Background checks are performed on each firearm transaction at a gun dealer’s stores. Your March 14 editorial, “Rural sheriffs side with criminals in defiance of background check law,” notes that a $25 background fee will be charged to people making private sales, but you fail to mention that there is a transfer fee that is not set, and it is to be decided by the dealer providing the service. That was left to a reasonable amount.
What is reasonable to you? My time is set at $50 an hour. I have to enter the gun into my books and sit on line waiting for Carson City to respond.
You also didn’t add that a gun dealer can’t transfer a used firearm unless he has a secondhand license from his city or a pawn license. There is a cost of more than $500 a year for that license.
The gun has to remain in the dealer’s custody for 30 days to ascertain whether it’s stolen. That requires a safe.
Now, a simple 10-minute transfer is a legal requirement for both persons to come to the store twice.
So, how do you expect sheriffs to enforce the law? A reasonable person would suggest that a cop must be present and a registration of firearms must exist.
A sheriff’s job is to protect the Constitution, not laws that are unconstitutional and unenforceable to make people feel good. Feel-good laws only infringe on innocent peoples’ rights.