1125 lines
64 KiB
Plaintext
1125 lines
64 KiB
Plaintext
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FIREARMS LEGISLATION IN GREAT BRITAIN
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(by Jan A. Stevenson)
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Most people of retirement age, though they may not realize
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it, were born at a time when there was no firearms legislation
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to speak of in this country. Nor had there ever been, for the
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first Firearms Act of any substance was that of 1920. The 1920
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Act was a comprehensive one and gave Britain an extensive system
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of controls that have rarely been exceeded in a democratic
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society. Subsequent enactments have put more flesh on the bones,
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but the structure of controls that the government of the day
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devised serves us still.
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From the point of view of social history, as recent
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research has made clear, the 1920 Act is a particularly
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important document. It marks a profound shift --indeed a
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reversal-- in the British state's attitude toward its citizens.
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In 1900 the Prime Minister said that he would "laud the day when
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there was a rifle in every cottage in England." The Lord Mayor
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hosted a meeting at Mansion House, attended by, among others,
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the Duke of Westminister, the Archbishop of York and the Lord
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Mayor of Liverpool, with the purpose of founding a, "Society of
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Working Men's Rifle Clubs, for facilitating rifle shooting, more
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especially in the evening, with small bore rifles and
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inexpensive ammunition, as an ordinary branch of recreation by
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working men's and working boys' clubs and institutions."
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The Duke of Norfolk undertook to chair the new Association
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while Lord Roberts, then Commander-in-Chief, had agreed to
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accept the presidency on his retirement from the Army.
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According to The Times: " ... the scheme would be a
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cooperative one, that is the gentlemen of the country would
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contribute to the funds, whilst the working men would be
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expected to join the clubs and make themselves efficient in the
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matter of rifle shooting."
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This was very different from the purpose of the 1920 Act,
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which was precisely to ensure that working men would not be able
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to lay hands on a rifle or make themselves proficient in its
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use. It was not deemed politic, however, to say so, and the bill
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was put through as a crime prevention measure. Its progress
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through parliament had been carefully prepared, and it
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encountered very little opposition.
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Police Superintendent Colin Greenwood who, as a Cropwood
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Fellow at the Institute of Criminology, University of Cambridge,
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during 1970-71, was the first to conduct serious, scholarly
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research in this field, recalled some years later how baffled he
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had been by the motivation of the 1920 Act.
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"The question troubled me for some time because I was naive
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enough to accept the assurances of the day that their
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legislation was aimed at the armed criminal...During the period
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1911 to 1913, firearms were involved in an average of 45 crimes
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of all types per year. During the period 1915 to 1917, the
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average had fallen to 15 cases per year. Would to God that we
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could have such figures today. Why, then, was legislation
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introduced? ... It was not until I read the diaries of the then
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Cabinet Secretary that the truth emerged." [Speech; Rhodes
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House, Oxford, June 1983.]
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The truth, as Colin Greenwood belatedly discovered, and as
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recently released Cabinet papers have underlined, was that the
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Government was extremely concerned by the possibility of a
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Bolshevik style revolution in Britain. The police were
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insufficient to deal with the anticipated troubles; the Army,
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after demobilization, of conscripts, would be insufficient as
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well. According to the Chief of the Imperial General Staff,
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there would soon be only 38 Regular Army battalions in Britain.
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"On the assumption that an adequate police force is in
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existence, it is considered essential to maintain the infantry
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garrisons in Great Britain at not less than 40,000 men in order
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to give a minimum strength of 30,000 effective bayonets for
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employment in an emergency." [PRO CAB 24/96 XCH 62903]
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The Chief of the I.G.S. was unable to guarantee this beyond
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March of 1920 and added that, "Further, an adequate police force
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does no apparently exist." He warned that if the Army were
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called upon at an early stage of civil disturbances, "it will be
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dispersed, and thus the last reserve in the hands of the
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Government will be dissipated."
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Sir Eric Geddes, Minister of Transport, complained that
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there were only eight battalions in the north, and he feared,
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"...a revolutionary outbreak in Glasgow, Liverpool or London in
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the early spring, when a definite attempt may be made to seize
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the reins of Government ... It is not inconceivable that a
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dramatic and successful coup d'etat in some large center of
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population might win the support of the unthinking mass of
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labour..." [PRO CAB 25/20]
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The Home Secretary reminded the Cabinet that the Bolsheviks
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had staged a revolution in Winnipeg, and now that the wartime
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blockade was dismantled, their emissaries could be expected in
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Britain, doubtless bearing vast quantities of forged five-pound
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notes such as had been discovered in Odessa, when the White
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Russian Army had taken the city.
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Geddes proposed: "...a meeting of Mayors of provincial
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cities (to) ascertain from them how far they are prepared to
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create skeleton organizations locally for dealing with civil
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disturbances when they occur, such skeleton organizations to be
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of a secret nature." [PRO CAB 25/20]
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A committee chaired by Sir Nevil Macready, Commission of
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Metropolitan Police, recommended that each regimental depot
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throughout the country should hold 1,000 stand of arms and
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appropriate quantities of ammunition as "the best method of
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making them available to loyalists in the event of an
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emergency." Bonar Law had urged the month before that, "weapons
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ought to be available for distribution to friends of the
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Government."
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The Prime Minister had been told in Cabinet that, "A bill
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is needed to license persons to bear arms. This has been useful
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in Ireland because the Authorities know whom was possessed of
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arms." The bill was soon forthcoming. It was introduced into the
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House of Lords on the 19th of April and sent to the Commons on
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the 6th of May.
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The Home Secretary, Mr. Edward Shortt, gave no hint of the
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matters that were so tormenting the Cabinet. The bill, he
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assured the House, was, "...designed to maintain greater control
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so that, as far as possible, criminals or weak minded persons,
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and those who should not have firearms may be prevented from
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having these dangerous and lethal firearms. As far as possible,
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we have provided that legitimate sport should not be in any way
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hampered, and so that any person who has good reason for
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possessing firearms, or to whom there is no objection, may be
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entitled to have them; but we hope, by means of this bill, to
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prevent criminals and persons of that description from being
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able to have revolvers and to use them."
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These words sound remarkably similar to those recently
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uttered by today's Home Secretary, Douglas Hurd. Mr. Shortt's
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reassuring tone, as he described to the House his concern to
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protect the public from armed crime whilst safeguarding the
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legitimate interests of shooting sportsmen, was no doubt in
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contrast to the atmosphere in the Cabinet Room in Downing Street
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where he and his colleagues anxiously discussed the possibility
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of strafing the working class from the air whilst fielding
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30,000 bayonets against them on the ground.
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What happened to Lord Salisbury's hope, expressed only two
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decades earlier, of having a rifle in every cottage? What
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happened to the absolute trust on the part of the ruling
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classes, as exemplified in the founding of the Society of
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Working Men's Rifle Clubs, in the patriotism and decency of the
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working class? The view then was that if Britain should have
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need to raise a mass army of national defense, the working class
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would form the infantry, and that the defense of the realm would
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depend on their ability to use their individual weapons with the
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expertise born of years of practice. That view, as it turned
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out, was to be vindicated within fifteen years in the trenches
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of Northern France. And finally, what made the Government so
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determined to truncate one of the essential liberties of
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freeborn Englishmen that they would legislate that liberty to
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extinction?
