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Now that House Bill 1240 — Washington State Legislature’s assault weapons ban — has been signed into law by Gov. Jay Inslee, gun stores across the state can no longer sell a wide variety of guns.
A previous Chronicle story shared responses from Centralia gun store owners who were in opposition to HB 1240, and Republican lawmakers in the area have made it clear in statements they oppose the ban.
Not all Lewis County residents oppose the new law, though.
Carol Brock sat down with The Chronicle earlier this month to share why she supported the legislation.
Brock is currently a commissioner for Lewis County Fire District 1 in Onalaska and the Lewis County Democratic Party chair. She added she was only speaking for herself — not on behalf of all Lewis County Democrats, some of whom she stated disagreed with her stance on the bill, nor on behalf of her fire district seatmates.
Brock said she was relieved the Legislature was finally doing something to address the mass shootings that keep occurring.
“We have had more, what they consider ‘mass shootings,’ which I understand is classified as anything more than four people, this year than we have had days in a year. Why?” Brock said.
Being a gun owner herself, Brock added she was raised around guns and is the daughter of tobacco share-croppers in Maryland.
“There were always guns in the house,” Brock said. “You had to have them to protect your animals, to sometimes take down a (wild) animal. We were always taught to respect them, taught how to use them.”
She believed they should be only used for hunting and self defense, both of which do not require weapons like AR-15s in her opinion.
“The type of weapons that 1240 has addressed are weapons of war. In the 20’s, when there was a problem with the gangsters with the ‘Tommy’ guns, they outlawed the ‘Tommy’ guns because there was no real need for them,” Brock said. “You’ve heard of the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre. They did that to protect civilians and to protect police.”
Brock said she is fine with the military and police keeping those weapons.
While gun rights advocates believe HB 1240 is unconstitutional and will ultimately be struck down by the courts now that it has been signed into law, Brock disagreed.
“I say that because we’re not trying to outlaw all weapons, all guns, we’re not trying to get rid of the second amendment with it. We’re just trying to put some railings on it,” said Brock.
Brock said she supported the Democrats in Washington for following through on the party’s platform.
“(With) this law that they’re putting in, they’ve just about covered everything that’s in their platform,” Brock said.
Brock admitted there are other issues fueling gun violence right now — including mental health and lack of proper firearms safety training — and while HB 1240 won’t fix the entire problem right off the bat, she said it’s a necessary first step.
She currently has a grandson who is a junior in high school who is anxious about going to school due to the fear of a shooter showing up.
“Kids should not be anxious about going to school, not for this reason. You’re usually anxious because some kid might pick on you or you have a test, those are the things you should be anxious about,” said Brock.
While HB 1240 mainly addresses assault rifles by banning sales in the state, it also includes a variety of gun modifications and restrictions on both pistols and shotguns.
Additionally, it lists 62 different weapon models from a variety of manufacturers that will be banned.
Any semi-automatic rifles with an overall length shorter than 30 inches will be banned for sale along with any conversion kits, parts or combination of parts that can be used to modify a rifle into an assault rifle.
Though it has now been signed into law, HB 1240 stated that antique firearms, any permanently inoperable firearm or any firearm manually operated by bolt, lever, pump or slide actions will still be legal. It also allows “existing legal owners to retain the assault weapons they currently own.”
For more information and to read HB 1240 in its entirety, go online to https://app.leg.wa.gov/billsummary?BillNumber=1240&Year=2023.
To read The Chronicle’s previous HB 1240 story as well as a summary of the bill, visit https://bit.ly/Chronline-HB1420.
