A rare court win for the NSSF and SAAMI in their effort to block California’s microstamping law. Here’s the NSSF’s press release:
NEWTOWN, Conn – A California Appellate Court has reversed the Fresno Superior Court’s dismissal of the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) and the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers’ Institute (SAAMI) lawsuit seeking an injunction to block enforcement of the state’s ammunition microstamping law and remanded the case back to the lower court to hear arguments.
“We are pleased by today’s ruling because it means we will now be able to prove in court that this ill-considered law must be enjoined because it is literally impossible to comply with its requirements, and the law never requires the impossible. We have long maintained that this nascent, unproven and unreliable technology should not have been mandated. When we ultimately prevail in this case, law-abiding consumers in California will once again be able to purchase new models of pistols this law currently prevents our industry members from selling in the state,” said Lawrence G. Keane, NSSF Senior Vice President and General Counsel.
NSSF and SAAMI filed the lawsuit on behalf of their members against the State of California in Fresno Superior Court seeking to block the enforcement of the state’s microstamping law, violations of which are a criminal offense. The state statute enacted in 2007, but not made effective until May 2013, requires that all new models of semiautomatic handguns sold in the state had to be designed to incorporate this unproven and unreliable microstamping technology.
Under this law, firearms manufacturers would have to micro laser-engrave a gun’s make, model and serial number on two distinct parts of each handgun so that, in theory, this information would be imprinted on the cartridge casing when the pistol is fired.
“There is no existing microstamping technology that meets the requirement of this ill-considered law. It is not technologically possible to microstamp two locations in the gun and have the required information imprint onto the cartridge casing. In addition, the current state of the technology cannot reliably, consistently and legibly imprint on the cartridge primer the required identifying information from the tip of the firing pin, the only possible location where it is possible to micro-laser engrave the information,” said Keane.
In 2007, California Assembly Bill 1471 was passed and signed into law requiring microstamping on internal parts of new semiautomatic pistols. The legislation provided that this requirement would only became effective if the California Department of Justice certified that the microstamping technology is available to more than one manufacturer unencumbered by patent restrictions. The California legislature subsequently reorganized certain statutes concerning the regulation of firearms, including the microstamping law in 2010. On May 17, 2013, Attorney General Kamala D. Harris provided such certification. Harris was elected to the U.S. Senate in November.
“Appellate Court Reverses Dismissal of NSSF and SAAMI Suit to Block CA Microstamping Reversed”
I think thats one too many reverses.
[edit] OK, you caught it. lol
That’s because Kommiepornia sucks @$$…Along with the rest of the Evil Occult of the DNC, and it’s Spirit Cooking operations to Help Nancy Pelosi, and their Tyrannical Senate bound AG. ….Or the office of Governor.Moonbeam…Or The DNC Anenerbe, Epstein Island of lost children, and their Alister Crowley Satanic priestess
Let’s be honest here- Satan’s not all that bad compared to the Democratic Party.
This is the very definition of shoveling sh!t against the tide.
As I understand it, any new pistol would still have to meet California’s various other pistol feature requirements, and have manufacturers submit models with ammo for testing, prior to being placed on the “not unsafe” list.
It will not be an immediate increase in available pistol models for purchase, if so.
Sorry, guys.
At least KH isn’t your AG any more.
Yeah, most manufacturers wouldn’t be interested in making a magazine disconnect and the bullshit loaded chamber indicator. At least now, there’s a hope that the manufacturers won’t have to comply with making something that is _literally_ impossible to make.
The other issue was that current CA safe list handguns couldn’t be updated if any design improvements were made without triggering the micro stamping requirement. Now those models can be upgraded.
Except Ca. is a huge market. Glock has kept Gen 3’s around pretty much just for Ca. after all.
This is true; however, there were a number of mopdels that qualified under the former rules but were bumped off due to the microstamping requirement when the manufacturer made a change in a part that the DOJ deemed “material.” For example, Ruger, as I recall, changed a takedown lever from forged to MIM, and as a result was precluded from selling the gun here. That will change if the certification is overturned.
By the by, this is one of two cases pending on the microstamping issue, and the other disappeared onto the federal trial court’s trial calendar some time ago and hasn’t been heard from since. In that case, the trial court denied a motion for preliminary injunction, but indicated that the DOJ was going to have a hard time supporting its certification because the only extant technology (on which the certification was based) places the stamp only on the primer, and not anywhere else, and thus does not fulfill the requirement of stamping in two locations.
Yeah, congrats on her no longer being your Attorney General; now we all suffer because the loons of CA elected her as US Senator. Crap, what was once localized to CA has now been thrust on the other 49 states. Thank you CA voters for saddling the US with another radicalized progressive who should have been or still could be, retroactively aborted.
She is extremely ambitious and fairly reckless. My bet is she will dig her own political grave sooner or later. Anyway, she will be junior as hell, DiFi had a much bigger power base.
So in other words, the courts has decided that it shouldn’t dismiss the thing out of hand but should instead let all the lawyers make a bunch of money before citing Mother Jones and finding for California. Got it.
Pretty much. Personally, I’m opposed to all of it (except for the lawyers making a bunch of money part).
To do so, the court would have to find that the express statutory requirement that the microstamp must appear in two places really means only one, since that is all that the current techoilogy can accomplish (for a while anyway, until the firing pin wears down).
Plus they would have to ensure that companies would ensure that the firing pin could not be replace with a non-stamping replacement. Good luck with that one.
