Massachusetts House No. 4885

July 25, 2024

A friendly journo from WGBH Boston asked me what we think of Massachusetts H4885 serializing all the guns and banning all the gun equipment. I’ll tell you what I told her.

1. The new serialization and licensing system is meant to ban the practice of DIY guns in fact, but not in name. Like California in 2018, Mass wants its Department of Criminal Justice to build and run a system for licensees to request and receive unique serial numbers before they can build a gun. If and when you’re approved, it will be illegal to use anything other than stone tools to assist you.
   
   The new system will likely not be funded or finished in time for the next Massachusetts legislative session, which will change the scheme again or ban the activity entirely. This is also the path California took.
   
   
2. The ban on milling machines and 3D printers abridges the First Amendment as a way to infringe the Second. In H4885, the way you determine if a milling machine violates the statute is by how it is advertised.

The journalist asked where I got the idea that guns should be unserialized in the first place. I said a couple hundred years ago or so there was a blockade of Boston Harbor that led to a siege. She and her Governor should look it up.

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