Disarming the Law-Abiding Citizen
Commentary
The government of Western Australia is promising a complete overhaul of firearms legislation, with some new restrictions having already passed in May.
Regardless of what is drafted, any new laws will end up passing through parliament because the Labor government maintains control of both lower and upper houses, allowing it to introduce virtually any legislation unimpeded.
Of course, a disarmed population is defenceless in the face of an external military threat, and more contemporaneously, impending tyranny. It is hard to believe that any supposedly democratic country would be willing to go to the extremes of the former Soviet Union to make sure people do not have the means for self-defence and to fight against impending tyranny.
In democratic societies, the right to self-defence is traditionally understood as a basic right of the citizen. By contrast, the former Soviet Union, a communist regime, had a gun ban for over 70 years.
But that did not successfully stop criminal gangs from obtaining firearms. During the 1970s and 1980s, the Soviet Union had a murder rate that was at least 50 percent higher than the murder rate in the United States.
In Australia, similar to the former Soviet Union, firearms are not permitted for the purpose of self-defence. They are allowed only under limited circumstances, such as for recreational shooting or hunting animals on eligible private properties.
In Western Australia, for example, the use of force for the purposes of self-defence is “excused” in the state criminal code.
These legislative provisions do not regard self-defence as a “right” but as mere “defences” to criminal charges.
This is an important distinction because a person using a firearm to defend themselves in their home may be charged with a criminal offence after having saved their own life or that of a loved one, requiring legal defence in order to clear their name.
The possession of a firearm and acts of self-defence are only allowed in Australia as a concession of the state, as outlined by 1996 (updated 2017) National Firearms Agreement (NFA) (pdf), which states: “Personal protection is not a genuine reason for acquiring, possessing or using a firearm.”
Hence, a disturbing paradox arises for a law-abiding citizen who might have a firearm on their premises while experiencing a home invasion in which they reasonably fear death or grievous bodily harm being inflicted on them or their loved ones.
The phrase “when seconds count, the police are only minutes away” is brought to mind, and one wonders how much “our safety” really matters to the average politician.
The NFA not only seeks to strip one’s ability to licence a firearm for the purposes of self-defence but also the ability for a victim to use it for self-defence in the case of a deadly attack.
What Happens Following a Gun Ban?
The NFA, for the most part, makes a genuine attempt at unifying the Australian state governments in firearms control and legislation.
However, there is no standard “agreement”, as the title implies.
Indeed, a 2017 Gun Control Australia report (pdf) communicates that “no Australian state or territory has at any stage fully complied with … the national firearms agreement.”
Disturbingly, a more damaging objective is found in Resolution 2 of the NFA opening statement: “Nothing in this agreement prevents jurisdictions from adopting additional—including more restrictive—regulations.”
When politicians and gun control advocates call to the “authority” of the NFA—one should remain cognisant: This statement is not legally binding, and it is irresolute at its core because it encourages perpetual regulatory endeavours to strip citizens of their property devoid of an evidence-based approach.
The problem with banning firearms is that it does not stop criminals—who, by their very nature, will not obey the law—from getting hold of weapons. It only restricts access for law-abiding citizens.
In the United Kingdom, most guns were banned in January 1997, but over the next eight years, that country experienced a 45 percent increase in homicides. Furthermore, crimes committed by the use of a firearm in the UK doubled over the following five and a half years after the full confiscation of all those firearms.
To give another example, firearms were banned in Ireland in 1972, and what had been a relatively stable homicide rate became a three-fold increase in homicides after that ban.
The United States provides a good laboratory because it is relatively easy to compare the 50 states and Washington D.C.
The country has a wide range of firearms legislation. Indeed, one may find almost every kind of gun legislation, varying from liberal laws about gun ownership in Texas and Tennessee all the way to an almost total ban on firearms in places such as Chicago and Washington D.C.
What you find is that there is really no benefit from banning firearms in terms of reduced violent crime rates. In Chicago and Washington D.C., there was actually a dramatic increase in murder rates and violate crimes in both places after the gun bans went into effect.
Arguments Lack Weight
While Western Australian Police refuses to publish official gun crime statistics, Police Minister Paul Papalia at least acknowledges that most gun crime is actually committed by individuals not licensed to possess a firearm.
The state has very low firearm crime, and almost every single gun used for criminal activity is not licensed nor owned by a licensed gun owner.
Criminals operating in this jurisdiction who seek to acquire, say, a semi-automatic pistol know very well that Chinese semi-automatic pistols or Czech-made blank-firing pistols (easily converted to use real ammunition) are available for little money on the black market.
Some people may claim that banning firearms will have a positive effect on Western Australia in preventing suicide. However, a firearm is just a means to an end and not the end in itself.
According to Sarah McKinnon, legal affairs manager at the National Farmers’ Federation, there is no verifiable link between access to firearms and suicide rates. She argues that this notion is “dangerous because it can cloud the message around suicide prevention.”
It is little wonder members of the Western Australian community are demanding a more evidence-based approach to the proposed firearms reforms.
Arguably, draconian measures will only impose an added cost and burden on the citizens who are gun owners. And, if crime, or the potential for crime, is a valid reason behind the new restrictive laws, then the state police would be better off concentrating on the social reasons behind the rise in crime, which are generally related to drugs, gangs and organised crime.
Of course, it is unlikely that these issues will be ever meaningfully tackled any time soon.
Above all, as Lysander Spooner reminds us: “To ban guns because the criminals use them is to tell the law-abiding that their rights and liberties depend not on their own conduct, but on the conduct of the guilty and lawless.”
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All comments made by Lance French are in his capacity as a private citizen and do not necessarily reflect those of any government entity.
Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
