By John A. Tures, Professor of Political Science, LaGrange College

Almost 25 years ago, an Atlanta day-trader beat his second wife and kids to death, then shot to death nine people, wounding 13. He later took his own life. At the time, those nine deaths put his rampage just outside the cases of the highest number of deaths in a spree killing. Now, that tragedy doesn’t even make the top 25 deadliest shooting sprees. Given that most of these mass killings happened after the assault weapons ban (AWB) was allowed to lapse, it’s a strong case for reconsidering this gun legislation.

There are plenty of studies that claim the assault weapons ban didn’t work. An editorial claimed, “the last time the country imposed such a ban it failed to make a measurable difference.” It adds “A 2004 study sponsored by the National Institute of Justice found that while the ban appeared to have reduced the number of crimes committed with “assault weapons,” any benefits were “likely to have been outweighed by steady or rising use of non-banned semiautomatics.” As a result, the Justice study found “there has been no discernible reduction in the lethality and injuriousness of gun violence, based on indicators like the percentage of gun crimes resulting in death or the share of gunfire incidents resulting in injury.” The main reason the failure of the ban to make a difference: “assault weapons” account for a tiny share of gun crimes — less than 6%. Even among mass shootings, most didn’t involve an “assault weapon” in the decade before the ban went into effect. Mass shootings didn’t stop during the ban, either — there were 16 while the ban was in effect, which resulted in 237 deaths or injuries. In fact, it was while the ban was in effect that the Columbine High School massacre happened, in which 13 students were killed and 24 injured. What’s more, gun deaths have steadily declined since 1994, even though the rate of gun ownership has climbed.”

Gun deaths,in fact, didn’t continue to decline, but flatlined after 2004, arresting their decline. Moreover, gun deaths rebounded strongly since 2016, though they have declined slightly since 2021. Both of these findings occurred whether you look at raw numbers or as a percentage of the population, according to the Pew Research Center.

Some of the cited studies focus only on the statistics before the AWB and during the ban. In previous research, I have found that there’s not much difference before and during the AWB for mass shootings, but after the ban lapsed, those rampages shot up. “From 1982-94, there were an average of 1.4615 mass shootings per year, and 1.6 mass shootings per year during the AWB years, 1995-2004, when the ban expired. But it was a different story when we covered the years after the ban. From 2005 to 2021, there were an average of 5.1176 mass shootings per year, far more than the 1.6 from the AWB years.”

I’ve often found that opponents of the AWB bring up the Columbine shooting, a tragedy that occurred during the time frame of the assault weapons ban. People should never forget it, just as I am reminding readers of that Atlanta-area shooting. But when you look at the 25 deadliest gun rampages, it is a different story.

Four of the cases of the top-25 mass shootings occurred before the AWB, in San Ysidro CA, Edmond OK, Jacksonville FL, and Killeen TX. There’s Columbine in 1999 (another survivor just died of her wounds), the only top-25 case from the AWB era. But the other 20 cases of mass shootings occurred after the assault weapons ban lapsed in 2004. The other 20 occurred after the ban lapsed (Las Vegas NV, Orlando FL, Blacksburg VA, Newtown CT, Sutherland Springs TX, El Paso TX, Uvalde TX, Lewiston ME, Parkland FL, San Bernardino CA, Binghamton NY, Ft. Hood TX, Virginia Beach VA, Thousand Oaks CA, Washington DC, Aurora CO, Pittsburgh PA, Monterey Park CA, Red Lake MN, and Santa Fe TX).

With Donald Trump in the White House, most don’t think there’s a chance for an assault weapons ban in Congress. But Trump has called for gun reforms at times, and once supported an assault weapons ban. And my research shows that some people change their views when they learn what Trump supports. Democrats didn’t abandon him when he called for changes in gun laws after the Las Vegas massacre. So there’s still hope for common-sense gun legislation in America.

John A. Tures is a professor of political science at LaGrange College in LaGrange, Georgia. His views are his own. He can be reached at jtures@lagrange.edu. His “X” account is JohnTures2.