Congressional Gun Ban

By: Alex V.

On March 19^th 2013 senate leader Harry Reid stated that the ban that has been proposed in Congress wouldn’t go through, but wants a vote on it to go through. This proposed ban, made by Dianne Feinstein, was very similar to a ban made in 1994 that had ended in 2004 happens to be one of the four proposals in the bill that was made in response to the Connecticut shooting. Reid though doesn’t believe that the bill would go through as even if it did get to the senate itself he believes that a filibuster would prevent the bill from ever getting any further.

This gun ban which was made by Dianne Feinstein was an attempt to ban semi-automatic weaponry and ‘assault’ style weapons, or any weapons that is modeled after military style weaponry, from the public. This ban in the bill has been a very controversial one that even with the recent shootings it is still believed to only get as many as 40 votes. This is mainly due to the many supporters of public arms found in the Republican and Democratic parties and even in the National Rifle Association. This ban, while of great focus to many people both in the governmental system and in the public, isn’t the only ban that was proposed in the bill that is trying to get passed.

In the bill several other measures were put in too that are actually quite good including strengthening of background checks with weapons purchasers, greater restrictions of gun trafficking, and attempts to improve school safety measures. These measures are all part of this bill and, while great by themselves, are being hindered by the attempt at assault weapons banning. In response to this action Mr. Reid split the bill into separate parts, but was only allowing one to get voted on in the congress and potentially the senate. This segment of the bill was the one to attempt to ban ‘assault’ style weaponry.

This package was first approved and came out on March 14^th 2013 after a heated debate and even after getting through that challenge many people still believe that this package wouldn’t be able to get passed. This point was even further debated when Senator Ted Cruz happened to retaliate back at the supporters of this package acting as a filebuster stating that they should focus on actual statistics and making constitutional bills instead of making a bill based on their emotional response to the recent shooting. Even after that point Mr. Cruz went even further onto the counter-topic and asked Ms. Feinstein if she and the other supports of the package thought that it was potentially possible for the first amendment to be potentially limited like the second amendment would be limited where Ms. Feinstein simply responded to it with, “I’m not a sixth grader.” This remark of hers, while focusing on her passion behind the idea of the bill, did not end up answering Mr. Cruz’s question in the end and ended up pushing it further to the side.