Gun Control

Gun Control

I believe absolutely that guns should not be banned. I believe that in our constitution, gun ownership is protected just like freedom of speech, and the freedom from cruel and unusual punishment. I believe that the Bill of Rights is interdependent, in other words that you cannot pick which ones to honor, and which ones to ignore. If this is allowed, no civil rights are safe. I also believe that the right to defend one's self is a basic human right, and that banning guns would deprive law-abiding citizens of the ability to defend themselves from armed criminals. I also believe that gun ownership keeps crime down, and that this claim is supported by scientific research. John Lott, Jr., a researcher at Yale University, found that on average, "violent crime dropped by 4 percent for each 1 percent increase in gun ownership. Also, firearms are used defensively 2.5 million times every year, more than four times as many as criminal uses. This amounts to 2,575 lives saved for every one taken by a gun."

Americans have a constitutional right to own handguns and stricter laws and licensing will not effectively save lives. Despite opposition from police, media organizations and various organizations to an ill-advised ban on handguns and the sale of firearms and ammunition, Proposition H passed in San Francisco Tuesday, 8 November, 2005. If you ban firearms, criminals will not obey the law and only law-abiding citizens will be victimized, first by the ordinance, which I believe violates state statute, and then by the outlaws.

The Brady law is a federal law (18 USC 922(t)) requiring instant background checks on prospective gun buyers. When a firearms dealer sells a handgun, shotgun, or long rifle to a prospective buyer, a background check must be performed on that person in order to ascertain whether or not that person is prohibited from owning a firearm due to past criminal actions.

"2,356,376 background checks were performed the first year the Brady law took effect, at a cost of about $24 per check. Of those checks, only four prosecutions were initiated. That's 14.1 million dollars per prosecution. Plus, local law enforcement agencies had to take officers off of the streets, and put them behind desks to process applications and perform background checks. Do you think this had any tangible effect on reducing crime?"

The only affect that this law had was to increase state and government spending on background checks that are fruitless when it comes to stopping criminals.

Different countries throughout the world provide examples of a wide range of gun control. They range from countries like China, where no guns whatsoever are allowed to be carried by citizens, to Colombia, where the government has distributed guns to peasants so that they could defend themselves. Countries that have been closely monitored by U.S. gun rights groups are Australia, the UK, and Canada. These countries are particularly relevant to the United States due to their similarities in government and social values. These countries have imposed restrictive gun-laws that include registration, and handgun bans. Interestingly, these bans have been directly followed with spikes in the rates of breaking and entering, assaults, and other crimes.

A 1998 study by the US Department of Justice found that there were 40 percent more muggings in England, and burglary rates were almost 100 percent higher than in the United States. And, counter-intuitively, rates of crimes using handguns are on the rise. In 1999-2000, crimes using handguns were at a seven year high. Apparently, criminals were easily able to access guns, but law enforcement officers and law-abiding citizens were not allowed.

In Australia, the government banned weapons in 1996, after a publicized shooting. Immediately after the ban, armed robberies rose by 73 percent, unarmed robberies by 28 percent, kidnappings by 38 percent, assaults by 17 percent, and manslaughter by 29 percent. This was reported on the Web site of the Australian Bureau of Statistics in January, 2000.

[The Constitution preserves] the advantage of being armed which Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation...(where) the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms.

"Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom in Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops that can be, on any pretence, raised in the United States. A military force, at the command of Congress, can execute no laws, but such as the people perceive to be just and constitutional; for they will possess the power, and jealousy will instantly inspire the inclination, to resist the execution of a law which appears to them unjust and oppressive"

In the mainstream media, they report that thousands of children die annually in gun accidents. This little statement is an outright lie. Gun accidents involving children are actually at record lows, although you wouldn't know it from listening to the mainstream media. In 1997, only 142 children under 15 years of age died in gun accidents, and the total number of gun-related deaths for this age group was 642. More children die each year in accidents involving bikes, space heaters or drowning. The often repeated claim that 12 children per day die from gun violence includes "children" up to 20 years of age, the great majority of whom are young adult males who die in gang-related violence.

Maybe there should be bans on bike riding, space heaters, and swimming instead?

Another issue touted in the media is gun shows are responsible for a large number of firearms falling into the hands of criminals. This is also false. Contrary to former President Clinton's claims, there is no "gun show loophole." All commercial arms dealers at gun shows must run background checks, and the only people exempt from them are the small number of non-commercial sellers. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, at most, two percent of guns used by criminals are purchased at gun shows, and most of those were purchased legally by people who passed background checks.

The tragedy at Columbine High School illustrates the deficiencies of current gun control laws. This one is quite the whopper! Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold violated close to 20 firearms laws in amassing their cache of weapons (not to mention the law against murder), so it seems rather dubious to argue that additional laws might have prevented this tragedy. The two