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Gun Fight at the Bridgeport Corral
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Business New Haven
1/11/1999
By: BNH
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At what we imagine was probably around high noon on December 30, Bridgeport Mayor Joseph Ganim sent a letter offering 14 gun manufacturers a “last chance.”
Hizzoner wasn't telling them to get out of town by sundown (the closest handgun manufacturer to the Park City, Sturm Ruger & Co., is one town line away over in Fairfield). Ganim instead was telling them either to settle up or face a lawsuit seeking $100 million for his city.
In addition to the damages that the mayor claims the gun manufacturers have visited on the city, he wants the industry to install safety devices that he believes could sharply curtail the unauthorized or accidental discharge of firearms.
Ganim's lawsuit follows others, including one by officials in New Orleans (a city few outside its borders would likely regard as terribly serious about law or order). Another lawsuit with similar claims has just gone to trial in New York, in which the plaintiff's attorney, representing the mother of a shooting victim, said the case is about “accepting responsibility.” We couldn't agree more.
Seeking to blame gun manufacturers for handgun deaths is a little much for us to take, however. Our interest - to be clear - is not about the Second Amendment to the U.S. constitution. To the contrary. Gun ownership - especially handgun ownership - is and ought to be tightly regulated. If Mayor Ganim was interested in pursuing that avenue, we would back him enthusiastically.
Here in Connecticut an election season recently came and went, and neither Ganim nor his party seriously raised the issue of controlling handguns during the campaign season. If the issue is about “accepting responsibility,” the electoral and legislative processes would seem to us to be a logical place to begin.
Many would like to compare this effort against gun manufacturers to the multi-billion-dollar tobacco industry settlement with 37 states. But that comparison doesn't hold water. Indeed, government has demonstrated its own responsibility in limiting crime and handgun violence, and cities such as New York, Bridgeport and New Haven have significantly reduced crime rates to prove it. But more can be done.
Where was the hue and cry from Ganim and others when Connecticut's legislators helped to refinance Colt Arms in Hartford or U.S. Repeating Arms in New Haven? Connecticut is home to (and was in part built by) several historic gun manufacturers. While that is no reason to protect them, it is a reason to respect them.
If we are willing to accept the concept that it is the gun makers that are responsible for gun violence, than why aren't the auto makers responsible for stolen cars or drunken driving deaths? More than 3,000 autos are stolen each year in Bridgeport; many end up being involved in other crimes as well. The technology exists to assure that cars are never stolen, or for that matter involved in drunken driving deaths, which number more than 25,000 nationally each year.
Some have accused Mayor Ganim of grandstanding. Instead, we believe he as succumbed to a new variation of the “welfare mentality,” by which responsibility is really something that others are supposed to do. Mayors of cities like Bridgeport and New Haven need to concentrate on building better schools, neighborhoods and fighting crime - not waging ideological or legal warfare.
We hope Mayor Ganim and his counterpart in New Haven (Mayor John DeStefano Jr. has been asked to join in the lawsuit, and city Corporation Counsel Thayer S. Bladwin has indicated that the city intends to take the matter seriously) will take their fingers off the trigger and back out of this particular O.K. Corral.
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