Anti-gun Laws Endangered Britain

(1) Okell also said British front-line troops In combat were compelled to use sport guns donated by Americans after the debacle at Dunkirk because of English laws prohibiting the peacetime possession of firearms.

Swiss Riflemen Foiled Hitler

"In contrast, he noted, Switzerland requires all men from 18 to 65 to possess a government-issued army rifle and to be proficient in its use... Nasi generals advised Adolph Hitler that an invasion of Switzerland would cost them 100,000 to 200,000 troops and the plan was discarded."

British registration laws so discouraged small arms practice that the populace was almost helpless against Hitler's invasion threats. See pamphlet on "Firearms Registration" by the National Rifle Assn.

The desperate plight of Britain in 1940, with inadequate arms for the Army, the Home Guard, and even the police, is mentioned by Winston S. Churchill, "The Second World War", Vol. 2, "Their Finest Hour" (Houghton Mifflin Boston 1949), pages 271-272. British destroyers went out to meet the American convoy with 200,000 rifles and other arms. When the "priceless arms" arrived, "special trains were waiting in all the ports... The Home Guard in every county... sat up all through the nights to receive them. . ."

(2) Firearms registration laws were used in Italy, Germany, and Spain. Such laws aided the Nazi invaders of Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland, the Low Countries, France, Denmark, and Norway. Hitler's invaders simply went to the city hall, seized the handy list of gun owners provided by the local politicians and police, and then grabbed the weapons, according to NRA pamphlet cited above. Church Council and Reserve Officers Denounce Anfuso Bill

The American Council of Christian Churches, 15 Park Row, New York, 38, N. Y., meeting in annual convention at West Palm Beach, Fla., April 27, 1962, unanimously resolved to protest "the Anfuso Bill, H.R. 613 (introduced in Congress) January 3, 1961, which requires the registration of all civilian pistols with the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The danger of this bill is that Fascists and Communists have used registration and subsequent confiscation of firearms to render the people helpless against violent revolution and dictatorship. This bill would be an unwarranted impairment of the Federal Bill of Rights which guarantees the right of all citizens to keep and bear arms in defense of law, life, and country. We recommend that this bill be rejected and also the repeal of the Federal Firearms Act of 1938 which distorts the Interstate Commerce clause and grants broad and dangerous powers including registration to the Secretary of the Treasury."

Substantially the same resolution was adopted by the Reserve Officers Association, Department of Florida, annual conference, Orlando, May 13, 1962. For more information on H.R. 613 (proposed Federal law) and the 1938 law, see "Right to Keep and Bear Arms", Dan Smoot Report (former FBI agent), March 19, 1962, P.O. Box 9538, Lakewood Station, Dallas, 1, Texas.

(3) We have now a Federal bonded debt of over $300 billion, a social security deficit of $320 billion, annual red ink spending, and heavy taxes, Federal and state. See article by Maurice H. Stans, former U.S. Budget Director, Reader's Digest, March 1960. Bureaucrats would not be able to meddle so much in our lives if their funds were reduced. We do not need more bureaus to waste our hard-earned money.

E. DUES THE DISARMAMENT ACT THREATEN OUR LIBERTIES? Definitely, yes. The Disarmament Act of Sept. 26, 1961, slipped through Congress in the adjournment rush, allows planning to strip the United States of most of our armed forces and turning them over to the communist-infested United Nations. "Even those personal rifles, shotguns and revolvers on which free people in the past have at times depended for their defense against tyranny would be first registered and then seized", according to "Life Lines" publication, Oct. 24, 1962, 620 Eleventh St., MW, Washington, 1, D.C.

THE AMERICAN MINUTEMAN, champion of liberty. "The foot soldier, since earliest history, has usually been the man who won or lost a war, and the (American) Revolution was no exoeption. That war belonged to the infantryman, and his chief weapon was the flintlock musket with its attached bayonet." Fred Cook, "The Golden Book of the American Revolution" (Golden Press N.Y. 1959), page 193. Under the vicious schemes of today's anti-gun fanatics and communists, the Minuteman would have been disarmed.

