Gun Control

A dozen lawmakers, including several Philadelphians, are hoping new public attitudes against guns - and the voices of Pennsylvania victims - can help win gun control in a Legislature with a pro-gun history. Reps. Dwight Evans, Andrew Carn, Babette Josephs and Sen. Allyson Schwartz, all Philadelphia Democrats, were among lawmakers yesterday announcing formation of the "Common Sense Firearms Safety Caucus. " They said recent school gun violence in Colorado and Georgia and a new state poll on gun safety provides the timing and the right atmosphere to adopt "sensible, rational" gun control.

U.S. Rep. Tom Ridge, the Republican-endorsed candidate for governor, is caught in a crossfire over an apparent flip-flop on gun control. Ridge last month said that if elected he'd sign legislation wiping out assault weapons bans in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. "I would sign this bill . . . I may be standing alone but I've always been an independent thinker," Ridge said after the state House passed a bill to erase local gun bans. The bill is in the Senate. Now, he says, he'll seek legislation to ban such weapons.

Beyond the noise and crowds of the cities, past the green lawns and shopping malls of the suburbs, lies Pennsylvania's vast heartland: millions of acres of fields and forest filled with game - and hunters. Lots and lots of hunters. For years, these hunters and the groups that speak for them have exerted considerable political influence in the state, enforcing on statewide candidates this unwritten rule: Thou shalt not favor any form of gun control. This year, for the first time in many years, there is a candidate who has violated that rule.

The National Rifle Association (NRA) is losing its aura of invincibility. In just the past week, the legislatures in New Jersey and Virginia withstood heavy pressure from the gun lobby and advanced, albeit narrowly, the cause of gun control. Perhaps more significantly, President Clinton seems ready to take leadership on this issue. Mr. Clinton, an avid supporter of the Brady Bill's five-day waiting period for gun purchases, used a visit to New Jersey Monday to applaud both Gov. Florio and Virginia Gov. L. Douglas Wilder for championing gun control on the state level.

The Republican ticket of George Bush and Dan Quayle has been drawing cheers from pro-gun crowds in the rural Midwest and Texas by painting Democratic nominee Michael S. Dukakis as an ardent anti-gun liberal. Dukakis' staffers decry the GOP's efforts as a distortion and contend that his true positions should satisfy most people. In fact, both candidates now say that primary responsibility for gun control should rest with state and local authorities. But even Democratic loyalists say that Dukakis may have underestimated both how emotional the gun-control issue is in rural America and its potential for demagoguery.

President Bush, in the aftermath of the latest school shooting, did not make a new call for gun control. Instead, he focused on the heart of the matter. "All adults in society can teach children right from wrong, can explain that life is precious," he said. The media seemed almost disappointed. The last line of an Associated Press story read: "President Clinton used a rash of school shootings during his term to call for stiffer gun-control laws. Bush did not mention the issue.

The face of the gun-control debate changed dramatically last week when President Bush suddenly went from the most prominent and powerful member of the National Rifle Association to - in the NRA's mind - just another misguided gun-control advocate. When the Bush administration first announced a temporary ban on the importation of assault weapons three weeks ago, the usually boisterous NRA held its tongue, saying only that it understood the need to vent emotions over drug-related violence and that it trusted Bush's campaign pledges opposing gun control.

Three gun-control bills now in the Pennsylvania legislature would close loopholes surrounding the illegal purchase, sale, and possession of firearms. They were described yesterday at a news conference at Philadelphia Police Headquarters by State Sen. Larry Farnese (D., Phila.), who introduced the legislation in February. He was joined by District Attorney Lynne M. Abraham, Deputy Police Commissioner Richard Ross, State Sen. LeAnna Washington (D., Phila.-Montgomery), and State Rep. Kenyatta Johnson (D., Phila.

Is gun control an infringement of our constitutional right or an attempt to save our right to live in a safe society? When our Founding Fathers wrote "the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed," they were addressing conditions of their day. In 1787, in a newly born nation, there were no "drive-by shootings" or deranged individuals spraying bullets into crowds; no "Saturday-night specials" or semi-automatics. These great minds were writing this Second Amendment to the Constitution based on the state of society at that time, and with the primary intent to protect the people from an over-powerful government, not to pit the violent against the peaceful, the immoral minority against the moral majority, or the strong against the weak.

Christopher Demby . . . Angel Rodriquez . . . Derrick Butts . . . Marcus Yates . . . At 20th and Tasker streets, in Point Breeze, above a small lot filled with trash and poison ivy, rises a wall of names, painted in memory of children who have died violently in recent years. Standing below the 45 names yesterday, a coalition of youths, community advocates, religious leaders and politicians called for passage of a City Council bill that would ban some of the weapons that killed those children.