Gun control initative 1639 back on ballot

The Washington state Supreme Court has ruled that the proposed gun-restriction measure, Initiative 1639, will appear on November’s election ballot.  The Thurston Superior Court had ruled that the initiative did not conform to rules for initiatives.

But a four-page order released Friday and signed by Chief Justice Mary Fairhurst reversed the lower court’s ruling.

State law “does not allow for pre-election judicial review of the form, process, substance, or constitutionality of an initiative petition,” according to the order.

Secretary of State Kim Wyman had expressed concerns about the formatting of the petitions, but said she had no legal authority to block it from the ballot. The justices on Friday noted that in their decision.

The gun restriction initiative campaign relied on lavish contributions from Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, and venture capitalist Nick Hanauer.

Billionaire Michael Bloomberg's personal gun-ban front group, "Everytown for Gun Safety," donated $250,000.

If enacted, I-1639 will

• raises the purchase age to 21 for semi-auto rifles
• mandate training
• enhanced background checks
• waiting periods
• require owners to keep firearms secured
• leave lawful gun owners to face criminal charges if someone prohibited from possessing a weapon takes a lawfully owned firearm. 

If enacted, I'm sure I-1639 will save zero lives -- but the rich will never let the People's right to self-defense get in the way of nervous authoritarian control.

Source https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/washington-supreme-court-puts-gun-regulations-measure-i-1639-back-on-november-ballot/ 

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Impolite is against restrictions on the People's rights.

I-1639 strongly resembles the bills the legislature was bandying about last session, primarily Substitute Senate Bill 5444.  Also see Impolite's articles on Gun Control Washington follow up,  Civilian gun restriction plans in Washington State, and Attorney General Bob Ferguson calls for Gun Bans.

Its clear that if  I-1639 ballots a yes, then even though the Washington State Supreme Court must overturn it for the same reasons Thurston County did, the authoritarian left in the legislature will be emboldened to enact similar bans. 

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Washington State Constitution, Article 1, Section 24: RIGHT TO BEAR ARMS. 

"The right of the individual citizen to bear arms in defense of himself, or the state, shall not be impaired, but nothing in this section shall be construed as authorizing individuals or corporations to organize, maintain or employ an armed body of men."  [A citizen has the right to be armed, but not to form a private army].

Kent teachers union demands big money

The situation parents in Kent face is just one of many like it around the state. Schools there are scheduled to start Aug. 30, but the teachers union in Kent is prepared to strike if its salary demands aren't met – even though teacher strikes are illegal.

Keep in mind, the current Kent contract runs through this upcoming school year. The union is threatening to strike and disrupt the school year despite being under a current contract. Other teacher unions under contract might do the same.

Why? Because the state this year approved more money for teacher salaries, and local unions want to lock in big raises now. They want the large raises now so legislators feel obligated to spend more next year, when local property tax rates are lowered (which was part of the McCleary compromise approved by the state Supreme Court).

It's a "get while the getting is good" position, with no regard to what districts can afford going forward. The Seattle Times says school districts need to "need to show some backbone" and mustn't "bargain away money you don't have."

This whole high-pressure situation shows the absurdity of setting pay in 295 separate contract negotiations. The state pays for the bulk of school costs and salaries, so it's time to make the rational move to statewide bargaining.

-Rob McKenna

King County proposes ban on common firearms

The King County clowncil unveiled their plan to ban “Semi-automatic, High Velocity Weapons.”  They call disarming the innocent public "common sense."

In a July 23rd op-ed, Joe McDermott, the Council Chair of King County, Washington, introduced a multi-prong “King County Gun Safety Action Plan” aimed at reducing gun violence.

The plan requires that warning signs be posted at gun shops, as well as any place a firearm is sold or discharged, to advise about “the very real and significant risk to health and life inherent with firearm ownership.” (The language of these signs is to be approved by the local board of health.) Second, gun owners will be required to securely store firearms and ammunition at all times and in all places. And, citing recent school tragedies, the third proposal instructs the County to collaborate with local youth to identify “youth-informed solutions” for reducing gun crime. According to one source, a failure to post the warning signage would expose violators to civil penalties of up to $100 per day; a violation of the storage mandate would be a criminal misdemeanor punishable by jail time of up to 90 days and a fine of up to $1,000.

