It seems as if an observer could fill up a legal pad listing the mistakes the local and state officials did in New Orleans. And the confiscation of handguns by police certainly ranks up there among the top ten dumbest things done in New Orleans.
Resistance is Futile has an excellent roundup of items about that particular debacle at Carnival of Cordite #30, and it's well worth a look.
RIF makes some interesting observations. There were some complaints that the NRA press release was a bit slow to arrive at the scene. But, RIF suggests that the NRA is to gun rights as the U.S. government is to disaster relief. Good analogy. In other words, it isn't the first responder. He suggests that anyone faced with such an illegal gun confiscation as occurred in New Orleans should cooperate with authorities, take notes, then go to local organizations for help.
It's hard to imagine the local police trying to confiscate privately owned guns out here in West Texas, and it's even harder to come up with a local organization that would help. There's the Midland Shooters Association, but it's a recreational club and nowhere in its bylaws is there anything that would allow the organization to get involved as a third party in a legal dispute that didn't involve the club itself.
The Texas State Rifle Association has a nice website, but their information about the New Orleans gun confiscations consists solely of a link the above mentioned NRA press release.
Maybe the National ACLU would help out. Oops. Sorry 'bout that. Their take on the 2nd amendment is this: "Except for lawful police and military purposes, the possession of weapons by individuals is not constitutionally protected. Therefore, there is no constitutional impediment to the regulation of firearms. --Policy #47."
Well then, how about the ACLU of Texas? Believe it or not, there's a possibility, though remote, that they might be of help in a gun rights issue. Their website doesn't spell out a position on the 2nd Amendment. However, Scott Henson of Grits for Breakfast testified on behalf of ACLU of Texas at a meeting of the Texas House Criminal Jurisprudence Committee in favor of HB 823 which, if the law is construed correctly in the courts, allows Texans to carry firearms in their vehicles without a concealed handgun permit. (More about HB 823 in a future post.) But realistically, if the Texas ACLU appeared in the headlines on the pro-gun side of a lawsuit the national organization would disown them, and their donor base would disappear in a New York minute. But, it would be one very courageous move on their part.
There are reports that the NRA is seeking plaintiffs to come forward and sue over the gun confiscations, but that would be a slam dunk case for the plaintiffs. And with a plaintiff who would likely prefer the money over a legal precedent and a defendant who would want the case to go away as swiftly as possible, there's not much chance that any such case would go beyond the trial court stage to set any legal precedent on gun rights.
As just about everyone knows, each of us is really on his/her own in a disaster. It's up to each of us to plan ahead, evacuate, run, swim or whatever it takes to stay safe. Don't wait on the government. And as for gun rights, some large group might come in later and take up the cause of an illegally confiscated gun, but don't bank on it.
I, for one, am proud to live in West Texas where people respect each other for the most part, and the police wouldn't try to take away legally owned guns. As for New Orleans, well, that's New Orleans, and what happens in New Orleans stays in New Orleans. And what the police there did is just one more dumb item listed on that legal pad.
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