An Imperfect Compromise on Assault Rifles

They say a good compromise is one in which nobody gets everything, everybody gets something, and nobody likes it.

How do the disputing parties on the issue of assault rifle massacres find the common ground needed to agree on a means to reduce them?

First they have to agree that the goal of reducing assault rifle massacres has enough merit to persuade everybody to give up something to achieve it, however intransigent they may now feel that their position is.

For reasons they hold dear, the pro-gun lobby feels that assault rifle massacres are a tragic but inevitable consequence of their right to bear arms. (READ MORE: Are Assault Rifles Strictly Weapons of War?)

For reasons they hold dear, the gun control lobby feels that denying law abiding citizens the right to purchase assault rifles is a reasonable forfeiture of rights if it makes just one less massacre inevitable.

So there is common ground, the concept of inevitability.  We all agree that we would like to see assault rifle massacres become less inevitable.

So what can be done to reduce that inevitability, and what must the opposing parties have to concede to achieve it?

Most assault rifle killers are emotionally deformed, unstable, asocial or anti-social, reclusive, and estranged from people who know them.

The people who live around them and know them well know that about them.

What if it took the supporting signatures of five people who knew the purchaser well to be a prerequisite to purchasing an assault rifle?

The five would have to have known the purchaser locally, physically and personally, not on-line, for at least six months.  This provision eliminates the option of procuring the signatures on-line.  In return for their participation, the signers would be exempted from lawsuits of any kind connected in any way to their advocacy for the prospective purchaser.

It is unlikely that the kinds of individuals who kill with assault rifles would be able to find five people who know them well who would be willing to attest to their fitness to purchase, own, and fire an assault rifle.

That should reduce their access to one.  It likely wouldn’t eliminate it completely but it would reduce it. And that should reduce the inevitability of assault rifle massacres, the common goal. (READ MORE: Recalling the Tragic History of Gun Control)

By agreeing to this compromise, the pro-gun lobby would not be giving up its right to bear arms.  It would be agreeing to permit a minimal, lifesaving stewardship of it.

By agreeing to this compromise, the gun control lobby would not see the right to bear arms taken from the people.  But it would see the same minimal, lifesaving stewardship of it.

Would reducing the inevitability of even one assault rifle massacre make this compromise, however imperfect, worthwhile?

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