http://www.denverpost.com/news/news0704a.htm
<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Gun-show initiative passes test
By David Olinger
Denver Post Staff Writer
July 4, 2000 - The Colorado Supreme Court cleared the way Monday for a citizen initiative to require background checks at gun shows.
If the measure reaches the November ballot, Colorado voters will be the first in the nation to decide whether every firearm sale at a gun show must be preceded by a call to check the customer's criminal record.
Proponents expect a high-stakes battle with the National Rifle Association, which has already begun shopping for a Colorado political consultant to help defeat the initiative.
In legal challenges, four groups of gun owners tried to keep the initiative off the ballot. They contended that its language was misleading, that it contained more than one subject and that it failed to adequately assess its likely cost to taxpayers.
Supreme Court justices rejected those challenges in a unanimous opinion. They held that the initiative has a single purpose, that the law enforcement and incarceration costs of regulating all gun-show sales were adequately described as undetermined, and that the citizen initiative is a fundamental constitutional right in Colorado.
The ruling was a victory for SAFE Colorado, a group formed after four guns sold privately at gun shows were used in the 1999 Columbine High School massacre. The sponsors announced at a news conference Monday that they had collected signatures from 63,424 people - enough to put the initiative on the ballot - but are continuing to circulate petitions to make sure enough registered voters have signed.
"I am obviously very, very encouraged," said SAFE Colorado political director Tom Mauser, who wore a button with a photo of his son Daniel, who was killed at Columbine. "We've cleared a hurdle that was in our way. Now there are others."
By federal law, licensed firearms dealers already must keep records of their gun-show customers and call for a background check before the sale is made.
The law does not apply, however, to vendors who rent tables at gun shows to sell private gun collections. Nor does it apply to gunshow patrons who bring a single gun to sell, advertising it as they walk the aisles.
Supporters of the initiative call this the "gun-show loophole." Every weekend, these events feature two sets of guns for sale, one requiring customer records and background checks, the other offering guns without paperwork.
Opponents call the initiative an infringement on their Second Amendment rights and a step toward a registry of what once were private gun trades.
To date the National Rifle Association has kept a low profile in this campaign. A powerful lobbying group for gun owners, it has limited its investment in the Colorado contest to paying the legal expenses of Barry Wagoner, an NRA member who challenged the initiative.
But SAFE Colorado leaders expect the NRA to spend millions of dollars to defeat the initiative once it is placed on the 2000 ballot. One Republican consultant in Colorado confirmed Monday that the NRA called her two weeks ago to explore her interest in directing a statewide campaign against the gun-show measure.
"I just told them I couldn't do it," said Katy Atkinson, a Littleton resident who has worked as a consultant for two Colorado Republicans in Congress, for school choice and, seven years ago, for the NRA.
Atkinson said she was too busy to take on the gun-show battle, and besides, "I'm not sure how I'm going to vote." Wagoner, the NRA member, was represented in the legal challenge by Hugo Teufel III, a lawyer who expressed little surprise at Monday's ruling.
In Colorado, "the process has been set up to favor the proponents of initiatives," he said. "All ties go to the runner." According to Handgun Control Inc., a Washington-based advocacy group, citizen groups in Colorado and Oregon have been campaigning for the first statewide referendums to require background checks on all gun-show sales. One other state, Florida, has adopted a referendum giving counties the option to regulate gun-show transactions.
Naomi Paiss, a spokeswoman for Handgun Control, expects the Colorado vote to be watched nationally. "Gun control has been such a hot topic since Columbine," she said. "It's hard to imagine a more obvious ground zero than Colorado."
SAFE Colorado was formed after Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, both Columbine seniors, killed a dozen classmates and a teacher with an arsenal acquired from Colorado gun shows. They bought three of their guns directly from private vendors at the Tanner Gun Show with the help of an 18-yearold friend, Robyn Anderson. Their fourth gun, a TEC-DC9 assault pistol, was sold privately at another show to Mark Manes, a 22-year-old man who later resold it to the killers.
The Colorado State Shooting Association, the NRA's state affiliate, successfully fought legislation in Colorado this year to require background checks on all gun-show sales. Its officials have been planning how to combat the same measure at the ballot box, where early polls have shown at least 80 percent of voters favor the initiative.
It "requires registration of the buyer and the firearm into dealer records," even when the gun-show seller is not a dealer, said James Winchester, a Colorado State Shooting Association official.
"These records are not destroyed. They're kept in perpetuity," he said. "If people want gun registration, this is an up or down vote on it."[/quote]
So...um... the two Columbine killers had a criminal record and this would have prevented them from coming into possession of the guns they used...
