LETTERS: STATISTICS FAVOR PROPOSITION B

To the editor:

I am writing in respect to the Feb. 19 front-page article, "Concealed guns under fire."If anyone remembers, as soon as Clinton took office he fired all serving U.S. attorneys and replaced them with his own appointees, so it is hardly newsworthy when U.S. Attorney Edward Dowd Jr. spouts the company line. Even the reference that "the Wild West is over" is one of the gun-banners stock phrases. Further, Dowd said the law would allow gang members to carry a weapon. Most gang members have criminal records, which disqualify them from even touching a gun, or are well known to the police, which is grounds for denying a permit.

Scott County Sheriff Bill Ferrell's reference to the number of traffic fatalities since the speed limit was raised and relating that to what will happen with the passage of concealed-carry is a load of bull. It can also be said that since most states have adopted mandatory seat-belt laws, traffic fatalities have also gone up. Therefore, mandatory seat-belt laws kill people and should be repealed. The relationship is just as valid. If anyone remembers, while the 55 mph limit was in force, gasoline prices approached $2 a gallon, I don't know about you, but I didn't do any unnecessary driving. Now my wife and I will take pleasure drives on the weekends. The only valid comparison would be fatalities per mile driven, but then that would not create the numbers wanted by people like Sheriff Ferrel.

If anyone noticed, it is only the top brass who are in opposition to the concealed-carry proposition. These people are nothing but politicians in uniform. They owe their status and position to the politicians who appointed them and are not about to do anything to jeopardize their positions. In St. Louis, the patrolmen's association representing the cops on the street has come out in favor of concealed-carry. These are guys and gals who are out there every day. Part of the hype is that concealed carry will jeopardize these very officers' lives. Unless the entire patrolmen's association is suicidal, there is no merit to this line.

How do patrol officers feel about guns? I have a survey of police officers in Pennsylvania conducted in 1997 by Stephen Christopoulos with a statistical margin of error of 3.3 percent. Here are some of the results. "Gun laws will reduce crime" -- 62.6 percent disagreed. "Outlawing civilian gun ownership will result in less crime" -- 88.6 percent disagreed. "Laws governing the possession and carrying of firearms are effective at preventing criminal acts" -- 71.2 percent disagree. "If the private ownership of guns were outlawed, the amount and/or rate of crime would decrease" -- 91.1 percent disagree. I doubt the rank-and-file officers in Pennsylvania differ much from their brother officers here in Missouri.

I was born and raised in Indiana, a state that has had a concealed-carry law dating back to at least the 1950s and which, I am proud to say, has earned a solid F from Handgun Control Inc. for its gun laws. There is no mandated training course and no qualification. The only restrictions on where you can carry your gun are federal (schools, airports and federal property). All the politicians are saying that the Missouri proposition "is so full of holes it will be dangerous." If this were true, Indiana would be a wasteland of dead bodies, as Indiana residents commonly carry guns into banks, liquor establishments, stadiums and hospitals, and there is no problem. I have had a permit since I turned 21, and I regularly carried a gun for 22 years with no problems. I had one incident in which just showing I had a gun on me stopped a group of would-be assailants in their tracks, and I didn't have to fire a shot.

There are 31 states that have concealed-carry laws. If all the negatives of those opposed to Proposition B were true, we would be hearing nothing else on the news but reports of bloodbaths, massacres and random violence in the streets of these states. The arguments of those opposed to Proposition B are nothing but so much brown wind.

ROBERT A. CRON

Cape Girardeau