When Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) last proposed a bill to outlaw “bump stocks” that allow a semi-automatic weapon to be easily made to behave much like a full-on machine gun, the bill didn’t even get to the floor. But now even Republicans seem to be coming around to the idea that maybe being able to shoot 500 Americans shouldn’t be quite as easy as it clearly was for Stephen Paddock.
In this week’s massacre in Las Vegas, lawmakers in both parties may have found the part of the weapons trade that few could countenance: previously obscure gun conversion kits, called “bump stocks,” that turn semiautomatic weapons into weapons capable of firing in long, deadly bursts.
Names like John Cornyn (R-TX), Chuck Grassley (R-IA), and Orrin Hatch (R-UT), which are rarely associated with reasonable pieces of legislation, have agreed to consider banning bump stocks. A bump stock attached to the right weapon can result in a rate of fire that is almost impossible to contemplate.
"This replacement shoulder stock turns a semi-automatic rifle into a weapon that can fire at a rate of 400 to 800 rounds per minute," [Feinstein] said.
But the truth is, that jaw-dropping rate of fire isn’t in the bump kit—it’s inherent in the gun. A bump kit does little more than remove the need to twitch the tip of one finger. It’s literally the smallest possible gesture Republicans could make toward gun sanity.
At the moment, the NRA is keeping a low profile. But Republicans may still be too afraid to make make even that minuscule gesture.
For a generation, Republicans in Congress — often joined by conservative Democrats — have bottled up gun legislation, even as the carnage of mass shootings grew ever more gruesome and the weaponry ever more deadly. A decade ago, they blocked efforts to limit the size of magazines after the massacre at Virginia Tech. Five years later, Republican leaders thwarted bipartisan legislation to expand background checks of gun purchasers after the mass shooting at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn.
Though the firing rate with a bump stock allows for prolonged bursts, they don’t make the guns fire any faster. The limitation of human muscles means that they can already fire five shots or more per second*. All it takes is a flutter of one finger. The shooting at the Pulse nightclub featured semi-automatic weapons with large magazines, but did not include a kit to convert the primary weapon used to automatic fire.
The weapon used in most of the deaths at Pulse was a Sig Sauer MCX, a $2,000, .223-caliber rifle with a firing rate of 927 rounds per minute. All that was required was a finger that could keep up. That means the Sig could have discharged standard 30 round magazine in only 5-6 seconds. Swapping out an expended magazine also takes even less time.
Bump stocks don’t make semi-automatic weapons more deadly, though it may be argued that they make delivering rounds slightly easier. The question now is whether the NRA and other organizations representing gun manufacturers will allow Republicans to even hint that it’s appropriate to address gun massacres by doing anything about guns.
"Given the spinelessness of so many of the Republican caucus, the best thing would be to get the leadership not to let it come up," Larry Pratt, co-founder and executive director emeritus of the Gun Owners of America, said in an interview with NBC. "If it comes to a vote, they are going to be held accountable."
Some Republicans have already gotten the message.
"I’m a Second Amendment man," said Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala. "I’m not for any gun control."
Outlawing bump stocks alone would do nothing to improve gun sanity. Which only makes it more insane that even that pointless gesture is unlikely to pass a vote.
Because voting against anything, no matter how obvious, is admitting that there should be some limits on the destructive power an individual should be able to wield against other citizens. And that’s something that the Republicans’ bosses just can’t have.
* Correction — In an earlier version of this piece, it was stated that the firing rate for a human shooter could be 10 rounds per second or more, a rate that is beyond the capacity of almost all people, even if firing without aiming. Thanks to Angryallen and others.