Registration and confiscation

[Pointedstick]

Some here have questioned the frequently-made assertion that gun registration leads to confiscation. I wanted to add another piece of evidence to the record, straight from a newspaper in my backyard reporting on what my very own lawmakers are doing:

The 10-bill package constitutes the single largest gun control push in decades in the Golden State, which already boasts some of the nation's strictest gun laws. It joins equally controversial proposals from Assembly Democrats that would regulate and tax ammunition sales and consider taking the state's 166,000 registered assault weapons from their owners.

http://www.mercurynews.com/politics-gov ... ut-big-gun

I know that some people really do believe that these are dangerous weapons that need to be confiscated, and while I disagree with that view, I respect it. But nobody should be unaware that the entire reason for registering weapons is so they can be confiscated later. The people looking to get rid of guns know it. You should too.

This isn't tinfoil-hat-Alex-Jones-conspiracy nonsense. It's what lawmakers are actively proposing.

[notsheigetz]

But nobody should be unaware that the entire reason for registering weapons is so they can be confiscated later. The people looking to get rid of guns know it. You should too.

This isn't tinfoil-hat-Alex-Jones-conspiracy nonsense. It's what lawmakers are actively proposing.

I have a hard time seeing how confiscation of registered guns would work in practice. I suppose it would start with a "voluntary" period in which people would be required to take their guns to the local police station and hand them over. Does anybody want to hazard a guess at the percentage of people who would comply? The next logical step would then be to issue fines and threats of imprisonment to those who failed to turn them in. By that time I suspect the much maligned Rush Limbaugh of libertarianism, Alex Jones, would have most of his listeners in full civil disobedience mode with new converts every day. Heck, even Rush Limbaugh himself, not to mention Glenn Beck would join the fight.  Then what are they going to do? Start going door to door arresting people?

I've always figured that gun registration was mostly about making it as much of a hassle to own a gun as possible.

(Whoops, I forgot that Obama can now kill any American citizens he wants with drones so maybe they just need the GPS co-ordinates of all the houses where they didn't turn in the guns.)

[moda0306]

Some people who want to register guns don't want them taken away.  Others do.  Is this any different than any other political topic ever discussed anywhere?  Any information our government collects or position it puts itself in, even if that was a smart move, will likely result in it positioning itself to do something evil and/or stupid in ways it couldn't have before.  The development of a military is probably very high on that list, but that's one of the very first things we ask our government to do.

If variable speed limits are a good idea, certainly the government is now more flexible to lower speed limits to asininely stupid levels than if they're painted on 60 mph, thereby decimating the economy.

If having a nuclear arsenal is strategically smart for the US military, certainly it gives them far more flexibility to kill massive amounts of innocent people.

If making people register their vehicles works for efficient tracking of property, certainly it gives our government far more capability to wreak havok on us with onerous taxes if our vehicles aren't fuel efficient enough (or American enough ).

There's far, far worse things that our government could do with the information and tools it has now than what it could do if it knew who owned what guns.  I'm not saying we become lazy thinkers, but just that we don't throw out good ideas because of "slippery slope" arguments that would much more appropriately apply to massive amounts of things the government does without taking it to the most tyrannical conclusion possible.

For the most part, I've gotten to the point where I want to judge our government's actions mostly on the face of the quality of the idea itself, and not on some feeling about what could happen, since if I start thinking like that I already live in a horribly scary, scary country.

[Pointedstick]

That's all true, Moda. I guess it really boils down to how much you trust the government. The data collection efforts, massive standing army, or drone fleet aren't really very scary if you feel you won't be targeted.

When my lawmakers begin legislative efforts to confiscate my property, I find that it doesn't inspire a great deal of trust in government. And for rather obvious reasons, when I evaluate the quality of the idea of having the government take my property from me, I don't find it a very good idea. 

[Benko]

I've gotten to the point where I want to judge our government's actions mostly on the face of the quality of the idea itself,

I've forgotten if you're a liberal (a number of your posts certainly have that feel), but the idea that intentions, "the quality of the idea" (not quality of the results) is what matters, how well an idea sounds, rather than does it produce real world changes as expected, vs well it sounded good, but the real world implementation has a tsunami of unintended consequences is very characteristic of liberal ideas from welfare (are poor people really better off after umpteen decades of welfare) to gun control to Obamacare (so much for keeping your own physician) to "spreading the wealth", on down the line. Your wording caught my attention because it confirmed a point made in a book I have been reading about the cultural revolution in the US, how it came about, and why it is still very much ongoing i.e. the shift to the left can't help but continue.

