Never Mind The Facts, Let’s Pass Gun Laws

By Rod Dreher • January 30, 2013, 9:39 AM

CHICAGO — Not a single gun shop can be found in this city because they are outlawed. Handguns were banned in Chicago for decades, too, until 2010, when the United States Supreme Court ruled that was going too far, leading city leaders to settle for restrictions some describe as the closest they could get legally to a ban without a ban. Despite a continuing legal fight, Illinois remains the only state in the nation with no provision to let private citizens carry guns in public.

And yet Chicago, a city with no civilian gun ranges and bans on both assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, finds itself laboring to stem a flood of gun violence that contributed to more than 500 homicides last year and at least 40 killings already in 2013, including a fatal shooting of a 15-year-old girl on Tuesday.

To gun rights advocates, the city provides stark evidence that even some of the toughest restrictions fail to make places safer. “The gun laws in Chicago only restrict the law-abiding citizens and they’ve essentially made the citizens prey,” said Richard A. Pearson, executive director of the Illinois State Rifle Association. To gun control proponents, the struggles here underscore the opposite — a need for strict, uniform national gun laws to eliminate the current patchwork of state and local rules that allow guns to flow into this city from outside.

So, because strict gun laws have done nothing to stem the tide of homicidal violence in Chicago, this only proves that the entire nation must be put under a ban, even those people — the vast majority of gun owners — who use guns responsibly, as is their Second Amendment right? Really?

I don’t care for the NRA’s absolutism. I have no problem in principle with gun regulations, up to a point (e.g., I would favor, for example, laws banning guns for felons and the mentally ill, banning gun shows, banning large-capacity clips). But the zealous ideological purity with which gun control proponents treat gun bans makes no sense to me. I’ve lived much of my life in East Coast cities, and the absolute freakout many middle-class, educated Easterners have about guns is, to me, inexplicable. Europeans are the same way. I mentioned on this blog how unnerved a French couple visiting me in St. Francisville was to learn that I had two guns in the house. If I had told them I had king cobras resting in the closet, they would scarcely have been less frightened.

Today there will be a hearing in Congress about gun control. Again, I am not opposed to having this conversation, and I cringe in advance of expecting the NRA’s representative saying something stupid, e.g., we should put armed guards in every school. Still, I also cringe to think about how the debate will be driven by emotion. Don’t you care about the Sandy Hook victims? and so forth.

Never mind that the Sandy Hook shooter used guns that had been legally obtained under strict gun control laws. Never mind that he could have killed as many children with pistols as with his “assault rifle.”

Never mind that Jeffrey Goldberg is surely right that there are already far, far too many guns in American life to make strict gun control effective.

Never mind that the assault rifle ban of the 1990s is widely believed to have been a failure.

Never mind that according to FBI statistics, 90 percent of gun homicides are committed with handguns, and only five percent with rifles (hence the failure of the 1994 ban).

Never mind that according to a survey cited by the Justice Department, 80 percent of inmates imprisoned for a crime involving a gun say they got the gun through family, friends, or illegal means (which is to say, they didn’t go through the channels that would have allowed gun control to prevent them from obtaining the weapon).

Never mind that, as the Annenberg Center explains, the issue is a lot more complicated than partisans — especially anti-gun partisans — say.

We Must Do Something, Or We Have Failed The Children! Wash, rinse, repeat.

Posted in Crime and Punishment. Tagged assault rifles, crime, gun control, handguns, Second Amendment.

123 Responses to Never Mind The Facts, Let’s Pass Gun Laws

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Linda says:

January 30, 2013 at 8:32 pm

Steven Colbert addresses the Constitution, gun control, tyranny, hypocrisy

The Word – United We Standoff
If the Second Amendment is truly meant to defend against government force, then citizens will never be safe until they can have their own aircraft carriers.

Colbert said, in part:
“Like anyone setting up a new government, the founders set up a clause that says if you don’t like us shot us …

I and my friend at Fox News have always stood with those who arm themselves against tyranny, patriots such as Bill Ayers and the Weather Underground

[great example of hypocrisy, who gets to decide what qualifies as tyranny?]

… you think that AR-13 is going to save you when the government comes knocking .. we all need our own aircraft carriers

http://tinyurl.com/b8jvuwg

Gun Control & State Sovereignty

State officials fight Obama’s gun grab-o-rama by trying to outlaw the enforcement of federal gun control measures.

http://tinyurl.com/afdmoe9
Anna Marie says:

January 30, 2013 at 8:49 pm

My father hunts, so I have been around guns since childhood. Venison and the occasional antelope (when he hunted out west) were dinner in my home. He was also a small business owner. One night while working late, he was held up at gunpoint. My Dad then got a handgun to protect himself and his business. I grew up in a suburb of Philadelphia. That’s my anecdotal story.

