When Guns are Finally Banned

Note: There isn't even a vague reference to the Constitutional Guarantee here.
It's just something that stands up to the plain old common sense test.

Scenario 1:

The worst fear in the hearts of LEGAL gun owners is realized. A landmark Federal Law is passed. All guns of any kind in private hands are banned.

Legal gun owners are required to turn in their guns or face jail. Being law-abiding citizens, they do so.

As a further step, the records seized from the now out-of-business gun dealers are used to locate and confiscate all previously legal firearms in private hands. Citizens who do not cooperate are jailed.

Neighbors turn in neighbors who are suspected of posessing illegal guns. Children, at the urging of the schools, turn in their parents.

Police departments, already stretched thin, must dedicate additional resources to the enforcement of these new laws.

Criminals, drug-dealers, gang members and other previously ILLEGAL gun owners, of course, do not comply with the law, their guns were always illegal.

IOW - The Criminals Still Have Their Guns

As with drug and alcohol prohibition, a huge black market for illegal firearms spawns a new, more sophisticated network of organized crime.

The illegal gun market explodes. Gun smuggling and black-market gun sales are now really big business.

Basement machine shops are set up to make black-market guns. The majority are poorly manufactured and many are unsafe in any hands. Substandard ammunition is also manufactured in basements and garages to feed the black-market needs. Accidental gun deaths rise.

The BATF has the same success in its 'War on Guns' as the DEA has with the drug war -- none.

Illegally armed burglars, muggers, carjackers and other criminals now know they can prey on the unarmed public, with little fear of a meeting a defense or apprehension by the already overtaxed police.

The crime rates go through the roof.

Helpless citizens now hover in fear in their barricaded homes and seldom venture outside.

The military is called up to assist and we now have armed troops on many street-corners.

A small percentage of renegade military and police personnel participate in the crime and corruption.

The news: "Today, a 52 year-old Brooklyn man, father of three, used an illegal war-surplus 45 to kill three armed prison escapees as they crashed through his daughter's bedroom door. Under the new 'zero tolerance' laws he has been jailed for having an illegal gun. When convicted he faces ten years in prison.

People (law abiding citizens) revolt.

People die.

Democracy, America, and society as we know it cease to exist.


Scenario 2:

Any adult citizen without a record as a felon or violent criminal can legally obtain firearms for sport and/or personal protection.

If a person with a felony or criminal background, or who is otherwise interdicted from the possession of a firearm attempts to purchase, or is found in possession of an illegal gun, they go to jail.

Law-abiding citizens who pass a background check for violent crimes are allowed to carry concealed weapons.

Burglars, muggers, robbers and carjackers now know that the person they are approaching may not only have a legal gun, but will be trained in its use.

Violent crime and murder rates drop.

Citizens remain secure in their persons and property against criminals with guns.


Simple Statistics


As the legal guns per-capita in the US has risen, violent crimes against people have dropped.

As soon as Great Britain banned all hand guns, the rate of gun related violent crime began to increase. The same is true for Australia.

All states that have passed concealed carry "must issue" laws have seen greater than the national average drop in gun-related crime. The media inspired fear of 'Highway shootouts' and every city becoming a 'Dodge City' just didn't happen.

No police officer has been shot by a person with a Concealed Carry Permit, but many have been assisted or saved by citizens with legal guns.

Guns are not a big contributor (percantages) to accidental death. Automobiles, swimming pools and electricity, however, are.

Over 100,000 felons and other interdicted persons have been prevented from legally purchasing a gun when their background check disclosed their criminal record.

Fewer than 1% of those criminals, however, were arrested and prosecuted for the additional felony of attempting to buy an illegal gun. This means that failure to enforce existing laws has kept at least 199,000 gun-seeking criminals on the street.

Regardless of the laws, the criminals will always have their guns.

Ask yourself this ... Why do those places with the toughest gun-laws have the highest rates of violent crimes against persons? Conversely, those places that do recognize a law-abiding citizens right to self defense have lower rates of violent crimes against persons.

See Also:

The Eggman's Take on the Second Amendment
and
You Don't Know Me, and I Have a Gun!

Eggman:
A lucid, well thought statement of fact that hopefully will induce the juices to flow in those who teeter on the fence.