Additional proposals put forward include an ordinance to compel the King County Sheriff’s Office to destroy forfeited weapons in working condition and those that have been turned in by gun owners, and a demand that Washington State lawmakers repeal the current firearm preemption law. This would clear the way for even more drastic “solutions.” Upon repeal of the state preemption law, the King County Gun Safety Action Plan will immediately impose a ban on the sale and possession of “semi-automatic, high velocity weapons” and “high capacity magazines,” and raise the minimum age for possession or purchase of a firearm to 21 years of age.

Apart from the preemption issue, the Action Plan’s requirement that every gun owner securely store firearms and ammunition “at all times, on all premises” would mean that firearms cannot legally be kept available for immediate use by police and corrections officers, those being victimized by a domestic abuser or stalker, operators of businesses in high-crime areas, ordinary homeowners, and other law-abiding residents of the state. According to a 2015 report on crime by the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs (WASPC), a crime against the person occurs every 6.8 minutes in the state, including a violation of a no-contact or protection order every 40.4 minutes. Property crimes are even more frequent and take place at the rate of one every 1.8 minutes, with a robbery every two hours and a burglary every 13.2 minutes (the report lists robbery and burglary as property, not person, crimes because the primary object is the taking of something of value from the victim).

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A Seattle and King County Public Health analysis on firearms and crime statistics dated the same year is equally informative. Three out of four firearm hospitalizations in King County were due to unspecified “assaults.” The great majority of firearm deaths were suicides rather than homicides (68% and 29%, respectively), although for children 18 years and under, firearm suicides occurred at about half the rate of homicides. Accidental shootings made up a very small part of firearm homicides – between one and four percent. Motives for homicides include robbery, and gang and drug crimes. For victims aged between 18 and 29, for example, 21% of homicides were gang-related and 15% were drug-related; “robbery” accounted for a further five percent, and “revenge” was listed for eight percent.

The same document notes the absence of information tying these homicides to “risk factors” like “firearm ownership.” A statistical analysis in 2014 on King County gun homicides is more explicit: “Firearm ownership history (e.g. stolen, legally obtained) not collected.” In addition, information on criminal history was “missing” for three out of five suspects (58%), although out of the remaining group, almost ten percent had a prior conviction, more than five percent were on parole or probation, and almost six percent were wanted on warrants or other charges or were out on bail or bond at the time of the offense.

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Regardless of how King County residents keep their firearms, “firearm ownership” or storage practices have not been associated in any way with these crimes. To the extent information is available, the data indicate a sizable proportion of gun homicides involved criminals who were likely already precluded from lawfully possessing a firearm under state or federal law. (It follows, too, that gang bangers, robbers, and the other perpetrators of gun crimes will comply with the proposed “safe storage” mandate in the same manner as they obey existing laws on legal weapon possession and use.)

The most peculiar part of the King County Action Plan is the comprehensive ban on the possession and sale of “semi-automatic, high velocity weapons.” Without more, the language is ridiculously overbroad and will encompass most modern firearms, air guns, BB guns, and flare guns. Besides making other parts of the plan redundant, this would certainly run afoul of the rights guaranteed by the Second Amendment and the Washington State Constitution (the “right of the individual citizen to bear arms in defense of himself, or the state, shall not be impaired…”).

Overall, it is hard to tell how the components of the Action Plan will accomplish any meaningful change in public safety or the behavior of violent criminals, apart from making honest citizens more vulnerable by impeding their ability to defend themselves. What is obvious, though, is the credibility gap: anti-gun activists who roll out purported “common sense” gun laws, together with the oft-raised assertion that they aren’t going to take anyone’s guns away, shouldn’t be surprised at how few people are willing to take them at their word.



National Rifle Association, Institute for Legislative Action

Gun control Initiative 1639 is 'fake and switch'

Proving that money can’t buy everything, Washington State’s most recent anti-gun ballot initiative may end up being derailed over a failure to comply with mandatory legal requirements, despite seven-figure funding through hefty donations from local billionaires and other big donors. 
Under state law, the sponsors of a ballot initiative must collect signatures using a prescribed petition format and process.

