Opinion ID: 2973517
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The ATF Rulings

Text: The Government argues that we should rely on several ATF Rulings (“the Rulings”) that define “designed to shoot” and “can be readily restored” and that classify various modified weapons 1 The United States Code explains that the Internal Revenue Code of 1954 as amended may be cited as the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, and that “[t]he sections of Title 26, United States Code, are identical to the sections of the Internal Revenue Code.” 1 U.S.C. § 204; Tax Reform Act of 1986, Pub. L. 99-514, § 2(a), 100 Stat. 2095 (noting that “[t]he Internal Revenue Title enacted August 16, 1954, as heretofore, hereby, or hereafter amended, may be cited as the ‘Internal Revenue Code of 1986’”). 2 The district court erroneously applied 18 U.S.C. § 3051(c)(1), which repealed 31 U.S.C. 9703(o) but was not enacted until November 25, 2002, over ten months after the property at issue was seized. This error, however, is immaterial, because the Customs laws, 19 U.S.C. §§ 1602-1631, apply under either statute, and thus the burden of proof is the same. Alverson’s argument that former 31 U.S.C. § 9703(o)(1) does not apply to forfeitures pursuant to 26 U.S.C. § 5872(a) because § 5872(a) is not an “applicable law enforced or administered by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms” is without merit. Because Congress specifically exempted § 5872(b) but not § 5872(a) from § 9703(o)(1)’s reach, the intent was clearly for § 5872(a) to be considered an “applicable law” under § 9703(o)(1). Moreover, Alverson points to no alternative statute that would have governed in place of 31 U.S.C. § 9703(o)(1). No. 04-5082 United States v. One TRW, Model M14 et al. Page 4 as machineguns because they were “designed to shoot” automatically. Typically, where a statute is ambiguous and the implementing agency has interpreted the statute, a court will determine what, if any, level of deference the interpretation should be afforded and then defer accordingly. The Supreme Court has distinguished between the more deferential standard of Chevron, under which agency interpretations will control as long as they are “based on a permissible construction of the statute,” Chevron U.S.A. Inc. v. Natural Res. Def. Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837, 842-43 (1984), and the less deferential standard of Skidmore, under which the weight of an agency’s interpretation “depend[s] upon . . . all those factors which give it power to persuade, if lacking power to control,” Skidmore v. Swift & Co., 323 U.S. 134, 140 (1944). See United States v. Mead Corp., 533 U.S. 218, 234-35 (2001). Chevron deference will be afforded to agency interpretations, like the ATF Rulings, that were not made pursuant to notice-and-comment rulemaking or formal adjudication, only where the reviewing court determines that Congress intended such agency action to have the “force of law.” Mead Corp., 533 U.S. at 231-32; see also Christensen v. Harris County, 529 U.S. 576, 587 (2000). The amount of deference that the Rulings merit is unsettled,3 and we need not decide this question in this case. The ATF Rulings, even if entitled to full Chevron deference, would provide little guidance, as their explanation of4“can be readily restored to shoot” hardly helps to clarify the statutory definition of this provision. Moreover, the Rulings have little bearing on whether the Defendant weapon “can be readily restored to shoot[] automatically” because the weapons at issue in the Rulings were classified as machineguns based on the ATF’s determination that they were “designed to shoot” automatically.5