Gun Ownership

When Scott Schulte stopped at Pasadena Pawn and Gun last week to pick up his fifth firearm of the year, the Maryland State Police still hadn't finished his background check. The store let him take the pistol anyway. "I figure I can use my discretion," owner Frank Loane Sr. told Schulte. "I know you. " An unprecedented surge of applications to purchase guns has overwhelmed Maryland's system for checking out the buyers. Dealers are required to wait seven days before releasing a firearm — which in the past has been enough time for the state police to complete the background check.

When government is given a job to do in seven days and it takes 10 weeks instead, anger and frustration is likely to be heard. Such is the case with the background checks for gun purchases. The Maryland State Police has a backlog, and gun dealers and purchasers alike aren't happy about waiting 10 times longer than intended. But let's also keep the problem in perspective. This clearly isn't an effort to deliberately inconvenience gun purchasers. State police are simply swamped with applications - the equivalent of four years of applications were received in the last four months.

Maryland's new gun control law will not head to voters now that organizers of a petition drive to halt the law failed to turn in any signatures before Friday night's deadline. "This means there were no successful petitions this year," Stephen Ackerman from the Secretary of State's Office said in an email. A referendum would have delayed the gun law until after the November 2014 election, and the petition drive's failure was welcomed by gun control groups. "This is a great day for Maryland," said Vincent DeMarco, president of Marylanders to Prevent Gun Violence.

When Scott Schulte stopped at Pasadena Pawn and Gun last week to pick up his fifth firearm of the year, the Maryland State Police still hadn't finished his background check. The store let him take the pistol anyway. "I figure I can use my discretion," owner Frank Loane Sr. told Schulte. "I know you. " An unprecedented surge of applications to purchase guns has overwhelmed Maryland's system for checking out the buyers. Dealers are required to wait seven days before releasing a firearm — which in the past has been enough time for the state police to complete the background check.

When government is given a job to do in seven days and it takes 10 weeks instead, anger and frustration is likely to be heard. Such is the case with the background checks for gun purchases. The Maryland State Police has a backlog, and gun dealers and purchasers alike aren't happy about waiting 10 times longer than intended. But let's also keep the problem in perspective. This clearly isn't an effort to deliberately inconvenience gun purchasers. State police are simply swamped with applications - the equivalent of four years of applications were received in the last four months.

The Maryland House passed the Firearm Safety Act of 2013 by a vote of 78 to 61 ("House passes gun control," April 4). The bill bans the sale or transfer of semiautomatic rifles and limits magazine capacity. Once signed by the governor, the law goes into effect on October 1. There are only seven states in America that have any restrictions on magazine capacity. Gun owners are free to purchase 100-round magazines in any of the other 43 states that respect gun rights. Those opposed to gun ownership know that gun owners will become politically active if they call for total bans on all firearms.

In the days before police say he was fatally shot by his roommate Dayvon Green outside their College Park home, University of Maryland senior Stephen Rane had expressed concerns about Green having a mental illness and owning guns, according to a close friend. "I know that he did feel uncomfortable in the house," said Drew Needham, a senior who lived with Rane for two years before Rane decided to move off campus into the 36th Avenue home with at least four others, including Green, a 23-year-old graduate engineering student.

ANNAPOLIS - Hundreds of gun rights advocates rallied outside the State House on Wednesday in opposition to new gun control measures proposed by Gov. Martin O'Malley. As O'Malley testified in favor of new gun restrictions before the Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee, protesters outside said his plan to ban assault weapons, limit magazine sizes and strengthen licensing measures would erode their rights. Harry H. Fahl, a photographer from Essex, warmed up the crowd in the morning by leading a group recitation of the Second Amendment, which quickly turned into a chant.

The new gun bill will be the first of hundreds Gov. Martin O'Malley plans to sign at a ceremony Thursday. Key provisions of the 62-page law include:   A ban on the sale of 45 types of assault weapons and their copycats.   A ban on sales of magazines that hold more than 10 rounds.   A fingerprinting and licensing requirement for handgun buyers.   A 4-hour training requirement for first-time handgun buyers.   A ban on gun ownership for anyone involuntarily committed to a mental heath facility, as well as those voluntarily committed for more than 30 days.

