Guns vs. People

In an urban city such as Cambridge, fear contributes to the way we live our lives. The fear of crime, for example, probably affects our lives more than crime itself. We buy locks, get timers for our lights, cancel mail deliveries during vacations, avoid walking certain streets at night and generally break up the normal patterns of our lives to avoid becoming victims of crime.

We also buy guns. Usually a handgun.

It is the fear of crime which makes people buy handguns to protect themselves. But the purchase of a handgun only magnifies the chance of accidental violence. Numerous studies have pointed out that arming oneself leads to more dead homeowners, not more dead robbers. As the number of handguns in circulation increases, the chances that the guns will fall into the hands of criminals also increase. Just about every handgun used in a criminal act was once stolen from an honest citizen. This in turn leads to more violent crime involving handguns. With this increase in crime, the fear of crime rises. The cycle continues, and people buy more handguns.

This cycle must be broken. Three-fourths of the homicides committed by firearms are of a non-felonious nature, that is to say, committed by friends or relatives usually involved in an argument.

The handgun is available and it is used.

Not until the alarming number of handguns in circulation is reduced substantially will the number of accidental handgun deaths decrease.

Unfortunately, the number of handguns in our society is rapidly increasing, not decreasing. There are 40 million handguns in the United States and they are being added at the rate of 3 million per year.

There has been much discussion about the so-called "right to bear arms," a right which the U.S. Supreme Court (four times in the last hundred years) has said applies to the militia, not the individual. Every citizen has above all the right to live. The right to live, not in fear of being blasted to eternity by a 38-caliber pistol, but in harmony with his community.

Our country has changed since the days of the wild west when men wore a six-gun strapped to their hip for protection. In a modern urban society where people live in close proximity to each other the prospect of every citizen carrying a handgun is an invitation to tragedy.

We must take a more civilized approach toward the question of guns in our society. We are the only country in the civilized world allowing our citizens to possess as many lethal weapons as they can afford. And we pay a very dear price for this luxury. We lost more of our citizens from accidental gun deaths (28,626) during the period of 1961 to 1972 than the combined number of deaths of the U.S. Army, Navy and Air Force personnel (26,919) suffered in Vietnam during the same period.

What disturbs me as a law enforcement officer are the accidental deaths which result from handguns. This is an unnecessary loss of life. Many of these lives could be saved.

It is for this reason that I support and will continue to support vigorously the banning of the private possession of handguns by everyone except the military and police. If the legislature cannot see its way to pass such a law, I will lead an initiative petition drive, collecting signatures next fall, which would put the question on the ballot in 1976.

The immediate effect of controlling the possession of handguns would not be to reduce crime but to reduce the many needless deaths and accidental shootings caused by the availability of the handgun. It would also decrease the amount of fear that these deaths generate. Hopefully, as the supply of handguns diminished, it would become more difficult for the criminal to obtain handguns.

But for now let us put an end to our domestic arms race. Let us think about saving lives, before it is too late.

Sheriff Buckley is a candidate for re-election.