I was an engineer (BSE with minor in electrical engineering).  You don't want cars, computers, or bridges etc., designed by people with good ideas, you want them designed by people with ideas that can be implemented and actually work in real life.

[RuralEngineer]

If someone could provide a logically sound reason for gun registration other than allowing easier confiscation, I might be more inclined to believe this notion that some people just really want a list of gun owners for, you know...documentation purposes.  The political equivalent of "shits and giggles."

If gun ownership has been screened for criminality as part of the background check, what purpose does registration serve?  I think it's entirely possible for governmental data collection to ONLY have negative consequences.  If the government of Germany suddenly decides it's a really good idea to make a list of all the Jews and where they live, there's not much of an upside there.

So far I have only seen negative consequences from people being foolish enough to register their firearms.  They've been exposed as potential targets for violence by a newspapers Freedom of Information Act request and now they're potential targets for involuntary confiscation.

On a related note, lets hope we can keep the maturity level up on this thread so it doesn't get locked.

Benko,

Quick comment, the fascination with the idea rather than the results is hardly limited to liberals, it's very much a human flaw.  I give you the war on drugs as exhibit A, the poster child for unintended consequences.

[moda0306]

Benko,

To be clear, by "the quality of the idea" I mean how good of an actual affect it will have as policy in practice, not some "intentions" based measurement, but thanks for helping me realize I am probably not being clear on that.


Pointed,

On confiscation of property, I tend to think that it's hard to imagine any potential government at all that doesn't confiscate or coerce in some form.  Even an ideal libertarian government (or, more specifically, levels of governments (fed/state/local)) is going to have to have some confiscation and coercion to protect our "negative rights."  So that litmus test really doesn't resonate with me.  Government simply has to tax and carry a gun to enforce contracts and form even the smallest military. 

Maybe less confiscation/coercion is better than more, but who's to say your government is "less coercive" than my government if we both measure coercive acts differently (ie, I may see something particularly tyrannical about the government taking my money, while you're maybe more concerned about government taking your guns... Just for example.). It's all a value judgement then.  All government is coercion, it's just a matter of our value judgements on those acts. I'm definitely not saying the holocaust = the income tax but I'm definitely not going to use words like "coercion" to try to decide the difference.  There has to be some kind of other test to decide whether the government is doing something good vs bad vs horrible, but words like "coercion" or "confiscation"  don't really do help, cuz government's always doing that.

[Pointedstick]

I object to gun confiscation because it hasn't happened yet. Money confiscation (i.e. taxation) is already a fact of life. That doesn't mean I object to it any less, and I fight politically at every opportunity I can for its reduction or abolition. If I lived in a state with no income tax, I would fight tooth and nail to keep it that way. Every bill that lowers taxes is something I support, even in "dangerous" or "radical" cases like the state (can't remember which; North Dakota, maybe?) that actually flitted with the idea of abolishing property taxation within its borders.

But I know where you're going with this.   Eventually it's going to come to the argument that government coercion is necessary to enforce private land ownership, but not only do I not accept the premise, I think there's a huge moral difference between the government using the threat of violence to enforce voluntary property arrangements people make between one another (i.e. being an arbiter or mediator) and the government using actual violence too take someone's property and destroy it (i.e. being a thief or a bully).

I use terms like "coercion" and "confiscation" in the context of government because I am absolutely comfortable arguing for the complete and total abolition of the state. You are correct that anyone who is not has no business using those terms, because they simply have a line for where the coercion should end that falls short of "entirely." Advocacy for a stateless society is philosophically my position, but I'm an incrementalist, not one of those unrealistic zealots who demands the state be destroyed immediately. I'm okay with dismantling it piece by piece over 1,000 years.

And with "less state power" as my goal, I oppose gun confiscation which is intended to tilt the balance of power away from the citizenry and toward the state. Taxation is less serious in this respect because our money is a creation of government, and having more money doesn't actually empower the government to do anything it couldn't already do with the resources at its disposal.

[moda0306]

PS,

I was going to kind of stay off the land ownership thing for now actually .

Even if government is simply enforcing private contracts, it still has to collect taxes to gun the courts and police. So you have to confiscate for that, regardless if private land ownership is a social engineering scheme or a natural right (or somewhere in between).

It's interesting to hear from a full blown anarchist.  I like it. It helps give your arguments more consistency.  I actually prefer anarchism to libertarianism on a philosophical level (realistically I think it would be a disaster).

