A Summary of Pro-Gun Arguments

by Lynn Clark

Recently I have felt that the NRA has not done as good a job as it could have in getting the pro-gun side of the message across to those who should hear it. Most of the blame for this lies with the news media through it's one-sided, unfair reporting about gun control issues. [1]

This situation has been greatly aggravated since the Federal Communications Commission abolished the fairness doctrine as it applies to news coverage. The news media is no longer required to even give the appearance of fairness concerning public issues. In the recent battle about "Saturday Night Specials" in Maryland, the two major newspapers in the area refused to run NRA-sponsored ads. The broadcast media is just as bad. This paper is an attempt to get the unadulterated facts to those in legislative circles who should know all the facts before they cast their votes on gun-related legislation.

Disclaimer

Although I am a Life Member of the NRA, I am not an official spokesman for the NRA. The views expressed in this paper are mine and should not be construed as representing the "Official" views of the NRA.

Acknowledgments

While the views expressed in this paper are ones I have developed over many years, I must give credit to the many knowledgeable authors who have published books and articles about gun control issues. Quite naturally, many of these articles have appeared in pro-gun magazines over the years. I would like to express my appreciation to the many authors who have taken the time to ferret out facts concerning gun ownership issues in this country throughout our 200-year history, as well as in other countries. I am particularly indebted to those authors who have had their articles published in the monthly magazines of the National Rifle Association, "The American Rifleman" and "The American Hunter". I am also indebted to the NRA Institute for Legislative Action which represents the interests of America's gun owners in the halls of Congress.

Preface

The following "letter to the editor" appeared in an October, 1988 edition of the Boulder (Colorado) Daily Camera.

Editor:

F. A.'s letter echoes the propaganda the National Rifle Association has been putting out recently, in very costly magazine advertisements, to the effect that the NRA is just a bunch of nice people who have hunting rifles or indulge in a bit of target practice now and then.

Perhaps that does represent what the NRA stood for when it was founded many years ago, and undoubtedly it still has members like that. But perhaps Dr. A has been too busy with his medical practice to notice that the NRA has now become the NRSNSPOMGCKBA, that is, the National Rifle, Saturday Night Special, Privately Owned Machine Gun and Cop Killer Bullet Association -- for it fanatically defends unrestricted ownership of all the above, no matter how irrelevant they may be to the non-homicidal amusements that the NRA likes to talk about for public relations purposes.

The real concern of the present-day NRA seems to be to defend the rights of gun manufacturers and sellers to make as much money as possible.

In the end Dr. A. may find that the NRASNSPOMGCKBA has worked against him. If the organization insists that all firearms, even machine guns which could never be legally used for hunting, must be treated alike, the public may take them at their word, and ban all of them. People who are appalled at the flood of handguns engulfing the country, and feeling that their personal safety is threatened, are in no mood to split hairs.

If Dr. A. belongs to an organization without looking at what it really is doing at the present time, he is naive. The organization, exploiting its original "Rifle" name while it promotes and protects so many other things, can only be described as totally cynical.

This paper is a personal response to the ideas represented by this letter and so many others like it which appear from time to time in the ebb and flow of the gun control debate. The unsettling thing about the ideas expressed in the letter is that so much of them are based on misinformation and distortions provided by the (by and large) anti-gun news media. Apparently, it is very easy for non-gun-owners to be misled. Those of us who are NRA members know better. This paper is an attempt to explain the pro-gun side of the arguments the anti-gun media chooses not to report.

Introduction

I will discuss the following issues: Saturday Night Specials/Handguns, Machine Guns, Semi-Automatic "Assault" Rifles, "Cop-Killer Bullets", "Plastic" Guns and Waiting Periods. Finally, I will discuss the NRA proposals for reducing gun-related crime.

First, let me state the obvious. The NRA is opposed to restrictions on the ownership and lawful use of firearms by law-abiding citizens. Period. Of course, we cite the Second Amendment of the Constitution as guaranteeing the right to keep and bear arms. We also believe that restrictive gun laws have little, if any, affect on crime reduction and further believe that this is demonstrated by the high crime rates in such cities as New York, Washington, D.C., and others with similarly strict gun control laws. The only people adversely affected by restrictive gun laws are law-abiding citizens. The NRA supports mandatory, severe penalties for the criminal misuse of firearms. Anything I have to say in the following pages is in addition to these ideas. Having said that, let's begin.

Saturday Night Specials/Handguns

The first issue mentioned in the quoted letter is the so-called "Saturday Night Special" (SNS). The difficulty gun owners have with this is one of definition. What makes a SNS different from other handguns? The anti-gun crowd1 invariably defines it as a "small caliber (.32 or less), short barrel (3" or less), cheap handgun which has no legitimate sporting purpose" or words to that effect. The fact is that convicted felons prefer large-caliber, high-quality, expensive handguns.[2] The "sporting purpose" part of this definition implies that the anti-gun crowd concedes a legitimate "sporting purpose" exists. If we take this to mean that these small handguns are not well-suited for big game hunting, then we will have to agree. On the other hand, if we include target shooting or plinking, then small, cheap handguns have a legitimate sporting purpose. Hunters do not use small, cheap handguns for big-game hunting. Indeed, most hunting regulations exempt small handguns. Nevertheless, I know many people who own small, cheap handguns. They just don't use them for hunting.

