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These were important discoveries. A hopelessness about gun crime had risen, based partly on the belief that most crime guns were stolen, partly on estimates that so many millions of guns were already in the hands of Americans that nothing could stanch their flow to criminals. But the discovery that crime guns were new guns and that many came from in-state dealers suggested that the migration of guns to criminals could be interrupted. And the tracing data produced a road map for how to do it.
Kennedy's computer named names. The data showed, for example, that guns bought by a single customer sometimes turned up in the hands of rival gangs, suggesting that the customer had been a "straw purchaser" who bought guns for resale to felons, kids and others forbidden by law to acquire them directly. The analysis produced the names of licensed dealers to whom an inordinate number of weapons had been traced. "Once you had all the data in one place, this stuff just fell right out," Kennedy says. "It couldn't have been more obvious."
Meanwhile, passage of the Brady law radically changed the rules governing firearms commerce. Previously, anyone purchasing a gun from a licensed dealer had only to fill out ATF Form 4473, which asked a customer a series of questions, including whether he had been convicted of a felony. If he answered yes, he could not buy the gun. If no, the dealer could sell it with a clear conscience, even if the buyer was twitching from a methamphetamine rush. No one bothered to check the answers. The approach was absurd: the nation was asking felons to confess their ineligibility just at the point of purchase. The Brady law required for the first time that someone check the truthfulness of a customer's answers. In the process, police and dealers discovered that many gun-shop customers were convicted felons--which proved that over the years, crooks had come to see licensed dealers as an easy source of guns.
Brady drew intense fire from America's Second Amendment fundamentalists. Meanwhile, in the background, a set of quieter regulations kicked in that further transformed the marketplace.
When I applied for a gun dealer's license in 1992, all I had to do was fill out a questionnaire and pay a $30 fee. Tens of thousands of Americans did likewise--until 1993, when President Clinton directed ATF to toughen the application process, noting that a driver's license was a lot harder to acquire. In December 1993 the bureau promptly issued new rules that required applicants to submit fingerprints and photographs, and Congress passed legislation boosting the three-year licensing fee to $200. In 1994 additional legislation required, for the first time, that gun dealers had to operate in compliance with municipal and state laws, including zoning ordinances. It also required would-be dealers to notify local police of their intent to open a gun store and to cooperate with ATF investigators seeking to trace firearms. Incredibly, such cooperation had been largely voluntary.