The Supreme Court and the Truth About Chicago's Handgun Ban

Fox News ^ | March 1, 2010 | John R Lott Jr

[JohnRLott]

In the 2008 “Heller” decision, the Supreme Court struck down Washington, D.C.’s handgun ban and gunlock requirements. Unsurprisingly, gun control advocates predicted disaster. They were wrong. What actually happened in our nation’s capital after the Heller decision ought to be remembered tomorrow as the Supreme Court hears a similar constitutional challenge to the Chicago handgun ban.

When the Heller case was decided, Washington’s Mayor Adrian Fenty warned: "More handguns in the District of Columbia will only lead to more handgun violence." Knowing that Chicago's gun laws would soon face a similar legal challenge, Mayor Richard Daley was particularly vocal. The day that the Heller decision was handed down, Daley said that he and other mayors across the country were "outraged" by the decision and he predicted more deaths along with Wild West-style shootouts. Daley warned that people "are going to take a gun and they are going to end their lives in a family dispute."

But Armageddon never arrived. Quite the contrary, murders in Washington plummeted by an astounding 25 percent in 2009, dropping from 186 murders in 2008 to 140. That translates to a murder rate that is now down to 23.5 per 100,000 people, Washinton’s lowest since 1967. While other cities have also fared well over the last year, D.C.'s drop was several times greater than that for other similar sized cities. According to preliminary estimates by the FBI, nationwide murders fell by a relatively more modest 10 percent last year and by about 8 percent in other similarly sized cities of half a million to one million people (D.C.'s population count is at about 590,000).

This shouldn't be surprising to anyone who has followed how crime rates change after gun bans . . .

[Venturer]

The population of DC is shifting. Many new Urban pioneers are moving in and the locals are being forced to move into PG County in Md. It has more to do with a town that more and more law abiding citizens are moving into than it does with any gun law.

[Condor51]

*** Single fathers should show that care more about their kids by paying child support and spending more time with their kids.” ***

I watch the TV program First 48. A week ago or so, in one episode there was a male Murder *victim* who had.... 13 Children. He got killed in a 'Drug Deal Gone Bad'.

LBJ's Great Society has really done a bang up job for the Black Community hasn't it.₍₁₎

(1) There should be a law against being a 'Liberal and/or Progressive'. Everything they touch turns to sheet. And every Gubmint Program they enact to 'help' is a virtual Death Sentence.

[MrB]

As to your point 1,

there IS a “law” against everything “liberal/progressive”,
it’s called the Constitution.

Actually, the Constitution only forbids the federal gov’t from trying socialist programs,

but at least the damage would be isolated to the state level, and you can escape that.

[PhilCollins]

“Liberal/progressive” is an oxymoron, since liberal ideas don’t cause progress.

[Condor51]

*** As to your point 1, there IS a “law” against everything “liberal/progressive”, it’s called the Constitution. ***

I meant a real law, like in the good old days, when Sedition was outlawed (Alien and Sedition Act)