European Gun Laws did not reduce Murder or Crime Rates

Gun Watch ^ | 14 December, 2015 | Dean Weingarten

[marktwain]

Those who push for more restrictions on gun ownership and use like to compare the United States with Europe.  They claim that Europe has low homicide rates because Europe has extreme restrictions on gun ownership and the carry of guns.  They ignore that the laws restricting gun ownership and carry came between World War One and World War Two.  The chart above is from a European academic paper(pdf) comparing homicide in Finland, the Netherlands, and Sweden.   The study was financed by the European Union.

European gun laws restriction ownership and carry were instituted after WWI.  Germany had no laws against the carrying of weapons or the acquisition of guns until 1919.  In England, anyone could walk into a shop and buy a shotgun until 1968, a rifle until 1920, and a pistol at a shop only required a tax stamp, available at any post office,  from 1903 until 1920.  Private sales were unregulated.

In France, modern gun laws began in 1938, according to CNN:

..most of our gun laws date back to the decrees of April 18, 1939. It was a time of official mobilization against Hitler's imminent offensive, a time when a derelict French government cared less about its citizens killing each other than about the populace, or political factions, turning their weapons against the state for an insurrection.

Poland had widespread private arms ownership for self defense until under NAZI and Soviet occupations during and after after WWII.

Following a severe increase in robberies in 1905, the Russian authorities reacted in 1906 by loosening the law and allowing all citizens free access to revolvers and ammunition, and to those who were gun permit holders virtually any firearm.

In Austria, according to a personal account(pdf), gun registration started in the 1940's.

I have not been able to find when Finnish gun laws were put into effect.  It was likely between 1918 and 1940.

 Don Kates affirms that severe restrictions on gun ownership and carry "gun control" as it has become known, was instigated in Europe after the first World War. 

European anti-gun laws only arrived after World War I, and they were not passed in order to curb crime. They were passed in response to the political violence of that tumultuous era (1918-1939) between the two World Wars.

The European study looks at firearms ownership and concludes that there is no correlation between levels of firearms ownership and homicide. From 2011 study of Homicide in Finland, the Netherlands, and Sweden(pdf):

Private gun ownership

All three countries have strict firearm legislation, and in all of them
ownership of firearms is subject to licence. In spite of this, partly
for historical reasons, firearm ownership prevalence differs sub-
stantially between the countries. The Finnish gun ownership rate
is one of the highest in Europe, and the Dutch rate is one of the
lowest. In Sweden, the ownership rate is higher than the Euro-
pean average, but considerably lower than in Finland (see table 1).

Most of the guns owned by private persons in Finland and Sweden
are shotguns or rifles used in hunting. The Finnish handgun own-
ership rate (6 per cent), although the second highest among the
European Union member countries, is very low if compared, for
example, with that in the United States. In the Netherlands and
Sweden handgun ownership is even rarer (van Dijk et al. 2007).

There seems not to be any clear correlation between firearm
ownership (at least legal firearm ownership) prevalence and homi-
cide rates in Europe (Granath 2011; Kivivuori & Lehti 2010). Ac-
cording to the International Crime Victim Surveys, for example, in
Finland, in spite of the high ownership prevalence and relatively
high violent crime rates, the use of guns in robberies, sexual of-
fences, or assault crimes is almost non-existent (van Dijk & van
Kesteren & Smit 2007, 284).

If you look at the chart, it is obvious that homicides in Europe did not drop dramatically between 1920 and 1940, or shortly thereafter.  Except for the war years, where homicides were much higher in the Netherlands, the homicide rate is essentially flat.  Strict firearms regulations, as a means of reducing the murder rate, was a failure.

That is not surprising, becasue that is not what it was designed for.  It was designed to prevent revolution against the elites.   Colin Greenwood and Professor Joyce Lee Malcolm exposed that reason in their scholarly studies.  Greenwood with his ground breaking Cambridge study in 1972, and Malcolm with her series of scholarly books, later.

©2015 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.
Link to Gun Watch

[marktwain]

The entire premise of gun control is a lie.

It is all based on lies and falsehoods.

[Sasparilla]

...They ignore that the laws restricting gun ownership and carry came between World War One and World War Two...

It goes back further than that. European Royalty objected to the populace from owning guns because they feared armed subjects would soon become free subjects.

The biggest gun control failure happened on Lexington Green and the road back to Concord. This is burned into the psyche of all red blooded Americans.

[BitWielder1]

The vast majority of guns are kept for self defense and are never used for crime or murder.
That alone should explain why gun control never has the intended effect.

[hecticskeptic]

I think the only study that would mean anything would be one that looks at total deaths that do not fall under the categories of natural, accidental, acts of war etc. To take one example of the flaws, the study would be meaningless if theoretically all guns could be made to magically disappear entirely but just as mysteriously, there was an equal rise in murders by knives, beatings etc. The other thing that such studies do not take into consideration is how many lives are saved by guns.... that too is not reflected.

[moose07]

Dogeared Page corner.

[libertylover]

The vast majority of guns are kept for self defense and are never used for crime or murder.

That's a little more truth than the left can handle. Here's some more: the vast majority of our gun crimes are black on black murders.

[riverrunner]

They like to couch it in saying gun murder rates. Like other murders do not matter.

[Black Agnes]

The entire premise of gun control is to stop the natives of particular countries from opposing what their leaders ultimately get up to. See the current European invasion for an example.

[Twinkie]

When guns are OUTLAWED, only OUTLAWS will have guns.