Under this dangerous act, Public Law 87-297, the President and Senate alone, without the House of Representatives, could surrender our armed forces to the United Nations, now dominated by communists and "neutralists". The goal is "disbanding of all national armed forces", according to Dept. of State pamphlet 7277, "Freedom from War" (1961). A grin warning of what could happen to America under the communist and neutralist dominated United Nations is found in the sneak Christmas (1962) attack to force Christian, anti-communist Katanga to join the communist Central Congo Government. UN forces alaughtered many defenseless civilians in Katanga.

Today we need preparedness, not disarmament, and liberation, not surrender.

F. DO ARMED CITIZENS PREVENT CRIME? Yes.

Every issue of the American Rifleman magazine contains news items gathered from all over the United States, showing how armed, law-abiding citizens prevent crime or capture criminals, when the police are not present.

But these cases do not tell the whole story-of the crimes that are never attempted because the criminal plotter knows or fears that his intended victim is armed. The unarmed citizen is at the mercy of hoodlums, thieves, murderers, sex maniacs, and communists. Ouns are often used to prevent robbery, murder, rape, and other crimes.

In Watson v. Stone, ↳ So.2d 700 (1941), the Supreme Court of Florida recognised the dangers of travel across Florida's lonely highways, especially at night, and the need to carry a weapon in the glove compartment of an automobile by "business men, tourists, commercial travelers, professional man on night calls, unprotected women and children in cars on the highways day and night, State and County officials, and all law-abiding citizens... These people should not be branded as criminals in their effort of self-preservation and protection

Public Disasters

Riots and civil commotion make even a stronger case for the armed citizen. Over 95% of the people are orderly and law-abiding, and should be armed against mob violence. In times of flood, hurricane, and storm, law officers cannot even reach many areas to prevent looting, rape, and murder. There have been riots against Congressional committees, as in San Francisco in 1959, started by communists, where local police battled without the aid of Federal forces; and labor violence, where vote-hungry state and federal officials sometimes are reluctant to prevent looting and murder.

Therefore, protection against crime cannot be left entirely to the police.
G. ARE PRESENT GUN LAWS IN FLORIDA ADEQUATE? Yes.
Present Laws Are Adequate Curbs

We already have many laws on firearms. In Florida we have Chapter 790, Florida Statutes, on firearms, including concealed weapons, use in crimes, sling shots, BB guns, selling to minors, and possession of guns by felons.

But one law, adopted in 1893 as a protection against lawless sawmill workers, has been grossly abused and irresponsibly enforced in Dade County and elsewhere. This law, Section 790.05, Florida Statutes, forbids anyone, even law-abiding citizens, to "carry around with him, or have in his manual posseIsion... any pistol, winchester rifle or other repeating rifle, without having a license...' A vicious law of this type, if enforced by the British King, would have made American independence and freedom impossible.

In the recent case of Davis v. State, Nov. 28, 1962, 146 So.2d 892, the Supreme Court of Florida upheld this unwise law, but dropped the hint that the wisdom of the law is a matter of legislative · .. concern."

In an editorial of Dec. 10, 1962, entitled "A Dangerous Law", the Sarasota Herald Tribune said: "Dade County Attorney Darrey Davis, a former president of the Florida Bar Association, calls the law obsolete and impractical." The edi* concluded that it "should be wiped off the books."

Moreover, the Florida Constitutional provision which says "the Legislature may prescribe the manner in which they (arms) may be borne" is too vague, stronger protection should be given of the right to bear arms.

We need positive laws to encourage pistol and rifle clubs, small practice, and marksmanship.

