First, the NFA does not prohibit the sale or ownership of automatic weapons, exactly. Rather, it prohibits the civilian sale or ownership of automatic weapons manufactured after 1986. This is important to understand because it means that civilian sale and ownership of automatic weapons remains lawful, with the appropriate license and registration, the process for which is very strict and does include a mandatory background check. I'm not making any assertions about whether or not that should change, but that is the current reality, and I do think we should correctly understand it.
And second, the most likely grounds on which the ban on bump fire stocks might be successfully challenged, I believe, has to do with confiscation without compensation. That's something we should be prepared to deal with if and when Democratic lawmakers do move forward with Congressional legislation. They may need to also provide funding for compensation to overcome that potential challenge.
Personally, I am in favor of protecting the rights of gun ownership, but I am also in favor of sensible gun control. Banning bump stocks, and importantly also banning any other device that achieves the same effect such as trigger cranks, falls very squarely into the category of sensible gun control, but it is important that we remember that even that will still leave the issue of rapid fire somewhat inadequately addressed, simply because it is possible to bump fire a semi-automatic weapon without any modification whatsoever.
What this regulation of bump stocks does correctly, from my perspective as a gun owner, is that it very narrowly targets a single characteristic that truly does matter. I can make reasonable arguments against banning pistol grips or telescoping stocks, but I can make none whatsoever against banning devices that increase rate of fire. So I do in fact want to see Congress do this and do it correctly so that it can withstand challenges in the courts.
But alongside the effort to ban devices that increase rate of fire, I still strongly believe that we also need a renewed ban on high-capacity magazines, with mandatory surrender or destruction. And of course any funding mechanism that may be required to allow such a ban to stand. This is related to the rate of fire issue because even though it remains possible to bump fire a weapon without modification, the utility of doing so is inversely proportional to the capacity of the weapon, because the faster the weapon fires, the more quickly one needs to reload.
The proper course of action, in my opinion, is to focus legislation on rate of fire and capacity, because those things do inarguably have legitimate bearing upon public safety. This would help avoid resistance on the grounds of banning irrelevant features, such as we saw with the AWB of the past. There are of course some gun humpers who will still object, but far fewer than the number who would object to regulation that also bans characteristics that do not actually have any bearing upon public safety.
= new reply since forum marked as read