Gun owners beware: Jim Ryan announces run for Illinois Governor

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The last time Illinois gun owners heard from former Attorney General Jim Ryan, Illinois government was in turmoil and Ryan wanted to be Governor.  The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Yesterday, Ryan announced that he still wants to be Governor of Illinois.  Like Mark Kirk, Ryan is a Republican--and like Mark Kirk, Ryan has a history of antagonizing gun owners in order to court anti-gun "moderates" in Illinois. In 2002, Ryan won the Republican primary and faced Rod Blagojevich in the general election, leaving gun owners with no "viable" choice who would represent them--or even listen to their concerns.  Ryan faced other obstacles, beginning with his last name--he was running to succeed another Governor Ryan who currently resides in federal prison in Indiana, and polling showed repeatedly that voters not only didn't realize that the two were not related, but that many, especially in Chicagoland, actually thought Governor George Ryan was running again.  (Even now, 19 percent of respondents to Ryan's own polling reportedly believe he's either George Ryan or a close relative . . . it's probably best not to dwell on what that says about the electorate.) And of course, Blagojevich was the first Democrat for Governor to get real support from the Chicago machine in some time; before him, the famous Illinois political combine had always been content to keep a balance with Republican office holders in statewide office and Democrats running Chicago, especially when, as with George Ryan, the Chicago Machine had the advantage of holding federal investigations over the state-level Republicans' heads.

But the big hit Jim Ryan took in 2002, the one very few "mainstream media" sources mentioned, began in 2000.  Ryan was eager to position himself for a run at the Governor's Mansion, and he was convinced as many politicians were in those days that there was only one correct side on the gun issue: moderate to anti-gun.  But what could he do to establish his anti-gun bona fides without alienating the deer hunters? He settled on a dramatic sting operation to catch people selling "assault weapons." Unfortunately, there was no practical way to crack down on such weapons using his jurisdiction as Illinois Attorney General, so he set his investigators the task of buying as many "assault weapons" as they could, as illegally as they could.  In the end, the only way they could accomplish their task was to find people who wanted to sell their firearms legally in interstate commerce, then convince them that it would be legal to circumvent federal law in some specific way.

This should have been the end of the investigation for several reasons; first, Ryan had set out to find traffickers, and he'd found none.  From the transcripts, it appears that all the sellers his people targeted were private individuals selling one or two of their own guns for personal reasons.  Second, the people they'd found were actually trying to follow the law, not break it--in other words, they'd found no criminals.  Third, and most importantly, the method the investigators settled upon to create illegal activity is itself illegal. At the time, John O'Connor of the Associated Press did an excellent (if widely ignored) job of covering the story, even including quotes from the transcripts of investigators' conversations with their victims:

Seller: "I'm not a dealer, just an honest citizen. I am however, aware that federal regulations require that if I transfer a firearm across state lines it must be transferred to a federal firearms license holder in the state of receipt. ... I can't take the risk of (ticking) off the Feds. I simply have to much to lose, wife, kids, job, house, etc. I'm sure the (federal authorities) would lock me up or at the very least fine the (deleted) out of me."
Investigator: "I spoke to a FFL that works in the same building as I do. He said in Illinois, as long as neither of us is a FFL gun dealer all I need is a valid Fire Arms Owner Identification Card. ... I would really like to avoid the hassle and expense of going through a dealer. Why should we put money in his pocket for doing nothing but having a piece of paper?"
Seller: "Thanks for your reply to my concerns about interstate firearms transfers. I must admit that I have never done this before and don't want to be liable for doing anything illegal."

Notice that the investigator actually claims to have consulted a licensed firearms dealer to find out what the law says.  The seller in this case would have been held liable for a criminal act (shipping a firearm interstate to someone other than an FFL) after being told that a legal expert advised that it would be legal to do so, if public outrage hadn't halted Ryan's grandstanding.

Seller: "It will have to be shipped through a licensed dealer to a
licensed dealer."  (Exactly as the law requires--CGRE)
AG: "If you are not a dealer, I believe you can ship the AK directly to me. This would cut out the expense of both of us having to pay dealers."
Seller, after reading about the federal dealer rule: "I believe it means that at least I must use a fire arms dealer from my end. Do you know the laws on this?" (Not quite--the law is that the firearm must be shipped to an FFL, not that it must be shipped from one.  But is this person showing clear criminal intent, or is he trying to find out what a confusing law says?)
AG: "We are both private citizens so you can sell to me directly."

Was the seller foolish to take legal advice from an anonymous buyer on the internet?  Undoubtedly, especially in a legal climate where the Attorney General of one of the largest states in the union had nothing better to do than run elaborate "stings" on gun owners who were attempting to follow the law.

Seller: "In checking with the local gun shop here in town the only way to sell a firearm is that it has to be sent from one FFL licensed party to another. ... I am not sure if it also applies to parts."
AG: "I do not believe parts have to go through a FFL, otherwise mail order places would be out of business."
Seller: "I just wanted to be legal about the transaction. ... I will
ship as parts. Like you say, no FFL required on the parts."

This is almost correct.  The seller could have shipped a box with all the parts except one, and that would have been legal.  However, every firearm has one central part that federal law considers a firearm by itself, whether it has any other parts attached or not.  For most guns, this is called the "receiver" or the "serial-numbered part." The box with that part in it, as far as the law is concerned, contains a firearm and is subject to all the same laws as a fully-assembled, working weapon. That box would have to go to an FFL, then to be transferred by him to the actual buyer.  The investigator's argument is a persuasive one, though, isn't it?

Perhaps that's why they chose to use it more than once:

Seller: "I need to send it to an FFL dealer, right?"
AG: "If you are not a dealer and just a private citizen, you can sell
directly to me."
Seller: "The only way you can send things via the mail over state lines is by sending to a valid FFL dealer. ... Sorry if this makes you change your mind, but I don't want to go to jail!"
AG: "How do you feel about breaking the gun down into two parts and sending them to me that way? It is definitely not illegal to send gun parts directly to an individual."
Seller: "All right. I'll break it down and send 2 packages."

Gun owners have good reason not to trust Jim Ryan, but they should not be the only ones.  Whether you think guns are good or bad, whether you think "assault weapons" should be legal or illegal, the real question to ask yourself about Jim Ryan is whether a man who would willfully entrap citizens outside his jurisdiction--citizens who are trying to follow the law--is fit to hold any elected office at all, much less to be Governor of Illinois. 

For More Information:

See www.illinoiscarry.org for more discussion of Jim Ryan as well as other Illinois gubernatorial candidates.