By Martin Finucane, Associated Press, 2/3/2000 00:03
BOSTON (AP) Pro-gun activists say the state’s ban on gun sales from people’s homes is snuffing out a legitimate business for no good reason, and they’re going to fight it.

Michael Yacino, executive director of the Gun Owners’ Action League, whose group planned to file a lawsuit in Suffolk Superior Court today, seeking to keep home gun sales alive.

”There’s been no evidence provided to us that indicates that these people have done anything wrong,” he said. ”We’re not sure what the problem was that was trying to be solved,” he said.

Attorney General Thomas Reilly told local law enforcement officials in the fall to begin revoking the licenses of dealers who sell guns from their homes.

Reilly sent a two-page letter to police chiefs across the state, citing a ban on home gun sales that took effect Sept. 1 as part of the state’s tough new gun control law. The move by Reilly in the fall immediately drew howls of protest from pro-gun activists.

State officials estimate that more than 700 out of 996 licensed gun dealers sell weapons out of their homes.

An attorney general’s spokeswoman didn’t immediately return a message seeking comment Wednesday.

But Sen. Cheryl Jacques, D-Needham, chief architect of the tough 1998 gun control law, said, ”The law is clear. I am confident that the courts will uphold the law. People don’t want businesses like gun shops or strip joints in their neighborhoods.”

”The bottom line is: it’s well within the purview of government to regulate businesses, particularly in residential neighborhoods. … It’s completely reasonable to ensure that guns aren’t being sold over someone’s kitchen table top,” she said.

Yacino, who has sold guns from his home himself, said the businesses are ”substantially regulated.” They are required to keep records, file reports to authorities and subject to inspection, he said.

Yacino said the suit, which names Reilly, Public Safety Secretary Jane Perlov and state police Col. John DiFava as defendants, would question the vagueness of the law and argue it was invalid under the state and federal constitutions.

”It’s a business issue, it’s a due process issue, it’s a fairness issue, it’s a standards issue,” he said.

Asked if home gun sales were a problem, Jacques said, ”Do you want to live next door to someone who’s selling guns out of their kitchen? I think the resounding answer would be `Absolutely not.”’

John Rosenthal, co-founder of the Newton-based Stop Handgun Violence Inc., said he believed Massachusetts was the first state to pass a ban on gun sales from homes.

The issue of gun control has heated up recently, with a state senator introducing a bill that would go even further to regulate guns than the 1998 law, which gun control activists say is the toughest in the country.

Sen. Cynthia Creem, D-Newton, Senate chair of the Criminal Justice Committee, has proposed limiting the number of firearms a person can legally purchase in the state to one a month.

Creem said the idea was to limit the bulk purchase of firearms and the illegal resale to criminals.

Yacino said such monthly limits haven’t worked in other states.

”It certainly has nothing to do with making me or you any safer. It hasn’t anywhere it’s been tried,” he said.

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