The Citizens Committee for the Rights to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA) filed suit Tuesday in federal court against Attorney General Eric Holder and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (BATFE) director over current law that bars cross-state handgun transfers.

The suit was filed in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, Fort Worth division, over the case of a couple from Washington, D.C. who tried to buy handguns from a federally licensed firearms dealer (FFL) but could not due to federal law.

“It is overreaching, if not downright silly, in today’s environment with the federal instant background check system to perpetuate a prohibition on interstate handgun purchases that has outlived its usefulness,” said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb in a statement Tuesday. “If a law-abiding citizen can clear a background check and legally purchase a handgun in his own state, he would pass the same background check just across the border in another state.”

[…] Under attack is the Federal Regulatory Regime set up by the Gun Control Act of 1968 that bars FFLs from selling handguns to potential eligible buyers who do not reside in the same state that the dealer is located. No such restriction applies to the interstate sale of rifles or shotguns.

[…]

“Federal law with respect to interstate rifle and shotgun sales provides a ready example of a more carefully tailored alternative, prohibiting sales that violate state law and permitting those that do not,” the complaint states. “There is no need to criminalize the entire interstate handgun market.”

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Source: Chris Eger, Guns.com