Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
I'm a gun rights advocate. The Second Amendment is as important as the First (so too is the Seventh, Tea Partiers, but we will talk about that another time).
I've often pointed out, as I'm sure my fellow Ricochetarians have, that just as matches don't start forest fires, people do - guns don't shoot people, people do.
I lay no blame for the OCCURRENCE of the massacre in Tucson on the gun. But a seemingly rational argument can be made for blaming the NUMBER OF VICTIMS on the extended magazine. That argument, for those who have made it to me, is bolstered by the fact that in Tucson, Laughner wasn't stopped until he was changing magazines (he fired 31 times and hit 19 people).
The extent of damages has always been a reason for regulation. It's why I can buy a cherry bomb, but not dynamite. The explosion isn't the problem - it's the size of it.
So I need some help. I want to save extended magazines. Can anyone give me good reasons why I should save them?
Bonus points: Describe why I need a magazine that may hold more than (picking an arbitrary number here) 10 bullets. Wouldn't we have less victims in Tucson if we limited magazines to 10 shots? Describe the scenario where I might need more shots without changing magazines.
Pro-Level: No slippery-slope arguments. Two reasons:
First, slippery-slope arguments are too easy to make, and too tough to grade. Prohibitions against yelling fire in a theater and laws against defamation have not erased the First Amendment and the very heavy restrictions on machine guns since 1934 (which seems to mirror a proposed restriction on extended magazines) hasn't erased the Second Amendment. We will waste a whole agument over "erosion of rights" with no yardstick by which to measure the erosion.
Second, this is Ricochet. We operate on a higher-level, so we can hash this out without the intellectual automatic weapon known as the slippery-slope argument.
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Jul '10
Re: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
Simple, Tommy. If I'm faced with multiple assailants during a home invasion or some sort of civil unrest, an extended magazine gives me a survival advantage over opponents who lack one.
Re: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
So too would dynamite, Kenneth. Do you support a repeal on regulations concerning dynamite?
Edited on Jan 29, 2011 at 11:44amJul '10
Re: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
Tommy De Seno: So too would dynamite, Kenneth. Do you support a repeal on regulations concerning dynamite? · Jan 29 at 11:43am
Edited on Jan 29 at 11:44 am
Gee, Tommy, i thought we were talking about handguns.
Re: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
Fair point, Kenneth. Let me switch it to machine guns, which have been (with limited exception) illegal since 1934.
Do you support a repeal of those restrictions on machine guns?
May '10
Re: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
We defended this exhaustively in Judith Levy's post, The Other Big Question.
Jul '10
Re: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
Tommy De Seno: Fair point, Kenneth. Let me switch it to machine guns, which have been (with limited exception) illegal since 1934.
Do you support a repeal of those restrictions on machine guns? · Jan 29 at 11:48am
Yes, I do. If I'm ever in a situation where I'm up against my own government, I want all the firepower I can get. The founders didn't win the Revolution with bows and arrows.
Edited on Jan 29, 2011 at 11:53amRe: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
I'm sorry Andrea but Ricochet has grown beyond my ability to read it all (which is a good thing).
So what did we decide in Judith's post?
Jul '10
Re: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
I'm a gun owner (though mainly interested in revolvers and bolt-actions), but if I owned a semi-automatic pistol, I would probably buy extended magazines. The reason being is that if I go to the range, I can fire a lot more rounds without having to put in a new magazine. It's more time-efficient. Also, banning them would do nothing to prevent mass-shootings. Say for instance, 30 round magazines were banned and the limit was 15 rounds. Well, if I wanted to shoot as many people as possible, I'd just carry two pistols each with 15 round magazines.
Re: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
Kenneth
Tommy De Seno: Fair point, Kenneth. Let me switch it to machine guns, which have been (with limited exception) illegal since 1934.
Do you support a repeal of those restrictions on machine guns? · Jan 29 at 11:48am
Yes, I do. · Jan 29 at 11:51am
Of all that I've come to like about you Kenneth (I'm a fan) my favorite part is your complete lack of hypocrisy!
Jul '10
Re: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
Tommy De Seno: I'm sorry Andrea but Ricochet has grown beyond my ability to read it all (which is a good thing).
So what did we decide in Judith's post? · Jan 29 at 11:52am
We decided that every family should own an M1A1 Abrams tank. And a bazooka.
May '10
Re: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
It's a slippery slope... oh. Never mind.
To Kenneth's point, anything that diminishes the effectiveness of a handgun as an offensive weapon would seem to diminish it as a defensive weapon as well.
On the other hand: one could argue that home defense situations rarely escalate into full-fledged shoot-outs. I recall the NRA arguing that the mere brandishing of a weapon is often enough to get bad guys to flee, and their Armed Citizen column usually highlighted instances where Granny pops Murderous Thug in the kneecap and then nails his Career Criminal pal between the eyes. Two shots.