This notion that a gun has no utility if it doesn't have a "legitimate sporting purpose" misses the mark. Small handguns, even the cheap variety, have a very utilitarian purpose when it comes to personal protection and that is undoubtedly why most of them are purchased, whether the threat is perceived or real, immediate or potential. If we agree that we each have the right to self-defense (Colorado State Law guarantees it [3], as do the laws of most states) it seems pretty ludicrous to deny the means to successfully carry out such a defense.

What might we suppose the odds are that a frail, elderly man or woman will overpower a young, strong assailant? What about a young, strong man or woman against multiple attackers? Unfortunately, the police are rarely there when the crime is in progress. Most criminals are not quite that stupid. In any case, where does it leave us if we should find ourselves in one of these unpleasant situations with no means at our disposal to stop the attack? What if we decide, after careful consideration, that we need to purchase a handgun for our personal safety? What if we can't afford an expensive, quality handgun? A small, cheap handgun would probably serve the purpose just fine (we just described a SNS).

The Justice Department study mentioned earlier has also shown that the thing convicted felons fear above all else is the possibility of confronting an armed citizen. They fear this more than the possibility of confronting an armed police officer. I haven't said that anyone has to shoot anyone. The same study and others have shown that the mere presence of a firearm is often enough to stop an attack or prevent one from starting (it does seem to be helpful if the attacker believes the intended victim will, in fact, use the weapon if necessary). Several years ago I advised one of my non-gun-owning and borderline anti-gun friends, who found herself in a very frightening situation, that I didn't think she should buy a gun because I didn't think she would use it if push came to shove. I also didn't think she would invest the necessary time to become proficient with it. After some discussion she agreed, but not everyone is like her. I have another friend who had his life threatened several years ago. His response was to buy a .357 Magnum. Again, I cautioned him at great length about his use of that gun. When the threat passed, he sold the gun. Nobody says you have to own a gun. Maybe your weapon of choice is a baseball bat, but I am pretty certain that you will not deter many attackers determined to commit mayhem, especially if they are superior in size or numbers or are high on drugs or passion. The cynical bumper sticker, "Smith and Wesson beats 4 aces" has a ring of truth in it.

In 1977 Canada passed a restrictive gun law. "The crime that gun ownership best deters is burglary of occupied residences. While only one in 10 American burglaries is committed against an occupied home, half of all Canadian burglaries are...The situation is even worse in Britain, where gun control is stricter, and 59% of burglaries are attempted against occupied residences." [4] Canadian and British burglars can be reasonably sure that the occupants will not be armed. American burglars cannot be so sure, so they try to avoid burglarizing occupied residences. Chalk up one benefit to private gun ownership in America.

I have had my house burglarized before and have had occasion to ask police officers about self defense. None of them has ever told me that I would be better off not owning a handgun or other firearm for personal protection, contrary to what the news media reports. If police officers tell you that you would be better off not owning a firearm for self defense, it may be a result of their assessment of your lack of determination to use it if necessary, your obvious unfamiliarity with firearms and a correct judgement about your unwillingness to become proficient with it, more than the result of a blanket policy of discouraging gun ownership for personal protection. By the way, these were regular police officers, not police chiefs who may be beholden to political forces more than the practical, every day side of law enforcement. The cop on the beat understands very well that he can't be everywhere and protect everyone all the time. It might be well to consider, if you were a police officer in our aggressively litigious society, what type of advice you might give to people like yourself. It wouldn't be too surprising to find that many police officers advise against gun ownership for personal protection more out of fear of potential liability suits than anything else.

We constantly hear that a gun at home is more likely to hurt one of the occupants than it is to deter a crime. Of course, it is up to a responsible adult to insure that kids can't get their hands on a loaded gun. That is what lock boxes are for. When you weigh the life of a child against owning a gun for self defense, the $70 cost of a lock box is a small price to pay. A lock box will keep a handgun secure from the curious hands of a child while still allowing an adult with the combination to access the gun in a matter of seconds should the need arise. It seems to me that if the news media really wanted to do something to prevent gun accidents at home, they would mention lock boxes. People aren't going to give up their guns in spite of what the news media tells them anyway, so why shouldn't the media do a public service and inform people about safe ways to keep guns at home? The NRA has the best educational program for "gun-proofing" children. It is a "gun-neutral" approach that uses a coloring book to emphasize three things about guns to children:

1. If you see a gun, stop -- don't touch it
2. Leave the area
3. Tell an adult

The NRA is introducing the coloring book into targeted school systems, and while critics have predictably howled at the idea, the program has received praise from educators and law enforcement groups. Far from lauding the NRA's efforts to teach firearms safety to young children in the schools, anti-gunners have denounced NRA's efforts in south Florida and the Chicago area which were experiencing a rash of firearms accidents involving children. The American Federation of Police and the Congress of Racial Equality have praised the program, and a few private schools have accepted it. Most public schools, however, responding to anti-gun educators and outsiders, have yet to accept the courses of the nations's leading authority on gun safety -- the NRA. So far, schools in Iowa, Missouri, Nebraska and Pennsylvania have requested the program.

