Do Citizens need Large Capacity Magazines?

The recent mass shootings in the United States has questioned on how to resolve this problem. There is evidence that many of these aggressors who have committed these shootings have been treated for mental illness or stop taking their medications or treatment. Some have been bullied in school like the ones at Columbine High School. Whatever the reason is, the bottom line, people are being wounded and killed.

We have people making statements that the Colt AR-15 and the AH-15 Ruger are military grade weapons or assault weapons, they are not. These weapons are semi-automatic firearms that can use high capacity magazines that can hold 15, 20, 30, or 50 rounds, the same can be said about copies made of the AK-47. Some companies even make drum magazines that can carry up to 90 shots. These are all semi-automatic weapons; you can fire a round as fast as you pull the trigger.

Military grade weapons are those with select fire, where soldiers can select single fire, three bursts shot or fully automatic firing at the intended target. A firearm does not make the person an excellent shooter; it is the person who is behind the weapon, who practices and becomes skilled at using the gun.

In the military, before you learn to use a weapon to fire it in the field, you learn weapon safety, when to shot and when not to shoot. You learn to field strip your gun, clean your weapon, then reassemble your gun. When you are training to become a law enforcement officer, you learn weapons safety, when to shoot and when not to pull the trigger. How to strip your firearm, clean your gun and reassemble your fire firearm.

If a person is going to buy a firearm, the person should go through a National Rifle Association gun safety course and pass the course, before being allowed to purchase any gun. Once a person has been given weapons and safety course, the individual can take the certificate and present the certification upon purchase of the gun of choice. The individual can fill out the BATF paperwork, and the firearms dealer can attach the document to the form and register the weapon and wait seven business days before the person can pick-up the firearm.

Those who have been prior military or law enforcement can be grandfather since the individuals had already received training in basic training or a law enforcement academy. Many security companies have their own weapons training instructor that will improve quality armed security officers. Like in Texas, teachers go through a firearms training and safety to become qualify as school marshals to protect students in rural school districts.

Maybe the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms should consider classifying these types of weapons and the high capacity magazines as a sub-class three license for those who want to buy these weapons must follow the same process as those who buy a class three license weapon.

State have the power to make laws for stores to stop selling high capacity magazines and only limit it to five round capacity. The only ones that will be allowed to buy high capacity magazines are law enforcement officers and individual security detail officers that protect nuclear power plants, electric power plants, water plants, water treatment plants, airports, seaports or state military installations, critical state facilities protection contracts or federal protection contract installations.

Remember the riot of Los Angles when four police officers were acquainted for the beating of Rodney King in 1991, the uprising lasted over five days in South Los Angles in 1992. 50 people died and more than 2,000 injured, Los Angles Police pulled out of the area, and it was beyond their control. Store owners had no police protection, and all they had were semiautomatic rifles with high capacity magazines to ward off looters, gangs who went around stealing and burning businesses.

Trying to solve this crisis of mass shooting is not an easy task, but something must be done very soon. Companies like Walmart and Dick's Sporting Goods have publicly announced that their companies will no longer be selling these firearms that can handle high capacity magazines for these weapons, corporate responsibility is moving in the right direction. I have talked to many former and current military and law enforcement personnel if there is any reason the average citizen needs a high capacity magazine? Most of us could not come up with a yes answer to this question.

In Texas, when you go hunting with a shotgun, you are regulated by state law that the gun can only hold three shotgun rounds and must have a stopper plug or dowel to prevent from hold more than three shotgun rounds. On rifles, most will just keep five shots, and state law will not allow any more than five rounds in your rifle. Yes, the Texas Game Warden does go around checking on people hunting when they happen to hear too many shots being fired, the officer will investigate.

We can still protect our First Amendment Rights and reduce the ability to have easy access to high capacity magazines. Then again people who enjoy shooting high capacity magazines participate in the competitive shooting. These gun-free zones at school allow mass shooters just to enable them to kill incident victims and license to concealed carrying citizen fear of being arrested. 

A parent should be allowed to carry a firearm to protect their children if a shooting was to occur. Remember the killer at the First Baptist Church of Sulfur Spring Branch, Texas when two citizens confronted the active shooter, he dropped his AH-15 Ruger and ran to his vehicle, and the two citizens gave chase, alerted law enforcement. If it were not for these those citizens, more people would have died that day.

Maybe the government should start a buyback program to get those high capacity magazines off the street and away from our schools. Our number one resource in America is the children who attend public and private schools; we need to do all we can to protect them. So, what is the answer to solving the mass shooting incidents in the United States?

People need to sit down and talk about how to resolve this mass shooting problem, to help prevent future events of mass shootings. These federal gun-free school zones have done nothing to stop these mass shooters. We need to bring back morality, right and wrong on how to handle problems. What is the answer, I do not know, but we need to solve this problem!