COLUMN RIGHT : Gun Bans Won’t Stop the Gunman : Plenty of legal firepower will still be available even if Congress outlaws “assault weapons.”

Few things are more frightening than a lone madman with a gun. He can strike at any time, in any place, for any reason--or for no intelligible reason at all. He seems more like an impersonal, unpredictable force of nature than an individual whose actions we can understand and explain. Hence the horror evoked by the massacre in Jacksonville, Fla., two weeks ago.

But while sympathy for the victims and uneasiness about our own vulnerability are perfectly natural, these emotions do not constitute an argument. In particular, they cannot properly support the case for a federal ban on “assault weapons.” Yet gun-control advocates nevertheless are using the reaction to the Jacksonville massacre for just that purpose.

They will point out that a measure approved in May by the U.S. Senate would prohibit the manufacture and sale of the kind of semi-automatic rifle that James E. Pough used to murder eight people in a Jacksonville office building. The ban, part of a comprehensive anti-crime package, would also cover three other types of domestically produced guns and five kinds of imported weapons.

The implicit message of the gun-control lobby is that had such a ban been in place, none of us would have heard of Pough, and eight innocent people--together with two others he is believed to have killed earlier--would still be alive. Certainly that was the idea behind California’s ban of seven “assault weapons,” enacted after Patrick Purdy’s attack on a Stockton schoolyard last year. That massacre, in which five people were killed, also sparked a New Jersey ban along with the proposed federal legislation.

Yet the Jacksonville and Stockton massacres cast serious doubt on the notion that gun-control laws can prevent rampages by armed lunatics. Gun-control advocates say that tougher, more effective laws are the answer. But they are pushing a purely symbolic ban on a few selected models of guns that look menacing but are no more dangerous than a host of weapons that would remain legal. According to Handgun Control Inc., “assault weapons” are guns that have military-style features such as pistol grips, folding stocks, bayonet mounts and large magazines. Yet a variety of such weapons--including the Springfield Armory SAR-48, the Sterling Mark 7 pistol and the Mossberg Model 500 Bullpup 12 shotgun--would not be covered by the proposed federal ban.

More important, the characteristics distinguishing “assault weapons” from other guns have little to do with the damage they are capable of inflicting. Semi-automatic hunting rifles can fire larger bullets at the same rate as the .30-caliber weapon that Pough used in Jacksonville.

“Someone who is that sick and that crazy is certainly going to find another way,” Handgun Control Inc. spokesperson Gwen Fitzgerald acknowledged. “(Purdy) probably could have done a lot of damage with a hunting rifle.” Yet Handgun Control Inc. insists it is not out to ban guns used for “legitimate” self-defense or sporting purposes. If so, the organization’s efforts are certainly futile.

Of course, it’s not clear that a more comprehensive gun ban would have much of an impact on crime, either. Although it is in one sense tautological, the National Rifle Assn. warning, “If guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns” makes a less obvious point as well: While the occasional murderer, such as Pough or Purdy, may buy his weapons at the local gun shop, most criminals can readily find other sources.

Another frequently ridiculed NRA slogan--”Guns don’t kill people; people kill people”--also reflects an important truth. A gun in itself is not a threat. Possession of a weapon violates no one’s rights.

And then there is that pesky Second Amendment. Try as they might, gun-control advocates cannot talk their way out of the Constitution’s straightforward language: “A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.” Gun-control advocates sometimes suggest that the National Guard takes care of the “well-regulated militia” and therefore disposes of the right to bear arms. No plausible reading of the amendment supports that conclusion. On the other hand, some supporters of gun control concede a constitutional right to bear arms but insist that it applies only to weapons that were available when the Bill of Rights was drafted. By the same sort of reasoning, the First Amendment would not cover radio or television.

The unpleasant truth is that there’s very little we can do to stop a James Pough or a Patrick Purdy. Even a careful editing of the Bill of Rights is no guarantee against random violence.