Originally published on Denvergazette.com

As soon as the Colorado general assembly convenes in January, there will be “assault weapon” legislation. Yet “assault weapon” is a vague marketing term and has nothing to do with any gun’s firepower.

In 1989, Colorado state Sen. Pat Pascoe introduced the first “assault weapon” bill in Colorado. It would have banned a list of guns by make and model. If there was something about the named guns that made them more dangerous than other guns, the bill could have specified it.

Then in 2013, Senate President John Morse introduced an “assault weapon” bill with a different approach. It defined “assault weapon” as all firearms except “handguns, shotguns, and bolt-action rifles.” Under the Morse bill, “assault weapons” would include single-shot rifles (invented in the 17th century), lever-action rifles (1855), slide action rifles (1884), and all semiautomatic rifles (1885).

Although the 2023 Colorado bill will be backed by the same gun-control lobbies that drafted and supported the previous bills, this time the definition of “assault weapon” will be entirely different. As always, it will not be about firepower.

The main target of the 2023 ban will be a subset of semiautomatic rifles. Every semiautomatic firearm shoots one, and only one, bullet each time the user presses the trigger. In contrast, a machine gun (an “automatic”) shoots bullet after bullet as long as the trigger is held down. Some semiautomatic rifles look like machine guns, even though they do not function like them.

A semiautomatic rifle fires at the same rate as common semiautomatic pistols. Such pistols, by manufacturers such as Colt, Smith & Wesson, or Ruger, have long constituted over 80% of handguns sold.

Rifles as a class are more powerful than handguns because rifles have long barrels and handguns have short barrels. Suppose you shoot the same ammunition through a handgun with a five-inch barrel and a rifle with an eighteen-inch barrel. Because the rifle barrel is longer, the expanding gas of the gunpowder explosion will push the bullet for a longer time; hence the bullet will have greater velocity when it finally leaves the rifle barrel. That is why rifle bullets travel much further than handgun bullets.

The rifles dubbed “assault weapons” are no more powerful than other rifles. Consider the AR-15 semiautomatic. The name is short for “ArmaLite Rifle, model 15.” It was invented in the late 1950s and introduced for sale in 1964. The AR’s most common caliber is .223. That is, the bullet’s width is 223/1000th of an inch. Under Colorado hunting regulations, that caliber is not allowed for big game hunting because it is too small to reliably take an animal with a single shot. The minimum caliber of big game hunting in Colorado is .240.

Instead of addressing firepower, the 2023 state legislature will likely copy definitions from recent laws written by the national gun prohibition lobbies for municipalities in Boulder. Such laws ban guns based on having a “characteristic” such as a “telescoping stock” or a “thumbhole stock.”

A telescoping stock can be adjusted to the user’s size. A tall person might extend the stock to full length, and a short person would shorten the stock. A good fit helps the user shoot more accurately. Before adjustable stocks were invented, only the wealthy could afford a stock with a custom fit.

A thumbhole in a stock allows the user’s trigger hand to hold the rifle more securely, thus stabilizing the rifle and improving accuracy. There is no legitimate constitutional purpose in forcing firearms to be less accurate, and hence more dangerous.

Although the definition of “assault weapon” constantly changes, the prohibition strategy has always exploited public confusion. Back in 1988, a public memo by gun control strategist Josh Sugarmann explained why gun prohibition groups would have an easier time selling “assault weapon” bans than handgun bans:

“The weapons’ menacing looks, coupled with the public’s confusion over fully automatic machine guns versus semi-automatic assault weapons — anything that looks like a machine gun is assumed to be a machine gun — can only increase the chance of public support for restrictions on these weapons.”

Three decades later, some of the public and many legislators are still confused.