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Clearly, the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia and the
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formation of the "Third International" with the object of
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exporting insurrection, had provided the panic element. But it
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would be oversimplistic to suggest this as sufficient
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explanation, for there had been several bills during the pre-war
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period that had presaged the 1920 Act. During the second reading
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debate in the House, the Member for Hull, Lt. Commander
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Kenworthy, expressed great concern: "In the past, one of the
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most jealously guarded rights of the English was that of
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carrying arms ... It has been a well known object of Central
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Government of this country to deprive people of their weapons."
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The bill itself was based on the secret report of a "purely
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departmental" committee chaired by Sir Ernley Blackwell, KCB,
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who had been charged on the 6th December, 1917, to consider the
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"restrictions which should be imposed upon possession,
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manufacture, sale, import and export of firearms in the United
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Kingdom after the war." Blackwell was Assistant Under Secretary
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of State for the Home Department, and his committee recognized
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two main sources of postwar danger: the "savage or
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semi-civilized tribesmen in outlying parts of the British
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Empire" and "the anarchist or 'intellectual' malcontent of the
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great cities whose weapon is the bomb and the automatic pistol.
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There is some force in the view that the latter will in future
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prove the more dangerous of the two."
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We might tentatively suggest that the Bolshevik spectre
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served to focus the anxieties aroused by the prewar anarchists.
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The anarchists, however, were regarded for the most part as
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foreign malcontents rather than as a direct threat to the
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domestic body politic: Communism, on the other hand, risked
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infecting the lower classes across a broad spectrum.
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One of the documents that Blackwell's committee considered
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was the draft pistols Bill of 1911, with which Blackwell himself
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had been closely involved, but that had never been put before
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the House. It had, for the first time, incorporated a system of
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certificates to be administered by the police, and had been
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intended to stiffen the Pistols Act, 1903, which had succeeded
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in its passage through Parliament only by virtue of being
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anodyne. There had been previous attempts to legislate in 1887
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and 1893, but these had been soundly rejected on the grounds
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that they represented an unconstitutional infringement of basic
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rights.
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Of that, there should be little doubt. Sir William
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Blackstone's Commentaries, first published in 1765, had
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meticulously described the development, substance and
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significance of "...the rights, or as they are frequently
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termed, the liberties of Englishmen...": "And we have seen that
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these rights consist, primarily, in the free enjoyment of
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personal security, of personal liberty and of private
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property...And lastly, to vindicate these rights, when actually
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violated and attacked, the subjects of England are entitled, in
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the first place, to the regular administration and free course
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of justice in the courts of law; next to the right of
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petitioning the King and Parliament for the redress of
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grievances; and lastly, to the right of having and using arms
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for self preservation and defense."
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The right to keep arms no doubt developed as a corollary of
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the natural law right of self defense, and by Anglo-Saxon times
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a corresponding obligation was clearly defined. All able-bodied
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freemen were expected to take part in the "hue and cry" to bring
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criminals to justice, and to serve in the army in time of war.
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For both of these purposes, they were expected to maintain arms
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according to their rank and station. A twice yearly inspection
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insured that the arms concerned were kept in good order and
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ready for use.
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The Normans retained this system, and indeed refined it.
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Henry II's Assize of Arms of 1181 detailed the types of weapons
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which persons of various rank were expected to have on hand, a
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question that was updated in 1285 by the Statute of Westminster
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[13 Edw I c6]. The greater one's wealth, the greater one's
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contribution, but even the poor were under obligation: "...and
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all others that may shall have bows and arrows."
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Indeed, firearms were at first regarded by the Crown as
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noisome, inefficient things that might tempt people to neglect,
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"...the good and laudable exercise of the longbow which always
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heretofore hath been the surety, safeguard and continual defense
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of this Realm of England." [33 Hen VIII c6]
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By the end of the 16th century, the musket had displaced
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the bow as the primary infantry weapon, and by Blackstone's
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time, the right to bear arms, and specifically firearms, was a
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well recognized element of the Constitution, existing quite
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separately from the obligational aspect.
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This was clearly enunciated during the debate on the
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Seizure of Arms Bill of 1820, in response to a fear of
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insurrection in the industrializing North. The Luddite violence
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of 1811 and 1812 had required 12,000 troops to put down, and a
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resurgence had led to the "Peterloo Massacre" of 1819 in which
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eleven people were killed and hundreds injured as the Yeomanry
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dispersed a crowd estimated at some eighty thousand. There was
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much talk of revolution and reports, no doubt exaggerated, of
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secret stores of arms and men drilling or training with them.
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The Seizure of Arms Act was to authorize justices of the
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peace to issue warrants for the seizure and detention of arms
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that might be used by revolutionaries. Parliament recognized
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that it was on delicate ground and clearly had no wish to
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abrogate a right. The Act applied only to the two cities and
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eleven counties in which there was a real fear of unrest, and
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would lapse after two years. Moreover, firearms (unlike pikes)
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could only be seized if it could be demonstrated that they were
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kept for a purposed dangerous to the peace.
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Despite the carefully circumscribed terms of the bill, Mr.
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T.W. Anson contended, during the debate on the 14th December,
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1819, that, "The principles on which it (the bill) is founded
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and the temper in which it is framed appear to me to be so much
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at variance with the free spirit of our venerated constitution
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and so contrary to the undoubted right which the subjects of
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this country have ever possessed -- the right of retaining arms
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for the defense of themselves, their families and properties --
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that I cannot look upon it without loudly expressing my
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disapprobation and regret."
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After a lengthy debate in which Mr. Anson found strong
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support, Mr. George Canning, later Prime Minister, summed up for
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the Government: "I am perfectly willing to admit the right of
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the subject to hold arms laid down by the Honorable and Learned
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Gentleman (Mr. Anson), having stated it on the authority of Mr.
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Justice Blackstone. The doctrine so laid down, I am willing to
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admit, is no other than the doctrine of the British
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Constitution. The Bill of Rights, correctly quoted and properly
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construed, brings me to the construction of the Bill which, in
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fact, recognizes the right of the subject to have arms, but
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qualifies that right in such a manner as the necessity of the
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case requires."
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It was generally accepted that Mr. Canning had made his
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case, and that by tailoring the bill to meet a specific and
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tightly circumscribed problem, the extent to which he had
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infringed the rights of the subject was acceptable and met
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Blackstone's prescription of, "...restraints so gentle and
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moderate, as will appear on further inquiry, that no man of
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sense or probity would wish to see them slackened."
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Subsequent legislative proposals were less clearly in
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accord with this principle, and it was to be nearly a century
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before a measure restricting firearms ownership or use was again
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enacted. The possible exception that one might cite was the Gun
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License Act of 1870, which required anyone who wished to carry
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or use a gun outside the curtilege of a dwelling house, to
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purchase a ten shilling license at the post office. This,
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however was strictly a revenue measure; it remained in force
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until 1967.
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Section 4 of the Vagrancy Act, 1824, made it an offense to
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be in possession of an offensive weapon with intent to commit a
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felony. But providing he was free of felonious intent and paid
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his ten shillings to the post office, the Englishman's right to
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acquire, possess and carry firearms was uninhibited by law until
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the twentieth century.
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There had been several measures proposed toward the end of
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the 19th century, but all fell, generally on grounds of
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unconstitutionality. The Pistols Bill, 1895, made it to a
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division, where it failed by 183 votes to 75. Mr. C. H. Hopwood,
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Member for South East Middleton, would appear to have reflected
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the feeling of the House when he suggested that, "To say that
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because there were some persons who would make violent use of
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pistols, therefore the right of purchase or possession by every
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Englishman should be taken away, is monstrous."
