Summary
Melting-point laws do not meet any of the criteria or achieve any of the goals advanced by their supporters but do succeed in making guns too expensive for the poorer segments of society. This is manifestly unfair and wastes effort better directed toward mandatory penalties and removing guns from the hands of those with a record of violence. Constitutional problems with gun-control laws are also examined. Melting-point laws prohibit guns made of a material that melts below 800 or 1000 degrees Fahrenheit.
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Extract
Gun control and economic discrimination: the melting-point case-in-point.
"Setting a high minimum price for handguns would be an effective means of reducing availability to precisely those groups that account for the bulk of the violent crime problem."(1)
I. Introduction In 1992, an estimated daily average of 36 people were murdered with handguns, 32 women were raped at gunpoint, 931 people were the victims of armed robberies, and 1557 people were assaulted with a gun in the United States.(2) During the same year, handgun crimes accounted for approximately thirteen percent of all documented violent crimes.(3) Some states have attempted to bridle such illegal firearm violence with "melting-point laws." The Illinois, South Carolina, Hawaii, and Minnesota legislatures have adopted rigid melting-point schemes designed to remove so-called Saturday Night Specials from the market.(4) Illinois, for example, prohibits the sale of handguns having "a barrel, slide, frame or receiver which is a die casting of zinc alloy or any other nonhomogeneous metal which will melt or deform at temperatures of less than 800 degrees Fahrenheit."(5) South Carolina and Hawaii have enacted laws virtually identical to Illinois, and Minnesota has enacted a similar law which has a 1000 degree melting point requirement and prohibits handguns with less than a certain "tensile strength" (resistance of the metal to longitudinal stress) and handguns that are made of a powdered metal less than a certain density.(6) The net effect on the handgun market is hard to determine precisely, but in South Carolina, the melting-point laws, along with Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms regulations, have resulted in bans on approximately ten percent of the handguns available on the retail market.(7) It is undisputed, however, that the handguns which fail to meet the melting-point requirements are made of cheaper materials and are the least expensive.(8) While there are manufacturers that produce handguns which both meet the melting-point standards and are less expensive than the premium makes, the sub-group of guns banned by the melting-point laws is the most affordable, and therefore the most accessible, segment of the handgun market.(9) Thus, the net effect of the melting-point laws has been to eliminate the most affordable segment of handguns from the market.(10) The primary arguments made in support of melting-point laws are threefold: (1) handguns which lack "quality materials" also often lack adequate safety and accuracy mechanisms and, thus, are not useful to sportsmen;(11) (2) handguns not meeting the melting-point requirements are made of softer metal, therefore making it more difficult for ballistics experts to identify these guns, and making it easier for criminals to file off the serial numbers;(12) and (3) the Saturday Night Specials which the melting-point laws target are the weapons of choice for criminals, and their removal from the marketplace will therefore reduce the criminals' access to firearms.(13) On the other hand, a compelling argument can be made that melting-point laws (1) are arbitrary in determining which handguns they ultimately remove from the market; (2) may have a negative effect on the ability of the police to track down criminals through the use of ballistics tests; (3) do not contribute to crime reduction; and (4) discriminate against the poor who cannot afford to purchase more expensive handguns. This Comment will endeavor to avoid the emotionalism which tends to permeate the gun control controversy by focusing on possible legal, factual, and policy flaws which may undermine the arguments advanced in justification of the melting-point laws. Il. The Justifications Offered in Support of Melting-Point Laws A. PREMISE 1: THE HANDGUNS TAKEN OFF THE MARKET BY MELTING-POINT LAWS ARE NOT USEFUL FOR SPORTSMEN This argument is misleading. It erroneously assumes that the only legitimate use of handguns will be for sport. Many citizens buy handguns for self-defense, not target shooting;(14) indeed, a significant percentage of the public agrees that "personal protection" is a legitimate reason for owning a gun,(15) and at least one-half of all U.S. households keep firearms.(16) Most importantly, criminologists and criminal law scholars have increasingly begun to agree that the public is right.(17) But the notion that usefulness for a "sporting purpose" should be a qualifying factor in handgun regulation is not rejected only by those who own guns. Using this criterion to differentiate between acceptable and unacceptable handguns fails to recognize other legitimate purposes for acquiring a handgun. The 1968 Gun Control Act clearly recognized that sporting uses are not the only legitimate purposes for acquiring a handgun: "[Il t is not the purpose of this title to place any undue or unnecessary Federal restrictions on handguns and law-abiding citizens with respect to the acquisition, possession, or use of firearms appropriate to the purpose of hunting, trapshooting, target s...See the full content of this document
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