What “Unsigning”
the Arms Trade Treaty Means for American Gun Owners
NRA-ILA
Friday, May 3, 2019
Last Friday, President Trump took the historic step of
ordering the “unsigning” of the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty during his address to the
NRA-ILA’s Leadership Forum. President Trump’s action effectively withdraws the
United States from the most comprehensive effort towards international gun
control.
Much of the intervening coverage on the ATT has focused
on how the treaty did or did not constrain U.S. arms sales abroad, but many
average law-abiding gun owners may be questioning how the treaty could or
couldn’t have affected them.
NRA’s complaints regarding the treaty have always been
based on its potential effect on law-abiding American gun owners. Those
complaints have focused on the treaty’s requirements for end use verification,
its sometimes-unintelligible vagueness, its ability to be amended without the
consensus of all parties, and its proponents repeated refusals to clarify that
it has no effect on the possession of small arms by civilians in the United
States.
The treaty urges record keeping of end users, directing
importing countries to provide information to an exporting country regarding
arms transfers, including “end use or end user documentation” for a “minimum of
ten years.” Each country is to “take measures, pursuant to its national laws,
to regulate brokering taking place under its jurisdiction for conventional
arms.” Data kept on the end users of imported firearms is a de-facto registry
of law-abiding firearms owners, which is a violation of federal law. Even
worse, the ATT could be construed to require such a registry to be made
available to foreign governments.
NRA’s complaints regarding the treaty have always been
based on its potential effect on law-abiding American gun owners. Those
complaints have focused on the treaty’s requirements for end use verification,
its sometimes-unintelligible vagueness, its ability to be amended without the
consensus of all parties, and its proponents repeated refusals to clarify that
it has no effect on the possession of small arms by civilians in the United
States.
The vagueness of the treaty and its ease of being
“amended” is best exemplified by actions that took place at a conference on the treaty last
year. At that conference, proponents of the treaty “welcome[ed]”
several living documents into the ATT. While seemingly innocuous on its face,
this change incorporated the International Small Arms Control Standards (ISACS)
into the ATT.
Falsely described as established “international
standards” or “international norms” that “provide clear, practical and
comprehensive guidance to practitioners and policymakers on fundamental aspects
of small arms and light weapons control”, the ISACS are in reality a series of
six standards developed by the UN for states to use in implementing their
global disarmament agenda. Series 3 – Legislative and Regulatory – and its
Module 3.30, “National Regulation of Civilian Access to Small Arms and Light
Weapons,” is the most alarming of all the ISACS.
Purporting to set the standards for “National Regulation
of Civilian Access to Small Arms and Light Weapons,” Module 3.30 creates a
means to almost entirely limit civilian access to small arms under the guise of
International Humanitarian Law, International Human Rights Law, and Gender
Based Violence. Highlights include, but are not limited to; a ban on civilian
possession of “military” style arms – no automatic weapons or magazines with
over a 10 round capacity, ballistic recordings, different risk classifications
on types of firearms (i.e. calibers over .45 are an intolerable risk to public
safety and semi-auto handguns and rifles are high risk), licensing and registration
of all firearms, training and storage restrictions, waiting periods, 20-year
record retention requirements of sellers, age limits and requiring a
demonstrated need to possess a firearm, with self-defense not being one of
them.
Perhaps the easiest way to understand the future danger
the ATT posed to U.S. gun owners is the complete refusal by proponents of the
treaty to clarify that it would have no effect on the possession of small arms
by law-abiding American gun owners.
While incorporation by reference of the ISACS into the
ATT was alarming, it was also not entirely unpredictable. As with every
anti-firearm UN initiative, concern must never lie entirely with what is in it
now, but with what it will become and how it will be used by a future U.S. administration,
especially one seeking international justification for a gun control
agenda.
Perhaps the easiest way to understand the future danger
the ATT posed to U.S. gun owners is the complete refusal by proponents of the
treaty to clarify that it would have no effect on the possession of small arms
by law-abiding American gun owners. NRA and other opponents of the
treaty repeatedly asked for a carve-out in the treaty, yet those requests were
flatly denied. If the treaty’s proponents had no intention of limiting American
gun ownership, why resist such a limitation to the text of the treaty?
Instead, the treaty included language in its preamble
that treaty parties be “mindful of the legitimate trade and lawful ownership,
and use of certain conventional arms for recreational, cultural, historical,
and sporting activities, where such trade, ownership and use are permitted or
protected by law.” A careful read will show that the use of arms for individual
and collective defense is notably missing from this statement, and the
statement creates no limitation and is really only an aspirational provision.
Please join us in thanking President Trump for protecting
our firearms freedoms by removing any obligation of the United States to be
bound by the “object and purpose” of the Arms Trade Treaty.
No comments:
Post a Comment