From: [k--ar--s] at [cc.memphis.edu] Newsgroups: talk.politics.guns Subject: James Wright testimony 3/31/95 ***FINAL*** Date: 4 Apr 95 03:37:24 -0500 This posting corrects an unintentional omission on my part in section #3, dealing with the 40% of handgun owners who cite self-protection as their reason for owning a gun. I have also corrected some spelling errors. Please update your archives accordingly, as this is my final version. -KB --- Statement of James Wright, criminologist, Tulane University before the Subcommittee on Crime of the Committee on the Judiciary, United States House of Representatives, March 31, 1995: Dr. WRIGHT: Thank you so much, and thank you for the opportunity to be here. My name is James Wright... and I'm a professor of sociology at Tulane University. I've spent the last twenty years of my academic career conducting research on guns and violence in American society. In the course of these two decades, I have come to the conclusion that there are at least ten simple, but terribly important facts about guns in America that every participant in the gun control debate should be aware of. I have referred to these in a recent paper as "Ten Essential Observations on Guns in America," and my point is to share them with the Committee _today._ While many of the facts of the gun control issue are hotly contested, and matters of great dispute, the ten fundamental truths that I wish to discuss are matters about which everyone more or less agrees. [1. HALF THE HOUSEHOLDS IN THE UNITED STATES POSSESS AT LEAST ONE GUN.] My first essential observation is that half the households in the country possess at least _one_ gun. So far as I can tell, the first question about gun ownership in a national probability sample of U.S. adults was asked in 1959, and similar questions have been asked dozens of times since. Over the last 35 years or so that we've been asking the question, every survey has reported more or less the same result, namely, that half of _all_ U.S. households own one or more guns. Although many people know this to be true, I think many of the implications of this fact are not well appreciated. The fact that the ownership percentage has been effectively constant for nearly four decades, for example, while at the same time the total number of guns in circulation has increased rather substantially, implies that the increasing supply of guns has been absorbed largely by the purchase of additional guns among households already owning more... one or more of them. Indeed there is fairly substantial and independent evidence that the average number of guns owned by persons owning _any_ has increased from about three guns 15 years ago to approximately four guns today. I think it is also obvious that from the viewpoint of public safety, the transition from N to_N + 1_ guns is considerably less ominous than the transition from no guns to_one_gun. If this first implication is correct, incidentally, it means that most of the people in the gun shops today buying new firearms already_own_guns --a useful point to keep in mind when pondering the alleged "cooling off" function to be served by waiting periods imposed at the point of retail sale. A second implication is that gun ownership is not deviant behavior, but rather, normative behavior across vast swaths of the social landscape. There are areas of the country where it would be an odd person indeed who did_not_own a gun. Finally, when we attempt to control crime or violence by controlling the general ownership and use of guns among the public at large, we are attempting to control the behaviors of a very small fraction of the population, the violent or criminally-inclined fraction, by controlling the behaviors and activities of roughly half the American population, and whatever else might be said about such an approach, it is certainly not very_efficient._ [2. THERE ARE AT LEAST 200,000,000 FIREARMS IN CIRCULATION IN THE UNITED STATES TODAY.] [The] second essential observation on guns in America today is that there are already something like 200,000,000 firearms in circulation, give or take a few tens of millions, to be sure. It has been said, I believe correctly, that firearms are the most commonly owned pieces of sporting equipment in the United States, with the exception of pairs of sneakers and running shoes. It is not entirely clear just how many acts of gun_violence_occur in the United States in any typical year. In recent years, we've been pushing 40,000_deaths_from firearm[s]. There are, in addition to that, perhaps a few hundred thousand non-fatal, but injurious, firearms accidents, conceivably 500 or 600,000 chargeable firearms crimes committed every year, and God-knows-how-many instances where guns are used to intimidate or to prey upon one's fellow human beings. Making very generous