I shamelessly cribbed this from ammo.com and Alex who sent me the link and permission to use it. It is very well thought out and well researched. I will be posting not as often until my school and studying is done.
Island Gun Laws: The History of Gun Control and Crime in Australia, New Zealand, and the UK
“We know that other countries in response to one mass shooting have
managed to craft laws that almost eliminate mass shootings. Friends of
ours, allies of ours, Great Britain, Australia, countries like ours. So
we know there are ways to prevent it.”
Politics nowadays are dominated by what gets attention, because what
gets attention spreads the fastest and furthest. This is the dark side
of social media and 24/7 news, and one event in particular in the
firearms world is ground zero for this phenomenon – mass shootings.
In the wake of a mass shooting, politicians who already dislike
law-abiding Americans owning guns use the tragedy to push for additional
gun laws,
irrespective of the existing laws already broken.
This is done when emotions are at their highest (and thus rational
thinking at its lowest), usually under the auspices of enacting gun laws
like those in the U.K. and Australia. President Obama's former Chief of
Staff
Rahm Emanuel said it best:
"You never want a serious crisis to go to waste. And what I mean by
that is an opportunity to do things you think you could not do before."
Careful analysis of these countries’ gun control experiments actually
depicts a more nuanced picture of gun policy and crime. In fact, there
is reason to believe that gun control may have actually
not had much of an impact on crime in either country – but this sort of
critical thinking
takes concerted effort, and who has time for such things when politics
today are less about sound, long-term policy and more about
sensationalizing another's tragedy to advance your agenda?
Below is a guide to help American gun rights activists understand the
history of gun registration and gun control efforts in the U.K. and
Australia, the two countries which anti-gun politicians often cite as
muses for their proposed laws.
Events That Led to Gun Laws in Australia
On April 28, 1996, Australia experienced a national tragedy. A
deranged murderer, Martin Bryant, went on a rampage and killed 35 people
in cold blood. In response to this atrocity, known as the Port Arthur
massacre, the Australian government undertook a heavy-handed gun control
campaign. This included a
mandatory buyback program
where Australian citizens had to turn over 650,000 “assault weapons” to
the government. This program was followed up by a subsequent buyback
program in 2003.
At the center of Australia’s gun control policy following the Port
Arthur massacre was the National Firearms Agreement of 1996. Although
international media outlets portray the 1996 NFA as a ban, it was
actually a draconian form of gun control that still allowed for gun
ownership, albeit to a very limited degree. The only real bans that took
place were ones targeting so-called “assault weapons” – long-guns such
as rifles and shotguns. Handguns were still accessible to the public,
but were subject to stiff restrictions.
Events That Led to Gun Laws in Great Britain
Britain’s first gun control package passed in the modern era was the
Firearms Act of 1920.
Fearing a growing wave of unrest in the aftermath of World War I,
British politicians passed this gun control law despite scant evidence
showing that crime was on the rise during that time period.
The Firearms Act of 1920 was only the beginning – as the 20th century
was a time of progressive government growth in all facets of life, and
the U.K. was no exception. After the enactment of the Firearms Act of
1920, the British government passed gradually stricter laws in 1937,
1968, and 1988. Despite having comprehensive gun control at the national
level, the homicide rate in Great Britain slowly grew from the 1950s
into early 2005.
When it came to mass shootings, British gun control efforts proved
futile. Shooting rampages in Hungerford, England and Dunblane, Scotland
received international attention, which put the island nation at a major
public policy crossroads. Like its Australian counterpart, the United
Kingdom opted for stiffer gun control.
After the
Hungerford massacre, the government responded with the passage of the
Firearms Act of 1988, a new gun control measure that placed draconian restrictions on rifles and shotguns. The
Dunblane massacre prompted the British government to ban the possession of handguns by passing the
Firearms Act of 1997.
Falling Crime Rates in the Western World
Arguably
the most popular example of foreign gun control, advocates of tougher
gun laws routinely cite Australia and its 1996 NFA law as an example of
gun control causing crime to fall. Although Australia is a nation
characterized by a low degree of crime, there’s more to Australia’s low
crime rates than gun control.
