Clinton’s latest
firearms rule
Inventory requirement part of
piecemeal gun-control strategy

By Jon E. Dougherty
? 2000 WorldNetDaily.com

The Clinton administration’s proposed rule that
would force all federally licensed gun dealers,
importers and manufacturers to inventory their
stocks once a year is the latest in a series of
actions the president has taken in an attempt to
further strengthen firearms regulations before
leaving office next January.

The proposal, which was authored by the
Treasury Department’s Bureau of Alcohol,
Tobacco and Firearms and published Monday
in the Federal Register, seeks to amend current
firearms regulations “to require federally
licensed importers, manufacturers and dealers
of firearms to take at least one physical
inventory each year.”

Furthermore, the rule would “also specify the
circumstances under which these licensees must
conduct a special physical inventory,” reporting
any missing firearms within 48 hours.

The rule change is necessary because it would
“help strengthen enforcement of federal firearms
laws and reduce the avenues in which violent
criminals and juveniles acquire illegal firearms,”
according to a statement released by Treasury
Undersecretary for Enforcement James Johnson
on Wednesday.

The BATF claims more than 27,000 firearms
were lost or stolen between 1998 and 1999,
making them a “significant source of guns for
criminals,” Johnson said.

The public has until Nov. 27 to comment on the
proposed rules.

Existing law already requires dealers, importers
and manufacturers to report missing guns
within 48 hours, BATF said. Such losses or thefts
can be reported either to the agency or another
“appropriate” law-enforcement authority.

“Inventory discrepancies, record keeping errors
and employee theft (problems which often only
become apparent when a physical inventory is
conducted) accounted for almost 40 percent of
the reported incidents” of stolen weapons, BATF
said in the Federal Register entry.

The rule would also clarify whose
responsibility — the sender or the receiver — it is
to report a weapon that does not make it to its
intended destination. At present, BATF officials
say, regulations do not single out which party is
responsible for filing the loss report.

“The lack of clarity … may result in neither party
reporting the theft or loss,” said the agency.

Officials said that in 1999, crimes were
committed with 1,271 guns that neither party –
sender or receiver — had reported stolen and
that no licensees had reported missing.

Critics of the new proposal call it an
unnecessary and politically motivated tool to
increase gun control.

According to a 1995 study by Doctors for
Integrity in Public Policy Research, headed by
Dr. Edgar A. Suter, the BATF has said that about
half of all federally licensed gun dealers have
no inventory and, thus, nothing to count.

Besides, the research group noted, “existent
federal … law stringently regulates gun dealers
and gun sales” already.

“There is extensive oversight and enforcement
of those laws,” the study said. “If illegal activity
can be identified, existent law can be used to
prosecute and punish the wrongdoers.”

The BATF proposal follows a Clinton directive
issued in February to crack down on the small
percentage of gun dealers who are the source of
a majority of weapons used in crimes, the Los
Angeles Times reported Feb. 5.

Clinton ordered federal agents to target 1,020
gun dealers in what he termed the “most
aggressive effort ever undertaken to ensure
responsible behavior by gun dealers,” the paper
said.

The dealers the administration identified –
though not by name — made up only 1.2 percent
of the nation’s federal licensed gun dealers, but
accounted for 57.4 percent of nearly 200,000
guns traced to crimes in 1998, according to a
BATF report.

Meanwhile, new rules adopted by BATF, along
with the State and Commerce departments, have
expanded the prohibition against importing
certain semi-automatic rifles, including a World
War II-era rifle that hasn’t been manufactured in
decades.

The rules, published in the Federal Register
June 20, conform to a directive issued by
President Clinton to the BATF, State and
Commerce departments following the Second
Summit of the Americas, held in Santiago, Chile,
in April 1998.

At that time, Clinton “announced that the United
States would issue regulations implementing
the ‘Model Regulations for the Control of the
International Movement of Firearms, Their Parts
and Components, and Ammunition.’”

The Model Regulations, which were drafted by
the Inter-American Drug Abuse Control
Commission at the request of the Organization
of American States, were written “to provide
standardized procedures for the international
movement of firearms … so as to prevent illegal
trafficking in these articles.”

According to one firearms importer, Boca Raton,
Fla.-based Century Arms, the newly banned
rifles include the venerable U.S.-made M-1
Garand rifle.

“On the day Al Gore accepted the Democratic
nomination for president, a legal committee at
BATF effectively banned an entire class of
previously importable firearms,” said a press
release on the Century Arms website.

According to the Federal Register, under BATF
rules, Part 47 — governing the “Importation of
Arms, Ammunition, and Implements of War,”
?47.57, entitled, “U.S. Military Defense Articles”
— “no military defense article of United States
manufacture may be imported into the United
States if such article was furnished to a foreign
government under a foreign assistance or
foreign military sales program of the” U.S.

Also, the rule — 69-309 — permitting active duty
U.S. military members to “import” up to three
rifles or shotguns and 1,000 rounds of
ammunition upon “returning from active duty,”
has been revoked by BATF.

The agency said it “believes that this ruling is
inconsistent with the … Model Regulations,
since no advance authorization is required for
such importations.” Under the BATF’s revised
rules, “servicemen returning to the U.S. from
overseas duty may still import personal
firearms pursuant to [Title] 18 U.S.C.,” but those
regulations involve filing forms — some in
triplicate — with BATF and also require prior
approval.

Firearms dealers like Century Arms, which have
been importing such weapons for years, see
more politics than practicality behind the new
measures.

Related stories:

Treasury, ATF release gun report

Gun registration bill not moving