[Pointedstick]

I try to be a friendly, realistic anarchist.   And I prefer the term "private law society" because "anarchy" tends to conjure up images of Mad Max for most, which is not at all how I believe it would turn out among a civilized people.

On the other hand, I'm fully aware that I will probably not live to see or live in a private law society, and if one does spring up somewhere, in all likelihood I will not be one of the first pioneers who immediately moves there. None of that stops me advocating for less state power within the state society in which I currently live. Hence, unqualified opposition to taxation and gun confiscation.

Now that I've established my philosophical credentials a bit  let's return to the issue of registration. Every example of government involuntarily compiling a list of people who do or own something that I can think of is for the purpose of in some way harming them in the future. Car registration is for taxation. Land deed registration is for taxation and confiscation (in the case of eminent domain use). Asset registration is for taxation and confiscation. Mandatory fingerprinting is for future confiscation of the attached person. Heck, even voluntarily signing up for government benefits like registering to vote puts you in the jury pool that you must show up for or face confiscation of your money or body.

Can anyone think of a case where government involuntarily compiles a list of people and/or their property that isn't for the purpose of confiscating either some money or the property in the future? Or the people themselves, in extreme examples?

[moda0306]

Well since the ownership of land isn't really feasible on any modern efficient scale without government recording, I tend to think registration of land ownership serves your ownership of land more than it's eventual confiscation.

The other stuff you're pretty spot on though.

[MachineGhost]

Even if government is simply enforcing private contracts, it still has to collect taxes to gun the courts and police. So you have to confiscate for that, regardless if private land ownership is a social engineering scheme or a natural right (or somewhere in between).

Taxes aren't necessary.  See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liturgy

Remember, the marauding teams of bandits got tired of roaming the countryside pillaging village after village during the Dark Ages, so they got smart and decided to set up a fixed shop in the villages and demand tribute from the inhabitants instead.  That is the origin of secular "government" as we currently know it.  Fraudulent to the core.  At least a King claimed divine right.

[MachineGhost]

Well since the ownership of land isn't really feasible on any modern efficient scale without government recording, I tend to think registration of land ownership serves your ownership of land more than it's eventual confiscation.

Oh B.S.!  Even title companies are private.  What you speak of is ultimately enforcement and authority, not the recording.  It's like how a plethora of government agencies are forbidden from collecting, recording and sharing private information on citizens, so they just go to the private credit rating agencies to get the information they want instead.  Legal but unethical.

[Pointedstick]

Even if government is simply enforcing private contracts, it still has to collect taxes to gun the courts and police. So you have to confiscate for that, regardless if private land ownership is a social engineering scheme or a natural right (or somewhere in between).

Taxes aren't necessary.  See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liturgy

What does that have to do with taxation?

[moda0306]

Even if government is simply enforcing private contracts, it still has to collect taxes to gun the courts and police. So you have to confiscate for that, regardless if private land ownership is a social engineering scheme or a natural right (or somewhere in between).

Taxes aren't necessary.  See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liturgy

Remember, the marauding teams of bandits got tired of roaming the countryside pillaging village after village during the Dark Ages, so they got smart and decided to set up a fixed shop in the villages and demand tribute from the inhabitants instead.  That is the origin of secular "government" as we currently know it.  Fraudulent to the core.  At least a King claimed divine right.

Oh is that how government was born?  And do babies come from storks?  Come on this is ayn rand stuff here.

[moda0306]

Well since the ownership of land isn't really feasible on any modern efficient scale without government recording, I tend to think registration of land ownership serves your ownership of land more than it's eventual confiscation.

Oh B.S.!  Even title companies are private.  What you speak of is ultimately enforcement and authority, not the recording.  It's like how a plethora of government agencies are forbidden from collecting, recording and sharing private information on citizens, so they just go to the private credit rating agencies to get the information they want instead.  Legal but unethical.

Title companies aren't moral authorities on who owns land or property... They're just recorders.  Eventually it takes someone with a gun to say "get off my lawn." 

[Pointedstick]

Title companies aren't moral authorities on who owns land or property... They're just recorders.  Eventually it takes someone with a gun to say "get off my lawn."

Exactly! But anyone can do that; it doesn't take a government to use force, threaten it, or imply the threat of its use in defense of a claimed property.