------------------
John/az
"When freedom is at stake, your silence is not golden, it's yellow..." RKBA!
www.cphv.com
<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Gun-show initiative passes test
By David Olinger
Denver Post Staff Writer
July 4, 2000 - The Colorado Supreme Court cleared the way Monday for a citizen initiative to require background checks at gun shows.
If the measure reaches the November ballot, Colorado voters will be the first in the nation to decide whether every firearm sale at a gun show must be preceded by a call to check the customer's criminal record.
Proponents expect a high-stakes battle with the National Rifle Association, which has already begun shopping for a Colorado political consultant to help defeat the initiative.
In legal challenges, four groups of gun owners tried to keep the initiative off the ballot. They contended that its language was misleading, that it contained more than one subject and that it failed to adequately assess its likely cost to taxpayers.
Supreme Court justices rejected those challenges in a unanimous opinion. They held that the initiative has a single purpose, that the law enforcement and incarceration costs of regulating all gun-show sales were adequately described as undetermined, and that the citizen initiative is a fundamental constitutional right in Colorado.
The ruling was a victory for SAFE Colorado, a group formed after four guns sold privately at gun shows were used in the 1999 Columbine High School massacre. The sponsors announced at a news conference Monday that they had collected signatures from 63,424 people - enough to put the initiative on the ballot - but are continuing to circulate petitions to make sure enough registered voters have signed.
"I am obviously very, very encouraged," said SAFE Colorado political director Tom Mauser, who wore a button with a photo of his son Daniel, who was killed at Columbine. "We've cleared a hurdle that was in our way. Now there are others."
By federal law, licensed firearms dealers already must keep records of their gun-show customers and call for a background check before the sale is made.
The law does not apply, however, to vendors who rent tables at gun shows to sell private gun collections. Nor does it apply to gunshow patrons who bring a single gun to sell, advertising it as they walk the aisles.
Supporters of the initiative call this the "gun-show loophole." Every weekend, these events feature two sets of guns for sale, one requiring customer records and background checks, the other offering guns without paperwork.
Opponents call the initiative an infringement on their Second Amendment rights and a step toward a registry of what once were private gun trades.
To date the National Rifle Association has kept a low profile in this campaign. A powerful lobbying group for gun owners, it has limited its investment in the Colorado contest to paying the legal expenses of Barry Wagoner, an NRA member who challenged the initiative.
But SAFE Colorado leaders expect the NRA to spend millions of dollars to defeat the initiative once it is placed on the 2000 ballot. One Republican consultant in Colorado confirmed Monday that the NRA called her two weeks ago to explore her interest in directing a statewide campaign against the gun-show measure.
"I just told them I couldn't do it," said Katy Atkinson, a Littleton resident who has worked as a consultant for two Colorado Republicans in Congress, for school choice and, seven years ago, for the NRA.
Atkinson said she was too busy to take on the gun-show battle, and besides, "I'm not sure how I'm going to vote." Wagoner, the NRA member, was represented in the legal challenge by Hugo Teufel III, a lawyer who expressed little surprise at Monday's ruling.
In Colorado, "the process has been set up to favor the proponents of initiatives," he said. "All ties go to the runner." According to Handgun Control Inc., a Washington-based advocacy group, citizen groups in Colorado and Oregon have been campaigning for the first statewide referendums to require background checks on all gun-show sales. One other state, Florida, has adopted a referendum giving counties the option to regulate gun-show transactions.
Naomi Paiss, a spokeswoman for Handgun Control, expects the Colorado vote to be watched nationally. "Gun control has been such a hot topic since Columbine," she said. "It's hard to imagine a more obvious ground zero than Colorado."
SAFE Colorado was formed after Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, both Columbine seniors, killed a dozen classmates and a teacher with an arsenal acquired from Colorado gun shows. They bought three of their guns directly from private vendors at the Tanner Gun Show with the help of an 18-yearold friend, Robyn Anderson. Their fourth gun, a TEC-DC9 assault pistol, was sold privately at another show to Mark Manes, a 22-year-old man who later resold it to the killers.
The Colorado State Shooting Association, the NRA's state affiliate, successfully fought legislation in Colorado this year to require background checks on all gun-show sales. Its officials have been planning how to combat the same measure at the ballot box, where early polls have shown at least 80 percent of voters favor the initiative.
It "requires registration of the buyer and the firearm into dealer records," even when the gun-show seller is not a dealer, said James Winchester, a Colorado State Shooting Association official.
"These records are not destroyed. They're kept in perpetuity," he said. "If people want gun registration, this is an up or down vote on it."[/quote]
So...um... the two Columbine killers had a criminal record and this would have prevented them from coming into possession of the guns they used...
------------------
John/az
"When freedom is at stake, your silence is not golden, it's yellow..." RKBA!
www.cphv.com
