Should be interesting.
Serial Numbers Unconstitutional? Some Federal Judge Thinks So.
- Thread starter hollowoutadime
- Start date
Should be interesting.
Of all the various rules and laws that are threatened by the Bauer ruling, I really didn't expect that serial number requirements would be the first to go 
This one is exciting...
Hard to have registration if all the guns lose their serial numbers...
Hard to have registration if all the guns lose their serial numbers...
Text. History. Tradition.
Eat a full bag of it, Authoritarians.
Eat a full bag of it, Authoritarians.
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I think milling a slot then lots of insirts with carefully worded statements to insert.
patiently waiting for the suppressor laws to fall.. Made In Texas or not.
Most people didn’t and still don’t grasp the significance of the standard laid out by SCOTUS in NYSRPA v the cunts in NY. Almost no gun control laws will survive the text as informed by history standard. Shits gonna get real
I'm grinding as we speak all my Saturday Night Specials, Forefathers predicted that one might need a throw away at one point in their lives.
I was surprised to learn that serial numbers weren't required until the 1968 gun control act.....so of thought they always were.
Education is a good thing.
Now go look up Chambers flintlock and learn that Thomas Jefferson shot a no shit machine-gun by the current ATF definition.
Now go look up Chambers flintlock and learn that Thomas Jefferson shot a no shit machine-gun by the current ATF definition.
Just wait until someone figures out that there were several machine guns in existence before the Constitution was written. Look up the Puckle Gun.
The reporting (if not the ruling) does have a serious error that serial numbers were not widely used before the GCA 68.
They were very widely used. And about the only place they didn’t appear was in very cheap .22’s, and some inexpensive foreign made guns.
When the industrial Revolution turned its eyes towards firearms in the 1840’s, serial numbers were very common. Not for government use, but so that the company could keep track of production, have “numbers” associated with shipping invoices and sales, government contract guns, etc.
Also allowed them to supply spare parts or supplies or accessories… because a serial number allowed the company to know the exact specifications of the product from their reference files.
This was true of many if not most industrial products. Bookkeeping needed serial numbers.
The government only got in the game as a precursor to registration and their long-desired End game of confiscation. As well as tracking for identification of crime guns.
The whole Oswald Carcano paper trail was one of the biggest justifications. Yet no one has ever adequately answered the question “why would Oswald have ordered a rifle and pistol, traceable to his mailbox, when he could have walked into any gun store in TX or LA, and paid cash for a totally untraceable firearm?” An act that “sealed his fate” in public eye as the lone shooter. And provided a justification for GCA68… passed by a leftist activist administration.
Hopeful the ruling does not hinge on the “uncommonness” of serial numbers pre’68. Because that is a ground for overturn, probably. It is flat wrong. What is right is that the government never recorded, saved or archived serial numbers (outside its own military and police forces) prior to 1968.
So the uncommon/unheard-of/unconstitutional part should be the tracking of a Constitutionally-guaranteed product and its owner by government-entities. And the requirement for businesses to put serial numbers on domestically-produced products. And probably it is unconstitutional to tell someone they can’t remove said serial number, because they have (or should hav) no say on what you do with a legally-owned product.
The spillover on this is immense, BTW. Because the government now mandates special features in printers, so that any printed page can be traced to the owner. Same with photocopiers. So send a letter containing a threat or hate speech or… anything deemed un-woke, and that piece of paper can be traced right to you… via the credit card trail and the serial number on the machine.
The First and Fourth Amendment violations there are utterly mind-boggling. And if this ruling applies to firearms and is upheld… and applied to all kinds of serial numbers…. Then it is a major privacy decision. Really major.
Anyhoo… fun history for the day… I’d be interested in hearing more from our true SH legal scholars on this. I’m just a historian… not a constitutional attorney. What say you guys?
But IMHO, The potential for a major SCOTUS case on this, if it gets appealed, is amazing.
Sirhr
Between this judgement and the bump stock judgement all the bans on scary features should be on the chopping block.
We in Illinois second this motion.
Chicago bangers are carjacking people with Wish.com happy-switch mod’d Glocks, but I can’t hunt coyotes with a suppressor.
Moronic.
No, it's based on the earlier ruling about what was common at the time of the signing of the constitution. So, you'd need to go back and review what was common around the 1780's.
They aren't going to do what elected (so-called) representatives and, worse, unelected bureaucrats don't tell them to do.
