Path: teetot.acusd.edu!network.ucsd.edu!usc!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!optilink!cramer
From: [c--am--r] at [optilink.COM] (Clayton Cramer)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.misc,ca.politics
Subject: Mass Murder in San Francisco & the Brady Bill
Date: 6 Jul 93 22:53:11 GMT

I see from reading the Santa Rosa (Cal.) Press-Democrat of 7/3/93 that
the self-executed mass murderer in question had:

1. No criminal history (which is unusual for murderers);

2. Purchased at least two of his weapons in Nevada (a violation of 
existing federal and state laws);

3. Passed a background check and waiting period (as currently
required by Nevada law);

4. Was a resident of a state (California) that already has a 15
day waiting period and background check for ALL firearms purchases.

Yet, I see that one of the senior partners of the law firm where
all this suffering took place is now attempting to bang the drum
for the Brady Bill -- which wouldn't have stopped Ferri from
buying his guns, since both states involved already have waiting
periods and background checks.  In fact, the Brady Bill's waiting
period is SHORTER and less comprehensive than California's current
waiting period law.

Is there ANY law that has any hope of stopping this sort of crime?
What punishment can the state threaten that exceeds what these
mass murderers do to themselves?  Nothing.

Cesare Beccaria's comments, made over two centuries ago, remain
just as valid today.

Cesare    Beccaria,     trans.    by     Henry    Palolucci,
_On_Crimes_And_Punishments_, Bobbs-Merrill  Co.  (New  York:
1963), p. 87-88:

     False is  the idea  of utility  that sacrifices  a
     thousand real  advantages  for  one  imaginary  or
     trifling inconvenience;  that would take fire from
     men because  it burns,  and water  because one may
     drown in  it; that has no remedy for evils, except
     destruction.  The laws that forbid the carrying of
     arms are  laws of  such a nature.  The disarm only
     those who  are neither  inclined nor determined to
     commit crimes.   Can it be supposed that those who
     have the  courage to  violate the most sacred laws
     of humanity,  the most important of the code, will
     respect the  less important  and  arbitrary  ones,
     which can  be violatd  with ease and impunity, and
     which, if  strictly obeyed,  would put  an end  to
     personal liberty -- so dear to men, so dear to the
     enlightened legislator  --  and  subject  innocent
     persons to all the vexations that the guilty alone
     ought to  suffer?  Such laws make things worse for
     the assaulted  and better for the assailants; they
     serve  rather   to  encourage   than  to   prevent
     homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with
     greater confidence  than an armed man.  They ought
     to  be  designated  as  laws  not  preventive  but
     fearful of  crimes,  produced  by  the  tumultuous
     impression of  a few  isolated facts,  and not  by
     thoughtful consideration  of the  inconveneniences
     and advantages of a universal decree.
-- 
Clayton E. Cramer {uunet,pyramid}!optilink!cramer  My opinions, all mine!
Politicians prefer unarmed peasants.