Universal Background Checks

Will Ederer
Critical Thinking Paper (Final)
CAP
5/10/15

On October 21st, 2012, Radcliffe Haughton shot seven women at Azana Spa, where his ex-wife
worked. He killed her and two other women and wounded four more before committing suicide, all
using a semi-automatic handgun he had bought the Sunday before. Although Haughton was under an
active restraining order that prevented him from passing the background checks necessary to purchase
firearms, he was able to use a website called ArmsList.com to purchase a .40 caliber semi-automatic
handgun by using a loophole in current gun legislation (Durkin). Because of current loopholes in gun
purchases, the success of current background check programs, and overwhelming American support,
the United States Congress must pass H.R 1217, the Public Safety and Second Amendment Rights
Protection Act of 2015, to ensure background checks on the sale of all firearms.
At the moment, background checks are necessary in sales from licensed firearms dealers
because of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act of 1993. This act was created for the purpose
of creating the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) as well as to create a 48
hour waiting period before the purchase of any handguns (Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act).
This system has worked incredibly well, denying over one million transactions to people ineligible to
own firearms since its creation in 1998 (National Instant Criminal Background). However, those
denied have a simple route to obtaining firearms using completely legal methods.
People normally ineligible to purchase firearms are able to do so from private sellers using a
loophole called the gun show loophole. In most states, there is no requirement for background checks
for firearms purchased from private, unlicensed individuals, including purchases made on the internet
(Gun Show Background Checks). It was through this loophole that Radcliffe Haughton was able to
bypass the need for a background check and buy his handgun from ArmsList.com despite his
restraining order (Durkin). This loophole also fuels much of the black market for illegal guns
(Bloomberg 2).
This loophole in legislation is a problem because it allows dangerous people easy access to
firearms. In the case of many mass shootings, the killers have bought their guns online. TGSCOM Inc.,

a Wisconsin based company that owns fifty websites that sell firearms, has sold the weapons
responsible for the Virginia Tech shooting, the Northern Illinois University shooting, and a shooting at
a Pennsylvania gym (Hamill). Cho Seung-Hui, the shooter responsible for the Virginia Tech shooting,
was able to purchase a 22-caliber Walther semi-automatic pistol despite having a history of mental
illness (Halfano). Online gun sales have been linked to black market trafficking, including one case
where a single man bought over 500 guns to sell to anyone willing to pay. Among others, those who
purchased the guns were linked to a terrorist bombing plot in Canada, a Brooklyn shooting, and many
cases of guns showing up at schools, including one in Silver Spring, Maryland (Cohen). Because of all
of the ways that people take advantage of the loophole, it is necessary to expand background checks to
close it.
A solution to the problems caused by internet sales and loopholes in gun legislation would be
simply to close those loopholes. To do this, it is necessary to expand the instant background check
system to all gun sales rather than only those sold by licensed firearms dealers. This would require
unlicensed dealers to contact licensed dealers and use the NICS to check the background of whoever
was attempting to purchase the gun. Doing so would prevent sales to ineligible people without leaving
the salesperson accountable. This would allow for investigations on possibly illegal deals to go quicker,
as all legal sales would be documented by the NICS. In this way, firearms would be further denied to
dangerous people, and dangerous people could be stopped before they use their weapon maliciously.
The state of California currently requires background checks every time a firearm is sold.
According to the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, California law requires any prospective
purchaser of a firearm to submit an application to purchase the firearm... through a licensed dealer to
the [California Department of Justice]. After submitting details about the purchaser, the California
Department of Justice will check available and authorized records, including the federal NICS
database, in order to determine whether the person is prohibited from possessing, receiving, owning, or
purchasing a firearm by state or federal law (Background Checks in California). This system of

having a middleman to check gun purchasing eligibility has worked well in California. This, along with
other comprehensive gun reform, has helped to reduce California's firearm mortality rate 52% from
1990-2010, the largest in the nation, which shows that regulation can drastically improve conditions
(Yastrow A18). This gun legislation makes sense and is supported not only in California, but across the
country.
Universal background checks have a lot of bipartisan support and support from the entire
nation. According to a Gallup Poll in 2013 to find out how much backing there was behind President
Obama's proposals to address gun violence, 91% of Americans supported criminal background checks
for all sales. This included 97% of all Democrats in the study, 92% of all Republicans, and 86% of all
Independent voters (Saad). Many of those opposed to universal background checks are simply opposed
to national gun registration.
Much of the argument against universal background checking is that background checks would
lead to a gun registry and gun registry would lead to gun confiscation. According to Wayne LaPierre of
the National Rifle Association, Gun transfers universally requiring approval by the government cannot
be enforced without mandatory gun registration... Whether the initial proposal includes a government
registry of firearm transfers or firearm owners, that's the end game. All around the world, registration
has led to confiscation ('Universal Background Checks' Mean). Because of concerns like this,
legislation is in place to prevent the federal government from creating a gun registration list, such as 28
CFR 25.9, about the retention and destruction of records in the NICS. It states, In cases of NICS Audit
Log records relating to allowed transactions, all identifying information submitted by or on behalf of
the transferee will be destroyed within 24 hours after the FFL [Federal Firearms License] receives
communication of the determination that the transfer may proceed (Retention and Destruction of
Records in the System). Because records in the NICS are destroyed once the transactions are deemed
eligible, there is no information that the government could use to create a national gun registry.
Without universal background checks, dangerous people will continue to purchase firearms with

