Sangamon
County Rifle Association
Right Reason on Second Amendment Rights
Springfield, Illinois
Right Reason on Second Amendment Rights
Springfield, Illinois
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Sangamon
County Rifle Association
Right Reason on Second Amendment Rights Springfield, Illinois |
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 Cities with most
restrictive gun
laws have the highest crime rates Jim Butler President, SCRA February 2006 GunNews The NRA has long pointed out that a disproportionately large number of gun murders has occurred in those jurisdictions having the most severe anti-gun laws. Something like 25 percent of gun murders in America have occurred in gun-banning New York City, Chicago, and Washington, DC, for decades. Yet, the population of these cities amount to less than five percent of our nation's population. Severe anti-gun laws including gun bans are usually passed in jurisdictions like these that already have a high rate of violence. Unfortunately, the problem with most of these gun control proposals is that they criminalize much of the citizenry but have only marginal effects on career criminals. National Crime Survey (NCS) estimates indicate that 83% of Americans will, sometime over the span of their lives, be a victim of a violent crime. In addition, the most common location is in or near the victims home, that is, the place where the victim would most likely have access to a firearm, if he owned one. According to a 1986 Survey by (Wright & Rossi) of 1,874 felons in prison in 10 states, 56% of the felons agreed with the statement that "most criminals are more worried about meeting an armed victim than they are about the police." Lately we have heard a lot of talk about gun registration and being able to trace guns used in crimes. Gun registration is essentially useless in crime detection. Tracing the history of a recovered gun generally leads to the discovery that it was stolen from a legal owner and after that its following pattern of ownership is unknown. Remember the infamous New York City "Sullivan Law"? State Senator Timothy Sullivan of New York in 1911 promised that if New York City outlawed handgun carrying, homicides would decline drastically. However, the year the Sullivan Law took effect, homicides increased and the New York Times pronounced criminals "as well armed as ever" Over 20,000 anti-gun laws since then have produced the same results. A comprehensive study of virtually all 3,141 US counties (by Lott & Mustard) in 1997 found that rates of robbery, as well as homicides (both with and without guns), rapes, and aggravated assaults, declined after states passed laws making it easier for non- criminals to obtain carry permits. As I See it Index Return to SCRA Home Page |