Once more the news is filled with questions over Gun Control and what can/should be done about it, given the recent mass shootings over the weekend. I previously posted on this topic but lost the post when I rebooted my website. My position, however, remains pretty much the same. Guns are not the problem, the shooters are the problem. The debate has shifted more towards this discussion but there are plenty who still want to talk about actual gun control. Before we get into that, I would like to talk briefly about something related.
Much of the discussion centers around “assault weapons/rifles/guns”. I am not sure where this terminology came from but do not consider it to accurately describe any weapon. Wouldn’t any weapon utilized to launch an attack be an assault weapon? If you are attacked by someone wielding a knife, isn’t the knife an assault weapon or assault knife? Be it a penknife, butcher knife, kitchen knife paring knife, etc. So in the context of guns, isn’t any gun used in an attack an assault weapon, be it a revolver, a rifle or an automatic pistol? (Automatic is also a bit of a misnomer in that it only fires one round with one pull of the trigger. Only Military and Police have legal access to weapons capable of firing more than one round per pull of the trigger. Automatic refers to the fact the gun automatically extracts the spent/fired cartridge and inserts a fresh cartridge readying the gun for another pull of the trigger.) With that out of the way, let’s move on.
The question I ask myself is, Why is this a national issue? Since when does every problem have to be resolved at the Federal level? If the Federal Government is going to be charged with solving every problem that arises, why not just get rid of the state governments and save ourselves a lot of tax dollars? Many states do have their own gun laws. Some have longer wait times after the background check. Others have some form of Red Flag law or provision. Why can’t States take care of the problem? They could change the age for gun purchasers. They could increase wait times. They could ban magazines capable of containing more than some fixed number of cartridges. They could even ban so-called assault weapons.
Any of these new laws could be subject to challenges at the Supreme Court level but the same is true of any law passed by Congress. Let states make the new laws. Then we can see what challenges come forth and which ones make it through. States then can adjust their law to conform with the ones that have made it through if they determine there is a need to have such a law.
Possession and selling of Marijuana are still Federal Offenses but many states have passed laws decriminalizing either medical use or recreational use or both. The Federal Government has yet to challenge any of these new laws in the courts and is lax in pursuing buyers and sellers in those states with such laws in place. It seems to be working for those states. Why can’t states take this action when it comes to guns?
In fact, why does the Federal Government have to be involved in so many issues better addressed at the state/local levels? Why do we look to the Federal Government for answers to problems we can address locally? I know that is not what the Founding Fathers intended. They foresaw smaller Federal Government with local communities and states determining what was best for them. I do not see anyone, maybe Rand Paul, arguing for a return to a smaller Federal Government and greater local/state self-determination. Why do we the American people believe the Federal Government can best determine what is in our best interest rather than us making that determination at a local level?
