Irma spurs talk of hurricane gun confiscations

As forecasters fret a massive hurricane continuing to build steam in the Atlantic, officials in U.S. territories likely to be affected by the disaster are contemplating plans to seize private property, firearms and anything else “required by the military forces for the performance of this emergency mission.”

According to the latest reports, Irma is currently a category 5 storm, the most powerful to build in the Atlantic off the U.S. coast in a decade. As the storm continues on a course that is likely to bring landfall on islands in the northeast Caribbean and then the U.S., disaster prepares are taking extremely drastic measures to ready themselves.

The Daily Caller was first to report on arms seizure orders coming out of the U.S. Virgin Islands:

U.S. Virgin Islands Gov. Kenneth Mapp signed an emergency order allowing the seizure of private guns, ammunition, explosives and property the National Guard may need to respond to Hurricane Irma.

Mapp signed the order Monday in preparation for Hurricane Irma. The order allows the Adjutant General of the Virgin Islands to seize private property they believe necessary to protect the islands, subject to approval by the territory’s Justice Department.

Mapp issued an emergency declaration Tuesday and mobilized National Guard units to prepare for the massive storm.

“This is not an opportunity to go outside and try to have fun with a hurricane,” Mapp said. “It’s not time to get on a surfboard.”

The Federalist Papers Project railed against the order Tuesday, noting that the confiscation order “flies in the face of the letter and spirit of the law, that the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed, and that no property shall be taken without due process of law.”

“This order is simply authoritarian, there is no other way to describe it. There can be ‘rules’ and ‘guidelines,’ but at the end of the day the people’s rights and property are under blatant attack,” the website’s Seth Connell said. “By executive fiat, the Governor not only authorizes confiscation of firearms and ammunition, but also directs them to do it.

“Is there no respect for people’s personal property, and right of self-defense during times of disaster? Or when a crisis emerges, do we abandon all foundations of free society and resort to the arbitrary forces used in the most cruel authoritarian regimes on the earth.”

Evidently not.

Of course, this isn’t the first time a disaster, a hurricane even, has been used as an excuse to disarm law-abiding citizens.

Just after Hurricane Katrina ravaged New Orleans in 2005, officials began confiscating lawfully-owned firearms from city residents, claiming that armed civilians would make the jobs of disaster responders more difficult.

“Guns will be taken,” New Orleans Superintendent P. Edwin Compass said at the time. “Only law enforcement will be allowed to have guns.”

That, as America subsequently saw, provided massive aid to looting and thieving criminals left in the city.

Only after several years and a lawsuit filed by the National Rifle Association did many of the law-abiding gun owners have their firearms returned.

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