Briman

If you are looking for a gun just to punch holes with and aren't going to do any sort of specialized competition with it, I would stay away from '03 springfields. one in good condition is going to cost more than a new remington 700, and you will destroy the value of it by drilling it for a scope, and there is no guarentee that you will get it to shoot as good as a factory rifle.. They also will kick much harder than a remington, because of the stock design. On the other hand, the '03 and 03A3s do have sights on them already that are excellent for target shooting. I have an 03A3 that I worked over for competition, it has a new surplus barrel, I had the action trued up and bolt lapped to the receiver and it is an absolute tack driver, but I put more money into that rifle than it will ever be worth.

If you want to shoot Service rifle High Power and didn't live in kooifornia, I would advise against a M1 in favor of an AR. An M1 is a good rifle and is by far my favorite rifle to shoot, but there isn't any guarantee that they will be accurate. They are finicky about ammo, most 30-06 ammo will function in them, but there is a very narrow selection of ammo you can use that won't damage the rifle, and most of that ammo is surplus, and expensive surplus at that. M1s can be made to shoot very accurately, for the price of accurization, you could buy a M1A. It migth be worhwhile to buy a Greek barrelled action from CMP which sells for around $300, spend another $200 to have it rebarelled to .308, then another $100 for a stock, for $~700 you would have a great shooter that can shoot very cheap surplus ammo, but you still wouldn't have a scope. M1's have the best sights of any military rifle ever made, the sights on M14s and M-16s are nothing but updated copies, with practice, a person can shoot using these sights just as well as anyone who uses a scope.