By Paul Lathrop | Contributing Editor
I have heard a phrase recently that I hadn’t heard in a long time: “The Overton Window.”
That is the concept that there are things that the general public sees as unacceptable on both extremes of the issue and generally finds something somewhere in the middle acceptable.
In the Second Amendment arena, we have witnessed that window move more and more to the anti-rights side over the past few decades, at least on the federal level. States seem to be divided, with several adopting permitless carry laws and declaring themselves Second Amendment sanctuaries. Other states are pushing more and stronger red flag laws, legislating “universal background checks,” and looking to limit magazine capacity.
It is time that we move the window ourselves. On one side, we have HB 125 and HB 127, which would end the Second Amendment as we know it. On the other side, we have Marjorie Taylor Greene’s bill entitled “The Second Amendment Preservation Act,” which would simply remove funding for any gun restrictions that are not already in place.
Both HB 125 and 127 and the Second Amendment Preservation Act have almost zero chance of passing. They didn’t introduce them to pass them. They brought them forward to move perceptions of what is acceptable. A side benefit of those proposed laws is to stir up strong supporters of those ideas and create conversation. Also, let’s face it, they are excellent fodder in political fundraising emails.
We need a brave legislator to introduce a measure that would repeal the 1934 National Firearms Act, the 1968 Gun Control Act, the Hughes Amendment, and a host of other Federal Restrictions of our right to keep and bear arms.
When a generally uninformed person looks at one extreme of the end of the personal possession and ownership of firearms and looks at the other extreme and sees “we aren’t going to fund any further restrictions,” the middle ground is going to be further restrictions.
