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“GUN AMENDMENTS TO SCIENCE, COMMERCE, JUSTICE, STATE APPROPRIATIONS” mentioning the U.S. Dept. of Justice was published in the House of Representatives section on pages H5364 on July 18, 2006.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
GUN AMENDMENTS TO SCIENCE, COMMERCE, JUSTICE, STATE APPROPRIATIONS
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the gentlewoman from New York (Mrs. McCarthy) is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mrs. McCARTHY. Mr. Speaker, this body's war on common sense continues.
Before the Independence Day recess, the House approved two amendments to the Science, Commerce, Justice, State Appropriations bill that promote irresponsible gun ownership and discourage police departments from working together to solve gun crimes. Last year the House passed legislation that would make sure that gun locks are included with all handgun sales. Last month the House stripped away that provision.
Gun safety locks can save lives. I agree with the proponents of these measures that most gun owners are responsible and store their guns safely and securely. I am not worried about these gun owners. Many responsible gun owners already voluntarily equip their guns with safety locks. Gun locks are needed to prevent accidents with the minority of gun owners who are not responsible. And while the pro-gun lobby does not like to talk about it, yes, there are irresponsible gun owners out there.
Last month in New Jersey an 11-year-old found his grandfather's gun and killed his 12-year-old best friend. A gun lock that you can purchase online for less than $7 would have prevented this tragedy. According to the CDC, 151 children died of accidental shotgun wounds in 2003. Mandatory gun locks would have saved some of those children's lives.
Gun locks prevent stolen guns from being used in crimes. Opponents of mandatory gun locks cite that the cost of gun locks prevent gun ownership. That is truly nonsense. This is like saying the added cost of air bags and seat belts prevent people from buying cars. And, again, trigger locks are relatively inexpensive. Seven dollars could save a child's life. Mr. Speaker, is a $7 gunlock really infringing on second amendment rights? Of course not.
I wish I could say that the amendment stripping away the gunlock provision was the only nonsensical amendment to the Department of Justice appropriations bill, but it was not. Once again, this bill would have made felons out of law enforcement officials who share ATF gun tracing information with police departments in other jurisdictions.
The ATF's gun-tracing program helps local police solve gun crimes by analyzing the unique marks made on bullets and cartridge cases when guns are fired. The images of these markings can be compared with other images in more than 200 Federal, State, and local law enforcement laboratories. But this appropriation bill would have made it a crime, a crime, for a police department to share information from the database with another department.
Say a police department in my district on Long Island obtains ballistic information from the ATF and a similar shooting occurs in New York City. The Long Island department could not share that information. In fact, an officer who did share this information would be arrested. This is absolutely insane.
Instead of cracking down on criminals using guns, this provision would treat police officers like criminals. To paraphrase my friend, Mayor Bloomberg of New York, it is a god-awful bill.
Again, some Members of this body put their allegiance to the NRA above common sense. The tracing program provides law enforcement agencies with valuable information about gun trafficking that can prevent crimes from happening. Tracing helps the public identify gun dealers and traffickers who are supplying illegal guns in our communities. But this provision would prevent the use of trace data as evidence in any State or Federal court or any nonATF administrative procedure. This provision cuts local law enforcement out of the loop. Without this tracing data, local law enforcement officers will not be able to pursue gun suppliers that have been implicated in crimes without the ATF's getting involved first. And we all know the ATF does not have the resources to get involved in every civil issue regarding gun crimes.
We let our police departments go after taverns that serve underage drinkers, but Congress will not allow them to crack down on the 1 percent, 1 percent, of dealers in this country who sell guns involved in 57 percent of the crimes.
Mr. Speaker, it is time for common sense. I hope the other body and the eventual conferees who will determine the final version of this appropriation bill will exercise more common sense than the House did last month.
Mr. Speaker, I have been here 10 years. I have never put any legislation forward that would take away the right of someone to own a gun. I am here for gun safety issues. I am here to save lives. I am here to keep down medical costs. I am here to protect our communities. We can do better. And we can with commonsense laws.
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