed through the state House on a 104-97 vote. Lawmakers in the state’s lower chamber have proposed dozens of measures intent on stripping away gun rights from law-abiding citizens in this session.
And more are already in the pipeline.
HB 777 is, in the words of ILA, “poorly crafted and includes parts and accessories.” The gun rights group further observed that the measure is “so draconian that you do not even need to possess an operable gun to be guilty of a felony. It also does not make an exception for antique firearms without serial numbers.”
If state lawmakers are indeed worried about Philadelphia’s crime rate, they would ignore meaningless unconstitutional gestures and focus on real world solutions that would take violent criminals off the streets. Instead, they insist on throwing every conceivable gun control measure against the wall to see what will stick.
And this one is not likely to stick.
The U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark Bruen decision set forth in crystal clear terms the threshold that gun control laws must reach to be constitutional. And clearly, there is nothing in the nation’s history of firearms regulation that serves as a precedent to Pennsylvania’s extreme measure.
Instead, the U.S. heritage is that of generations of gun enthusiasts and hobbyists using their skills and expertise to carefully craft their own weapons. Pennsylvania lawmakers would do well to acknowledge this and turn their attention on actual solutions to the state’s problems.
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