Today, in response to the UCC shootings, Hillary Clinton resurrected that old chestnut, making gun manufacturers liable for the misuse of their legal product. She would allow the families of murder victims whose killers used a gun to sue the gun manufacturer for damages.
It’s a gun ban by another name, since no manufacturer would be able to afford the liability insurance required to stay in business. And if you think this would end with the manufacture of guns, think again. Gun ranges, gunsmiths, gun retailers (who are federally-licensed) would soon find themselves covered, making the transfer, sale, and repair of firearms effectively illegal.
The proposal is silly on the face of it. Guns can be used for many purposes, almost all of them lawful, safe, and beneficial. Guns are used for self-defense in this country every day. As has been repeatedly mentioned, even as gun ownership has soared, crime rates, including the murder rate by guns, has plummeted.
But as long as we’re at it, let’s understand that while slightly fewer than half murderers use handguns, many use knives or blunt objects such as hammers. If the goal is to reduce actual murder, rather than to simply get guns out of the hands of law-abiding citizens, we should, by logic, allow the families of murder victims whose killers used hammers or steak knives to sue those manufacturers, as well. In 2014, 71 people were murdered by fire. We should then allow those families to sue match manufacturers.
Eighty-nine people were murdered by strangulation. Strangling someone with one’s bare hands is hard; an object is usually used. Clearly, the manufacturers of electrical cord, rope, belts, and other clothing should be liable.
In Israel, Palestinians have recently taken to driving cars into Jews standing at bus stops. Were such a practice to become common here, the auto manufacturers should be held liable, as well.
Obviously, the economy would grind to a halt within minutes of such laws being passed, indeed, long before they actually became law, as retailers and manufacturers scrambled to get out of these suddenly-risky businesses. But in principle, there’s nothing different between holding Ginsu responsible for the murderer who uses its kitchen knife and Glock responsible for the breakdown of social order in Chicago.
Despite having lost the gun control debate, Democrats holding and running for the White House continue to try to make a partisan issue out it. The issue always fades away because the media and the Washington Democrats never learn that this isn’t a partisan issue anymore, with most Americans resisting new gun laws.
There are three former state senators here in Colorado who could remind them, though.