Homicide rates have been declining
across
Western Europe, Canada, and the U.S. since the 1990s. Australia was not
exempt from this trend, and in fact, Australia’s falling crime was
essentially the
norm for industrialized countries in the West.
Homicides were already a rare occurrence before the passage of the 1996
NFA. In sum, we can barely learn anything meaningful from slight changes
in Australian homicide rates around this time.
In
Why Crime Rates Are Falling Throughout the Western World, Michael Tonry argues the following:
“There is now general agreement, at least for developed
English-speaking countries and western Europe, that homicide patterns
have moved in parallel since the 1950s. The precise timing of the
declines has varied, but the common pattern is apparent. Homicide rates
increased substantially from various dates in the 1960s, peaked in the
early 1990s or slightly later, and have since fallen substantially.”
This same trend of declining violence was on display in the United States.
American homicide rates reached a 51-year low in 2014.
During this time period, there wasn’t a gun control measure as
comprehensive as Australia’s NFA in America that we can point to in
explaining this decline.
In fact, American gun ownership per capita increased by 56 percent from 1993 to 2013. This was accompanied by a gun violence decrease of 49 percent.
Correlation is not causation, but this goes to show the explanations
behind crime rates are complex and are not necessarily about passing a
so-called gun control “fix.”
The Effects of Gun Control in Australia
According to gun researcher John Lott, homicide rates in Australia have been on a
downtrend
since 1969. During this timeframe, the only time homicide rates
increased was from 1998 to 1999, not long after the NFA was passed.
However,
Ryan McMaken
argues that Australian crime data is very spotty. He contends that the
data is not very reliable because crime was such a non-issue that the
government did not prioritize recording it. McMaken provides further
context:
“Australia is a small country, with only a few more million people
than Florida, spread out over an entire continent. In the relatively
high homicide days of the early 1990s, Australia's homicides totaled
around 300. This means in a bad crime year, in which homicides increase
by only 20 or 30 victims, it could swing overall rates noticeably.”
All in all, what we can gather is that Australia had low crime rates
well before the passage of the 1996 NFA. However, this is one part of
the story.
Australia’s gun buyback program from 1996 to 1997 was able to reduce the
supply of firearms
from 3.2 million 2.2 million, but the declines in homicide or suicide
rates were not as high as many gun control advocates expected.
Interestingly enough, Australia’s gun buyback did not even stifle
civilian gun ownership. In 2010, private gun ownership was back to 1996
levels. Plus, data from 1997 to the present day show that gun ownership
in Australia has actually grown three times faster than the population.
The total number of
firearms in circulation went from 2.5 million to 5.8 million.
Gun control advocates maintain that the more guns present, the more
likely crime rates will skyrocket. Crime rates were already low before
gun control came into being and continued to fall even after gun control
was implemented. Moreover, Australia still experienced an increase in
the amount of guns in the country despite the gun control laws in
effect.
Indeed, it’s hard to place what factors exactly contributed to
Australia’s decreasing homicide rates. It’s simplistic to believe that
gun control is the missing x-factor in lowering crime. Additionally, the
Australian experience shows that Australia’s decision to not completely
ban gun ownership has given some law-abiding gun owners a little bit of
flexibility in acquiring firearms.
The Australian gun control case actually looks quite bleak when
compared to the U.S.’s higher degree of gun rights over the past few
decades. From 1995 to 2006 – a time when firearm ownership was reduced –
Australia witnessed a significant increase in rapes and sexual
assaults. In
400 Years of Gun Control,
author Howard Nemerov specifically pointed to numbers indicating a 21.4
percent increase in rape and sexual assault rates during this period.
On the other hand, America saw increased gun ownership during this
time, so it’s no surprise they fared better when it came to sexual
assaults, which fell by 16.8 percent. Gun ownership tends to benefit the
most vulnerable in society, like
women and the
elderly,
who are often overpowered in violent assaults by criminals who rely on
brute strength. With guns entering the equation, the playing field is
ultimately leveled.
All in all, gun control down under is not what it seems.
The Effects of Gun Control in the U.K.
Like
Australia, low homicide rates have been generally the norm in recent
British history. At the beginning of the 20th century, England and Wales
were already some of the safest countries in the world based on global
and historical standards.
