Excerpt
Gun owners packed a hearing room in the Connecticut capital, vowing to oppose a bill that would require new markers on guns so that they are easier to trace.
One after another, they testified that the technology, called microstamping, was flawed and would increase the cost of guns.
But the witness who commanded the most attention in Hartford that day in 2009 was a representative of one of Connecticut’s major employers: the Colt Manufacturing Company, the gun maker.
The Colt executive, Carlton S. Chen, said the company would seriously consider leaving the state if the bill became law. “You would think that the Connecticut government would be in support of our industry,” Mr. Chen said.
Soon, Connecticut lawmakers shelved the bill; they have declined to take it up since. Now, in the aftermath of the school massacre in Newtown, the lawmakers are formulating new gun-control measures, saying the state must serve as a national model.
But the failed effort to enact the microstamping measure shows how difficult the climate has been for gun control in state capitals. The firearm companies have played an important role in defeating these measures by repeatedly warning that they will close factories and move jobs if new state regulations are approved.
The companies have issued such threats in several states, especially in the Northeast, where gun control is more popular. But their views have particular resonance in Connecticut, a cradle of the American gun industry.
Like manufacturing in Connecticut over all, the state’s gun industry is not as robust as it once was. Still, Connecticut remains the seventh-largest producer of firearms in the country, according to federal data.
Colt, based in Connecticut since the 1800s, employs roughly 900 people in the state. Two other major gun companies, Sturm, Ruger & Company and Mossberg & Sons, are also based in the state. In all, the industry employs about 2,000 people in Connecticut, company officials said.
Gun-control advocates have long viewed Hartford, the capital, as hospitable terrain, because Connecticut is a relatively liberal state and already has more gun restrictions than most. Democrats control both houses of the legislature.
Yet lawmakers in Hartford did more than shelve the microstamping bill in 2009. They also declined to push a bill last year that would have banned high-capacity ammunition magazines — the very accessory used by Adam Lanza to kill 26 people, including 20 children, at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown.
In several states, the gun companies have enlisted unions that represent gun workers, mindful that Democratic lawmakers who might otherwise back gun control also have close ties to labor.
COMMENT: The gun-nuts oppose making guns easier to trace?! So they ARE hiding something. The cost issue is a smoke screen.
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