.44-Caliber Mistakes

WE DON'T expect common-sense gun laws from this Congress, but a couple of House-passed riders to the Justice Department's 2007 budget are especially noxious -- and ripe for Senate repair.

One bars enforcement of a law that requires trigger locks to be sold with all new handguns. The other restricts law enforcement officials' access to gun-tracking information collected by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF). The Senate Appropriations Committee, scheduled to consider the budget tomorrow, should keep both measures out.

Congress approved the trigger-lock mandate last October. Not only was it a good idea, but it was also part of a broader compromise on the Hill: The Senate added the measure to a bill that limited gunmakers' legal liability. Yet Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.) argued last month, "Responsible and law-abiding gun owners do not need the government to tell them to be safe."

The problem is that there are plenty of irresponsible gun owners. Researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported last year that 1.7 million American children live with unlocked, loaded guns in the house. In a study released in the Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine in May, 39 percent of children knew where their parents kept their guns, and 22 percent claimed that they handled them, even though their parents claimed they didn't. Studies have indicated that programs such as the National Rifle Association's Eddie Eagle program, which trains children not to play with their parents' guns, don't work.

Trigger locks won't save all of the children who, without the law, will die of accidental gunshot wounds (as 151 did in 2003, according to the CDC). Not all gun owners will use them. But locks would make it a lot easier for gun owners to be safe, just as seat belts made it easier for drivers to protect themselves.

The restrictions the House approved for ATF gun-tracing information, meanwhile, have tainted Justice Department funding bills since Rep. Todd Tiahrt (R-Kan.) added them in 2003. This data tracks a gun's history once it's been seized in a crime. Gun rights advocates claim that the government shouldn't provide it to the public because criminals could check to see if they're being investigated.

But the budget that passed the House last month goes beyond blocking public disclosure; the rider would keep gun-tracing information from local police unless it's for a specific criminal case. Even then, they couldn't share it with neighboring authorities -- a provision that would seriously hamper tracking and interdiction of illegal guns. If D.C. police used ATF tracing data to find that a large number of guns used in homicides came from one shop in Maryland, District police couldn't share that information with Maryland law enforcement agents.

The House also wants to render federal gun-tracing information inadmissible in civil court, hindering legal action against irresponsible gun distributors. New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's office, which is trying to sue some of these "rogue" gun sellers, claims that civil litigation is an essential tool to fight interstate gun trafficking. Given that in 2000 1.2 percent of gun dealers sold 57 percent of the guns used in crimes, the mayor has a point.

Requiring the sale of trigger locks with handguns and sharing federal gun-tracking data would save lives, and the costs of doing either are marginal. The Senate Appropriations Committee should keep this in mind tomorrow.