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April 19, 2007 at 09:35:46

Wild West Era Had Stricter Gun Control Than America Has Today

by Marc McDonald     Page 2 of 2 page(s)

www.opednews.com

 
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However, if you take a close look at the specific issues that drives the NRA ballistic these days, you realize just how weak gun control laws are in this country.

Take, for example, the NRA's furious, ongoing opposition to the Brady Bill. This modest legislation does nothing more than simply require a check on the backgrounds of gun buyers for criminal activity. And thanks to the NRA, the law is filled with enough loopholes to drive a truck through (such as the gun show loophole).

It's hard to imagine any sane person opposing the Brady Bill. But the NRA took up the case and raised such a hysterical fuss that one might have guessed that the law called for nothing less than the repeal of the Second Amendment.

Despite what the NRA would have us believe, controls on guns in America have actually weakened over the past quarter century. For example, when George W. Bush was Texas governor, he signed a "concealed-carry law" at the NRA's bidding. When he did so, Texas joined 22 other states that since 1986 had made it legal to carry concealed weapons. Today, some 48 states allow some form of concealed carry.

Bush also signed a bill denying Texas cities the ability to sue gun manufacturers (so much for his lip service to the idea that local entities ought to be able to conduct their affairs without meddling interference from state government).

And speaking of gun control ordinances, as Wikipedia points out, the O.K. Corral shootout itself was sparked by Virgil Earp's efforts to "enforce Tombstone's law prohibiting the carrying of deadly weapons."

The fact is, the Old West was downright safe, compared to today's blood-soaked streets in America. For one thing, no one in the Old West ever had to face down a lethal killing instrument like a modern-day Glock semi-automatic pistol. Firearms in the Old West were downright crude and tame, compared to a Glock.

If even a Wild West town like Tombstone could have strict gun control ordinances, why can't we do the same as a nation today?

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The creator of the progressive site, BeggarsCanBeChoosers.com, Marc McDonald is an award-winning journalist who worked for 15 years for several Texas newspapers, including the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, before he quit his day job and set up shop in cyberspace in 1995. McDonald's articles have appeared in a number of popular progressive Web sites, including OpEdNews.com, BuzzFlash.com, Crooks and Liars, Salon.com, Progressive Daily Beacon, The Neil Rogers Show and The Raw Story. McDonald's Web articles have also been featured and reviewed by various national and international media, including CNN Headline News, the BBC, the Washington Post, USA Today and many more.

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Books:Wyatt Earp: The Life Behind the Legend (Wiley, 1997)co-author Mental Toughness: Baseball's Winning Edge (Ivan R. Dee, 2006)Former reporter, San Francisco Examiner and other California newspapers 
Casey TefertillerBooks:Wyatt Earp: The Life Behind the Legend (Wiley, 1997)co-author Mental Toughness: Baseball's Winning Edge (Ivan R. Dee, 2006)Former reporter, San Francisco Examiner and other California newspapers 

A clarification

I just wanted to clarify the concept of “gun control” in the frontier West. In Tombstone and other towns that I have researched, the gun ordinances were used as what were called “discretionary laws.” This means the laws would be enforced at the discretion of the officer.


In the past, law officers enjoyed much more discretion in how they performed their jobs. Laws against loitering and vagrancy were used by officers to identify potential threats and remove them from the community. The problem, of course, was that the laws were not always enforced fairly. For example, loitering could be used to prohibit the First Amendment right of assembly. In some areas, these laws were unfairly enforced against minorities. After WWII, the discretionary laws were struck down. While the abuses to these laws were clear, it has had the impact of not allowing officers to remove potential law breakers.


In the weeks before the Tombstone gunfight, the “Tombstone Nugget,” a local newspaper, railed for greater enforcement of the gun laws, complaining they were not being enforced stringently. The problem was that folks could carry guns when they were entering or leaving town, or when they were on their way to a hotel or saloon, where the guns could be checked. This makes the law almost unenforcible since just about anyone could claim they were about to check their guns or leave town.


Many towns did enact gun ordinances, including Dodge City, where drovers had their fun by shooting up the town after a long night of drinking. However, I have never found records of a town where the gun ordinances were stringently enforced in such a way that the officers were wandering the streets, plucking weapons at will. Rather, the laws allowed the officers to identify potential threats and use the gun ordinances to disarm or arrest them before trouble ensued.


The movie “The Unforgiven” creates a different sort of Western myth in contrast to the other myths cited by writer MacDonald. There was an intense belief in the value of life, and very few Westerners could take a life easily and without regret. MacDonald is correct in his assessment that the West was not as wild and rowdy as what we often see in our modern society. However, one reason is that any mass murder attempt would have been stopped quickly because of the quick availability of weapons. It was a time when even society ladies were prone to pulling a small pistol from their pocketbooks if danger arose. If a killer attempted a wild massacre, he would likely face a dozen gun barrels before he could get far in his quest.


One other caution would be that the use of Wikipedia is always hazardous. There are much better sources for real history.

 Casey Tefertiller

by Casey Tefertiller (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 9 comments) on Friday, April 20, 2007 at 9:07:23 AM
 

 

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