The State constitution requires that every petition must “include the full text of the measure so proposed,” which is echoed in a state law that mandates all petitions circulated for signatures must have “a readable, full, true, and correct copy of the proposed measure printed on the reverse side of the petition.” This guarantees that every voter being asked to sign the petition has an opportunity, beforehand, to review the complete text of the measure, so as to reduce misinformation, deception, or fraud regarding what is actually being proposed and supported by the signer.

The Secretary of State’s Handbook on initiative laws confirms that the “Office of the Secretary of State must ascertain that the signer, at the time of signing the petition, had the opportunity to read the complete text of the measure. Otherwise, the Office of the Secretary of State cannot verify the signatures on that petition.”

The group behind Initiative I-1639, the Alliance for Gun Responsibility (AGR), has turned gun-control initiatives in Washington State into a cottage industry, with two previous ballot initiative campaigns. According to the AGR, I-1639 represents its “most comprehensive” initiative in Washington State to date.

The Initiative document itself consists of 30 pages of wide-ranging and extensive changes to the state’s firearms laws on rifle sales and transfers, “assault rifles,” training requirements, gun dealer compliance, age to purchase or possess restrictions, new purchase and transfer fees, new firearm storage crimes, and more. This shows changes to the existing law in the traditional legislative manner, with underlining for additions and strikeouts for deletions. 

Each petition sheet circulated to the signing public reads that the “undersigned citizens and legal voters…direct that the proposed measure known as Initiative Measure No. 1639… a full, true, and correct copy of which is printed on the reverse side of this petition, be submitted to the legal voters…” Not only were 30 pages of changes (now reduced to teeny-tiny text) crammed onto the back of each petition page but – unlike the original Initiative document – the petition pages lacked any indications, by way of strikeout or underlined text, to show the actual amendments being proposed to existing state law.

Concerned citizens initially raised these compliance issues in June. In their application seeking a court injunction to prohibit Washington’s Secretary of State from accepting the signed petition, the court declined to intervene, concluding that court review was “authorized only if the Secretary [of State] refuses to file the petition.” In the meantime, I-1639’s sponsor continued to use the same petition pages to collect signatures.

The Secretary of State acknowledged that “significant” constitutional concerns had been raised regarding I-1639’s petition format and confirmed that the “petition sheets presented a text of the measure that lacked underlining and strikethroughs to explain its changes to existing law,” but Initiative 1639 was, regardless, certified for inclusion on the November 2018 ballot.

Early this month, the NRA and Alan Gottleib of the Second Amendment Foundation filed two separate lawsuits against the Secretary of State, seeking to enjoin the certification under state law.  By incorrectly labeling the petition information as the actual text of I-1639, the Initiative sponsor violated the explicit, mandatory statutory direction that a “readable, full, true, and correct” copy of the Initiative be included with the petition pages. More significantly, this was also false, misleading, and unfair to voters.

Under this “I-1639 bait-and-switch,” not only were voters asked to sign a petition containing a copy of the proposed measure that was almost impossible to read, the text made it impossible to distinguish between current law and the changes being proposed. “None of the voters who signed the Submitted Petition had a copy of the actual text of I-1639 on the petition that they signed, and there is no proof that any of the voters who signed the Submitted Petition had an opportunity to review the text of the initiative to be placed on the ballot.”

These failures, according to the lawsuits, invalidate the petition and the signatures, and the Secretary of State should have rejected the signatures and withheld certification. The lawsuits ask the court to apply the constitutional and statutory requirements and suspend or deny certification.

In addition to the defective, incorrect text and print so voluminous and small that voters could scarcely be expected to read it, the lawsuit also raises claims of “misleading signage [and] untruthful signature gatherers” – one source contends that “paid signature gatherers were caught on film telling voters the initiative had nothing to do with gun control.”

A hearing date has been set for August 17.

The National Rifle Association is the source of this article.

Update, August 17, 2018

Thurston County Superior Court today ruled against the AGR and ordered a writ of mandamus to prevent I-1639 from appearing on the ballot. The judge agreed the signature sheets did not comply with state law – the font size was far too small to be readable and didn't include required strikethroughs (which show what existing laws are repealed or modified).