Assembly Passes Bill Requiring Course or Test for Gun Buyers

The Assembly on Tuesday approved legislation to require handgun purchasers to first pass a course or test in the safe handling of firearms.

The bill, sponsored by Assemblyman Rusty Areias (D-Los Banos), a former member of the National Rifle Assn., was sent to the Senate on a vote of 44 to 32. The NRA opposes the bill.

Former Gov. George Deukmejian vetoed a similar measure last year. A spokesman for Gov. Pete Wilson said Wilson has no position on the new version of the legislation.

“The NRA motto is guns don’t kill people, people kill people,” Areias said on the lower house floor. “This is safety training for people. It only makes common sense.”

Another supporter, Assemblywoman Marguerite Archie-Hudson (D-Los Angeles) said statistics show that handgun accidents are the fourth leading cause of deaths of children under 14.

“My own personal preference would be handgun control and no one could possess one,” Archie-Hudson said, “but that is not reality.”

An opponent, Assemblyman Tom McClintock (R-Thousand Oaks) called it a “government by nanny” bill that would require people “to take a course to be told to be careful with guns. . . . I guarantee you this will be a source of resentment for every citizen who has to take a course.”

The conservative legislator disclosed that he had become a first-time gun owner this year, purchasing a firearm to protect his wife and children after receiving threats on his and their lives.

A supporter of the bill, Assemblyman John Burton (D-San Francisco), noted that the state requires motorists to pass a test before being allowed to drive, although there was a time when testing was not required. “This is the same thing,” Burton said.

Assemblyman Richard L. Mountjoy (R-Monrovia), who said he owns a dozen handguns and he didn’t know how many rifles, said he preferred that gun safety courses be taught in the public schools.

The legislation would prohibit a gun dealer, starting July 1, 1993, from transferring, delivering, or selling a pistol or revolver to anyone who did not present a basic firearm safety certificate. Violations would be misdemeanors punishable by up to six months in county jail and a $1,000 fine.

Licensed gun dealers would be instructors for the two-to-four-hour gun safety course and could administer the test. The fee for the course or test could not exceed $17. The certificate would represent satisfactory completion.

In his veto message last year, Deukmejian said the earlier version of the bill was “seriously flawed” because it did not demand that a prospective handgun purchaser “pass” the course or test before obtaining a weapon.

“In other words,” Deukmejian said, “if you pay $17 and sit in a class without paying any attention or learning anything, you are still given a certificate which then enables you to purchase a gun.”

Areias said the “loophole is closed” in the latest version of the bill. The San Joaquin Valley lawmaker said Wilson had expressed support for the gun safety course concept during the 1990 gubernatorial campaign.