This is a column I wrote in 2000 on the Second Amendment, following the Million Mom March against gun violence. I am re-running it today, because of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling yesterday tossing out the Washington DC gun-control ordinance.
I tend to subscribe to a slightly different view than most liberal gun-control activists. I do think there is a right to bear arms enshrined in the constitution — given the history of the time, as Eugene Robinson points out today in The Washington Post — but that manufacturers do not necessarily have an unlimited right to manufacture weapons.
Industry should be focus of anti-gun efforts
South Brunswick Post, May 9, 2000/The Cranbury Press, May 10, 2000
“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
There are few sentences in American history that engender as much passion or confusion as the Second Amendment.
It is a tangled sentence that catches itself on its tenses, obscuring its meaning and making interpretation difficult. Random commas seem to short-circuit the sentence’s flow, splitting what could be a straightforward clause into two, dangling and incomprehensible ones.
Over the years, these 27 words have been used by pro- and anti-gun groups to back up their own interpretations of what the Founding Fathers had in mind when it comes to the right the bear arms, both pointing to different clauses to justify their arguments.
Gun-control advocates — backed by some court decisions — say the right to bear arms is dependent on the existence of the militia, while pro-gun groups view the right to bear arms as sacrosanct in and of itself.
Coverage of Sunday’s Million Mom March for Common Sense Gun Laws did little to clarify the constitutional issue, as images of mothers and kids and mournful speeches decrying the violence were cross-cut with images of a significantly smaller counterdemonstration and impassioned pleas to allow mothers to use their firearms to defend their families. And both sides spoke with a certainty about gun rights that belie the pitfalls we’ve faced in trying to parse through the amendment’s language over the last 208 years.
When all is said and done, however, one thing remains. Our society is drowning in firearms and we need to do something to reduce the number of guns on our streets. However, we also need to be careful that the buckets we choose to bail the water out do not spring their own leaks.
Gun-control advocates have outlined a plan they say will clear our streets of guns: stepping up licensing and imposing waiting periods and background checks on buyers; mandating trigger locks so guns cannot be fired accidentally; limiting the number of guns that can be purchased in a month; restricting sales at gun shows.
All of these proposals will have their impact, but we must be careful not to portray them as a panacea for all that ails us. To do so will make it easier for pro-gun activists to shoot holes in the gun control argument.
The fact is, guns will continue to be a problem on our streets so long as we let the gun manufacturers produce as many guns as they think they can sell, regardless of who the buyer and what use the gun will ultimately have.
A gun has only one purpose: to destroy. All other uses stem from this. They are intimidating because of the implied threat of destruction they carry with them. They are effective when used for hunting because they kill the animals being hunted.
That’s why we need to focus our attention on the gun industry and force it to take responsibility for the dangerous situation it creates in the name of profit.
Activists have been successful in forcing Congress to craft federal regulations changing the way the auto industry conducts its business, resulting in the mandatory installation of seat belts, air bags and other safety equipment and in eliminating led from gasoline and lowering the level of toxic emissions being pumped from exhaust pipes. They’ve been successful in forcing the government to regulate the kinds of construction materials used in houses, including banning asbestos and requiring the use of fire-retardant materials.
There is no reason a similar approach could not work with the weapons industry.
According to Handgun Inc., a major gun-control group, installation of load indicators would show when guns are loaded, magazine disconnect safeties would prevent guns from firing if the ammunition magazine is removed and locking mechanisms would prevent unauthorized users from firing.
The government also could limit the manufacture of weapons that have no “legitimate civilian use,” such as “assault weapons and low quality, easily concealable ‘junk guns,’ or Saturday Night Specials,” and so-called “cop-killer bullets” and “mail-order parts which allow someone to assemble an untraceable gun without a serial number,” the organization says.
“Because firearms are often used in crime, it is incumbent on gun manufacturers to constantly evaluate the risks to public health and safety of the products they design,” the organization says. “The industry must stop supplying the market with guns which are attractive to criminals and which have no legitimate civilian use.”
Finally, the makers of guns need to stand up and accept responsibility for risks they create. That means facing litigation and paying damages.
We can’t keep fighting over the meaning of a badly worded amendment. But we can — and should — take steps to staunch the flow of firearms by turning off the spigot.
