Category Archives: Constitution

This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Thursday, June 14, 2018: 

As The New American accurately predicted in its coverage, the ban on so-called “assault weapons” passed unanimously by the Deerfield, Illinois Village Board of Trustees in early April was tossed by a court before the ban could be implemented on June 13.

It was thrown out with 24 hours to spare, by Lake County Circuit Court Judge Luis Berrones, on Tuesday. The ban clearly violated a state law of Illinois that declares that “the regulation of the possession or ownership of assault weapons are exclusive powers and functions of this State. Any ordinance or regulation, or portion of that ordinance or regulation, that purports to regulate the possession or ownership of assault weapons in a manner that is inconsistent with this Act, shall be invalid.”

Mayor Harriet Rosenthal also predicted the outcome. The ban was intended, she said, to “increase the public’s sense of safety” following another mass shooting, notwithstanding “potential objections … or the enforceability of such a ban.” In other words, the ban was “feel good” legislation that had nothing to do with reducing gun violence in Deerfield (a small, low-crime community 25 miles north of Chicago) but merely to make a statement.

Said The New American at the time:

The chances that this nascent law is stillborn are between excellent and certain. The National Rifle Association (NRA) announced on Wednesday it would be financially and logistically supporting an Illinois-based pro-gun group, Guns Save Life, in its lawsuit to stop the law from going into effect.

 

The next day the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) announced it had already filed a lawsuit in the 19th Judicial Circuit Court in Lake County along with the Illinois State Rifle Association (ISRA).

SAF’s Executive Vice President Alan Gottlieb explained:

We moved swiftly to challenge this gun ban because it flies in the face of state law. While the village is trying to disguise this as an amendment to an existing ordinance, it is, in fact, a new law that entirely bans possession of legally-owned semi-auto firearms, with no exception for guns previously owned, or any provision for self-defense.

 

The new ordinance also provides for confiscation and destruction of such firearms and their original capacity magazines. What is particularly outrageous about this new law is that it levies fines of up to $1,000 a day against anyone who refuses to turn in their gun and magazines or move them out of the village by the time the ordinance takes effect in June. This certainly puts the lie to claims by anti-gunners that “nobody is coming to take your guns.”

The New American coverage in April ended: “The courts will likely — hopefully — toss the ordinance into the trash bin of history well before it becomes law on June 13.”

It was tossed, with 24 hours to spare.

This article was published by The McAlvany Intelligence Advisor on Friday, June 15, 2018: 

Back in April, this writer explored in this space the consequences facing residents of the little town of Deerfield, Illinois if its ban on all so-called “assault weapons” had been upheld by the court. Happily, just the day before the ban was to be implemented, Lake County Circuit Judge Luis Berrones blocked it.

The ban clearly violated Illinois’ state law that declares that “the regulation of the possession or ownership of assault weapons are exclusive powers and functions of this State. Any ordinance or regulation, or portion of that ordinance or regulation, that purports to regulate the possession or ownership of assault weapons in a manner that is inconsistent with this Act, shall be invalid.”

Deerfield Mayor Harriet Rosenthal predicted the outcome.

This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Friday, May 25, 2018:  

In her reelection campaign video posted last week at NowThisNews, far-left anti-gun Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren (aka “Pocahontas,” with a Freedom Index Rating of just 13 out of 100) promised not to take any money from the National Rifle Association (NRA), declaring:

This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Monday, May 14, 2018: 

Lobbying records uncovered by The Federalist in early May show that Dick’s Sporting Goods hired three anti-gun lobbyists to push for gun-control legislation in Washington. The Federalist noted:

The three lobbyists tapped by Dick’s to push for gun control are … Joel Johnson, who worked for both President Bill Clinton and Senate Democrat leadership; Andrew King, who worked for Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.); and Christina Brown, a former staffer for Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.).

This latest development is more evidence of what the National Rifle Association (NRA) calls the “irrational” behavior of Dick’s Chairman and CEO Edward Stack, son of the chain’s founder, Dick Stack. First, Stack announced in February that his stores would no longer be selling handguns to anyone under age 21, that he was removing all AR-15 semi-automatic rifles from his stores’ shelves, and that those stores would no longer sell “high-capacity” magazines that carried more than 10 rounds.

Next, Stack announced that, rather than return that inventory to the gun manufacturers under their return policies — or donate them to local police departments or armed security service companies — he would have his company destroy them.

In conjunction with his first announcement in February, Stack issued this statement:

This article was published by The McAlvany Intelligence Advisor on Monday, May 14, 2018: 

Two lifetimes of blood, sweat, effort, and tears have gone into building Dick’s Sporting Goods from a small bait and tackle fishing supply store in Binghamton, New York into a corporate giant. Its chain of 610 stores plus Field & Stream, Affinity Sports, Golf Galaxy, Oshman’s Sporting Goods, and True Runner generates, until recently, $8 billion in annual sales with a total asset value of over $4 billion.

So why would Dick’s Chairman and CEO, Edward Stack, son of founder Dick Stack, want to burn the place down, just to make an ideological statement? The NRA has called his actions “irrational” and “strange” while other observers have called them bizarre, inconsistent, and hypocritical.

It started in February, following the high school shooting in Florida on Valentine’s Day. One of his stores sold a shotgun to the perp and Stack felt personally responsible even though it wasn’t used in the massacre. Something had to be done, he felt, even if it was irrational. In announcing that his stores would no longer sell AR-15 semi-automatic rifles, nor handguns to anyone under age 21, nor “high capacity” (over 10 rounds) magazines, Stack said:

This article appeared online at TheNewAmerican.com on Monday, May 7, 2018:  

When Effingham County, Illinois, passed a resolution declaring itself a sanctuary county for gun owners, The New American failed to give sufficient credit to Effingham’s state attorney Brian Kibler for generating the idea. Joe Thoele, an Effingham County board member, took the idea and ran with it, persuading seven of the eight members of the board to pass it. Said Kibler at the time: “If you can be a sanctuary county for undocumented immigrants, why can’t you be one for firearms [owners]?”

It was later revealed that Kibler’s use of the word “sanctuary” was deliberate and intentional: