The new roster is a requirement under MGL ch. 140 § 131 3/4 that is supposed to reflect the new version of MGL ch. 140 § 131M passed into law by Ch. 135 of the Acts of 2024. FCAB is charged under that statute to “compile and publish a roster of firearms banned under…§ 131M” and forward it to the Secretary of the Executive Office of Public Safety and Security (EOPSS) for their approval and enforcement.

There are serious legal concerns about bringing something like this roster into existence in the first place and, like most other provisions of Ch. 135, there are many ways to interpret this requirement and the draft is confusing and very poorly drafted.

In other areas of Massachusetts gun law, a roster is a list of guns approved for sale. As much as GOAL finds that appalling, it at least makes sense as it is an exhaustive, permissive list and you know what you are getting with it. This list however, is designed, for lack of a more accurate term, to be the exact opposite. This roster is a list of items banned for sale in the Commonwealth, so it would logically follow that anything not on that list would be for sale…but that is not the case.

An “approved” list can be added to from time to time as it tells retailers what they can sell. One of the dangers of a “banned” roster being added to over time will endanger retailers and gun owners as they will likely refer to the roster to see if a particular item is listed. If not, they could sell/purchase a firearm only to have it added to the banned roster later. The draft roster contains a warning that it is not exhaustive, making it absolutely useless as the law itself contains a catch-all provision in the features test. This is not “belt and suspenders,” this is more emperor has no clothes.

Yet another legal issue is that there are no “banned” ASFs in Massachusetts. There are many semi-automatic firearms with restrictions on when they had to be owned, which the state seems to make it up as they go. This means the roster should be blank.

All that being said however, this roster is NOT EVEN A LIST. It is a useless restatement of the current language of § 131M with an addendum containing the previous language of the law lazily tacked onto the end. That’s right: the previous language of the law that was purposely (maybe?) removed from the law by Ch. 135 in favor of different language. But hey, why not use a poorly-written, confusing provision in a brand-new statute to allow an unelected advisory board to unilaterally change the meaning of the law? This roster is dangerous, redundant, petty, autocratic and a waste of time. FCAB is saying that in order to understand and comply with the new law we are required to understand and comply with a law that no longer exists!

GOAL is working on ways to get it thrown into the trash heap where it belongs – more to come.

Section 131¾. (a) The secretary of public safety and security shall, with the advice of the firearm control advisory board established in section 131½ compile and publish a roster of assault-style firearms banned under section 131M