At first glance, the gun control measures appeared to coincide with
decreases in Britain’s homicide rates, which started taking place after
2002. However, there is reason to believe that there were other factors
contributing to Britain’s falling crime rates during that period. John
Lott argues that
increased policing in the U.K. is a more plausible explanation for this drop around the early 2000s.
Although Lott recognizes that the police play a crucial role in fighting crime, his research over the years has led him to the
conclusion
that the police can’t always be at crime scenes to save lives. They
usually end up at the crime scene after the fact, thus demonstrating the
need for other security options at our disposal. An
increased law enforcement
presence eventually hits a point of diminishing returns as witnessed in
the U.K. during the mid-2000s. Despite a substantial increase in the
police force, the murder rate was still above the pre-handgun ban rate.
Gun control advocates remain steadfast in their belief that gun
control was solely responsible for the fall in murders after 2002. Even
if we concede ground on this point, we also have to ask why gun control
was not at fault for the
repeated increases
in murder rates from the 1960s until the 1990s – a time when homicide
gradually increased despite new gun control legislation being passed
throughout those decades.
We must also keep in mind that statistical figures in the U.K. should
be viewed with a certain degree of skepticism given the differences in
the way crimes are accounted for. Starting in
1967,
homicide figures in England and Wales exclude cases that don’t result
in convictions. Put simply, when no arrest for a homicide is made, which
in turn results in no conviction for the murderer, the murder is not
accounted for in statistical figures.
The U.S. has a different approach to recording homicide statistics – including cases that did
not
result in murder convictions. For example, deaths caused by defensive
gun use as well as unsolved cases would be classified as homicides in
the U.S.
This makes crime rate comparisons between countries like the U.S. and
the U.K. rather tricky. When adding gun control laws and their effects
on crime rates into these comparisons, the picture becomes murkier.
Confounding variables abound which can lead to flawed interpretations of
these events. Recent data show that the U.K.’s gun control experiments
are actually causing more harm than good. Like its Australian
counterpart, which also implemented draconian gun control in the 1990s,
negative criminal trends have started to surface since new gun control
laws were enacted.
Sexual assaults have seen an alarming rise from 1995 to 2006,
specifically increasing by 76.5 percent according to Howard Nemerov’s
book
400 Years of Gun Control. All the gun control in the world has not been able to save the U.K. from steadily increasing rates of violent crime.
One particular interesting detail about crime under the country’s gun
control regime is that criminals have now changed the tools they use to
carry out their dirty deeds. Specifically, British criminals are using
knives to commit crimes.
The Guardian reported on the recent knife crime wave sweeping across the U.K.:
“Police recorded 39,598 offences involving a knife or sharp
instrument in the year to December 2017, a 22% increase compared with
the previous year (32,468), and the highest number registered since
comparable records started in 2010. Gun crime rose to 6,604 offences.”
The London Metropolitan Police
reports
that teenagers commit 49 percent of knife crime. On top of that, three
quarters of stabbings were committed by minorities. Breitbart also gave a
lurid depiction of London’s ongoing knife rampage:
“London specifically experienced record high knife crime,
increasing by 15 percent to a total of 14,987 blade offences –
representing 38 percent of all knife crimes across England and Wales and
averaging 41 knife crimes a day.”
With questionable immigration policies that
prevent assimilation and an environment that does not protect law-abiding Britons’ right to self defense, the U.K. risks sliding into social chaos.
Sadly, British politicians still believe more government control is
the answer to this problem. In the face of this stabbing epidemic,
London Mayor Sadiq Khan has advocated for
knife control. One Member of Parliament Scott Mann has even
floated the idea of embedding GPS trackers on all knives sold in London.
Instead of considering alternatives like tougher policing in
crime-ridden neighborhoods or even arming their citizens, elected
officials in London have created a de facto surveillance state. A report
from
WorldAtlas
uncovered that London is the most surveilled city in the world with an
estimated 51,000 cameras used to snoop on London residents.
