The day before Thanksgiving, President Obama signed the 2016 National Defense Authorization Act into law. While one of its most sweeping changes is the creation of a new retirement plan for military personnel, an interesting provision in the legislation which will transfer up to 100,000 M-1911A1 pistols to qualified recipients via the Civilian Marksmanship Program. Previously, CMP has been limited to transferring rifles such as the M-1 Garand.
The program will begin with a one-year pilot effort which will transfer up to 10,000 pistols. Further details are below.
SEC. 1087. TRANSFER OF SURPLUS FIREARMS TO CORPORATION FOR
(a) AUTHORIZATION OF TRANSFER OF SURPLUS FIREARMS TO CORPORATION FOR THE PROMOTION OF RIFLE PRACTICE AND FIRE- ARMS SAFETY.— (1) IN GENERAL.—Section 40728 of title 36, United States Code, is amended by adding at the end the following new subsection:
THE PROMOTION OF RIFLE PRACTICE AND FIREARMS SAFETY.
S. 1356—288
‘‘(h) AUTHORIZED TRANSFERS.—(1) Subject to paragraph (2), the Secretary may transfer to the corporation, in accordance with the procedure prescribed in this subchapter, surplus caliber .45 M1911/M1911A1 pistols and spare parts and related accessories for those pistols that, on the date of the enactment of this subsection, are under the control of the Secretary and are surplus to the require-ments of the Department of the Army, and such material as may be recovered by the Secretary pursuant to section 40728A(a) of this title. The Secretary shall determine a reasonable schedule for the transfer of such surplus pistols.
‘‘(2) The Secretary may not transfer more than 10,000 surplus caliber .45 M1911/M1911A1 pistols to the corporation during any year and may only transfer such pistols as long as pistols described in paragraph (1) remain available for transfer.’’.
(2) TECHNICAL AND CONFORMING AMENDMENTS.—Such title is further amended—
(A) in section 40728A—
(i) by striking ‘‘rifles’’ each place it appears and inserting ‘‘surplus firearms’’; and
(ii) in subsection (a), by striking ‘‘section 40731(a)’’ and inserting ‘‘section 40732(a)’’; (B) in section 40729(a)—
(i) in paragraph (1), by striking ‘‘section 40728(a)’’ and inserting ‘‘subsections (a) and (h) of section 40728’’; (ii) in paragraph (2), by striking ‘‘40728(a)’’ and inserting ‘‘subsections (a) and (h) of section 40728’’; and
(iii) in paragraph (4), by inserting ‘‘and caliber .45 M1911/M1911A1 surplus pistols’’ after ‘‘caliber .30 and caliber .22 rimfire rifles’’;
(C) in section 40732—
(i) by striking ‘‘caliber .22 rimfire and caliber .30 surplus rifles’’ both places it appears and inserting ‘‘surplus caliber .22 rimfire rifles, caliber .30 surplus rifles, and caliber .45 M1911/M1911A1 surplus pistols’’; and
(ii) in subsection (b), by striking ‘‘is over 18 years of age’’ and inserting ‘‘is legally of age’’; and (D) in section 40733—
(i) by striking ‘‘Section 922(a)(1)-(3) and (5)’’ and inserting ‘‘(a) IN GENERAL.—Except as provided in sub-section (b), section 922(a)(1)-(3) and (5)’’; and
(ii) by adding at the end the following new sub-
section: ‘‘(b) EXCEPTION.—With respect to firearms other than caliber .22 rimfire and caliber .30 rifles, the corporation shall obtain a license as a dealer in firearms and abide by all requirements imposed on persons licensed under chapter 44 of title 18, including maintaining acquisition and disposition records, and conducting background checks.’’.
(b) PILOT PROGRAM.—
(1) ONE-YEAR AUTHORITY.—The Secretary of the Army may carry out a one-year pilot program under which the Secretary may transfer to the Corporation for the Promotion of Rifle Practice and Firearms Safety not more than 10,000 firearms described in paragraph (2).
S. 1356—289
(2) FIREARMS DESCRIBED.—The firearms described in this paragraph are surplus caliber .45 M1911/M1911A1 pistols and spare parts and related accessories for those pistols that, on the date of the enactment of this section, are under the control of the Secretary and are surplus to the requirements of the Department of the Army.
(3) TRANSFER REQUIREMENTS.—Transfers of surplus caliber .45 M1911/M1911A1 pistols from the Army to the Corporation under the pilot program shall be made in accordance with subchapter II of chapter 407 of title 36, United States Code.
(4) REPORTS TO CONGRESS.—the Secretary initiates the pilot program under this sub-section, the Secretary shall submit to Congress an interim report on the pilot program. Secretary completes the pilot program under this sub-section, the Secretary shall submit to Congress a final report on the pilot program. this subsection shall include, for the period covered by the report—
(A) INTERIM REPORT.—Not later than 90 days after
(B) FINAL REPORT.—Not later than 15 days after the
(C) CONTENTS OF REPORT.—Each report required by
(i) the number of firearms described in subsection
(a)(2) transferred under the pilot program; and
(ii) information on any crimes committed using firearms transferred under the pilot program.
