The Ban on Assault Weapons

The Ban on Assault Weapons

In January 1989, a man named Patrick Purdy armed with an AK-47 fired over 100 rounds into a schoolyard in Stockton, California. He killed five children and wounded thirty others before turning the gun on himself. This is only one horrible shooting among countless others involving so called assault weapons. These acts of violence shocked people into focusing on gun laws to control crimes involving guns. September 13, 1994 congress passes the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act. People want to ban assault weapons because they believe that they are more dangerous than other weapons.

The Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 targets certain weapons declared as assault weapons. An assault weapon as defined by the 1994 Crime Control Act is any semi-automatic rifle that can accept a detachable magazine and has two or more of the following: A folding or telescoping stock, A pistol grip, A bayonet mount, A flash suppressor or threads to attach one, or a grenade launcher (Assault Weapons, 2010). The 1994 Crime Control Act banned the manufacture, transfer, and possession of certain semiautomatic firearms designated as assault weapons and large capacity ammunition magazines (Koper, 1999). These weapons are being targeted because of their use in violent crimes. The Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement act of 1994 expired on September 13, 2004. Now the Obama administration wants to reinstate the assault weapon ban and make it permanent so it will not expire. Are these so called assault weapons used in so many crimes that they need regulated?

Many people would like you to believe that assault weapons are the weapon of choice for drug dealers and other criminals, like one chief of police from Denver that testified this to city council members in a lawsuit. The state of Colorado conducted an inventory of every firearm in police custody in Denver as of March 1991. Out of all the shotguns seized by the police not one was covered under the 1994 Crime Control Act. Out of 282 rifles in police custody, nine or 3.2% were covered under the 1994 Crime Control Act. Of all the handguns only 0.6% were covered under the 1994 Crime Control Act. The Denver police only had fourteen banned guns in custody. Of these fourteen guns only one was used in a violent crime. The other thirteen were seized from people who were never charged with any offense. California 1990, 36 of 963 firearms involved in aggravated assault or homicides are assault weapons. Chicago 1985 through 1989 175 out of 17,144 seized guns were assault weapons. Florida 1989, all rifles, even those not considered assault weapons account for 2.6% of the weapons used in homicides and between 1986 and 1989 assault weapons were used in only 17 out of 7,500 gun crimes. In 1994 David B. Kopel wrote an article based on police statistical surveys like you just read and concluded that "Assault weapons are used in only about one percent of gun crime" (Kopel, 1994) and 47 other studies indicate that less than 2% of crimes involving guns are assault weapons (Assault Weapons, 2010). So assault weapons should be banned because people believe "Assault weapons are designed to slaughter people" (Siebel, 2008).

Some would have you believe that assault weapons are only designed to kill people and this is why they should be banned. What about some of the first guns? They were used to kill, whether it is animals or humans, for hunting or self defense and even war. In a book published by the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence they state that assault weapons are semiautomatic versions of fully automatic guns designed for military use (Siebel, 2008). Not all guns defined as assault weapons are versions of military weapons. Some assault weapons are designed after military weapons. There more reliable,

...