This is what we're up against in PA...

[NineseveN]

http://www.handgunsanity.org/

Frequently Asked Questions about Handgun Control

1. What makes you think you have any chance to pass handgun legislation in PA, when it’s a known fact that the NRA and the sportsmen’s associations refuse to concede even a little bit on changing gun laws?

Creating change and moving what was considered
automobiles, regulation of smoking and on and on. And, whatever the old and tired accepted wisdom, the fact is that the gun lobby does not control voters, a majority of whom, including a majority of gun owners, favor strengthening PA’s handgun laws. Most sport shooters and hunters do not support the radical and uncompromising positions of the reactionary pro-gun organizations. The bulk of PA voters and gun owners are not threatened by moderate limits on handgun sales, nor do they oppose such means to permanently disrupt the illegal handgun trade. Gaining enactment of legislation to reduce the availability of illegal handguns to criminals and violent teens will take time and commitment, but it will be done.

2. Why shouldn’t we just hire more police? Doesn’t that mean we’ll be safer without sacrificing gun owners’ rights?

Without doubt, better and more efficient law enforcement is a critical part of reducing gun crime and violence. But, as police chiefs across the country have said repeatedly: “We cannot arrest our way out of this problem.” Law enforcement executives know that handguns move far too easily from legal sale at PA gun shops to illegal sale on street corners and across playgrounds. This knowledge is why law enforcement typically favors moderate limits on handgun purchases. Lawful societies have a duty to balance individual privilege with public safety. Ours does it every day using laws and legislation. Whatever the gun lobby may want everyone to believe, there is no absolute “right” to purchase as many handguns as anyone might wish. In fact, no law limiting handgun sales or possession has ever been overturned on the grounds of “rights.” Besides, it is fanciful to describe limiting individuals to the purchase of twelve handguns per year as a sacrifice of anything other than the ability to illegally supply handguns to prohibited purchasers, who cannot buy handguns legally themselves.

3. Isn’t handgun violence just an urban/Philadelphia problem?

No, illegal handgun violence strikes nearly every community of any size in PA. Just released FBI data shows that, while crime in general has declined in recent years across the country, handgun crime and violence has increased. Evidence from cities and towns in PA, such as Allentown, York, Reading, Harrisburg and others, confirms this trend. This is a symptom of the growing efficiency of the business of illegal handguns, which puts handguns into the hands of more and younger people. Sadly, more handguns in more hands translates into more death and injury. As long as PA’s lax gun laws encourage the easy movement of handguns from gun shops to illegal street sale, handgun crime and violence will grow across the Commonwealth.

4. Doesn’t the Constitution guarantee me the right to have as many guns as I want in my home?

No, of course not. The much misinterpreted Second Amendment to the Constitution does not grant any individual any personal right to ownership or possession of any gun. This is easily shown by the fact that no gun law has ever been struck down in American history on Second Amendment grounds. Whatever the mythologizing of the gun lobby, the courts have made it clear that the Second Amendment does not speak to any so-called “individual right.”

5. Why can’t we just use gun locks?

Gun locks (trigger locks, gun safes, etc.) are only effective if they’re used, which takes the will to do so. There is plenty of evidence to show that a large portion of people who acquired gun locks with the intent to use them do not, so it is obvious that, whatever their merit, gun locks will not adequately reduce handgun crime and violence. Furthermore, gun locks will do nothing to stop the illegal handgun trade, which is the main supply source for felons and those intent on mayhem.

6. I’m a hunter and I just want to hunt deer. Why are you trying to take away my rights?

No one’s seeking to interfere in any way with your ability to hunt. We seek only to reduce the availability of handguns to people we all agree shouldn’t have them. Legislation we seek in PA, mainly a law to limit individuals to the purchase of no more than one handgun in any thirty-day period, does not deal restrict long guns at all. And, limiting individuals to as many as twelve handguns per year is not a hardship on anyone but illegal handgun traffickers and their criminal customers.

7. Doesn’t having a handgun in my house make me safer?

Hardly. There is abundant evidence that keeping a handgun in a home makes that home much less safe. Handguns in homes are far more likely to be used to wound or kill residents of the home, their families, friends or neighbors than any intruder. Law enforcers recommend alarms and dogs as more effective and infinitely safer ways to discourage intruders.

