Gun sales skyrocket as Obama's inauguration nears

Mike Massie got his first shotgun at the age of 10.

Guns have been in Massie’s life since he was 5 years old and trudging along beside his father carrying an unloaded shotgun. His children know how to handle weapons; he even purchased his nephew’s first shotgun when the boy was just one month old.

That’s why the Lynchburg resident is worried about what will happen to gun-control laws when President-elect Barack Obama takes office next month.

“I feel that I have the right to bear arms legally to defend myself, my family and my property,” Massie said. “I don’t believe that the government has the right to tell me I can’t do it.”

Concern that new gun-control measures will follow Obama’s election has fueled skyrocketing increases in gun sales and applications for permits to carry concealed weapons, both in Central Virginia and across the nation.

The Virginia State Police also has seen a surge in the number of background checks for potential gun owners, especially since the November election.

And local gun dealers report a waiting list for sales of assault rifles and many handgun models.

The president of the Virginia Citizens Defense League, Phillip Van Cleave, said gun owners point to Obama’s voting record as a state senator in Illinois and as a U.S. Senator.

He said Illinois has some of the nation’s most-restrictive gun laws, and is just one of two states (Wisconsin is the other) that does not allow weapons to be carried concealed.

Obama has said that he is respectful of the Second Amendment right to bear arms, but that efforts need to be made to crack down on gun violence.

“You’ve got the tradition of lawful gun ownership, that all of us saw, as we travel around rural parts of the country,” Obama said during an interview early this year with Tim Russert. “And it is very important for many Americans to be able to hunt, fish, take their kids out, teach them how to shoot. And then you’ve got the reality of 34 Chicago public school students who get shot down on the streets of Chicago.

“We can reconcile those two realities by making sure the Second Amendment is respected and that people are able to lawfully own guns, but that we also start cracking down on the kinds of abuses of firearms that we see on the streets.”

In Lynchburg, applications for concealed-carry permits are up over this time last year by more than 52 percent, for a total of 350 permits issued through November. In nearby counties, increases range from 9 percent in Appomattox to 34 percent in Amherst.

The Virginia State Police performs background checks for gun sales through licensed dealers. Spokeswoman Corrine Geller said normally there is about a 3 percent increase in those checks each year. This year, however, background checks increased by 12 percent over 2007.

“Only licensed gun dealers are required to do background checks,” Geller said. “You do not have to do background checks for direct sales, just those by licensed gun dealers.”

On Nov. 8, the Saturday following the election, the Virginia State Police’s Firearms Transaction Call Center received 1,862 transactions. Background checks jumped to 38,467 in November compared to 23,976 in the same month last year, a 60 percent increase.

Massie himself has a concealed-carry permit and has purchased three guns since the election.

“I carry everywhere I legally can,” he said. “I have that right and I feel like the government is taking that right away from us or will make it so hard that you’ll wish you were dead before you got through it.

“I feel like I’m being told one thing and once Obama gets into office, it will be different.”

For Massie, it’s part tradition and part self-defense. He has an artificial leg and carrying a gun makes him feel confident that he could protect his family.

“If a man was going to rape you or hurt you and you pull out your Colt .45 and put it in his face and give him that smile like, ‘Come on,’ he’s going to think twice.”

Assault rifles and handguns are selling out in Lynchburg, said Lindy Inge of L. Oppleman’s Guns. The trend began about two weeks prior to the Nov. 4 election.

“We’ve experienced quite a bit of the trend,” Inge said. “The so-called assault rifles of any brand and any type — I can’t get them from the wholesale dealers. Nobody’s got any of any type.”

Dealers are telling Inge that there is a four- to six-month wait to even get those guns in stock. The situation is much the same with handguns. Inge said rifles are the only weapons that seem to be unaffected by the demand, since those who want hunting rifles bought their guns at the start of the hunting season.

“It’s Obama-mania,” Inge said. “Everybody is afraid that Obama with his extreme views on handgun control and … most of his cabinet is anti-gun people.”

Inge said he typically orders guns once every six weeks. But since the election, he’s made four large orders. He’s had customers tell him about unsuccessfully trying four different dealers for certain handguns.

The theory behind the surge in gun sales is that those who already own the weapons will not have to give them up, Inge said. They just won’t be able to purchase new weapons. Possessing a concealed-carry permit allows a person to bypass the restriction of purchasing one gun per month.

“The people who buy these do not want to do anything evil with them,” Inge said. “A lot of people do carry. You’d be surprised at the number of people who do carry. If they are responsible, a person is able to get a gun and carry concealed and if the need arises, they may be able to save a life or several lives.”