Washington Voters Reject Tough Gun-Control Initiative

With gun owners and victims’ advocates across the nation watching, the National Rifle Association won a key battle Tuesday as Washington voters shot down a tough gun-control proposal.

With 49 percent of precincts reporting, Initiative 676 was failing 69 percent to 31 percent. It trailed by wide margins in the 27 counties that reported early results, including King County.

In early returns from Spokane County, the measure trailed 81.6 percent to 18.3 percent.

Other initiatives also failed poorly. Voters were defeating:

Initiative 685, which would have made Washington the third state in a year to reject federal drug policy and approve the medical use of marijuana.

Initiative 673, which would have required health plans to cover the services of any provider offering treatment covered by the plan. The campaign pitted managed-care companies against “alternative providers,” largely chiropractors.

Initiative 678, which would have permitted trained hygienists - the people who scrape and clean teeth - to ply their trade independent of dentists. Opponents, mostly dentists, said dental health would suffer.

Initiative 677, a citizen-sponsored plan to guarantee employment protections for gays.

Sponsors of the gun-control measure faced tough odds after the NRA showed up a month ago with more than $2 million and its most visible spokesmen to defeat a measure it viewed as an intrusion on Second Amendment rights.

Tanya Metaksa, the NRA’s top lobbyist in Washington, D.C., said the sound defeat sent a message to gun-control advocates across the country.

“The American people don’t want the government telling them how to mandate safety or responsibility,” she said in a telephone interview from the opposition camp’s election party.

“We energized hundreds of thousands of people who put out 90,000 yard signs, stood on street corners in the rain and were dedicated to making sure the initiative fails. This was truly a grassroots effort,” she added.

Under Initiative 676, most of Washington’s estimated 1 million handgun owners would have had to pass an exam or take an eight-hour safety course to qualify for a $25 safety license. It called for license records that would have formed a database for law enforcement and allowed police to confiscate the guns of those who didn’t comply.

The initiative would have given the Department of Licensing 14 months to implement the program.

The measure also would have required that trigger-locking devices be included with handguns sold or transferred in the state, a concept endorsed by President Clinton and recently adopted by a number of handgun manufacturers. Use of the locks, which range in price from $5 to $90, would not have been required.