All authority devolves to force when you peel away the layers. Government is just a large, powerful concentration of force that seeks a monopoly on its use, nothing more. Every objection that could be made about the private use or threat of force could therefore just as easily be made against the government too, indicating that the question of how to create a civilized society is not solved simply by having a central authority of force. I love this passage from some random thing I found myself reading recently:

http://www.newapproachtofreedom.info/pe ... ction.html

Because man has not mastered the problem of achieving prosperity, he has turned to government for its solution. Thus he has complicated his problem, for government offers no solution to the problem of prosperity, while its intervention in this primary problem brings the additional problem of how to govern government. When government undertakes to solve man's problem for him it undertakes the mastery of society and it cannot be both master and servant. Thus it has failed in both spheres. By intertwining the prosperity problem with the political problem man has snarled the threads and no solution of either is possible without separation.

[annieB]

Thanks PS.That does seem to sum up the trap..

[moda0306]

PS,

I wasn't speaking so much to the morality of government as to why it records our land ownership. It doesn't do it to confiscate land (usually). It does it to reinforce to people that what they are sitting on is theirs and the government will help them defend it (usually).

Did I mention, this is only "usually" what is happening ?

[Benko]

an interesting twist http://thenewamerican.com/usnews/constitution/item/14505-firearm-makers-boycott-anti-gun-city-and-state-governments
gun manufacturers refusing to sell to governments who restrict civilian gun ownership..

That is great.  And whoever said that no one was suggesting confiscation:

http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2013/02 ... n-in-guns/

[Pointedstick]

That is great.  And whoever said that no one was suggesting confiscation:

http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2013/02 ... n-in-guns/

It's amazing how little they care about the civil rights of their constituents. I don't see a bright political future for any legislator who votes for that poisonous bill.

[moda0306]

an interesting twist http://thenewamerican.com/usnews/constitution/item/14505-firearm-makers-boycott-anti-gun-city-and-state-governments
gun manufacturers refusing to sell to governments who restrict civilian gun ownership..

That is great.  And whoever said that no one was suggesting confiscation:

http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2013/02 ... n-in-guns/

Who was suggesting that nobody wants to confiscate.  Some gun rights advocates think we should be able to by fully auto sub machine guns. I don't constantly rip on that wing of the policy argument.

I agree that confiscation is a bad idea, but I think it's a bit of a straw man to suggest gun control advocates are so naive to think nobody wants to confiscate.

[Pointedstick]

an interesting twist http://thenewamerican.com/usnews/constitution/item/14505-firearm-makers-boycott-anti-gun-city-and-state-governments
gun manufacturers refusing to sell to governments who restrict civilian gun ownership..

That is great.  And whoever said that no one was suggesting confiscation:

http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2013/02 ... n-in-guns/

Who was suggesting that nobody wants to confiscate.  Some gun rights advocates think we should be able to by fully auto sub machine guns. I don't constantly rip on that wing of the policy argument.

I agree that confiscation is a bad idea, but I think it's a bit of a straw man to suggest gun control advocates are so naive to think nobody wants to confiscate.

Of course some of them want to confiscate. But until the very moment when a bill is introduced, they will always deny it. For years, anti-gun lawmakers endlessly proclaim their support of the second amendment, how they value the rights of sportsmen and civilians interested in owning firearms for self defense, how they're not going to take your shotguns, and so on and so forth. Then they introduce a bill to confiscate your guns.

BTW, I will right now come out and admit my support for civilian ownership of full auto SMGs.   If you want a hard line for what weapons people should be able to own, how about this one: whatever police can have, everyone else can have too. That has the effect of forcing society to make a trade-off: if a gun is claimed to be too dangerous for me to own, police can't have it either. We'll wind up with a very well-armed citizenry or a very poorly-armed police force. I would prefer the former, the the latter would be preferable to a well-armed police force and the remainder of the population disarmed.

[moda0306]

Maybe the police shouldn't be able to have smg's then... I find it funny that Wayne LaPierre and others that agree with him think we should put armed police in our schools when they claim the 2nd amendment is for defending ourselves against an armed government.

If the goal is to match the federal government first and foremost, though, shouldn't we be legalizing far, far more deadly weaponry than smg's?  Mines, bombs, tanks, armed fighters and choppers, rocket launchers, grenades, nukes, etc... Where does it stop? 

I'm glad you're being honest about your position.  Some gun enthusiasts aren't. .

[Benko]

Some gun rights advocates think we should be able to by fully auto sub machine guns.

Proof?

And there was a post on here saying something to the effect of who is trying to confisgate guns, which I why I posted that.  And it is not just some random e.g. NY times crackpot suggesting confiscation, but a legislator.  Even if you find someone advocating owndership of sub machine guns, it won't be a legislator.  Point being you can't accurately say that left wing and right wing crackpots equalize, since the left wing ones are in the legislature (and NY times, and CNBC...).