New Zealand: An Addendum
On
March 15, 2019, New Zealand faced its own Port Arthur incident. A
28-year-old Australian citizen by the name of Brenton Tarrant opened
fire on two mosques in Christchurch, leaving 50 people dead. The
shocking nature of this massacre had media talking heads around the
world on edge for the next week
In an already polarized environment in western countries, where
identity politics have strong pull, politicians were quick to make their
pro-gun control stances heard. From
Alexandria-Ocasio Cortez to
Bernie Sanders, U.S. members of the Democratic Party have made their calls for gun control clear. Universal
background checks and so-called “assault weapons” bans are now on the table.
There is no question this event was a horrific tragedy and the
atrocious nature of the incident will forever rock New Zealand’s public
conscious. That being said, analyzing this incident and figuring out how
to go from there requires level-headed thinking. Much to the dismay of
pro-gun advocates who want to see their countries expand gun rights,
emotion tends to reign supreme in all public policy discussions.
As with the Australian and British cases, we find that New Zealand
has also witnessed the same declining crime rates trend the rest of the
West has experienced in the past few decades. In 2014, New Zealand’s
homicide rate stood at
0.9 per 100,000 people. Particularly curious, New Zealand hit a 40-year low in its murder rates in
2017 – with only 35 people being killed in the country. Murders peaked in the 1980s, with
1986 being the year with the highest total of murders, standing at 79.
It should be noted that New Zealand does feature pretty strict gun control. Gunpolicy.org
notes that
in New Zealand, “the right to private gun ownership is not guaranteed
by law,” which is a stark contrast from the U.S. – which nominally
recognizes it as a right.
Prospective gun owners in New Zealand must have a license before buying
a gun. Then, they must go through a universal background check of sorts
that “considers criminal, mental health, medical, addiction and
domestic violence records.”
Following the Mosque shootings, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern
immediately called for bans on semi-automatic weapons and “military-style” variants. She got her
wish
a few days after the shooting, with a new ban on “assault weapons.”
Despite the New Zealand government’s push for gun owners to turn in
their firearms in the wake of the mass shooting, a
paltry number of firearms have been turned in so far.
Like Australia, we cannot assume with certainty that gun control has
been the primary driver of New Zealand’s already low crime rates. The
effects of New Zealand’s new gun control laws will be an interesting
case study nonetheless.
But with the American counterexample showing how crime rates can
still decrease, even with certain jurisdictions liberalizing gun laws,
we must call into question the conventional wisdom that gun control is
the alpha and the omega of decreasing crime rates. When push comes to
shove, the New Zealand government’s newest gun control package may turn
out to be a dud that only satisfied the political class’s “do
something.”
Follow the Red, White, and Blue
The
British government will eventually have to admit that there’s only so
much it can do to fight crime. Instead, the U.K. and Australia, for that
matter, should follow in the footsteps of America and expand gun
rights. The gun rights victories that have occurred since the 1980s have
served America well.
Research from the
Pew Center
in 2015, showed that the murder rate in America fell by one half – 7
per 100,000 in 1993 to 3.4 per 100,000 in 2014. In the same period, the
total number of gun deaths (numbers that include accidental deaths and
suicides) dropped by almost one-third, plummeting from 15.2 to 10.6 per
100. Additionally, the number of privately owned guns and people
carrying concealed has grown year by year.
Over the past three decades, gun laws have witnessed unprecedented levels of relaxation
at the state level.
From reforms such as licensed concealed carry to permitless
Constitutional Carry, law-abiding gun owners in certain states have more
firearms freedoms than in previous decades. These numbers at least
demonstrate that looser gun laws don’t lead to chaotic episodes of
violence. Crime rates don’t suddenly explode when people are allowed to
freely own and carry firearms. The warnings of so-called
Wild West scenes popping up left and right prove to be unfounded.
The Australian and British cases, on the other hand, show a more
mixed picture of countries that were already safe before passing gun
control due to political outrage. The effects of these laws are still
being discerned, however, it can be argued that they have had little
effect on impacting crime. In the British case, law-abiding citizens may
want to have expanded gun rights due to the country’s increasingly
unstable
migrant crisis and the police’s inability to stop crime.
All in all, a truly free society is one that respects an
individual’s right to self defense. No matter the intentions, governments have no authority to infringe upon this sacred right.
