New York’s governor learned with COVID that executive power can be abused with impunity, and now he’s setting his sights on firearms.
New York’s governor learned with COVID that executive power can be abused with impunity, and now he’s setting his sights on firearms.
A fter signing an executive order this week declaring a “first in the nation” disaster emergency aimed at gun violence, New York governor Andrew Cuomo promised to tackle the gun problem in much the same way he took care of COVID — which, considering his disastrous response during the pandemic, sounds more like a threat.
Instead, as with COVID, Cuomo has empowered himself to “temporarily suspend” laws “if compliance with such provisions would prevent, hinder, or delay action necessary to cope with the disaster.” It seems the only thing Cuomo learned from COVID is that executive power can be abused with impunity. Indeed, it’s another transparent effort to blame a lack of gun control on failed public-safety policies, which is quickly becoming a political problem for Democrats.
We should start by reiterating that gun-ownership rates — or a lack of gun laws — have nothing to do with rising crime rates. None of the places experiencing the biggest spikes in criminality over the past year have loosened any of their restrictive gun laws.
While there has been no change in firearm policy, that can’t be said of policies governing law enforcement. Last year, for example, the NYPD disbanded the city’s major anti-crime unit, which critics claimed alienated residents. The city passed cashless bail reform. And despite spirited assertions from national Democrats that they have no interest in such policies, the New York City Council and Mayor Bill de Blasio defunded the police department last year, cutting $1 billion from its budget. Then, of course, there is the broad-brush vilification of cops, which not only undermines community trust, but recruitment and retainment of cops.
There is no doubt that crime is rising — homicides are up over 40 percent and shootings up over 90 percent year over year in New York City. There is also plenty of room for growth. From 1969 to 1995, NYC had around 1,500 murders every year. And the high mark for homicides wasn’t all the way back in 1970s, as many people seem to believe due to the cultural depictions of New York. In 1990-1993, murders hit an average of over 2,000 per year. No doubt, plenty of New Yorkers remember those days, which surely has something to do with the Democratic Party primary win of former cop Eric Adams as mayor. A precipitous drop in crime began in the late 1990s. By 2019, there were fewer murders in NYC than there had been in 1959 or even 1929.
None of those trends had anything to do with guns laws. The federal Gun Control Act was passed in 1968, and the Firearm Owners Protection Act was passed in 1986. Not that New York City needed either, as it was one of the first places to institute widespread gun-ownership restrictions, and it still has some of the most restrictive laws in the nation. In New York City, it’s the cops who decide whether someone can have a handgun license. State and city legislators simply ignore Heller, making it prohibitively difficult for law-abiding citizens to own a firearm. New York is already home to basically every gun law now being called for by national Democrats.
Which is why Cuomo has turned to the “public health emergency” gambit. This has long been the goal of anti–Second Amendment activist groups, who want to imbue the state with extrajudicial power to tax and mandate and sue. It’s an emergency, after all. This effort also ties in directly with Cuomo’s promise to sign legislation that allows for civil lawsuits against gun manufacturers and dealers.
First of all, studies show that the vast majority of guns used in crimes are obtained in some illegal manner — either stolen, given to them by someone they know, found at the scene of a crime, or obtained illicitly in an underground market. The idea that dealers are regularly selling weapons to criminals, endangering their businesses for a few dollars, is a myth.
Secondly, the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act doesn’t protect gun makers who “knowingly” violate the law or deceive the public. The “health emergency” is an attempt to broaden what deception entails. Now, if gun owners were accidentally discharging guns in large numbers, or gun manufacturers were misrepresenting the purpose or lethality of their products, then perhaps civil lawsuits would make sense. But only a small fraction — around 1 percent — of gun deaths are due to accidental firing. Really, these laws are an attempt to transform gun manufacturers into the new cigarette companies.
Smoking, alas, isn’t a constitutional right. And no trendy “cross-cultural” or medical argument trumps this fact.
Most of Cuomo’s other executive actions are just platitudinous smokescreens.
- “Targeting hot spots where gun violence is coming from”
- “Having positive engagements with at-risk youth”
- “Breaking the cycle of escalating violence”
- “Getting illegal guns off the streets”
- “Keeping guns out of the hands of dangerous people”
- “Rebuilding the police-community relationship”
Has New York not been working to get illegal guns off the streets? Has it not been keeping guns out of the hands of dangerous people? Why aren’t cops already targeting violent hot spots? What happened over the past year to the dynamics of crime?