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A much diluted bill, however, was to succeed eight years
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later. The Pistols Act, 1903, provided that before one could
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purchase a pistol or revolver at retail, one had either to
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produce a gun license or game license, available at the post
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office, or give reasonable proof that one was a householder
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intending to use the pistol in or within the curtilege of his
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own house, or present a letter, countersigned by a justice of
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the peace or a police officer of the rank of inspector or above,
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that one was departing abroad for a period of six months or
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more. There was also a bar on retail sales to persons under the
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age of 18; private sales were outside the scope of the Act. The
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only effect of the Act was to oblige retail customers who were
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not householders to pay a ten shilling tax at the post office.
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The burden of the law was minimal and therefore tolerable.
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The purpose of the bill, according to Mr. Hulme, its
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sponsor, was not to prevent crime but hopefully to eliminate
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some of the accidents, particularly involving young people, that
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one heard of from time to time.
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Mr. Hulme's intentions notwithstanding, the 1903 Act was
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soon criticized for not accomplishing what it had not been
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intended to accomplish, and a much stiffened version was ready
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for introduction in 1911. Soundings may have indicated that it
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would encounter the same sort of resistance that had scuttled
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the 1893 and 1895 bills, however, since it was never brought
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before Parliament.
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|
This persistent legislative activity from 1893 onward, for
|
|||
|
all of its lack of success, suggests the emergence of a feeling,
|
|||
|
in administrative circles, that the Constitution was outmoded in
|
|||
|
this respect, and that some beneficial effect would accrue from
|
|||
|
restricting the legitimate private ownership of firearms.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The effect anticipated is not always easy to deduce for, as
|
|||
|
Greenwood belatedly discovered, legislative proposals sometimes
|
|||
|
sail under false colours. This could be the said to have
|
|||
|
particularly been the case of the Firearms Act, 1920, the
|
|||
|
Criminal Justice Act, 1967, (which introduce the shotgun
|
|||
|
controls) and perhaps the current bill as well.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The Firearms Act, 1920, established the framework of
|
|||
|
controls that has characterized the British system ever since.
|
|||
|
This was strictly and administrative confection: the Blackwell
|
|||
|
Committee, upon whose recommendations the Act was based, met in
|
|||
|
secret and their report was never published. The chairman, Sir
|
|||
|
Ernley Blackwell, was a senior Home Office official, while the
|
|||
|
secretary, who was also a member of the committee, was Mr. F.J.
|
|||
|
Dryhurst, recently Commissioner of the Prison Service. Other
|
|||
|
members represented the Metropolitan Police, the County and
|
|||
|
Borough Police Forces, the board of Customs, Board of Trade, the
|
|||
|
War Office and the Irish Office.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The committee proceeded on the assumption that controls
|
|||
|
were desirable and that they would be effective. The
|
|||
|
Commissioner of Police for the Metropolis had reported that
|
|||
|
during the three years 1911-1913 there had been 123 cases in
|
|||
|
which firearms had either been used in crime or had been found
|
|||
|
in the possession of persons who had come into the hands of the
|
|||
|
police. For the corresponding period, 1915-1917, there had been
|
|||
|
47 cases. Blackwell ascribed this decline, from an average of 41
|
|||
|
cases per year to 15.6 cases per year, entirely to the
|
|||
|
beneficial effects of the wartime Defense of the Realm
|
|||
|
Regulations, which required a license for the retail purchase of
|
|||
|
rifles, pistols, and ammunition. Blackwell anticipated that when
|
|||
|
the Regulations expired, instances of armed crime "may be
|
|||
|
expected to rise to or above their former level." With
|
|||
|
hindsight, and armed crime rate in the Metropolis of 47 cases
|
|||
|
per year sounds Utopian. Blackwell's contention, "That the
|
|||
|
control of firearms should be made far more stringent than it is
|
|||
|
now is a proposition that hardly anyone could be found to
|
|||
|
question," [Blackwell, page 1] might best be taken in the
|
|||
|
context of the secrecy with which the Committee undertook its
|
|||
|
deliberation and its exclusively civil service and police
|
|||
|
composition.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
Blackwell submitted his report on the 16th of November, 1918. On
|
|||
|
the same day, he wrote to Sir Maurice Bonham Carter at the
|
|||
|
Ministry of Reconstruction, who had been responsible, along with
|
|||
|
Sir Edward Troup, for setting the committee up.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
Of the report, Blackwell wrote in a covering letter, "It
|
|||
|
will be better not to publish it. There is a good deal in the
|
|||
|
Arms Traffic Report that could not be published and a regards
|
|||
|
our Report, any prolonged discussion with the 'trade' is to be
|
|||
|
avoided." [PRO REC1/342/55946] "You will see," he assured Bonham
|
|||
|
Carter, "that we have arrived at framing a fairly stringent
|
|||
|
system of control."
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
Stringent it was. Indeed, the certification procedure that
|
|||
|
Blackwell's committee designed has been recognized as about as
|
|||
|
stringent as can be effected short of an outright prohibition.
|
|||
|
The distinctive features are the wide-ranging discretion
|
|||
|
accorded to chief constables and the burden laid upon the
|
|||
|
applicant to "satisfy" the chief constable both as to his
|
|||
|
personal suitability and as to his legitimate requirement for
|
|||
|
the firearms or ammunition applied for.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
Complaints of overzealousness were almost immediately
|
|||
|
forthcoming. The first appeal against a chief constable's
|
|||
|
decision was heard at Middleton Police Court the 20th of
|
|||
|
December, 1929; the Act had come into effect the 1st of the
|
|||
|
month previous. The Rev. Henry Evans, vicar of Tonge, appealed
|
|||
|
against the refusal of the chief constable to issue him a
|
|||
|
certificate for a Winchester rifle which he had owned for many
|
|||
|
years for sporting purposes and for the control of vermin in his
|
|||
|
poultry yard, as he had repeatedly explained to police officers
|
|||
|
on the occasions of their recent visits.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
When making out the application form, the Rev. Evans had
|
|||
|
indicated that his reason for requiring a certificate was so as
|
|||
|
to comply with the law. The chief constable refused to accept
|
|||
|
this, and the Rev. Evans refused to fill out another form,
|
|||
|
noting that there was no requirement in the law for him to have
|
|||
|
made out the first one.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The court found in Rev. Evans' favour. The Home Office, in
|
|||
|
an internal note, complained that, "The police chose a case in
|
|||
|
which they were very likely to lose, and covered by H.O.