ease and their sellers being held unaccountable. Our current background check program works well in
denying dangerous people access to firearms, but overwhelming loopholes allow ineligible people to
purchase firearms with no questions asked. Although a black market for illegal guns will always exist,
blocking as many illegal sales as possible is the first step to lowering gun violence in America. With
overwhelming bipartisan support from the American public to expand background checks universally,
the US Congress must pass H.R 1217, the Public Safety and Second Amendment Rights Protection Act
of 2015, to ensure background checks on the sale of all firearms.

Works Cited
"Background Checks in California." Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. Law Center to Prevent Gun
Violence, 2012. Web. 31 Mar. 2015.
Bloomberg, Michael R. Point, Click, Fire: An Investigation of Illegal Online Gun Sales. New York
City: City of New York, 2011. Everytown for Gun Safety. Web. 31 Mar. 2015.
Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act. 3 USC. 1993. Government Publishing Office. Web. 30 Mar.
2015.
Cohen, Sharon. "From Streets to Schoolyard: Anatomy of a Gun Trafficking Case." USA Today. USA
Today, 2011. Web. 31 Mar. 2015.
Durkin, Erik. "Website Helps Milwaukee Spa Shooter Illegally Buy Gun." New York Daily News.
NYDailyNews.com, 2014. Web. 30 Mar. 2015.
"Gun Show Background Checks State Laws." Governing. e.Republic, 2015. Web. 15 Mar. 2015.
Halfano, Sean. "Va. Tech Killer Bought 2nd Gun Online." CBSNEWS. CBS Interactive, n.d. Web. 31
Mar. 2015.
Hamill, Kristen. "Gym Shooter Bought from Sites That Sold to College Gunmen." CNN. Cable News
Network, 2015. Web. 31 Mar. 2015.
LaPierre, Wayne. "'Universal Background Checks' Mean Gun Registration, Gun Bans and
Confiscation." The Daily Caller. Daily Caller, n.d. Web. 31 Mar. 2015.
"National Instant Criminal Background Check System Operations 2012." Federal Bureau of
Investigations. Federal Bureau of Investigations, n.d. Web. 15 Mar. 2015.
Retention and Destruction of Records in the System. 28 C.F.R. Sec. 25.9. Cornell University Law
School Legal Information Institute. Web. 31 Mar. 2015.
Saad, Lydia. "Americans Back Obama's Proposals to Address Gun Violence." Gallup Polls. Gallup,
2015. Web. 15 Mar. 2015.
Yastrow, Shelby. Reply to letter. New York Times 26 Mar. 2013: A18. Global Issues in Context. Web. 15
Mar. 2015.