So the battle is against the 'so called' representation that views itself as our overlords and as kings, queens and "American Royalty." And against their buraucracy... In older times it would be their "court." Not court of law... but the straphangers and implementers of any Royal whim. "Yes, Your majesty, a wonderful idea to rid us of that meddlesome priest... I will curry your favor and get right on that..." says the fawning lackey while slinking off to send The Kings Men to hack off heads.
Court cases like this make it impossible for those who forsake their oath for a paycheck or power... to play games. On the subject of forsaking oaths for power and position and money... How about them Doctors?? Sitting taking an oath they clearly don't believe in because, well, I want to be a rich doctor with godlike powers over life and death.
Anyhoo... this case is potentially good news on many levels.
Sirhr
I understand... and that is very true. And I don't disagree with that viewpoint. But if one thinks like an attorney trying to overturn this... or as an appeals court judge who might want to look at history a little more broadly... it's why I would say that if the ruling referred to serial numbers pre-68 (and not just the article), then that could be a way to overturn.
Strict originalism is pretty hard to enforce... but when originalism is combined with an historical trail that shows that 'original' thinking was in place until modern times, then it becomes easy. Serial numbers were prevalent just 50 years or so after the Constitution and Bill of Rights were Ratified (1789) When 'originalism' was superceded by practice, law, etc. for 'most' of our history, it becomes more tenuous.
Again, you are right on. But do the courts agree with us? That is my only concern. The opportunity here, on the other hand, is fantastic!
Cheers,
Sirhr
“What is right is that the government never recorded, saved or archived serial numbers (outside its own military and police forces) prior to 1968.”
Respectfully, you may have overlooked NFA 1934.
Respectfully, you may have overlooked NFA 1934.
I don't think that many people (including here on SH) are aware of the recent SC ruling about this. Game changer.
I'm dreaming a bit, but....... I hope the SCOTUS rulings end up making the government and all it's agencies go back to 1775 and determine if their proposed laws and bans on us were allowed back then..... If not, then WOOHOO! for us.
You are correct, of course! Though the reality was that NFA was really a de-facto ban by extreme taxation. Because the ISG cannot Constitutionally ban a product. But they can excise tax it so completely as to make it impossible to own… while also requiring egregious paperwork to create a high bar for ownership.
That is where I think the SCOTUS could nail NFA. It is not a tax. It is a ban disguised as a tax. The Hughes Amendment was similarly unconstitutional. Perhaps more so than the original NFA.
But thank you for the correction!
Sirhr
I wonder if it was a matter of serial numbers weren't used for tracking firearms before the GCA68?
The SCOTUS ruling in NYSRPA v the cunts in NY wasn’t about the history of the firearms industry but the history of regulation of firearms, it is irrelevant how far back manufacturers used serial numbers but what matters is when serial numbers were first required by law and whether or not that fits with the text as informed by history.
Agreed.
Tell it to the judge and the appealing attorneys... or an activist SCOTUS if they off another Conservative ;-)
Sirhr
It clearly was. That's what I mentioned in the Oswald case where they were able to trace his purchase of a surplus Carcano to a, I think, Chicago gun store where he bought it by mailorder. The FBI traced serial numbers in crime long before GCA 68. I am sure big city departments did the same. But at the time, unless the seller/jobber kept a serial number WITH a receipt, which they didn't have to do, there would be no record of the buyer.
But before '68, you could call manufacturer. Find out what distributer ordered it. Find the shop they sold it to. And hope they kept a record of the (almost certainly cash) transaction. They didn't have to. Also at the time, you could simply mail Smith and Wesson or Colt and special order whatever you wanted. They would cash your check and send your gun right to your house. But they would have a record of that transaction. And, in fact, still do, sort of. Roy Jinks the S&W Historian has all those records. So does Colt. All the way back to who ordered an SAA in Kansas City in 1890... and what features he wanted on it.
But there was no requirement for record keeping at the dealer. And no requirements for ownership (AKA the ever-growing list of "YES/NO" qustions one has to answer. Why do you think the "Renouced your citizenship" question is on the 4473 (or whatever it is now)? Because of Oswald! Who renounced his citizenship and went to the USSR before coming back and assuming his US identity again.
Anyway, it's been done for years. But not because serial numbers were required. But because industrial-age manufacturing required record-keeping and serial numbers. Easy for LE to jump on to solve crimes. Back when they were actually focused on solving real crimes. Not promoting street crimes and ANTIFA violence and fake insurrections while interfering with elections. But that's another thread entirely....
Sirhr
I just got this in my Facebook feed from the Washoe County Sheriff in Norther Nevada. They have issued a warrant for possession of firearm with changed, altered, removed or obliterated serial number and without bail, no less.
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