Gun control opponents can be counted on to cite violence such as the horrific mass shooting in downtown Sacramento last weekend as evidence that gun laws don’t work. California has more gun laws than any other state, the argument goes, so every shooting within its borders undermines the entire enterprise of firearm regulation.
This is nonsense. The correlation between the availability of guns and the incidence of gun violence is as strong as common sense would predict. Laws that make guns less accessible therefore tend to diminish the likelihood that people will be hurt and killed by them. Gun violence, in short, is a policy problem, and local, state and national policymakers can still do more to prevent shootings.
A study of gun violence led by Stanford researchers, published this week in the Annals of Internal Medicine, underscored the strong association between the presence of firearms and their misuse, finding that Californians living with handgun owners were nearly three times as likely to be killed with a gun. The researchers also noted that one in three American homes contains a firearm, “a far higher level of private ownership than in any other country,” figures augmented by a surge in gun purchases during the pandemic.
Mass shootings such as the two the Sacramento region has suffered in just over a month periodically focus attention on the problem partly because gun violence is so routine. Through the first two months of this year, Sacramento police recorded 122 shootings and 30 gunshot victims — about one every two days. Despite the rising incidence of mass shootings, they accounted for only about 1% of the more than 45,000 firearm-related deaths nationwide in 2020.
The national prevalence of guns and laissez-faire laws only limit California’s power to reduce violence. With some of the strictest firearms regulations in the country, Californians are 37% less likely than the average American to be killed with a gun. A resident of Wyoming, which has among the nation’s laxest laws, is about three times more likely to die by a bullet. But Californians are still substantially more likely to die by gunfire than New Yorkers and New Jerseyans, for example, which shows state policymakers can do more.
The Legislature and Gov. Gavin Newsom ramped up one-time spending on community violence prevention programs last year, but they could provide much more funding on a continuing basis with an excise tax on guns and ammunition. A gun tax would have the additional benefit of making weapons more expensive and using a portion of the revenue from gun sales to address their societal costs. Unfortunately, the Legislature failed to pass Bay Area Assemblyman Marc Levine’s bill to impose such a tax in June.
The state could put up additional barriers to firearm access with bills to enable state and local governments as well as individual Californians to sue gun manufacturers for the harm caused by their weapons; crack down on more of the components of so-called ghost guns, which are designed to evade regulation; and ban gun shows from public property.
It’s also clear that in some cases, California’s gun regulations have outpaced its ability to enforce them effectively, particularly with respect to confiscating weapons from those not allowed to own them. The man who killed his three daughters and a chaperone at a Sacramento area church in February was under a restraining order that should have prevented him from possessing a firearm.
Much more could be done at the national level if not for a U.S. Senate and Supreme Court that over-represent pro-gun forces. Enacting and enforcing gun laws at the state and local levels can nevertheless bolster California’s relative safety in a violent country.
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