Since a national act banning assault weapons expired Sept. 13, activists on national, local and campus levels have debated its impact on the future of gun violence.
Since a national act banning assault weapons expired Sept. 13, activists on national, local and campus levels have debated its impact on the future of gun violence.
The Federal Assault Weapons Act of 1994, part of crime legislation from former President Bill Clinton’s administration, prohibited the manufacture and distribution of 19 varieties of assault weapons and expired this month. Recent polls demonstrated widespread support for the ban—even among gun owners.
About 68 percent of Americans and even 32 percent of National Rifle Association members advocate the ban’s renewal, according to two studies released this month by the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania. North Carolina’s local governments have expressed general support for the ban as well.
David Jones, director of the North Carolina Governor’s Crime Commission, said nothing negative has been said “among commission members or anyone in our circles” about the ban. “By and large, they would be in favor of its continuation,” he noted.
In Durham, activist groups such as the Religious Coalition for a Nonviolent Durham, are adamant in their approval of the ban.
“We have increased the risk factor for this community,” RCND director Marcia Owen said. “The availability and accessibility [of assault weapons] has increased the risk to public health.”
Despite the ban’s broad support, gun activists are quick to counter that the legislation dealt more with aesthetic issues than function. Sharyn Duke, owner of Armory Arms Inc. in Durham, explained that even prior to the expiration, she carried similar weapons in her store. “You could still get the guns,” she said, noting loopholes in the law. She added that she had seen no increase in sales of such weapons at her store in recent weeks. The ban, Duke argued, had essentially no effect.
Anti-gun activists said gang violence is one issue that the ban’s expiration has the potential to affect. “In certain areas of the state, there seems to be a growing number of gangs,” Jones said. In the future, he said, the Crime Commission and the N.C. Gang Investigator’s Association will monitor violence in relation to assault weapons.
Owen said Durham is an area in which gang violence is present, and that “criminals will use assault weapons to defend turf.”
“It doesn’t take a lot of intelligence to recognize that [gun violence] is the problem of weapons that are designed and produced and marketed to inflict bodily trauma,” Owen said. “It is the presence of guns that really have an enormous risk to our culture, to our society.” The low homicide rate in certain European countries, Owen added, shows a direct correlation to very strict gun laws in those nations.
Opponents of the ban said it does not target the roots of gun violence. “People who commit crime prefer something easy to conceal, like handguns,” said Wayne Paschall, owner of The Country Store in Durham, which used to carry guns but no longer does. “In cases that involve extreme shooting, like Columbine, it has been handguns.”
The cumbersome nature of assault weapons, he explained, makes them less applicable to many crime situations. Paschall also noted that in the Durham community in particular, drugs often lie behind gun violence, and the government should work to handle this problem first.
On campus, an organization has already emerged to publicize the issue. Within the Humanitarian Challenges FOCUS program, students developed People Against Assault Weapons. The students said they were unaware of the issue until just a week before the expiration date and they wanted to spread the word to other Duke students. Members of PAAW coordinated events around campus that allowed interested students to put their handprints in paint to support the ban’s continuation.
In addition, postcard petitions were available, addressed with detailed messages to Duke alumna Sen. Elizabeth Dole, R-N.C.
“When she ran for Senate, she pledged to make a difference in gun violence,” said PAAW member Megan Moskop, a freshman. “And she really hasn’t done anything with that so far.”
The postcards aimed to remind Dole of her history with Duke and urged her to support the continuation of the ban. “I would support a much stronger version of the ban,” said Moskop, “although the renewal of the ban would be better than nothing.”
Despite his vocal support of the act in the 2000 election, President George W. Bush has not pushed for its continuation as the original legislation encouraged. Because the ban was a federal law, many local officials noted that nothing more can be done than observe effects in the coming months.
“I can’t predict what’s going to happen,” said Owen, who fears the ban’s expiration will lead to increased violence. “Maybe nothing will happen, and that would be fantastic.”
Get The Chronicle straight to your inbox
Signup for our weekly newsletter. Cancel at any time.