[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 34 (Thursday, March 16, 2006)]
[House]
[Pages H1125-H1126]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    SAVING LIVES THROUGH LEGISLATION

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from New York (Mrs. McCarthy) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mrs. McCARTHY. Madam Speaker, I came here to Washington to do 
everything I could to reduce gun violence in this country; and 
unfortunately, the atmosphere that is here is preventing me from doing 
that.
  There are many out there that say I am out there to try to take away 
the right of someone to own a gun, and yet I have never introduced any 
kind of legislation that would do any such thing.
  What I am trying to do is save lives. What I am trying to do is 
certainly try to keep medical costs down. We have come to an agreement, 
many Members in this Chamber, on legislation I introduced a couple of 
years ago. The reason behind this legislation was because, 
unfortunately, there was another shooting in my district and two of my 
parishioners were killed. And the sad story is it could have been 
prevented.
  Peter Troy, who is someone that had a very long mental health 
background, and he also had a restraining order from his mother against 
him because of his violent acts, was able to go into a store and 
legally buy a gun. He was able to do this because the State, my State 
of New York, did not put the information into the State system that was 
supposed to go into the NICS system.
  This is happening every single day across this Nation. We looked into 
it and figured how can we change this. So we started looking at the 
different States. We saw that some States hardly had any records in the 
NICS system that had anything to do with domestic violence. We saw also 
that many States did not put anything in on those that were convicted 
of felonies. So we came up with legislation that we thought would help 
to reduce crime in this country.
  We came up with legislation that we knew if we could keep guns out of 
illegal hands, those that should not be able to buy a gun, we could 
save lives. And if we could save lives, we are hoping also we could 
save injuries, and this way it is a win-win situation for everyone in 
our community.
  I am hoping before the Memorial Day recess that I will be able to get 
my legislation back on to the floor for a vote. It did pass in 1997, 
and we had it on a voice vote because everybody agreed with it.
  Now, I know our time down here is very short. We are going on another 
break this very week. For the 10 years that I have been here in 
Washington, we have never had a break in March. I wish we could be 
staying so we could continue to work to do the people's work.
  I guess what I want to talk about is that we could have reasonable 
laws that could help people, save people's lives and make a difference 
in someone's life. We can do this without certainly infringing on 
anyone's second amendment rights.
  The NICS bill that I am proposing would help our States bring their 
data up to speed. We all know that computers and the Internet are 
moving very rapidly, but a computer is only as good as the information 
in it. What I propose, and what had been accepted here in this House, 
would give the States the money so that when someone is convicted of a 
crime that would make them ineligible to be able to buy a gun, that 
would immediately go into the system. This is a win-win situation for 
everyone.

[[Page H1126]]

  Back in my State of New York we are seeing more and more illegal guns 
coming into my city. It is probably happening in a lot of other States. 
It is only a small percentage of those bad people that are buying these 
illegal guns that we can stop.
  Madam Speaker, there are so many things we could do to stop gun 
violence in this country, to make a difference. And I know it is not on 
the top of the list of everybody in this country. I know the majority 
of people are struggling to just get through their day, working, coming 
home, taking care of the family, doing everything that a family should 
be doing because they honestly feel that we as politicians are down 
here protecting them.
  We talk about homeland security. We talk about possible terrorists in 
this country, and yet we make it so easy for those out there to buy 
guns.
  Madam Speaker, I hope we can make a difference. I hope we can change 
the dialogue. I hope we can save lives. I hope we can prevent injuries.

                          ____________________