Why would that be a problem for the court? I mean the Supreme Court has in the past ruled that not participating in interstate commerce, i.e. growing grain for your own consumption rather than buying it, is interstate commerce. Or that a tax is actually a fee. Why shouldn’t they come up with two places really means one?
It would be doubly retarded if this law applied to revolvers too.
As soon as you say that, they’ll rule it applies not only to revolvers but muzzle loaders as well…
It has been a long time, but as I recall, the trial court dismissed this case when it concluded that SAAMI and NSSF lacked standing. This decision says they do, so it is not a decision on the merits by any stretch of the imagination. With the case returning to the trial court, set your follow up calendar to two years. It will take that long for Plaintiffs to do the necessary discovery and file their dispositive motions. If denied, trial will be in three of four years.
Unless of course, the DOJ relents. Yeah, right. That is NOT going to happen. Harris is still around until sworn in early next year, and her appointed successor (who still has to be vetted by the Legislature) is an avid gun banner who voted for the Democratic version of the Background Check (and terrorist watch list ban) in Congress. [Now that the Democrats have a supermajority, that will happen quickly.]
When the Big One happens, may Pence be in office and refuse to provide disaster relief for this lunatic asylum at the expense of the rest of the country. Sorry to those on this blog that live there and don’t drink the Kool Aid. I live in a firearms-friendly hurricane-prone area and have a much higher risk of disaster. I am sure that Kamila and the progs in CA, if they had their way, would want to penalize me for daring to live with the risks of a hurricane and guns in the house, and simultaneously demand that the rest of the country bail out CA for earthquakes, unavoidable droughts, zombie disease, and who knows what else because “CA is so important.” Bull.
CA, where I happen to live (5th generation) in a rural area, is indeed VERY important. We have the major ports for all things coming from Asia. We have oil. Water has been discovered in vast quantity deep below CA. We have the largest agriculture production in the nation; making CA the breadbasket of the nation. So much that we actually export products like dates and pistachios overseas. We grow more cotton than anywhere outside the deep south. Vegetables are shipped across the nation. Beef and chicken (including eggs) are major products. The list goes on and is readily available online and off. We keep a good share of illegal aliens from flooding your states.
There are a great many good citizens here who object to what is being done here by the progressive controlled legislature and executives. Out here in the boonies, even Democrats appreciate the 2nd Amendment. Gun rights are not the only thing the progressive legislature is destroying. They are bankrupting the state with their insane agenda. Even liberal/democrats are reaching the edge. The conditions are the same as when Moonbeam’s father Pat Brown ruined the economy of the state with his liberal agenda… and that won us a fiscally conservative governor named Ronald Reagan who, without laying off anyone or raising taxes, saved the state economy. Essentially every law enforcement agency in the state came out against the gun control laws (although they were ignored). California was once a great place to live, and it can be again if the liberals reach the end of their ropes, or we can band together to counter their votes.
As I recall, we broke the super majority control these traitors held, though they still have a majority.
the real difficulty would be getting all the unicorn horns to make the firing pins out of.
these people make me think of Hitler in his bunker in the final days of the war, commanding his generals to move non existent units into play to stop the Allied tide. too deep in their delusions to look around and see how lost they are.
Right now, if you’re a police officer you can purchase an “unsafe” gun (i.e., not approved by California). But, if you’re not a member of the elite, you can only purchase “safe” guns (i.e., approved by California).
You’d think the manufacturers would limit their sales in California to [u]only[/u] “safe” guns, irregardless of whatever exemptions are in place for the elites, just to preclude the possibility of a lawsuit over a so-called “unsafe” gun creating a liability.
Some manufacturers have done just that. When Cali banned .50 BMG guns, Barrett stopped all sales and service of their products to CA law enforcement. They had a rifle in their shop in TN when the law passed. They fixed it up, but told the agency that they had to come pick it up.
Why is it that when an appeal court reverses the lower court, the end isn’t a win for the side that originally lost? A reversal should reverse the lower court ruling.
I really hope that whole California Secession movement is a success. America will be much better off without their Senators or their electoral votes.
F CA
When CA votes for secession were coming to take our real estate back.
Just a scenario:
Yup California secession will be the death nail think about it. The civil war was because the Southern States refused to pay Federal Taxes and thus as punishment President Lincoln introduced the Proclamation Emancipation Act that would free the enslaved thus ending free labor resources, thus began the Civil War. If the Southern states were to have compromised and paid the tax then Slavery would still be the main source of labor and probably not just in the South. California will never succeed in splitting itself from the Federal States and after they lose the war because there will be a war and there would be nobody here to defend her because lack of guns and ammo to those that would come to her defense upon a Federal Troop Invasion. And those that have the guns and ammo are not going to come to her rescue because they will be busy ransacking the governor’s office and strapping his LT. governor and his sorry ass to a rail. Then will come the carpetbaggers with their land grabbing papers. Thus as someone stated earlier they would come and take back their real estate. Well as stated before this is just a scenario but it has been played out before but with a lot more support and a hell of a lot more resources and the war was lost. This is a lose lose game. The only difference is we will probably be rid of all the damn liberals and their idiotic laws. Now on another note Arizona plans to split itself from the liberal Ninth District Supreme Court and Create a Twelfth District Supreme Court taking with it Idaho, Nevada and Washington. This will be done without a war and with the stroke of a pen.
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