What do we do about suicides? Suicides rank far and away as the highest percentage of gun-related deaths. The argument of the anti- gun crowd is that the suicide rate will drop dramatically if we eliminate private ownership of guns. The article about Canadian gun laws referenced above also points out that "suicides involving firearms fell noticeably after 1978, reversing the previous trend. The overall suicide rate, however, did not drop, which leads to the inference that the availability of particular weapons has no impact on a nation's suicide rate. America's suicide rate, already slightly lower than Canada's, declined some more."

As you can see, the discussion has changed from one about "Saturday Night Specials" to handguns in general. If convicted felons spurn small, cheap handguns in favor of their large-caliber, higher-quality counterparts, why should anyone be so eager to ban them? Let's take it a step further. The Justice Department study mentioned above also pointed out that if all handguns were banned and confiscated, criminals would simply cut off the barrels of rifles and shotguns to concealable length. Professor Wright said it this way,

If a ban on handguns was enacted, 64% of the criminal respondents said they would shift from a handgun to sawed-off rifles and shotguns. That finding was elicited from three-fourths of "handgun predators" and five-eighths of those who had used a handgun more than once in crime...We would do well, by the way, to take this response seriously: most of the predators who said they would substitute the sawed-off shotgun also told us elsewhere in the questionnaire that they had in fact sawed off a shotgun at some time in their lives and that it would be "very easy" for them to do so again. The possibility that even a few of the men who presently prowl the streets with handguns would, in the face of a handgun ban, prowl with sawed-off shotguns instead is itself good reason to think twice about the advisability of such a ban. That as many as three-quarters of them might do so causes one to tremble.

Wright argues, then, that there are "sensible and humane" reasons for opposing a handgun ban. In a turnabout from his previous gun-control views, Wright concurs with NRA members in saying, "They oppose gun regulation because they don't believe it will help control crime, and so do I." [5]

Machine Guns

The second issue mentioned in the letter is that of unrestricted, private ownership of machine guns. Again, this is another issue that has received short shrift from the news media. On the surface, it is very appealing to support such a ban. But I think we need a little history before we can understand what is really behind NRA support for the private ownership of machine guns.

First, a definition is in order. A machine gun is defined as a firearm which will fire continuously as long as the trigger is depressed and as long as ammunition is available to the weapon. A machine gun is also properly referred to as a fully-automatic weapon.

Up until 1934 there were no restrictions of any kind concerning ownership of machine guns. Unfortunately, John Dillinger, Bonnie and Clyde and others began running around the midwest robbing banks. That was bad enough, of course, but they made it worse by using Thompson submachine guns in the course of their robberies. This caused such an uproar that the congress passed the National Firearms Act of 1934 (26 USC 4181-4191, 5801-5872) as a way to regulate the ownership of such weapons. The NFA act placed the following restrictions on the purchase and ownership of machine guns:

1. The prospective purchaser had to pay a $200 transfer tax for each machine gun purchased
2. The prospective purchaser had to undergo a very thorough background check conducted by federal law enforcement agencies

The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (BATF) has testified that there is no record of any legally owned and registered machine gun having been used in any crime since the NFA was enacted in 1934. Period. In fact, the BATF (which is the agency responsible for regulating the ownership of machine guns) has consistently supported the right of law-abiding citizens to purchase and own such weapons. It is easy to understand that any citizen who is willing to undergo a very thorough FBI background check in order to own such a weapon and is willing to pay thousands of dollars for it, is going to be very careful about safeguarding it.

If you're wondering why anyone should have a right to own machine guns, I'll give you three reasons. First, machine guns are incredibly fun to shoot, albeit very expensive to do so. Second, there are legitimate collectors who want to have one as part of their collection. Third, contrary to the letter's assertion, machine guns are legal for hunting in some states. I don't have any figures, but I believe that most people who own machine guns own them for the first two reasons. I doubt that any machine gun owners actually use them for hunting.

Well, something probably sounds funny here. After all, the news media has been quite active in the last few years reporting crimes in which machine guns have been a factor. And BATF has said that no legally owned and registered machine gun has ever been used in any crime. The simple fact is that every time you have heard of a crime involving a machine gun, that machine gun was an unregistered, illegally manufactured or imported machine gun, the mere possession of which carried penalties of fines up to $10,000 and/or imprisonment up to ten years as well as civil penalties and property forfeitures. The NFA is a law which has worked remarkably well over the last 50 years. It is a shame that the news media has made no distinction between legally owned and registered and illegal unregistered or imported machine guns. That blurring of the difference leads people to completely erroneous conclusions about what the NRA is up to. Of course, it is the legally owned and registered machine guns which the NRA supports.

