This 'Gun-Control'
Package Says What?

By Charles C. W. Cooke. Aug 25, 2022

In 1780, while writing the first Constitution of Massachusetts, John Adams demanded “a government of laws and not of men.” In part, this was a rejection of monarchy and an endorsement of separation of powers. It was also a call for clarity in law. As an experienced lawyer, Adams understood all too well that sloppy, vague and ambiguous statutes reduce liberty by making it impossible for the citizenry to understand the rules by which it is bound. Good laws empower free people; bad laws empower overbearing government.

By Adams’ standard, Washington, D.C.’s, newest 'gun-control' measure, The Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, is a bad law.

Given the way it was written, it was always going to be.

The product is a haphazard, slapdash mess—the result not of assiduous deliberation, but the inevitable outcome of a small group of senators rushing to agree to something before the summer break.

In and of itself, such behavior is problematic; irrespective of the quality of their work, lawmakers should not be chipping away at our constitutional rights in the interest of seeming busy. But, if they are determined to change the law, they ought to do so with circumspection and with prudence. The Bipartisan Safer Communities Act exhibits neither of these qualities.

There are three parts to the new law. .....