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JFK assassination sowed seeds of failure for gun-control efforts [View all]
JFK assassination sowed seeds of failure for gun-control efforts
CHICAGO _ When a couple armed with assault rifles slaughtered 14 people at a holiday gathering in San Bernardino, California, this month, U.S. gun control advocates saw an opportunity. President Barack Obama lamented that "in America it's way too easy for dangerous people to get their hands on a gun" and said making it harder was the only right response.
Within a day, the Republican-controlled Senate rejected an expansion of background checks for gun buyers and defeated a law barring individuals on the terror watch list from purchasing firearms. Before the Christmas break, an effort to lift a 17- year-old ban on nearly all government research into gun violence was also defeated.
The origins of this familiar impasse lie in a congressional battle nearly five decades ago following some of the most traumatic political assassinations in the country's history: a president, his brother and two civil rights leaders. The White House pushed -- and failed -- to require that guns be licensed and gun owners registered right after the killings of Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert Kennedy in 1968.
"The template was established in the 1960s," said Joseph Califano, chief domestic affairs adviser to President Lyndon Johnson. "With all the clout we had, we couldn't do it."
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/sns-wp-blm-guns-4832d1f2-a97b-11e5-b596-113f59ee069a-20151226-story.htmlCHICAGO _ When a couple armed with assault rifles slaughtered 14 people at a holiday gathering in San Bernardino, California, this month, U.S. gun control advocates saw an opportunity. President Barack Obama lamented that "in America it's way too easy for dangerous people to get their hands on a gun" and said making it harder was the only right response.
Within a day, the Republican-controlled Senate rejected an expansion of background checks for gun buyers and defeated a law barring individuals on the terror watch list from purchasing firearms. Before the Christmas break, an effort to lift a 17- year-old ban on nearly all government research into gun violence was also defeated.
The origins of this familiar impasse lie in a congressional battle nearly five decades ago following some of the most traumatic political assassinations in the country's history: a president, his brother and two civil rights leaders. The White House pushed -- and failed -- to require that guns be licensed and gun owners registered right after the killings of Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert Kennedy in 1968.
"The template was established in the 1960s," said Joseph Califano, chief domestic affairs adviser to President Lyndon Johnson. "With all the clout we had, we couldn't do it."
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