#32


NEAL KNOX REPORT

                     SEMI-AUTO HEARINGS HELD
                          By NEAL KNOX
        Washington, D.C. (Feb. 10) -- Sen. Howard Metzenbaum's (D-
OH), S. 386 (which will described in detail in our next column)
[x]would treat "assault weapons" the same as machine guns,[xx]
including a freeze on new guns and registration of presently
owned guns under the same procedures as machine guns.

     "Assault Weapon" is defined as [x]"any semi-automatic
firearm ... or a box or drum magazine ... which holds more than

ten rounds of ammunition[xx]," or [x]any shotgun or tubular
magazine .22 rimfire semi-auto with a capacity exceeding six
rounds.[xx]

     We did not receive a complete copy of the bill until after
our testimony for today's Senate hearing had to be turned in to
the Judiciary Committee.  The following is my oral statement.
                               ---
        Mr. Chairman, in my five minutes I will attempt to convey
what we think of this bill -- and what we [x]feel[xx] about this

bill -- and the similar bills that are being proposed across the

nation.

        Once again the advocates of firearms prohibition are using
the emotional outpouring following a tragedy to propose
legislation which would not have prevented such tragedy.

        Once again the stated objective -- this time a ban on
"assault rifles" -- is an undefinable term like "Saturday Night
Special" which the drafters use to confuse the public while
attempting to ban as many firearms as they possibly can.

        Once again the failures of the criminal justice system, the

failures of existing firearms laws -- and the certain failure of

the proposed law -- are ignored.

        Once again the Constitution of the United States would be
shredded and trampled by those who claim to be concerned about
civil liberties.

        Some of the witnesses today can see only the bloody bodies
of those innocent children in Stockton -- and every one of us
shares the grief of those who loved them.

        But Mr. Chairman, in the past couple of weeks I have also
been hearing from people who witnessed the bloody bodies of
American soldiers in Vietnam, in Korea, on Iwo Jima and in
France.  They fought with the U.S. service rifles that bills like

this one would now prohibit.  And they are angry.

        Each of them told me that they risked their lives fighting
to preserve this nation -- not the soil on which we stand; not
this Capitol; not the President nor the Congress; but they fought

and risked their lives, and saw their friends die, for the
fundamental rights shared by every American, and in the hope of
preserving and passing on those rights to their children and
their children's children.

        To them, and to me, [x]not one of our civil liberties is
more important[xx] than the right to keep and bear arms.

        Sir William Blackstone, who codified the English Common Law

on which our law is based, described the right to bear arms as
one of the fundamental rights of Englishmen.  The common man of
America inherently understands that this ancient common law right

is his right.

        That right is the insurance policy that the founders of this

nation provided to guarantee the rest of our civil liberties.

        The beauty of the Thomas Jefferson and James Madison freedom

insurance plan is that [x]so long as the right exists, it is not

needed.[xx]

        In 1833 Justice Story described the right to keep and bear
arms as the palladium, the guardian, of all our other liberties,

calling it "a strong moral check against the usurpation and
arbitrary powers of rulers."

        In 1859 the Texas Supreme Court put it more bluntly:  "The
people cannot be effectually oppressed and enslaved, [x]who are
not first disarmed[xx]."

        Before the Civil War a slave could be put to death for
laying his hands on a gun.  Slave owners were subject to heavy
fines for allowing Blacks to learn how to use a gun.

        In 1857 the U.S. Supreme Court declared that freed slave
Dred Scott could not have the full rights of American citizenship

-- for that would allow freed slaves to possess guns and attend
political meetings.

        Will we be enslaved if this bill passes?  Probably not.
Probably not while I'm alive.

        But [x]we cannot be enslaved[xx] if this bill -- and bills
like it -- are defeated.

        Mr. Chairman, I see those five bodies on the Stockton
schoolyard.  Those children died pointlessly and tragically, but

this bill won't bring them back.

        I also see those thousands of bodies spread from Bunker Hill

to Bastogne, from Porkchop Hill to Pleiku.  They, too, died
tragically.  But [x]they didn't die pointlessly.  They died for
the right that I came here today to defend.[xx]


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