Dateline: November 2015. Your author and his 11-year-old
daughter stroll through the dusty cases of a gun museum, perhaps
this one.
“Dad, why is that ugly gun in here with all the old
muzzleloaders?”
“Well, sweetie, that’s technically a muzzleloader too.”
“Come on, Dad. That gun has a plastic thumbhole-pattern stock
with a RealTree camouflage pattern. It looks like a modern deer
rifle.”
“Well, there’s a reason for that, and actually, it involves
politics.”
“Oh no, I didn’t mean to get you started on guns and
politics…”
“See, a long time ago, there was a group of dedicated hunters
who were very interested in re-creating the experience of hunting
as it was done back in the frontier days. So they used replicas of
old-fashioned firearms, like Hawken rifles or Kentucky rifles like
Daniel Boone used.”
“Did Daniel Boone’s rifle have a fluted, chrome-finish barrel
with an integral ported compensator to reduce recoil, like that
one?”
“No, sweetie, that came later. Anyway, in most states, hunters
were granted a special season in which they could hunt deer only
with these old-fashioned black-powder firearms. You had to be a
very good hunter, and sneak in very close, because you only got one
shot and it took forever to reload. And those old weapons weren’t
nearly as accurate as a modern rifle.”
“Oh. So that’s probably why they mounted that Redfield
illuminated-reticle variable-power scope over the existing
fiber-optic sights.”
“Yes, but that came later, too. See, about 1985, this smart
fellow named Tony Knight was fed up with the old-timey
technology, and he did a little research. Knight proved that there
were a few obscure gunsmiths in the 18th century who made some guns
that were laid out like a modern rifle. Instead of having the
hammer off to the side like on a musket, the firing mechanism was
in a straight line behind the powder charge. It never caught on
back then, but Knight modernized it and began selling a new sort of
rifle that was a ‘primitive’ muzzleloader as far as the letter of
the law was concerned, but looked and shot much more like a
twentieth-century deer rifle.”
“Why would these traditionalist black powder hunters want
something like that?”
“They didn’t, silly. But a lot of hunters who didn’t really care
that much about hunting in ye olde pioneer spirit, like this guy, saw it as a way to extend deer season
by a week or two and get an extra deer tag to fill. With these
in-line muzzleloaders it was much more like hunting with their
regular rifles. So Knight and some other companies sold millions of
the things. Why, I remember looking at a page from a national
outdoor catalog back in 2005, and noticing that all of
the muzzle-loading rifles they were selling were modern in-line or
break-action designs, with no old-timey rifles at all!”
“So what happened to the old traditional black-powder
rifles?”
“They still make them. If I were going to go black-powder
hunting I’d get an old-fashioned one. I like the idea of accepting
the limitations of the frontier equipment. It would be a great
lesson, I think, in the hardships our ancestors went through in
settling this country.”
“Mmm. Say, does this place have a gift shop, Dad? Because maybe
instead of this lecture…”
“Really, the point of the sport is about accepting a particular
handicap, one based in history. If you miss the deer because of the
old technology, well, then you miss the deer. Unlike Daniel Boone,
you can stop and get chalupas on the way home from deer camp and
your family won’t have to scavenge for poke salad for dinner. So I
don’t think it’s all that sporting to game the system with a
tricked-out, ugly high-tech rifle in low-tech season just because
you can’t stand to leave the field empty-handed.”
“So do you want to ban them?”
“Oh, goodness no! That was what the liberals did with the
assault weapons ban that expired in ‘05 — they essentially banned
types of guns based on cosmetic features, like the shape of the
stock. This is America and you can own any kind of ugly gun you
want. I’ll even defend your right to own ugly guns with some very
ugly guns of my own, should it come to that. There’s no reason you
shouldn’t hunt with an in-line muzzleloader if you want to. But I
sure don’t have to like them.”
“Dad, are you an elitist?”
“Have you been listening to Hugh Hewitt again? No, sweetie, in outdoor
sports, you’re always the sportsman; it’s the other guy who’s the
elitist. Actually, I may be a gun snob, but I think the in-line
muzzleloader crowd are the elitists. These are guys who want an
extra week of deer hunting all to themselves, and are willing to
buy not only an extra deer license, but an extra
government-approved gun to do it. Like a lot of penurious hunters I
never could spring for that platinum-plus deluxe deer hunter
package.”
“Well, what happened to these things? Why aren’t they around any
more?”
“A few years ago, the states saw deer populations skyrocketing.
So they extended the regular modern-rifle deer season by another
week or two. And at the same time, people started realizing that
what these special seasons did was effectively to grant a monopoly
to the muzzle-loader industry. Some states began cracking down on
their definition of what qualifies as a black-powder rifle. Others
just eliminated the primitive firearms season altogether, figuring
that if a hunter wanted to hunt with a primitive firearm —
traditional or ugly — in the longer regular season, nothing was
stopping him.
“Hunters were glad to get the extended season with their regular
rifles, so they didn’t mind. Most of them had only bought their
in-line rifles to comply with the regulations, not because they
actually preferred them to their Rugers and Marlins.
“No, the ones who really complained were the muzzle-loader
manufacturers who were deprived of the entire reason for their
product. Without the laws and the loopholes that created them,
there was little reason for anyone to buy them. There was still a
market for the traditional rifles among traditionalists, but the
in-line rifles just became expensive, unsightly wallhangers. Mainly
you see them in garage sales for twenty dollars, but occasionally
you see them in gun museums — as a curiosity from a more regulated
age.”
“Hmmm…so, Dad, what you’re saying is, the inline
muzzle-loading boom is an example of how government regulations
distorted markets, produced unintended consequences, and codified
an inferior, un-competitive technology that would have vanished
long ago without the regulations that sustain it?”
“Exactly. That’s my girl! Hey, let’s go to the gift shop and
find you a pro-second-amendment T-shirt that will get you kicked
out of school.”
