Good AP story on where a lot of bills originate from, “Legislation templates make proposing bills easy“:
“For state legislators across the country, sponsoring bills can be as easy as filling in the blanks. Groups from both ends of the political spectrum offer lawmakers model legislation requiring a minimal amount of tailoring from state to state … “
Well, not exactly. The template needs to be translated to conform to state law and that does require some lawyering.
“… The model legislation often intersects with the legislative goals of advocacy groups … The guns-in-cars measure has been endorsed by the National Rifle Association, and similar laws have been enacted Arizona, Louisiana and Utah …”
Of course the antis do the same. Much of their stuff comes from the Legal Community Against Violence which has a section on their website “Model Laws” that has templates for semi-auto bans, .50 cal bans, dealer liability, etc. Compare their templates to current antigun bills in Albany.