Talk:Gun control

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I removed the following (Summary: Yes, it absolutely does) because the memo is not a legally binding opinion as far as I know. It is merely the opinion of the AG, which admittedly is the one who enforces laws and prosecutes them, and probably shows that he would be lenient on many a case when it come to gun law violation. But it is not a definitive legal opinion.

User:SiberioS

I am reverted the changes made to this article to the previous version, because the person who made these changes violated SourceWatch policy by engaging in wholesale deletion of content, without providing any reason for doing so (other than the evident fact that he disagrees with the previous version).

There may be some worthwhile material in what was added, but I don't have the time at present to sift through it, so I am appending it below. I will note, however, that some of it is questionable. For example, simply describing John Lott as a a "scholar" is akin to describing Randy "Duke" Cunningham as a "statesman." Lott has a proven record of false statements, including citation of studies which he claims to have conducted but for which he is unable to show any evidence that he ever even collected data. --Sheldon Rampton 22:08, 6 Mar 2006 (EST)

Reverted article follows:


The term gun control, according to the Wikipedia, "refers to attempts by society (generally by government or 'the State') to limit the possession, production, importation, shipment, sale, and/or use of 'guns' -- in this context, generally personal firearms: handguns and long guns. Weapons normally produced and intended for military and paramilitary (e.g. SWAT team) use, such as fully-automatic weapons, are especially contentious." See the Wikipedia article on "gun control".

Infoplease defines gun control as "government limitation of the purchase and ownership of firearms," with the "availability of guns ... controlled by nations and localities throughout the world." Although, it states, the "'right of the people to keep and bear arms' is guaranteed by the Constitution, [it] has been variously interpreted through the years." For example, "in 2002 the Justice Department, under Attorney General John Ashcroft, indicated that it interpreted the amendment as more broadly supporting the rights of individuals to possess and bear firearms."

Self Defense

Scholars such as John Lott, author of More Guns, Less Crime, have discovered a positive correlation between gun control legislation and crimes in which criminals victimize law-abiding citizens. The findings reveal that criminals ignore gun control laws, and are effectively deterred by armed intended victims.

Advocates of rights to gun ownership (gun rights) counter that since law abiding gun owners vastly outnumber the criminals who steal guns, the only way to eliminate this avenue of criminal gun ownership is to fully disarm all law abiding gun owners. Even then, just as with illegal drugs and illegal full-autos, the criminals would continue to smuggle guns into the USA from other nations. The Scotland Yard report on the illegal importation of firearms into the U.K., following the near total gun ban in that nation, is cited as an example of what happens when firearms are banned for law abiding citizens. The USA experience with Alcohol Prohibition and the current "War on Drugs" being other prime examples cited by gun rights advocates.

Non-defensive uses of guns, such as hunting, varmint control and the sport of target shooting, are often lost in the debate despite being the most common reasons for private gun ownership.

Security against tyranny and invasion

A position taken by gun rights advocates is that an armed citizenry is the population's last line of defense against tyranny by their own government. They point out that many soldiers in the American Revolution were ordinary citizens using their privately owned firearms. In addition, the people's power to replace elected officials by voting is sufficient to keep the government in check.

Indeed, there is a historical regularity in that totalitarian regimes pass gun control legislation as a first step of their reign of terror. The sequence is supposed to be gun registration, followed some time later by confiscation. Nazi legislation is the most famous example of this sequence, but it also occurred in Marxist regimes.

Invasion by hostile outside forces is another reason gun rights advocates oppose registration. If captured, the associated records would provide invaders with a means of locating and eliminating law-abiding resistance fighters. Location and capture of such records is a standard doctrine taught to military intelligence officers. Registration aside, gun rights advocates point out that an armed citizenry is a strong deterrent against a foreign invasion.

U.S. gun control

In the United States, gun control has a strong racist origin and reasoning. Before the American Civil War ended, state "Slave Codes" prohibited slaves from owning guns. After the Emancipation Proclamation was issued in 1863, and after the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution abolished slavery in the U.S. and the Civil War ended in 1865, states persisted in prohibiting blacks, now free, from owning guns under laws renamed "Black Codes." They did so on the basis that blacks were not citizens, and thus did not have the same rights, including the right to keep and bear arms protected in the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, as whites. This view was specifically articulated by the U.S. Supreme Court in its infamous 1857 decision in Dred Scott v. Sandford to uphold slavery.

The United States Congress overrode most portions of the Black Codes by passing the Civil Rights Act of 1866. The legislative histories of both the Civil Rights Act and the Fourteenth Amendment, as well as The Special Report of the Anti-Slavery Conference of 1867, are replete with denunciations of those particular statutes that denied blacks equal access to firearms. [Kates, "Handgun Prohibition and the Original Meaning of the Second Amendment," 82 Mich. L. Rev. 204, 256 (1983)] However, facially neutral disarming through economic means laws remain in effect.

After the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1878, most states turned to "facially neutral" business or transaction taxes on handgun purchases. However, the intention of these laws was not neutral. An article in Virginia's official university law review called for a "prohibitive tax...on the privilege" of selling handguns as a way of disarming "the son of Ham," whose "cowardly practice of 'toting' guns has been one of the most fruitful sources of crime.... Let a negro board a railroad train with a quart of mean whiskey and a pistol in his grip and the chances are that there will be a murder, or at least a row, before he alights." [Comment, Carrying Concealed Weapons, 15 Va L. Reg. 391, 391-92 (1909); George Mason University Civil Rights Law Journal (GMU CR LJ), Vol. 2, No. 1, "Gun Control and Racism," Stefan Tahmassebi, 1991, p. 75] Thus, many Southern States imposed high taxes or banned inexpensive guns so as to price blacks and poor whites out of the gun market.

