Date: 2005-10-20
Speaker: VAN HOLLEN (democrat)
Chamber: H

Mr. Speaker. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker. I will include in the RECORD the following letters in opposition to S. 397. Letters from the ABA. letters from two former directors of the ATF. a letter from a number -of nationally recognized organizations. and letters from a number of law professors. Mr. Speaker. a moment ago. I raised the scenario of a terrorist getting denied access to an airplane because they are on the terrorist watch list going down to a local gun shop and saying. You. know. I am on that watch list. can I get some guns? And under this legislation. that individual would be allowed to purchase those guns. I have read the bill. and that is why I offered the amendment in committee. And what the bill says very clearly under negligent entrustment is essentially if the gun dealer knows or should know that the person to whom the product is supplied is likely to use the product in a manner involving unreasonable risk of physical injury. Now. we all might say common sense tells us that that would cover a person on the terrorist watch list. But you know what. that is not what the explanation was in committee. In fact. I have the committee transcript here. and the gentleman from Utah stated that the reason that they did not want to adopt the amendment was not because the bill already covered that scenario. The real reason was they have questions about the reliability of the terrorist watch list and whether or not someone who is on the terrorist watch list is legitimately put there. Well. here is the question. If the terrorist watch list is good enough to deny someone access to an airplane becauge that will put the public safety at risk. why is it not good enough to deny someone a firearm who goes down to the local gun store? We have tried to make it a condition that people who are on the terrorist watch list cannot purchase weapons at gun stores. The Attorney General in testimony before our committee said maybe we should think about that. We have not passed that as a Congress. And so for the chairman of the committee to say that the gun store owner will be assumed to know that person is a danger. when the United States Congress and the Judiciary Committee have refused to make that decision. it is just plain wrong. The Congress has not gone on record saying that someone on the terrorist watch list should not get a gun. Why should we expect a gun dealer and seller to do that? So this does open a loophole that would allow exactly the scenario I talked about. It would close the door on lawsuits by the victims of the snipers in this area. The letters I submitted for the RECORD from law professors and others -make it absolutely clear that that is what this does. Look. we have got a system for bringing lawsuits. We heard from the author of the bill. the gentleman from Florida . a number of cases that were filed that he said were frivolous. Most of those cases were in fact dismissed from the courts. The system is working. Frivolous lawsuits were dismissed. But what this legislation would do is to change the rules. It does not have to change the rules to protect the ones that were dismissed. they have been dismissed under the existing rules. So why are we changing them? Because we want to deny people who bring legitimate suits today. people like the families of the sniper victims. people like the officers from New Jersey. the police officers. who I must point out. again. and emphasize obtained settlements in those lawsuits. We want to close the courthouse door on them. I would just ask a very simple question. Mr. Speaker. my colleagues. We have a bill here saying we are going to protect the Lawful Commerce in Arms Act. which in fact changes the rules to make what is today unlawful. lawful. Why do we not go about the business of passing legislation to protect the victims of gun violence rather than that small handful of badapple gun dealers who wrongfully and negligently help put the guns in the hands of killers in this country and allow them to go on the kind of rampage that leads to the death of so many people. The killers are in jail. Thank God for that. But why should someone whois known to be negligent. who the ATF found to be negligent and later closed the gun shop. why should that person not be liable for their contribution to the negligence and to the deaths and sufferings that were faced -by those families? Let us get about protecting the victims. Mr. Speaker. the material I previously referred to is as follows: