You’ve been watching action movies for like forever, and you have some spare cash. It’s time to cowboy up and buy…wait for it…a machinegun! Except you can’t. You sort of can, but not really.

But I don’t want a belt-fed, general-purpose machinegun, you know, a rifle caliber, crew-served weapon, just a submachine gun—go here for a subgun primer--like an Uzi or MP5 or Thompson, something that shoots pistol caliber ammo, like 9mm or .45ACP.

So sad.

Image: author

Until 1934, Americans could own machineguns without restriction. It was Prohibition, and the organized crime it birthed, that made criminal machine gun use newsworthy, and the 1934 National Firearms Act, enacted a year after the repeal of Prohibition by the 21st Amendment, regulated possession.  It imposed a $200 non-transferrable tax, government registration, background checks (fingerprinting, photographs, etc.) and storage requirements, all of which take many months at bureaucratic speed to process. The same process is required for suppressors, and rifles or shotguns that do not meet minimum federal barrel length—at least 16” for rifles, 18” for shotguns--and overall length—at least 26” for both--minimums.  

There have been attempts to liberalize the law, particularly for suppressors, but even when Republicans controlled the White House and both Houses of Congress, congressional “leaders” felt “it just wasn’t the right time.”  Somehow, it never is.

The Gun Control Act of 1968 froze the importation of new automatic firearms and in 1986 the Firearm Owners Protection Act was passed, largely to try to end rampant government abuses of law-abiding gun owners. During final debate, late at night when most Representatives were gone, a Democrat introduced a ban amendment, and the execrable Charles Rangel (D-NY), the presiding officer, called a voice vote. Even though it was obviously defeated, Rangel declared it passed. Republicans, fearing the media would say mean things about them, rolled over–-D/S/Cs had not yet hit on reflexively calling everyone and everything racist–-and all fully automatic firearms manufactured after May 19, 1986 became unavailable for citizen ownership (18 USC 921).   

Democrats/Socialists/Communists have so successfully demonized common semiautomatic rifles that provision has never been struck down. One can still own a fully automatic gun—even crew-served, belt-fed, rifle caliber guns--following the procedure established in 1934, but the 1986 amendment froze the number of such weapons in circulation. 

I can own a suppressor?  A short-barreled, semiautomatic rifle or shotgun?

Yes, but they’re treated like machineguns, so the entire federal process for each one applies, including the $200, non-transferrable tax, for which one gets an actual, official, stamp. Fortunately, contemporary suppressor companies have made the process as painless as possible. They do all the federal paperwork, and when the ATF gets around to approving it, your suppressor is delivered to your doorstep. You will shoot to the top of government “insurrectionist, domestic terrorist, radical, traditional Christian, MAGA” lists.

Cool!  What about my submachine gun?

The problem is virtually none are for sale, and the few that are cost whatever the market will bear, which these days means tens, even hundreds, of thousands of dollars. Submachine guns are gold mines, increasingly scarce gold mines, and they’re not selling. When their owners die, their guns will probably be lost in tragic boating accidents. Remember, only guns made before May 19, 1986 may be owned by Americans. Even individual police officers are in the same boat. Their agencies can own new subguns, and of course the military can, but not individuals. It’s a seller’s market. The law has driven up the price of newly made weapons for even governmental agencies.

But who needs a submachine gun, a suppressor or a short-barreled rifle or shotgun?

No one needs a car capable of traveling more than 50 MPH. No one needs a Corvette, but Joe Biden has one. No one needs air conditioning, electric toothbrushes or any of the products and conveniences we take for granted, yet none of those things are integral to securing a specifically enumerated constitutional right.

As with any firearm, one should be properly trained in the manual of arms, the specific techniques and procedures of safely loading, firing, making safe, cleaning and maintenance of the weapon. Machineguns are, like pistols or shotguns, simply tools designed for specific purposes. In the history of American gun ownership machineguns have been criminally used by their federally licensed owners perhaps four times. Unlike what one sees in the movies, they are not bullet-hosing mass-death machines. Like all guns, they must be aimed and fired from the shoulder, using only two to three rounds bursts.

But all that is irrelevant; our legislative betters have made that choice, and so many others, for us. Now you know why and how.

Mike McDaniel is a classically trained musician, Japanese and European fencer, life-long athlete, firearm instructor and retired police officer and high school and college English teacher.  His home blog is Stately McDaniel Manor.