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Abstract
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Amid a high murder rate, a spate of horrifying mass shootings, and calls for gun control, conservatives often suggest better enforcement of the gun laws we already have. Such efforts would not lower America's homicide rate (nearly 7 per 100,000 in 2021) to Japan's (about 0.25), but they could reduce our rate of violence considerably.
At every stage of the law-enforcement process, from gun-store inspections to the prosecution of those caught misusing firearms, there are opportunities for improvement. And such efforts could be fertile grounds for bipartisan compromise, as they would involve a mix of gun control--including support for some lower-profile efforts by the Biden administration--and criminal control.
American civilians' guns generally begin their lives as retail products at federally licensed gun dealers, which are required to conduct background checks on buyers. The overwhelming majority of both dealers and buyers are legitimate, but naturally there are exceptions. Sometimes dealers lose track of their inventory, fail to conduct background checks, or knowingly sell guns to people who plan to turn them over to criminals.
Licensed dealers must submit to unannounced inspections of their inventory and records by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), to ensure that all the guns are properly accounted for. If these inspections uncover "willful" violations of the federal Gun Control Act--meaning intentional disregard of or plain indifference to one's legal duties--a dealer can lose his license. Lesser violations are handled through warnings of varying severity to ensure future compliance.
The ATF has a goal of inspecting gun stores every three years, but it doesn't get close to meeting it: There are more than 75,000 "licensed business entities" making or selling weaponry (not counting federal firearm licensees who merely collect curios and relics, with whom the total number rises to about 130,000), but the ATF has done only about 10,000 inspections a year this past decade, and the number has been lower since the pandemic. A recent audit by the Justice Department's Office of Inspector General found that more than 2,000 licensees hadn't been inspected in ten years...
Language: en |