“Nobody Wants to Take Your Guns.”

Introduction

Gun rights organizations are often criticized for not “compromising” or not
agreeing to “reasonable” gun controls. Gun owners are chided for being
paranoid, after all nobody wants to take away their guns.

First, the word compromise in this context is a misnomer. The term
“give-back” or surrender is more appropriate because no guarantee against
further erosion of gun owners’ rights is ever put into law. The anti-control
groups never receive concessions in return for any new gun control law.

Gun owners do have legitimate cause for concern. Although a majority of
Americans does not want handguns outlawed, a significant minority does. In
nation-wide polls taken over the last twenty-five years around 40% are in
favor of banning the civilian possession of handguns. Almost 20% are in
favor of banning the civilian possession of any kind of firearm. (Source:
Kleck, Gary, Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control, p 105, 345-46.
Walter de Gruyter, Inc., New York 1997)

It is this significant minority which often makes it difficult for gun
rights organizations to put their faith in what may seem like “reasonable
solutions”. For example, many have suggested firearms be controlled by the
same consumer agencies that regulate other products. However the following
quotes don’t exactly engender trust in such an arrangement:

My general counsel tells me that while firearms are exempted from our
jurisdiction under the Consumer Product Safety Act, we could possibly ban
bullets under the Hazardous Substances Act. — Richard O. Simpson,
Chairman, U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. 1973.

Firearms are currently exempt from the health and safety laws that apply to
every other consumer product in America, from toasters to teddy bears.
Applying those same standards to guns is the real key to reducing firearm
death and injury in America. Under these standards, handguns would be banned
because of their high risk and low utility. — “The False Hope of the Smart
Gun,” Violence Policy Center (cited March 16, 1999).

“Reasonable” Gun Control

[Emphasis original]

Handgun Control, Inc., and the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence represent
the moderate position on gun safety. The misrepresentations of the gun lobby
aside, Handgun Control, Inc., seeks common-sense gun policies that encourage
responsible gun ownership. — “For Gun Owners Only,” Handgun Control Inc.
(cited March 16, 1999)

[Source URL, http://www.handguncontrol.org/gunowner/index.htm, was removed.
Copy of original available at:
http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_hci_forgunownersonly.html.]

We Are NOT “Gun Banners”-and never have been… Handgun Control, Inc., has
never advocated banning firearms used for legitimate purposes such as
hunting and recreation.
— “Gun Measures We Don’t Support,” Handgun Control Inc. (cited March 16,
1999)

[Source URL, http://www.handguncontrol.org/gunowner/dontsupport.htm, was
removed. Copy of original available at:
http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_hci_measureswedontsupport.html.]

Hopefully you noticed Handgun Control, Inc. (HCI) doesn’t include
self-defense as a “legitimate purpose” for owning a firearm.

Though they claim to not be gun banners, they did file a friend of the court
brief in the appeal of the Morton Grove case. (In 1981, Morton Grove,
Illinois was the first U.S. city to ban civilian possession of handguns.
Source: Halbrook, Stephen P., What the Framers Intended: A Linguistic
Analysis of the Right to “Bear Arms”. Originally published as 49 Law &
Contemp. Probs. 151-162, 1986.)

Further, HCI petitioned (in 1974) the Consumer Product Safety Commission
(CPSC) to ban, not handguns (since Congress specificall exempted firearms
from CPSC jurisdiction to avoid the potential of a few regulators banning
firearms manufacture), but handgun ammunition in “interstate commerce with
the exception of use by the military, police, security guards, and gun
clubs.” (388 F.Supp 216 [1975]. Committee for Hand Gun Control, Inc. v
Consumer Product Safety Commission, et al; D.C. Dist. Ct. Dec. 19, 1974. See
also Petition On Hand Gun Ammunition Published In Federal Register)

Here is an example of what some congressional representatives consider to be
reasonable gun control:

Mr. Speaker, I rise to introduce the Public Health and Safety Act of 1993 on
behalf of myself and nine of my colleagues: Mel Reynolds, Bill Clay, Jerry
Nadler, Eleanor Holmes Norton, John Lewis, Nydia Velazquez, Ron Dellums,
Carrie Meek, and Alcee Hastings. This legislation, first introduced in the
Senate by Senator John Chafee, would prohibit the transfer or possession of
handguns and handgun ammunition, except in limited circumstances. It would
go a long way toward protecting our citizens from violent crime.

