July 2, 2008

If Charlton Heston were alive, he'd be beaming. The man who filled the silver screen with chariot races and a parting of the sea played another prominent role in later years -- president of the National Rifle Association.

Heston treasured his constitutional right to own a gun and was fond of intoning at NRA conventions, with his rifle held aloft, that his weapon would be taken only "from my cold dead hands."

Now, thousands of fervent gun rights advocates can celebrate their most important court victory -- the Supreme Court decision last week that interprets the Second Amendment as giving citizens the right to have guns in their homes for self-defense. The ruling applies to residents in Washington, D.C., and soon will apply to all Americans.

In the wake of that victory, paradoxically, this might be a perfect opportunity to impose a few additional common-sense regulations on gun ownership.

The Supreme Court's majority made clear that they have no problem with reasonable gun regulations, such as prohibiting criminals or the mentally retarded from buying a handgun.

For years, gun rights advocates have fought even the most modest restrictions, fearing that one limit might lead to another, creating a tide of regulations that would swamp their right to own guns. But with that right now securely affirmed by the high court, such fears of creeping over-regulation are less warranted.

The time is right for reasonable lawmakers, both in Springfield and in Washington, to push harder for a small number of new restrictions that would make it more difficult for the bad guys to get locked and loaded.

Here are four proposed gun regulations that we believe would pass muster with the court and make our cities safer:

• The gun show loophole: Congress needs to close a legal loophole in many states that allows people at gun shows or flea markets to peddle their weapons without conducting background checks on potential buyers.
  
  Illinois has closed the loophole partly, but not entirely. In this state, gun show vendors must do background checks, but a person who simply sells a gun to a guy in the neighborhood or to someone answering an ad does not have to do a background check.
  
  It's critical to close the gun show loophole across the country. Right next door in Indiana, the loophole is wide open.
  
  
• Gun store employee background checks: Of course, felons can't have guns. But right now, there's no federal requirement that gun dealers perform felony background checks on their employees -- a step that even a gun industry association endorses.
  
  Illinois is one of the states that addresses the problem to a degree. It requires gun store employees to have a Firearm Owner's Identification card, which means they must have cleared a background check. But just as with the gun show loophole, Congress needs to act so that a consistent standard is applied in every state...