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0 of 3 Premium Clicks used this month SUBSCRIBE Print + Online Subscriber Activation | Register x Forgot Password | Need an Account? e-edition | subscribe | newsletter | deals Classifieds Jobs Autos Real Estate FEATURED » NEWS NOW Emergency services, Oct. 16 ... Since You Asked: Park resurfacing delayed during winter ... SOU training gives tips on what to do if there's an active shooter ... Emergency services, Oct. 16 ... Since You Asked: Park resurfacing delayed during winter ... SOU training gives tips on what to do if there's an active shooter ... OUR VIEW Our View: Study shows gun background checks save lives Comment MailTribune.com Writer Posted Jun. 18, 2015 at 12:01 AM Posted Jun. 18, 2015 at 12:01 AM » Social News Gun rights advocates were furious when Oregon lawmakers passed and Gov. Kate Brown signed a bill requiring background checks on private gun sales. The new statute would hinder only law-abiding citizens, they said, while criminals would still be able to arm themselves easily. A new study, however, says that's just wrong. In 1994, spurred by an epidemic of drive-by gang shootings, Connecticut lawmakers passed a bill to require citizens to obtain a permit to buy a gun, and to pass a background check first, even for a private purchase. The background check requirement was essentially what Oregon enacted this year. A new study released last week in the American Journal of Public Health estimates that Connecticut law was responsible for reducing gun homicides 40 percent in 10 years, saving 296 lives. And that 's not a sloppy conclusion based on wishful thinking. Although gun homicide rates were dropping across the country during those years, the rate in Connecticut fell faster and dropped lower than in 39 states without a similar law, according to researchers at Johns Hopkins University and the University of California, Berkeley. The researchers went one step further, and created a statistically "synthetic Connecticut" without such a law to estimate what would have happened had the law not passed. That comparison yielded the 40 percent difference in gun homicides . Another interesting statistic: Non-gun homicides in the real Connecticut and in the synthetic Connecticut were the same for that 10-year period, providing another indication that the background check law was responsible for the reduction. But wait. Didn't the criminals continue to get guns whenever they wanted them, as opponents of such laws always argue? Not at all. It turns out that making it more difficult to buy a gun legally reduces the supply and drives up the price of black-market firearms, reducing the number of guns in circulation. “People assume incorrectly that criminals will do anything and everything in terms of cost and risk to get their hands on a gun,” one of the study's authors told The Washington Post. “But that simply is not what the data tells us.” Yes, the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School happened in Connecticut years after the background check law took effect. Clearly the law didn't stop a deranged young man from stealing his mother's legally purchased guns and mowing down schoolchildren. No gun law is perfect. But supporters of universal background checks — which is the vast majority of Americans, and 74 percent of National Rifle Association members in one poll — understand that the inconvenience to law-abiding citizens of complying with the law is worth it if even one life can be saved. In Connecticut, it wasn't just one life. It was almost 300 lives in just 10 years. MailTribune.com Writer Posted Jun. 18, 2015 at 12:01 AM » Comment or view comments Reader Reaction » STAY INFORMED Email NewsLetter Sign Up Today Sign up for our newsletter and have the top headlines from your community delivered right to your inbox. Southern Oregon Directory Featured Businesses Loading... 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