NY’s Assault Weapon Registration Begins

ALBANY (AP) —
Officer Tom Richards puts another gun on a pile next to a milk crate containing hand guns in Teaneck, N.J., Sunday as part of a gun buyback program. (AP Photo/The Record, Chris Pedota)
Officer Tom Richards puts another gun on a pile next to a milk crate containing hand guns in Teaneck, N.J., Sunday as part of a gun buyback program. (AP Photo/The Record, Chris Pedota)

Key measures of New York’s tough new gun law kicked in Monday, with owners of firearms now reclassified as assault weapons required to start registering the firearms and new limits on the number of bullets allowed in magazines.

As the new provisions took effect, New York’s affiliate of the National Rifle Association planned to file a court request for a federal injunction to immediate halt to the magazine limit.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo calls those and other provisions in the state’s new gun law common sense while dismissing criticisms he says come from “extreme fringe conservatives” who claim the government has no right to regulate guns.

“Yes, they are against it, but they are the extremists and the extremists shouldn’t win, especially on this issue when it is so important to the majority,” Cuomo said in a radio interview last week. “In politics, we have to be willing to take on the extremists, otherwise you will see paralysis.”

New York’s new gun restrictions, the first in the nation passed following December’s massacre at a Connecticut elementary school, limit state gun owners to no more than seven bullets in magazines, except at competitions or firing ranges.

Rich Davenport, recording secretary of the Erie County Federation of Sportsmen’s Clubs, questioned likely compliance with the requirement.

“I’m guessing it’ll be pretty low,” said Davenport. “I’m offended as an American.”

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