Unfortunately, from my viewpoint, the NFA has been effectively nullified by an amendment to the Firearm Owners Protection Act of 1985 (FOPA). Representative Bill Hughes (D-NJ) managed, over BATF opposition, to get an amendment attached to the FOPA which put an end to the legal private ownership of new machine guns. In fact, this is the first time any category of firearms has been brought under an outright ban. The irony is that the category of firearms that got banned is the only category which has never been used in any crime. The NRA has the overwhelming support of its membership to work to repeal Representative Hughes' amendment. As an aside, Representative Hughes admitted that most of his understanding of crime involving machine guns came from television shows like Miami Vice. So much for being an informed Congressman. Apparently, many American's source of information about guns is the same.

Semi-Automatic "Assault" Rifles

The latest gambit of the anti-gun crowd is the hysteria about semi-automatic "assault" rifles . Again, this is an example of the anti-gun crowd hurrying to ban a category of firearms without first acquiring the facts.

A semi-automatic firearm is defined as one which fires a single cartridge with a single pull of the trigger and which automatically loads another fresh cartridge in preparation for the next pull of the trigger. The trigger must be released and pulled again before the next cartridge will fire. Please note the difference from a machine gun discussed above.

Since the early part of this century, the United States Government has supported, through the National Board for the Promotion of Rifle Practice (NBPRP), an on-going, very active program of high-power rifle competition. It is administered by the Director of Civilian Marksmanship (DCM) of the Department of the Army with the assistance of the NRA. Millions of shooters, men and women, have participated over the years with each year's program culminating at the national matches at Camp Perry, Ohio. The matches are shot in "strings" of 10 or 20 shots and consist of shooting at targets up to 600 yards away in three positions: prone, sitting and standing. Some strings are shot in "slow fire" (about 1 minute per shot) and others are shot in "rapid fire" (about 10 seconds per shot). This is all done without the use of telescopic sights. As you may surmise, this requires much skill and concentration, especially at the long distances involved. The purpose of the program is to promote rifle marksmanship among the civilian population in order to insure that an adequate pool of trained marksmen is available in the unlikely event that we should become involved in another major war. The primary intent is that these marksmen will be available to help train large numbers of military recruits should the need arise.

Here is what the anti-gun crowd does not know or will not admit to knowing. Probably 95% (perhaps more) of those who participate in this program use semi-automatic rifles of military origin. The use of a semi-automatic rifle is a decided advantage in such competition, particularly in the rapid fire events. Very few shooters use bolt-action rifles anymore. Indeed, since the current standard-issue military rifle is the M-16, more and more shooters are using the AR-15 which is the civilian, semi-automatic version of the M-16.

Having said this, I must ask, "How do you ban semi-automatic firearms without penalizing the tens of thousands of law-abiding shooters who participate in the high-power rifle program?" Bear in mind that this program provides considerable recreation to those who participate in the sport. Please understand also that these are not the people who shoot up school yards. They don't deal in drugs, either. Nor do they belong to street gangs. There are many hundreds of thousands of other law-abiding citizens who own and lawfully use semi-automatic "assault" rifles as well. Do you really believe that banning firearms will keep them out of the hands of smugglers and other criminals? They already smuggle drugs. Do you think they won't smuggle firearms? The only people who would be adversely affected by a ban would be the law-abiding citizens who enjoy the shooting sports. I have heard estimates of the number of semi-automatic "assault" rifles in civilian hands ranging from one to nine million. It is ludicrous to think that any appreciable dent will be made in the crime problem by banning such firearms when it is so obvious by the numbers that the overwhelming majority of these firearms are used for legal "sporting purposes". The use of these types of firearms in crime is almost universally related to the drug problem. We should be focusing on the cause of the problem rather than trying to cure it by treating the symptoms.

The anti-gun crowd asserts that semi-automatic weapons' sole purpose is to kill people. Technically, that is incorrect. It is much preferable to wound enemy soldiers and that was one of the design criteria that went into the development of our military M-16, (see the extended discussion of "Cop-Killer Bullets" in Appendix A).

These weapons were designed to continue to work in the harshest possible conditions. They will operate at 60 degrees below zero, at 120 degrees above zero and everywhere in between, and will function when they are clean, or covered with mud (only a slight exaggeration). In short, they are the most reliable firearms available and are desirable for that reason alone. Because they are used to kill people doesn't mean that every civilian who buys one does so for that reason. Millions of law-abiding, semi-automatic-owning people in this country strenuously object to such a characterization because it doesn't fit.