So it is depressing, to say the least, when I come across what
Gretchen posted at 12:02 pm. A link insinuating that gun owners are the modern day equivalent of slaveholders.

If you wonder why folks think there is an attempt to demonize gun owners, rather than have a rational debate about our gun culture, check out her link.
jon s says:

January 30, 2013 at 9:16 pm

We don’t know what exactly happened at Sandy Hook yet, so stating one way or the other what could/could not have happened seems premature. At one point there were reports Lanza was rushed by the principal– if that is true then it’s conceivable a semiautomatic made a difference.

Most of those Chicago guns come from places with lax gun laws, sold legally.

Anyone who argues that the sheriff is lying about whether a semi killed those folks needs their head examined.
M_Young says:

January 30, 2013 at 9:21 pm

“M. Worrell: Gun laws aimed at lawful gun owners do not reduce crime, and even if we, like Britain, banned virtually all guns, you might suppress gun deaths but you’d see the same rise in violent crime that they did.

Homicide rate in US: 4.8/100,000
Homicide rate in UK: 1.2/100,000″

Alkali, we have a much larger population of sub-Saharan African descent. That population, 13% of the total, commits half of our murders. I think I’ve done the math on this and the murder rate for US whites is 2.9, if I remember.

You always must control for race when comparing the US to other advanced countries.
Gus says:

January 30, 2013 at 9:29 pm

“because the criminals run wild in Chicago, unchallenged by commensurate force in the hands of their victims and with no fear that anything of substance will be done by the city.”

Uh-huh. Except the overwhelming majority of murders in Chicago are gang related, between two armed camps who are fighting over turf. Nice strawman, though.
M. Worrell says:

January 30, 2013 at 10:19 pm

Gus, my advice to you is to start reading the Chicago Tribune. Or, move to the near west side of Chicago and then see how smug you feel when you have to defend yourself with a baseball bat and mace.

I do not deny that if you remove guns entirely (a myth in itself), you will decrease gun-related deaths. That’s little comfort to the woman who lacks a gun in order to protect herself from a knife-wielding rapist.

“Official crime figures show the UK also has a worse rate for all types of violence than the U.S. and even South Africa – widely considered one of the world’s most dangerous countries.”
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/334904/violent-britain-charles-c-w-cooke
Consequences1 says:

January 31, 2013 at 12:15 am

Britain, France, Sweden, Canada and Mexico all have HIGHER violent crime rates than the United States:

When different countries count different things, they end up with really misleading statistics.
Fred says:

January 31, 2013 at 7:41 am

Having read the nytimes piece I would say that the central theme is the fact that no matter how tight you make the regs surrounding guns, if that city is surrounded by communities where there are no tightened regs, guns will flow into the city. And they do, in the case of Chicago. (See Chucks Gun Shop just outside the city limits from the nytimes story) Hence the need for tighter regs/gun safety across the nations, at the federal level. No one is going to take guns away from those legally enabled to own them. you might have to work a little bit in order to obtain one, but you can and will get one.
Hansen says:

January 31, 2013 at 8:28 am

I believe this is totally about the disarmament of America’s civilian populace, not keeping our schools safe. The Democrat Party has become the Communist Party, and under Communism, civilians are not allowed to have guns, with few exceptions. Lest one think I will hammer only the C/Dems, the Republican Party has become Socialist Lite, while the Libertarians continue to devolve towards anarchy.
loudonisafool says:

January 31, 2013 at 11:34 am

Hence the need for tighter regs/gun safety across the nations, at the federal level.

Not really. The city could set up check points and metal detectors and require TSA style pat downs for entry to and exit from the city if they were really concerned about keeping guns out. The added benefit of that route (over national regulation) is that it allows the citizens of those towns to experience their freedom to be safe from scariness in all of its glory.
Siarlys Jenkins says:

January 31, 2013 at 12:29 pm

I eagerly await publication of the Hansenist Manifesto of True Whatism.
exley says:

January 31, 2013 at 3:20 pm

” The city could set up check points and metal detectors and require TSA style pat downs for entry to and exit from the city if they were really concerned about keeping guns out.”