|
|||
|
instructions to issue certificates freely to reputable persons
|
|||
|
already in possession." [PRO HO45/11024/408571]
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The instructions referred to had been promulgated the 24th
|
|||
|
of November and were supplemental to extensive notes for
|
|||
|
guidance issued to chief constables on the 5th of October. The
|
|||
|
fact that the Home Secretary found it necessary, within weeks of
|
|||
|
the Act's taking effect, to bring the constabularies' attention
|
|||
|
to, "...the following observations, which may assist Chief
|
|||
|
Constables in enforcing the Act without unnecessary interference
|
|||
|
with persons who were properly in possession of firearms at the
|
|||
|
time of the passing of the Act, and are not likely to abuse
|
|||
|
permission to retain them," [HO Circ. 406,571/76] is probably
|
|||
|
indicative of a substantial volume of complaints.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The chief constables were less than appreciative of the
|
|||
|
Home Secretary's assistance in these matters. Their Districts
|
|||
|
1,2,& 3 Conference forwarded a resolution to the Home Office
|
|||
|
expressing, "...regret that the Home Office has seen fit by
|
|||
|
their circular 408,571/76 of the 24th November, 1920, to modify
|
|||
|
the previous instructions issued to Chief Constables in Home
|
|||
|
Office circular 408, 571/33 of 5th October, 1920, as such action
|
|||
|
had placed Chief Constables in a difficult position." [PRO
|
|||
|
HO45/11024-62971]
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
They asked that the avenue of appeal to the courts be
|
|||
|
abolished, and that complaints be referred to the Secretary of
|
|||
|
State for adjudication.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
By 1934, the Act, and the system of controls over rifles
|
|||
|
and pistols which it incorporated, had "run in," and the
|
|||
|
Government felt that it was time for a review. The Home
|
|||
|
Secretary appointed a Departmental Committee under the
|
|||
|
chairmanship of Sir Archibold Bodkin, a recently retired
|
|||
|
Directory of Public Prosecutions, "...to consider the various
|
|||
|
types of firearms and similar weapons ... and to report whether,
|
|||
|
in the interests of public safety, any amendment of the law is
|
|||
|
necessary or desirable in respect of such weapons and
|
|||
|
ammunition." [HMSO Cmd. 4758.1934]
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
Bodkin's committee was somewhat more broadly based than
|
|||
|
Blackwell's (it included three Members of Parliament) and
|
|||
|
invited submissions. It heard oral evidence from 38 witnesses
|
|||
|
representing 21 organizations, and received written
|
|||
|
communications from ten departments and organizations. The
|
|||
|
report (Cmd. 4758) was published in December of 1934 and
|
|||
|
reprinted in 1968.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The Bodkin Report is interesting in many respects, not
|
|||
|
least in its use of statistical evidence. The Committee had
|
|||
|
requested an elaborate report from each chief officer of police
|
|||
|
in Great Britain concerning, "...cases known to the police in
|
|||
|
which certain types of weapons had, during the three years ended
|
|||
|
28th February, 1934, been "a) used by or found in the possession
|
|||
|
of persons engaged in crime (including cases of suicide) or
|
|||
|
avoiding arrests, (or) b) the cause of accidents involving
|
|||
|
personal injuries." [Bodkin, page 2]
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The information thus gathered was tabulated and broken down
|
|||
|
so that details such as the age of the user, the calibre or
|
|||
|
gauge of the weapon, the type of cartridge, and the degree of
|
|||
|
injury were immediately accessible. These tables cover seven
|
|||
|
pages and are extraordinarily well set out and useful. The
|
|||
|
survey covered: shotguns, sawed-off shotguns, smooth-bore
|
|||
|
pistols, toy or dummy pistols converted to fire, toy or dummy
|
|||
|
pistols not converted, air pistols, and air guns or rifles -- in
|
|||
|
other words, those types of firearm that were not covered by the
|
|||
|
Firearms Act, 1920.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The committee's decision to seek no data regarding the
|
|||
|
types of firearm controlled by the 1920 Act meant both that the
|
|||
|
effectiveness of that Act could not be evaluated and that no
|
|||
|
case for deregulation could be supported by quantitive evidence.
|
|||
|
This was the more unfortunate in that they were quite clear that
|
|||
|
deregulation was within their terms of reference [Bodkin, page
|
|||
|
3].
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The Committee's use of evidence (or lack thereof) opens
|
|||
|
them to criticism on several points. They professed much
|
|||
|
sympathy for the gun trade, which had been decimated by the 1920
|
|||
|
Act but whose remaining members had "borne their losses with
|
|||
|
resignation and have loyally cooperated with authorities."
|
|||
|
[Bodkin, page 10]
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
Moreover, "It seems quite clear," they report, "that in
|
|||
|
1920 Parliament intended to abstain, as far as possible, from
|
|||
|
discouraging the formation of rifle clubs and target practice
|
|||
|
generally." [Bodkin, page 15]. They were earnestly pressed by
|
|||
|
the trade to deregulate .22 rifles, but declined to do so on the
|
|||
|
perhaps significant grounds that, "...it would be a retrograde
|
|||
|
step after 14 years of restriction if all control over such
|
|||
|
weapons were abolished." [Bodkin, page 16]
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
According to the evidence collected, ordinary shotguns had
|
|||
|
been used in 94 crimes over the three years of the study. Shot
|
|||
|
pistols had been used in 25 and sawed-off shotguns in eight.
|
|||
|
Bodkin recommended placing the latter two types of weapon under
|
|||
|
firearm certificate control, but favored leaving normal shotguns
|
|||
|
outside the Act. They may have been quite correct in suggesting
|
|||
|
that shotguns so outnumbered shot pistols that a roughly 4:1
|
|||
|
ratio of use in crime was not disproportionate. But they made no
|
|||
|
attempt to quantify the number of either type in circulation,
|
|||
|
nor did they address their minds to the question of what was
|
|||
|
achieved by restricting sawed-off shotguns when both shotguns
|
|||
|
and hacksaws were unrestricted.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The Bodkin Committee collected a great deal of information
|
|||
|
and did an impressive amount of work, but their line of argument
|
|||
|
is not always persuasive. One often suspects that the evidence
|
|||
|
is decorative and that the report actually reflects an
|
|||
|
administrative class view of what a well-ordered universe would
|
|||
|
be like. Their conclusion, that the system of controls
|
|||
|
established by the Firearms Act, 1920, "...lying as it does
|
|||
|
largely in the hands of responsible officers of police, has, in
|
|||
|
our opinion, been well administered and forms an efficient
|
|||
|
system of controlling the sale of firearms and ammunition,"
|
|||
|
[Bodkin page 9] ignored the question of what the system
|
|||
|
accomplished. The members of the committee no doubt assumed that
|
|||
|
the controls were of some public benefit, but they did not pose
|
|||
|
the question and sought no evidence that would have permitted an
|
|||
|
answer.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The Bodkin Committee suggested a number of changes of
|
|||
|
detail in the 1920 Act, but none of structure. Perhaps their
|
|||
|
most notable proposals were that shotguns with barrels less than
|
|||
|
20 inches in length be subject to firearm certificate control,
|
|||
|
and that machine guns be removed from firearm certificate
|
|||
|
control and be reclassified as prohibited weapons. The
|
|||
|
reclassification of machine guns was at the suggestion of the
|
|||
|
British Field Sports Society.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The Bodkin committee recommendations were incorporated in
|
|||
|
the Firearms Act, 1936, which turned out to be longer than the
|
|||
|
act it amended. The following year, the 1920 and 1936 Acts,
|
|||
|
along with the intervening Firearms and Imitation Firearms
|
|||
|
(Criminal Use) Act, 1933, and the Firearms Act, 1934 (regulating
|
|||
|
the sale to persons under seventeen of firearms and ammunition)
|
|||
|
were consolidated in the Firearms Act, 1937, which was to remain
|
|||
|
in effect, virtually unamended, for thirty-one years.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The Firearms Act, 1937, carried Britain through the trauma
|
|||
|
of the Second World War, across the flat and tranquil decade of
|
|||
|
the 1950's, and into an era of spiraling crime and quantum
|
|||
|
increases in criminal violence. The 1937 Act, perhaps, was no
|
|||
|
more responsible for the latter phenomena than it was for the
|
|||
|
period of remarkable repose that preceded it.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
In the absence of directly comparable statistics, all that
|
|||
|
can be said with confidence is that the 1950's marked the last
|
|||
|
time, and perhaps the only time, that armed crime had been as
|
|||
|
rare as it had during the Belle Epoque when there was no
|
|||
|
restrictive legislation at all.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
However, few people retained a clear memory of the period
|
|||
|
prior to the First World War, and across the intervening
|
|||
|
decades, the feeling had taken root that the low level of armed
|
|||
|
crime must be due to the rigour of statutory restrictions. When
|
|||
|
violent crime began its vertiginous rise in the mid-1960's, the
|
|||
|
understandable feeling of many was that more restrictive
|
|||
|
legislation was needed. The police were less prone to such and
|
|||
|
instinctive reaction, for chief constables realized that the
|
|||
|
degree of control which they exercised over the legitimate
|
|||
|
ownership of rifles and pistols left little to be desired.