NAGANO, Japan -- Would the biathlon competitors please check their weapons at the door?That about sums up the plight of the world's greatest cross country skiers and target shooters at the Winter Olympics. They have come to a land of tight gun control laws, and they have been temporarily disarmed.Their .22-caliber rifles are headed for a double lockup. Their ammunition has been cataloged right down to the last bullet.And if they want to practice -- or compete -- they've got to undergo an eye scan to retrieve their guns.

Maryland's new gun control law will not head to voters now that organizers of a petition drive to halt the law failed to turn in any signatures before Friday night's deadline. "This means there were no successful petitions this year," Stephen Ackerman from the Secretary of State's Office said in an email. A referendum would have delayed the gun law until after the November 2014 election, and the petition drive's failure was welcomed by gun control groups. "This is a great day for Maryland," said Vincent DeMarco, president of Marylanders to Prevent Gun Violence.

Maryland's new gun control law will not head to voters now that organizers of a petition drive to halt the law failed to turn in any signatures before Friday night's deadline. "This means there were no successful petitions this year," Stephen Ackerman from the Secretary of State's Office said in an email. A referendum would have delayed the gun law until after the November 2014, and the petition drive's failure was welcomed by gun control groups. "This is a great day for Maryland," said Vincent DeMarco, president of Marylanders to Prevent Gun Violence.

Now comes the Baltimore Sun editorial staff that just recently blasted the Second Amendment rights to gun ownership ("Ban assault weapons," March 22) raising the roof that the press' First Amendment Rights have been trumped on because of the gathering of AP phone records by the Obama administration's attorney general ("An assault on press freedom," May 15). Either the Sun editorial staff thinks their readers are too stupid to know the hypocrisy of their positions on these two issues, or they actually believe supporting the Constitution is a menu of pick and choose.

Gov. Martin O'Malley on Thursday signed a gun-control bill that is among the country's most sweeping legislative responses to the December mass shooting in Newtown, Conn. The law bans the sale of assault-style rifles, including the AR-15 used in the Newtown killing of six educators and 20 first- and second-graders. The law limits gun ownership for people with mental illness, outlaws the sale of high-capacity magazines and establishes the nation's first new handgun licensing scheme in two decades.

The new gun bill will be the first of hundreds Gov. Martin O'Malley plans to sign at a ceremony Thursday. Key provisions of the 62-page law include:   A ban on the sale of 45 types of assault weapons and their copycats.   A ban on sales of magazines that hold more than 10 rounds.   A fingerprinting and licensing requirement for handgun buyers.   A 4-hour training requirement for first-time handgun buyers.   A ban on gun ownership for anyone involuntarily committed to a mental heath facility, as well as those voluntarily committed for more than 30 days.

In much the same way the recent drug disposal day organized in Harford County was a valuable public service for people looking to safely divest themselves of unwanted medications, the gun turn-in day planned Saturday in Harford County and at locations elsewhere across Maryland is a valuable public service for people who are looking for a safe way to divest themselves of unwanted firearms. Similarly, in much the same way that drug disposal days have, at best, a limited effect on drug abuse problems in the community, a gun turn-in day will have, at best, limited effects on the use of guns in criminal activity.

When former Maryland basketball player Lonny Baxter was arrested near the White House and charged with carrying an unlicensed handgun yesterday morning, the incident was news locally but didn't get much play nationally. Baxter isn't a high-profile player. That's part of it. But there's also the fact that his arrest was only the latest in a numbing string of incidents involving athletes and guns. Just a week ago in Ohio, police say they found four loaded guns in Maurice Clarett's truck after a high-speed chase that ended when they pepper-sprayed the former Ohio State football star.

Terrorism, whether practiced in the U.S. or overseas, can be defined as a deliberate act of violence to instill fear in a target audience. We fight terrorism when we stay calm but resolute; we abet terrorists when our response is to panic or try to foment panic in others. This past weekend, the CEO of the National Rifle Association stood up on a stage in Houston and chose to follow the latter route, linking the recent bombings in Boston with gun ownership - or a lack thereof. "How many Bostonians," the NRA's Wayne LaPierre asked, "wish they had a gun two weeks ago?"

I grew up with guns in my house. There are guns in my house. I understand the sport of the shooting range and the sport of hunting. I understand the argument, while not finding it convincing, that guns in the home protect you. What I do not understand is any argument for assault weapons in private hands. Assault weapons were created to kill people - just as one did so effectively in the hands of a 20-year-old at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Now is the time to have a reasoned discussion of gun ownership and of gun control.