Need Protection of Constitutional Rights

Adequate enforcement of existing state laws against unlawful use of especially by minors and criminals, is the real need. Nevertheless, we ce stantly read about the efforts of well-meaning persons, and those who are well-meaning and who have a sinister and subversive intent, to promote new and dangerous gun laws and ordinances. These efforts should be discouraged. Interference with civil, constitutional rights should be penalised, whether by právate citizens or public officials.

Communist revolutionaries and other criminals can get their arms by theft, smuggling, and other means, and ignore gun laws.

No gun law can disara determined criminals who can make homemade "Zip guns" (Life magazine, April 1, 1958, page 127), smuggle then from abroad, or steal them, even from Government stocks, as reported by the FBI.

The police chief of Hollywood, Fla., Phillip Thompson, then President of the Florida Police Chiefs Association, told the Miami Herald, Feb. 16, 1961: "I don't think the mere passing of a law is going to have too much effect, truthfully, because when people want guns they'll get them." He described New York's harsh Sullivan Act as "not being effective."

Weapons Arrests Under 15 in United States

Reports on the use of firearms in crime are not complete for the United States. However, the 1962 World Almanac, page 303, shows 1,702,000 deaths in the United States in 1960, including 37,160 for automobile accidents, 56,170 for other accidents, 19,450 for suicide, and 8,010 for homicide (use of firearms not indicated).

At page 311 the Almanac shows FBI crime statistics. In 1960 there were 2,313,368 arrests, including 21,748 arrests on weapons charges, or less than one percent (1%). "Weapons" includes other things besides firearms.

These figures do not indicate actual convictions for crimes involving firearms. Criminals use poison and other weapons besides guns.

Moreover, these figures are negative and do not tell the whole story. We have no figures on the crimes prevented by the armed citizen, which can well be many times the number of actual crimes.

FBI Omits Firearms Controls

The annual "Uniform Crime Reports" of the Federal Bureau of Investigation list the factors generating crime, but specifically omit firearms controls. True crime reduction, according to the FBI, depends on religious, educational, recreational, racial, and other factors, including the "policies of prosecuting officials and the courts" and "efficiency of the local law enforcement agency." Racial Factor

Houston, Texas had a high murder rate, but a study by Dr. Henry A. Bullock found that Negroes were 67% of the assailants and victims, but only 20% of the population. "Urban Homicide in Theory and Fact", Journal of Criminal Law, Criminology and Police Science, Vol. 45, No. 5, Jan.-Feb. 1955.

No Connection Between Gun Registration and Murder Rate

An American and international survey of crime and gun laws and FBI reports was reported by William C. Shead, "Do Laws Requiring Registration of Privately Owned Firearms Lower Murder Rate?", 3 South Texas Law Journal, pages 317-331 (1958). Highlights of the findings were: Mexico, with a gun registration law "has the highest homicide rate in the world", 32.8 killings per 100,000 people. "Knives are used in 45 percent of the crimes, guns in 26 percent, and blunt instruments in 6 percent."

"There is no evidence... that, acting alone, laws requiring the registration of privately owned firearms have any effect on the rate at which murders and homicides are committed."

At page 318 a table shows the 1957 murder rate of 25 American cities, including New York City with 314 murders and a rate of 3.9 murders per 100,000 population. Cities in four other states with less severe gun laws and a lower murder rate were Boston, Mass. (2.8), Milwaukee, Wis. (2.9), Pittsburgh, Pa. (3.7), and Denver, Colo. (3.5).

Handiest Weapon Used

Murderers will use the handiest weapon--gun, knife, board, ice pick "or simply the bare hands." (Page 331).

A study of 588 killings in the Philadelphia area showed that "few homicides due to shooting could be avoided merely if the firearms were not immediately present, according to Dr. Marvin E. Wolfgang, Professor of Sociology, "Patterns in Criminal Homicide."

Broward County Juvenile Court Judge Dorr Davis exhibited weapons used in crime such as knives, brass knuckles, screwdrivers, pliers, crowbars, and a homemade bomb, as well as guns. See Fort Lauderdale News, March 8, 1962, page C-1.