|
|||
|
Shotguns remained uncontrolled, but were comparatively rarely
|
|||
|
used in crime.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The question, nonetheless, was repeatedly posed as to
|
|||
|
whether any benefit would be derived from drawing them into the
|
|||
|
system. Invariable, the answer was that would not. Sir Frank
|
|||
|
Soskice, as Home Secretary, gave the matter close consideration
|
|||
|
and told the House, on 11 February, 1965, while announcing the
|
|||
|
provisions of the forthcoming Firearms Act, 1965, that, "The
|
|||
|
Government have considered carefully the possibility of
|
|||
|
extending to shotguns the firearm certificate procedure, but
|
|||
|
have decided against it. There are probably at least 50,000
|
|||
|
shotguns in legitimate use throughout the country and the burden
|
|||
|
which certification would put on the police would not be
|
|||
|
justified by the benefits which would result."
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
Sir Frank was replaced at the Home Office toward the end of
|
|||
|
the year, and on the 3rd of March, 1966, Roy Jenkins, the new
|
|||
|
Home Secretary, announced that he was reconsidering the matter.
|
|||
|
He was, he said, "actively considering new legislation in
|
|||
|
relation to shotguns." By the 23rd of June, the review had been
|
|||
|
completed, and Mr. Jenkins reported that, "The type of shotgun
|
|||
|
which is freely available and which can be used without special
|
|||
|
exemption was considerably restricted under the Firearms Act. I
|
|||
|
must pay some regard to the burden of inspection which would be
|
|||
|
put on the police. The police do not consider that it would be
|
|||
|
right to make an extension at this time."
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
In other words, the matter had been looked into repeatedly,
|
|||
|
and the conclusion was that it was simply not worth doing.
|
|||
|
However, only seven weeks later, an incident occurred that was
|
|||
|
to lead Mr. Jenkins to reverse his position entirely.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
At 3:15 P.M. the 12th of August, a Metropolitan Police "Q"
|
|||
|
car turned into Baybrook Street, Hammersmith. Foxtrot 11 pulled
|
|||
|
to the side, and two officers, DS Head and DC Wombell, left the
|
|||
|
vehicle to approach a parked Vanguard estate car containing
|
|||
|
three men. As they drew near, Harry Roberts shot both of them
|
|||
|
dead with a .38 Enfield revolver. John Duddy leapt out and ran
|
|||
|
to the Q car, where he killed the driver, PC Fox, with three
|
|||
|
shots from a .380 Colt pistol. Britain's greatest manhunt was
|
|||
|
on.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
John Duddy and an accomplice, John Witney, the owner of the
|
|||
|
Estate car, who had been present at the time, were soon
|
|||
|
arrested. But it was three months before Roberts, a Malayan
|
|||
|
veteran, was finally tracked down and captured near Bishop's
|
|||
|
Stortford, Hertfordshire. He had gone to ground in Epping Forest
|
|||
|
and worked his way north on foot.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
Meanwhile, the case dominated the news absolutely; the
|
|||
|
gratuitous brutality of the crime aroused widespread revulsion
|
|||
|
and on the 6th of September, a memorial service for the slain
|
|||
|
officers drew a thousand-strong crowd to Westminister Abbey,
|
|||
|
carrying banners calling for the restoration of capital
|
|||
|
punishment in such cases.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
Hanging had only been finally abolished in November of 1965
|
|||
|
and Mr. Jenkins, whose feelings on the matter were well known,
|
|||
|
was under heavy pressure from press and public alike, to
|
|||
|
reintroduce it. On the 12th of September, less than a week after
|
|||
|
the demonstration at Westminster Abbey, he announced that he
|
|||
|
was, "...endeavouring to draw up plans to end the unrestricted
|
|||
|
purchase of shotguns. They can be purchased far too easily, by
|
|||
|
mail order or other means, and there is evidence that the
|
|||
|
criminal use of shotguns is increasing rapidly, still more
|
|||
|
rapidly than that of other weapons." [Daily Telegraph 13.9.66]
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The "evidence" Mr. Jenkins referred to was the records of
|
|||
|
"indictable offenses involving firearms," a disparate category
|
|||
|
consisting mostly of damaged property, poaching, threats and
|
|||
|
assaults and so forth, rather than the sort of "armed crime"
|
|||
|
that most people would think of. However, this body of data, as
|
|||
|
well as more relevant statistics, had been available to Mr.
|
|||
|
Jenkins, as indeed it had been to Sir Frank Soskice, and no
|
|||
|
doubt had been carefully studied before each reached his
|
|||
|
conclusion that proposals to further restrict shotguns were not
|
|||
|
justified by the evidence.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
If one discounts the possibility that Mr. Jenkins thought
|
|||
|
that restricting shotgun ownership was a relevant legislative
|
|||
|
response to and incident in which police officers were shot with
|
|||
|
pistols, then an explanation of why the Home Secretary
|
|||
|
completely reversed his policy is still needed.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The evidence suggests that Mr. Jenkins introduced
|
|||
|
legislation against shotguns in hope of deflecting the pressure
|
|||
|
for a reintroduction of capital punishment. If so, he was
|
|||
|
successful, albeit at the cost of approximately half a million
|
|||
|
man hours of police time, per year, over the past twenty years.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
Rather than introducing a Firearms (Amendment) Bill that
|
|||
|
might have attracted focused opposition, Mr. Jenkins used the
|
|||
|
forthcoming Criminal Justice Bill, 1967, as the vehicle for his
|
|||
|
proposed measures. This was an immensely significant and
|
|||
|
controversial bill which, among other things, did away with the
|
|||
|
requirement for a full hearing of evidence at committal
|
|||
|
proceedings, instituted a parole system, abolished the
|
|||
|
requirement for a unanimous verdict in criminal trials, placed
|
|||
|
restrictions on newspaper reporting of committal hearings and
|
|||
|
introduced suspended prison sentences. Part V of the bill, which
|
|||
|
introduced licenses for shotguns, was well camouflaged in a
|
|||
|
thicket of portentious and far reaching reforms to the criminal
|
|||
|
justice system. Opposition to Part V, therefore, was fragmented
|
|||
|
and diffuse.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The next year, the Firearms Act, 1968, consolidated the
|
|||
|
1937 Act and Part V of the Criminal Justice Act, along with two
|
|||
|
intervening measures, the Air Guns and Shot Guns, etc., Act of
|
|||
|
1962 and the Firearms Act, 1965. The former had originated as a
|
|||
|
private member's bill, introduced Mr. Brian Harrison, and
|
|||
|
regulated the circumstances under which young people between the
|
|||
|
ages of 14 and 21 might lawfully purchase, use or have in their
|
|||
|
possession airguns, shotguns and firearms, as well as ammunition
|
|||
|
and pellets for them. The latter act was more interesting.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The Firearms Act, 1965, was designed to strengthen the hand
|
|||
|
of the police against criminals, or suspected criminals, and as
|
|||
|
such was supported by most of the shooting organizations, though
|
|||
|
some of its provisions, notably a clause enabling chief
|
|||
|
constables to attach conditions to the registration of firearms
|
|||
|
dealers, have led to problems not then anticipated.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
Other clauses created the offense of armed trespass,
|
|||
|
regulated the carrying of firearms and ammunition in a public
|
|||
|
place, gave the police wider powers of search and arrest without
|
|||
|
warrant, penalized the carrying of a firearm with intent to
|
|||
|
commit an indictable offense, increased the minimum length of
|
|||
|
shotgun barrel from 20 inches to 24 inches and generally
|
|||
|
increased penalties overall.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The most notable feature of the 1965 Act, however, was the
|
|||
|
haste with which it was carried through Parliament. The Home
|
|||
|
Secretary did not intimate that he had it in mind to legislate
|
|||
|
until the 21st of January. Proposals were announced on the 11th
|
|||
|
February; the bill was introduced on the 28th of February and
|
|||
|
given a second reading only two days later, on the 2nd of March.
