Gun control run amok:
Investigators with the Library’s Office of the Inspector General have raised a string of objections after Congress stripped them of their ability to buy and carry firearms.
Though the office has carried firearms in the course of its duties for the past 15 years, and inspector general agents at other federal agencies do the same, lawmakers inserted language into the fiscal year 2009 omnibus spending bill, which was signed into law in March, that prohibited the library’s officers from using federal funds to “purchase, maintain or carry” firearms.
They cited an apparent “separation of powers” concern — the library’s investigators are deputized by the U.S. Marshals, which falls under the executive branch, but they investigate abuses in the Library of Congress, which falls under the legislative branch. . .
The office wrote in its semiannual report to Congress in March that the decision would “impede” investigations. It also received an opinion in April from the Government Accountability Office that there is no legitimate “separation of powers” concern. . .
Crimes against the Library of Congress take many forms. The IG’s office investigated child pornography, embezzlement, identity theft and credit card fraud in the last fiscal year, according to its own accounting. . . While investigating crimes in and against the Library of Congress might not sound like the most dangerous job, another official in the inspector general’s office said most of their investigations take them off site, into some dangerous neighborhoods in the District of Columbia, Maryland, Virginia and other states.
I’m sympathetic to separation of powers concerns, but if there’s a problem in the legal status of the Library of Congress, it can hardly be corrected by disarming its investigators.
Internet Scofflaw 