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Definition of "committed"
Clayton Cramer has an interesting posting relating to an article in Journ. of the American Academy of Psychiatry Law. The gist of it is that the cases are clear that an involuntary committment can create prohibited status under GCA 68, they're all over the place beyond that point. Some say that a temporary emergency committment that doesn't lead to a formal committment proceeding is no bar to gun ownership. Others say that a procedure where the committment order is issued by two physicians, without judicial findings, is enough.
Going to the article he cites, indeed it is a mess, beyond the principle that if a committment is for observation, without subsequent finding that the person is indeed insane, he's probably in the clear.
At the level of state law, it's even worse. In four states, voluntary committment, or diagnosis without committment, can be a bar. In California, just being given a 72 hour committment for observation is a bar, altho it ends after five years. Four states have no bar based on psychiatric findings at all.
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What happened to the idea of maybe a trial with a jury and confronting witnesses and all that before we take away people's rights?
I thought doctors weren't supposed to be in the adjudication business. They make great expert witnesses, but the judicial process doesn't end if the prosecution can find two expert witnesses to testify.
Until the NRA and the ACLU agree on a fair standard and process for "committment" and begin to get every state to enact that process, HR 2460 just makes a VERY BAD system more efficient.
NRA seems oblivious to the real problem -- lack of appropriate standards and procedure AT THE STATE LEVEL.
"Thanks NRA. The trains going to the camps now run on time."
HR2460 doesn't talk about states. It requires records from agencies and departments; the state definitions may really not matter much.
While I don't like the part where four states will strip a right away from you because of a singe shrink's diagnosis (especially given conditions like Asperger's, which would not impair the ability to safely own a gun), the Federal folk really can't deal with those issues.
The problem with HR2460 is that it leaves the federal law issue alone. 18 USC 922 (d)(4) would be unconstitutionally vague if it weren't a firearms law; as long as it's up to the federal courts to randomly pick what is and isn't insane, giving incentives for mental health records is going to result in a tsunami of all mental health records. They can afford to force the peons to go to court and prove that they're innocent, or go to a panel and prove that they're not risky.
It is really very simple. There is no valid argument otherwise. If you don't want the power abused, do not give them the power.
Judge this law based upon the potential harm when improperly applied, because that occurrence is as sure as the sun revealing itself in the east each morning.
One of the most corrupt politicians in our history and former POTUS, Lyndon B. Johnson, understood this and remarked so publicly.
Human behavior has not appreciably improved since that time or the eons before, but politicians behavior has appreciably and measurably deteriorated. H.R. 2640 is a national tragedy waiting in the wings.
And existing federal law itself only requires that any lawful authority consider you to be risky for a report to be added to the NICS, although until hr2460 passes almost all agencies do not do so unless asked by the Attorney General.
HR2460 will at least give an out once the records are in, if you don't mind proving that a negative to the agency that put your name in the first place.