| In a vote that is sure to make out-of-state gun purchasers happy, the West Virginia House of Delegates overwhelmingly passed HB 4521 Friday morning. The so-called "Second Amendment Appreciation Act" creates an annual sales tax holiday for the purchase of guns during the first weekend in October.
At a time when West Virginia is struggling to balance its budget and cutting appropriations for essential components of our social safety net, lawmakers have chosen to give a tax cut to gun owners.
Delegate Scott Varner (D-Marshall), who was one of 11 co-sponsors of the bill, commented to WTRF-TV that "The idea is to get them in to purchase the firearm and, along with that, you get all the ancillary benefits."
One can't help but wonder if some of those "ancillary benefits" will be more gun related crime and accidental shootings in West Virginia and beyond.
Unfortunately, the bill passed with only 2 nay votes. Delegates Brown and Doyle deserve great credit for having the courage to stand up to the NRA.
Gun control advocates are not the only critics of the legislation. The Tax Foundation, a nonpartisan tax research group based in Washington, D.C., has characterized gun sales tax holidays as "good politics, but terrible policy".
In a post on their blog, the Tax Foundation comments:
"They [gun sales tax holidays] are a political gimmick. But lawmakers should not be allowed to play politics with the tax code.
Let's be clear here: the issue is not gun rights. If applying the sales tax to guns is anti-Second Amendment, then taxing mp3 players is anti-music and taxing paper clips is anti-paper clip."
Similar guns sales tax holidays have been enacted in Louisiana and South Carolina and are under consideration in Mississippi and Oklahoma.
The bill now goes to the WV State Senate where it will likely be referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee chaired by Sen. Jeffrey Kessler (D), who like Del. Varner, represents Marshall County.
Coincidentally, Sen. Kessler made headlines earlier this month for another gun-related bill, Senate Bill 515. Kessler introduced what he called "the Bloomberg Bill" in an effort to curtail out-of-state sting operations, which are being conducted across the country by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, aimed at preventing guns from being used in crimes in New York.
Kessler commented that such operations amount to illegal entrapment, which encourages otherwise law-abiding citizens to break the law. SB 515, which has now passed the WV Senate and is pending in the WV House of Delegates, would make it a felony for someone who is not a law enforcement officer to knowingly solicit a gun dealer to sell a gun or ammunition under circumstances which the person knows would violate the law.
-- Post edited to reflect amended title of the bill, which excludes ammunition purchases from the sales tax holiday. |