These semi-automatic "assault" rifles are also legal for use in hunting in most states. However, most states limit the magazine capacity to five rounds when used for big-game hunting (deer and larger). Some states also limit the use of .22 caliber cartridges to small game. For example, in the state of Colorado, the Colt AR-15 is illegal for hunting large game animals because it uses a .22 caliber cartridge. Colorado hunting regulations require a minimum .24 caliber cartridge. In the state of Utah it is legal for the same game. However, the Chinese-made AK-47 is legal in both states because it fires a .30 caliber cartridge. Both of these "assault" rifles are sufficiently accurate for use in hunting at distances up to about 300 yards, just like other hunting rifles. One reason some people use "assault" rifles for hunting is due to their light weight. It is a whole lot more enjoyable to lug a six-pound "assault" rifle up and down the mountains than it is to lug a nine-pound "sporting" rifle. Three pounds makes a big difference.

Let me explain two other reasons people find these weapons so desirable. First, the current generation of "assault" rifles are also incredibly fun to shoot. Why? Because one of the problems the military has had over the years is that it is difficult to teach good marksmanship skills to recruits who have had no shooting experience, especially when the rifle hurts them so badly when they shoot it. All current generation military firearms have buffering systems which absorb most of the recoil energy developed by the rifle when it is fired. Therefore, it doesn't hurt. This is even true of those "assault" rifles available in .30 caliber such as the Chinese AK-47 and the German HK-91. Besides any .22 caliber rim-fire rifle, semi-automatic "assault" rifles are perhaps the best choice to use for teaching new shooters how to shoot. In fact, anyone who has gone through basic military training in the last 20 years will tell you that drill instructors routinely demonstrate the low recoil of the M-16 by firing it while holding the butt of the rifle against their crotch, forehead or chin. No one in their right mind would even think of doing that with anything other than a semi-automatic "assault" rifle. Doing so with a bolt-action rifle could be fatal or eliminate any possibility of having children.

Second, many newer generation semi-automatic military rifles are designed around, or are available in, a smaller caliber cartridge, usually about .22 caliber (most older generation military rifles were based on a .30 caliber cartridge). This contributes to less recoil energy which in turn means less pain. The military reason for a smaller caliber is that it allows the individual soldier to carry more ammunition and increases the chances of wounding, rather than killing an enemy soldier. The smaller caliber also costs less to shoot, i.e., more bang for the buck (no pun intended). The advantage of lower costs is not lost on civilian or military shooters.

All of this information is totally lost on the anti-gun crowd because they have little personal experience with firearms. It is silly for non-gun-owning "experts" to proclaim why certain classes of firearms are of no use to private citizens. With no personal experience with firearms, what qualifies them to make such assertions? We all agree, however, that something must be done to prevent these, or any other firearms, from easily finding their way into the hands of criminals. More about that later.

Cop-Killer Bullets

The last issue mentioned in the letter was "Cop-Killer Bullets". First, let me point out that no police officer has ever been shot with so-called "Cop-Killer Bullets". The term "Cop-Killer Bullet" was adopted by the anti-gun crowd for it's obvious emotional appeal. The proper terminology is armor-piercing bullets.

The "Cop-Killer Bullet" legislation which the anti-gun crowd tried to pass would have outlawed all firearm ammunition which would penetrate the bullet-proof vests commonly worn by police officers. Not only would this have outlawed the teflon-coated, hardened, armor-piercing bullets designed for police use, but it would also have outlawed almost all rifle bullets commonly used for hunting, since almost all rifle bullets will easily penetrate such body armor. In other words, if this legislation had passed as written by the anti-gun crowd, it would have had the practical effect of ending all "legitimate sporting" uses of rifles by outlawing the ammunition. The NRA had no choice but to oppose such ridiculous legislation. The legislation which was finally passed had the desired effect of outlawing civilian use of bullets specifically designed for police use in piercing armor while leaving rifle bullets exempt, as well they should have been. This compromise legislation was passed with the NRA's full assistance, cooperation and support.

Please refer to Appendix A for further discussion of "Cop-Killer Bullets".

This leads us to an issue not mentioned in the letter but which is similarly misleading if you rely on the news media for your understanding of it. That issue is the so-called "Plastic Gun".

Plastic Guns

During the latter part of 1988, Senator Howard Metzenbaum (D-OH) and Senator Edward Kennedy (D-MA) introduced legislation under the guise of "airport security". It really had nothing to do with airport security, but rather set an arbitrary limit on the minimum amount of steel a handgun could contain. It also would have given discretionary power to unelected bureaucrats to change the definition of "not readily detectable" as applied to handguns and airport security equipment.

The news media did not bother to report that the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (BATF), among others, opposed this legislation. Representatives of both agencies testified before Congress that the proposed legislation was unnecessary and would do nothing to enhance airport security. They also pointed out that there is no firearm which is not readily detectable by present airport security devices, nor is anyone on the threshold of developing such a firearm. Hence, this proposed legislation was aimed at a non-existent target.

The compromise bill that was finally passed requires that all handguns manufactured and sold in this country have enough metal in them to insure that they generate a sharp x-ray image. Contrary to what the news media chose to report, this legislation was passed with the full support and cooperation of the NRA.