@loudonisafool

your solution is pure silliness. Not viable. Again, this is about tightening up gun safety, and it needs to be done as a whole, not in a patchwork piecemeal fashion as exists today. I fail to see how that infringes on your 2nd amendment rights. You can keep your guns, but you need to carry liability insurance, you cannot buy them at gun shows and you must go through a certain level of processing at the points of purchase that will weed out those who should not be purchasing guns. Everybody….no loopholes. Now where in that does it say you loose your 2nd amendment rights?
Glaivester says:

January 31, 2013 at 6:46 pm

In other words, if you fear government oppression, Wouldn’t you want to vastly shrink, or eliminate, the US military which is indeed part of the government?

Why do you think so many people came out to support Ron Paul?

I don’t care for the NRA’s absolutism.

NRA is absolutist? Never heard of Gun Owners of America, have you?
2brknot2b says:

January 31, 2013 at 8:45 pm

All the gun laws in the world, total disarmament, won;t stop the thugs from committing crimes. What does deter criminals is armed citizens. Those in jails have said just this. So, why this talk about disarming the non-violent, law abiding? Seems ludicrous to disarm the very people of whom criminals are scared to death. But that is the lunacy of the commuNAZI gun ban movement. See the police state one recommends. Is that what America has come to be?
Loudon is a Fool says:

February 1, 2013 at 9:35 am

Excley sez:

You can keep your guns, but you need to carry liability insurance, you cannot buy them at gun shows and you must go through a certain level of processing at the points of purchase that will weed out those who should not be purchasing guns.

You can vote but you need to pay your Patriotic Franchise Excise Tax, vote in person, and pass the National Questionnaire to Identify Low Information Voters and Ensure Proper Patriotic Outlook Examination.

You can criticize the government but you need to buy an insurance policy to cover you in the event you slander a government official, you’ll need to run your script by the National Advisory Board for Free Speech and Unicorn Hunting (you know, just to make sure you’ve got your facts straight) and you’ll need to register for a National License to Speak Freely (and Hunt Unicorns).

You can exercise your religion provided that your religion has filed (and kept up to date) its proper paperwork with the Bureau of Religion and Animal Husbandry, your religious organization is fully paid up on its Excise Tax to Promote Religious Toleration and To End Poverty and Other Bad Stuff Like Unicorn Hunting, and provided that your religion is on the list of those determined by the Bureau of Religion and Animal Husbandry to be fully up to date in its theology.

And let’s not even get into the super dooper sacrosanctness of any below the belt right where the merest hint of an encumbrance is a violation of the right.

In any event, my post was merely intended to suggest that a more appropriate response to the desire of Chicagoans to infringe on their neighbor’s rights in an effort to make their ludicrous laws workable, is they should impose more better ludicrous laws on themselves. Certainly checkpoints are absurd. But absurd people deserve absurd laws. I think it actually makes them happy.
c matt says:

February 1, 2013 at 10:19 am

banning large-capacity clips

I am fine with that, as long as they leave the magazine capacity alone.
c matt says:

February 1, 2013 at 10:23 am

A link insinuating that gun owners are the modern day equivalent of slaveholders.

If anything, it would seem to be gun-banners are the modern day equivalent of slaveholders since it was the slavehodlers who wanted to ban guns from slaves.
c matt says:

February 1, 2013 at 10:32 am

and you must go through a certain level of processing at the points of purchase that will weed out those who should not be purchasing guns.

Umm…that already exists, even for purchases at gunshows. It’s called a background check. In fact, most of Obama’s executive orders last month basically said “we will do our job now… this time, for real.”

The only thing that is new, and little talked about, is a more stringent mental health check. FBI can track felons, but apparently “mental health issues” is only self reported. Seems there should be a way to check publicly available documents that would require a further check before a purchase is allowed to go forward (eg., were there any voluntary/involuntary commitment proceedings, domestic violence/disturbance charges, etc.).
AnotherBeliever says:

February 1, 2013 at 11:32 pm

Rod, I share your general opinion on the great divide between parts of the country where gun ownership, target shooting, and hunting are fairly common, and areas of the country where it is not. We tend to talk past each other to our detriment. However, I’m not sure that Chicago is a good example of why gun control laws won’t work. Chicago is a city in a larger state with less strict gun controls, surrounded by dozens of states with even less stringent gun controls. There aren’t border patrol checkpoints when you cross any of these boundaries. There aren’t random customs inspections of shipments, no giant x-ray machines. What fairly weak laws we have against weapons trafficking do not apply within our borders. What’s more, thanks to NRA activism, we don’t track gun purchases or purchasers as closely as we could so it’s hard to pin down hard data on guns and crime in the first place. However, when entire COUNTRIES have cracked down on the more dangerous types of guns, it has had an impact. To be sure, the impact was not immediate: there were still plenty of the banned guns in circulation for several years. But eventually, those numbers started to drop, as buy-backs took effect and as weapons were seized from houses and businesses when police had a warrant for investigating crime scenes and as weapons were seized at inbound border control and customs checkpoints.

