davidl@tekig.UUCP (David Levadie) (01/04/85)
As long as we're going to fling statistics around...
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>From an article in Wall Street Journal by Don B. Kates, Jr, a San Francisco
civil-liberties lawyer.
District of Columbia police were sued because somehow both "911" calls two
women had made to report that their house had been broken into and their
downstairs roomate was being raped got lost in the shuffle. The court
determined that for the next 14 hours all three were held captive, robbed
and sexually tormented.
...
...the court reiterates the universal and "fundamental principle of
American law that a government and its agents are under no general duty
to provide public services, such as police protection to any particular
citizen."
In lieu of a right to police protection, the District safeguards its
citizens by forbidding them to buy handguns or keep any gun to protect
home or business.
...
In the five years before the ban went into effect in 1977, homicide in
the District dropped almost 36%. But in the five subsequent years it
rose 16% (while decreasing 9% in neighboring Virginia - which has no such
law).
...
Faced with a drastic increase in rape, Florida police in Orlando instituted
a highly publicized program in 1966 in which 3,000 women received handgun
defense training. Rape statistics were down 90% by 1967, while aggravated
assault dropped 25% and burglary fell 24%. Although rape began to increase
again when the one-year program ended, even five years later it was still
13% below the 1966 figure. In the same period, rape in the surrounding
area had increased 308%. When a defensive firearms program for Detroit
grocers received wide publicity from the police chief's denunciations
and the shooting of seven robbers, grocery robberies dropped 90%.
...
...recall the Atlanta suburb that reacted to the Morton Grove, Ill. handgun
ban by requiring every sane, responsible head of household to keep a firearm.
Compared to the preceding year, burglary rose slightly in Morton Grove but
fell 73% in the Atlanta suburb.
...
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OH YEAH... by the way, NOBODY has yet been able to explain to me why I
should have to give up ANYTHING because of somebody ELSE's incompetence -
or why I should consider allowing the State to "protect" me from my
own incompetence, if any. I guess it must just not be convenient for
liberal socialist types to discuss such issues... I mean, after all, the
rights of the individual are ALWAYS subordinate to those of the "people"
(read: socialist government) - right?