by L. Neil Smith

On Concealed Carry and the NRA

by L. Neil Smith

So now we know: NRA backs government approval checks for gun ownership

The NRA's Second Amendment

NRA Supported the National Firearms Act of 1934

The NRA is to the 2nd Amendment as H & R Block is to the 16th

by Gary Clark

Tactical PR Failed: Continuing the Debate on NRA's Gun Prohibitionism

by Angel Shamaya, KeepandBearArms.com

NRA Claims Neutrality on Cops-Only National Concealed Carry Bill

by Angel Shamaya, KeepandBearArms.com

Why does NRA's Spokesperson Evade the "Repeal" Issue?

by Angel Shamaya, KeepandBearArms.com

New NRA-Halbrook gun lawsuit in DC counterproductive, disruptive

by Sisyphus, KeepandBearArms.com

NRA State Affiliate for South Dakota Says: “If you’re going to carry in an enclosed motor vehicle, you better have a permit."

by South Dakota Gun Owners

NRA Director Sen. Larry Craig's Ammunition Ban Amendment

by Angel Shamaya, KeepandBearArms.com

Text of Senator Larry Craig's Ammo Amendment

by Angel Shamaya, KeepandBearArms.com

America's largest gun control organization

by Vin Suprynowicz, Las Vegas Review-Journal

Gun control, NRA-style

by Vin Suprynowicz, Las Vegas Review-Journal

Second Amendment: Changing of the guard

by Vin Suprynowicz, Las Vegas Review-Journal

Registration: The NRA Paradigm

by Russ Howard, former NRA Director

The NRA Has Lost Its Way

by Jack Harbinger

NRA or Sarah Brady?: 'Gangsterland weapons have no legitimate place...'

NRA Exec. V.P. Franklin L. Orth, 1968

Tactical PR Failed: Continuing The Debate On NRA's Gun Prohibitionism

by Angel Shamaya, Director, KeepAndBearArms.com

The Professional Face Of Evil

Interviews by Angel Shamaya, Director, KeepAndBearArms.com

NRA Says Honest Americans Would Turn In Banned Guns

by Angel Shamaya, Director, KeepAndBearArms.com

JPFO's Aaron Zelman Speaks to the NRA Board

A JPFO Alert from The Liberty Crew

Gun Owners Should Worry...About The NRA
by Clarence E. Lovell, Member NRA Board from 1980 to 1993

Project Exile

Reports on Project Exile's Colorado kickoff
by Mark Call

Project Exile
by Larry Pratt, GOA

Project Exile or Gun Gulag?
by Russ Howard

Post Script to Project Gulag
by Russ Howard

Direct Quotes from the NRA on Project Exile
from the NRA

Project Gesatpo
by Ari Armstrong, Colorado LP

Zero Tolerance?
by David Kopel, "The Gore Gun Agenda"

Harry Browne blasts LaPierre for "unconstitutional enforcement"
by Ari Armstrong, Colorado LP

We condemn Project Exile
A coalition of American gun rights leaders

Gut Questions for the NRA board
by John G. Lankford

NRA funnels members' cash to gun control advocate Baucus
by Gary Murbut, President of Montana Shooting Sports Assoc.

NRA wins, gun owners lose again in Pa.
by the Allegheny County Sportsman's League

Why does the NRA refuse to support Front Sight?
by Dr. Ignatius Piazza

Bursting the registration bubble
by Russ Howard

NRA management turns on Second Amendment
by Brian Puckett

NRA screws Ohioans again!
by Jimm Ramm, Gunsoft.com

NRA-ILA rehabilitates gun-grabber image with award
by Andy Barniskis

Secret Surveys...What's Going on?
by Kevin Starrett, OFF

GRNC response to NCRPA President Russ Parker's attack
by Paul Valone, GRNC

Not Rational Anymore
by Dr. Sarah Thompson

NRA Gun Control Schizophrenia
by William F. Jasper

America's Largest Gun Control Organization
by Vin Suprynowicz

Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory
by Vin Suprynowicz

Losing the War
by William Lolli

NRA a Trojan Horse
by Larry Bigham

Harry Browne on the NRA

Why Does NRA Refuse Support?
by Ignatius Piazza of Front Sight

Statement on NRA Management
by Brian Puckett

NRA: Neurotic Republican Appendage
by Charles Curley

I Am Not the NRA
by Geoff Metcalf of WND

Latest NRA Sellout
by Grass Roots of North Carolina

Project Exile / Conservative Digest
by Grady Miller


For all its blustery rhetoric about standing firm for the right to keep and bear arms, the National Rifle Association’s continuing concessions to gun control exhibit the signs of a split personality.

