I am not against gun ownership. I am for some gun regulation. My home when I grew up had about 10-15 guns in it. There were rifles, double barrel shotguns, pump action shot guns and a variety of long barreled weapons. There were no hand guns. Our guns were killing varmints and for hunting deer. Gun safety was important. There were no trigger locks in our home but the ammunition was kept in a separate and somewhat secret place from where the weapons were. It was also very clear that if you entered the closet where the guns were you were in a damn heap of trouble.
For the most part my father handled guns with great respect. But one time he lost his temper and pulled a gun on some “friends” of mine. While no one was shot or injured the potential for dire and cataclysmic results hung on a hair. It was only luck that the breeze didn’t blow that day and bend that hair.
My modest proposals based are these:
1. No one who has ever been convicted of the use of a gun in a crime should ever been allowed the right to possess a gun again. I am not talking about minor infractions like discharging a gun in the township limits, or the like. I am talking about robbery, home invasions, battery, etc. The penalty should be significant a year of more incarcerated.
2. There should be a limit to the total number of guns in a household based on the number of adults in the residence. 18 would be the minimum age to own a gun. That number should allow more long barreled guns than hand guns. Exceptions to the capitation could be made for bona fide collectors but such collectors would be required to be registered and collections documented with some form of registry.
3. All sales of guns should require detailed paperwork indentifying the source of the gun and a mental health clearance/background check for the purchaser. Period. Transfers would be final only when the paperwork was filed with the appropriate governmental entity and approved. Liability for acts of violence would remain with the original owner of the weapon for acts of violence conducted by subsequent purchasers of the weapon if the laws of transfer are not followed.
4. All gun owners would be required to have gun safes and trigger locks. All guns would have to be insured for both theft and liability.
5. All gun purchasers would be required to undergo annual gun safety programs on the first purchase of a weapon and each year succeeding for so long as a person under 18 resides in the home.
6. A working definition of assault weapons and rules regarding ownership should be developed. The argument here is simple; we do regulate who can own howitzers, tanks, machine guns and hand grenades. Nobody really objects to that really and in dicta the Supreme Court has tacitly acknowledged this kind of regulation is apt. Well almost nobody objects to that. My thought is that the higher the speed of bullet discharge, and thus the higher the potential for loss of human life, the greater the scrutiny and regulation of the weapon.
I don’t want to be prying guns from the hands from the cold dead hands of NRA members. But we do regulate dangerous things, autos, alcohol, open burning, etc. Sensible gun regulation is in the same vein. We can work toward a common ground of some common sense gun regulation.
Just my thought on this.
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