Gun Registration

Gun Registration

Gun registration is an issue that is hotly debated on television and in the political arena. Many people want all gun owners to register their firearms with the government, providing a registry of who owns what types of guns. This makes the ownership legal. Without this registration, many fear that the government has the right to seize the firearms of anyone who has not completed the proper registration forms and paid the appropriate fees.

The reason for the gun registration program is one of public safety. The supporters of this program argue that there are too many guns that are privately owned and used to commit crimes against innocent people. Very often murders go unsolved because police are unable to trace the gun that was used in the shooting because it was never registered. These supporters believe gun registration will go a long way towards cutting down on homicides caused by shooting.

The opponents of gun registration argue that those people who use guns for criminal reasons are such a small proportion of the population that it really doesn’t make a difference. If they intend to kill someone, they will find a way to do it with or without a gun. A black market exists for drugs and the same thing will happen with firearms making them more of a threat to society than they currently are. These people also argue it is their right to own a gun to protect themselves and their families against these criminals. Allowing people to have guns at their disposal does not mean they are going to randomly start shooting everyone in their way

Gun registration will let the government know who has illegal weapons – ones that are not allowed to be in the possession of ordinary citizens, such as machine guns. With registration, people have to apply for a licence to own a firearm and in most cases successfully complete a Firearms Safety Course before the licence will be issued. In Canada, gun registration of handguns has been mandatory since 1934. In 2001, the government sought to bring in complete gun registration, but for the first time in history, Canadian gun owners failed to comply. They used the statistics that even though handguns were registered, not one murder has ever been solved through the registration process.

With gun registration, the government has the right to deny a person permission to own a gun. This seems to be a direct contradiction of the premise “innocent until proven guilty”. Gun owners are worried that total gun registration will eventually lead to the disarming of the people and cite the Nazi disarming of the Jews after gun registration became law in Germany. They also cite examples from Great Britain saying that after gun registration became law, different kinds of guns will gradually be outlawed until no one will be allowed to own a gun of any kind.

No amount of gun registration will effectively wipe out crime in either large cities or rural areas. In Russia, for example, private possession of firearms is illegal, yet there are accounts of mass murders. Modern day serial killers all had guns that were bought through legal channels. Even if gun registration does become law, the government has no idea who owns guns in the country. People who disagree with the law will simply choose not to register their firearm and no one will know anything about it. The fact of trying to get everyone in a country as large as the United States or Canada to register their firearms is a very costly venture and one that will not achieve its objectives.