One might think from the oceans of venom and ink hurled at the National Rifle Association by President Clinton, Sarah Brady, and the anti-gun fanatics of the Establishment press that the NRA is the unwavering, unshakable, and indefatigable champion of the natural right of all Americans to keep and bear arms. Is not the simple fact that NRA leaders Charlton Heston and Wayne LaPierre are daily pilloried and burned in effigy by the disarmament zealots proof positive that they are the premier defenders of the Second Amendment?

Yes, the NRA is the arch-villain whom gun-banning extremists love to hate. It is the largest, oldest, wealthiest, most powerful gun-rights organization on the planet. But is the venerable gun group worthy of the odium heaped upon it by its enemies? We wish it were. However, as we shall show, it is getting more and more difficult to look at the record and rhetoric of the NRA without seeing a chronicle of piecemeal, strategic surrender. For all its bluster about standing four-square and forever firm against all infringements on the right of private citizens to own firearms, the NRA appears to have already resigned itself to gradual defeat on its most basic issues. Now, it seems, the organization is completely preoccupied with convincing its loyal and generous members that its concessions (some might say betrayals is more accurate) on vital gun rights are victories, not defeats.


Strange Bedfellows

Who would have thought, for instance, that they would live to see the day when the NRA would be lining up shoulder to shoulder with its nemesis, Handgun Control, Inc., to applaud the biggest-ever expansion of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF)? Yet that is what we saw earlier this year, when President Clinton proposed to double the ranks of ATF inspectors and increase the number of ATF gun agents by 23 percent. What’s more, the Clinton package called for a vast new army of federal, state, and local prosecutors to "fight gun crimes."

The Chicago Tribune, in a January 18th story entitled "Clinton plans gun-law enforcement push," described the plan thusly: "President Clinton plans to announce today an initiative that the White House is calling the biggest gun enforcement push in history, a $280 million plan to hire 500 new firearms-law enforcers and 1,100 gun-crime prosecutors." The story went on to report that "representatives of Handgun Control Inc. and the National Rifle Association both applauded the idea."

The Tribune story continued:

"We’ve often said that strong enforcement is needed, and one key is boosting ATF," said Handgun Control President Robert Walker. Meanwhile, NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre said he backs the plan, but he was skeptical the administration would follow through.

"I don’t want to declare victory on this without letting it be known that we will hold them to it and monitor their performance and report to the American people," LaPierre said. "It better be more than just a sound bite, but we’re for it in a big, big, way," he said.

Yes, this is the same ATF whose agents the NRA once described as "jack-booted government thugs." Has some miraculous transformation that we do not know about come over the Clinton thugocracy to render it less hostile to private gun ownership and more solicitous of the Second Amendment? Have the ATF’s minions turned in their jack-boots and SWAT regalia for ballet slippers and tutus? Have Bill Clinton or Janet Reno said or done anything in recent memory to support any illusion of hope that, with these hundreds of new agents and prosecutors, the ATF and Department of Justice might go after real criminals rather than using these new resources to entrap, persecute, and prosecute gun owners, as they have done in the past?

The NRA leadership apparently thinks so, but they can cite very little evidence to support such false hopes. Oh, they are very high now on their new pet project: Project Exile. In full-page newspaper ads last year, the NRA urged Congress to "Adopt and fund Project Exile nationally … every violent felon caught with a gun goes to jail for 5 years, period." Under the Exile program, state and local prosecutors assist and defer to federal prosecutors, who have a more "streamlined" process and tougher sentencing. And, undoubtedly, they can point to some genuine victories in taking violent felons off the street, but at a cost of doing extreme violence to our country’s constitutional separation of powers.

Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court William Rehnquist has emphatically warned of the dangers from the recent vast expansions of "federal jurisdiction over crimes involving drugs and firearms," as well as taken notice of the perilous trend to "federalize" certain juvenile crimes. "Unless steps are taken to stop or reverse this trend," said Justice Rehnquist in his 1998 State of the Judiciary report, "either the demands placed on the federal judiciary will eventually outstrip its resources, or the judiciary will become so large that it will lose its traditional character as a distinctive judicial form of limited jurisdiction."

Justice Rehnquist went on to wisely note:

The pressure in Congress to appear responsive to every highly publicized societal ill or sensational crime needs to be balanced with an inquiry into whether states are doing an adequate job in these particular areas and, ultimately, whether we want most of our legal relationships decided at the national rather than local level. Federal courts were not created to adjudicate local crimes, no matter how sensational or heinous the crimes may be. State courts do, can, and should handle such problems.

These concerns have been echoed recently by the National Sheriffs Association, the National District Attorneys Association, and the American Bar Association, all of which have decried the continued encroachment of the federal government on state and local jurisdictions. People who treasure the freedom that flows from assiduously maintaining our constitutional checks and balances and separation of powers will not see a solution to our problems of crime and violence in calling on Washington to — as the NRA says — "just enforce the laws already on the books." Many of those federal laws are already unconstitutional and should be repealed, not enforced.

Even if the Clinton/Reno Justice Department could be held to going after only violent criminals (surely a vain hope), expanding federal police and prosecuting resources and authority will come back to ensnare us in many ways. Nevertheless, in his May 27, 1999 testimony before the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Crime, NRA Executive Director Wayne R. LaPierre reiterated the group’s endorsement of this federalizing trend. While rightly and forcefully condemning the draconian, full-speed-ahead gun control proposals tendered by the notoriously anti-gun Senator Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), LaPierre offered as an alternative a reduced-speed package headed in the same direction. Said the NRA exec:

• "We think it’s reasonable to provide mandatory instant criminal background checks for every sale at every gun show. No loopholes anywhere for anyone."

• "We think it’s reasonable to prevent all juveniles convicted of violent felonies from owning guns, for life."

• "We think it’s reasonable to provide full funding for the National Instant Check System so it operates efficiently and instantly."

• "We think it’s reasonable to support the federal Gun-Free School Zones Act."

• "We think it’s reasonable to expect full enforcement of federal firearms laws by the federal government."

Each of the NRA’s "reasonable" endorsements constitutes support for federal usurpation of power and an expansion of the federal police state. Let’s just look at its endorsement of "full enforcement of federal firearms laws by the federal government." That stance puts the NRA in the position of accepting the false claims of the gun control lobby that Congress may constitutionally infringe on gun rights. It also lends credence to the notion that the anti-gun laws Congress already has passed, if fully enforced, could curb firearm-related criminal activity without eviscerating the Second Amendment. Ergo, if enforcement of existing federal legislation helps reduce crime, why not enact more to further reduce, or eliminate, crime?


Consistently Inconsistent

The NRA assures its members in no uncertain terms that it is dead-set against firearms registration, rightly pointing out that, in country after country, registration lists have been used by governments to seize the means of defense against tyranny. In fact, it says gun registration is "inherently evil." In a position statement entitled "Licensing and Registration," posted on its website on April 9th, the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action states that, for gun owners, "perhaps only one other word in the English language so boils their blood as the word ‘registration,’ and that word is ‘confiscation.’ Gun owners fiercely believe those words are ominously related."

Indeed they are. Which is what makes the NRA’s insistent support for the National Instant Check System (NICS) so incredible and so dangerous. The "instant check" system provides the basis and the means for a national, computerized firearms registration database.

