[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 4]
[House]
[Page 5058]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                               GUN REFORM

  (Mr. MORAN asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. MORAN. Mr. Speaker, throughout the United States, in red and blue 
States alike, we have speed limits for travel on public roads. These 
laws are good public policy because they prohibit behavior that can 
endanger the lives of others. But imagine if we blocked our police from 
using speed detection devices so they could never prove that you were 
speeding or if we only allowed the use of those devices on certain 
roads. Such a policy would make speed limits mere suggestions with no 
consequences for those who would violate the law.
  It sounds ridiculous, but this is exactly the strategy we currently 
use to prohibit the purchase of firearms by criminals and those with 
serious mental illness. Federal law bans the purchase of guns by 
dangerous people, but massive loopholes in our background check system 
permit at least 40 percent of purchases to evade the law without 
detection by law enforcement.
  The NRA and its supporters often claim that we need to enforce the 
laws on the books. Agreed. Universal background checks are designed to 
do just that--to provide an actual enforcement mechanism. That's what 
the Congress should require because 90 percent of the American public 
wants us to do at least that.

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