[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 45 (Tuesday, April 11, 2000)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2483-S2485]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            SCHOOL SHOOTINGS

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, this week is the last week the Senate will 
be in session before we take a break for the Easter holiday. During the 
period of that break, on April 20, we will remember an anniversary. It 
is a sad remembrance. It is the 1-year anniversary of the shooting at 
Columbine High School in Colorado.
  Most of us can remember the scenes from television played and 
replayed so often. The scenes of children, not unlike our own children, 
racing out of the school away from other kids who were shooting away 
with weapons. You can remember, I am sure--I will always remember--a 
young man who dragged himself, having already been shot, out of a 
window, trying to fall to the ground and get away from danger. We saw 
that terrible scene on television.
  We watched as the funerals unfolded one after another; 12 innocent 
students were killed and 23 were injured.
  We finally came to realize as a nation that the tragedy which struck 
in Colorado could touch any one of us anywhere and at any school. 
Columbine was not the most predictable place for this to occur. 
Columbine was a place where you would have thought that would never 
occur. But sadly, this is the reality of America where too many guns 
are used in crimes of violence.
  If you look through the chronology of school shootings since 1997, 
Bethel in the State of Alaska; Pearl, MI; West Paducah, KY; Jonesboro, 
AK; Edinboro, PA; Fayetteville, TN; Springfield, OR; Littleton, CO; 
Conyers, GA; Deming, NM; Fort Gibson, OK; Mount Morris Township, MI--
you will remember that episode in Michigan. It wasn't that long ago. On 
February 29, a 6-year-old boy went to his first-grade classroom, pulled 
out a 32-caliber Davis Industries

[[Page S2484]]

semiautomatic pistol, pointed it at his classmates, and then turned the 
gun on Kayla Rolland, 6 years old, and fatally shot her in the neck.
  This sad reality is on the minds of American families. The obvious 
question of the Senate and the Congress is: Is there anything you can 
do? What can you do? What will you do?
  The first anniversary of Columbine will come and go next week, and 
sadly Congress will have done nothing--absolutely nothing.
  We passed a bill last year on the floor of the Senate which at least 
moved us closer to the possibility of keeping guns out of the hands of 
criminals and children.
  There was an idea behind this law that was not an unreasonable or 
radical idea, which was the suggestion that if a person bought a gun at 
a gun show, that person would be subject to the same background checks 
as a person who bought one from a licensed gun dealer. We don't want to 
sell guns to criminals. We don't want to sell them to people with a 
history of violent mental illness. We certainly don't want to sell guns 
to children. Why wouldn't we check at a gun show to make certain that 
we are keeping guns away from those people? That is what the law said. 
That was what was passed here in the Senate.
  The background check has become automated and computerized. Within 2 
hours after the name is submitted, some 95 percent of all of the names 
submitted--they run them through--95 percent of the people who buy a 
gun at a gun show would be delayed 2 hours from buying a gun. For the 5 
percent where questions are raised and they can't give them an 
immediate answer, that 5 percent is 20 times more likely to be in a 
prohibited category; that is, they are 20 times more likely to be 
criminals, people with a history of violent mental illness, or those 
who should otherwise be disqualified.
  The law we proposed was not a radical idea. It said: Can you wait 2 
hours at a gun show so we can do a background check and make sure that 
people who should not buy guns, don't buy them? It is an inconvenience. 
But you know, we put up with inconvenience every day for the security 
of ourselves and our families.
  When I flew through O'Hare Airport yesterday to come to Washington, I 
went through a metal detector. They stopped me: Take the change out of 
your pockets and go back through. That is an inconvenience. That is a 
delay. I am prepared to accept that. If it means there will be fewer 
terrorist attacks and fewer threats on people traveling, I accept it.