allowances all around, however, the total number of acts of accidental and intentional gun violence, whether fatal or not, whether injurious or not, cannot possibly be more than a couple of million per annum at the absolute_outside._ This implies, moreover, that the 200,000,000 firearms now circulating in the U.S. market would be sufficient to sustain gun violence at the current rate for at least another century, this even assuming that every gun was used once and only once for some nefarious purpose, and that all additions to the supply were halted _permanently_and _at_once._ Because of the immensely large number of firearms already circulating in the U.S. market, the violence- reductive effects even of fairly draconian gun control measures might very well not be felt for many decades. [3. MOST GUNS ARE OWNED FOR SPORTING AND RECREATIONAL REASONS] A third observation is that most of the 200,000,000 guns that are out there are owned for what I would consider to be socially innocuous sport and recreational_reasons._ About a_third_of the guns presently in circulation are_handguns,_the remainder rifles and shotguns. When one asks gun owners_why_they own guns, various sport and recreational activities dominate the responses: hunting, target shooting, collecting, and the like. Even when the question is restricted just to handgun owners, about 40% will say they own the gun for recreational applications, another 40% will say they own it for self-protection, and the remaining 20% will cite some job-related reason as the reason for them to own a gun. Thus, in the majority, I believe gun ownership is a topic more appropriate to the sociology of_leisure_than to the criminology or epidemiology of violence. Unfortunately, when we seek to control violence by controlling the general ownership and use of firearms among the public at large, it at least looks as though we think we have intuited some direct causal connection between drive-by shootings in the inner city and squirrel hunting or skeet shooting in the hinterland. Or such, in any case, is the implication that the nation's squirrel hunters and skeet shooters often draw, and frankly, it's no wonder they sometimes question the_motives,_ not to mention the_sanity,_of anybody who would suggest such a preposterous thing[]. [4. MANY FIREARMS ARE OWNED FOR DEFENSE AGAINST CRIME] My fourth observation is that many firearms are also owned for self-defense_against_crime, that some are indeed used for that purpose, and, whether they are_actually_any safer or_not,_many people certainly seem to_feel_safer when they have a gun. Findings have been mentioned this morning from recent work done by my colleague Gary Kleck at Florida State [University] that Americans use guns to protect themselves from crime as often as a couple of million times a year, a finding that I know [the other panelist] Dr. Bordua will discuss in more detail. If this is_true,_it's very hard to square with the common assumption of gun control advocates that guns are not_efficacious_as a private defense against crime. Whatever the true number of self-defensive uses proves to be, about a quarter of all gun owners, and about 40% of handgun owners mention defense against crime as the main reason they owned a gun, and large percentages who give some other main reason will mention self-defense as a secondary reason. Gun owners and gun advocates insist that guns provide real protection, as indeed the panel that preceded us testified, and indeed as Gary Kleck's findings suggest. Anti-gun advocates insist that the sense of security is more_illusory_than _real._ But the fact [is,] practically everything people do to defend against crime provides only the_illusion_of security, in that any such measure can be defeated by a sufficiently clever and motivated criminal. Most people have realized, no doubt correctly, that the police cannot protect them from crime. So people face the need to protect themselves, and many choose to own a gun along with taking many other measures for precisely this purpose. My question is whether a society that is manifestly incapable of protecting its citizens from crime really has any right or moral authority to tell people what they_may_or may_not_do to protect_themselves._ [5. BAD GUYS DO NOT OBTAIN THEIR GUNS THROUGH LEGAL CHANNELS] My fifth observation is that the bad guys do not obtain their guns through normal retail channels. Research on both adult and juvenile felons and offenders has made it obvious that the_illegal_ firearms market is dominated overwhelmingly by informal swaps, trades, and purchases involving family members, friends, acquaintances, drug dealers, street and black market sources of various sorts. It is a pretty rare criminal_indeed_who attempts to acquire a gun through a conventional over-the-counter transaction with a