Rob Boudrie
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I respectfully disagree with GOAL and think that the effort to start a referendum to recall the recent atrocity of a law is not strategically wise.
The proper reason to file referendum petitioins, or file court cases, is with a strategy to win - not to use these vehicles as platforms to express righteous indignation. There is no reasonable path to a win with a "let people buy child killing weapons of war" vote ... which is how it will be spun. Ditto for arguing people should be able to carry concealed handguns without ever having fired a gun.
People, or orgs, filing cases can become consumed in their personal conviction that they are on the side of what is right, that they lose perspective on strategy and tilt at windmills or try to teach pigs to sing. The long battle is chess, not checkers.
Senator Cheryl Jacques declared "I do not want or seek votes from GOAL members" when running for election - and knew that stating this would help her win. She was undefeatable in elections until she chose not to re-run.
MA is not WY. Such a referendum will almost certainly fail. GOAL can publish any "investigation" or "analysis" it wishes, but that will pale in comparison to the mainstream media against us. The genpop will be constantly hit with "assault weapon", "weapon of war", and the classic "does not violate the second amendment" . The referendum will go down in defeat, and will have demonstrated that the new law represents the will of the people. Even someone who has been our friend Senator Moore voted in favor of the bill.
The 1976 handgun ban referendum was different - people could relate to handguns as a self defense tool, and GOAL was formed as a defensive move - and did an astoundingly good job and resisting and defeating it. The system was against us then as well- the MA SJC took a case right before the referendum (Davis, I think) so it could hand down a ruling that there was no individual right to own a handgun in MA.
Similarly, any suit to throw out the entire law is unlikely to succeed as the strategy will let the court hang an adverse decision on a few points, ignore the other points, and set a precedent against us. Better to attack specific points in separate actions (eating the elephant one bite at a time).
Update: At the time I wrote the above, I was not aware it would put the law on hold for a year or two, so I retract my opinion that this is a bad idea.
The proper reason to file referendum petitioins, or file court cases, is with a strategy to win - not to use these vehicles as platforms to express righteous indignation. There is no reasonable path to a win with a "let people buy child killing weapons of war" vote ... which is how it will be spun. Ditto for arguing people should be able to carry concealed handguns without ever having fired a gun.
People, or orgs, filing cases can become consumed in their personal conviction that they are on the side of what is right, that they lose perspective on strategy and tilt at windmills or try to teach pigs to sing. The long battle is chess, not checkers.
Senator Cheryl Jacques declared "I do not want or seek votes from GOAL members" when running for election - and knew that stating this would help her win. She was undefeatable in elections until she chose not to re-run.
MA is not WY. Such a referendum will almost certainly fail. GOAL can publish any "investigation" or "analysis" it wishes, but that will pale in comparison to the mainstream media against us. The genpop will be constantly hit with "assault weapon", "weapon of war", and the classic "does not violate the second amendment" . The referendum will go down in defeat, and will have demonstrated that the new law represents the will of the people. Even someone who has been our friend Senator Moore voted in favor of the bill.
The 1976 handgun ban referendum was different - people could relate to handguns as a self defense tool, and GOAL was formed as a defensive move - and did an astoundingly good job and resisting and defeating it. The system was against us then as well- the MA SJC took a case right before the referendum (Davis, I think) so it could hand down a ruling that there was no individual right to own a handgun in MA.
Similarly, any suit to throw out the entire law is unlikely to succeed as the strategy will let the court hang an adverse decision on a few points, ignore the other points, and set a precedent against us. Better to attack specific points in separate actions (eating the elephant one bite at a time).
Update: At the time I wrote the above, I was not aware it would put the law on hold for a year or two, so I retract my opinion that this is a bad idea.
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