Controlling Firearms Sale

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31129, 4 August 1966, Page 15

Controlling Firearms Sale

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter —Copyright) WASHINGTON, August 2. The Austin sniper’s rampage of death is expected to rally support for Congressmen seeking legislation to control the sale and possession of firearms in the United States. According to a recent estimate, three-quarters of a million people have been killed by firearms in the United States since the turn of the century. Yet only one State —New York—has strict laws regulating the sale and possession of firearms. In many other states, a gun

can be bought as easily as groceries. According to the police, the sniper who shot 15 people in Austin bought a high-powered rifle on credit in a departmental store. The biggest stumbling block to regulation of arms is in

the American Constitution, which states in Article two: “A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.” Sporting associations and firms which make firearms also have a powerful antiregulation lobby in Washington.

Senator Thomas Dodd, a leading supporter of firearms control, commented today: “The Austin incident is an extreme example of what has been going on for much too long in this country. Rifles are used to murder and wound tens of thousands of people annually. “I hope these shootings in Austin will cause those who have fought controls over the sale of rifles to any criminal or deranged person to have second thoughts.” Senator Dodd is chairman of the Senate Juvenile Delin-

quency Subcommittee which recently approved an Administration bill to control mailorder and over-the-counter sales of firearms.

A powerful group is expected to seek to exempt rifles from the bill’s scope. In its present form the bill would ban the inter-state mail order of concealable firearms —such as pistols and revolvers—to individuals; regulate the inter-state sale of sporting rifles and shotguns; restrict the import into the Unied States of military surplus firearms and certain other foreign-made firearms; bar the sale of pistols and revolvers to persons under 21; bar the sale of rifles and shotguns to persons under 18; ban the over-the-counter sale of concealable firearms to persons who' axe not resident of the state where they are sold; and place special regulations over the acquisition of destructive devices.