8. Do gun control laws prevent crime? The NRA says no.

The gun lobby is bound by its role to encourage sales for its patrons in the gun industry to do whatever it can to discourage new laws to prevent gun violence, including making claims that are not factual. In fact, other every other developed country in the world, including our neighbor Canada, has laws that severely limit the availability of handguns. These same countries also have crime and violence, much like ours in the USA. But, none of these countries has more than a tiny fraction of the rate of handgun crime and violence that we have. Further, the American states typically having among the lowest per capita rates of handgun violence are also considered among the states with the strongest gun laws. Clearly, laws to prevent handgun violence work.

9. Why is it that in cities with strong gun control legislation, like Washington DC, the homicide rate is higher than in cities with weaker/fewer laws?

Another gun lobby myth. Actually, according to a just released study, Philadelphia, under Pennsylvania’s weak gun laws, has the highest rate of violent crime among the largest cities in the country. Note that New York, which has among the most strict gun regulations, has a rate substantially less than half that of Philadelphia’s, and the two cities among the ten most populous in the country, San Diego and San Jose, both exist under California’s strict gun laws. More germane yet is that the states with the lowest per capita rates of gun violence (per CDC data) are all states with relatively strong gun laws (MA, HA, NJ, NY and CT)

10. Why are hunters and other sportsmen so opposed to handgun control? You don’t shoot deer with a handgun!

Actually, most hunters and sportsmen are not opposed to reasonable limits on access to handguns. It just seems that they are because the gun lobby spends millions of dollars in public campaigns to convince the media and politicians that they speak for everyday hunters and sportsmen, when, in fact, they speak mainly for the gun industry that funds their activities. Rather, hunters and sportsmen are every bit as concerned about illegal handgun crime as are gun violence prevention advocates, and most of them are not opposed to moderate limits on handgun purchases. According to a 1999 Pennsylvania statewide survey, for instance, a majority of hunters support a statewide One Handgun A Month law.

Sadly, the bold underlined stuff is mostly true, the pink italicized stuff is outright lies and fabrication. There's nothing we can do about the pink stuff except refute it every chance we get. The bold, underlined stuff, that's our people, fellow gun owners that really feel that way. That part is up to us.

[secretbard]

"Act now, Save lives"

Just watched their little video of their rally Oct. 16th and couldn't be more sickened by the inaccuracies, falseness and utter fantasies that making a law to penalize someone for not reporting their lost or stolen gun within a certain time period... and limiting one handgun sale per person per month is going to do anything to curtail criminals either acquiring their guns illegally or criminals using guns to break the law. Again, we see shortsightedness from the people who think they are going to make a difference in the way criminals conduct their criminal behavior.

I say we strengthen the laws we already have. How about getting tougher on the courts instead of letting politics and plea bargains run rampant. I was hit by a drunk driver a few years ago, and now I'm disabled... and do you know what the person got for fleeing the scene of the accident... 1 year probation and $750 fine for pleading guilty. Now how is that justice? I personally believe that the justice system needs a good overhaul so that justice is served and not just made a mockery by criminals who can get off and repeat offenders everywhere.

[mrwildroot]

Truckload of crap...
mw

[RocketFoot]

That whole website is crap! As well as ceasefirepa!!

[vetter3006]

What a bunch of bull crap!

[Hokkmike]

Websites are like bad hair days, anybody can have one. Too bad people read this stuff, let alone take it seriously.

[Rule10b5]

What the hell does hunting have to do with gun rights?

And why should I care what a self-professed "hunter" thinks about restrictions on firearms purchases?

[SteveXD]

Nice Post!

I love how they say the second amendment doesn't apply to the people. Yet all of the other amendments are for the people???

Ugg... that made me ANGRY!!!

[phillyd2]

Nice Post!

I love how they say the second amendment doesn't apply to the people. Yet all of the other amendments are for the people???

Ugg... that made me ANGRY!!!

Why so angry?

Not starting to start a fight here but the article is correct in stating that the courts don't overrule a gun laws by saying that the 2nd. is a individual right. Most of the laws on the books are based on the premise that the 2nd. is NOT a individual right. The PA Constitution clearly states that "The right of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the State shall not be questioned" yet you ARE questioned when buying a gun.

The DC case may change that if its heard and ruled "correctly" by the Supreme Court but until then the time to be pissed off about this is about 30 years too late.