In the 1990s, "gun control" laws continue to be enacted so as to have a racist effect if not intent:

  • Police-issued license and permit laws, unless drafted to require issuance to those not prohibited by law from owning guns, are routinely used to prevent lawful gun ownership among "unpopular" populations.
  • Public housing residents, approximately three million Americans, are singled out for gun bans.
  • "Gun sweeps" by police in "high crime neighborhoods" whereby vehicles and "pedestrians who meet a specific profile that might indicate they are carrying a weapon" are searched are becoming popular, and are being studied by the U.S. Department of Justice as "Operation Ceasefire."

SourceWatch Resources

External Links

Relocated from Article page

Relocating long opinion section from article page. --Bob Burton 18:43, 8 Mar 2006 (EST)

Self Defense

Scholars such as John Lott, author of More Guns, Less Crime, have discovered a positive correlation between gun control legislation and crimes in which criminals victimize law-abiding citizens. The findings reveal that criminals ignore gun control laws, and are effectively deterred by armed intended victims.

Advocates of rights to gun ownership (gun rights) counter that since law abiding gun owners vastly outnumber the criminals who steal guns, the only way to eliminate this avenue of criminal gun ownership is to fully disarm all law abiding gun owners. Even then, just as with illegal drugs and illegal full-autos, the criminals would continue to smuggle guns into the USA from other nations. The Scotland Yard report on the illegal importation of firearms into the U.K., following the near total gun ban in that nation, is cited as an example of what happens when firearms are banned for law abiding citizens. The USA experience with Alcohol Prohibition and the current "War on Drugs" being other prime examples cited by gun rights advocates.

Non-defensive uses of guns, such as hunting, varmint control and the sport of target shooting, are often lost in the debate despite being the most common reasons for private gun ownership.

Security against tyranny and invasion

A position taken by gun rights advocates is that an armed citizenry is the population's last line of defense against tyranny by their own government. They point out that many soldiers in the American Revolution were ordinary citizens using their privately owned firearms. In addition, the people's power to replace elected officials by voting is sufficient to keep the government in check.

Indeed, there is a historical regularity in that totalitarian regimes pass gun control legislation as a first step of their reign of terror. The sequence is supposed to be gun registration, followed some time later by confiscation. Nazi legislation is the most famous example of this sequence, but it also occurred in Marxist regimes.

Invasion by hostile outside forces is another reason gun rights advocates oppose registration. If captured, the associated records would provide invaders with a means of locating and eliminating law-abiding resistance fighters. Location and capture of such records is a standard doctrine taught to military intelligence officers. Registration aside, gun rights advocates point out that an armed citizenry is a strong deterrent against a foreign invasion.

U.S. gun control

In the United States, gun control has a strong racist origin and reasoning. Before the American Civil War ended, state "Slave Codes" prohibited slaves from owning guns. After the Emancipation Proclamation was issued in 1863, and after the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution abolished slavery in the U.S. and the Civil War ended in 1865, states persisted in prohibiting blacks, now free, from owning guns under laws renamed "Black Codes." They did so on the basis that blacks were not citizens, and thus did not have the same rights, including the right to keep and bear arms protected in the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, as whites. This view was specifically articulated by the U.S. Supreme Court in its infamous 1857 decision in Dred Scott v. Sandford to uphold slavery.

The United States Congress overrode most portions of the Black Codes by passing the Civil Rights Act of 1866. The legislative histories of both the Civil Rights Act and the Fourteenth Amendment, as well as The Special Report of the Anti-Slavery Conference of 1867, are replete with denunciations of those particular statutes that denied blacks equal access to firearms. [Kates, "Handgun Prohibition and the Original Meaning of the Second Amendment," 82 Mich. L. Rev. 204, 256 (1983)] However, facially neutral disarming through economic means laws remain in effect.

After the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1878, most states turned to "facially neutral" business or transaction taxes on handgun purchases. However, the intention of these laws was not neutral. An article in Virginia's official university law review called for a "prohibitive tax...on the privilege" of selling handguns as a way of disarming "the son of Ham," whose "cowardly practice of 'toting' guns has been one of the most fruitful sources of crime.... Let a negro board a railroad train with a quart of mean whiskey and a pistol in his grip and the chances are that there will be a murder, or at least a row, before he alights." [Comment, Carrying Concealed Weapons, 15 Va L. Reg. 391, 391-92 (1909); George Mason University Civil Rights Law Journal (GMU CR LJ), Vol. 2, No. 1, "Gun Control and Racism," Stefan Tahmassebi, 1991, p. 75] Thus, many Southern States imposed high taxes or banned inexpensive guns so as to price blacks and poor whites out of the gun market.

In the 1990s, "gun control" laws continue to be enacted so as to have a racist effect if not intent:

  • Police-issued license and permit laws, unless drafted to require issuance to those not prohibited by law from owning guns, are routinely used to prevent lawful gun ownership among "unpopular" populations.
  • Public housing residents, approximately three million Americans, are singled out for gun bans.
  • "Gun sweeps" by police in "high crime neighborhoods" whereby vehicles and "pedestrians who meet a specific profile that might indicate they are carrying a weapon" are searched are becoming popular, and are being studied by the U.S. Department of Justice as "Operation Ceasefire."
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