Oregon State Legislature sent this bulletin friday, November 22, 2023, by devadmin
Ballot Measure 114 – would enact a law outlining a procedure to apply for a permit-to-purchase for a firearm. Permits would be issued by the Department of State Police. Applicants would need to pay a fee, submit a photo ID, be fingerprinted, complete approved safety training, pass a criminal background check, and not be prohibited from possessing firearms. The Department of State Police would be able to deny a permit to an applicant believed to be a danger to oneself or others or if an applicant is prohibited from possessing a firearm.
The initiative would also prohibit the manufacture, importation, possession, use, purchase, sale, or otherwise transferring of ammunition magazines capable of holding more than 10 rounds. It would make violations a class A misdemeanor, which is punishable by up to 364 days in jail, a fine of up to $6,250, or both.
Measure 114 is disingenuous, deceptive, dangerous, and duplicitous, besides being unconstitutional.
It is disingenuous as can be seen by the propaganda coming from the proponents of this measure. They claim it will somehow magically increase gun safety and reduce violent crime. However, the current crime wave we see in most major metro areas, in Oregon and across the US, does not stem from honest, hardworking men and women trying to purchase firearms.
The law-breakers and fugitives who are breaking windows and stealing jewelry, robbing clothing stores on main street, and hijacking cars on the boulevard are not going to bother with a permission slip for their next ungodly act. Yet, the forthright men and women who might have the need to purchase a firearm will need to go through great lengths of absurd and picayunish minutiae to try to get a permission slip. Today people already have to undergo Oregon’s strict and stringent paperwork requirements and background check regulations for any firearm purchase, only they don’t first need a permission slip.
There are 250 to 280 million firearms in the US. with 42% of US homes owning a legal firearm. With approximately 120 to 150 million current and legal firearm owners in the US, we still have the lowest crime exposure per 100k population.
Sure, the Big-tech media moguls are more than happy to make money and earn clicks by pushing the details when a tragedy occurs, but that should not drive our policy decisions. The news industry survives based upon sales and revenue and often lives by the old adage, “if it bleeds, it leads!”
Measure 114 is deceptive because it creates legal obligations without expressly identifying how those requirements will be created, managed, funded and controlled. For example, it requires a “permit” to buy any firearm which then requires a class that may only be taught by police, community college, or private firearms instructor that does not even exist in most communities.
The tedious detail within the statutory requirements makes this measure particularly onerous. First, it is literally impossible for police and sheriffs’ offices to enforce and comply with all of the regulations. The Oregon State Sheriffs Association (OSSA) estimates that they will need nearly $40,000,000 dollars annually to staff and manage the measure in its current form. This measure will punch a $40,000,000 hole into existing law enforcement office budgets and is a underhanded method for defunding the police.
Additionally, this measure turns all current owners of any high-capacity magazine into criminals, if they cannot prove that their high-capacity magazine was owned before the effective date of this 2022 Act. Very few people still have receipts for $10 or $15 purchases from 5, 10 or 40 years ago, The legal jeopardy presented for having three or four multi-round magazines in one’s possession shows the level of animosity being projected against current law-abiding citizens.
The deceptive wording states, “this measure will enhance the safety of residents, particularly children, of this state by prohibiting the manufacture, sale, or transfer of large-capacity ammunition magazines and regulate the use of such magazines that are currently owned.” In other words, the goal of this section is to “enhance safety.”
To illuminate the ridiculousness of this proposition, let’s set up an illustration. Suppose a person owns a 10-round magazine, and has a receipt from 1985. Is this magazine safer than the newer magazine that a single mom might want to purchase after the effective date? The new statutory category, based upon ownership date alone, makes one item legal and another like item illegal. Yet, the ownership date has no impact on whether one item might be safer than the other. This is simply deception.
In Oregon, the story of the day will no longer be “Innocent, until proven guilty.” The proponents want people to believe that all is well, but honest people will need to prove their innocence.
Measure 114 is dangerous because it essentially denies citizens in Oregon the right of self-defense and the right to engage in commerce for the protection of themselves and their family members. This illiberal and narrow-minded measure would make it so difficult for the average citizen to own a firearm that it would be a de-facto ban on all gun sales.
Lastly, Measure 114 is duplicitous because it ignores the negative impacts that these needless regulations will have on minority communities. Before Measure 114 was approved for the ballot, it was an Initiative Petition, known as, IP 17. Democrat House Member Travis Nelson and I were concerned about disproportionate impacts of this measure on Oregon’s indigenous and minority populations.
Using Oregon law ORS 137.683 – 137.685 we requested a “Racial and Ethnic Impact Study” for this ballot measure. According to the statute:
The racial and ethnic impact statement must:
(A) Describe the effects of the state measure on the racial and ethnic composition of the criminal offender population as defined in ORS 137.683;
(B) Include the information described in ORS 137.683 (3); and
(C) Be impartial, simple and understandable
The data suggests there is a real danger in this ballot measure for minorities yet, the duplicitous proponents appear not to be concerned. The data shows and is cited by the Criminal Justice Policy Program at Harvard Law School. In a report to the state’s Chief Justice, Racial Disparities in the Massachusetts Criminal System (2020) the report noted:
“Even after accounting for case severity and a host of other factors, Black and Latinx defendants charged with drug and weapons crimes are more likely to be convicted and sentenced to incarceration and they also receive substantially longer incarceration sentences than similarly situated White defendants.”
Now, assuming all things equal, why did the Oregon Criminal Justice Commission fail to provide any relevant feedback on the impacts of Ballot Measure 114? The Commission only reported, “The CJC lacks data…”, “The CJC is unable to provide predictions” and “ it is not possible for CJC to provide an estimated impact of this section.”
Again, nothing but disingenuous, deceptive, dangerous, and duplicitous nonsense streaming from those wanting to defund the police, while diminishing our personal and collective safety.
Dennis Linthicum
Oregon State Senate – District 28