Gun Regulation Ideas

Apart from banning guns, what kind of gun regulation ideas are available?

Here are some suggestions:

Taxes and Fees

* Impose a new 100% federal excise tax on all sales of firearms, firearm parts, and ammunition to be earmarked for trauma care and mental health care at facilities in either the state where the sale took place or an adjacent state.  Create an exemption for the military and law enforcement agency purchases.

This would reduce gun purchases most for the lowest income people who are most likely to commit crimes with guns and would also use funds to mitigate the harm of firearm accidents, firearm suicides and murders.  This could also cause a tipping point in social norms by reducing the number of private firearms owners over time.

* Increase the fee required to obtain a firearm dealer's license and divert funds to the same trauma and mental health care fund.  This would reduce the number of basically private individuals who have a firearm dealer's license, making it harder for such people to make illegal black and gray market sales.

Environmental Regulations

* Require that lead, the soft  heavy metal, be phased out of bird shot because of the environmental contamination that it causes to the pristine wilderness where bird hunting takes place.  Similar regulation is not necessary for bullets because a much larger percentage of bullets hit the target and don't enter the environment.

* Ban the use of exploding targets on public lands which have been shown to cause a significant number of wildfires.

Civil Liability

* Impose full civil liability, on a joint and several basis with shooters, upon anyone who has illegally sold a firearm or ammunition to someone who illegally uses any firearm or ammunition (whether or not it was the one sold) within ten years after the illegal sale.

* Impose civil liability for 50% of the economic damages (i.e. excluding pain and suffering and punitive damages) on anyone whose negligence makes it possible for another to use their firearms or ammunition cause harm to another accidentally, recklessly or intentionally.

* Require gun owners to purchase liability insurance with a minimum policy limit of $50,000 in connection for the negligence liability described above.

* Require someone age twenty-one or older who is legally able to buy a gun to agree in writing in a public record to be fully civilly liability to take responsibility for the ownership of a gun (by gift or otherwise) by a person under the age of eighteen, or by anyone under the age of twenty-one who has not graduated from high school (not including a GED).  The liability would cease when the applicable age and/or background check requirements were met.

Background Checks And Eligibility To Buy Firearms

* Include private sales in the firearms purchase background list requirements.

* Actively confiscate guns already owned by someone added to the firearms purchase background list.

* Expand the list of circumstances that come up in a firearms purchase background check and prohibit someone from having a firearm to include:

** The following within the previous ten years (occurring after the effective date of the law): (a) a bad conduct military discharge, (b) a dishonorable military discharge, (c) a misdemeanor conviction for assault, (d) a misdemeanor conviction for vandalism that was conducted using a firearm or explosive, (e) a conviction for DWAI or DUI, (f) a conviction for drug use or public intoxication, (g) a conviction of a hate crime, (h) a deportation for commission of a crime, (i) a child abuse criminal conviction or civil termination of parental rights due to child abuse, (j) a civil judgment or misdemeanor criminal conviction for a civil rights violation, or (k) a civil judgment or criminal conviction involving local, state or federal firearms regulations.

** Add anyone currently in pre-trial release in a criminal case, or on probation to the firearms purchase background check system.

** Add anyone who pleas not guilty for reason of insanity, regardless of whether a judge or jury agrees, to the firearms purchase background check system.

**  Create a system for identifying people who have attempted suicide and add them to the firearms purchase background check system.

** Immediately add anyone subjected to a 72 hour mental health hold to the list temporarily, which will last for ten years unless contested in a court proceeding within 1 year of release from the hold. In a court proceeding the individual would have to show by a preponderance of the evidence that it is more likely than not that the person does not suffer from a mental health condition that is a danger to himself or others if armed, with the DA representing the state.

** Allow an individual, or their parent, guardian, or conservator to place an individual into the firearms purchase background check system on the grounds that they are developmentally disabled and have an IQ too low to be eligible for the death penalty, or suffer from a mental illness that could make the person a threat to the public if armed.