BELLEVUE, WA – The Second Amendment Foundation and its partners in a case challenging the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives’ “final rule” redefining frames and receivers as firearms, have filed a response brief with the U.S. Supreme Court in a case is known as VanDerStok v. Garland.
SAF is joined by Defense Distributed, Polymer80, Inc., and Not an LLC, LLC (doing business as JSD Supply). They are represented by Houston, Texas attorney Charles R. Flores.
The brief recalls how Congress enacted the Gun Control Act of 1968 pursuant to the Commerce Clause with no intention of discouraging or eliminating the private ownership or use of firearms by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes. This includes the long-standing tradition of building personal firearms, and the original act defined “firearm” as a working gun, not a gun part, or kit, or incomplete firearm. In 1978, ATF promulgated a rule defining the “frame or receiver” of a firearm, taking the position that “receiver blanks” were not “firearms” under the 1968 Act.
“In 2022, this changed,” SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb recalled, “when the ATF redefined the term ‘firearm’ to include parts kits or segments known as frames and receivers. This arbitrary and complete reversal of its own rule essentially criminalizes an American tradition dating back to the colonial era.”
According to SAF Executive Director Adam Kraut, who is a practicing attorney, this definition change carries “huge legal consequences” for American gun owners, particularly the “home gunsmiths” who continue the tradition of building their own, personal firearms.
“American citizens,” Kraut said, “have always had the right to make personal guns without government permission. The Second Amendment protects this right, which has its foundation in the nation’s history. This rule change is an egregious attempt by a federal agency, and the current administration, to essentially criminalize an activity which is part of the American heritage.”
The Second Amendment Foundation (www.saf.org) is the nation’s 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 720,000 members and supporters and conducts many programs designed to better inform the public about the consequences of gun control.
