Dems Push 'Red Flag Bill' To Help Teachers Remove Guns From Students' Homes
The liberal attack on Second Amendment rights never lets up.
One of the latest moves to make gun confiscation a reality in the United States was unveiled this week in New York state, when deep blue Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced a push for a “red flag” law that would enable local authorities to remove guns from homes if a judge signs off on it because others felt the homes’ environment posed a risk of gun violence.
Other states have enacted or are considering such laws, but the New York bill goes further than any other – and is a prime example of how every “common sense” gun control step ends up being about confiscation.
According to the New York Post, the proposed Empire State law would empower teachers and school administrators to petition a judge to have guns removed from a student’s home if the student is “troubled” enough.
Other states have “red flag” laws – normally gun-friendly Florida passed one in March, according to the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. But they generally apply to family members of gun owners, or to law enforcement officers who consider an individual to be at risk of going on a criminal killing spree.
That kind of predictive law enforcement is bad enough, but gun grabbers routinely sell it as a matter of “common sense” restrictions. If family members and local cops think an individual is dangerous, the argument goes, then it’s one of those times an individual liberty has to be sacrificed for the greater good.
Of course, Ben Franklin had something to say about “those who would give up essential liberty, to purchase a little temporary safety” (they deserve neither), but at least the gun control crowd can pretend they’re being sensible.
The New York bill’s plan to include school teachers and administrators among those who can go to a judge to have guns confiscated gives the game away. The education establishment is quite possibly the single most liberal professional bloc in the United States.
Like another big Democrat gun control push – “no fly, no buy,” which would give faceless bureaucrats in the Transportation Security Administration the right to decide who can enjoy Second Amendment freedoms – New York’s “red flag” law would amount to its citizens essentially surrendering a constitutional right to the state for no good reason.
And if history proves anything – from medieval serfdom to Communist Russia – it’s that when individuals are subjected to the arbitrary powers of the state, it doesn’t end well for the people.
According to the Sun-Sentinel, Florida joined five other states that already had “red flag” laws when it enacted its own this year in the wake of the Parkland school shooting in February. The other states were California, Connecticut, Indiana, Oregon and Washington.
Massachusetts lawmakers are currently considering their own “red flag” bill, with the state Senate scheduled to vote on it this week, according to New England Public Radio.
The state House passed the bill in May over the objections of gun rights supporters, including Jim Wallace, executive director of the Gun Owners Action League of Massachusetts, who summed it up perfectly.
“This is a bait and switch to the public who thought they were getting a bill about suicide prevention and public safety, but now get a gun confiscation bill,” Wallace said, according to The Salem News.
“Those laws are already on the books,” he said. “This is direct assault on due process and the right to keep and bear arms.”
And that was even without Cuomo’s crazy idea of giving teachers and school administrators the same rights as family members and cops to attack gun owners’ rights.
No matter how liberals try to sell proposals like “red flag” laws as ways to keep children safe, or prevent another school massacre, or any of the other apparently noble goals they espouse, the bottom line is what Wallace called it – a “bait and switch” to allow more gun confiscation.
The New York bill’s proposed expansion of a power to teachers that not even cops and family members should have is just the latest proof:
The liberal attack on Second Amendment rights takes many forms, and employs different arguments, but it never, ever lets up.
Truth and Accuracy
We are committed to truth and accuracy in all of our journalism. Read our editorial standards.
Advertise with The Western Journal and reach millions of highly engaged readers, while supporting our work. Advertise Today.
