Question for folks who want to ban civilian use of semi-auto firearms:

It's not the license itself that is the costly part. It's only $200 bucks or so for the Class III tax tamp (machine gun license so to speak). The costly part comes from the price of the machine guns themselves based on supply and demand as a result of the government banning the new manufacture of them in 1986.

So since no civilian market ones have been manufactured in 34 years the only ones in circulation are ones that were produced and owned prior to that. That limits the amount of them in circulation which increases the price of them to absurd levels if you want one.

Anyone who can legally own a normal firearm can own a machine gun if your state allows it. There are like 10-20 million AR-15s in the US and they are being manufactured by the thousands every year to this day which is why they can be had for around 500 bucks or so for an entry level one. There are only around 600,000 machine guns in the US with no new ones being manufactured so they cost anywhere from 5,000-50,000 bucks if you can find one for sale.

My local gun shop has an M60 for sale, it's been there for years because nobody wants to pay $18,000 bucks for it.

 

It's simply the basic principle of supply and demand. The government put in place a law that stopped the new production of an item therefore making the item rare which in turn significantly rose the price. There is no government mandate that a full auto M16 costs $10,000 a minimum or anything like that.

The government isn't legally allowed to mandate the price of firearms, that falls under the "infringe" part of the 2A. However what the government can do, as demonstrated by machine guns, is put in policies that will use the capitalism system of ours to inflate the price of something it really doesn't want you to have.

The sheer cost, and impracticality of full auto weaponry is what keeps them out of most folks hands. Not any actual law because there is no federal law that says you can't have one and if you can even afford one in the first place then you can surely afford the $200 tax stamp required to own one.

 

His argument is correct in this specific case. Due to indirect government policy (banning the new manufacturing of machine guns) the price of these guns has risen to the point where only those with a certain amount of wealth are able to purchase them. The "average" American citizen can't afford a machine gun but the wealthy can afford one.

Nothing in the Constitution states that the government must give you a firearm, it states that the government cannot do anything to DIRECTLY prohibit you from obtaining one if you are a law abiding citizen without a criminal record. Which is why I said the inflated prices of machine guns are not the result of the government directly mandating that they cost so much which is why it's not illegal.

It says "shall not be infringed" not "shall be provided", so no soup kitchens are not obligated to hand out machine guns to poor people. However, if the poor person at the soup kitchen has a class III tax stamp and the soup kitchen is mega rich with a stash of M60s then the government is not allowed to say they CAN'T give you a machine gun unless you have a criminal record or it's illegal in that particular state to own one.

 

I agree that adding children to the equation is a whole different ballgame. I am single with no children so I keep my home defense firearms out and within arms reach. Wasn't always the case though, when I had a family living here with me and a small child I simply accepted the risk of being unable to get to my shotgun in a split second over leaving it out at arms reach for the boy to possibly grab.

I still had plenty of guns in the house but they were locked up and the self defense gun was a pistol in a quick release safe in the top of the closet that the boy would need an actual ladder to get to even he ever figured out something was up there. He wasn't old enough for me to teach him about firearms at the time, he was only 2. He was, however, deathly afraid of "spooky" stuff so I simply told him that our bedroom closet had ghosts in it and he was too terrified to ever even go in the bedroom lol. I planned on teaching him about firearms and safety and whatnot as he got older but they left before he ever got old enough.

 

Whether our "half-arsed Constitution" recognizes that is actually the entire point. Our Constitution is our law, you can't just toss out parts of it that you don't agree with or reword it at your leisure. Nothing in the US Constitution states that a US citizen is required to own a firearm nor that a US citizen is required to be provided one if they want one. It simply states that the government is not allowed to directly prohibit a US citizen from owning and/or obtaining a firearm unless they have lost their right to do so (criminal, mentally ill, etc).

You not having enough money to purchase a firearm is not the governments fault and the government is under no obligation to provide you with one according to the US Constitution. So your argument is invalid in this case. Not having enough money is not being "denied" your rights. Denied means the government specifically mandated that CANNOT exercise your rights. That is not the case in the case of poor vs rich folks. There is no government mandate that says a poor person CANNOT own an M60 machine gun.