By Dave Workman
Senior Editor
On the same day that Aurora, CO murder suspect James Egan Holmes was slapped with 24 counts of murder and 116 charges of attempted murder, anti-gun Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) and Rep. Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY) introduced a bill to restrict on-line ammunition sales.
Holmes allegedly purchased more than 6,000 rounds of ammunition on-line in the months prior to a shooting at the opening night of the Batman film in Aurora. A dozen people were killed and more than 50 were wounded or injured in the attack.
Lautenberg and McCarthy are calling their legislation the Stop Online Ammunition Sales Act. In statements to reporters, the two anti-gun Democrats described their legislation as a “common sense” measure. It is another collaboration between the two anti-gunners, who also are sponsoring legislation to ban large-capacity magazines and make background checks tougher.
“If someone wants to purchase deadly ammunition, they should have to come face-to-face with the seller,” Lautenberg asserted in a statement quoted by NJToday. “It’s one thing to buy a pair of shoes online, but it should take more than a click of the mouse to amass thousands of rounds of ammunition. This legislation is a simple common-sense step that would put safeguards in place to detect suspicious activity, helping to prevent the sale of ammunition to a terrorist or the next would-be mass murderer.”
McCarthy added, “The Stop Online Ammunition Sales Act pulls ammunition sales out of the shadows and into the light, where criminals can’t hide and responsible dealers can act as a line of defense against the planning and stockpiling of a potential mass killer.
“Law-abiding gun owners and shooters should support this legislation,” she insisted, “because it hinders criminals from abusing the Second Amendment right that our nation promises and could save innocent lives in the process.”
However, gun rights activists were not quickly jumping on board after reading what the bill contains.
The Lautenberg-McCarthy measure would require that only licensed dealers could sell ammunition, and purchasers must show photo identification at the time of sale. Dealers would be required to maintain records of their ammunition sales, and they would have to report all purchases of more than 1,000 rounds to the same individual within five consecutive business days.
Repeating the theme that appears to be the new slogan of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, Brady President Dan Gross said in statement supporting the bill, “We as a nation know we are better than this. We are better than the massacres at Aurora, Co., Virginia Tech, Tucson, and the Long Island Railroad. We are better than 32 gun murders every day. In the past week, we have been inspired to see Americans come together on WeAreBetterThanThis.org to begin a real conversation about what we can do to prevent the tragedy of gun violence in our nation – a conversation that includes Democrats and Republicans, those who own guns and those who don’t; a conversation fundamentally respectful of the Second Amendment.”
But the bill could face stiff opposition not only from gun rights organizations, but from big catalog merchandisers who sell ammunition on-line.
