Thank you, Representative Anderson, for your efforts toward preserving our second amendment rights.
The 10-round limit is feel-good legislation that has made thousands of legal Connecticut gun owners criminals. Forget 30-round magazines; if you cannot produce proof that you legally acquired it prior to 2013 it is now a misdemeanor punishable by up to a year in prison to possess any magazine accommodating more than 10 rounds. Hope you saved your receipt.
I support universal background checks, but I also believe that registration is a step toward confiscation; history supports this. When gun ownership is a crime only criminals will own guns … or 15-round magazines.
If you visit the range regularly it’s certainly convenient to have several 30-round magazines loaded, but not a hardship to have twice as many 15-round—oops, OK three times as many 10-round magazines loaded.
One generally acquires a firearm for one of three reasons: recreation, self-defense or to commit a crime. Universal background checks are great, but how many in group three were able to purchase their gun legally because of HIPAA laws, or a misguided attempt to obscure a troubled past?
And how many crimes are committed by someone with five, 10 or 15 priors? Why are these people not in prison?
And who knows how many bullets you will need in order to defend yourself or your loved ones? Consider a mom home alone with her kids, she hears a window break and becomes the victim of a home invasion. She knows where her husband keeps his semi-automatic rifle, how to hold and point it and where the trigger is, but she has never fired it. But because it’s new she now has 10 chances not 30.
The Sandy Hook shooter trained, firing a reported 154 rounds, using 30-round magazines. With practice it takes about three seconds to swap out a magazine. The shooter was OCD, bet he could beat that. So, with 10-round magazines, 130 rounds? But need more pockets?
And why was this kid trained in firearms? He had displayed psychological issues at age two. By seventh grade his creative writing was too violent to be shared with the class. He owned nine knives, three swords and a spear. He’d been diagnosed but never treated. And we waste our time with how many bullets law-abiding gun owners can have in their gun.
I support SROs, they allow kids to develop healthy relationships with police officers. But why are they the only good guys with a gun allowed in a school? I think that anyone with proper training (i.e., ex-military, ex-cop, or anyone who has demonstrated proficiency in advanced weapons and live fire training) should, if they choose, be allowed to conceal-carry in schools.
And why do we even have gun-free zones, allowing these miscreants a safe space in which to commit their crimes?
Rep. Anderson’s decisions and motivations are not the only ones deserving scrutiny.
Editor’s Note: House Bill 5717 sponsored by Representative Mark Anderson proposed to eliminate capacity limits on firearm magazines, remove all requirements to register large capacity magazines, and require the state to destroy any records accumulated that document the location of large capacity magazines.