The need for a ban on handguns cannot be overstated. Unlike rifles and
shotguns, handguns are easily concealable. Consequently, they are the
weapons of choice in most murders, accounting for the deaths of 25,000
Americans in 1991.

A 6-month grace period would be established during which time handguns could
be turned in to any law enforcement agency with impunity and for
reimbursement at the greater of $25 or the fair market value of the handgun.
After the grace period’s expiration, handguns could be turned in voluntarily
with impunity from criminal prosecution, but a civil fine of $500 would be
imposed.

Exemptions from the handgun ban would be permitted for Federal, State, or
local government agencies, including military and law enforcement;
collectors of antique firearms; federally licensed handgun sporting clubs;
federally licensed professional security guard services; and federally
licensed dealers, importers, or manufacturers.

The Public Health and Safety Act of 1993 represents a [b] moderate,
middle-of-the-road approach[/b] to [b]handgun[/b] control which deserves the
support of all members of Congress who want to stop gun murders now. [/I]—
Introduction of the Public Health and Safety Act of 1993 — Hon. Major R.
Owens ( Rep. NY, Extension of Remarks – September 23, 1993. Source: The
Congressional Record, 103rd Congress, 1993-1994)

More Quotes from Politicians, Periodicals, and Prominent Persons

Mr. President, what is going on in this country? Does going to school mean
exposure to handguns and to death? As you know, my position is we should ban
all handguns, get rid of them, no manufacture, no sale, no importation, no
transportation, no possession of a handgun. There are 66 million handguns in
the United States of America today, with 2 million being added every
year. — Senator John H. Chafee, Rhode Island (June 11, 1992, The
Congressional Record, 102nd Congress, 1991-1992)

Mr. speaker, we must take swift and strong action if we are to rescue the
next generation from the rising of tide armed violence. That is why today I
am introducing the Handgun Control Act of 1992. This legislation would
outlaw the possession, importation, transfer or manufacture of a handgun
except for use by public agencies, individuals who can demonstrate to their
local police chief that they need a gun because of threat to their life or
the life of a family member, guard services, licensed pistol clubs which
keep the weapons securely on premises, licensed manufacturers and licensed
gun dealers. — Rep. Stephen J. Solarz, New York (August 12, 1992, The
Congressional Record, 102nd Congress, 1991-1992, Daily Edition E2492-2493.)

Twenty years ago, I asked Richard Nixon what he thought of gun control. His
on-the-record reply: ‘Guns are an abomination.’ Free from fear of gun
owners’ retaliation at the polls, he favored making handguns illegal and
requiring licenses for hunting rifles. — William Safire (originally from a
New York Times column), Los Angeles Daily News, June 15, 1999, P. 15.

The only way to discourage the gun culture is to remove the guns from the
hands and shoulders of people who are not in the law enforcement
business. — New York Times, September 24, 1975
There is no reason for anyone in this country, for anyone except a police
officer or a military person, to buy, to own, to have, to use, a handgun.
The only way to control handgun use in this country is to prohibit the guns.
And the only way to do that is to change the Constitution. [/I]— Michael
Gartner, former NBC News President, USA Today, January 16, 1992

The goal is an ultimate ban on all guns, but we also have to take step at a
time and go for limited access first. — Joyner Sims, Florida State Health
Dept., Deputy Commissioner, Chicago Tribune, November 7, 1993

Gun violence won’t be cured by one set of laws. It will require years of
partial measures that will gradually tighten the requirements for gun
ownership, and incrementally change expectations about the firepower that
should be available to ordinary citizens. — New York Times, December 21,
1993

We are inclined to think that every firearm in the hands of anyone who is
not a law enforcement officer constitutes an incitement to violence. Let’s
come to our senses before the whole country starts shooting itself up on all
its Main Streets a delirious kind of High Noon. — Washington Post, August
19, 1965

By a curiosity of evolution, every human skull harbors a prehistoric
vestige: a reptilian brain. This atavism, like a hand grenade cushioned in
the more civilized surrounding cortex, is the dark hive where many of
mankind’s primitive impulses originate. To go partners with that throwback,
Americans have carried out of their own history another curiosity that
evolution forgot to discard as the country changed from a sparsely
populated, underpoliced agrarian society to a modern industrial
civilization. That vestige is the gun — most notoriously the handgun, an
anachronistic tool still much in use. — Time, April 13, 1981