(Somewhat unrelated note: I also don’t see the point of lifting the gun-free zones around schools. Security guards, cops, maybe a few designated and TRAINED football coach types, sure. But I’m less than convinced that your typical middle aged non-Veteran female teacher is able or willing to handle a gun AND keep it out of the hands of her own students. And I’m in favor of any gang bangers found with handguns on their person on or near school grounds getting the book thrown at them.)

I honestly don’t expect the gun control measures recently introduced by Democrats to pass in full. But I do think there’s room for compromise. A ban on new high capacity magazines, 100% background checks, making gun trafficking a federal offense, enabling law enforcement to track weapons electronically, and liability for the owners of unsecured weapons when those weapons are used at a crime scene.
AnotherBeliever says:

February 2, 2013 at 9:33 am

Loudon, you can vote. Unless you are under 18, mentally incompetent, or an ex-con. And you do need to register with your local municipality in order to do it. And there is a growing movement that you must produce photo ID in order to cast your vote.

You can criticize your elected officials. Unless you are in the military – then you may only do so privately, off duty, and when not in mixed ranks. You also may not publicly do so if you are a Federal employee. No one may commit actual slander or libel against anyone, public figure or not.

You may freely exercise your religion. Up to the point where it infringes on other people’s rights (don’t care if your religion requires a human sacrifice, it’s not permissible), or is against local civic code (exhibit A: peyote is okay on the Reservation in American Indian ceremonies. Same ceremony in suburban Boston will get you arrested) etc.

We set limits to our Constitutional rights. We even currently set limits to our gun rights. You have to jump through some serious hurdles and lay down some serious dough to own a machine gun in this country. There’s plenty of room for discussion on whether we need a few more limits. Let Congress debate it, let them vote on it, and let the inevitable court challenges work their way through our system. That will settle the matter.
exley says:

February 2, 2013 at 3:35 pm

c matt sez:

“Umm…that already exists, even for purchases at gunshows. It’s called a background check. In fact, most of Obama’s executive orders last month basically said “we will do our job now… this time, for real.””

And what of the estimated 40% of gun sales being performed by private citizens, not at gun show or gun shops, which do not currently require background checks. Given that 40% of gun crime perps sprouts from these particular guns, what of that? I point you to the “Source of gun” states found in the Firearm Use By Offenders paper put out by the U.S. Department of Justice. I will direct you to the “Source of gun” table not far into the report. I believe that would be a sane place to start increasing gun regulation, no?

But I am sure you will wave me off with a dismissive flick of your hand as a dumb naive lib, so…go take a read thru of this:

https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles/165476.pdf

I’ll cut to a few interesting stats:

- There were 13.7 million firearm transactions in
1993-1994, including 6.5 million handguns. About 60
percent of gun acquisitions involved federally
licensed dealers.

- About 211,000 handguns and 382,000 long guns were
stolen in noncommercial thefts in 1994.

- Slightly more than half of all privately owned
firearms were stored unlocked; 16 percent of
firearms were stored unlocked and loaded.

Now I know this is a study from ’97, but the NRA has done a wonderful job of legally shutting down any type of investigation into gun trends in this country, so work with me here.

Keep your guns, buy them appropriately – not in a private sale, sell them appropriately, store them appropriately, and you can enjoy gun ownership? Thing re gonna tighten up in this realm and it has nothing to do with your 2nd amendment rights. Too stringent for you? then you are a whiner who wants what he wants no questions asked. annoying.
ElitecommInc. says:

February 5, 2013 at 5:12 pm

c matt sez.

considering the number of actual gun deathsaccidental ot intentional . . . I am not surre of the import of your stats.
exley says:

February 6, 2013 at 10:20 am

ElitecommInc:

So if they are unimportant stats, you should have no issues with tidying up these loose ends – these numbers don’t amount to much in your opinion, so lets eliminate these unimportant stats by ending the ability for private citizens to sell/buy guns with no background check (ie: require universal background checks), require gun owners to properly secure their guns (or face some issue if they do not and their guns are either stolen or used without their authorization in a crime by someone else or used to commit suicide by someone else who gained access to them)

Or are by ‘unimportant’ are you saying these stats should just be accepted as collateral damage of your right to do what ever you want, right or wrong, when it comes to guns, because, well, 2nd Amendment!?

Increasing general gun safety in this manner does not equate to stripping you of your 2nd Amendment rights … get over it.