BELLEVUE, WA — Newly-introduced legislation that would repeal prohibition of handgun ownership by citizens in Washington, D.C. is “long overdue,” the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms said today.
“For more than a generation, it has been disgraceful that American citizens living in the nation’s capitol have been essentially stripped of their Second Amendment rights under the Constitution,” said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb. “Just how much more ironic could it be that in Washington, D.C. – the capitol of freedom – citizens are not free to exercise one of the most basic of civil and human rights, the right of self-defense?”
Legislation sponsored by Senators George Allen of Virginia and Texans Kay Bailey Hutchison and John Cronyn would dismantle the Washington, D.C. handgun ban. Dubbed the “District of Columbia Personal Protection Act of 2005,” it is similar to a measure in the House of Representatives that already has 123 sponsors.
“The Washington, D.C. handgun ban” said CCRKBA Executive Director Joe Waldron, “has been a dismal failure. Criminals ignore it and honest citizens are essentially prisoners in their own homes because of it, fearful to venture far from the front door. That’s not much of a testament to the ‘Land of the Free and Home of the Brave’.”
“Narrow-minded District businessmen and elitist politicians who have opposed similar legislation in the past are part of the problem, not the solution,” Gottlieb added. “Incapable of admitting they’ve been wrong about solving the District’s violent crime problem and reducing the District’s murder rate, they would rather continue the status quo, in which law-abiding citizens are little more than fodder in a target-rich environment for criminals.
“It is deplorable,” Gottlieb concluded, “that anyone would oppose a measure clearly aimed at making Washington, D.C. residents safer in their homes and neighborhoods, when politicians on Capitol Hill currently enjoy tighter security than commercial airline passengers. If Congressional opponents of personal protection weren’t such hypocrites, they would be ashamed of themselves.”
With more than 650,000 members and supporters nationwide, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (www.ccrkba.org) is one of the nation’s premier gun rights organizations. As a non-profit organization, the Citizens Committee is dedicated to preserving firearms freedoms through active lobbying of elected officials and facilitating grass-roots organization of gun rights activists in local communities throughout the United States.