N.J. Assembly gun control bills would save lives: Editorial

By Star-Ledger Editorial Board
on February 21, 2013 at 5:59 AM, updated February 21, 2013 at 6:04 AM

The Assembly is scheduled to vote today on nearly two dozen gun control bills that stirred outrage from an overflow crowd at a hearing last week. But don’t get the wrong idea. The majority of New Jerseyans are in favor of stricter gun laws, and for good solid reasons.

States with stricter gun control laws tend to have lower levels of gun violence. They save lives, and the correlation is substantial, according to a 2011 analysis by economist Richard Florida.

And even though New Jersey is stricter than most, it has a long way to go. A dangerous person here can still buy a gun in a private sale with no background check, and order huge stockpiles of ammunition online. He can buy large magazines of 15 rounds, as well as bullets that rip through police body armor and a .50 caliber sniper rifle that can hit an airplane.

New Jersey is also a laggard when it comes to providing the federal government with information on ballistics that it needs to solve crimes, or on the thousands of potentially dangerous people who are banned from buying guns under existing law.

The package of bills in the Assembly would change all that. They would ban armor-piercing bullets and most long-range .50 caliber rifles, while reducing the legal size of magazines to 10. They would require purchases of ammunition to be made in person to help prevent illegal sales. They would require gun buyers to show proof of training in firearm safety, and stiffen penalties for those who fail to report when a gun is lost or stolen.

And in cases where mentally ill people are deemed by professionals to be an imminent danger to themselves or others — the standard for involuntary commitment — police could seize weapons from the home.

A few of the bills are flawed. One would allow municipalities to establish weapons-free zones around schools and public facilities, an approach that failed miserably in the war on drugs. In most cities, that covers nearly all territory, so the effect is establishing tougher penalties in the cities than in the suburbs for the same exact crime. In the case of drugs, the tougher penalties landed almost exclusively on African-Americans and Latinos.

Another bill exempts firearms records from the state’s open public records law. This sounds like a knee-jerk reaction to backlash against the Journal News, which published the names and addresses of gun owners in several New York counties. But ask yourself this: If your child is offered a baby-sitting job, wouldn’t it be nice to know if the home­owner has a gun so you can ask if it’s under lock and key? What if you know a local teen has a serious drug problem and there are guns in the house?

On the whole, though, this package has great merit and would save lives. The pity is that the federal government has proved to be so unable to embrace sane policies on guns. That leaves us vulnerable, no matter what we do, because guns can be imported from other states with lax laws and sold on the streets of Newark.

President Obama is trying his best to break the grip of the National Rifle Association in Washington. Here in New Jersey, where public support for tough laws is solid, we are in position to lead the way. The Assembly package is an excellent start.