If the above is true, then perhaps Tommy's right. High capacity magazines may indeed be more important to an offensive shooter than a defensive one.
The counter to the above (since I've run out of hands) is that a premeditated killer like Laugher would simply (a) procure a high capacity magazine regardless of its legality; (b) carry multiple weapons; or (c) take the time to hide behind something for 3 seconds so he could switch magazines.
Edited on Jan 29, 2011 at 12:01pmRe: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
So far here is what we have:
1. Usefulness against insurrection;
2. Convenience at the gun range;
3. Futility of regulation in limiting the number of victims.
That's a great start! I hope we can add to it. I'm dining with a liberal tonight and I want to be ready for him.
I have to run now but will check back later to see if we have more.
Re: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
Tommy, extended magazines are in wide circulation and of absolutely no danger in and of themselves--they are more of a convenience feature than anything else. Banning new high-capacity magazines--as in California today and nationally during the Clinton-era "assault weapons ban"--creates just one more opportunity to arrest law-abiding citizens who inadvertently miss a step in navigating our ever more labyrinthine gun laws--"Can you prove that you acquired that magazine before this date? Put your hands behind your back."
Robert Verbruggen has an excellent piece over at NRO describing how seemingly sensible incremental restrictions work in practice to ensnare honest Americans living in or traveling through New Jersey.
May '10
Re: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
Tommy De Seno: So too would dynamite, Kenneth. Do you support a repeal on regulations concerning dynamite? · Jan 29 at 11:43am
Edited on Jan 29 at 11:44 am
Isn't that kind of a reverse slippery slope argument?
Dec '10
Re: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
Off the top of my head, here's a couple.
I'm a hunter unexpectedly confronted by an attacking Grizzly.
Competition shooting where multiple targets must be hit in the shortest period of time.
Not necessarily. As someone else noted, a trained individual can change magazines very rapidly, in a couple of seconds.
Also, if magazine capacity is limited by law, that doesn't mean they will be unavailable. There will be a black market for extended capacity magazines.
Edited on Jan 29, 2011 at 12:04pmDec '10
Re: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
I think it's pretty hard to argue that "size" didn't matter in Tucson. Instead, I would use the leftist tactic of shifting the game-board under their feet.
There are two discussions we could be having about how to prevent another Tucson right now. One is, how do we solve the problem of institutionalizing violent psychotics before they commit violence? Instead, the only conversation we're having and the only one we're likely to hear anything about from the administration is, shouldn't we place "reasonable" (they're always reasonable, aren't they?) limits on the rights of law abiding Americans so that psychotics cause fewer casualties when they commit violence? Count on the Left to always make the wrong choice.
Edited on Jan 29, 2011 at 8:50pmSep '10
Re: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
Why do you need a high capacity magazine? So you won't have to change clips as often. Duh. Now, if you're shooting at something you shouldn't oughta, that's a law enforcement issue. I'm with Kenneth, guns--all guns-- should be legal to own. What an individual does with them is a different matter. There are hundreds of folks that have jumped through the hoops to legally own machine guns. How many congressman have they shot?
May '10
Re: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
According to John R. Lott Jr,
"1) Victims rarely have to actually fire their guns. Criminals rarely have to fire their guns.
2) In some extremely rare cases criminals fire more than a few shots. In some extremely rare cases victims might want to fire more than a few shots."
If this is the case, then banning high-capacity magazines should have, as Lott says, a negligible effect on reducing crime.
Edited on Jan 29, 2011 at 12:12pmRe: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
Tommy, you've got your hands on a very, very hard question. Or so at least it seems to me. To start with extremes, simply because the extremes are easiest to deal with, we'd probably all agree that ordinary citizens have no right to nuclear weapons, but that the government has no right to ban pea-shooters. On the long, long spectrum between nukes and pea-shooters, though, finding just the right place to draw the line--well, as I say, that strikes me as a hard question.
My first impulse is to ask what the courts have made of it. The answer, though, is that they've very seldom taken it up. About 18 months ago, I interviewed Judge Silberman for Uncommon Knowledge--Judge Silberman wrote the opinion declaring the District of Columbia's ban on handguns to be unconstitutional. The Judge made an arresting point: When he began researching the case, he quickly discovered that no gun law litigation had reached the Supreme Court in more than seven decades.
May '10
Re: Extended Magazines: Convince Me Why They Shouldn't Be Banned Or Limited
Magazine capacity takes the the focus off the real issue - the criminal and the criminal behavior. Would you accept a first amendment limit limit on the number of posts you could make? If you limit magazine capacity you won't stop additional shots. Look at the VA Tech shooter - he had multiple firearms. It's called a New York reload to draw a second firearm instead of reloading the first firearm. So should we limit people to only 1 firearm?