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In an effort to bring Illinois-style anti-gun legislation to the entire country, Rep. Bobby Rush has introduced HR-45, the Blair Holt’s Firearm Licensing and Record of Sale Act.  This act would require a national database of firearm sales, licensing of firearms owners, and the bill would make it illegal to transfer firearms from one private person to another.

The bill would make it illegal to possess a handgun or long gun with a detachable magazine unless you were licensed.  Additionally, the ban on transfers will eliminate private sales, requiring all transactions to go through a dealer and be tracked in the national database.

Further, firearms as gifts would be severely curtailed, limited to the “infrequent” transfer of a firearm “by an individual to a parent, child, grandparent, or grand-child.”  This would eliminate an uncle gifting a firearm to his nephew, etc.

Please contact your elected representatives, and let them know your position on this dangerous legislation.  Also, if you are not already a member, please join the NRA today!  They are “on the ground” in D.C. everyday, fighting for our Second Amendment rights.

From the NRA:

U.S. Representative Bobby Rush (D-Ill.) recently sponsored H.R. 45, also known as “Blair Holt’s Firearm Licensing and Record of Sale Act.”  The bill is, at its core and as its name implies, a licensing and registration scheme. 

The measure calls for all handgun owners to submit to the federal government an application that shall include, among many other things:  a photo; an address; a thumbprint; a completed, written firearm safety test; private mental health records; and a fee.  And those are only some of the requirements to be licensed! 

The bill would further require the attorney general to establish a database of every handgun sale, transfer, and owner’s address in America.  Moreover, the bill would make it illegal to own or possess a “qualifying firearm” — defined as “any handgun; or any semiautomatic firearm that can accept any detachable ammunition feeding device…” [emphasis added] without one of the proposed licenses. 

Additionally, the bill would make it illegal to transfer ownership of a “qualifying firearm” to anyone who is not a licensed gun dealer or collector (with very few exceptions), and would require “qualifying firearm” owners to report all transfers to the attorney general’s database. It would also be illegal for a licensed gun owner to fail to record a gun loss or theft within 72 hours, or fail to report a change of address within 60 days.  Further, if a minor obtains a firearm and injures someone with it, the owner of the firearm may face a multiple-year jail sentence. 

H.R. 45 is essentially a reintroduction of H.R. 2666, which Rush introduced in 2007.  H.R. 2666 contained much of the same language as H.R. 45, and was co-sponsored by several well-known anti-gun legislators–including Barack Obama’s chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel.  H.R. 45 currently has no co-sponsors.