Yesterday, President Obama announced, in response to the
school shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary, his plans to curb gun violence. In setting forth his agenda, the President is
asking Congress to renew a ban on the sale of assault weapons, ensure the
performance of background checks on all guns sold and pass new gun-trafficking
laws. The President himself is taking
steps to improve the background check process, reinstating funding for federal
research on gun violence, ensuring more counselors are available at schools and
providing greater access to mental health services.
The Senate is planning to begin discussing the President’s
agenda starting next week; the House of Representatives is expected to wait and
see what the Democrat-Senate passes before they act. Once discussions begin, it is expected that there
will much opposition to the ban on the sale of assault weapons, as well as a
proposed prohibition on high-capacity magazines. On the other hand, there appears to be much
stronger support for universal background checks on gun sales and stricter gun trafficking
laws.
There is much support for stricter gun control, and there
are many arguments as to why the President’s proposal is overreaching. Whether for or against the President’s
recently stated objectives, there are some obvious issues that the government
will have to deal with before crafting any further gun control laws.
The first most obvious concern will be whether these laws
violate the 2nd Amendment to the United States Constitution. The true import of the 2nd
Amendment has been debated whenever gun control laws are proposed. The question becomes, does a citizen’s right
to bear arms (and what type of arms?) trump the safety and welfare of other
citizens? Will these proposed measures
even provide for the greater safety they propose to create? In the Sandyhook Elementary School shooting,
the shooter obtained the gun from his mother; increased and improved background
checks cannot determine whether a gun obtained by one person, who is able to
pass the background check, will be used by another.
A second issue is the failure to create a sufficient
database to ensure background checks are thorough. In order to create a federal database of
people prohibited from purchasing firearms, states must provide the necessary
data. Without complete records, some
people who should not be permitted to purchase a gun will slip through the
crack. Even though a gun seller does all
they are required to do under the law, without proper notification guns may
still be sold when they should not be.
Finally, and perhaps most difficult will be to define what
constitutes an “assault rifle”. On one
side, people advocate that any semi-automatic weapon with detachable magazines
and “military” features like pistol grips, flash suppressors and collapsible or
folding stocks should be deemed an assault rifle. However, gun advocates state that the term “assault
rifle” should be used to describe only fully automatic weapons; they believe
that many of the features used to designate “assault rifles”, other than being
fully automatic, are merely cosmetic.
With such debate over what does and does not constitute an assault
rifle, manufacturers may be able to side-step restrictions with minor
alterations, much as they did under the 1994 ban.
Whether one sides with the President’s agenda or feels it is
overreaching, the above issues will have to be dealt with in order to ensure
any legislation that is written fulfills its intended purpose: help to prevent
further gun violence while maintaining the rights of United States’
citizens. The legislation will have to
be drafted to be very specific, and cooperation by all states will be
required. The government cannot prevent
all acts of gun violence as no system will be perfect, but the government must
also exercise caution in creating a law which has no real effect or overly
violates citizens’ rights.
For more information, below are articles with additional
information:
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