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Fewer and fewer states and communities are holding gun “buy backs.” The gun-free paradise known as New Jersey is bucking the trend. From bergendispatch.com . . .

Legislation sponsored by Assemblyman John F. McKeon, Speaker Vincent Prieto and Assemblyman Benjie Wimberly that would create a statewide gun buyback program in an effort to reduce the number of firearms in New Jersey communities gained approval from the Assembly Judiciary Committee on Monday.

The bill would mandate nine “turn in” events each year, funded by the state (although private donations would be accepted). As is the common practice, guns would be turned in anonymously for monetary rewards. One third of the programs would be required to be held in high crime areas.

The author of Freakonomics summed up the academic view of gun turn in events the best (the term “buyback” is pure propaganda. The people buying the guns never owned them before.) From “Freakonomics” web site:

When it comes to gun buybacks, both the theory and the data could not be clearer in showing that they don’t work. The only guns that get turned in are ones that people put little value on anyway. There is no impact on crime. On the positive side, the “cash for clunkers” program is more attractive than the gun buyback program because, as long as they are being driven, old cars pollute, whereas old guns just sit there.

In New Jersey, where the Second Amendment is actively infringed, private buyer competition is discouraged. In other states, private buyers flock to the gun turn in events. The new media covers the private buyers, which forces the old media to do so as well.

The message from this activity is that the people turning in guns for the paltry sums offered are either being taken advantage of by the state, which destroys the valuable property for no good reason; or that the state is foolishly wasting money to buy and destroy junk.

Only one “buyback” system makes any sense: an innovative Ohio program founded by Deer Park City Councilman Charles Tassel, called “Street Rescue”.  In that system, people can turn in guns that they do not want; then the guns are sold to legal dealers. The money is used to buy more guns that people do not want, essentially “recycling” guns from people who do not want them, but do not want to take the time to sell them, themselves.

That message is far, far different from the nanny-state message of most “buy back” events. That “buyback” message, where valuable guns are destroyed, is: “Guns are Bad. Turn them in to the Police.” Many promoters of gun turn-in events openly proclaim that this is the message they are pushing; actual effects of the event are secondary.

All handgun sales in New Jersey require government approval before they’re allowed to occur. That effectively bans the private purchase of  handguns at market prices at these events. It might be possible to arrange private sales of long guns; but police can disqualify people who have the an FID issued by the state, which is necessary to buy a long gun privately. This likely chills attempts to buy privately at New Jersey “buybacks.”

A willing seller and a willing buyer could theoretically arrange to meet at a government-approved shop, pay the fees and wait for the red tape to be done. It’s theoretically “possible.” But then the sale is no longer “private.” It’s a government monitored transaction where everyone is registered and tracked, and it makes those firearms subject to government confiscation at any time.

©2016 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.
Link to Gun Watch

21 COMMENTS

  1. Anybody up for a road trip to New Jersey? I’ve got some pipes I bought at Ace that I chambered in .22 I no longer want, might as well try to turn a profit.

    • Defense distributed Lulz liberator = $25. It’s a gun. Time to print a few and get paid! – then take that money to the next gun show for a quality product.

    • Exactly!

      Time to buy some pipe, a few nails, and some epoxy at the local hardware store to make some shotguns for the local “buy back”. Figure on spending about $15 in pipe for each shotgun … assuming that pipe will actually be available and there isn’t a run on pipe at your local hardware store!

  2. Its the same old BS. You cant buy back something you never owned to begin with.
    Makes me wish I still had my Davis 380.
    Best $65 fishing weight I ever used.

  3. my old man unloaded some broken air rifles he inherited from granddad at one of these. suckers

    he’s in his last week in that hellhole..thank goodness. joining me and his grand kids out here in the free state of Arizona (just don’t try to vote in a presidential preference election!)

  4. Can we have a “criminal buyback” where people turn in unwanted criminals to the police who destroy them? Sounds like people WOULD actually end up safer with such an idea.

  5. “Every person of a foot (infantry) company shall be armed with a good musket or fusee (a short barrelled musket), well fixed, and a bayonet fixed to it, a cutting sword or cutlace, a cartouche (cartridge) box or powder horn, with six charges of powder, and six sizable bullets at least, and shall appear at the time and place of muster so armed: and shall keep his place of abode, beside what is above mentioned, one pound of powder and four pounds of bullets and shall bring them into the field, if required. Each horseman shall be provided with a good horse, a Saddle, Breast plate (armor)…holsters, a case of pistols, a cutting sword…and shall keep at the place of his Abode, beside the Arms above mentioned, a well fix’d Carbine.”…..Militia Laws of the Colony of New Jersey 1774. Origins and Development of the Second Amendment. David T. Hardy. Page 36.

    242 years later, the colony who fought for independence from the British, which hosted a pivotal battle of the revolution in Trenton, now a state which embarks on a dubious gun buy back program, infringes on citizen right to keep and bear arms and jeopardizes citizens right to lawful self defense.

    Does success against the grievances of the Crown evolve into the conditions brought forth upon us?

    • In a word, Yes.

      In a few more words:

      (Samuel) Adams was among the earliest and most persistent advocates for resistance to Britain. In 1772, he declared in “The Rights of Colonists” that “Among the natural rights of the Colonists are these: First, a right to life; Secondly, to liberty; Thirdly, to property; together with the right to support and defend them in the best manner they can.”Adams’ revolutionary beliefs and sentiments would not, however, translate into sympathy for the actions of Daniel Shays and other Massachusetts Regulators in 1786 and 1787. As far as Adams was concerned, the contrast between the colonial protests and rebellion of the 1760s and 1770s and the court closings and protests of 1786 could not be greater. For Adams, the key difference was that the revolutionaries had been resisting the tyranny of a monarchical power. By 1786, the government was safely in the hands of the people of Massachusetts: “A commonwealth or state is a body politic, or civil society of men, united together to promote their mutual safety and prosperity by means of their union.” In his eyes, the Regulators were rebelling against this “civil society of men” rather than working with them to promote the good of the union, and they should thus be dealt with harshly. Adams therefore strongly recommended that the leaders of the insurgents be immediately executed:

      “in monarchies the crime of treason and rebellion may admit of being pardoned or lightly punished, but the man who dares rebel against the laws of a republic ought to suffer death.”

      http://www.shaysrebellion.stcc.edu/shaysapp/person.do?shortName=samuel_adams

      • Yikes. I bet unemployed hipster douchebags refrained from shutting down speeches and blocking highways back then!

  6. Most of you aren’t seeing these the right way. Don’t think of them as a stupid and ineffective way of “getting guns off the street”, and start thinking of them as opportunities to buy that first model 1911 you’ve always wanted for $200. Im sure you could get some nice, cheap milsurp out of it too.

  7. WE should think about a buy-back of common sense for the garden state. Fools breeding fools. Where has common sense gone in the Northeast states lately?? Anyone??

    Seeing piles of beautiful walnut and blued steel as scrap just makes me sick. Many of those pieces are carrying the legacy of these peoples’ forefathers who fought for freedom. I am so glad to be in Wisconsin, a flyover state instead

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