(c) LIMITATION ON TRANSFER OF SURPLUS CALIBER .45 M1911/M1911A1 PISTOLS.—The Secretary may not transfer firearms described in subsection (b)(2) under subchapter II of chapter 407 of title 36, United States Code, until the date that is 60 days after the date of the submittal of the final report required under subsection (b)(4)(B).
Additionally, the law requires the Department of Defense to develop procedures allowing military personnel to carry personally owned firearms on base, pursuant to local laws.
I just checked my calendar and it sure isn’t April 1st.
Obama administration releasing 100,000 1911’s into CMP? Is this his ‘Let’s bury the hatchet’ Christmas present to the NRA and law abiding gun owners across the US?
I don’t think that this was his idea. or that he wanted this.
No, definitely not. He had already vetoed an earlier version of the NDAA over the debt ceiling.
Don’t hold your breath too long on this one…
“The Secretary of the Army may…”
May, not shall, so this won’t actually happen until 2017 at the earliest.
Very key point. Amazing how folks get fooled so easily.
“May” allows the agencies to do something. It doesn’t mean it will or direct them to act. Look at the difference between “will issue” concealed carry permit states and “will issue”.
The same applies to regulations allowing service members to carry. The law directs base commanders to put procedures in place to allow concealed carry on base. The current batch of risk averse commanders aren’t going to make the procedures user friendly. Just add a step saying when the commander believes the need to arise the following procedures will be put into effect…
The law is satisfied. A procedure exists it just isn’t being implemented.
Or it will be “implemented”, but only to allow commanders, their sycophantic buddies and select others to carry based on some arbitrary criteria while everyone else is told to pound sand, what with the “all for me, none for thee” mentality that seems to pervade so many in management, erm, leadership positions these days.
I fear the end result will be a tangled web of conflicting bureaucratic obstacles that will make approval, certification, and actual carrying of a firearm more trouble than it should be; with the intent of deterring it all together.
I hope to be dead wrong and pleasantly surprised, but I won’t hold my breath…
Waiting warmly for On-Base carry, but it won’t happen until I get out, more than likely.
This guy fails at taking peoples guns almost as bad as he fails at being a socialist.
I’m sure if talk to his imam it’ll be: “That guy? Yeah he shows up for the first night of Ramadan and for the Eid al-Fitr pot luck. Other than that, never see the guy.”
Really? I don’t like Obama but he’s clearly a moderate and a pragmatist. His anti-gun efforts aside, he’s been on both sides of the aisle on many policies especially special operations (Libya, Iraq, Somalia, Afghanistan, etc). Don’t like the guy’s politics, but a socialist he is not.
That sound you hear?
Its the sound of my (bad) joke going over your head.
😉
I’ve been following this for a while. I cannot wait to get my GI 1911. For those concerned about the may/shall, CMP has let on that they may already have 1911s from the Army.
It’s still going to be a while before they’re actually for sale, but all signs point to this is happening.
I’m sure DOD is hot on this just like the DON is all over the LEOSA. Quantico hasn’t even drafted a plan to implement it for us jarheads. Come on, it’s been years! Get it together Devil Dogs!
TACOM had this idea and has been pushing it for several years, finally getting the US Representative for the area around Anniston to add this rider to the NDAA. I don’t think this is the first time he’s done it, either, but the first time it didn’t get stripped out in committee.
I was at a brief several years ago where the guy from there explained that because of storage and annual testing it costs $2-5 a year to store weapons at their long term storage facility, so they had to go eventually because of the costs and that the staff were near rebellion at the thought of of cutting up the remaining Army 1911s and were working to get the law changed to allow them to go to CMP.
While Army stocks are down to 100K on 1911s, the change to NDAA was open enough that they can apparently sell any non-NFA firearm that the Army transfers to CMP, and the Army is the final spot for firearms storage/disposal for the the other two branches. For example, when Army M16A1 stocks were depleted because of 1033 Program Sales to local US LEAs, Air Force M16s (or whatever funky GAU designation they gave them) went to TACOM, where they became the 1033 sales M16s.
This means that marksmanship training weapons from ROTC, funky one-off handguns and maybe even M9s, M11s and shotguns may end up at CMP one day soon, which will keep them going, as they are running out of US stocks of Garands and are out of 1903-series and M1917s, except for the occasional “surprise” find that goes up on their auction site.
The 1911s are going to go faster than the Bavarian Police returned M1 Carbines though and I bet CMP puts most or all on the auction site. Or they may not go up at all if the Secretary of the Army refuses to release them and we will have to wait until Spring 2017 when a new, non-Obama Secretary is confirmed.
~Theoretically~ 1911s are over 100 years old (model, not individual weapon) and maybe that makes it less of a hot button…”antique” pistols and all that. Can’t wait to see if they come out on the website…I expect they will be pricey, though.