There’s a reason why moving slow on legislation is good. If it’s too big, or you do it too fast, you often complicate the problem. New York has just passed the most stringent anti-gun laws on the books. Yes, government did something! However, as progressives crack open the champagne, they forgot to exempt law enforcement on the measure banning high-capacity magazines. Then every single cop in New York has essentially broken the law. The new law limits firearm magazines to seven-rounds in New York.
According to Jim Hoffer of ABC Eyewitness News, “as the statute is currently written, it does not exempt law enforcement officers. Nearly every law enforcement agency in the state carries handguns that have a 15 round capacity. A spokesman for the governor’s office called Eyewitness News to say, ‘We are still working out some details of the law and the exemption will be included, currently no police officer is in violation.”
Of course, it’s bad PR to say that cops are law breakers. Perhaps, this little kerfuffle could’ve been settled if the NY legislature didn’t go through hyperspace to push through this new anti-gun bill. Furthermore, in a time when we want to deal with mental health and firearms, you’re first instinct isn’t to scare people from treatment. Allahpundit of Hot Air, citing a piece in USA Today, wrote that:
Mental health experts say a new tougher New York state gun control law might interfere with treatment of potentially dangerous people and even discourage them from seeking help.
The law would require therapists, doctors, nurses and social workers to tell government authorities if they believe a patient is likely to harm himself or others. That could lead to revoking the patient’s gun permit and seizing any guns…
“The people who arguably most need to be in treatment and most need to feel free to talk about these disturbing impulses, may be the ones we make least likely to do so,” said the director of law, ethics and psychiatry at Columbia. “They will either simply not come, or not report the thoughts that they have.”
“If people with suicidal or homicidal impulses avoid treatment for fear of being reported in this way, they may be more likely to act on those impulses,” he said
[...]
That’s a solid result for gun control. The police are momentarily in limbo legally and the threat to the public might actually increase as would-be spree killers decide it’s now too risky to seek therapy. Get Cuomo’s office a video camera and a group of kids reading letters about gun control, stat.
Well, usually the gov’t is too good to obey it’s own laws… bad form for Democrats to set an example for what they want, you know.
“A spokesman for the governor’s office called Eyewitness News to say, ‘We are still working out some details of the law and the exemption will be included, currently no police officer is in violation.”
If it’s been signed in and it had an immediate execution date, and if the police are covered, I find it hard to see how they are not in violation. So, *if* all the above is the case, then what we really have here is yet another instance of Progressives in power saying the laws will serve them, and not them the laws.
I have no wish for silly rigid interpretation of law, but on the other hand, if you sign in a law, you be the first one to actually follow it in *all* particulars, before you demand the plebeians do. This brings up this follow-on point–I often bring up partition not because I think it ideal or desirable, but because I truly think a critical mass of the Left has already turned autocratic and have already rejected the idea of themselves being restrained when the only thing stopping them is words on paper, not political force. And strangely enough, I find that threatening to liberty.
Just call the new exemption bill the David Gregory Cops and Politically Connected Exemption Bill.
Maybe have Cuomo sign the bill on Meet the Press, and present Gregory with a gold-plated 9mm with a 15 round clip.
Cuomo had to pass his bill to find out what’s in it.
“Your Honor, after the Governor corrected the law, I thought I could have a 15-rd capacity gun, because I just forgot I wasn’t a cop!”