Quote:
Originally Posted by GerSan69
Do you understand, that is not always true?
Many guns have no serial number. What would you say to someone that builds a gun from an 80% receiver?
Here's the thing. Prior to 1968, a serial number was not necessary on any gun that was not covered by the NFA of 1934. And defacing or removing a serial number only applied to NFA weapons prior to 1968! It is more than likely that OP's gun was re-imported in the 1940s or 50s, because US Customs, one of the strictest agencies in the world when it comes to applying the law to every item that enters the USA, allowed this gun into the country. If it were illegal, it would not have been allowed.
Since a serial number was not required, removing it to engrave the gun was perfectly OK back then.
I'm sorry if anyone finds my tone offensive. I'm certainly not trying to. But on the other hand, think of the poor guy who gets rid of a perfectly legal firearm because of completely false information.... I think he'd be feeling a lot more than just "offended!"
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I've always thought this argument made logical sense as well. Given the age of the firearm and the provenance of the engraving, the S it N was obviously removed before the GCA68 made it illegal to do so. As I have always understood US law you can't make something illegal retro-actively and then prosecute for it. Seems the absolute worst that could happen is the gun could be confiscated by an extremely over-zealous ATF agent, but they would already have to be looking at the owner really hard and be really determined to find something to nail them for in order for it to become an issue. If they're coming after you that hard chances are 99 out of 100 that they are going to find SOMETHING to nail you for one way or the other any way.
I wouldn't be concerned about it if it were mine.
Now without the engraving that can be positively attributed to being pre-GCA68 it would be a different story all together, because you wouldn't be able to prove that the SN was removed before the GCA68 made it illegal.
On the other hand, given the age of the gun, they would still have to prove that it WASN'T done before it was made illegal, wouldn't they?