Happy Birthday to us!!!!!
Today, May 11, 2002, ARM USA celebrates its 3rd year in business! It's been rough but we made it this far. We recently signed up for another three years - here we go again!
Just to think that 3 years ago, we opened the store (after several licensing delays). We had ordered safes from Cannon which didn't arrive when promised, so we taped make-believe safes out on the floor with masking tape. To help make the store not look so empty, we had about 10 racks with ARM USA t-shirts. We did just about anything we could to make the store look like we had a lot of inventory. A lot has changed in 3 years.
Nowadays we are constantly shifting products around, trying to make room for all the cool stuff we've got. We have been slowly transitioning toward the high-end, tactical and law enforcement markets. Our BlackHawk inventory has increased tenfold. We've added many different titles of videos and books related to gun-smithing, defensive shooting, long-range target shooting and more.
We're up to 7 different 50 caliber rifles - on display - and expect another one or two in the next month. We now carry safes by American Security, who started building safes for the commercial market over 50 years ago. We also carry wooden gun cabinets now. We appreciate each and every customer who has made ARM USA what it is today. We thank you and hope you'll continue to support us for years to come.

Not to beat a dead horse, but I just can't get over this huge victory we just had over the California Assembly Public Safety Committee. We held out til the very end thinking positively and urging folks to keep writing and faxing, knowing all the well our chances of success were probably still slim. All I can say now is "Whew!!!" and thank God they came to their senses.
We'd like to personally thank all those who flew up to Sacramento to testify before the committee. Frank and I are basically married to the store and couldn't get away. Thanks to those who sent faxes and emails and called the legislators' offices. Everyone's hard work really paid off.
We know the proposed law was a farce and are happy we defeated it. After all, with a web site like www.50BMGstore.com, we've got a little invested here.
In case you missed the news, you can find it here.

Effective this month, ARM USA will be holding a monthly drawing. To enter the drawing, visit the store and complete an entry form. A winner will be drawn from all entrants on the last open day of each month. May's prize will be an American Security Pistol Box (valued at $119.99). This locking box meets California's requirements for a locking box. No purchase is necessary and the winner need not be present to win. One entry per person per day. Winner pays sales tax. Winner to be announced in subsequent issue of ARM USA's Freedom Reporter.

In April we began opening at 12:00 Tuesday thru Friday. Although we had posted notice on the door and on the website, and recorded the new hours on the answering machine, many customers aren't aware of the time change. We've had to give ourselves an extra hour each day to complete and maintain the state paperwork.
In January, we had to start keeping extra paperwork on "approved locking devices" with each firearm purchase. And if you think that's bad, just wait til next year!! Paperwork will effectively DOUBLE AGAIN. Next year, new legislation goes into effect which requires us to maintain copies of purchasers' utility bills, driver's license, HSC (Handgun Safety Certificate-also new for next year), affidavit of demonstration of "Safe Handling," just to mention a few. We'll have more details on how this affects you as they are made available to us.
We apologize for having to open later, but as the poster in the window says,

"YOU CAN BLAME THE ELECTED LEGISLATORS AND THE VOTERS THAT VOTED FOR THEM AND CITIZENS WHO DID NOT EXERCISE THE RIGHT TO VOTE - INCLUDING GUN OWNERS"

Our new hours are Tuesday - Friday 12Pm - 7PM, Saturday 10AM - 6PM

We're looking for some part-time help. In the past (with the exception of our opening crew) we have drawn new employees from our customer base. It works well for a couple of reasons. First of all, if a person comes in the store, it usually means they are familiar with guns. Secondly, we have come to know most of our customers on a first name basis and have interacted with them. What better way is there to see how they would interact with other customers?
We'd also be likely to consider prospects that are referred to us by our customers. So if you know of anyone who has experience with firearms, send them our way. Be sure they tell us who referred them.

We've got a case full of consignment guns looking for good homes. The good thing about consignment guns is that most will go as private party transfers and are therefore not subject to the "One Gun Per 30 Days" restriction. Many of these used guns have never even been fired. ( I know most people don't understand how that can happen, but I do. I've got a bunch of those myself.) In the next few days we'll have a second case at least a third full. As time permits, the used guns / consignments will be listed on our website here.

ARM USA
1538 N. State College Blvd.
Anaheim, CA 92806
Sizes L - XL - XXL are currently available

WASHINGTON, May 7 The Justice Department, reversing decades of official government policy on the meaning of the Second Amendment, told the Supreme Court for the first time late Monday that the Constitution "broadly protects the rights of individuals" to own firearms. The position, expressed in a footnote in each of two briefs filed by Solicitor General Theodore B. Olson, incorporated the view that Attorney General John Ashcroft expressed a year ago in a letter to the National Rifle Association. Mr. Ashcroft said that in contrast to the view that the amendment protected only a collective right of the states to organize and maintain militias, he "unequivocally" believed that "the text and the original intent of the Second Amendment clearly protect the right of individuals to keep and bear firearms." It was not clear at the time whether the letter to the rifle association's chief lobbyist simply expressed Mr. Ashcroft's long-held personal opinion, or whether it marked a departure in government policy.

The Supreme Court's view has been that the the Second Amendment protected only those rights that have "some reasonable relationship to the preservation of efficiency of a well regulated militia," as the court put it in United States v. Miller, a 1939 decision that remains the court's latest word on the subject.

But it has been evident since last fall that Mr. Ashcroft was in fact setting new government policy. In October, the federal appeals court in New Orleans, saying it did not find the Miller decision persuasive, declared that "the Second Amendment does protect individual rights," rights that nonetheless could be subject to "limited, narrowly tailored specific exceptions." Mr. Ashcroft quickly sent a letter to all federal prosecutors' offices, calling their attention to the decision in United States v. Emerson and informing them that "in my view, the Emerson opinion, and the balance it strikes, generally reflect the correct understanding of the Second Amendment."

