In Virginia, a Dance Around Gun Reform
As the battle over gun reform has raged on Capitol Hill this year, it’s become ever-more clear that this is more a regional issue than a partisan one. Indeed, 20 Democrats voted last week in support of a proposal forcing states to honor conceal-carry permits issued by other states. And a House bill granting Washington, D.C., a voting representative in Congress remains stalled because an amendment scrapping most of D.C.’s strict gun control laws is attached — an amendment that chamber leaders know will pass because plenty of moderate Democrats support it.
All of which makes the gun-control debate in Virginia’s gubernatorial race that much more interesting. In an eye-opening piece today, The Washington Post describes the strange dance around the issue taking place in the Old Dominion, where the leading candidates — former attorney general Robert F. McDonnell (R) and state Sen. R. Creigh Deeds (D) — have begun to buck their regional sensitivities in favor of the party line.
“„Until recently, Deeds, as a lawmaker from rural Bath County, had been a more staunch advocate of gun rights than McDonnell, whose career began in Virginia Beach. One of Deeds’s signature pieces of legislation was a state constitutional amendment guaranteeing Virginians the right to hunt and fish. Deeds also secured the National Rifle Association’s backing in the 2005 attorney general’s race against McDonnell, who won by 360 votes.
“„Former Virginia governor L. Douglas Wilder, a Democrat, pointedly declined to endorse Deeds in that campaign because Deeds, as a delegate, had refused to support legislation limiting handgun purchases to no more than one per month — a measure McDonnell backed.
Yet on the issue of the gun-show loophole — which allows unlicensed gun vendors to sell firearms without performing background checks on the buyers — it’s Deeds who wants to close it and McDonnell who would keep it open.
Deeds told The Post that his change of heart came the day of the Virginia Tech shooting, in which a student killed 32 people with handguns before taking his own life. “As a father, I felt just a need deep down in my soul to respond to their grief somehow,” Deeds told the Post.
McDonnell, meanwhile, is also warming to his party’s traditional Second Amendment approach.
“„McDonnell … now says he supports a repeal of the one-a-month law because computerized background checks and other advances make it unnecessary. In an interview last week, McDonnell also said he opposes further regulating gun shows because statistics show only a tiny number of guns used in crimes were obtained at gun shows.
“„“I’d say it’s a little bit of a misnomer to call it a loophole,” McDonnell said. “It’s really an attempt to regulate private sales.”
McDonnell was also quick to point out that the Virginia Tech shooter didn’t buy his weapons at a gun show. Of course, he easily could have. And if McDonnell gets his way, that will remain the case.
