Tancredo seeks initiative supporting gun rightsBy Lynn Bartels of the Denver Post
Posted: 11/28/2009Former U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo has proposed a 2010 ballot measure that would recommend to Colorado's top elected officials that they oppose gun restrictions.
The Jefferson County Republican said he was prompted to act because the Obama administration has announced its intent to participate in negotiations on an international arms- trade treaty.
The treaty would regulate international trade — not domestic sales — but Tancredo argued Friday that gun owners had a right to be concerned.
"It's a pretty slippery step to gun confiscation," he said.
Tancredo conceded his measure is not binding, so even if it did pass, elected officials could vote their own way on gun issues.
"But if it passes with a healthy majority, then it's an excellent, excellent way of sending a message to Congress," Tancredo said Friday. "We cannot bind them to it, but we have every right to tell them what we think. What I like about this is the debate that will result from having this on the ballot."
Leading gun-control proponents could not be reached Friday for comment on the initiative.
Tancredo, who served 10 years in Congress, and his longtime friend, Charles Heatherly of Centennial, last week filed the gun proposal with the Legislative Council, the first in a number of steps needed to get a measure on the ballot.
The initiative asks Colorado's governor, state lawmakers, two U.S. senators and members of the U.S. House to "oppose any proposed international treaty, protocol or other agreement which limits, restricts or impairs the rights of individual citizens to keep and bear arms."
Tancredo said gun-rights supporters are upset because of an announcement by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in October that the United States was going to support United Nations-led efforts to negotiate an arms treaty.
"Conventional arms transfers are a crucial national security concern for the United States," Clinton said in part, in a statement issued by the State Department.
"The United States is committed to actively pursuing a strong and robust treaty that contains the highest possible, legally binding standards for the international transfer of conventional weapons."
Critics of such a movement include John Bolton, a Bush appointee to the United Nations. He told the National Rifle Association's NRA News that the Obama administration "is trying to act as though this is really just a treaty about international arms trade between nation states, but there's no doubt . . . that the real agenda here is domestic firearms control."
The Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and decades of court interpretations of it limit government authority to restrict domestic arms sales or ownership. But the NRA is quick to draw its members' attention to anything the group perceives as potential erosions of those rights.
Tancredo said if Colorado voters approve the initiative, he plans to take it to other states that allow citizens to put measures on the ballot. As for the remaining states, he said, he would work with their legislatures to consider similar resolutions.
Lynn Bartels: 303-954-5327 or lbartels@denverpost.comhttp://www.denverpost.com/headlines/ci_13882372
