The Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act

The Brady Act
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Course
Contents TOC \o "1-3" \h \z \u Introduction PAGEREF _Toc487664375 \h 3Critique PAGEREF _Toc487664376 \h 3Analysis PAGEREF _Toc487664377 \h 7Conclusion PAGEREF _Toc487664378 \h 14
The Brady Act
Introduction
The Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (to be referred to from now on as the Brady Act for brevity) came into being in its final form in late 1993, as a corollary to the initial acts surrounding gun violence prevention during 1968. It is a law which made background checks mandatory for all firearms purchased within the United States borders, along with also creating a mandatory five day waiting period between application and approval.
Originally, the Brady Act was brought into the House of Representatives by Charles Schumer early in 1991, but the concept was never brought to a vote, and so it was dropped for a while. Schumer again attempted to bring the Act to a vote in early 1993 – the Act was discussed and voted on throughout the year, and was eventually signed into law by President Clinton on November the thirtieth. The Act retained its name from the Press Secretary to Ronald Reagan, who was shot in the head during an attempted assassination of the president, leaving him partially paralysed for the rest of his life. The attack also say Tim McCarty of the Secret Service and Thomas Delehanty (police officer with the district police) injured.
This paper will be divided into two main parts – in the first part, the case study itself will be analysed and critiqued, showing readers what it actually means. In the second part, the article will be discussed in terms of other literature which shows the impact that the Brady Act has or has not had, with an even spread of literature for both sides of the argument. Finally, the conclusion will sum up everything that has been said, with a final discussion of whether or not the Brady Act was ultimately successful.
Critique
The case study which is to be analysed within this paper is concerned with an action plan of why the Brady Act is necessary in the first place.
The interim provisions of the Act required that licensed firearms dealers request a presale check on any potential handgun purchasers from the Chief Law Enforcement Officer. (Case Study)
The Act itself was brought in for the purpose of reducing violence perpetuated by handguns, as we have seen. However, there was a lot of controversy surrounding the Act, and how it would be enforced, especially considering America had the right to bear arms enshrined in its very Constitution (albeit as an amendment rather than a part of the initial work (Legal Information Institute)). The need to restrain certain aspects of firearms was naturally something which clashed with the Constitution, necessitating careful planning. As the case study points out, without the in-depth discussion which took place, it would have been very difficult to get state compliance with the new ideas.
The case study lays out the qualifications which would prohibit someone from holding a firearm permit or firearm itself. These qualifications are quite extensive, and also necessary if background checks are to truly be effective. While most of the qualifications do look to make sense, since they all i...