Industry aims to disarm anti-gun lobby

If there is a profit to be made, a market to be exploited, someone in the US will be doing it.

The recent rash of shootings, especially among disturbed teenagers in high schools, has highlighted the indiscriminate availability of guns. Russell Eugene Weston, the man who killed two police officers in Washington, DC a few weeks ago, had been formally diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic in Montana, but was still able to legally obtain a firearms licence in Illinois.

While much has been written and discussed about the causes of US violence and the heated matter of gun-control legislation, little mention has been made of the American firearms industry and its role in the availability of guns.

In fact, despite the increased visibility of guns in recent events, the US gun business is an industry in decline. Although it is still a $2 billion-a-year (£1.4 billion) business, sales are heading downward. In 1980, for example, 1,912,989 rifles were manufactured in the US. By 1986, that number was down to 970,541. By 1996, production of rifles was back up to 1,424,319, but that number is still below sales 18 years ago.

Similar indications are provided by sales figures for revolvers. In 1980, some 1,566,149 revolvers were made in the US. By 1986, that was down to 734,650. By 1996, that number was down further to 498,944. Only the sales of pistols automatic handguns has risen, from 783,480 in 1980 to 985,533 in 1996.

All told, gun makers will sell about four million guns this year, down from 5.1 million in 1981.

Most gun makers are private companies, making hard financial data difficult to find. But one publicly held company, Sturm, Ruger and Co in Connecticut, seems to be representative. Its firearm sales reached a high of $180 million in 1994. By last year, sales were $149 million (£1.05 million). Remington, also a major manufacturer, reported sales of $28.2 million in the last quarter of 1998, down $1 million from a year earlier.

Part of the problem is certainly the industry's public relations conundrum, created in part by its non-compromising response in the past to political calls for seemingly innocuous measures, such as safety locks and industry support for a waiting period before people can purchase guns.

"We are being depicted as an industry that is somehow doing dark and terrible things," Mr Ed Schultz, president and CEO of Smith and Wesson told Businessweek magazine. "We'd better start telling the world what we are doing," he said.

So they are. Several months ago representatives from Smith and Wesson, Beretta USA and six other manufacturers stood with President Clinton to announce they would voluntarily install child safety locks on their guns. It was an important step; the industry has stood closely with the National Rifle Association, headed by actor Charlton Heston, in opposing any regulations on the industry. Its new alliance with Mr Clinton puts it at odds with the NRA.

The NRA's position is grounded firmly in philosophy, in the US Constitution's Second Amendment which grants citizens the "right to bear arms". In addition, the NRA often cites a 1989 Department of Justice report which found that 168,881 crimes of violence were not responded to by police within an hour. Citizens need guns to protect themselves, says the NRA.

For the industry, philosophy holds little weight. It seems increasingly prepared to do what it must to neutralise public frustration and perhaps even more importantly, to stave off the kind of costly liability litigations that have hit the tobacco industry.

There are already more than 100 liability lawsuits against gun makers around the US. Last year, Philadelphia Mayor, Mr Edward Rendell, considered filing a city-sponsored lawsuit to recover the city's costs in treating shooting victims. In Chicago, one family who lost three children to handgun violence has filed suit against two gun manufacturers as well as the sporting goods retailer who sold the guns.

Chicago Mayor, Mr Richard Daley, is considering joining the suit; "The key is to get a lawsuit whereby the manufacturer is held liable for injuries," Mr Daley said. "Go after the manufacturers."

That kind of talk is clearly scaring the industry. "We could never take the kind of hit that tobacco could take and survive. A lot of companies are very marginal in their staying power," Mr Richard Feldman, director of the American Shooting Sports Council told Businessweek. Part of the reason the industry agreed to child safety locks was to enhance its image in front of juries in possible future litigations, he said.

The real battle for the future of the industry lies, strangely enough, in the discussion of assault weapons. It is perhaps one of the healthiest divisions of the industry, and yet the market that is least socially defensible. There is a clear weakness in arguing that a gun, such as the TNW M2HB Semi-Auto gun, weighing 84 pounds and costing $6,300, a gun the likes of which, according to Guns and Ammo magazine has "an outstanding track record in destroying aircraft, transport vehicles and the occasional train. . ." has a legitimate sporting purpose.

Despite federal legislation banning assault weapons, which can carry large magazines of bullets and offer fierce velocity, many gun makers have got around the rules by making cosmetic modifications to their weapons.

US Senator, Ms Diane Feinstein, from California told the Los Angeles Times: "They'll get around any piece of legislation to ply their wares. Here we have the perfect weapon for someone who wants to go against the police, for the grievance killer, for the drug traffickers and the drive-by shooters. Their indiscriminate sales make no sense to me."

Still, those guns are popular, especially in places like Texas where farmers and ranchers use them to shoot varmints.

For the gun industry, with sales declining and criticism growing, torn between popular guns and terrible publicity when those weapons are misused, the choices appear to be dwindling.