Let's discuss "plastic guns". The gun which started all of this nonsense is the Austrian made Glock 17. It is a semi-automatic 9 mm pistol which is 83% steel by weight (19 ounces). The lower half of the pistol, the receiver, is mostly a polymer material. This results in a durable, lightweight pistol. Even though the pistol has a large amount of polymer in its construction, it still looks like a pistol under airport x-ray equipment. Astrophysics Research Corp., the world's largest manufacturer of x-ray security screening equipment and the manufacturer of the units currently used at over 90% of U.S. airports, in a response to Representative Mario Biaggi (D-NY) stated, "Fully assembled, the Glock 17 looks exactly like any other automatic pistol when viewed on the television monitor of our Linescan airport x-ray security machine. Further, it causes our Mark 100 Metal Detector to alarm at the normal setting just as any other pistol does. When the Glock 17 is broken down into its three basic components...all three components are still visible and identifiable on the television monitor of the x-ray system by a trained security operator. In all tests, the Glock 17 was x-rayed while inside a standard briefcase with a normal amount of paper (approximately 1" thick) and other items usually found in a briefcase. Even the plastic frame shows clearly...". [6] You didn't read this in your local newspaper because they chose not to report it.

Waiting Periods

Let's take one more issue. Again, in 1988, Senator Howard Metzenbaum (D-OH) and Representative Edward Feighan (D-OH) attempted to attach a previously rejected anti-gun bill, the so-called "Brady" bill, onto the Omnibus Drug Bill. Their amendment would have done the following:

1. Impose de facto nationwide handgun registration
2. Give the government control over the sale, transfer, trade, loan or gift of a handgun
3. Create a multi-million dollar bureaucracy that could arbitrarily deny handgun ownership
4. Make federal law of legislation already rejected by a majority of states -- including Metzenbaum's and Feighan's home state of Ohio

It is really beyond me how anyone could have the audacity to introduce legislation on the national level which has previously been soundly rejected by their own constituents. There ought to be a law against that! This legislation was advertised as anti-drug legislation. Representative Feighan made that claim on the MacNeil/Lehrer News Hour. The presumption was that a one-week waiting period would prevent felons from obtaining guns. The Justice Department study mentioned earlier "showed just the opposite: Criminals don't buy guns through regulated channels; they don't get permits or register their guns; and the more serious they are as criminals, the less likely they are to get guns from licensed dealers, directly or indirectly". [7] The only people who would be affected by such proposals are law-abiding citizens.

This legislation was obviously just another veiled attempt at gun registration. Fortunately, the House adopted a substitute proposal that directs the Justice Department to try to create a computer system for gun dealers to identify felons who attempt to purchase firearms. The NRA supported this bill. I believe that such a system is very workable. Indeed, we already have prototypes of what such a system might be like in the current nationwide computer information networks like CompuServe, The Source, Genie and others.

By the way, a waiting period would not have prevented John Hinckley from purchasing the handgun with which he shot President Reagan and the others. At the time he purchased the gun, he "had no felony record, had not been adjudicated a mental incompetent by any court, and would have been approved to purchase a handgun under any waiting period system yet devised". [8] The Stockton schoolyard murderer, Patrick Purdy,

had also purchased five handguns in California after going through their two-week waiting period and police background check. All of his previous felony arrests had been plea-bargained to misdemeanors.

Conclusion

Restrictions on the lawful ownership and use of any firearm are ill-advised. I believe the facts support the notion that restrictive gun laws adversely affect only law-abiding citizens. The letter to the editor quoted at the beginning of this paper implied that a total ban of all firearms would be the ideal solution to the crime problem. I suggest that this would result in an increase in criminal activity the likes of which we have not seen in modern history. A total ban on private ownership of firearms would have the practical result of disarming law-abiding citizens without disarming criminals. To suggest that banning the private ownership of firearms will decrease crime is to display a supreme ignorance of how easy it is to manufacture or smuggle firearms, not to mention a severely pollyana-ish view about what motivates violent criminals. We can't even keep criminals from manufacturing guns in prisons! The only way a total ban would work would be to also erase all record of firearm technology and eliminate all access to charcoal, sulfur and potassium nitrate, the three main components of gunpowder (potassium nitrate is readily available in lawn fertilizer). The mechanics of firearms is no big secret. Fortunately, or unfortunately depending on your point of view, we have come too far to seriously consider banning firearms as a means of decreasing gun-related crime.

What then do we do about crimes involving firearms? I believe that we are seeing worse crimes because the deterrent value of prison time is much diminished from what it used to be. As long as we continue to tolerate a system which provides revolving-door justice and allows capital crimes to go unpunished we will continue to see crime rates increase and/or crimes to become more heinous. We must face up to the fact that it will cost money to make felony convictions a useful deterrent. Banning guns won't decrease violent crime. Criminals will always get the guns they need.

