As the liberals repeat their mantra that gun control is the answer to violence, Americans need to ask, “How has that been working elsewhere?” Take the United Kingdom as an example. England, after all, is often held up as a shining example of good governance when it comes to gun control. But, surprise, the United Kingdom has posted an increasing number of homicides.
In the year ending in March 2018, the last year for which statistics were available, 726 murders were reported—a 3% increase from the previous year. And, not surprisingly, a large number of those killings—285 (almost 40%)—were committed through the use of knives.
The United Kingdom has generally seen a climb in all knife incidents, with the number of police responses to knife incidents reaching more than 44,000 in 2019—a 15-year high.
The trend indicates a couple of things. First, if someone is bent on killing another person, the attacker will find a tool for the task. Second, restricting access to guns does not get to the root of the problem: that people are inherently capable of committing violent crimes.
In the U.K., it would seem that there is little fear of consequences as only a small number of infractions ever make it to court. That’s right, of the 44,076 knifing incidents, fewer than 8% of those cases resulted in legal charges.
This situation seems to mirror shortcomings in the U.S. justice system when the courts often fail to adequately punish people for criminal infractions and those sentenced for gun crimes often receive far less time in prison than the maximum prison sentences. The United States already has thousands of gun-control laws on the books at all levels, and some of those are just overlooked in big-city courtrooms and police stations. For example, federal law stipulates that a straw purchaser be sentenced to 10 years in prison and fined $250,000.
But here are some actual results from Chicago, a city run by liberals for decades:
A Chicago man was sentenced to 30 months for illegally buying 25 firearms over a one-year period. Also a Chicago woman facing charges of buying guns for prohibited persons was sentenced to probation.
And the people who actually use guns during the commission of crimes against persons get similarly light sentences in many cases.
Rather than focusing on making it more difficult for law-abiding citizens to buy firearms for sport or protection, the liberals need to realize that a tough-on-crime approach is a far more effective way to make people think twice about using a firearm illegally. We’ve seen it work during Project Exile in Virginia; we can employ a similar strategy across the nation if we want to combat violence.
