Anti-paramilitary training laws the next threat to private shooting ranges

After municipal and environmental laws failed, town officials approached Vermont State Senator Phillip Baruth for help. He quickly sponsored a bill making it a felony to operate a “paramilitary training camp” within the state.

Baruth, a liberal Democrat from Burlington, admitted he introduced the bill after Pawlet officials complained there was no state law that they could use to force Banyai to shutter his private ranges on his private property.

This week, Vermont’s Gov. Phil Scott – a Republican – signed the bill into law.

4071. PARAMILITARY TRAINING PROHIBITED

(a) A person shall not:

(1) teach, train, or demonstrate to any other person the use, application, or making of a firearm, explosive, or incendiary device capable of causing injury or death, or techniques capable of causing injury or death to persons, if the person knows or reasonably should know that the teaching, training, or demonstrating is intended to be used in or in furtherance of a civil disorder; or

(2) assemble with one or more other persons for the purpose of practicing or being taught, trained, or instructed in the use, application, or making of a firearm, explosive, or incendiary device capable of causing injury or death, or in techniques capable of causing injury or death to persons, if the person knows or reasonably should know that the practicing, teaching, training, or instruction is intended to be used in or in furtherance of a civil disorder.

It’s the “in furtherance of a civil disorder” that is the wedge in the door. Who could argue with a law against training someone to commit a crime? Well… how *exactly* do you determine what a civil disorder is? The law states: The term “civil disorder” means any public disturbance involving acts of violence by assemblages of three or more persons, which causes an immediate danger of or results in damage or injury to the property or person of any other individual. Three people in a fight is a “civil disorder.”

We’ve seen people arrested for committing acts of self defense. So is defending yourself against subway psychos (one psycho, two or three people holding him down) or mobs of murderous arsonists (one kid with a rifle against multiple armed assailants) “civil disorder?” I bet it can be to a creative prosecutor. And you can bet that if anyone who taught firearms safety, marksmanship or even basic self defense teaches the general public, chances are that one of their students will, at some point, use that training. And if there is a creative prosecutor, not only will the trainee get arrested… so will the trainer. Will the prosecutor win the trial against a guy who ran a karate school and who once taught a kid who then went on to karate chop another kid in a schoolyard brawl? Maybe, maybe not. But the prosecutor might well bankrupt the karate teacher in the process, so… that’s a win for the prosecutor, even if there’s a “not guilty” verdict.