Annotated Bibliography
"Background Checks in California." Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. Law Center to Prevent Gun
Violence, 2012. Web. 31 Mar. 2015. This source is about California's Background check laws,
how they work, and more general information about them. The point of this article is to provide
information on smart gun legislation that has worked in the past. This source is useful because it
provides me general information about the processes in some California Gun Legislation.
Bloomberg, Michael R. Point, Click, Fire: An Investigation of Illegal Online Gun Sales. New York
City: City of New York, 2011. Everytown for Gun Safety. Web. 31 Mar. 2015. This source is an
investigative report by the City of New York's Mayor Michael Bloomberg. The main point is to
show the problems with online gun sales through an investigative report. This source is very
useful as it provides many other sources that I can use as well as statistics and investigations I
can cite in my paper.
Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act. 3 USC. 1993. Government Publishing Office. Web. 30 Mar.
2015. This source is the Online republication of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act of
1993. This source is useful in order to refer back to the law as well as to find its successes and
failures.
"Close Loopholes for Gun Purchases." Tampa Bay Times [Saint Petersburg] 29 Oct. 2014: 8A.
Opposing Viewpoints in Context. Web. 15 Mar. 2015. An article in the Tampa Bay Times in
2014, about why background checks should be expanded to close the gun show loophole. The
point of this article is to provide support and evidence for why background checks should be
expanded universally. This article seems to have a pretty liberal bias, and it uses opinionated
ideas rather than reporting the straight facts. This source is useful because it cites various
statistics that I can research myself as well as providing various arguments I can use in
developing my paper.
Cohen, Sharon. "From Streets to Schoolyard: Anatomy of a Gun Trafficking Case." USA Today. USA
Today, 2011. Web. 31 Mar. 2015. This source is about a gun trafficking case and everything
involved with it, as well as where the guns ended up. This source is useful because it provides
many examples of guns bought on the black market, where they were bought, and how the
entire process worked.
Durkin, Erik. "Website Helps Milwaukee Spa Shooter Illegally Buy Gun." New York Daily News.
NYDailyNews.com, 2014. Web. 30 Mar. 2015. An Article in the New York Daily News in 2012
about the Azana Spa Shooting, Radcliffe Haughton, and the weapon he used to perpetrate the
crime. The point of this article is to show that Haughton bought the weapon using a legal
method although he was under an active restraining order, and it explains New York Mayor
Michael Bloomberg's goal for Universal Background checks after the incident.
"Gun Show Background Checks State Laws." Governing. e.Republic, 2015. Web. 15 Mar. 2015. This is
a web article on state gun legislation, specifically the gun show loophole where background
checks are not required in sales from unlicensed dealers. This source is useful for information
about legislation as well as various statistics and data samples that I can use in my paper.
Halfano, Sean. "Va. Tech Killer Bought 2nd Gun Online." CBSNEWS. CBS Interactive, n.d. Web. 31
Mar. 2015. An article about the Virginia Tech shooting, where the killer bought his gun, and the
killer's history of mental illness. The point of this article is to provide information about what
happened behind the scenes of the shooting. This source is useful for background information
about this specific event.
Hamill, Kristen. "Gym Shooter Bought from Sites That Sold to College Gunmen." CNN. Cable News
Network, 2015. Web. 31 Mar. 2015. This is an article about a shooting that took place in a gym
in Pennsylvania, and about where the shooter bought his gun. The main point is to show what
happened in the shooting and where the man bought his gun, as well as others who have bought

the gun from that source. This is useful because it gives general information about specific
shootings.
LaPierre, Wayne. "'Universal Background Checks' Mean Gun Registration, Gun Bans and
Confiscation." The Daily Caller. Daily Caller, n.d. Web. 31 Mar. 2015. An article by Wayne
LaPierre, of the NRA, about his feelings on "Universal Background Checks," and how that
really means gun registration which leads to gun confiscation. This source is useful because it
shows his and people like him's opinions on Universal Background Checks, and why he thinks
we shouldn't have them.
"National Instant Criminal Background Check System Operations 2012." Federal Bureau of
Investigations. Federal Bureau of Investigations, n.d. Web. 15 Mar. 2015. An FBI report on the
success of the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), in 2012. This
source provides no arguments, but it has a lot of data and statistics about the various things that
the NICS does. This source is pretty useful because it provides a lot of statistics and hard
evidence, and it shows no bias. It helps to prove some important points, such as the successes
and failures of the program.
Ramde, Dineshe. "Radcliffe Haughton Had History of Abuse; Killed 3, Himself at Azana Day Spa in
Wisconsin." Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 2015. Web. 30 Mar. 2015. This source is
an article from the Huffington Post about the Azana Spa Shootings in 2012, and about the
shooter, Radcliffe Haughton. The point of this article is to provide insight on what happened at
the shooting and the history of the shooter himself. This source is useful to me because it
provides background information on the shooting and the things that led up to it.
Rawson, David. Reply to letter. New York Times 26 Mar. 2013: n. pag. Global Issues in Context. Web.
15 Mar. 2015. Another letter to the editor in the New York Times in 2013, about why
background checks should be expanded universally. This letter is useful in that it provides
arguments and evidence that I might be able to make use of in my paper.
Retention and Destruction of Records in the System. 28 C.F.R. Sec. 25.9. Cornell University Law
School Legal Information Institute. Web. 31 Mar. 2015. This is the Code of Federal Regulations
regarding the NICS and its retention and destruction of records. This source is useful because it
is the rule I can refer to when talking about how long the NICS retains its records.
Saad, Lydia. "Americans Back Obama's Proposals to Address Gun Violence." Gallup Polls. Gallup,
2015. Web. 15 Mar. 2015. A Gallup Poll on how many Americans supported various proposals
in President Obama's plan to reduce gun violence in 2013. The main point is to show how many
people support the various proposals; the results show a lot of support toward increased gun
control. This is a useful source because it gives direct evidence about public support of gun
control measures.
Yastrow, Shelby. Reply to letter. New York Times 26 Mar. 2013: A18. Global Issues in Context. Web. 15
Mar. 2015. A letter to the editor in the New York Times in 2013, about the successes of
expanded background checks. The point of this letter is to show that expanded background
checks have worked; specifically, Shelby Yastrow cites California, which saw a 52% drop in
firearm mortality from 1990-2010, the largest in the nation. California has, at the center of its
gun control legislation, universal background checks, which Yastrow also says. This source is
liberally biased, and it provides opinionated ideas. However, this source is useful because it
cites useful information and arguments that I may be able to use in my paper.