Inquirer Editorial: The least they couldn't do
There's no use passing laws against jaywalking, because some pedestrians will still jaywalk. There's no use passing laws against speeding, because motorists will still speed.
There's no use passing laws against jaywalking, because some pedestrians will still jaywalk.
There's no use passing laws against speeding, because motorists will still speed.
There's no use making it a crime to rape or murder, because victims will still be assaulted.
As dumb as those statements sound, they sum up the view of lawmakers who say there's no use passing tougher gun laws because criminals will break them.
Despite all the carnage that has occurred in this country - not just the recent massacres, but also the daily toll of urban gun violence - they still don't get it.
Because these lawmakers won't acknowledge that more restrictive gun laws can reduce violence even though they won't end it, the Senate on Wednesday killed a bill cosponsored by Sen. Pat Toomey (R., Pa.) to require background checks for most gun sales.
It took one who knows Congress' ways, former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D., Ariz.), to accurately depict the Senate's moral malfeasance. In an essay for the New York Times, Giffords, who was disabled by a gunman in 2011, accused the senators of cowardice.
"These senators made their decision based on political fear and on cold calculations about the money of special interests like the National Rifle Association, which in the last election cycle spent around $25 million on contributions, lobbying, and outside spending," she said.
Make no mistake about Giffords' accusation: She is saying that some senators and representatives care more about acquiring cash for their reelection campaigns than protecting people like the 26 Sandy Hook Elementary School students and educators killed by a gunman in December.
Many Americans have long suspected as much. But to hear that from a recent member of Congress who has seen the kind of pressure the NRA can apply turns those suspicions into truth. And how should the Sandy Hook parents, who left their homes for weeks to lobby Washington for gun reform, feel about that?
"We'll return home now, disappointed but not defeated," said Mark Barden, whose 7-year-old son, Daniel, was killed at Sandy Hook. "We return home with the determination that change will happen - maybe not today, but it will happen. It will happen soon."
That's the optimism of a parent desperately wanting to believe that the tragedy of his child's death will lead to something good. But pessimism is the prevailing mood among others who thought Sandy Hook had dampened America's infatuation with guns. More background checks were the least the Senate could do, and it didn't.
Monday-morning quarterbacks say President Obama didn't act fast enough; that his appointment of a commission to develop new gun-control legislation gave the NRA all the time it needed for the hot sentiment for stricter gun laws to cool down.
But that wasn't the problem. It made sense to seek consensus on new laws. And some recent polls show that up to 80 percent of Americans want broader background checks. Faced with losing NRA support, though, too many senators didn't care what the public wanted.