On March 9, 2018, Florida Governor Rick Scott signed Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Act into law. Of course this bill was quickly wrote up, as most bills are especially when they have emotional ties to them. The pages upon pages in this bill, will only make the problem that it wants to fix worse. Also lets not talk about how the majority of shootings are done with guns that are purchased illegally, rifles are rarely used as a tool of homicide and the term “assault rifle” is only a meaningless cosmetic determination, the Florida law has major issues. On page 26 the bill reads:
790.222 Bump-fire stocks prohibited.—A person may not import into this state or transfer, distribute, sell, keep for sale, offer for sale, possess, or give to another person a bump fire stock. A person who violates this section commits a felony of the third degree, punishable as provided in s. 775.082, s. 741 775.083, or s. 775.084. As used in this section, the term “bump fire stock” means a conversion kit, a tool, an accessory, or a device used to alter the rate of fire of a firearm to mimic automatic weapon fire or which is used to increase the rate of fire to a faster rate than is possible for a person to fire such semiautomatic firearm unassisted by a kit, a tool, an accessory, or a device.
The way bump stock is defined is any conversion tool that gives a weapon a mimic of automatic fire, the problem with this definition is that automatic weapons do not fire faster than semi-automatic weapons in the same family. So basically using a bump stock anyways is pretty much pointless as an AR-15 with an automatic conversion fires exactly as fast as the semi-automatic variety. Modifications only useful for competition where a single millisecond counts. Since bump fire stock was defined as a modification to make a semi-automatic fire faster than a semi-automatic and that’s an impossible statement, the law effectively banned nothing. The real problems in this bill are not really the 75 pages of nothing, but the mental health provisions. Under the sub-provision referred to as the “Risk Protection Order Act,” the State of Florida granted itself the ability to make a one sided decisions if someone is "mentally fit" to have a gun then they will put a full weapon restriction on that individual and guess what..........They can do it without a trial..... The law directs law enforcement to to publicly accuse individuals to family and neighbors that the individual could be violent. Here is what page 37 says:
The respondent shall have the burden of proving by clear and convincing evidence that the respondent does not pose a significant danger of causing personal injury to himself or herself or others by having in his or her custody or control, purchasing, possessing, or receiving a firearm or ammunition.
Anyone who's weapons are confiscated will have one year to clear their name, otherwise the state will destroy all weapons and ammunition confiscated. Given how backed up courts are already, this order is an all but guaranteed permanent confiscation. Again the worst comes from the mental health laws, students that seek mental health services will have to register with the school, what type and reason for the service. What sucks is how many parents will be hesitant to put their kid in a mental health service, as he could be labeled as a threat. Sure the records will be confidential and sealed, but I think we all know how that goes.. 71% of school shooters have been identified as the target of social and physical attacks by peers and are also twice as likely to feel like they need to be armed in a school environment. Creating greater pressures of being outed as having issues will only amplify the stress. The bill is unlikely to result in any positive outcomes promoted by those who voted for it. Given that numerous errors are present in the bill, some fixed at the eleventh hour (such as changing the word handgun to firearm in the waiting period section, if unfixed would have just repeated an already outstanding law), few, if any, of the politicians actually read the text before voting on it or signing it into law, extending the grand tradition of politicians only voting on how nice the bill title says. With this Florida law being such a mess and provisions within so easy to abuse, the road to good intentions in the State is a superficially disguised Road to Serfdom. I just hope we do not federalize the gun laws, that is where the problem would be as if we give the central government that power we may never know what would happen. Well thanks for reading guys please upvote, follow, and resteem!