We have 36 states in this union whose legislatures have approved concealed carry permits or "shall issue" permits. These are mandated by law for no specific reason other than a lawful citizen wants one. Unlike Maryland where you must jump through 400 hoops to get one.

Probably not in my lifetime, however, it is still legal to protect ones home and family. Those that do not own, nor wish to have a gun in their home should not look to the police or their neighbors for assistance when the need arises. If is their duty to protect their holdings.

For those who question our wish to carry concealed. Simply, I would rather have it and not need it, than need it and not have it. What difference does it make if I carry it on my person for 20 years, unbeknownst by anyone, and never have a need. Does it make me a bad person for being prepared. How many have had AAA for as many years and never had to call for a repair? Its' called being prepared.

My 2 cents.

Actually, a "Dodge City" situation did develop briefly in the late 1980s/early 1990s, when Florida passed an open carry law, that allowed people to openly carry and display firearms on their person. Being as Florida is a tourist environment, the sight of people walking around with guns on did a great job of deterring criminals, but intimidated tourists, so the law was repealed.

Bruzilla said:

Actually, a "Dodge City" situation did develop briefly in the late 1980s/early 1990s, when Florida passed an open carry law, that allowed people to openly carry and display firearms on their person. Being as Florida is a tourist environment, the sight of people walking around with guns on did a great job of deterring criminals, but intimidated tourists, so the law was repealed.

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I think the "Dodge City" scenario The Eggman posted of is shootouts in the street which did not happen even with open carry.

This is a question that I ask in all seriousness: If Scenario 1 happened, and an effort was made by the government to confiscate all firearms, thus yielding a denial of our rights by the government, the exact situation that the 2nd Ammendment was designed to prevent, would that be a cause of a second Civil War or have we lost so much of our sense of freedom and become so conditioned to doing whatever the government says, that there would be no organized revolt?

Bruzilla said:

This is a question that I ask in all seriousness: If Scenario 1 happened, and an effort was made by the government to confiscate all firearms, thus yielding a denial of our rights by the government, the exact situation that the 2nd Ammendment was designed to prevent, would that be a cause of a second Civil War or have we lost so much of our sense of freedom and become so conditioned to doing whatever the government says, that there would be no organized revolt?

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This country is much better than the question gives it credit for. Scenario 1 can only happen in the minds of those with an extreme case of paranoia. I'm talking nationwide not NY city, Wash. D.C. or San Fran. where the Leftist preach paranoia but the whole of the USA.

willie said:

This country is much better than the question gives it credit for. Scenario 1 can only happen in the minds of those with an extreme case of paranoia.

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I know people in Canada and Australia (especially Canada) who said the same thing... right before the government took all their guns.

willie said:

This country is much better than the question gives it credit for.

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Scenario #1 not Canada or Australia.

One more 'Point of Logic'

ASSUME for a moment that all firearms have been successfully removed from criminal hands.

Would violent crime still exist?

Of course, but now with knives, machetes, clubs, etc.

Even if you COULD get rid of the tools, you still have the criminals, which are the root of the problem.

Here's a novel idea!

Get rid of the violent CRIMINALS FIRST. Once that is done, their tools (guns, knives, stones, tire-irons, etc.) will AUTOMATICALLY cease to be a major problem.

No matter how many tools you outlaw, the criminals will always remain the root of the issue.

Yoko Ono said it best after her husband John Lennon was gunned down on the streets of New York. "Violence is in the hearts of man, not in their tools."

Until then I never paid much attention to her or for that matter the musicians of the era. But, that kinda woke me. Can't disagree with someone who just lost a loved one to violence, yet refuses to go along with the hype that eminates from the anti-gun groups and similarly thinking politicians.

willie said:

Scenario #1 not Canada or Australia.

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That's wishful thinking.

willie said:

This country is much better than the question gives it credit for. Scenario 1 can only happen in the minds of those with an extreme case of paranoia. I'm talking nationwide not NY city, Wash. D.C. or San Fran. where the Leftist preach paranoia but the whole of the USA.

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I think you are being naive. It couldn't happen in pre-WWII Germany, but it did.

The Eggman said:

ASSUME for a moment that all firearms have been successfully removed from criminal hands.

Would violent crime still exist?

