Firearms - Getting Down To Undisputable Truths
Here's a fact that is guaranteed to drive anti-gun groups absolutely insane: there is no corollary between the rate of firearms ownership and homicide and violent crime rates.

This might come as a total shock to many reporters, editorial writers and elected officials, but it is the result of a lengthy - and scientific look - at gun ownership and how it does not relate to the incidence of murder and violence by criminologists Prof. Don Kates of the United States and Prof. Gary Mauser of Canada. In fact, their summation is one that will more than likely rock the misconceptions of many: "nations with very stringent anti-gun laws generally have substantially higher murder rates than those which allow guns."

Wow.

The Kates/Mauser report appears in no less than the current issue of the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy. Entitled "Would Banning Firearms Reduce Murder and Suicide? A Review of International Evidence" is a detailed look at gun ownership and how it, in fact, bears no relation to the incidence of murder and violence.

For some, like the Second Amendment Foundation's Alan Gottlieb, the report is another case of the facts of a matter outweighing the emotional rhetoric so blithely accepted by mainstream media members. "Kates and Mauser make a solid factual case against all the emotion-laden rhetoric from the gun control crowd," Gottlieb states. "While their research will obviously not close the debate, they've made a strong case against the traditional anti-gun mantra. Gun ownership is not the problem, and this new report proves it."

Could it have come at a more opportune time? Not likely. With the rhetoric and fundraising efforts of gun-control groups at a fever pitch following the Virginia Tech tragedy, the Kates/Mauser study, if given equal coverage (a big IF), will use irrefutable scientific data to disprove the premise that individual ownership of firearms automatically means increased violence.

But this study isn't the first time the point has been made. In an earlier study, Kates showed a declining murder rate over the 25-year period from 1973 to 1997. In that same period, overall gun ownership increased 103 percent and handgun ownership went up 163 percent. Murders during the same period dropped 27.7 percent.

The Second Amendment Foundation's Gottlieb minces no words on the importance of the findings.

"The Kates/Mauser research strips bare the claims by gun control proponents that America is more dangerous than other countries because of our right to keep and bear arms," Gottlieb sats. "What these two seasoned researchers have revealed is that some of the most violent countries in Europe are those with the most stringent gun laws. It seems hardly a coincidence that here in America, the highest crime rates are in places with strict gun control policies, such as Chicago and Washington, D.C. However, in areas here and abroad with high rates of gun ownership violent crime rates are lower. "

When I spoke with Dr. Gary Mauser, he was succinct in his appraisal of "gun free zones".

"These 'free fire zones'" he said, "are killing people. They encourage passivity."

He also sent me a quote we could all remember:

"If I had a formula for bypassing trouble, I would not pass it round. Trouble creates a capacity to handle it. I don't embrace trouble; that's as bad as treating it as an enemy. But I do say meet it as a friend, for you'll see a lot of it and had better be on speaking terms with it."

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

In the 1960s, cartoon character Pogo uttered a phrase that became the watch words of those who still seem to believe America is the problem, and not the solution to many of the world's ills: "we have met the enemy and he is us."

Today, the "us" might be our consistently failing to correct the inaccuracies of the dangerous stereotypes we allow anti-firearms groups to propagate.

When we deal in facts and not emotion, our opponents are over fatal terrain. They cannot win if we force them to deal in facts.

IN OTHER NEWS AROUND THE FIREARMS WORLD...

As was reported in yesterday's edition of The Outdoor Wire, Pike County, Illinois has fired back at Illinois legislators who seem intent on passing progressively restrictive gun laws. With an economy that's heavily dependent on the hunting industry, Pike County's Commission passed a resolution which has told state legislators Pike will not recognize legislation that infringes on the right to keep and bear arms as is guaranteed under the Second Amendment of the Constitution.

Word of that action is spreading across the United States and other small counties are beginning to discuss their own measures to prevent the usurpation of their rights by legislators they feel are either disconnected or indifferent to their jurisdiction's needs.

As word begins to spread, the Pike County officials who spearheaded the resolution are finding themselves celebrities.

This Sunday, Tom Gresham's taking his national radio show "Tom Gresham's Gun Talk" to Pike County, Illinois. The reason? Gresham says "These brave people fired a rhetorical shot starting a new phase of the gun rights war."

Gresham will feature Robert Kanady and Mark Mountain, the pair of Pike County Commissioners who pushed for the resolution as well as Dick Metcalf, nationally -known gun writer and president of the Pike-Adams Sportsmen's Alliance (PASA). Gresham's show will originate from PASA Park in Barry, Illinois, at the end of the USPSA's Single Stack national championship.

Others, including Rob Leatham, 18-time USPSA National Champion and 12 time Single Stack competition champion are scheduled to appear.

And in Texas, some very unusual collaborators are taking on a group of Texas prosecutors who appear to be taking the law into their own hands - at least when it comes to Texas' concealed weapons laws.

In a report called "Above the Law: How Texas prosecutors are placing their own judgment over that of the Legislature and the law of the land" the American Civil Liberties Union has collaborated with the Texas Criminal Justice Coalition and the Texas State Rifle Association to unveil the actions of some Texas prosecutors who don't care for the clarifications made to Texas' concealed-carry laws. The clarification states, simply, that citizens have the right to carry a legal handgun in a private vehicle.

Some Texas prosecutors didn't like that new law — to the point several directed local police to ignore the statute.

In the joint report, it appears that in at least 13 jurisdictions in Texas, that is, indeed the case. 13 county/district attorneys, including district attorneys for counties in large metropolitan areas like Houston and Fort Worth, have instructed police officers to interrogate Texans unnecessarily, arrest Texans, or take their guns even if they are legally carrying the gun in a car under HB 823 standards.

According to the report, one County Attorney One "advised police officers that it's simply too complicated to try and determine whether a Texan is legally carrying a stowed gun in the car, so officers should arrest for "unlawful carrying" as before and let the prosecutor's office 'sort out the legal niceties.'"

Those are fighting words to the authors of "Above the Law" and they have countered by naming those County Attorneys, citing examples of their having instructed officers to either circumvent or ignore the law, and publishing a guideline of "what to do if you're stopped".

The report hit the streets this week, and it's expected that the County Attorneys named in it will be hitting the ceilings.

Should make for some interesting conversations over the next few weeks.

As always, we'll keep you posted.

--Jim Shepherd