The Al Capone Playbook for America’s Guns Crisis

Despite the outcry after the Florida school shooting last month – and the broad public support for tougher gun laws – it’s hard to imagine Congress introducing an outright ban on assault rifles. But lawmakers looking for a Second Amendment-friendly solution could try another approach to discouraging their use, tapping a playbook from the 1930s, suggests Stephen Mihm for Bloomberg View.
 
“Many reformers [in the 1930s] wanted an outright ban on machine guns, silencers, sawed-off shotguns, and other weapons in the gangster arsenal. But [then-Attorney General Homer] Cummings knew that could easily invite a constitutional challenge,” Mihm writes.
 
“So Cummings looked to another piece of federal legislation for inspiration: the Harrison Narcotics Tax Act of 1914, which imposed taxes on the production, distribution, and sale of opiates. Understanding full well that the power to tax was the power to destroy, Cummings proposed that Congress impose a $200 transfer tax each time someone bought or sold a machine gun -- or approximately $3,700 in today’s money.
 
“As gun control historian Adam Winkler has observed, this strategy was akin to the one used by the feds to take down Capone: tax evasion charges. And like that strategy, the gun tax worked. The popularity of these weapons effectively collapsed.”
 
“None of this amounted to a ban on machine guns: It was still possible to buy them even if almost no one did. And that’s the lesson for today. If Congress is leery about trampling on gun rights but wants to do something about assault rifles, perhaps they should take some inspiration from Homer Cummings.”