The NRA has proposed three specific things we can do to reduce gun- related crime without punishing law-abiding gun owners:

1. Not allow a person to plea bargain a felony charge down to a misdemeanor except once in a five-year period.
2. Find funds to build more prisons, even if it means a special tax to get these violent offenders off the streets. (The NRA won a statewide referendum on this in Oregon in the November, 1988 election.)
3. Call on the U.S. Justice Department to stop the practice of coddling criminals by refusing to enforce the four-year old NRA-sponsored McClure/Volkmer Act (FOPA). This act gave the federal government the tool to take drug traffickers carrying firearms off the streets with a mandatory five to twenty year prison sentence with no parole possible.

If the first proposal were in effect, Patrick Purdy would have been in prison and not in that Stockton schoolyard killing children. Before that tragic incident, Purdy was arrested for soliciting sex -- and released. He was arrested for the possession of narcotics -- and released. He was arrested on dangerous weapons charges -- and released. He was arrested for attempted robbery -- and released. And he was arrested for receiving stolen property -- and released. Even a police psychiatrist, in a written report, warned that Purdy was a danger to himself and to society -- a warning repeatedly ignored by the criminal justice system. Because of the failure of the criminal justice system to indict Purdy on even one of those felony charges, he legally purchased five handguns in California after going through the 14-day waiting period and police background investigation.

Let's review. The news media has misrepresented each of the issues mentioned in the letter to the editor as well as every other gun issue they have covered. Lately, the news media has accused the NRA of going "off the deep end" (words straight out of Handgun Control, Inc. literature) and being out of step with the American public. On the contrary, it is the NRA which is in step with the 70 million adult Americans who own guns. It is the anti-gun crowd, who have little personal experience with guns, who keep going off the deep end. It is the news media which continues to go off the deep end through biased, one-sided reporting. Through misinformation and misrepresentation they keep trying to chip away at the right which may ultimately preserve the republic. Noted environmentalist Edward Abbey said, "When the government bans guns, only the government will have guns". I believe the founding fathers understood what Abbey meant. It is worthy of serious reflection. It is significant that the "right to keep and bear arms" is the second of the ten rights in the Bill of Rights.

On February 13, 1989 the same newspaper mentioned at the beginning of this paper, in a gun control editorial stated:

The Second Amendment is not about duck hunting. It is a step back to a time when men thought of armed uprising, of fighting off our own government when and if it became too burdensome.

Most of our rules of conduct and laws have evolved to reflect a more permanent view of government and society's relationship to it.

They certainly have more confidence in government than many people do. The lessons of history prove that we must be ever vigilant if we truly desire to preserve our liberty. Every great civilization throughout history has crumbled under it's own weight. Ours may suffer the same fate if we don't stay alert and protect the Constitution -- all of it.

When all is said and done, it is the news media in this country which bears primary responsibility for the misinformation and misrepresentation which leads people to erroneous conclusions. The claims of the anti-gun crowd are the only claims the news media uncritically reports. Both sides of most issues get some news coverage. That is decidedly not the case when it comes to gun issues and the NRA. The news media generally portrays the NRA in a negative light. Is it possible that is an accurate representation of an organization which represents the interests of over 70 million people? The following tidbit appeared in the September 15, 1988, "Alarums and Diversions" column of the LIBRARY JOURNAL.

"A highly placed library source in Washington, DC told A&D that the American Library Association lobby and the National Rifle Association lobby are the only ones whose information was considered consistently truthful and reliable by legislators. We will not even consider the 'strange bedfellows' variations possible to that remark."

I can't vouch for the source of the above quotation, but I think it should be obvious that the people who are best qualified to address the technical merits of the gun-control debate are those who own and use guns on a regular basis. Non-gun-owners speak totally from emotion, not facts (their passionate assertion about the non-sporting capabilities of semi-automatic "assault" rifles is a perfect example). It seems natural to fear that which we don't understand. I believe that is why non-gun-owners react the way they do when the subject of gun control comes up. The facts concerning gun-related crime are on the side of the NRA and law-abiding gun-owners.

Implicit in criticisms of the NRA is the idea that the NRA is duplicitous in it's purposes. The "Cop-Killer Bullet" episode is a classic example of the anti-gun crowd doing something with the best of intentions, but failing because of their ignorance about firearms. At least, that is the charitable view. It could also easily be construed as another covert attempt to ban firearms in this country without coming out and saying that is what they're trying to do. It would be a lot easier to deal with anti-gun groups if they would just be up front with the American people about what their goals are. Instead, they deceive the public about their motives by focusing attention on invented, emotional non-issues cloaked in such terms as "Cop-Killer Bullets" and non-existent "Plastic Guns". They say they just want to restrict gun ownership "a little". Nobody really believes they will disband their organizations and go save the whales if we allow them to restrict gun ownership just "a little". Their ultimate goal is the total disarmament of the American people. They won't come out and say it because they know a majority of citizens won't support them. You need to go no further than anti-gun organizations in America to learn what duplicitous means.