|
|||
|
Third Reading was on the 12th of May and Royal Assent was given
|
|||
|
the 5th of August.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
Significantly, the Murder (Abolition of the Death Penalty)
|
|||
|
Bill was already at the committee stage before the Firearms Bill
|
|||
|
was introduced, yet did not become law until three months later.
|
|||
|
The haste with which the Firearms Bill had been patched together
|
|||
|
was reflected in the great number of amendments required to
|
|||
|
eliminate anomalies and unintended effects.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The Government were clearly anxious that the abolition of
|
|||
|
hanging might herald a new willingness on the part of criminals
|
|||
|
to use violence of all forms and firearms in particular. Their
|
|||
|
anxiety was not misplaced. And midway through the Firearms
|
|||
|
Bill's passage, Roy Jenkins took office as Home Secretary. It is
|
|||
|
possible that this precedent conditioned his actions eight
|
|||
|
months later after the Shepherd's Bush murders, as the incident
|
|||
|
in Baybrook Street became known.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The Shepherd's Bush affair may also have contributed to a
|
|||
|
hardening of attitude on the part of chief constables.
|
|||
|
Certainly, in retrospect, 1967 seems to mark the beginning of an
|
|||
|
overt hostility toward the shooting sports on the part of chief
|
|||
|
officers that had not been manifest before. Police Review
|
|||
|
magazine described it this way: "There is an easily identifiable
|
|||
|
police attitude towards the possession of guns by members of the
|
|||
|
public. Every possible difficulty should be put in their way. No
|
|||
|
documentation can be too rigid, no security requirements too
|
|||
|
arbitrary, which prevents guns coming into the hands of
|
|||
|
criminals." [Police Review 8.10.82]
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
People who wished to comply with the law found themselves
|
|||
|
subject to bureaucratic harassment as chief constables pursued
|
|||
|
an often acknowledged policy of "reducing the number of firearms
|
|||
|
in the hands of the public to the absolute minimum." Over the
|
|||
|
next fifteen years, more than a quarter of rifle and pistol
|
|||
|
certificate holders had been eliminated. In 1968, there were
|
|||
|
216,281 firearm certificate holders in England and Wales; by
|
|||
|
1983, that figure was down to 159,804, a reduction of 56,477, or
|
|||
|
26%. The policies that achieved this substantial result involved
|
|||
|
a great deal of ultra vires activity and generated resentment
|
|||
|
and animosity among those affected.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
In 1973, the Government decided to legislate again, and
|
|||
|
issued a Green Paper, The Control of Firearms in Great Britain
|
|||
|
(Cmd. 5297), which was to achieve some notoriety. The Green
|
|||
|
Paper was based on the report of a working party chaired by Sir
|
|||
|
John McKay, then H.M. Chief Inspector of Constabulary for
|
|||
|
England and Wales. The rest of the committee, which consisted
|
|||
|
exclusively of members of the police, the Home Office and the
|
|||
|
Scottish Office, have not been identified; the report has never
|
|||
|
been released. One can only judge it through the Green Paper.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The McKay Committee gathered some interesting statistics,
|
|||
|
but the Green Paper used them in a manner so casual and
|
|||
|
self-serving that the argument, rather than being bolstered by
|
|||
|
the evidence, was discredited. Professor Richard Harding, who
|
|||
|
studied the Green Paper with great care, described it as,
|
|||
|
"...statistically defective...scientifically quite useless; the
|
|||
|
data are presented in a way which precludes objective evaluation
|
|||
|
by any one else." [1979 Crim LR 772]
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
Nor was the Green Paper well served by its tone, which was
|
|||
|
sanctimonious and authoritarian. Its premise was simply that
|
|||
|
armed crime was increasing, therefore more restrictions were
|
|||
|
needed. Bodkin was cited as an authority for his proposition: "A
|
|||
|
Departmental Committee set up in 1934 found that the 1920 Act
|
|||
|
had reduced the likelihood...of criminals obtaining possession
|
|||
|
of the more dangerous firearms (rifles and pistols)." [Green
|
|||
|
Paper, page 3]
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
In fact, the Bodkin Committee had "found" no such thing,
|
|||
|
but had simply asserted it, having avoided, perhaps consciously,
|
|||
|
gathering any evidence that might have permitted testing the
|
|||
|
hypothesis.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The Green Paper met a hostile reception in Parliament and
|
|||
|
in the press, and was soon withdrawn by the Government. Some of
|
|||
|
its proposals, however, were adopted as "force policy" by chief
|
|||
|
constables, and were applied as if they were law.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
Shortly after the Green Paper was withdrawn, the Home
|
|||
|
Office began increasing the fees for grant and renewal of
|
|||
|
firearm and shotgun certificates in a manner that many regarded
|
|||
|
as punitive, though this was denied by ministers. There had been
|
|||
|
inflation adjusting increases in 1969 and 1971; the increases
|
|||
|
begun in 1973 were therefore on top of an already
|
|||
|
inflation-adjusted figure. Over the ensuing give years, the fees
|
|||
|
for grant and renewal of a firearms certificate were raised by
|
|||
|
714% and 800% respectively; the increases for grant and renewal
|
|||
|
of a shotgun certificate were 1,200% and 800%. The Home Office
|
|||
|
conducted several "costing exercises," each of which in turn was
|
|||
|
thoroughly discredited.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The twenty years following have been characterized by
|
|||
|
legislative stability, offset by an increased willingness to use
|
|||
|
extra-legal means for imposing a preferred policy line. The
|
|||
|
latter part of this period is also distinguished by more overt
|
|||
|
hostility toward private firearms ownership on the part of chief
|
|||
|
officers, and by a far more active participation in pressure
|
|||
|
politics by the police.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The Association of Chief Police Officers determined in
|
|||
|
December, 1982, to push resolutely to have shotguns placed under
|
|||
|
the same controls as rifles and pistols. With the assistance of
|
|||
|
the Superintendents Conference and the Police Federation, they
|
|||
|
have since undertaken three "campaigns" characterized by a
|
|||
|
carrot and stick approach. An hysterical press campaign would be
|
|||
|
followed by an invitation to the Home Secretary to legislate in
|
|||
|
the manner desired. The most recent campaign has used the
|
|||
|
Hungerford incident as a platform and has proved imminently
|
|||
|
successful. As the Home Secretary has several times stated,
|
|||
|
Hungerford had provided the opportunity to "move forward," and
|
|||
|
the police were among the foremost "urgers forward" in the
|
|||
|
matter.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The Firearms (Amendment) Bill indeed represents a move
|
|||
|
forward in the sense that legislation in this field, in Great
|
|||
|
Britain, represents a linear progression from liberty to
|
|||
|
prohibition. As we have demonstrated, the position up to the
|
|||
|
outbreak of the First World War was that the right to keep arms
|
|||
|
was one of the elementary liberties of freeborn Englishmen, a
|
|||
|
fundamental part of the Constitution. This right has been
|
|||
|
progressively circumscribed, limited, eroded, discounted, and
|
|||
|
finally repudiated. The effect of the present bill will be
|
|||
|
finally to eradicate it. It subsists, at present, in relation to
|
|||
|
shotguns, provided that one is of good character. The effect of
|
|||
|
the present bill is that no matter how good one's character, one
|
|||
|
will not be permitted to possess a shotgun unless one can
|
|||
|
demonstrate an administratively approved "good reason" for so
|
|||
|
doing.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
But if Mr. Hurd meant to imply that "moving forward" meant
|
|||
|
enhancing the social good by addressing effective legislation to
|
|||
|
a defined problem, he needs to make his case. Perhaps his is the
|
|||
|
right policy to pursue, but that has yet to be demonstrated.
