The city of Seattle has the authority to impose a tax on guns and bullets according to Judge Palmer Robinson of King County Superior Court. Judge Robinson ruled in favor of the City of Seattle this week after the National Rifle Association (NRA), the National Shooting Sports Foundation, the Second Amendment Foundation, and others filed suit to protest the city’s tax on guns and bullets. The groups argued that the city did not have the authority to pass the law.
Under the law, called the “gun violence tax,” gun and ammo sales in Seattle are subject to a tax of $25 per firearm at sale and $0.05 for every round of ammunition at sale ($0.02 for every round of .22 caliber ammunition and smaller). Seattle’s City Budget Office estimates that the gun violence tax will raise between $300,000 and $500,000 per year: revenue raised under the tax will be used for education as well as violence prevention.
Judge Robinson ruled that the law is permitted as a tax measure to raise revenue and not gun control – a slight distinction but one that matters in this case. As in other matters (including the health care law which was challenged in the Supreme Court), whether a measure is considered a tax has a significant impact on whether it may be enforceable.
In his ruling, the judge relied heavily on the primary purpose of the law, as stated, as well as how the revenue would be spent. Judge Robinson ruled that the funds raised were for broad purposes and not regulatory in nature – that, he says, made it a tax. And, the judge ruled, Seattle has the right to impose certain kinds of taxes, including this one. He dismissed the case against the city, clearing the way for the tax to become effective, as planned, on January 1, 2016.
A related law that requires gun owners to report a lost or stolen firearm within 24 hours is already in effect in Seattle. Gun owners in Seattle who fail to report lost or stolen firearms can be slapped with a $500 civil penalty. Under federal law, firearms businesses holding a federal license, must report lost or stolen guns but not individual gun owners.
A similar law is already in place in Cook County, Illinois, the nation’s second-largest county. Cook County imposes a $25 tax on the sale of firearms; an additional tax on gun cartridges is slated to take effect on firearm cartridges on June 1, 2016. One of the goals of those measures, according to Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle, was to reduce gun violence in the county. However, according to reports in the Chicago Tribune, gun violence continues to escalate in the city of Chicago with the numbers of persons shot in 2015 already eclipsing the numbers of those shot in 2014 by more than 10%.
The Second Amendment Foundation has vowed to appeal the ruling in Seattle and other groups are mounting challenges to stop Cook County’s ammo tax from taking effect this summer.
You can read the Seattle opinion here.
