Assault Gun Sales Ban Wins Initial OK in Long Beach

LONG BEACH-The city this week took steps to join the list of Los Angeles County communities that have outlawed the sale of rapid-fire assault weapons in the wake of the schoolyard slayings of five Stockton school children by a gunman firing a semiautomatic AK-47 earlier this year.

Less than a month after two of its committees voted to shelve the proposal, the City Council gave preliminary approval to an ordinance banning the local sale of the military-style guns, increasingly used in drive-by gang shootings that often claim the lives of people who are not gang members.

After listening to more than two hours of testimony from a parade of opponents and proponents, the council voted 8 to 1 in favor of the ban, even while terming it a weak law that does not go as far as those recently adopted in a number of other cities.

Possession Legal

While the ordinance would make it illegal to sell the weapons, it does not outlaw their possession--as do ordinances passed by Los Angeles, Compton, Whittier and Carson.

The chief council proponents of the ban seemed content to restrict the prohibition to sales, a measure more easily enforced and less volatile than one that would require existing gun owners to give up their assault weapons.

Gun owners nonetheless condemned the ban as a dangerous first step toward total gun control. They insisted law-abiding citizens have a right to buy the weapons to protect themselves against criminals and terrorists, and argued that the measure would do nothing to thwart random gang shootings involving semiautomatic weapons.

“In my opinion it is nothing short of idiocy. . . . It can’t possibly work,” said Gene Snyder, one of 30 people who spoke against the ordinance at Tuesday’s council meeting. “It’s an emotional knee-jerk reaction to the publicity in the newspaper.”

To the surprise of council members who were expecting opponents to far outnumber supporters, nearly as many people spoke in favor of the measure as spoke against it.

“It’s certainly a step in the right direction,” said Frank Berry, president of the Long Beach branch of the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People. Berry and others argued that whatever rights people have to buy semiautomatic weapons are outweighed by the right to live in a peaceful environment.

“We recognize when the rights of some should be given more consideration over the rights of others,” said Berry, one of 26 people to testify in favor of the ban.

Councilman Jeffrey A. Kellogg, who cast the only vote against the ordinance, said he was opposing it, not because he favored assault weapons, but because he thought the ban would be ineffective. Statewide legislation is the answer, not a local ordinance, Kellogg insisted.

But Councilman Les Robbins, who last month voted with Kellogg not to draft an anti-assault weapon ordinance, this week voted to approve it.

“The more I thought about it, the more I thought there are a significant majority of people out there, who say, ‘Assault rifles, who needs them?’ ” Robbins said after his vote.

Councilman Thomas J. Clark indicated that the council was probably satisfied just to ban sales--rather than the possession--of military-type weapons because members assumed statewide legislation will soon be enacted, overriding any local bans. “We were making a statement. We feel there’s a good chance this will be moot,” commented Clark, who said the ordinance was “about the weakest you could have” and still show support of a state ban.

The ordinance, which would go into effect 31 days after final approval, makes it a misdemeanor to sell semiautomatic rifles with a detachable magazine capacity of 20 rounds or more, including such guns as the AK-47, Uzi, Colt AR-15 and the Beretta AR-70. The sale of shotguns with a folding stock or magazine capacity of more than six rounds is also forbidden.

City Atty. John R. Calhoun, who drafted the measure, said it was modeled after other cities’ ordinances, making it more likely that the Long Beach law would be affected by court rulings either upholding or overturning the legality of local bans.

While the state has clearly preempted the authority to regulate the licensing and registration of firearms, precluding cities from doing so, Calhoun said state law is considerably murkier when it comes to the regulation of the sales and possession of firearms, leaving the door open for a local ordinance.