From: "John Q. Public" <[j q p] at [globaldialog.com]> Newsgroups: alt.current-events.clinton.whitewater,alt.politics.clinton,talk.politics.guns,talk.politics.misc Subject: Clinton's Gun Hoax Date: Mon, 16 Sep 1996 23:37:07 -0500 not to be used for commercial purposes Wall Street Journal 9/16 Clinton's Gun Hoax By JAMES BOVARD President Clinton is making the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act a centerpiece of his re-election campaign. He's mentioned the Brady Act, which requires a five-day waiting period and police background check for handgun purchasers, over 300 times in speeches and interviews since he took office. But as with many of the president's policies, the reality doesn't live up to the hype. In his Aug. 29 acceptance speech at the Democratic Convention, Mr. Clinton proclaimed that "we stopped 60,000 felons, fugitives and stalkers from getting handguns under the Brady bill." Seven days later, speaking to supporters in Michigan City, Ind., Mr. Clinton upped the ante, proclaiming, "We did pass the Brady Bill and 100,000 felons, fugitives and stalkers lost their handguns." White House Deputy Press Secretary Mary Ellen Glynn explained away the 100,000 figure by stating that the president "misspoke" and noting that "he was reaching the end of a train trip." However, both the 60,000 and 100,000 figures are political hoaxes. The Brady Act may have resulted in denying 60,000 people permission to buy a handgun at a specific store. But to claim that those people were thereby prevented from getting a gun makes as much sense as deducing the number of homeless by how many people have ever been turned down for a mortgage loan--regardless of whether they subsequently got another loan or had other lodging. Black Market Guns Few criminals bother filling out federal forms when they acquire weapons. A recent national survey of police chiefs found that 85% believed that the Brady Act has not prevented any criminal from obtaining a handgun from illegal sources in their jurisdiction. According to a 1991 Justice Department survey of convicts, most guns used to commit crimes have been acquired illegally or on the black market. The only way that Mr. Clinton could confidently assert that 60,000 to 100,000 "felons, fugitives and stalkers" didn't get guns is if his administration had prosecuted all of them and locked them up. (It is a federal crime, carrying a prison sentence of up to 10 years, for a convicted felon to purchase a handgun.) However, federal prosecutors in the first 15 months of the new law locked away only three people. (Four others were convicted but not incarcerated.) A General Accounting Office report noted, "None of the prosecutions involved prospective gun purchasers with previous convictions for violent offenses." The lack of prosecutions is especially surprising, since would-be handgun buyers must supply their address in filling out the application. Thus, federal agents need merely drive to the person's residence and slap on the handcuffs. The Justice Department, responding to GAO criticism about the lack of prosecutions, noted that "prosecutions for false statements on handgun purchase applications are inefficient and ineffective." A high-ranking Justice Department official also justified the lack of prosecutions because "no new resources were provided to U.S. Attorney Offices, which already must make resource allocation decisions to address competing demands." While the federal government may not have the resources to enforce the Brady Act, the law does dump a huge administrative load on local police agencies. Dennis Martin, president of the National Association of Chiefs of Police, estimated in late 1993 that enforcement of the Brady Act would require at least 10 million hours a year of law enforcement employees' time. "Ironically," Mr. Martin noted, "we may expect an increase in crime as understaffed, overworked law enforcement agencies throughout the nation spend millions of hours away from patrols and crime-solving to engage in background checks not funded by the Brady bill." Nor is there any credibility to Mr. Clinton's claim that all the 60,000 or 100,000 blocked purchasers were "felons, fugitives and stalkers." A January GAO survey found that in the first 15 months of the law's enforcement, 38% of would-be gun buyers had their applications rejected for administrative reasons (primarily paperwork snafus), 7.6% were rejected because of traffic violations, 2% because of minor drug violations, 0.3% because of a dishonorable discharge from the armed forces (primarily for being AWOL), and 0.8% because they were illegal aliens. Only 44.7% were denied as a result of felony convictions, arrests, warrants or indictments. (Another 1% were denied because they were classified as "fugitives from justice.") GAO found that the vast majority of people who were denied handgun purchases did not have a history of violence. In Fort Worth, Texas, only 2.3% of those denied handgun purchases were violent felons; in Harris County (Houston), Texas, 3.4%. The highest figure that GAO found was in Ohio, where 15.3% of the denied applicants had violent felonies on their records. Even the 44.7% felony number is inflated. GAO noted that the denials reported by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms last year "do not reflect the fact that some of the initially denied applications were subsequently approved, following administrative or other appeal procedures." In many instances law enforcement officials are overly zealous in denying handgun purchases. Some of the jurisdictions GAO surveyed (including Arkansas and Nevada) routinely denied handgun purchase applications based on records showing a felony arrest, even when no evidence was found of a conviction. Also, some jurisdictions are denying the right to buy a handgun to any person who has ever had been arrested for "minor drug offenses," regardless of whether he was convicted. Thus, someone caught with a single marijuana cigarette at age 19 may be prohibited from ever owning a handgun for his family's self-defense. A Charade The Clinton administration itself has made it obvious that the Brady Act is a public relations charade. When the constitutionality of the act was challenged in 1994, the administration responded in a court brief that a local Arizona sheriff need only make a "reasonable" effort to conduct a background check--and stated that, if the sheriff's department was too busy at that time, "a 'reasonable' effort may be no effort at all." Apparently, as long as political bragging rights are safe, it doesn't much matter to the Clinton Justice Department whether the law is actually enforced. But the act may not even be on the books much longer. Four of the five federal district judges who have examined challenges to the Brady Act have ruled it a violation of the 10th Amendment, though a federal appeals court upheld it. The Supreme Court will hear a challenge to the act this fall, and the law may be dead and buried before the next presidential inauguration. In the meanwhile, Mr. Clinton will continue to wring maximum political value from the law. The Brady Act epitomizes the mindset of focusing obsessively on guns as the root of all evil, while letting violent felons skip merrily along even after they have committed a new crime. "It is an irony that Clinton is using the Brady Act as a focus of fighting against crime," says Gerald Arenberg, executive director of the National Association of Chiefs of Police. "You talk to the 650,000 guys in uniform, and they know it is a joke." ------------------------------------------------ Mr. Bovard is the author of "Lost Rights: The Destruction of American Liberty" (St. Martin's Press, 1994).