Keep Guns Out of Criminal Hands By THE EDITORIAL BOARD The Senate, at long last, will take up a package of gun-control measures when it returns from recess next month. On Thursday, the majority leader, Harry Reid, announced that one of those measures will require almost all gun buyers to undergo a background check. This is a vital step that would help keep guns out of the wrong hands, and it deserves far more bipartisan support than it has received.
Already, the gun lobby has exerted so much pressure on Republicans and red-state Democrats that the Democrats have dropped an assault weapons ban. The ban will be brought up as an amendment to the bills endorsed by the Senate leadership, dooming its chances. But if the Senate can resist further demands from the National Rifle Association and increase the number of background checks, it still has a chance to significantly reduce gun violence.
Currently, only licensed firearms dealers are required to check the backgrounds of buyers, and they cannot sell to anyone the system flags for having a criminal record. Sales between private individuals, about 40 percent of all gun sales, are not subject to these rules. Last week, the Senate Judiciary Committee signed off on a bill that would make background checks virtually universal, except for transfers within families and clearly temporary transfers.
Poll after poll has shown that the vast majority of Americans support closing the loophole for private sales. In the 14 states with universal checks, gun trafficking is 48 percent lower than in states without them. Nonetheless, this bill lacks the 60 votes necessary to get past a Republican filibuster, according to Senate officials. No Republican has signed on as a co-sponsor. So talks are under way to water it down a bit, to attract enough Republicans to beat a filibuster and pressure the House to go along.
Negotiators say the most likely compromise would require background checks for all commercial and advertised sales, including those on the Internet, along with sales at gun shows. That would cover most of the sales for which checks do not now take place, but it would leave out unadvertised, person-to-person sales of guns, a significant omission. Negotiators are exploring the possibility of a new government Web site that could verify buyers in these sales, though it is not clear whether that is feasible.
Removing the universal requirement would seriously diminish the bill, but the bill would still be a huge improvement over the current patchwork of gun checks. And that, of course, is why the N.R.A. is trying to kill it. The group’s Congressional water-carriers continue to demand that no record be kept of the expanded checks, even though licensed dealers are already required to keep such records.
“When the universal background checks don’t work, then registration will be proposed to enforce them,” said Senator Charles Grassley, Republican of Iowa, last week. “And when that doesn’t work, because criminals won’t register their guns, we may be looking at confiscation.”
This dangerous fiction may appeal to the most extreme gun owners, but a large majority of the public has rejected it. The Senate should do the same.
This is part of a continuing series on the epidemic of gun violence and possible solutions. Other editorials are at nytimes.com/gunchallenge.
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