The Tragic History Of Gun Control
BY Herschel Smith
5 years, 2 months ago
Via Dave Hardy, this piece from Stephen Halbrook.
Purportedly to fight street violence, Germany’s Weimar Republic in 1931 decreed gun registration, but warned that the records must not fall into the hands of radical elements. Unfortunately, those radical elements — the National Socialist Party led by Adolf Hitler — seized power in 1933 and used those very same records to disarm political opponents, rendering them incapable of resistance. Disarmed German Jews paid the price in the 1938 Kristallnacht pogrom, a major step in the road to the Holocaust.
Political protest and violence in France prompted Prime Minister Pierre Laval in 1935 to decree firearm registration and repression of the right to assemble. What could possibly go wrong?
The registration records were critical to the Nazis, who overran France five years later, imposing the death penalty for those not turning in their guns, and conscripting the French police to ferret out violators. Despite the chance of being executed, numerous French citizens hid their firearms instead of surrendering them.
The same Pierre Laval became the chief collaborator of the Nazis during the occupation. French newspapers regularly reported the names of gun owners shot by firing squads.
The brave French, who held onto their guns despite the threat of execution, formed the basis for the French Resistance. To be sure, they never had sufficient arms, and prewar restrictions on “military-style” firearms hampered their efforts, leaving them with inferior weapons. Yet, they were able to commit acts of sabotage, gain intelligence, and sustain an underground movement to assist the Allies. After D-Day, they engaged in open armed resistance.
Such experiences are as old as humanity. Tyrants, conquerors, and dictators of every breed disarm their subjects in order to dominate and exploit them. It’s an iron law of history. Has it lost its meaning today?
Universal background checks are no good without a national gun registry, and vice versa. This is why such cannot be allowed.
On September 9, 2019 at 9:33 am, Frank Clarke said:
“…prewar restrictions on “military-style” firearms…”
Saint Antonin Scalia’s dictum about “arms in common use” in DC v Heller will put us right there. The next generation of arms, not being yet ‘in common use’, will –according to this casually-tossed-off aspect of the ruling — be eligible for banning.
That is: if you want a lightsaber, young Jedi, you’re going to have to build it yourself if you can find the right parts.