NCJ Number
160171
Date Published
1992
Length
7 pages
Annotation
Compared with other weapons, assault guns are responsible for very few deaths in the United States; banning assault weapons will not reduce crime and will only lead to the erosion of the right to bear arms.
Abstract
A semiautomatic weapon requires the shooter only to load a quantity of cartridges into its magazine before firing and then to squeeze the trigger for each successive shot. Semiautomatic weapons can be fired rapidly, but they are not fully automatic, like the machine gun. They do not fire continuously for as long as the trigger is held back or cartridges remain in the magazine. An assault rifle is a member of a class of weapons first developed for military use by the Germans in World War II. Assault rifles are capable of selective fire, that is, they can be fired in both semiautomatic and automatic modes as the situation demands. The so-called "assault rifles" marketed in the United States by both domestic and foreign manufacturers do not have the built-in capability to produce fully automatic fire. Although most semiautomatic weapons of any type can be altered to be permanently fully automatic, such procedures are currently illegal. The rifles labeled as assault rifles for sale in the United States are not designed as the original assault rifle, because they do not have the capability of being fired selectively as automatic or semiautomatic weapons. Although police departments in certain areas where there is heavy drug traffic have testified to the rising criminal use of semiautomatics, University of Texas criminologist Sheldon Ekland- Olson has estimated that "assault rifle" type firearms have been used in less than 1 percent of all homicides committed in the United States, and the cheap "Saturday Night Special" handguns favored by many petty criminals have been used in 30 to 40 percent of such killings. Compared to other weapons that can be fired and reloaded rapidly, such as a Remington Model 1100 semiautomatic shotgun fitted with a five-round magazine for 12- gauge cartridges, the AK-47's only advantages are its superior range and accuracy if used in firing slow, aimed shots. If the goal of gun-control enthusiasts is to eliminate all guns capable of rapid fire or the discharge of multiple projectiles in quick succession, then they will ultimately have to move against all revolvers, all shotguns, and all lever-action and bolt-action magazine-fed rifles. The end result of such a campaign would be the prohibition of all firearms except muzzleloaders and single- shot breech-loading hand and shoulder guns. A ban on all metallic cartridge-fixed ammunition might logically follow, since elimination of it would render inoperable any illicit semiautomatic weapons still retained by any citizens. The triumph of gun-control advocates will eventually deprive this Nation of the essential ability to define its mortal enemies and to unite in arms to oppose them.