This ques­tion was pub­lished with per­mis­sion from the author.  The ques­tion email pos­es the ques­tion of gun con­fis­ca­tion dur­ing time(s) of civ­il unrest and dur­ing a dis­as­ter where any gov­ern­ment is capa­ble of reach­ing out and con­fis­cat­ing guns “for the good of the peo­ple.”

I’ve read your blog for sev­er­al weeks now and found it well thought out.

But in regards to your plans for firearms, in the event of an emer­gency (SHTF or some­thing lead­ing up to TEOTWAWKI) do you *real­ly* believe that you will be allowed to keep your firearms if such an event hap­pens?

Remem­ber that after Kat­ri­na, New Orleans police con­fis­cat­ed all [legal] firearms and held on to them long after the imme­di­ate emer­gency was over. It was­n’t until the NRA sued and won did peo­ple final­ly get them back.

And if there is social unrest pred­i­cat­ed on an severe eco­nom­ic down-turn (as many very cred­i­ble pun­dits believe there will be in 2011), gov­er­ment at the local, state and/or Fed­er­al lev­el will most like­ly try a firearms con­fis­ca­tion as they try to main­tain order — just at the very time you may need them (even if you don’t “bug out”). Can’t count on the NRA or the courts to sup­port the 2nd ammend­ment in the event of such an emer­gency.

I’m pre­sum­ing you have pur­chased them from legit­i­mate sources (not ask­ing, not judg­ing) so they are licensed/registered/etc and eas­i­ly tracked down.

And even if you don’t leave but are forced by cir­cum­stances to leave your home for ‘off­i­cal’ shel­ter like in a school or armory (or sta­di­um as in New Orleans), I doubt you can take your firearms in. After­all, it would make a state­ment to walk into a school gym with a duf­fle in one hand and a rifle slung over your shoul­der!

So while I agree issues of defense can’t be ignored, can such *real­ly* be relied upon to be avail­able if/when need­ed?

Thanks.

Here was my answer.  I do not claim to be right, and I hope it answered his ques­tion well:

You pose a few good ques­tions and have some good points.  Here is what I think.  And, take this with a grain of salt, because this is just one man’s opin­ion.

First, if there is a pre­dictable dis­as­ter geo­graph­i­cal­ly iso­lat­ed dis­as­ter not unlike Kat­ri­na, I can see our gov­ern­ment try­ing to con­fis­cate guns.  If there is an unpre­dictable dis­as­ter, such as an earth­quake, etc. There will be no time to do so, and local and state LEOs will be too busy react­ing to the sit­u­a­tion.  It will be mobi­lized fed­er­al enforce­ment that will be mobi­lized to han­dle sit­u­a­tions such as con­fis­ca­tion, in my opin­ion.

As for civ­il unrest, well, that is anoth­er sto­ry.  It is an unpre­dictable man made “sit­u­a­tion.” And, if the sit­u­a­tion is large enough, it will need to be con­tained before LEOs come to your door con­fis­cat­ing your guns.  Again, I feel this will be geo­graph­i­cal­ly and demo­graph­i­cal­ly iso­lat­ed.

As for offi­cial shel­ter’s, I would pre­sume that every­one will be thor­ough­ly searched on the way in.  My friend who checked into a men’s shel­ter, must be back by 8:00 p.m. every evening, and CANNOT bring in food, a mul­ti-tool, knife, or any­thing the city of NY deems a weapon.  They took the main­stay rations and mul­ti-tool I gave him away when they searched him on his way back into the shel­ter.  Every­one gets searched when they go back inside.  But they do not want ex-con­victs or those hun­gry to fight over a cup­cake.  Which, ulti­mate­ly makes sense to me.  That said, I can see the SAME thing hap­pen­ing in a super-dome sit­u­a­tion.  No one will be allowed to bring food, knife, or gear in that is of a con­sum­able or defen­sive nature.  With that, every­one will be made to depend on the gov­ern­ment as a resource.

As for my guns, all of them have been legit­i­mate­ly pur­chased.  I hold sev­er­al CCW per­mits.  Get­ting caught with an ille­gal hand­gun is a felony offence, and I will lose all my CCW per­mits, as well as nev­er be allowed to own one again, legal­ly.  Um, not exact­ly high on my list of offens­es.

Now that said.  I know you are an avid read­er of the blog, and I cer­tain­ly appre­ci­ate that.  I also appre­ci­ate your com­ments and input.  They help me think through my own process­es.

I urge every­one to look for a Bug Out Loca­tion.  Maybe it is a friends home 100 miles away, maybe it is your par­en­t’s house, or a cousin, etc.  Maybe it is a hotel room or your sum­mer home on a lake in the coun­try.  Hon­est­ly, I do not care.  I am out of Dodge, and I sug­gest if you can, you get out too.  It may be the dif­fer­ence between a lifestyle of liv­ing (and not just being alive) vs. wait­ing for aid.  I am not an advo­cate of wait­ing for aid.

In con­clu­sion, I am an advo­cate of bug­ging out, as you know “if” you live in the sub­urbs or in an urban envi­ron­ment.  To me, it makes sense.  In addi­tion, you have to be astute enough to under­stand what is hap­pen­ing as it begins, or have the fore­sight enough to get the hell out of town when there is a pre­dic­tion of a hur­ri­cane, 10 days of hard rain, pre­dic­tion of five feet of snow in three days, civ­il unrest, or any oth­er man made dis­as­ter.  Now, there is no guar­an­tee I am going to actu­al­ly get to my des­ti­na­tion.  There is no guar­an­tee that I am going to be able to get out of town.  But, if I do, gear, food, guns, etc. come with me.  Guns go for var­i­ous rea­sons.  One, yes, is pro­tec­tion and secu­ri­ty.  Con­verse­ly, the oth­er is offen­sive in nature, and that is hunt­ing and food.  Being from a rur­al town in the coun­try, I have no prob­lem with going out in the woods and “bring­ing din­ner home,” per se.

• Here is a link to the 2006 Reuters sto­ry on anoth­er blog about gun con­fis­ca­tion dur­ing an emer­gency:  http://www.commondreams.org/headlines06/0714–06.htm