In 2022, the State of Washington, rather than punishing only criminals who bring more than ten rounds of ammunition to a crime, took its hoplophbia out on everyone by prohibiting the sale of “large capacity” magazines to anyone in the state.
Let us first concede that few, if any, liberal gun-grabbers have any idea what a magazine is, let alone one with a large capacity. You would need to have experienced “range day” even to begin to have a clue, and most proglodytes think a “range” is that gas thing in the kitchen where their illegal alien household staff cooks their dinner but that they have banned for everyone else (the gas stoves not the illegals).
We shall also concede that the State government was not working to enrich the manufacturers of 10-round magazines (as in, you’ll need a lot more of them for range day).
And, given that the law prohibits the sale, not possession, of “high” capacity magazines, we accept that this law does nothing to address the problem of mass shootings unless, by problem, you mean there aren’t enough of them to keep your anti-gun press release machine humming. Every anti-gun law from the left increases the chance of shootings.
What Happened?
The chirpy little Progs passed the law, and a local gun store ignored it, which made the Left giddy with excitement about the upcoming dance with the lawfare devil in the pale moonlight. The case goes to court and ends up in front of a County Superior Court judge (Gary B. Bashor), who announces that the law is unconstitutional.
While lawyers for the state argued that the court should uphold the law based on the “enduring American tradition of firearms regulations,” Bashor — citing the 2022 Bruen ruling — said instead that the burden was on the state to show an analogous founding-era regulation.
“The State has failed to do so,” he wrote, adding that the laws cited by the state were passed well after the founding era or were not relevant because they dealt with hunting regulations and gunpowder storage, not firearms regulations and self-defense.
He wrote that the state’s reading of both Heller and Bruen is “tortured and incorrect.”
Defenders of the useless law immediately appealed the ruling to the State Supreme Court and got a stay. The pointless exercise remains in effect while the case continues its dance, which includes questions the judge asked, like why the Seattle Police Chief wants his officers to “carry 17-round magazines because they need to be prepared for every scenario they might encounter,” but it is “not appropriate for a member of the public to be prepared for all scenarios they might encounter.”
I don’t know if the Prog Lawyers for the State of Washington have an answer for that unless it is that by defunding the police, there are fewer officers with 17-round magazines to oppress minorities. And since crime is up, why not argue that 17-round magazines were not an adequate deterrent and, therefore, unnecessary?
Whatever you do, do not refer to Democrat urban leadership’s enduring tradition of disarmament in conjunction with the disarmed population continuing to elect the same party into office despite rising budgets, crime, and poverty, alongside declining services, privacy, and student test scores. The judge might decide to limit the number of Democrats allowed in the Municipal government to ten.