A Legacy of Injustice: The California "Assault Weapons" Control Act 20 Years Later.mov

Matt Corwin is a former military police officer who was attending Los Angeles City College while on injured reserve leave from the Army before being reactivated. He was active in conservative politics on campus. On April 23, 2007, someone from his school called the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department and told Detectives about Matt's MySpace webpage, which depicted numerous legal firearms, as well as videos of Mr. Corwin shooting at a range.

From there, Matt's horror story began. Now, the California Rifle and Pistol Association (CRPA) Foundation, in cooperation with National Rifle Association (NRA) News, has released a video documenting Matt's experience, and the outlandishness of California's law banning certain semi-automatic sporting firearms. Twenty years after it's passage, the law has only a legacy of injustice. The compelling video, "A Legacy of Injustice," is posted at http://www.youtube.com/MichelLawyers.

California law essentially bans the possession of certain firearms designated as "assault weapons." But the term "assault weapon" has no meaning in technical firearm parlance. It is a purely legal term, arbitrarily defined by statute and administrative regulations and contrary to common sense. As a result, there is a tremendous amount of confusion about what constitutes an "assault weapon." (To read about these laws please visit the Reference Materials section of our website at: Michellawyers.com.)

Private citizens are not alone in their confusion over what is regulated by California's "assault weapon" control law. Police, prosecutors, and judges are equally confused. Many of these leaders are interviewed in the video.

Watch "A Legacy of Injustice" and consider how easy it could be for you or your family to become an accidental felon under California's vague gun laws.

Seventeen years ago the NRA and CRPA joined forces to fight local gun bans being written and pushed in California by the gun ban lobby. Their coordinated efforts became the NRA/CRPA "Local Ordinance Project" (LOP) - a statewide campaign to fight ill-conceived local efforts at gun control and educate politicians about available programs that are effective in reducing accidents and violence without infringing on the rights of law-abiding gun owners. The NRA/CRPA LOP has had tremendous success in beating back most of these anti-self-defense proposals.

In addition to fighting local gun bans, for decades the NRA has been litigating dozens of cases in California courts to promote the right to self-defense and the 2nd Amendment. In the post Heller and McDonald legal environment, NRA and CRPA Foundation have formed the NRA/CRPA Foundation Legal Action Project (LAP), a joint venture to pro-actively strike down ill-conceived gun control laws and ordinances and advance the rights of firearms owners, specifically in California. Sometimes, success is more likely when LAP's litigation efforts are kept low profile, so the details of every lawsuit are not always released.

To see a partial list of the LOP and LAP's recent accomplishments, or to contribute to the NRA or to the NRA/CRPAF LAP and support this and similar Second Amendment cases, visit www.nraila.com and www.crpafoundation.org.

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[Fettman501]

American street drug dealers get their drugs from Mexican cartels; they get the drugs from South American smugglers, who in turn get the plants from Peru... How are American guns funding wars in Mexico? Why not ban "assault weapons" from the military since we gave the Taliban a huge supply of AK-47's in the Cold War? It's better to have a single guy having the better rifle than to have the only rifle.

[ASeventhSign]

@ZAGGNUT1

Only a Liberal could so willfully disregard reality.

[klonaro]

their trying to disarm us we should fight for our rights we have the right to bare arms

[tehatemachine]

@ZAGGNUT1 I'm not talking about the actual definition. And clearly you already know I Was referring to modern day liberals. Who completely defy the definition as a result because modern day liberals believe in forcing others to give to someone else or take away A inorder to promote B as a result.

[ZAGGNUT1]

@tehatemachine i love how you misuse liberal. ever heard of libertarian? like liberty? Liberalism refers to a broad array of related ideas and theories of government that consider individual liberty to be the most important political goal.

[gmailsnowwalker]

Yep, california is a problem for the rest of these United States, as it is no longer a state but a 3rd world country within the borders of these United States.

[tehatemachine]

@Blahblobify Yeah California is definatly a fucked up assbackwards state. This is why liberals should NOT run this country. California is a crystal clear example of failure in upholding the constitution. I don't know why half of these laws where never struck down by the supreme court for it being unconstitutional.

Notice the states that are more liberal by majority according to statistics. Are less free.

[Blahblobify]

Fuck California gun laws and fuck the police officers that enforce them. I lost a fine Colt revolver and spent a night in jail because some asshole cop was "just doing his job" when he saw I had a gun IN A CASE in the back seat of my car. No big deal here in Arizona but in California you are a criminal.

[BigJ782011]

Eric Holder need to be locked up and not enforce any Assault Weapons ban! What he did when he gave Mexican Drug Cartels guns illegally trying to track them he caused some innocent people south of the boarder and a boarder patrol agent to be killed in the line of duty. Now what he did was basically illegal sales of firearms to no citizens violating the Gun Control Act of 1968. He needs to be arrested and have a trail that was a federal crime what he did.

