Everything Will Be a Felony

One of the arguments I make against prohibiting anybody with a felony from owning firearms is the fact that most felony crimes aren't violent in nature. While an argument can be made to prohibit a murderer from owing a firearm as they have a history of violence there is no logical argument for preventing people charged with tax evasion from owning firearms. On top of that more crimes are being pushed up to felony level every day including the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act:

In order to step up the prosecution of hackers and scary cybercriminals, the feds are changing a law to make unauthorized access to a computer system a felony rather than just a slap-on-the-wrist misdemeanor. That means making a change to something called the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.

The article mentions an amendment being proposed to exempt violations of websites' terms of services from the law but that's not the point of this particular post. The point is that the government is constantly increasing the severity of crimes and those increases may leave you barred from exercising your rights even though you've never done anything violent.

I'm a firm believer in making criminals pay proportional compensation to their victims. This means that punishments should fit and once that punishment is exacted no further punishment should be brought against you. Those who steal from somebody should be made to return the stolen property (or the property's value if it's no longer returnable) along with an amount equal to the value of the stolen property. Once that debt has been paid no further punishment should be brought against the criminal. There is nothing proportional about preventing somebody who evaded theft taxes or hacked a computer from owning firearms or voting.

A vast difference exists in violent and non-violent crimes. Many people who are willing to perform non-violent crimes such as speeding or fraud are not willing to perform violent crimes such as assault or murder. The idea that we should prohibit all felons from ever again owning firearms needs to go the way of the dodo. Too many crimes are listed as felonies to make any logical argument that all felons should have their rights removed. Under the current system the government could ban firearms simply by elevating more minor crimes such as speeding and jaywalking to felony status.