A California Democrat is proposing a new law requiring residents to register their shotguns and rifles or go to jail, CBSNews.com has learned.

Assemblyman Mike Feuer, whose district includes Beverly Hill and West Hollywood, this week introduced legislation ordering law enforcement to “permanently keep” records of anyone who buys a gun from a dealer or an individual. California already stores information about handgun purchases.

Feuer is no friend of firearms owners: his previous legislative effort, which Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed into law, required all new handguns to include “microstamping” technology that can imprint serial numbers on spent ammunition casings. As a Los Angeles city councilman, Feuer proposed limiting city residents to one gun a month.

Feuer spokeswoman Arianna Smith declined to answer questions about the bill on Tuesday afternoon, saying the staff member involved was in a meeting and not immediately available.

The proposal comes as the U.S. Supreme Court is considering a landmark civil rights case, McDonald v. Chicago, which will decide whether Second Amendment rights in the federal constitution trump state anti-gun laws. But California is proposing mandatory registration — and not a flat ban, as Washington, D.C. once tried and the justices rejected — and even legal scholars specializing in this area disagree about whether registration is constitutional.

“Even though the constitutionality of such a measure is a close call, it is a horrible public policy choice,” says Gene Hoffman, chairman of the CalGuns Foundation. “Just as Canada is about to do away with their long gun registry after squandering $1 billion, California wishes to attack law abiding gun owners for firearms not used in crime.”

A CBC News article last month reported that the Canadian parliament is backing away from the nation’s gun registry, which was enacted in 1989 and has now come under fire by critics who call it a billion-dollar boondoggle.

Feuer’s bill isn’t exactly a surprise: He told the Brady Campaign, an anti-gun advocacy group, earlier this year that his forthcoming proposal would give law enforcement another tool to track down people in possession of illegal firearms. “This legislation will close a glaring loophole and ensure that all firearm records, not just handgun records, are maintained for law enforcement purposes,” Ellen Boneparth, spokesperson for the California Brady Campaign Chapters, said in a statement at the time.

Feuer appears to have adopted an unusual approach to introducing his mandatory registration bill. He took an existing piece of criminal legislation, AB 1810, that dealt with graffiti and vandalism, and replaced it with a completely new version with the same bill number.

A hearing is scheduled for April 13 in Sacramento before the California State Assembly’s Committee on Public Safety.

At the moment, a minority of states including New York, Maryland, California, New Jersey, and Massachusetts require mandatory registration for handguns. Others, like Pennsylvania, require sales of handguns to go through a dealer, who keeps records of the transaction.

No federal firearm registry exists, though some anti-gun types have pushed for one in the past. An unsuccessful 1995 bill, H.R. 169, would have imposed California-style registration of handguns nationwide through a “federal handgun registration system.” Violations would have been punished by up to 12 years in prison. The author of the bill, Rep. Cardiss Collins, D-Illinois, told her colleagues at the time that “I still believe the best way to control handguns is to ban them outright.”

Declan McCullagh is a correspondent for CBS Interactive’s CNET News and a contributor to CBSNews.com. You can e-mail him or follow him on Twitter as declanm. Declan previously was a reporter for Time and the Washington bureau chief for Wired.

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My own review will be coming soon, but here is a review from gun blast

Arshad Mohammed, Reuters
WASHINGTON

Tue, Oct 6 2009WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The United States reversed policy on Wednesday and said it would back launching talks on a treaty to regulate arms sales as long as the talks operated by consensus, a stance critics said gave every nation a veto.

Barack Obama | China | Russia

The decision, announced in a statement released by the U.S. State Department, overturns the position of former President George W. Bush’s administration, which had opposed such a treaty on the grounds that national controls were better.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the United States would support the talks as long as the negotiating forum, the so-called Conference on the Arms Trade Treaty, “operates under the rules of consensus decision-making.”

“Consensus is needed to ensure the widest possible support for the Treaty and to avoid loopholes in the Treaty that can be exploited by those wishing to export arms irresponsibly,” Clinton said in a written statement.

While praising the Obama administration’s decision to overturn the Bush-era policy and to proceed with negotiations to regulate conventional arms sales, some groups criticized the U.S. insistence that decisions on the treaty be unanimous.

“The shift in position by the world’s biggest arms exporter is a major breakthrough in launching formal negotiations at the United Nations in order to prevent irresponsible arms transfers,” Amnesty International and Oxfam International said in a joint statement.

However, they said insisting that decisions on the treaty be made by consensus “could fatally weaken a final deal.”

“Governments must resist US demands to give any single state the power to veto the treaty as this could hold the process hostage during the course of negotiations. We call on all governments to reject such a veto clause,” said Oxfam International’s policy adviser Debbie Hillier.

The proposed legally binding treaty would tighten regulation of, and set international standards for, the import, export and transfer of conventional weapons.

Supporters say it would give worldwide coverage to close gaps in existing regional and national arms export control systems that allow weapons to pass onto the illicit market.

Nations would remain in charge of their arms export control arrangements but would be legally obliged to assess each export against criteria agreed under the treaty. Governments would have to authorize transfers in writing and in advance.

The main opponent of the treaty in the past was the U.S. Bush administration, which said national controls were better. Last year, the United States accounted for more than two-thirds of some $55.2 billion in global arms transfer deals.

Arms exporters China, Russia and Israel abstained last year in a U.N. vote on the issue.

The proposed treaty is opposed by conservative U.S. think tanks like the Heritage Foundation, which said last month that it would not restrict the access of “dictators and terrorists” to arms but would be used to reduce the ability of democracies such as Israel to defend their people.