Appendix A -- An Extended Discussion of "Cop-Killer Bullets"

What I'm about to say may sound morbid, but please understand that I am trying to show how complex this "Cop-Killer Bullet" issue really is. The Geneva Convention laid down specific rules concerning what type of bullets may be used by military forces. The basic rule is that all small arms (rifles and handguns) ammunition must be non-expanding. That is, it must have a full-metal jacket around the lead (pronounced 'led') core of the bullet, especially on the pointed end that will initially impact an enemy soldier. This full-metal jacket (usually a copper alloy) is intended to prevent the bullet from doing what all bullets tend to do on impact. That is, they flatten out, or expand, to perhaps two or three times their diameter. When this happens, a bullet transfers most of its kinetic energy to the target. The more kinetic energy a bullet transfers to a target, the more damage will be done. This is why hunting bullets are required to be expanding bullets. Expanding bullets maximize the likelihood that a quick, painless kill will result. If we allowed non-expanding bullets to be used for hunting, most animals would be simply wounded because the bullet would pass right through them and they would run off and hide somewhere to die a slow painful death from blood loss.

If a bullet can be prevented from expanding, it will transfer minimum kinetic energy to the target thus minimizing the potential damage. At the same time, the likelihood of survival is maximized. So the Geneva Convention requires that military forces use non-expanding, or full-metal jacket bullets. Armor-piercing bullets are the ultimate non-expanding bullets.

You may be wondering what all this has to do with "Cop-Killer Bullets". Just this; not all police officers wear bullet proof vests all the time. If a police officer without a bullet-proof vest is going to be shot, he or she may have a better chance of survival if shot with an armor-piercing bullet rather than an expanding bullet, which is what virtually all other bullets are. An armor-piercing bullet will go through a human body and do virtually no serious damage unless it passes through a major organ (like the heart or brain) or impacts a major bone. This assumes that competent medical attention is available reasonably quick.

On the other hand, anyone shot with a typical bullet is likely to suffer major damage regardless of the location on the body which the bullet hits. This has to do with the hydrostatic shock effect of an expanding bullet. It is like you or me falling into water. If we fall into water from a height of three feet, it is no big deal, because the water can flow around us. On the other hand, if we fall into water from a height of 500 feet, the impact will probably kill us. An expanding bullet traveling at 1000 feet per second or faster will likely deliver most of its kinetic energy into the body. Since our body is about 70% water, this energy will send shock waves through the body and disrupt tissue over a large area potentially causing a lot of damage. An armor-piercing bullet has a great likelihood of causing minor damage because it will take most of it's energy with it as it passes through the body.

Understand, these statements are not meant to minimize the tragedy of police officers being injured in the line of duty. Rather they are intended to provide a better understanding about the physics of firearms. The anti-gun crowd doesn't understand this. Many Americans have a similarly shallow level of understanding.

Footnotes

[1] The major players on the anti-gun side of the debate are Handgun Control, Inc. (HCI), the National Coalition to Ban Handguns (NCBH) and the news media in general.

[2] "The Armed Criminal in America" by Dr. James W. Wright and Peter H. Rossi. Study commissioned by the U.S. Department of Justice in 1985. Dr. Wright is a professor of sociology and director of the Social and Demographic Research Institute (SADRI) at the University of Massachusetts, an expert on survey research, and a reformed advocate of harsh gun laws. In a 1975 article entitled: "The ownership of the Means of Destruction: Weapons in the United States", Wright attacked the NRA and gun ownership. In 1979, Prof. Wright joined with Mr. Rossi -- also from SADRI at U. Mass., and a former president of the American Sociological Association -- in studying the gun issue more thoroughly. This caused a dramatic shift in their views. Although Wright currently supports so-called "permissive" gun laws, he no longer espouses "gun control" as an effective form of "crime control". And while Prof. Wright's previous anti-gun research gained massive media attention, his more recent voluminous and scholarly research has been all but ignored by the news media.

[3] Sections 18-1-704, 18-3-4/202/203

[4] "Canadian Gun Laws and Crime", the AMERICAN RIFLEMAN, September, 1988, page 56, by David B. Kopel, a Colorado lawyer and a former assistant district attorney for the Manhattan (N.Y.) District Attorney's office. Kopel is the author of "Trust the People: The Case Against Gun Control", a policy analysis published by the Cato Institute in July, 1988.

[5] "The Armed Criminal in America", an article by Dr. Paul H. Blackman in the August, 1985 issue of the AMERICAN RIFLEMAN.

[6] Letter from Astrophysics Research Corporation to Representative Mario Biaggi (D-NY), excerpted in the September 1987 issue of the AMERICAN RIFLEMAN.

[7] Excerpted in the AMERICAN RIFLEMAN, August 1988, page 56.

[8] Testimony of David B. Kopel, concerning the Metzenbaum waiting period bill (S.466), before the Senate Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on the Constitution, August 2, 1988.