[BigJ782011]

It is bull shit how Commieforina is more focused on harrassing gun owners, but they are not really focused on sick fucks like pedophiles. Last I checked, they a problem, A PROBLEM, legal gun ownership is not a problem with law abiding citizens! So California, go arrest the real criminals and sickos not say every gun owner has issues and have problems and harrass us. DON'T TREAD ON ME! AND LONG LIVE THE REPUBLIC!

[falprepped]

Fear the government maybe, respect no. They view is as pheasants

[oldcratch]

One of the biggest problems was stated @5:35. They are activly trying to find you guilty, in their eyes you are allready guilty of something, they're just not sure of what. So they work very hard with taxpayer money to find out what your guilty of.

If you can't see whats wrong with that, then all I cant say is wait for them to apply this philosophy to something you care for and enjoy but THEY DEEM is unacceptable, if you let this type of reasoning go on then it will happen to your liberty.

[G2340mm]

I got Two words..F**K CALIFORNIA...its sad I live in it...

[jokinyo]

@saebeck32 here's a quote for ya "Firearms stand next in importance to the Constitution itself. They are the American people's liberty teeth and keystone under independence. -- George Washington" the founding fathers knew guns were necessary regardless if it takes 2 min to reload or 2 sec.

[CyclingAZ]

FUCK CALIFORNIA 

[Blahblobify]

California Gun Laws are a crime against freedom and the assholes that enforce those laws are criminals.

And by that I mean asshole California cops.

[Cosmo1093]

I've always wondered how the California "assault weapons" ban would stop criminals from having assault weapons. To get high capacity mags, a criminal could either A. go to any neighboring state and buy some, or B. order magazine "rebuild kits" and illegally put them together.. To get around the bullet button, a criminal could just buy a tool like the "wonder wrench" or "mag magnet" or they could just replace it with a normal mag release. But of course the law will stop those criminals, right?

[Cosmo1093]

@Saebeck32 (cont.) And correct me if I'm wrong...but since the expiration of the Clinton-era "assault weapons" ban in '04, gun violence/murder rates have not gone up -- they've gone down, even with high capacity magazines becoming legal again. Homicide rates have been at their lowest since '64...while gun ownership and gun sales rates are at a 20-year high. Why do we "need" another assault weapons ban? That ban was an utter failure and had no effect on crime rates..what's the difference now??

[Cosmo1093]

@Saebeck32 People shouldn't sign mortgages that they (should) know they can't afford...

The term "assault weapon" is very vague and quite redundant. Ever heard of the FBI's NICS? Yeah, everybody goes through (at least) that when buying a gun. Maybe we should just enforce existing gun laws before creating unnecessary laws...

And last time I checked, the Second Amendment doesn't say "the right to bear arms..except for what ____ doesn't think you need."

[Saebeck32]

@Cosmo1093 OWS wants rules that prevent ripping off homeowners....you people seem to want stage an armed insurrection to prevent the imaginary FEMA concentration camps that Glenn Beck told you about. And i agree people should have a right to own a firearm. But not an assault weapon. Not the weapons with extended magazines. And everyone who plans on owning weapon has to register, and have a background check.  That seems fairly reasonable to me.

[Cosmo1093]

@Saebeck32 The members of the "state militias" of the time were free to come and go as they pleased, and they brought their own weapons to fight with -- some of which were muzzle-loading rifles which were key to American victory. They were just ordinary citizens, nothing like the "militia" that the Militia Act of 1903 created.

Even OWS protestors want a "revolution" and "change," what's your point? Just because you don't like guns doesn't mean its a RIGHT you can take away from others.

[Saebeck32]

@Cosmo1093 We had state militias during the revolutionary war! There is no despotism coming to the US. You are all just trigger happy Fox News Tea Party nuts who are just itching to start the next revolution.

[Cosmo1093]

@Saebeck32 Last time I checked, the state militia, aka the National Guard, wasn't founded until 1903 -- over 100 years after the Bill of Rights was ratified. Neither the DoJ/Supreme Court, nor the authors of the Bill of Rights would agree with you either. Might I suggest reading the Federalist Papers?

It doesn't matter that "assault weapons" did not exist in the 18th century. The primary purpose was to give citizens an effective means to FIGHT despotism. You can't do that with a musket anymore.

[knee2tarmac]

@saebeck32 The internet wasn't in existence during the time the Bill of Rights was drafted, which includes the First Amendment so maybe you should just shut your pie hole. Go spew your drivel somewhere else.

[mkeulr]

Opressive gun laws in America don't or won't stop crime in Mexico or in the United States. They will only create victims of law abiding folks from both criminals and our own police and Federal law enforcement.