normal retail outlet. Now, many efforts at gun control pertain to the initial retail sale of weapons, for example, the prohibition against gun purchases by people with felony records, or by [people with] alcohol and drug [abuse] histories, or the national five-day waiting period in the Brady Bill, or various state and local permit and registration laws. Since felons rarely obtain guns through customary retail channels, these kinds of controls imposed at the point of retail sale must neccessarily_miss_the vast majority of criminal firearms transactions. Having learned now well more than a decade ago, incidentally, that the criminal acquisition of guns involves these informal and hard-to-regulate transfers, average gun owners often conclude, whether correctly or not, that such measures as registration, permits, waiting periods, and so on and so forth, must therefore be intended primarily to keep tabs on_them,_that registration or permit requirements are just the first step towards _outright_confiscation of all privately held firearms, for example, or that mandated registration of new gun purchases is an unwarranted police-state intrusion on the Constitutional rights of law-abiding citizens. [It] doesn't really matter whether they're_correct_in this judgement or not, that they reason in this vein, I think, is sufficient. It is reasoning in precisely this vein that often seems bizarre, or even_psychotic,_to proponents of these kinds of measures, but it is exactly the style of reasoning, I think, that raises the stakes in the debate over guns and that accounts for the white-hot ferocity of that debate today. [6. THE BAD GUYS INHABIT A VIOLENT WORLD AND CARRY GUNS FOR SURVIVAL] My sixth observation is that the bad guys inhabit a violent world. As such, a gun often spells a life or death difference to_them._ If you ask felons, whether adult or juvenile, why_they_ own guns, why they carry guns, themes of self protection, self- defense,_survival,_and so on, dominate their responses. Very few of the bad guys say they acquire or carry guns specifically for _offensive_or crime-committing purposes, although that is_obviously_ how many of them get used. These men live in an extraordinarily hostile environment. Many of them come to believe, no doubt correctly, that their ability to survive in that environment depends critically on being adequately armed. "Adequately armed," in this case, means being better armed than your most likely adversary, namely the police. If sheer survival is indeed the issue, then a gun is a bargain at practically any_price._ As James Q. Wilson has recently argued, the largest share of the gun violence problem results from the wrong people carrying guns at the wrong time and place. The survival motive among the bad guys means_exactly_that the wrong kinds of people will be carrying guns pretty much_all_the_time._ The evident implication is that the bad guys have to be disarmed_on_the_streets_if rates of gun violence are to decline, and that, I think, implies a range of interventions far removed from what gun control advocates have recently urged on the American population. [7. EVERYTHING THE BAD GUYS DO WITH GUNS IS ALREADY ILLEGAL] My seventh observation is that everything the bad guys do with their guns is already_against_the law. That criminals will generally be indifferent to the law would seem to follow from the definition of the terms, but it's a lesson that we've had to learn time and again throughout our history. As a matter of fact, and as has already been stated by the panel this morning, gun acquisition by felons, whether from retail or private sources, for_whatever_ reason, is already_illegal._ Yet obviously felons still acquire guns. Since practically everything the bad guys do with their guns, or do to obtain their guns is already_against_the law, one is entitled to wonder whether there is some_new_law that we haven't yet thought up that we can somehow pass that will persuade them to _stop_it. [8. DEMAND FOR GUNS CREATES ITS OWN SUPPLY] My eighth observation, [is] a theoretical observation from my colleagues in the Department of Economics. Demand creates its own supply. This is sometimes called the First Law of Microeconomics, and it_clearly_holds whether the commodity in demand is_legal_or _illegal._ So long as a demand for some product exists, then there will be profit to be made in satisfying that demand, and therefore the [demand for that] product_will_be satisfied. That is only a fancy way of saying that as long as people wish to own guns, be they criminals or average Joes, then guns will be there for them to_own._ I think it relevant that, for example, Brazil, manufactures small arms. Brazil makes actually pretty inexpensive, but relatively_decent_small arms. I think in fundamental respects the question whether we can disarm