He told the prosecutors to inform the department's criminal division of any case that raised a Second Amendment question so the department could "coordinate all briefing in those cases" and enforce federal law "in a manner that heeds the commands of the Constitution." In the briefs it filed at the Supreme Court after the close of business on Monday, the Solicitor General's office attached the Ashcroft letter and included the following footnote to explain its new position:

"In its brief to the court of appeals, the government argued that the Second Amendment protects only such acts of firearm possession as are reasonably related to the preservation or efficiency of the militia. The current position of the United States, however, is that the Second Amendment more broadly protects the rights of individuals, including persons who are not members of any militia or engaged in active military service or training, to possess and bear their own firearms, subject to reasonable restrictions designed to prevent possession by unfit persons or to restrict the possession of types of firearms that are particularly suited to criminal misuse."

While announcing the government's new position, the briefs do not ask the court to respond by taking any action itself. In both cases, defendants charged with gun offenses raised Second Amendment defenses and appealed to the Supreme Court. One is the Emerson case, now called Emerson v. United States, No. 01-8780, an appeal by a doctor who was charged with violating a federal law that makes it a crime for someone to own a gun while under a domestic violence restraining order. The other is Haney v. United States, No. 01-8272, an appeal by a man convicted of owning two machine guns in violation of federal law.

Solicitor General Olson urged the Supreme Court to turn down both appeals. He said that even accepting an individual right to bear arms, the application of the laws at issue in both cases reflected the kind of narrowly tailored restrictions by which that right could reasonably be limited. Consequently, there was no warrant for the court to take either case, the briefs said.

Hi folks,

Just a quick one today, but it provides LOTS of reading for you.

As you have probably heard, the Justice Department now admits that the Second Amendment is an individual right. However, they are doing so in briefs trying to prevent the hearing of two Second Amendment cases -- Emerson's and Haney's.

The Haney case is about a dumb guy who walked into a police station and said he had unlicensed machine guns and that they couldn't do anything about it. He likely did this on his own, without consulting gun rights groups with attorneys, and he is now in jail. Hopefully the Supreme Court will ignore his case as he did not present a strong argument at trial, and therefore his poor planning could harm all gun owners as it is unlikely that his case could be salvaged in appeals.

The more interesting case is, of course, U.S. v. Emerson. Since Emerson was never convicted of a crime, and was subject only to a boilerplate, civil divorce court restraining order rather than a criminal domestic violence restraining order, SAF has maintained that his right to own a gun should not have been eliminated so easily.

Without Emerson's appeal to the Supreme Court, funded mostly by SAF in cooperation with numerous small contributors with high dollar supporting organizations in the Fifty Caliber Shooters' Policy Institute, KeepAndBearArms.com and the Washington Arms Collectors, it is unlikely that the Justice Department would have bothered with the meaning of the Second Amendment in the Haney case.

In short, our efforts made a difference! And this provides more authoritative support that the Second Amendment is an individual right in future lawsuits.

But if the Supreme Court doesn't take a Second Amendment case, then a future administration could change the interpretation of the Second Amendment again.

For this reason, we hope the nation's highest court will accept the Emerson case, and decide this issue clearly for the first time in over 200 years.

For more information, read the Government Briefs in Emerson and Haney linked off of here: http://www.saf.org/pub/rkba/news/EmersonFix.htm

Read News and Editorial Coverage of this Justice Department change here: http://www.saf.org/pub/rkba/news/EmersonAppealNews.htm

Read about the Emerson Defense Fund here:
http://www.saf.org/pub/rkba/press-releases/EmersonDefenseFund.htm

Donate to the Emerson fund here: https://wwws.mainstream.net/saf/contribute/contribute_form.html

Thanks again for everything!

Sincerely,
Dave LaCourse

Join the NRA or renew your existing membership at ARM USA for only $25. That's a $10 savings off the regular annual rate of $35 per year! All NRA members save $10 on firearms at ARM USA. If you are not a member of the NRA, we will sign you up for a liberty membership, FREE of charge when you buy a firearm from us!!!

www.Assaultweb.net - A great place for questions and answers, whether it be guns, hypothetical situations or when you've just got to get something off your chest. Yes, I put this in nearly every newsletter I send because it is such a great site!

Write Your Reps - If you don't already have contact information for your representatives, you can find it here. This link was taken from the NRA-ILA website. I believe the NRA pays for this service, so let's put it to good use!

www.Firearmnews.com - Providers of the handy dandy full-color Osama Bin Laden target and lots of other useful information.

www.AR-15.com - Forums for general discussion, meetings and events, firearm related discussion and origin of WebShooters shooting events organized by Rick314 and held at the Angeles Ranges (same range our 50 caliber shoots are held).

Vote on 2nd Amendment rights
Does the 2nd amendment guarantee an individual's right to own firearms ?
Vote here: http://www.vote.com/vote/45188921/index.phtml?cat=4075633

Feel free to forward this newsletter to those who may be interested. Many customers hear about our store through word of mouth. Although we've been here 3 years now, and despite the advertisements in the Orange County Register and 6 or 7 Yellow Pages books, there are still so many people who don't know we exist. We need all the help we can get to spread the word. Thanks!!

If you have links or information you think would be useful to fellow gun owners, please send them to SUBSCRIBE@ARMUSA.com. Please do not direct any corrspondence to the yahoo address above as it is not accessed on a regular basis. Thank you.
Frank & Jolynne
ARM USA
Anaheim, CA 92806
www.50BMGstore.com
714-520-4600