For the safety of all Americans, the purchase and use of firearms must be controlled and regulated by the federal government in a uniform system applying to all gun owners in all states. Qualifications for ownership and use should include: passing a written test, a physical test, and a medical test as well as training in use of firearms.
A fair and workable system should have as a basic principle that every gun owner should have a reason to have a gun: military, security officer, police, hunter, target shooter. There should be uniform regulation in all states so that a person cannot buy a gun in one state but then take it to another state to evade regulations.
Enforcement should be the responsibility of the local police chiefs, who know the angry and unstable people in their area, who have self-interest and motivation because their officers are most often in the line of fire. All guns should be stored in the local police station, signed out for use, and then returned to the police station. No guns should be allowed at home to avoid children or unauthorized persons having accidents, to avoid the use of guns as a tool to settle an angry argument, to avoid gun use in a vehicle during road rage, to avoid availability during mental depression.
The cost of installing such a system would be far less than the current cost of gun incidents. It would give law-enforcement another tool at the local level where most crime and accidents take place.
Legitimate use of guns under safe procedures would be protected, even encouraged - but murders, suicides, and deaths by gun accident and errors would be reduced dramatically.
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4 comments:
You know Jerome, of course you are right but States will not let go of the right to make the decision themselves.
You may know such a system existed here in Massachusetts though I do not know if it does any longer.
I re,member having to register ans get checked before the gun shop would let me get ammo and a weapon.
Guns and other lethal weapons will never be controlled here in the United States because of the multiple millions on the streets controlled illegally and purchased on the dark side.
Another problem is the gun shows where purchase is supposed to be controlled but too often is done under the table and to any mad man willing to pay.
You know how it goes, the right thing is never done only what serves one interest or the other. Everyone thinks it is their right to do what they want and they will not give that perceived right to thr feds though in a perfect world I think they should.
Grossman deserves plaudits for raising the gun control issue. Yes, we need civility--the thrust of publc discussion so far. Civility is necessary but not sufficient.
It's time to call out public officials who use violent language and public officials who tolerate in others such as Palin, Beck, Coulter, Limbaugh, O'Reilly.
Grossman's reasonable suggestions deserve adoption. It's opponents are plainly soft on security protection and violence for people living in the USA.
David Cohen,
Washington DC
David it is the right thing to do so like all right answers it will be ignore to satisfy one self interest or the other and that is the problem today everywhere.
Grossman's is an interesting suggestion, but I agree it probably could not be implemented.
There is one element of it that would make me nervous, not in Northern Virginia, but in, say the locale of the documudrama, "American Violet". I would trust our police to manage, store and release guns to owners. But there are places in this country where I don't believe the police could be trusted to perform the function without bias, or even at all.
If such an idea were implemented, some of the savings would somehow have to be redirected to support the additional facilities and staff that would be required.
And how much would it cost to track down the gun that was not returned? This would surely, in a world of Minutemen, militias and hate groups (who would probably find ways to obtain guns and even have them stored under the proposed scheme), be a frequent occurrence.
But uniform rules, standards, etc. across the country would surely be an improvement over what any state has now.
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