The Truth About Dianne Feinstein’s ‘Assault Weapons Ban’
It will be hidden by the usual suspects in the Democrat Party and mainstream media.
Democrats are remembering Dianne Feinstein, the U.S. senator from California who died at age 90 last night, for her amendment, to then-Sen. Joe Biden’s 1994 crime bill, “banning” AR-15s and other “assault weapons” from Sept. 13, 1994 until the same date 10 years later. Reportedly, Feinstein’s biography lists the “ban” as one of her “most notable achievements.”
The facts beg to differ.
When Feinstein’s “ban” took effect, Americans owned fewer than a half million AR-15s. During the 10 years the “ban” was in effect, Americans bought another 736,000 or so. That was for three reasons:
First, guns already owned were exempt. The “ban” applied to only the manufacture of new guns. Feinstein said, “If I could have gotten 51 votes in the Senate of the United States for an outright ban, picking up every one of them, Mr. and Mrs. America turn them all in, I would have done it.” But, she said, “I could not do that. The votes weren’t there.”
Second, in the five months between when the “ban” was imposed by a Democrat Congress and signed into law by Democrat Pres. Bill Clinton, and when it took effect, manufacturers increased production so they’d have inventory of exempt guns to sell thereafter.
Third, the “ban” allowed the “banned” guns to be manufactured in slightly modified form.
Here’s an AR-15 as manufactured before the “ban.”
Here’s an AR-15 manufactured while the “ban” was in effect.
The difference? The second rifle doesn’t have a flash suppressor or bayonet lug, features that have nothing to do with how the rifle works.
Even anti-gunners ridiculed the “ban”
Feinstein’s “ban” was so anemic that the gun-prohibition activist group Brady Campaign complained that “Only semi-automatic guns with multiple assault weapon features are banned” and “assault weapon manufacturers here and abroad have responded by cosmetically altering several of their best-selling weapons and putting them back on the market.”
Another such group, the Violence Policy Center, said “most of these weapons are now sold in post-ban models virtually identical to the guns Congress sought to ban.” It called Feinstein’s legislation “flawed,” “a ban in name only,” a “fictional ban,” and a “charade.” (Which is why legislation anti-gunners have introduced in Congress ever since has proposed a much more severe ban.)
And in a 1995 CBS 60 Minutes segment titled “What Assault Weapons Ban?” reporter Leslie Stahl said “Assault weapons are still . . . . sold by the thousands.” Calling 1994 “the best year for the sales of assault weapons ever,” Stahl said that Clinton’s claim that the ban reduced the number of “assault weapons” was “a good applause line.”
After Feinstein’s “ban” expired, Americans began buying AR-15s at an even greater rate. Today, they own so many—estimates are well over 20 million—one is reminded of the statement often attributed to the late Sen. Everett Dirksen, to the effect that once you’re talking about money in the billions of dollars, pinpointing the exact number of dollars becomes pointless.
That’s important, because the Supreme Court ruled in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) that guns “in common use” cannot be banned (a proposition for which there is no legitimate support, but that’s another story).
Also, in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen (2022), the Court ruled that outlier gun restrictions are unconstitutional. That’s important because guns that disarmament activists call “assault weapons” have been around since at least the 1940s, Feinstein’s “ban” was in effect for only 10 years during the subsequent 80 years (and counting), only a handful of states have bans (some of which are much more severe than Feinstein’s), and the first of those bans was imposed in 1989.
Furthermore, in U.S. v. Miller (1939), the Court—closer to the truth than it was in Heller—recognized the right to arms that have “a reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia,” such as those that are “ordinary military equipment” (AR-15s are the semi-automatic-only variants of the military M16) and any others the use of which “could contribute to the common defense.”
Those descriptions certainly apply to AR-15s and similar firearms, and Feinstein and other activists working for incremental civilian disarmament have said as much, by repeatedly referring to them as “weapons of war.”
As for Feinstein herself, in the 1970s she carried a handgun for protection. But in 1982, as mayor of San Francisco, she campaigned for a ban on handguns. She didn’t care that the ban violated the state’s law prohibiting local jurisdictions from imposing gun restrictions more restrictive than provided for by state law. Fortunately, a court cared and the ban was struck down.
Similarly, when campaigning for her “assault weapon” legislation, ranting about “weapons of mass destruction” that “don’t belong in civilian hands,” Feinstein knew that the guns she wanted to ban were rarely used in crime. The California Department of Justice had concluded that “the use of ‘assault weapons’ (in crime) is very much lower than is represented in the media and in political statements” and “assault weapons play a very small role in assault and homicide cases submitted to city and county (forensics) labs,” but it said that “Information on assault weapons would not be sought from forensics laboratories as it was unlikely to support the theses on which [“assault weapon” ban] legislation would be based.”
And when Los Angeles Police Academy personnel told Feinstein that the guns she wanted to ban were rarely used in crime, she waved that information off, as inconvenient for what she had in mind.
Before Feinstein’s “ban” expired, a study mandated by Congress concluded that “the banned weapons and magazines were never used in more than a modest fraction of all gun murders.” For those and Second Amendment reasons, in 2004 a Congress more honest than Feinstein or the Congress that did her bidding in 1994 refused to extend her “ban” beyond its 10-year limit.
Thereafter, as noted, ownership of AR-15s soared. And within 10 years, the nation’s murder rate was cut in half, to an all-time low.
Predictably, Biden today said of Feinstein “There’s no better example of her skillful legislating and sheer force of will than when she turned passion into purpose, and led the fight to ban assault weapons.”
Except that she didn’t. Americans own about 50 times as many ARs as when she started trying to ban them.
© 2023 Mark Overstreet