Register Sticks and Stones?

A comprehensive registration and permit law would cover every weapon, ineluding sticks and stones, but it could not prevent crim.

Are Police and Prosecutors Doing Their Jobs Well?

Shead urges that we see if the police, prosecuting attorneys, and the courts are using present laws to the extent possible... Inefficiency is covered up with a rash of excuses... Determine if the present demand for stringent gun registration laws is simply a smokescreen behind which inefficiency and lack of enforcement are being concealed." (Shead, page 331).

I. WHAT IS THE WORST CRIME FOSTERED BY ANTI-GUN LAWS? Genocide, or the murder of a people or a nation; or their enslavement, overthrow, liquidation, and torture under a fiendish dictatorship. Even if the arrests on weapons charges were many times the figure of under 15 of arrests in 1960, the number would be minute alongside the crime of murdering and enslaving an entire nation. Homicide is heinous, but treason is infinitely

worse.

The survival of 190,000,000 Americans and the free world demands firearms protection instantly available to every law-abiding citizen without red tape. We are infinitely safer with firearms in the hands of most Americans, even a few criminals, than are the disarmed victims of communism, with weapons only in the hands of Marxist criminals, who now enslave one billion people. Studies indicate the following conclusions regarding anti-gun laws: They do not reduce crime.

3.

A.

B. They can greatly increase crime by hoodlums and Marxists.

CONCLUSIONS

A. Vicious and irresponsible attempts to infringe or destroy the right to firearms for defense and other lawful purposes should be severely punished by civil damages, heavy fines, and prison sentences.

B. All persons who aid and abet the communist criminals should be barred from public office and severely punished under law, and by public disfavor, and patriots should be generously rewarded and honored.

C. Crime by use of guns, automobiles, and other dangerous weapons cannot be prevented. Crime can be punished and discouraged.

D. The lawful use and possession of firearms by law-abiding adults must NOT be infringed.

E. The registration of weapons and record of firearms sales do NOT deter communists and criminals, are a dangerous aid for confiscation by dictators as well as well-meaning officials, and should NOT be required.

F. Under English-American jurisprudence, every person is innocent until adjudged guilty. Likewise, every citizen has the right to keep and bear arms, unless and until the state affirmatively proves that he is incompetent or has been convicted of a serious crime. The burden must be on the government, not the individual.

G. The inherent right of defense must be encouraged by adequate laws and constitutional safeguards.

4. WHAT WE NEED

A.

POSITIVE legislation which repeals and overrides special acts and charters, and city and metro ordinances, with severe criminal penalties for the infringement of the right to keep and bear arms, and encourages firearms training for personal, local, state, and national defense.

See pamphlet, "The Gun Law Problem", National Rifle Assn., 1600 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W., Washington, 6, D. C.

B. A STRONGER constitutional provision in Florida to protect the right to keep and bear arms.

C.

DEFEAT the Anfuso bill (H.R. 613) and similar vicious proposals. D. REPEAL the anti-gun law of 1893, Sections 790.05 and 790.06, Florida Statutes.

E. REPEAL the Federal Firearms Act of 1938, and all state and federal laws which forbid the possession and use of firearms by law-abiding citizens. F. INSTRUCTION in gun safety by youth clubs, rifle clubs, military training, and other means; encourage weapons training and drill.

G. REDUCTION of crime, juvenile delinquency, and rehabilitation of criminals by better training in homes, churches, schools, and other mans.

5. WHAT TO DO

A. WRITE your local, state, and federal lawmakers.

B. WRITE your Congressmen and Senators and ask how they voted on the

dangerous Disarmament Act, and demand repeal.

C. DEMAND a reduction in Federal power and spending.

D. DEMAND state and federal laws to promote and encourage marksmanship and an armed citizenry..

E. INFLUENCE public opinion through letters to the editor, speakers, civic groups, resolutions, petitions, etc. 7.

DEMAND that candidates for office declare themselves for or against the right to bear arms.

