Permit requests for concealed arms surge after attacks

States throughout the country are seeing a dramatic increase in citizen requests for permits to carry concealed weapons, with some reporting the volume of applications has more than doubled since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

While nationwide figures are not available, random checks of gun shops and state agencies in charge of gun registrations and criminal background checks confirm the historical trend that in times of unrest, security-conscious Americans often turn to guns.

In Florida, background checks jumped 50 percent in September, according to the state Department of Law Enforcement. Concealed-gun permit requests in Texas almost tripled between the week before Sept. 11 and the week ending Oct. 27, the Texas Department of Public Safety said.

“We’ve seen this for 30 or 40 years, whenever there is free-floating anxiety. People feel like they want to do something,” said Andrew Molchan, director of the Professional Gun Retailers Association, a Ft. Lauderdale-based trade association that represents about 4,000 gun shops nationwide.

“When you had the riots in Los Angeles and Miami, you always have an uptick in firearm sales in the local area,” Molchan said. “Usually it’s a very steep up and a very steep down.”

The surge in applications for concealed weapons permits and gun purchases comes at a time of changing national and political attitudes toward guns. Gun ownership in homes had been declining in recent years. Thirty-six percent of the nation’s households had guns in 1999, down from 51 percent in 1993, according to federal figures.

At the same time, many state legislatures have been relaxing concealed weapons laws, making it easier for people to carry a weapon. Since Michigan changed its law July 1, about 30,000 people have applied for permits to carry a gun. State officials say they expect the number to top 125,000, up from the current level of about 50,000 Michigan residents who have a permit to carry a concealed weapon.

Support for tighter laws drops

Opinion polls in recent years have indicated declining support for tighter gun-control laws. In a Gallup poll last month, 53 percent said laws covering firearms sales should be stricter-- down from 78 percent in 1990, according to Gallup.

It is unclear whether Americans are acting on President Bush’s call to be vigilant and, in effect, deputizing themselves with sidearms. Molchan and some gun shop owners said the percentage of first-time gun buyers was higher, perhaps 20 percent. There were more women purchasing guns, they said.

“How exactly is your 9 mm automatic going to help you if someone points a 757 [airplane] in your direction?” asked Dan Polsby, a professor at the George Mason University School of Law. “It’s not going to help much, but on the other hand it isn’t going to hurt, either.”

Polsby, an advocate for the 2nd Amendment right to bear arms, said he has seen no evidence that relaxed concealed-carry laws have contributed to an increase in crime. And he is not convinced that the recent spurt in gun ownership will contribute to more violence.

“I don’t think we’re at a break point in terms of gun ownership, but at some point you may have optimized the amount of private deterrence and you start down the slope on the other side. What point that is I don’t know,” Polsby said, “but if I were a policymaker, I’d want to keep an eye on that.”

Eric Holder, a former deputy attorney general and U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia during the Clinton administration, argues that the national preoccupation with security is overlooking firearms that could fall into the hands of terrorists.

“While we are appropriately discussing requiring criminal background checks on airline pilots, baggage handlers and airport security personnel, federal law does not require background checks on all firearms sales,” Holder said in a recent column written for The Washington Post. “In the interest of national security, this should be changed immediately.”

Holder and others point to a 2000 case in which a felon bought assault weapons, shotguns and ammunition at a Michigan gun show that he intended to ship to the terrorist group Hezbollah. Ali Boumelhem was legally exempt from a background check because he purchased the weapons at a gun show. He was under FBI surveillance and was captured before he sent the weapons abroad.

Gun shop owners say the sales spurt probably has peaked. John Schrank, manager of Schrank’s Smoke ‘n Gun in Waukegan, said gun sales have “fallen back to essentially normal” in the past two weeks, after being up 50 percent in the six weeks after the terrorist attacks.

“This was kind of like Y2K,” Schrank said, referring to preparations leading up to New Year’s Day 2000.

A recent Time/CNN poll indicated that Americans are more willing to purchase items that might not have been on their shopping list before Sept. 11. About one-third said they have considered purchasing bottled water and extra food; 12 percent listed a gas mask; and 20 percent mentioned a firearm.

`Huge market in precautions’

“There’s a huge market in precautions in the United States right now and Americans are doing anything to make themselves feel better--bottled water, guns, maps of the countryside,” said Franklin Zimring, a law professor at the University of California. “When people want to feel better, to gain a measure of comfort, they’ll choose any port in the storm.

“This is a short-term reaction to an emergency that has a long pedigree in American history,” he said. “Usually that short-term run-up has very few long-term consequences. . . . Over the next couple of years, permit applications will go down.”

Gun laws always have been politically sensitive. Last summer the Bush administration warned it would not join a pact to curtail the global flow of illegal small arms if it infringes on the American right to own guns. Last week, Democrat Mark Warner’s finessing of the gun-control issue in Virginia helped him win the governor’s race.

State legislatures have not begun a review of gun ownership, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Most are not in session. Zimring said a review of the laws probably will not be necessary.

“We’re talking about a lot of people buying guns who are the least risk of being victims or perpetrators of crime,” he said. “The threat is mostly to themselves.”