  That is what this law says; it is an inconvenience. At a gun show, 
wait for the background check to be completed before you are allowed to 
get your gun. That is what we proposed.
  Second, we said if you are going to own a gun, you have a legal 
responsibility to store it safely. You exercise your constitutional 
right under the second amendment to buy a gun, but then when you take 
it home, for goodness' sake, put it in a place so children can't get 
their hands on it.
  We called for trigger locks, and that is becoming a popular, common 
suggestion--it is not an unreasonable suggestion, certainly--so 
children don't get their hands on guns. Every day in America, we lose 
just as many kids to guns as we lost on April 20, 1999, at that one 
high school in Colorado--12 kids a day die because of guns. Some are 
suicides, some are drive-by gangbanger shootings, and others are just 
accidents where curious kids play with guns and shoot themselves or 
their playmates.
  Our bill said let's require trigger locks on guns, let's make sure 
they are stored safely and the kids, such as this fellow in Michigan, 
do not end up with a .32-caliber Davis industries semiautomatic pistol 
in the first grade where he killed Kayla Rowland. That was the second 
part of this bill.
  The third part said you don't need these high-capacity Ammo clips 
with hundreds of bullets in them if you are going out to shoot a deer. 
If you need a semiautomatic weapon to shoot a deer, maybe you ought to 
stick to fishing. We are saying we don't need to make these clips in 
the United States nor do we need to import them. These are people 
killers. These are not guns used in sporting or hunting enterprises. 
That was the third part of the bill.
  We almost lost the gun shows provision I have just described on the 
Senate floor. The gun shows amendment passed by one vote, the vote of 
Vice President Gore, who under the Constitution can break a tie. He 
showed up that day and cast the deciding vote. We passed the gun shows 
amendment by one vote after Columbine, after this national tragedy. We 
passed it by one vote. We sent it across the Rotunda to the House of 
Representatives. Now it is their responsibility. We gave them 2 or 3 
weeks to prepare to debate the bill. But we obviously gave the gun 
lobby at least the same period of time to prepare their campaign 
against it. And they were successful. They watered down the gun shows 
amendment. They took the viable parts out of it. They passed a shadow 
of what we passed in the Senate.
  At that point, it goes to the conference committee and the House and 
Senate sit together and try to work out a compromise. Here we sit, 
almost a year after Columbine, and we have done absolutely nothing. 
Families across America who expect this Congress to do the most basic 
things for gun safety have a right to be angry that this Congress is so 
insensitive and unwilling to address this critical issue of gun safety, 
of safety in the classrooms, keeping guns out of the hands of 
criminals, violently mental ill people, and children.
  The other side says, of course, it isn't about new laws. We hear the 
gun lobby say we have plenty of laws, it is about enforcing the laws on 
the books. How many times have we heard Charlton Heston and those folks 
come up with that argument? I don't disagree with them. I think 
enforcement is critical and existing laws should be enforced.
  So last week while we were debating the budget resolution, I brought 
a proposal on the floor of the Senate. Many Members, frankly, subscribe 
to the NRA position that we need more enforcement. I said let's put 
more agents and inspectors in the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and 
Firearms so they can find the gun dealers who are breaking the law and 
selling their guns to criminals; let's put 1,000 more prosecutors 
across America to enforce those laws, prosecute those laws, and put 
people in jail who violate those laws.

  Unfortunately, I couldn't succeed and I didn't prevail. A Senator 
came to the floor and offered an alternative which took out all the 
money for the ATF agents and inspectors. He didn't want to put more 
enforcement in the gun laws of America. And he prevailed. The argument 
that this is about enforcement doesn't square with the vote that took 
place last week.
  There are 102,000 gun dealers across America, about 80,000 who 
actively sell weapons that are used in sport and hunting. When we did a 
survey, out of those 80,000 federally licensed gun dealers, we found if 
we narrowed it down to those gun dealers who sell guns that end up 
being used in crime, traceable guns used in crime, only 1,000 of the 
80,000 gun dealers are the culprits, the ones selling guns to people 
that are ultimately used in crime. Over half the guns used in crime in 
America come from 1,000 of the gun dealers out of 80,000.
  It makes sense to me to go after these 1,000, and it makes sense to 
me to give resources to the ATF and the Department of the Treasury to 
go after these gun dealers, close them down if we have to, but enforce 
the law. Don't let people--whether they are in Illinois, my home State, 
or any other State--sell guns that are going to be used in a crime.
  When I put the amendment on the floor, the other side couldn't accept 
that. They didn't want to put more enforcement in the gun laws. So they 
came up with a much weaker alternative.
  Here we are at the traditional and historic standoff. This Congress 
failed to act for 1 year after Columbine. The images are still fresh in 
our mind of those kids running for their lives out of their own high 
school; those caskets, one after the other, at funerals; grieving 
parents, grieving communities, and a grieving nation; and this 
Congress, unable and unwilling to respond or act. It is shameful. It is 
disgraceful. And it continues. The school violence, the gun violence 
that struck Columbine, continues. Look beyond the schools. We see it in 
the streets and the neighborhoods, and more children will die today

[[Page S2485]]

in America, 12 more, the same number killed at Columbine--12 more--
because we will not take the initiative for gun safety.
  Has this Congress reached such a point that we are under the thumb of 
the National Rifle Association and the gun lobby? That we would let 
those well dressed lobbyists down on K Street rule our agenda to the 
point where American families are being ignored? I hope not.
  I hope when we remember in just a few days the anniversary of 
Columbine, families across America will take just a few minutes, get on 
the phone, and call their Congressman and their Senator and ask them 
one simple question: I just heard about Columbine; what have you done 
with your vote to make my kids safer in school since this tragedy? If 
citizens will call and ask that question, perhaps we will see a change 
of sentiment here on Capitol Hill.
  I yield back the remainder of my time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California.
  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask to speak as in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator is recognized.
  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I thank once again the Senator from 
Illinois for his eloquence on the issue of sensible gun laws and add my 
voice to his plea that the Senate do what it is supposed to do, which 
is to bring out the juvenile justice bill with five sensible gun 
control measures, sensible measures that will reduce gun violence.
  I thank the Senator from Rhode Island, Mr. Reed, who is on the floor 
as well, for his very important sense-of-the-Senate Amendment to the 
budget resolution, which actually says it is the opinion of the Senate 
that we ought to be voting on those gun measures. It passed by a slim 
majority, but so far we have not seen any results.

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