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Two handed grip = any other weapon?
Say Uncle posts on a court ruling that a pistol with a vertical forend grip is not "any other weapon" under the NFA.
"Any other weapon" requires application and registration, as with a machine gun, altho the transfer tax is only $5 as I recall. It's a legal quirk that originates in the history of the NFA. NFA as introduced in Congress would not only have covered MGs and short barrels, but also handguns (at the $5 rate). To prevent quibbling over what was a handgun, it added and any other gun capable of concealment on the person. Congress stripped the handgun part out, but forgot to take out and any other weapon. So all the obscure palm guns and cane guns and anything that isn't really rifle, shotgun or pistol, has to be registered. ATF's position. ATF takes by regulation the position that a pistol is a gun intended to be fired from one hand, and so putting a vertical forend on a pistol makes it a two handed gun, and AOW rather than a pistol. From his report, a court has ruled this isn't so.
Congress sometimes does nobody (gun owner, ATF, or anyone else) any favors when it writes law. Esp. laws that wind up governing very obscure firearms. A .44 mag is just a gun. A .32 rimfire palm gun that uses ammo not made in near a century, and which its owner wouldn't dare fire for fear of breaking a part and reducing its value, winds up with federal registration, send in your fingerprints for a full FBI check, etc.
Hat tip to Sebastian...
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I'm not clear on what this means. A federal agency says the law means X. A state court says it means Y. Does this mean that we need a "case and controversy," such as a South Carolinian who gets prosecuted by the ATF, to take this to a federal court and begin getting this sorted out?
Obviously state law doesn't trump federal law, but if there's no clear interpretation of federal law then one is clearly needed.
I'm also curious: if a pistol is always a pistol unless registered otherwise, does this mean you could buy a Skorpion w/o folding stock, attach one, and not register it because it's still a Skorpion pistol? If so, then the designation of "short-barreled rifle" becomes virtually meaningless.
Federal law typically varies from circuit to circuit unless the supreme court decides to settle an issue or congress makes a special circuit to hear all appeals on a particular matter (like the CAFC for patents).
Basically whether or not gun X is an AOW depends on what your circuit has decided or if it hasnt decides, what the local ATF branch thinks on any given day.
And yet, a gun with a "horizontal forward grip" (see Thompson pistol) doesn't count as AOW.
As far as my legal research, and that of others who hang out at www.subguns.com, the BATFE/DOJ has never won this issue in any district court. However, the DOJ/BATFE, as far as I know, has never appealed one of those losses to a Circuit Court of Appeals. So, you have various districts in which a pistol with a forward vertical grip is just a pistol, and others where the BATFE still considers it an AOW subject to tax and registration under the NFA.
These rifle/pistol/shotgun definitions (re: intended to fire from...") can sometimes be helpful in state areas.
For example, CA law defines generic assault weapons as being rifles, pistols or shotguns having certain configured features suites. Also, CA law bans only "50BMG rifles".
But some entities are firearms, and are not rifles, pistols or shotguns. For example, a pintle-mounted semiauto Ma Deuce is not a CA-banned 50BMG rifle, because it ain't intended to be fired from the shoulder. It's just a 'firearm'.
Our Brady-driven DOJ opined that a cal. .30 M1919 was not an assault weapon even if it had a pistol grip, instead of spade grips, because (very murkily) the pistol grip didn't protrude far enough below the action. In reality, the presence or protrusion of the pistol grip is irrelevant on a nonrifle/ nonpistol centerfire firearm and the DOJ likely wanted to dance around the issue.
It thus appears in CA that any semiauto centerfire firearm, not banned by make/model combination, can legally have pistol grip and detachable magazine and flash hider - if there were no buttstock attached and it was clearly not "intended to be fired from the shoulder"). Since this'd be a nonrifle, it would not be subject to the min. 30" overall length limit for semiauto centerfire rifles. All that would have to be maintained is the min 26" overall length and min 16" bbl length.
This is consistent with BATF GCA '68 rifle/shotgun matters for sales to 18 up to 21 year olds. GCA'68 exempts *rifles* and *shotguns* for FFL sales to this age group; a Mossberg 500 sold in 'Cruiser' pistol-grip configuration without a buttostock attached or in the box is not considered a shotgun (the design is 'not intended to be fired from shoulder') and this situation was treated in BATF FFL Newsletters end of 1998/early 1999 (IIRC).
Bill Wiese
San Jose CA
The transfer tax is $5. The tax to build your own is $200.