We are beyond the stage of restrictive licensing and uniform laws. We are at
the point in time and terror when nothing short of a strong uniform policy
of domestic disarmament will alleviate the danger which is crystal clear and
perilously present. Let us take the guns away from the people. Exemptions
should be limited to the military, the police and those licensed for good
and sufficient reasons. — Patrick V. Murphy, New York City Police
Commissioner, December 7, 1970

As you probably know by now, Time’s editors, in the April 13 issue, took a
strong position in support of an outright ban on handguns for private
use. — Time Magazine, Letter to NRA, April 24, 1981

If it was up to me, no one but law enforcement officers would own hand
guns… — Chicago Mayor Richard Daley Federal Gun Legislation Press
Conference in Washington, D.C., November 13, 1998.

The League, therefore, supports a ban on the further manufacture, sale,
transportation and importation for private ownership of handguns and their
parts. — League of Women Voters of Illinois Gun Control Position-in-Brief.

No presidential candidate has yet come out for the most effective proposal
to check the terror of gunfire: a ban on the general sale, manufacture and
ownership of handguns as well as assault-style weapons. — Guns Along the
Campaign Trail, Washington Post, Monday, July 19, 1999, Page A18.

Straight from the Mouth of a U.S. Government Attorney

The U.S. government argues in federal court (U.S. v. Emerson information
page) that there is absolutely no right of an individual to own firearms!

Judge Garwood: “You are saying that the Second Amendment is consistent with
a position that you can take guns away from the public? You can restrict
ownership of rifles, pistols and shotguns from all people? Is that the
position of the United States?”

Meteja (attorney for the government): “Yes”

Garwood: “Is it the position of the United States that persons who are not
in the National Guard are afforded no protections under the Second
Amendment?”

Meteja: “Exactly.”

Meteja then said that even membership in the National Guard isn’t enough to
protect the private ownership of a firearm. It wouldn’t protect the guns
owned at the home of someone in the National Guard.

Garwood: “Membership in the National Guard isn’t enough? What else is
needed?”

Meteja: “The weapon in question must be used IN the National Guard.”
(Excerpt of oral arguments in U.S. v. Emerson, 5th Circuit Court of Appeals,
June 13, 2000)

More Quotes

The following quotes are excerpted from, “Under Fire: The New Consensus on
the Second Amendment”, by Randy E. Barnett and Don B. Kates (Originally
published as 45 Emory L.J. 1139-1259, 1996).

Recommending that federal law limit ordinary citizens to “ownership [only]
of sporting and hunting weapons,” — Taming the Gun Monster: How Far to Go,
L.A. Times, Oct. 22 (editorial)
Under our plan individuals could own sporting weapons only if they had
submitted to a background check and passed a firearms safety course. Other
special, closely monitored exceptions could be made, such as for serious
collectors. — Taming the Monster: The Guns Among Us, L.A. Times, Dec. 10,
1993 (editorial).

My own view on gun control is simple. I hate guns and I cannot imagine why
anyone would want to own one. If I had my way, guns for sport would be
registered, and all other guns, would be banned. — Deborah Prothrow-Stith,
Dean of the Harvard School of Public Health

Mutual protection should be the aim of citizens, not individual
self-protection. Until we are willing to outlaw, the very existence or
manufacture of civilian handguns we have no right to call ourselves citizens
or consider our behavior even minimally civil. — Garry Wills
[historian/writer], John Lennon’s war, Chi. Sun-times, Dec. 12, 1980.

Wills has also written “Every civilized society must disarm its citizens
against each other. Those who do not trust their own people become predators
upon their own people. The sick thing is that haters of fellow Americans
often think of themselves as patriots.”… — Or Worldwide Gun Control?,
Phila. Inquirer, May 17, 1981.

The only reason for guns in civilian hands is for sporting purposes.—
Sarah Brady, Jackson, Keeping the Battle Alive, Tampa Trib., Oct. 21, 1993
(interview with Sarah Brady).

Denouncing defensive gun ownership as “anarchy, not order under law–a
jungle where each relies on himself for survival,” and an insult to
government, for “[a] state in which a citizen needs a gun to protect himself
from crime has failed to perform its first purpose. — Ramsey Clark, former
U.S. Attorney General, Crime in America 107 (1970)

A Web page by Prof. Eugene Volokh, UCLA Law School, features more quotes
from gun control proponents grouped by politicians, media figures &
institutions, and advocacy groups.

http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_gcnobody.html

Notes: This was copied from a truly great site; gunsite.com