Sutherland Urges Firearms Ban, Doubts Chance for Law's Passage

Arthur E. Sutherland, professor emeritus of constitutional law at Harvard, proposed yesterday a federal law against the "manufacture, importation, possession and sale of ammunition and rearms of any description."

Sutherland is one of the first to propose national confiscation of all firearms. Most advocates of gun control are opposed to total confiscation, seeking only to keep guns from criminals and incompetents.

Speaking to the 1970 United Press Editors and Publishers conference, Sutherland urged the national confiscation of all firearms "with exceptions for the Army, Navy, Marines and Air Force."

"We're too crowded," he said. "It [the gun] kills too many people by mistake. It kills the wrong people. It's a murderous encumbrance, an out-of-date thing in our society. Get rid of it."

Eventually, Sutherland foresees even the confiscation of police weapons although "you'll have to allow the police a few more years than you do John Citizen."

He said disarming the police is a highly "political matter." People don't want to see "the guardians of law and order walking the streets disarmed so criminals can just shoot them down," he said.

"Unhappily," Sutherland added, "people want to have guns: to go hunting and to protect their homes against criminals." The new climate of violence has given frightened citizens one more reason to resist giving up their "rights as Americans" to carry arms.

Not too optimistic about the law's adoption in the near future, Sutherland feels that any gun legislation would be "simmering on the back burner" for quite a while to come.