The ATF’s obsession with pistol braces is based on accidental law

As a group, gun owners have been conditioned to be pretty wary of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. That said, the recent tumult surrounding “pistol braces” has us even more anxious than usual. These braces are devices designed to help people operate large handguns based on familiar platforms such as the venerable AKM and AR-15. This whole mess relates to the administrative agency’s attempts to shoehorn these arms into the National Firearms Act, a terrible law wrought with hidden contradictions.

As initially conceived, the NFA sought to ban virtually all “concealable” firearms. Congress, recognizing that it did not have the authority to enact such a ban outright, attempted to achieve the same objective through the NFA’s prohibitively expensive taxation and registration scheme.

At first, the definition of an NFA-restricted firearm included any “pistol, revolver, shotgun having a barrel less than sixteen inches in length, or any other firearm capable of being concealed on the person.” Language pertaining to short-barreled rifles was to be explicitly added as well. The phrase “any other firearm capable of being concealed on the person” makes the intent of the bill clear: the law targeted all small, concealable firearms, be they pistols, shotguns, rifles, or exotics that defy simple classification.
Source: Washington Examiner
ATF Police by Office of Public Affairs Photo by Shane T. McCoy / US Marshals is licensed under Flickr Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.

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