|
|||
|
Indeed, one of the remarkable things about firearms legislation
|
|||
|
in this country is that, not only have its benefits never been
|
|||
|
demonstrated, but that the government of the day, throughout,
|
|||
|
has been careful to avoid looking objectively at the question.
|
|||
|
There has been a series of committees, operating in various
|
|||
|
degrees of secrecy, assuring us and themselves that the policy
|
|||
|
being pursued was the correct one, while somehow neglecting to
|
|||
|
demonstrate it.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
Blackwell, in 1918, baldly asserted that "hardly anyone
|
|||
|
could be found to question" the proposition that "the control of
|
|||
|
firearms should be made far more stringent than it is now."
|
|||
|
Bodkin, in 1934, said that the Firearms Act, 1920, "forms an
|
|||
|
efficient system of controlling the sale of firearms and
|
|||
|
ammunition," but did not question the assertion and avoided
|
|||
|
gathering evidence that would have allowed it to be tested. The
|
|||
|
Green Paper of 1973 merely accepted Bodkin's assumption that
|
|||
|
controls work, and said that circumstances called for more of
|
|||
|
them.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
With the 1987 White Paper, the Government appear to have
|
|||
|
moved beyond the feeling that an increase in restrictions
|
|||
|
requires justification. Controls seem to be regarded as an end
|
|||
|
in themselves. As one senior civil servant recently put it,
|
|||
|
"Controls are good."
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The Firearms (Amendment) Bill now before Parliament
|
|||
|
consists of an enumeration of measures which the officials find
|
|||
|
congenial. Both they and the ministers are quite open in saying
|
|||
|
that no research was undertaken and that they could provide no
|
|||
|
evidence of probable benefit from and of the proposals in the
|
|||
|
Bill.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
In fact, all but four of the proposals in the 1987 Bill
|
|||
|
were lifted from the 1973 Green Paper. Greenwood was perhaps
|
|||
|
uncharitable but not inaccurate when he described Mr. Hurd's
|
|||
|
proposals as "emptying Whitehall's rubbish bin into Parliament."
|
|||
|
Parliament rejected the Green Paper in 1973 for its "police
|
|||
|
state" approach and its alleged irrelevance to the problems it
|
|||
|
purported to address.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
If it is to be accepted into law fifteen years later, then
|
|||
|
prudence would dictate that each of its provisions be analyzed
|
|||
|
objectively. If this is not done, the likelihood of Parliament's
|
|||
|
enacting sound and equitable law is remote. We shall indeed have
|
|||
|
moved a long way from Blackstone's prescription of,
|
|||
|
"...restraints in themselves so gentle and moderate...that no
|
|||
|
man of sense or probity would wish to see them slackened."
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
There have been two further enactments since 1968 which
|
|||
|
must be mentioned for the sake of completeness. The Criminal
|
|||
|
Justice Act, 1972, increased the penalties for criminal misuse
|
|||
|
stipulated in the 1968 Act. The penalty for possessing a firearm
|
|||
|
with intent to endanger life or using a firearm to resist arrest
|
|||
|
was increased from fourteen years to life imprisonment, while
|
|||
|
that for carrying a firearm with intent to commit an indictable
|
|||
|
offense, or while committing certain specified offenses, was
|
|||
|
increased from ten and seven years respectively, to fourteen
|
|||
|
years.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The Firearms Act, 1982, was a Home Office measure put
|
|||
|
forward as a private member's bill with bipartisan support. It
|
|||
|
was sponsored Mr. Eldon Griffiths (later Sir Eldon), the
|
|||
|
Parliamentary representative of the Police Federation, with the
|
|||
|
objective of enacting the proposal in paragraph 121 of the 1973
|
|||
|
Green Paper, banning realistic replica or toy firearms. The
|
|||
|
problems of definition, however, proved insuperable and the
|
|||
|
bill, when published, related instead to replica firearms which
|
|||
|
were capable of conversion to fire a shot. Mr. Griffiths
|
|||
|
contended that his bill would help to stem, "the rising tide of
|
|||
|
crime and terrorism." He was no doubt referring to the
|
|||
|
unpublished draft, for no one could recall a crime, much less
|
|||
|
and act of terrorism, committed with a converted replica.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The law would be better served, and would command greater
|
|||
|
respect, if it could be shown to address a problem. One of the
|
|||
|
most conspicuous features of firearms legislation in Britain has
|
|||
|
been a persistent refusal to undertake any objective analysis of
|
|||
|
its utility or consequences in terms of social benefit or effect
|
|||
|
on specified mischiefs, either prospectively or retrospectively.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The danger is twofold. In the first place, if a law cannot
|
|||
|
be demonstrably justified, those who have thus far voluntarily
|
|||
|
complied with it may cease to do so, and will moreover find
|
|||
|
their respect for the law in general diminished. This is a
|
|||
|
result that wise government should avoid. In the second place,
|
|||
|
if a law is irrelevant, resources committed to enforcing it are
|
|||
|
at best wasted and at worst counterproductive.
|
|||
|
================================================================
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
****************************************************************
|
|||
|
A BRIEF CHRONOLOGY
|
|||
|
****************************************************************
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
Several dozen statutes govern the possession, use,
|
|||
|
transport and trade in firearms in the United Kingdom, often
|
|||
|
quite tangentially. The Cemetary Clauses Act, 1847, for example,
|
|||
|
made it an offence to discharge firearms in certain cemetaries
|
|||
|
and burial grounds, except in connection with a military
|
|||
|
funeral. The Town Police Clauses Act of the same year penalizes
|
|||
|
the wanton discharge of firearms in the street to the annoyance
|
|||
|
of residents or passers by, while the Wildlife and Countryside
|
|||
|
Act of 1982 distinguishes, for no readily apparent reason, among
|
|||
|
shotgun action types that may be used for game and vermin
|
|||
|
species. Then there are the various Game Acts, Deer Acts, Night
|
|||
|
Poaching Acts and so forth on the one hand, and the Police Acts,
|
|||
|
the International Headquarters and Defence Organizations Act,
|
|||
|
the Gun Barrel Proof Act and Diplomatic Privileges Act on the
|
|||
|
other. One could go on in this vein for many more pages, and a
|
|||
|
digest of firearms law, if complete, would be compendious; a
|
|||
|
case of firearms misuse often attracts charges from a number of
|
|||
|
statutes.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
The purpose here is merely to give a concise chronology of
|
|||
|
the most important statutes relating to private firearms
|
|||
|
ownership. No mention will be made of failed bills, peripheral
|
|||
|
acts, war emergency regulations or acts relating to Scotland,
|
|||
|
Ireland or Northern Ireland. The Channel Isles and the Isle of
|
|||
|
Man of course have separate legislation. The 1973 Green Paper
|
|||
|
appears because of its topical significance.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
Those who wish to look more deeply into the matter may
|
|||
|
consult: *Gun Law* by Godfrey Sandys-Winsch (London: Shaw &
|
|||
|
Sons, 1979, 3rd ed.), *Firearms Control* by Colin Greenwood
|
|||
|
(London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1972), and *The Law Relating to
|
|||
|
Firearms* by P.J. Clarke and John W. Ellis (London:
|
|||
|
Butterworths, 1981).
