-Caveat Lector-
Finally!
An article about the school shootings with some 'common sense'
behind it. Now, we might get somewhere.
http://www.trib.com/HOMENEWS/WASH/GunControl.html
>>
School shooting victims' relatives disagree on blame
By LAURIE KELLMAN
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) - Two parents who share grief over their children's murders
at the hands of classmates disagree on whether the shooters, guns or
lawmakers themselves are to blame for their tragedies.
The April 20 murder of Columbine High School student Rachel Joy Scott, 17,
should be blamed solely on Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, her father says.
"There are people behind those instruments of death," Darrell Scott told the
House Judiciary subcommittee on crime during a hearing Thursday. "I do
believe Eric and Dylan bear primary responsibility for my daughter's death,
not the guns themselves."
But Byrl Phillips-Taylor of Richmond, Va., blamed an AK-47 for her son's
1989 death at the hands of a "classmate with a grudge."
"The easy availability of guns got my baby killed," Phillips-Taylor told the
panel, urging lawmakers to pass the mandatory background checks for gun show
transactions and other new firearms restrictions voted by the Senate last
week.
"The Senate has demonstrated that it cares about keeping guns away from
children," she said. "And that may be the turning point that every mother
like me has been waiting for."
House Republican leaders this week said they support the concept of the gun
restrictions passed by the Senate, but they rejected demands from Democrats
to rubber-stamp the measures this week.
Judiciary Committee Chairman Henry Hyde, R-Ill., who has co-authored gun
control bills in the past, said careful consideration of the legislation
next month would ensure that new controls would not infringe on the Second
Amendment right to bear arms.
Republicans at the hearing Thursday criticized the Clinton administration
for failing to prosecute violators of existing firearms laws while pushing
for more gun restrictions.
Rep. Bob Barr, R-Ga., suggested that if the Ten Commandments had been posted
at high schools where the shootings occurred, "we would not have had the
tragedies that bring us here today."
Replied Deputy Attorney General Eric Holder Jr.: "If the young people and
adult criminals who committed these crimes had a tougher time getting their
hands on guns, these horrible crimes might have been prevented."
Vice President Al Gore, who broke a 50-50 Senate tie last week in favor of
the new gun show restrictions, returned to the Capitol to accuse House
Republicans of trying to please the National Rifle Association.
"At this very moment, there are some of the other side meeting behind closed
doors plotting to have more delays in order to preserve loopholes" in
firearms laws, he said.
NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre told the House subcommittee that
the Senate bill was a "red tape nightmare."
"Basically it would extend the reaches of the federal government into the
homes of this country," LaPierre said.
He said the NRA supports mandatory gun show background checks and other
concepts in the Senate bill, but not as it is written. For example, he said,
the Senate would consider "your uncle's skeet-shooting range" a gun show
subject to government regulation.
Scott, testifying at the request of committee Republicans, supported
LaPierre's complaint that some gun control advocates were seeking to put the
blame for the shootings at the NRA's doorstep.
"I don't believe that they are responsible for my daughter's death," said
Scott, who said he was not a member of the group and does not own a gun.
Scott also scolded lawmakers about their eagerness to pass more laws despite
the cultural causes behind school shootings. "Political posturing and
restrictive legislation are not the answers," he said.<<
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