Control of handgun and automatic rifle sales has created fierce political and public debate.
Congress passed the National Firearms Act on June 26, 1934, during President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s administration. The law arose as a response to the increasing rates of mob violence, which began in the 1920s and reached a
Peak in the early 1930s. Rates of violent overall CRIME had fallen to all-time lows during the 1950s and early 1960s but jumped 25 percent between 1964 and 1967. The assassinations of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., on April 4, 1968, and Senator Robert F. Kennedy a month later on June 5 prompted a widespread public reaction, and in response, Congress enacted the Gun Control Act of 1968. The act banned interstate sales of firearms and required the licensing of most firearm dealers. It also barred felons, fugitives, minors, and the mentally ill from purchasing or owning firearms. In 1980 the U. S. Supreme Court upheld the 1968 law in Lewis v. United States, concluding that Congress could keep firearms away from “persons classified as potentially irresponsible and dangerous.”
The push for the enactment of systematic gun control legislation arose in the 1970s and became especially strong in the 1980s. On March 30, 1981, John Hinckley tried to assassinate President Ronald W. Reagan but succeeded only in wounding the president and paralyzing press secretary James Brady. After his recovery, Brady and his wife, Sarah, became vocal advocates for more stringent regulations on private firearms and formed Handgun Control, Inc. They helped rally numerous other state and local groups into a larger gun control lobby and drew the attention of the national news media and many film and television celebrities. By the mid-1980s the issue of gun control polarized into two ideological positions: gun control versus gun rights.
Advocates of gun control contend that the need for public order requires close regulation of private access to firearms. Few activists seek total abolition of all firearms, nor has there been a call among activists for the repeal of the Second Amendment. Instead, most advocates seek federal legislation that would limit private access to only specific types of firearms, to be used only under specific conditions, and to be made available only to specific classes of people. Proponents of gun control argue that, with regulation of gun sales, handgun violence would decrease in the United States, and regulation would prevent access to guns through legal means for irresponsible and dangerous persons. Often, gun control activists make an analogy that just as driver’s licenses are regulated, so too should guns be regulated.
In contrast, gun rights advocates argue that gun control legislation violates the Second Amendment, which specifically forbids infringement by the federal government of the people’s right to “keep and bear arms.” Gun rights advocates further argue that federal gun control legislation violates the Tenth Amendment, which forbids unnecessary intrusion of the federal government into the affairs of the states. Lastly, gun rights advocates argue that gun control legislation unduly interferes with noncriminal pursuits, such as hunting and competition shooting.
News coverage of firearm-related homicides and “drive-by” shootings in urban neighborhoods forced the issue into the forefront of public debate, making Handgun Control, Inc., the most vocal and popular advocate for gun control, and the National Rifle Association (nRa) the most well-known champion of gun rights. Though both sides cited national and international statistics, the correlation between gun ownership and crime is too tenuous for either side to claim empirical support.
During the 1980s, many efforts at gun control were aimed at state legislatures. President William J. Clinton, however, created an environment favorable to federal gun control and signed the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act in November 1993, which was the first significant federal gun control law since 1968. It required a five-day waiting period and a background check on all persons seeking to purchase a handgun. Four years later, in Printz v. United States (1997), the Supreme Court struck down the provision requiring a mandatory background check as a violation of the Tenth Amendment, but upheld the provision requiring a five-day waiting period since it applied only to store owners and not state governments. Printz had no effect on the 27 states with gun control laws.
In 1994 Congress passed the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, which, among other things made illegal the manufacture, sale, and importation of 19 different types of semiautomatic assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines (holding 10 or more rounds). Several gun retailers tried to challenge the law in federal courts, but their cases were dismissed before reaching the Supreme Court. The following year, in United States v. Lopez (1995), the Supreme Court concluded that an earlier statute, Gun Free School Zones Act of 1990, was unconstitutional because the “zones” inevitably affect all classes of citizens who might live nearby. The courts have indicated tolerance for specific gun control legislation aimed at eliminating specific dangers to society, but have otherwise opposed general measures that limit access to firearms as a social good by itself.
In the late 1990s a series of school shootings again prompted a renewed effort to pass more stringent gun control legislation, including the Children’s Gun Violence Prevention Act of 1998, which requires child-resistant safety devices on all new guns sold after 2002. The city of New Orleans became the first city to sue gun manufacturers, charging them with gross negligence for not including safety systems on all weapons. Chicago filed a similar suit, arguing that gun manufacturers contributed to illegal gun trafficking in the city. In addition, 17 other cities and counties filed similar suits. Later, nongovernment groups filed suits, including the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (naacp) and the parents of the students killed during the shooting at Col-
Columbine High School teacher Patty Nielson speaks at a Senate Policy Committee hearing on gun safety legislation, Washington, D. C. (Smith/Newsmakers)
Umbine High School on April 28, 1999, in Littleton, Colorado. In March 2000 gun manufacturers Smith and Wesson settled their suits out of court by agreeing to include safety locks on all firearms and to dedicate 2 percent of their profits toward the research and development of “smart” technology that would make it difficult for anyone but the owner to fire a handgun. The settlement angered many gun rights advocates and was not imitated by other manufacturers. On June 25, 2008, the U. S. Supreme Court in a 5-4 ruling overturned the District of Columbia’s 32-year-old ban on handguns as incompatible with the Second Amendment right. Justice Antonin Scalia, writing for the majority, declared that the right to own handguns was part of the “historical narrative” of the Second Amendment right to own arms, and as a result the Constitution does not permit the “absolute prohibition of handguns held and used for self-defense in the home.” The Court also struck down the District’s requirement that firearms be equipped with trigger locks or kept dissembled.
