Letter to the editor:

Fewer shots for fewer shootings

Wed, Feb 28, 2018 (2 a.m.)

In the wake of the horrendous Oct. 1 slaughter here in Las Vegas, there was a predictable call for gun control, but Congress could not even manage to regulate bump stocks. Clearly, politicians are not going to easily separate Americans from their firearms. Now, the Florida school shooting comes along, with at least 17 more innocent children and teachers dead.

People are too ready to use firearms to settle disputes. Seems to me that when a person is holding an auto-loading gun, (like the common 9 mm Glock 17 holding 17 rounds, or the popular magazine-fed AR-15 autoloading rifle), the large number of rounds available makes it easier to decide to shoot than if there were only, say, five rounds available.

I would like to propose a ban on the sale of autoloading weapons for the police and the public. Firearms could be purchased back by gun sellers and destroyed at public expense. Use of an autoloading weapon outside one’s own property should carry a significant penalty.

Our founders could not possibly have imagined the deadly weapons available today, and limiting the possession and use of firearms to five-shot revolvers and five-round bolt action rifles keeps with the wording and intent of the Second Amendment.

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