The U.S. lobbying group the National Rifle Association has also opposed the treaty.

A resolution before the U.N. General Assembly is sponsored by seven nations including major arms exporter Britain. It calls for preparatory meetings in 2010 and 2011 for a conference to negotiate a treaty in 2012.

By Ann DeMatteo, Assistant Metro Editor

NORTH HAVEN — The Marlin Firearms Co., one of the town’s top taxpayers, will start to lay off employees in May and will close by June 2011.

The gun manufacturer’s employees were told Thursday that the jobs of 265 salaried and hourly workers would be eliminated over 18 months. Marlin traces its history back to 1870.

Marlin officials could not be reached for comment, but First Selectman Michael J. Freda heard the news from a company official Thursday evening.

Freda said several factors appear to be driving the closure, from the cost of doing business in Connecticut to wage differentials.

“The situation appears to be compounded by the fact that Connecticut is a difficult state for any manufacturer to sustain its business model,” Freda said after meeting with the company official.

Freda said he asked whether the services Marlin was providing would be moved, but was told that was undetermined.

State and federal officials also were contacted Thursday, according to Freda.

The Remington Arms Co. bought Marlin in late 2007. Marlin is on Kenna Drive, off Bailey Road. Remington is a North Carolina affiliate that falls under the umbrella of the Freedom Group, one of the largest manufacturers of firearms and ammunition in the world, according to its Web site.

No layoffs or closures were anticipated at the time of the $41.7 million sale.

The firearms manufacturer should not be confused with The Marlin Co., a business-to-business Internet and print publication service that operated at the plant until late 2007. Now in Wallingford because it needed more space, that company employs 120 people.

The chairman and president of The Marlin Co. is Frank Kenna III, whose grandfather, the late Frank Kenna Sr., bought Marlin Firearms at auction in 1924 when it was bankrupt. Marlin Firearms was started by John Marlin.

“I’m sure for the employees, it’s devastating,” Kenna said of the closure. “I still know a lot of them, and all I can say is I’m very sympathetic to them. It’s a tough blow.”

But, Kenna said the rifle and shotgun industry has changed over the years. “What’s happening in the industry is it’s consolidating and there are fewer and fewer individual firearms companies. The culture has changed.

“When we sold we were producing half of the number of rifles that we were in the early 1970s,” he said.

The news that Marlin will be closing comes at a bad time for North Haven, which has a $6.6 million revenue gap going into the next fiscal year.

“The timing of this news is very unfortunate as we are preparing for our upcoming budget,” Freda said.

As a result, his efforts to generate economic development in town, possibly with incremental tax financing to attract new businesses, “will be kicking into higher gear.”

Freda said he will be doing his best to urge local Marlin officials to arrange a meeting for him with the parent company.

“I would like to meet with the parent company in an effort to see if there’s any way to keep them here,” said Freda. “I can’t accept it without making an attempt,” he added.

How much tax revenue the town receives from the company annually was not immediately available. On the 2009 grand list, Marlin was ranked No. 14.

Contact Ann DeMatteo at 203-789-5716 or adematteo@newhavenregister.com.

Freda said he would like to team up with U.S. Rep. Rosa L. DeLauro, D-3, to see what resources are available.

New sale posted on the sales page…check it out

BELLEVUE, WA – The Second Amendment Foundation is delighted to be part of a new and growing international organization whose goal is the protection of firearms rights for private citizens.

The International Association for the Protection of Civilian Arms Rights (IAPCAR) met last week in Nuremberg, Germany. Gun rights organizations and activists from several countries, including Sweden, Norway, Germany, the United Kingdom, Canada, Italy and the United States attended. The group’s official slogan is “Liberty and Security.”

SAF Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb, who serves as an IAPCAR director, just returned from the meeting, and he is encouraged that groups from other countries, including The Philippines, Switzerland, Belgium, Argentina, Finland, India, Israel, Greece, South Africa, and Australia are also interested in joining.

“Self-defense is a human right,” Gottlieb observed, “that is not just limited to citizens of the United States thanks to our Second Amendment. We look at IAPCAR as an organization that can counter the world gun control campaign currently being waged by the International Action Network on Small Arms (IANSA). We will provide rebuttal to IANSA’s misinformation and myths about firearms ownership, and work to expand the individual human right to defend ourselves and our families from crime, the violence that often accompanies civil unrest and the growing threat of terrorism.”

Current plans call for IAPCAR to have offices in Washington, D.C. and Vienna, Austria, Gottlieb revealed. Washington, D.C. attorney Mark Barnes will serve as managing director.

“I am very encouraged by the response we’re getting from firearms groups all over the world,” Gottlieb said. “This is an important first step’ in regaining much lost ground, and putting the brakes on an international movement to strip private citizens of the means to protect their most cherished right, that of self-defense.”

Julianne Versnel, another IAPCAR director, said the group already has member organizations in Canada, the United States, Greece, Germany and Italy.

For more information, visit IAPCAR.com.

The Second Amendment Foundation (www.saf.org) is the nations oldest and largest tax-exempt education, research, publishing and legal action group focusing on the Constitutional right and heritage to privately own and possess firearms. Founded in 1974, The Foundation has grown to more than 650,000 members and supporters and conducts many programs designed to better inform the public about the consequences of gun control. SAF has previously funded successful firearms-related suits against the cities of Los Angeles; New Haven, CT; and San Francisco on behalf of American gun owners, a lawsuit against the cities suing gun makers and an amicus brief and fund for the Emerson case holding the Second Amendment as an individual right.