A Cynical Grab For Undeserved Money Targeting Freedom Cities Are Abusing The Legal Process.

Fri., Jan. 8, 1999

By D.F. Oliveria daveo@spokesman.com (509) 319-0354

Fresh from sticking up the tobacco industry and picking the pockets of low-income smokers, public officials now are aiming at handgun manufacturers - and the Second Amendment, of course.

Dozens of U.S. cities are considering lawsuits, seeking to hold manufacturers responsible for the cost of violent crime. New Orleans and Chicago led the way last fall by filing suit. Boston, San Francisco, Bridgeport, Conn., and Miami-Dade are in the wings.

The goal isn’t necessarily to win, although the tax spenders were inspired by the $246 billion settlement the states wrung from the tobacco industry. Rather, city officials want to gut-shoot gun manufacturers by suing them into bankruptcy.

This attempt to injure an industry producing a legal product is constitutionally dangerous - and cynical.

Forces guiding this gun control-by-fiat push refuse to hold individual criminals accountable for the misuse of firearms. They ignore the wisdom of the National Rifle Association slogan: “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people.” Rather than deny law-abiding Americans the right to bear handguns for protection and sports pleasure, anti-gun lobbyists should attack the root causes of gun accidents and violence: criminality, gangs, domestic disputes, inadequate firearms training.

The shotgun approach in the cities’ lawsuits is revealing. Their strategy calls for attacking gun makers in numerous places on various issues, hoping something will stick.

The cities can’t use the same argument the states did in their tobacco suits - that manufacturers misled consumers about the danger and addiction of their product. Everyone knows a gun is dangerous, whether it’s in the hands of a hunter, a bank robber or a citizen defending his home and family.

The tobacco settlement showed revenue-hungry officials how to tap industry to fund their social programs. Now, the gun industry is in the crosshairs. Automobile makers are sure to follow. Why blame drunken drivers for maiming and killing when those who make their vehicles have deeper pockets? The fast food industry, with its artery-clogging menus, should worry, too.

As should we all, when abusive lawsuits take aim at freedom.

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