The 1993 Brady law authorized a temporary five-day waiting period, applicable only to handgun purchases, for five years, to be superseded after November 30, 1998 by an "instant check" system that would cover rifles and shotguns as well. The chief proponent of the "instant check" compromise was the NRA, which has resolutely defended it ever since. During the heat of battle over the Brady bill, NRA lobbyists, rather than standing firm in opposition to the measure, became more concerned about modifications that would "improve" it and make it acceptable. USA Today for October 26, 1993 quoted NRA spokesman James Baker as saying, "We already support 65 percent of the Brady bill, because it moves to an instant check, which is what we want."

Now, in its "Licensing and Registration" statement, the NRA tells its members: "Enactment of the Brady Act, for example, establishes the principle of a national gun licensing system. Once a lenient national handgun licensing system is established, the licensing system can gradually be tightened, and police, as they have done in Great Britain, can begin inventing their own conditions to put on licenses." Why didn’t NRA leaders recognize this danger before, when it was supporting the instant-background-check provision in Brady, against the protests of many of its most experienced members, as well as against the advice of many other gun groups?

And why does the NRA leadership continue to support the NICS when their own research and experience shows it to be faulty, costly, and abusive? On March 9th, the NRA posted on its website a harsh critique entitled, "GAO Finds Fault With FBI’s NICS Operation," which points out that "the FBI’s ‘Instant Check’ often isn’t ‘instant’ for honest citizens." The federal Government Accounting Office report, notes the NRA, "shows that the system failed to provide ‘instant’ checks 28% of the time, adversely affecting the rights of nearly 1.2 million law-abiding citizens. Nearly one-quarter of the citizens who appealed had their denials reversed. Those wrongful denials, GAO reports, were caused by FBI examiner error in 42% of the cases."

A more serious problem with the NICS is to be found in the NRA’s own pending lawsuit against the Justice Department, for making the NICS into precisely what its opponents warned it would become: a national registration system. Under directives from Attorney General Reno, the FBI has been maintaining the records of people who have applied to purchase firearms. The NICS was sold as a system that would provide an "instant check" to assure that the applicant did not have a criminal record. But, we were assured, there would be no permanent record made of applications, which would constitute a form of registration. Guess what? The Reno DOJ/FBI illegally insists on making those "instant" checks into permanent records. That should come as no surprise. What doesn’t compute is the NRA leadership’s continued support for this proven threat to rights it claims to cherish and defend.

Not Rational Anymore
Sarah Thompson, M.D.

A lot of people claim that NRA stands for "Not Relevant Anymore".

I wish it were true. Unfortunately, the NRA is about as irrelevant as Chuck Schumer, Dianne Feinstein and Frank Lautenberg – and much more effective at promoting gun control. The NRA is relevant; but it’s Not Rational Anymore.

Thanks to the NRA, we have the National Firearms Act of 1934, the Gun Control Act of 1968, Brady registration, and Project Exile. Now, in addition, we will likely have six more years of Orrin Hatch and four more of Mike Leavitt.

That’s right. The NRA spent a lot of money and went to a great deal of trouble to support and endorse Utah’s elite anti-gun duo. They helped Hatch get the Republican nomination for his re-election and helped keep Leavitt from losing his nomination.

Most of you are probably familiar with Senator Hatch, and his abominable S. 254, the Juvenile InJustice Bill. Now that the NRA has done everything possible to give Hatch cover for his gun-grabbing ways, I expect the bill will explode out of the conference committee and land right in the middle of Clinton’s desk. Hatch’s own version of the bill (not including amendments by other anti-gun senators) includes the following:

• Mandatory trigger locks with each sale
• Mandatory registration of all gun show and pawn shop transactions
• Mandatory registration of all firearms repairs
• Mandatory 5 year prison sentence for parents whose children responsibly use certain semiautomatic firearms without written permission.
• Increasing BATF funding by $40 million
• Mandatory lifetime ban on firearms ownership for anyone who commits certain crimes as a juvenile

Hatch’s excuse is that these are "pro-gun" provisions that will "protect" gun owners. Apparently he believes that if this bill is passed, the anti-gun forces will simply go away.

