Please contact your state Representative today in support of H 562!
House Bill 562, the Second Amendment Affirmation Act, could be considered by the full North Carolina House of Representatives any day, perhaps as early as tomorrow. As previously reported, H 562 has faced opposition from anti-gun extremists such as former New York City Mayor and billionaire Michael Bloomberg who continue to funnel out-of-state money into North Carolina to promote a deceptive, misinformation campaign. It is critical that state Representatives hear from gun owners and sportsmen who support this legislation!
Anti-gun advocates have been running ads that seem intended to mislead North Carolinians into believing H 562 would eliminate all background checks on handgun purchases. H 562 would simply replace a nearly 100-year-old law that allows sheriffs to use arbitrary, personal discretion when determining who may lawfully purchase a handgun with the FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). NICS is utilized by the majority of other states, and also used in North Carolina for purchases of rifles and shotguns from licensed dealers. The current antiquated, inefficient law requires law-abiding North Carolina citizens to ask permission from their local sheriff before being allowed to purchase a handgun. Even if an individual is not prohibited from purchasing a handgun under federal or state law, a sheriff can still deny the request based on the sheriff’s personal belief that the individual is not of “good moral character,” whatever that means.
Furthermore, there is no real uniformity to how this law is implemented, as many sheriff departments operate the system differently. It is long past time for this system to be repealed, and for North Carolina to join the majority of the country by utilizing NICS for handgun purchases from licensed dealers.
Along with repealing the handgun purchase permit system, the Second Amendment Affirmation Act seeks to make a number of important improvements which would:
- Require the chief law enforcement officer (CLEO) of a jurisdiction to certify the transfer or making of a firearm in a timely manner. This measure had been removed in a previous version, but has been added back to the bill.
- Clarify the exemption for keeping a firearm in a vehicle by a person with a valid Concealed Handgun Permit while the vehicle is on the property of a public school.
- Improve the existing Range Protection Law, which would help to protect shooting ranges from new local ordinances designed to shut them down.
- Improve the issuing process and remove unnecessary disqualifiers for Concealed Handgun Permits.
- Remove the prohibition on using a lawfully possessed short barreled rifle for hunting.
- Strengthen North Carolina’s preemption statute.
It is critical you continue to contact your state Representative and urge her or him to support the Second Amendment and support NRA’s efforts to pass H 562, the Second Amendment Affirmation Act. Let your representative know that Michael Bloomberg and his gun-ban supporters do NOT speak for you, and you support NRA's position to replace the flawed Pistol Purchase Permit system with the far more efficient NICS background check system used by the majority of other states.
Please use our online form or call your Representative TODAY and politely urge him or her to support H 562, especially replacing the flawed Pistol Purchase Permit system with the NICS background check system, and encourage others to do the same.
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