Guns (sic) Lobby Racks Up Legislative Gains Across U.S.
By Alan Elsner
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The powerful U.S. gun lobby seems poised for victory in a high profile battle to end a ban on some assault weapons and experts say it has also been piling up numerous quiet victories at the state level.
A federal ban on certain military-style semi-automatic weapons enacted in 1994 is due to expire on Sept. 13. The Republican congressional leadership, backed by the National Rifle Organization and other gun groups, seems determined to allow the law to lapse.
Gun control groups say only vigorous intervention by President Bush could change congressional minds. They concede that the chances of that happening weeks before the Nov. 2 presidential election are zero. Bush has said he would sign the extension of the law if it passed but has not intervened in the debate.
"The assault weapons ban has no chance of being extended unless President Bush gets forcefully behind it but Bush has apparently made a naked political calculation," said Jim Kessler of Americans for Gun Safety.
Gun owners make up an important part of Bush's political base. The NRA is enthusiastically backing him against Democrat John Kerry.
Earlier this month, Congress passed legislation which will allow retired and off-duty law enforcement officers to carry concealed weapons even in states that do not permit them. Bush will sign the bill into law Thursday.
Gun proponents have worked hard for 15 years and with considerable success to win the right for Americans to carry concealed weapons.
In 1986, only eight states were obliged by law to issue citizens who requested them licenses to carry such weapons. That number has grown to 38, according to the NRA.
Ohio's law took effect in January. Last year alone, New Mexico, Colorado, Minnesota and Missouri, where legislators overrode a veto by Gov. Bob Holden, passed "right to carry" laws for applicants who pass a gun training course and a background check.
"QUIET REVOLUTION"
"We have seen the normalization of the idea that Americans may carry concealed weapons. It is a quiet revolution and it will bring about a certain culture change as we become accustomed to the idea of people in urban as well as rural areas carrying weapons around with them," said Robert Cottrol of the George Washington University law school.
Statistics suggest that the number of U.S. households owning firearms has stayed stable or may even have declined slightly in recent years. The data is somewhat uncertain since surveys have produced figures as high as 49 percent and as low as 36 percent.
The number of weapons in circulation continues to rise, reflecting the fact that guns are extremely durable and can be maintained in working order virtually indefinitely.
Some believe the spread of concealed weapons laws will have little practical effect.
"These 'right to carry' laws have swept much of the country and do have great symbolic significance for proponents and opponents but they are full of sound and fury, signifying nothing," said William Vizzard, a criminal justice professor at Cal State Sacramento, quoting Shakespeare's Macbeth.
Vizzard said the number of people applying for permits was relatively low and the number of people actually carrying weapons on a daily basis even lower.
In Arizona, which recently marked 10 years since passing its "right to carry" law, around 68,000 residents have active permits. The state population last year was 5.6 million. Some proponents now want to make it easier for applicants to get the permits by reducing the mandatory training hours.
The data suggests that neither the promises of gun groups that such laws would deter crime, nor the warnings of opponents that they would cause more gun accidents, have come to pass.
Kessler of Americans for Gun Safety said his group did not even bother fighting such laws.
"They are ineffective in stopping crime but they also seem to be unharmful and have not led to mass shootings the way some on the left feared," he said.