Other notable accomplishments of Utah’s senior senator include:

• Overseeing the Waco cover-up and declaring that the government had done nothing wrong
• Voting against a prohibition on US troops serving in combat under UN command
• Voting to confirm notoriously anti-gun Surgeon General, David Satcher, an advocate of fraudulent anti-gun "junk" science.
• Voting to confirm liberal, activist judges including Richard Paez, Marsha Berzon, and Margaret Morrow
• Refusing to allow the Freedom from Union Violence Act to emerge from the Senate Judiciary committee, thus endorsing violence as legitimate political activity.
• Supporting the Chemical Weapons Treaty
• Supporting taxpayer funding for the National Endowment for the Arts

This no doubt explains why the NRA flew Wayne LaPierre out to Salt Lake City to defend Orrin Hatch against angry gun owners. It no doubt explains why Charlton Heston sent me a letter explaining that "Senator Hatch has been one of the most committed, principled and consistently effective advocates of your Second Amendment rights on Capitol Hill. He’s stood with the NRA and fought to protect your constitutional freedoms when others lacked the courage or the stamina to do so."

The last time I saw Sen. Hatch, he waggled his index finger at me and told me I was too stupid to understand how things are done in Washington and I should trust him to do the right thing. Maybe he’s right; I certainly don’t understand how registering my guns, rewarding the murderous BATF, and throwing me in prison for taking my son shooting with a 10-22 protects my rights.

Was Hatch at least better than his opponents? Absolutely not! Both (defeated) challengers Greg Hawkins and Frank Guliuzza are committed gun rights advocates who made their opposition to gun control a highlight of their campaigns. Hawkins failed to force a primary by only 53 votes out of 3500. By endorsing the only anti-gun candidate, and helping to eliminate the pro-gun candidates, the NRA made sure we’ll have a choice between an anti-gun Republican and an anti-gun Democrat in November.

While it’s not much of an excuse, it is true that Hatch was a supporter of gun rights twenty years ago when he was a freshman senator. This is more than can be said for Governor Mike Leavitt, who has never been an advocate of gun rights.

While Leavitt is best-known nationally for his support of an internet tax, here in Utah he’s leading the gun control charge. He has actively supported the following:

• Banning concealed carry in schools and churches (regardless of the wishes of the school or church authorities)
• Prohibiting firearms possession for anyone convicted of one of a long list of misdemeanors, including spanking a child
• Increasing fees for carry permits, background checks, instructor permits, etc.
• A lifetime ban on firearms possession for anyone committed to a mental institution, even if the commitment was wrongful or the person recovered fully
• Allowing public schools to question children about their parents’ firearms ownership and use without parental notification or permission
• Prohibiting firearms possession by juveniles adjudicated delinquent without a jury trial
• Expanding prohibitions on handgun possession to include long gun possession
• Calling a special session of the legislature specifically to enact gun control legislation

Yet, the NRA donated $10,000 to Leavitt’s reelection campaign, and then endorsed him, writing: "Your record of accomplishment reflects the priorities and beliefs of the NRA membership, and we believe you are uniquely suited to be the Republican nominee for Governor of Utah in 2000…We look forward to continuing our relationship with you in the years ahead to continue preserving and protecting Utah’s rich Second Amendment and hunting traditions."

Once again, all three of Leavitt’s opponents, including current challenger, Glen Davis, are committed gun rights advocates, who focused on gun rights in their campaigns, attacked Leavitt’s anti-gun record, and put their commitments in writing. Had the NRA chosen to support a pro-gun candidate, that person might now be Utah’s Republican gubernatorial candidate.

The bottom line is that in Utah’s two most critical contests, the NRA went out of its way to support and endorse the ONLY anti-gun candidate in each race! This is sickening beyond words.

What is going on here? I have no way of knowing for sure, although I hear those Potomac Swamp vapors are toxic to higher brain functions. But I have some ideas…

The NRA’s business is gun control. Without gun control, the NRA would be reduced to teaching firearms safety and use, hunter education, and sponsoring sporting events. These are important and necessary functions, and the NRA does a good job with these non-political tasks. But the big money, the media attention and the glamour are in gun control. No gun control means no million dollar contracts, no dinners with celebrities, no lavish expense accounts, and no TV appearances.

