Gun Violence in the United States 3

In 1972, the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms was created giving them dominion over the enforcement of the Gun Control Act. Previously, called the Department of the Treasury’s Alcohol and Tobacco Tax Division, the word “tax” was replaced with “firearms”. Personnel of the newly restructured bureau nearly doubled in size from when it was known with the previous Agency’s title. ATF is a Division of the Internal Revenue Service.

The Law Enforcement Officers Protection Act and the Firearms Owners’ Protection Act were both legislated in 1986. The first Act mentioned made it illegal for companies that produced ammunition and similar accessories for firearms to import or manufacture armor piercing bullets. These projectiles were termed “cop-killers” on the street. They have the capability to penetrate bulletproof clothing such as Kevlar vests, etc.
The second Act listed protected gun sellers by easing constraints on certain gun sales but imposed further penalties for individuals who used firearms during the commission of a variety of crimes and cracked down on other persons who had previous convictions for burglary or robbery who were engaged in the illegal shipment of firearms.

The 1990 Crime Control Act banned illegal semiautomatic shotguns or rifles from being assembled from parts which were imported through legal means. It also requested the attorney general to develop an approach for launching and examining a plan to enact criminal consequences for having a firearm in a person’s possession or firing a gun of any type within the confines of a school. The plan was also assigned to attempt the creation of school zones that would be drug-free.

1994, the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act was a portion of President Bill Clinton’s crime bill legislated in 1993. Before the bill became law, it was commonly recognized as the Brady bill, titled for White House press secretary James Brady who was seriously injured in the assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan in 1981. On an interim basis, the Act maintained that a five-day waiting period and background check was to be established before a manufacturer, dealer or importer, of licensed firearms would be allowed to deliver or sell a handgun to an unlicensed potential buyer. It also introduced a requirement to set up a new National Instant Criminal Background Check System database that would be operated by the FBI. The waiting period phase of the law was initiated in early 1994, with the background check provision commencing in late 1998. The bill was aggressively opposed by the NRA.

Another act of Congress regarding crime and its enforcement which went into effect in 1994 was the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act. It was the biggest and thickest crime bill in our country’s history at a total of 356 pages. It provided for 100,000 new law enforcement officers, almost ten billion dollars in prison funding and over six billion dollars for prevention programs. The Act was calculated with substantial feedback from proficient police officers and other law enforcement professionals. The bill was originally authored by Senator Joe Biden (D-Del.), sponsored by U.S. Representative Jack Brooks (D-TX.), passed by Congress and ultimately signed into law by President Clinton.

The law was generally acknowledged as the Assault Weapons Ban although only portions of it qualified precisely as that. It banned the possession, manufacture, possession, and importation of large-capacity ammunition magazines as well as new semiautomatic assault weapons for use by civilians. Standards for semiautomatic assault weapons that are included by the ban were conveyed along with a list of nineteen explicit firearms. The new law also prohibited minors from owning, retaining or selling handguns and give authority to the attorney general to appraise anticipated and current state laws relating to juveniles.

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