Gun owners across Maine would be subject to a first in the nation and potentially expensive new mandate just for owning a firearm under a proposal put forward by Rep. Janice Cooper of Yarmouth. The proposal will be considered by the Legislative Council of the Maine Legislature later this month before it can move forward.
Listed on the website of the Maine Revisor of Statute’s website is the proposed bill, LR 2645 “An Act To Require a Person Who Owns a Firearm To Purchase Liability Insurance.”
While several states have attempted to impose such requirements, no state has successfully passed the requirement into law. Supporters typically say that the measure will cut down on violent crimes committed with guns. Opponents strongly disagree.
Insurance companies and gun rights advocates both have opposed efforts in other states for numerous reasons.
Insurance companies say that while advocates of such mandates often talk about cutting down on violent crimes committed with guns, liability insurance does not cover intentional acts – only accidents. They say that puts the goals of supporters of the law at cross purposes with the principle of insurance. Insurance companies have also said that a new requirement would be costly and complicated.
Gun rights advocates have some overlapping concerns related to driving up the cost of buying or owning a gun – some firearm liability insurance proposals that have been put forward in other states or nationally would have required gun owners to show proof of insurance before being allowed to even purchase a firearm.
But the concept of paying to exercise a constitutional right, they say, amounts to an unconstitutional infringement before any discussion about the cost of insurance comes into play.
“This is just another in a long line of ‘do something’ attempts by the socialist left to make owning a gun so onerous that they hope people will opt not to. A solution to a non-existent problem. I can’t think of any other right protected by our constitution that requires insurance to exercise,” says Bruce Ashmore, a member of Gun Owners of Maine, a vibrant and effective grassroots organization focused on defending gun rights.
“The Second Amendment doesn’t end with “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed, if you have liability insurance,” he says.
Further, skeptics question how such a law could be enforced. Would the government create a registry of gun owners and monitor their liability insurance?
Unlike car insurance, which is only required for vehicles on public roads, firearm liability insurance would presumably be required at all times, even when firearms were locked away for months or years on end.
The penalty for not having adequate insurance could also be steep. In 2013, a Representative from New York proposed a law that carried a $10,000 fine for individuals who sold a firearm to someone without adequate liability insurance.
Another bill in the New York State Senate would have required gun owners carry $1 million in liability insurance coverage.
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