Joining the majority opinion were Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Samuel Alito, Anthony Kennedy and Clarence Thomas. Dissent was offered by Justice John Paul Stevens, who held that elected officials had the right to regulate the civilian use of weapons. A separate dissenting opinion was written by Justice Stephen Breyer. Other dissenters were Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and David Souter.
See also conservative movement; federalism; militia movement; property rights.
Further reading: Ted Gottfried, Gun Control: Public Safety and the Right to Bear Arms (Brookfield, Conn.: Millbrook Press, 1993); William J. Vizzard, Shots in the Dark: The Policy, Politics, and Symbolism of Gun Control (Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield, Inc., 2000).
—Aharon W. Zorea
Habib, Philip C. (1920-1992) diplomat Philip Charles Habib was a career diplomat of Lebanese descent who served in various positions in the government for nearly four decades. From 1968 to 1971 he served as a U. S. delegate to the Vietnam War negotiations in Paris. In 1969 he was named the acting head of the U. S. delegation because of his advanced skill and flexibility in the negotiations. Following the Vietnam War, Habib served as the U. S. ambassador to the Republic of Korea from 1971 to 1974 and then as assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs from 1974 to 1976. After those years abroad, he served as the under secretary of state for political affairs from 1976-78. During this time, he was instrumental in arranging the meetings that led to the Camp David Egyp-tian-Israeli peace accords in 1978.
He retired from government work in 1978 due to health reasons, but returned at the request of President Ronald W. Reagan in the early 1980s. Habib served as President Reagan’s personal representative to the Middle East from 1981-83, where he helped arrange a temporary cease-fire in the Lebanese civil war as well as a withdrawal of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) from that country. In 1986 Habib served as a special presidential envoy to the Philippines, where he helped convince President Ferdinand E. Marcos to go into exile. Following his work in the Philippines, Habib once again retired from government service. He spent his last years working as a senior research fellow at the Hoover Institute at Stanford University. Philip Habib died on May 25, 1992, while on vacation in France.
See also Camp David accords; foreign policy.
—Leah Blakey
Haig, Alexander M., Jr. (1924- ) American statesman and general
Born December 2, 1924, Alexander Meigs Haig grew up in Bala-Cynwyd, Pennsylvania, a suburb of Philadelphia.
In 1943 Haig attended the University of Notre Dame and in 1944 he received an appointment to the United States Military Academy. After graduating in 1947, Haig was assigned to General Douglas MacArthur’s staff during the occupation of Japan. He went on to serve in Korea and Vietnam before returning to the United States, and serving as deputy commandant at West Point.
In 1969 Haig was appointed military aide to National Security Advisor, Henry A. Kissinger. During this time, Haig cultivated a relationship with H. R. Haldeman, President Richard M. Nixon’s chief of staff. In 1970 Haig became Haldeman’s deputy, a position he held until 1973, when he replaced Haldeman because of the Watergate scandal. When Gerald R. Ford became president, he appointed Haig as Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR), the commander of North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) forces. While in Europe, Haig developed strong relationships with many European leaders. Also, Haig increased the combat effectiveness of NATO forces by staging maneuvers and war games with troops transported from the United States.
Haig resigned as SACEUR in 1979 over what he perceived as the weak and inconsistent foreign policy of the Carter administration. These criticisms caught the attention of Ronald W. Reagan, and Haig was invited to brief Reagan on Europe and military affairs. Haig’s briefing led to his being named secretary of state in 1981. Haig proposed that an interagency group chaired by State Department officials should coordinate the foreign policy process.
Haig’s push for control led to confrontations with Reagan’s staff, when his critics accused him of being power hungry and, perhaps, dangerous. In order to blunt his advances, James Baker, Richard Allen, and Edwin C. Meese III limited Haig’s role in the administration’s crisis management team. Vice president George H. W. Bush was appointed to head the team. This split within the administration was revealed to the public on March 30, 1981, after the attempted assassination of President Reagan. Haig’s comments during a press conference that he was “in charge” until Vice President Bush arrived struck many critics as high-handed and a revelation of Haig’s ambition for power.
Haig’s policy stances also generated friction. A strong supporter of NATO, he opposed sanctions against the Soviet Union after martial law was imposed in Poland in 1981. The Europeans feared sanctions would interfere with the natural gas pipeline being built from Siberia to Western Europe. Also, Haig was viewed as pro-British during the Falkland Islands war. The administration feared that his stance would imperil U. S. efforts to develop an anticommunist front among the Latin American governments. Finally, Haig strongly supported Israel during its invasion of Lebanon, an action deemed highly destabilizing and reckless.
His foreign policy disagreements contributed to his resignation on June 25, 1982. Haig ran unsuccessfully for the 1988 Republican presidential nomination but pulled out due to lack of support. Since then, Haig has been active in various business enterprises, is president and became chairman of the board of Worldwide Associates, and is a trustee of the Hudson Institute.
—John Korasick
World History