Of course, but now with knives, machetes, clubs, etc.

Even if you COULD get rid of the tools, you still have the criminals, which are the root of the problem.

Here's a novel idea!

Get rid of the violent CRIMINALS FIRST. Once that is done, their tools (guns, knives, stones, tire-irons, etc.) will AUTOMATICALLY cease to be a major problem.

No matter how many tools you outlaw, the criminals will always remain the root of the issue.

Click to expand...

Bruzilla said:

This is a question that I ask in all seriousness: If Scenario 1 happened, and an effort was made by the government to confiscate all firearms, thus yielding a denial of our rights by the government, the exact situation that the 2nd Ammendment was designed to prevent, would that be a cause of a second Civil War or have we lost so much of our sense of freedom and become so conditioned to doing whatever the government says, that there would be no organized revolt?

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Many will give up. Others will revolt. Washington, Jefferson, Adams, Monroe, and the other founders, if alive, would be among those revolting. Why do you think the U.N. wants all arms confiscated from private citizens world wide? You can't have a one world government if the people have the implements and the cahonies to refuse.

Don't believe it can happen? This is going on right now.

Washington, DC, Feb. 18 (UPI) -- Wayne LaPierre, executive vice president of the National Rifle Association of America, has used the Conservative Political Actions Conference as a forum to harshly criticize U.N. efforts to reduce the amount of small arms in the hand of civilians.

At the same day the U.N. Security Council debated its actions to implement sanctions and arms embargoes, LaPierre accused the United Nations of denying U.S. citizens the right to bear arms.

...

Meanwhile Stuart Holliday, alternate U.S. representative in the United Nations for Special Political Affairs, welcomed U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan's report on small arms, calling the weapon-confiscation programs a relatively modest investment that could lead to large dividends in threat reduction.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/upi-breaking/20050217-065131-7843r.htm

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Keep dreaming it can't happen in the U.S. and you will wake up a subject instead of a citizen.

Speaking of how our country is too smart for that...

http://www.floridatoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050223/BREAKINGNEWS/50223002

A 13-year-old student in Orange County, Fla., was suspended for 10 days and could be banned from school over an alleged assault with a rubber band, according to a WKMG Local 6 News report.

Robert Gomez, a seventh-grader at Liberty Middle School, said he picked up a rubber band at school and slipped it on his wrist. Gomez said when his science teacher demanded the rubber band, the student said he tossed it on her desk.

After the incident, Gomez received a 10-day suspension for threatening his teacher with what administrators say was a weapon, Local 6 News reported.

"They said if he would have aimed it a little more and he would have gotten it closer to her face he would have hit her in the eye," mother Jenette Rojas said.

Bruzilla said:

Speaking of how our country is too smart for that...

http://www.floridatoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050223/BREAKINGNEWS/50223002

A 13-year-old student in Orange County, Fla., was suspended for 10 days and could be banned from school over an alleged assault with a rubber band, according to a WKMG Local 6 News report.

Robert Gomez, a seventh-grader at Liberty Middle School, said he picked up a rubber band at school and slipped it on his wrist. Gomez said when his science teacher demanded the rubber band, the student said he tossed it on her desk.

After the incident, Gomez received a 10-day suspension for threatening his teacher with what administrators say was a weapon, Local 6 News reported.

"They said if he would have aimed it a little more and he would have gotten it closer to her face he would have hit her in the eye," mother Jenette Rojas said.

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So? You worried the UN is going to ban rubber bands?

willie said:

So? You worried the UN is going to ban rubber bands?

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Do you have a clue? I'm sure he was saying that the U.S. has gone completely overboard on "weapons".

2ndAmendment said:

Do you have a clue? I'm sure he was saying that the U.S. has gone completely overboard on "weapons".

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I would like to apologize to anyone and everyone to whom I offended in my post, and subsequent replies about the paranoid people and the use of firearms.

It's not the red hits I received, but more to the point, I was wrong to poke fun at those that take life and themselves too seriously.

OK - I'm against gun control. But aren't we kind of beating a dead horse here? We've had a few threads on this topic, and it seems to keep coming back up for further discussion. No offense meant, I assure you.

2ndAmendment said:

Do you have a clue?

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It was S A R C A S M

You can thank me later.