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RICHMOND, Va.—As gun rights bills go, this one was tailored to a particularly niche constituency: Virginians who want to carry antique, muzzle-loading firearms but can’t because of a nonviolent felony conviction.

Legislation to fix that problem has easily cleared the General Assembly, but only after a brief detour Tuesday in the House of Delegates when Del. Marcus B. Simon, D-Fairfax, decided to needle the GOP majority.

A justification for the bill given in a committee hearing, Simon said, was that letting ex-offenders have antique guns and up to 5 pounds of gunpowder for recreational or cultural purposes would open new opportunities for ex-offenders to participate in society and turn their lives around.

"Because if they weren't out hunting during black-powder season they'd probably be cooking meth,” Simon said. “And apparently those were the only two options that you had.”

The comment seemed to raise the hackles of Del. Michael J. Webert, R-Fauquier.

"Outside of Fairfax and outside of Northern Virginia, we have things called Civil War reenactments and things like that that involve hundreds, thousands of people,” Webert said. “Would that not be included as participating with the community, besides cooking meth?”