G. WORK TO ELECT patriots and defeat the enemies of freedom.

H.

JOIN the National Rifle Association.

Long Live America!

American patriots should act to defeat and destroy the vicious, reactionary, and anti-progressive schemes of fascism, Naziism, Hitlerism, socialism, communism, Marxism, Fabianism, Keynesism, Stalinism, Castroism, leftism, and other forms of brutal, regimented, and dictatorial society. These rotten systems spread hunger, poverty, misery, terror, and degradation, and offer us nothing to copy.

Instead, we should preserve and extend our free, Christian, tolerant, Constitutional way of life, which rests on the Bible, the Ten Commandments, the law of Moses, limited government, a Republic of laws, checks and balances, Bill of Rights, boldness, resourcefulness, nonesty, thrift, hard work, personal help for the needy, free enterprise, liberty, patriotism, loyalty, love of country, independence, preparedness, good will toward peaceful nations, and bondage to none. This American system, widely envied, and the goal of millions seeking freedom, has brought the greatest prosperity, freedom, happiness, progress, and spiritual blessings enjoyed anywhere in the world. All these things are the fruits of a Constitutional Republic.

The author received his A.B. and LL.B. degrees at The George Washington University, Washington, D. C., is an overseas veteran of World War II, and served in the British Isles and the Liberation of Normandy. Admitted to the Florida bar in 1938, he is a member of the bar associations of Broward County and Florida, and of the American Bar Association. In 1961 he served as Assistant City Attorney of Fort Lauderdale.

The author would appreciate your sending him news clippings, editorials, pamphlets, crime records, resolutions, and a reference to any books and other information on this important subject.

Additional copies of this article are available at cost, fifteen cents each. Send check or money order covering the number desired to James E. Edwards, 2631 East Oakland Park Boulevard, Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.

A PATRIOTIC JOURNAL SPEAKS OUT

The Sarasota Herald-Tribune is one of the leading, patriotic newspapers of Florida. Following the decision of the Supreme Court in the Davis prosecution, which hinted at the need for legislative reform regarding this obsolete law, this outstanding journal ran a series of articles by W. C. Burnett from Nov. 30 through Dec. 4, 1962 on the adequate existing gun restrictions, the folly of this antiquated law, and the need for the armed American Minuteman, culminating in the following editorial of Dec. 10, 1962 which calls for repeal.

Dec. 10, 1962

Sarasota Herald-Tribune
A Dangerous Law

On Page One of today's Herald-Tribune is a story with extremely disturbing implications.

Dade County is getting ready to require all residents who own a pistol or repeating rifle to obtain a permit. It is doing this under an antiquated Florida statute which pertains to every county in Florida-not just Dade.

Dade County Attorney Darrey Davis, a former president of the Florida Bar Association, calls the law obsolete and impractical. But, he says, the law as it stands makes you a lawbreaker if you buy a rifle and carry it out to your carunless you have a proper permit. And, he adds, you need a permit to hunt with a rifle. "Your hunting license doesn't give you the right to carry a gun," he says.

A top Dade law enforcement official says the law is being enforced "selectively and with the utmost discretion." Let's assume this is true. In that very fact lies a threat of direst proportions.

A law that has to be enforced "selectively" is a bad law. Even when it is enforced by wellintentioned men for worthwhile purposes, it is a flagrant notice that our laws do not apply equally to all men-that some are arrested while others, similarly situated, are left alone.

But when a law is enforced "selectively" by. men of too little honesty or too much ambition, then it becomes nothing less than a tool of a police state.

Liberty exists only so long as we are gov erned by laws, not by men. "Selective" enforcement is, almost by definition, a government of

men.

The antiquated Florida statute which lends Itself to such abuse and which is so obviously impractical and antiquated should be wiped off the books.