the American criminal population amounts to asking whether an organized criminal enterprise that successfully imports hundreds of tons of Colombian cocaine into the U.S. market every year would not find the means to illegally import hundreds of tons of handguns from Brazil, if there were some reason to do so, or some profit to be made in so doing. And, if you agree with me that this proposition is more or less _self-evidently_true, then you will conclude that we will_never_ reduce the supply of firearms to the criminal population by enough to make an appreciable difference. [9. GUNS ARE NOT INHERENTLY GOOD OR INHERENTLY EVIL] My ninth observation is that_per_se_guns are neither inherently good nor inherently_evil._ Guns, that is, do not possess their own teleology. Benevolence and malevolence are things that inhere in the motives and behavior of_people,_not in the technology they possess. All guns, are nothing more, nothing less, than a chunk of machined metal that has a variety of purposes to which it can be put, all involving a small projectile hurtling at high velocity downrange, to lodge itself in a target. We can only say that guns are good when the target strikes us as an appropriate one, and evil when not. The gun itself is immaterial to this moral judgement. Singling out certain_types_of guns for specific policy attention, 'assault weapons' these days, "Saturday Nite Special" handguns in an earlier area... earlier_era,_is almost always justified on the grounds that the type of gun in question "has no legitimate use" or "is designed only to kill." By definition, however,_all_guns are_designed to kill,_which is to say, designed to hurtle a projectile downrange to lodge in a target. And if one grants the proposition, which, I admit is an arguable proposition, that self- defense against predation and plunder is a legitimate reason to_own_a gun, then all guns, regardless of their type, regardless of their characteristics, regardless of their firepower, regardless of their_quality,_ _all_guns, _regardless,_have some potentially _legitimate_application. It seems to me, therefore, that the focus... the frequent focus, in gun control circles on certain "bad guns," is fundamentally misplaced-- the idea that there are good ones and bad ones and that we want to get rid of the bad ones. When all is said and done, it is the behavior of people, I think, that we evidently need to control. [10. GUNS ARE PART OF THE AMERICAN CULTURE] And then, finally, my tenth observation is that guns are important elements of our history and our culture. Attempts to control crime by regulating the ownership or use of firearms are attempts to regulate the artifacts and activities of a culture that in its_own_way is as_unique_as any of the other myriad cultures that comprise the American ethnic mosaic. This is what is referred to as the American gun culture, about which many have written, and, I believe it remains among the_least_understood_of any of the various subcultural strands that make up modern society. The existence and characteristics of the American gun culture also have implications that are rarely appreciated. For one, gun control deals with matters that people feel_strongly_about, that are part of their background, and their heritage, and their upbringing ...and their_worldview._ Advocates for gun control are frequently taken aback by the_stridency_with which their seemingly modest and sensible proposals are attacked. But from the gun culture's point of view, restrictions on the right to keep and bear arms amount to the systematic destruction of a valued way of life, and are, in that sense, a form of cultural genocide. Scholars, and criminologists, and legislators, who speculate on the problem of guns and crime and violence would, I think, profit to look at things, at least occasionally, from the gun culture's point of view. There are about 50,000,000 U.S. families who own firearms, and hardly_any_of these families have ever harmed_anyone_with their guns, and virtually none ever_intend_to. Nearly_everything_these families will ever_do_with their guns is both_legal,_and largely innocuous. So when we advocate restrictions on their_rights_to own guns, as a means to fighting crime, we are casting aspersions on _their_decency, as though we somehow hold_them_responsible for the crime and violence that plague the nation. Is it any wonder they object often loudly and vociferously to such slander? And, thank you so much for your attention. Dr. Bordua... --END-- -- **x*dna Ken Barnes, LifeSci Bldg. | ,="=, | NRA *(==) * The University Of Memphis | n/ {( (^\_. | JPFO * \' * Memphis, TN | "==" | GOP! *(=)*** [k--ar--s] at [cc.memphis.edu____]| Don't Tread On Me | U-U "The people never give up their liberties but under some delusion." --Edmund Burke, speech in Buckinghamshire, 1784