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
GUN LICENSES ACT, 1870 - required anyone wishing to carry
|
|||
|
or use a gun elsewhere than in, or within the curtilege of, a
|
|||
|
dwelling house, to purchase a licence, for ten shillings, from
|
|||
|
the Post Office. Strictly a revenue measure. Repealed in 1967.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
PISTOLS ACT, 1903 - Prohibited the retail sale of pistols
|
|||
|
to those under 18 years. Required other purchasers to produce
|
|||
|
either a Gun Licence or Game License (see above), or reasonable
|
|||
|
proof that the purchaser was a householder intending to use the
|
|||
|
pistol within the curtilege of his house, or a letter,
|
|||
|
countersigned by a justice of the peace or a police officer of
|
|||
|
the rank of inspector or above, that the purchaser was going
|
|||
|
overseas for a period of not less than six months. Defined a
|
|||
|
pistol as a firearm with a barrel less than nine inches in
|
|||
|
length. Required dealers to keep records. Did not apply to
|
|||
|
private sales. Repealed in 1920.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
FIREARMS ACT, 1920 - Established the framework of controls
|
|||
|
still in use. Enacted the recommendations of the secret
|
|||
|
Blackwell Committee report. Fear of revolutionary activity a
|
|||
|
principal motivation. Made possession of a rifle or pistol
|
|||
|
dependent on a certificate issued by chief constables, who were
|
|||
|
given wide powers of discretion. Dealers were subject to
|
|||
|
registration. There were exclusions for various professional
|
|||
|
categories. Shotguns, air weapons and antiques excluded. Appeal
|
|||
|
to Petty Sessions against chief constable's decision. Repealed
|
|||
|
1937, except for ss. 16 and 19(1). Incorporated in FIREARMS ACT,
|
|||
|
1937.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
FIREARMS and IMITATION FIREARMS (CRIMINAL USE) ACT, 1933 -
|
|||
|
Created offence (maximum sentence 14 years) of using or
|
|||
|
attempting to use a firearm or imitation firearm to prevent
|
|||
|
lawful arrest or detention. Created offence of being in
|
|||
|
possession of a firearm or imitation firearm either while
|
|||
|
committing or when apprehended for committing specified
|
|||
|
offences. Maximum sentence seven years, to be served in addition
|
|||
|
to any sentence for the primary offence. Burden of proof on the
|
|||
|
defence. Repealed and incorporated into the Firearms Act, 1937.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
FIREARMS ACT, 1934 - Raised the minimum age for purchasing
|
|||
|
or hiring a firearm from 14 to 17 years and created appropriate
|
|||
|
offences. Repealed by and incorporated into the Firearms Act,
|
|||
|
1937.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
FIREARMS (AMENDMENT) ACT, 1936 - Enacted the
|
|||
|
recommendations of the Bodkin Committee report (Cmd 4758:HMSO,
|
|||
|
Dec., 1934, reprinted 1968). Shotguns and other smoothbore
|
|||
|
firearms with barrels less than 20 inches made subject to
|
|||
|
firearms certificate, as were shotgun cartridges with pellets
|
|||
|
greater than .36" diameter. Machine guns removed from firearm
|
|||
|
certificate control and made subject to Admiralty, Army Council
|
|||
|
or Air Council authority. Sound moderators subject to firearm
|
|||
|
certificate control. Extensive regulations concerning firearms
|
|||
|
dealers. Chief constables empowered to add conditions to firearm
|
|||
|
certificates. Appeals transferred from Petty Sessions to Quarter
|
|||
|
Sessions. Repealed by and incorporated into Firearms Act, 1937.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
FIREARMS ACT, 1937 - Consolidated the four preceding Acts.
|
|||
|
Repealed by and incorporated into the Firearms Act, 1968.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
AIR GUNS and SHOTGUNS, etc., ACT, 1962 - A private member's
|
|||
|
bill, introduced by Mr. Brian Harrison. Regulated the
|
|||
|
circumstances under which young people aged 14-21 may purchase,
|
|||
|
use or have in possession firearms, shotguns, airguns or
|
|||
|
ammunition or pellets therefor. Repealed in 1968 and
|
|||
|
incorporated into the Firearms Act, 1968, as ss.22-24.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
FIREARMS ACT, 1965 - Intended as legislative prophylaxis
|
|||
|
against an anticipated upsurge in criminal violence following
|
|||
|
the forthcoming abolition of capital punishment. Substantially
|
|||
|
increased the penalties for Firearms Act offences. Created new
|
|||
|
offences of armed trespass, possession of firearms and
|
|||
|
ammunition in a public place, and carrying a firearm or
|
|||
|
imitation firearm with intent to commit a criminal offence.
|
|||
|
Extended the prohibition of firearms ownership by convicted
|
|||
|
persons. Created extensive new regulations for firearms dealers
|
|||
|
and authorised chief constables to attach conditions to dealers
|
|||
|
registrations. Minimum length for shotgun barrels increased from
|
|||
|
20" to 24". Absolute prohibition on shortening the barrels of a
|
|||
|
shotgun to a length less than 24" except by a registered dealer,
|
|||
|
and then only for purposes of resleeving. Repealed by and
|
|||
|
incorporated into the Firearms Act, 1968.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
CRIMINAL JUSTICE ACT, 1967, PART V - Placed shotguns with
|
|||
|
barrels of 24" or more under certificate control. Introduced in
|
|||
|
response to an incident in which police officers were killed by
|
|||
|
criminals armed with illegal pistols. A shotgun certificate was
|
|||
|
based on the personal suitability of the applicant and was not
|
|||
|
restricted to designated guns. Repealed by and incorporated into
|
|||
|
the Firearms Act, 1968.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
FIREARMS ACT, 1968 Gave the Home Secretary power to alter
|
|||
|
fees charged by order. Consolidated the 1937 and subsequent
|
|||
|
Acts.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
CRIMINAL JUSTICE ACT, 1972 - Increased the penalties for
|
|||
|
criminal misuse stipulated in the Firearms Act, 1968.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
1973 GREEN PAPER CMND 5297 - entitled *The Control of
|
|||
|
Firearms in Great Britain: A Consultive Document. Based on the
|
|||
|
secret report of Sir John McKay's working party of 1971-72, it
|
|||
|
proposed draconian restrictive measures unsupported by any
|
|||
|
verifiable evidence. Rejected by Parliament. All but four
|
|||
|
clauses of the current Firearms (Amendment) Bill are drawn from
|
|||
|
the Green Paper.
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
FIREARMS ACT, 1982 - Subjected to firearm certificate
|
|||
|
control replica or imitation firearms deeped "readily
|
|||
|
convertible" to discharge a projectile. Creates a defence of
|
|||
|
innocent ownership. A code of practice agreed upon with the
|
|||
|
trade governs new production.
|
|||
|
|