The NRA needs gun control. So the NRA perpetuates gun control. They support anti-gun politicians, and when those anti-gun politicians propose more gun control, the NRA sends out more letters screaming for help, and another few million dollars roll in. What a scam!

Of course in order for the scam to work for very long, the NRA also needs to appear to be doing something. They need to be able to claim that they helped to elect pro-gun politicians. This means that the NRA is necessarily more concerned with supporting a winner than with supporting pro-gun candidates. Thus the NRA supports whomever they think will win, rather than the most pro-gun candidate.

The Utah governor’s race is a perfect example. Mike Leavitt is solidly anti-gun, but the media insisted he was a "sure thing", with an 80% approval rating. So the NRA endorsed him, instead of any of the pro-gun candidates. They goofed. Gun owners hate "Slick Mikey", and booed him right off the stage. They forced Leavitt into a primary with pro-gun candidate Glen Davis. The NRA destroyed the best chance they had to elect a pro-gun governor of Utah, and may end up irreparably damaging the rights of Utah’s gun owners. Even the Utah Shooting Sports Council, the NRA’s usually docile ally, is furious at this betrayal.

These shameful shenanigans allow the NRA actually to support gun control by colluding with the media and the gun-grabbers. The anti-gun forces moan endlessly about the NRA and its "extremist" views, even though the NRA is neither "extreme" nor even very "pro-gun". The media then define the sides as NRA vs. Handgun Control, Inc. (HCI), giving us a choice between NRA sponsored gun control and HCI sponsored gun control. This completely eliminates the possibility of NO gun control from the discussion, and thus from the minds of the public. If your choices are limited to NRA gun control and HCI gun control, you can bet you’ll end up with – you guessed it – gun control!

The problem here is not ordinary NRA members, many of whom are solid pro-gun, pro-liberty folks, many of whom I consider friends. These people don’t believe that Mike Leavitt is "uniquely suited to be the Republican nominee for Governor of Utah". They’re hard-working, responsible Americans who don’t deserve to have their hard-earned money spent on anti-gun politicians.

If you’re a Utah NRA member, you gave over $.50 to Leavitt this year! Meanwhile, all three of the pro-gun candidates combined spent less than the $10,000 the NRA gave this anti-gun zealot. What might have happened had the NRA decided to support one of the pro-gun challengers? (Consider that Glen Davis got 46% of the vote while spending only $3,000. It’s mind boggling!)

What happened in Utah must not be allowed to happen in other states. It’s time the NRA’s reprehensible support for gun control and anti-gun politicians is exposed to NRA members and to the public. It’s time people realize that the NRA is doing more harm than good. It’s time to send the NRA the same message we send to people like Bill Clinton and Ted Kennedy – NO MORE GUN CONTROL! Otherwise the NRA may end up endorsing Hillary Clinton this fall!

Please write to the following people to protest the NRA’s support for gun control:

Mr. Randy Kozuch
NRA/ILA Director of State and Local Affairs
National Rifle Association of America
11250 Waples Mill Road
Fairfax, VA 22030

Mr. James Baker
NRA/ILA Director
National Rifle Association of America
11250 Waples Mill Road
Fairfax, VA 22030

Mr. Charlton Heston
Office of the President
National Rifle Association of America
11250 Waples Mill Road
Fairfax, VA 22030

You can also call 1-800-392-8683.

Nearly three years ago, I wrote the following Letter to the NRA:

When you decide to stop selling our birthright,

When you decide to stop supporting permits,

When you proclaim that each and every one of us is innocent until proven

guilty; that we need not subject ourselves to "background checks",

registration or bureaucracy,

When you refuse to tolerate evil,

When you are willing to call evil by its rightful name,

When you are willing to call genocide by its rightful name,

When you stop distracting yourselves and others with peripheral issues,

When you learn that a compromise with the devil is no compromise at all,

Then, and only then, will you have my support.

Until that time, may your chains rest lightly.

I’m still waiting for a response.

And for Not Rational Anymore to come to its senses.

Ó 2000, Sarah Thompson, M.D., and The Righter

Dr. Thompson is Former Executive Director of the Utah Gun Owners Alliance.