50 years after JFK, 'mail-order' guns still easy to get

If he had had accesss to the Internet, Lee Harvey Oswald could have used it to obtain a weapon. If he had had accesss to the Internet, Lee Harvey Oswald could have used it to obtain a weapon. Photo: HANDOUT Photo: HANDOUT Image 1 of / 5 Caption Close 50 years after JFK, 'mail-order' guns still easy to get 1 / 5 Back to Gallery

WASHINGTON -- Lee Harvey Oswald assassinated President John F. Kennedy on Nov. 22, 1963, with a mail-order Mannlicher-Carcano 6.5 millimeter bolt-action rifle, for which he paid $19.95 plus shipping and handling.

Fifty years later, obtaining guns via mail is less common because the U.S. Postal Service imposes major restrictions on firearms shipments.

But despite a myriad of federal and state laws regulating gun transactions, buying a firearm via the Internet is commonplace.

Where Oswald mailed his money order with a coupon torn from an ad in the National Rifle Association's American Rifleman magazine, troubled individuals today can search online and similarly get their hands on powerful weapons with no questions asked, gun control advocates claim.

"Here we are 50 years later, still confronting these horrific shootings," said Sue Hornik, executive director of New York-based States United to Prevent Gun Violence. "Only now, we have assault weapons that are a lot more powerful than anything on our streets when Kennedy was president."

But gun-rights organizations insist that Internet sales are little more than a marketing medium through which buyer and seller come together. The Internet "does not provide any legal opportunity to simply buy a firearm as if it were a pair of jeans," an NRA fact sheet states.

There are 4,000 or more websites that facilitate gun sales between buyers and sellers, according to one estimate. Some, like cheaperthandirt.com, have their own inventory and require that all transactions be finalized through a federally licensed firearms dealer near the buyer, who runs a background check before completing the sale.

Others, like armslist.com, operate along the lines of Craigslist or eHarmony, bringing buyer and seller together to complete their own transactions.

Under federal law, any interstate firearms sale -- whether the seller is a licensed dealer or private individual -- must be concluded by a licensed dealer with a background check through the FBI's National Instant Criminal Background Check System.

The system is designed to establish whether an individual is qualified to purchase a gun. Disqualifications include felony conviction, mental illness adjudication and receipt of a restraining or protective order.

But U.S. law generally does not extend to sales within state borders. Those sales are governed by state laws -- if they exist.

Ten states -- including Connecticut, New York and California -- require a background check or permit to complete intrastate sales of all weapons. In addition, six states require them for handgun sales.

But the remaining states -- including Texas -- do not require background checks for in-state purchases.

Bipartisan background check legislation sponsored by Sens. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Pat Toomey, R-Pa., would have required background checks on all online sales, whether interstate or intrastate. The measure fell six votes short of breaking a Republican-led filibuster in April.

"Until we address this particular flaw in our policy, it's hard to imagine we can make any progress on guns," said Daniel Webster, director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research in Baltimore. "We're swimming against the tide until we correct this."

Armslist.com is the main focus of gun-control advocates' ire. The website organizes gun sales by individual states, which helps buyers in lightly regulated states avoid background checks.

Sellers list their wares item by item and buyers can post ads broadcasting their wants. Armslist.com did not return email requests for comment.

A study in September by the advocacy groups Third Way and Americans for Responsible Solutions found that armslist.com advertising in states without background checks is twice the average of those states that require them.

An investigation by Mayors Against Illegal Guns concluded that of 607 gun-seekers on armslist.com identified as living in the state where they placed the ad, 3.3 percent -- one in 30 -- had committed crimes that would have prevented them from passing background checks.

Gun-rights advocates counter that anyone intent on causing mayhem will find a gun one way or another.

"People can argue that just one transaction is too many if someone gets killed, but that assumes the murder wouldn't have happened without the questionable transaction," said Jeff Knox, head of the Arizona-based Firearms Coalition. "That's a false assumption. While guns are sometimes used as tools of violence, they are more frequently used for defense, and even more frequently not used as weapons at all, but as sporting goods, works of art, and insurance policies."

But gun-control advocates point to horror stories illustrating how "the Web really opens up so many opportunities and makes it way too easy for dangerous people to find guns," as Lindsay Nichols of the San Francisco-based Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence put it.

Last year, a Wisconsin man, Radcliffe Haughton, who was under a restraining order obtained by his wife, Zina Daniel, bought a semi-automatic Glock pistol through armslist.com with no background check. The next day, he went to his wife's workplace and killed her along with two others before killing himself.

"This is not a gun rights issue," said Elvin Daniel, Zina's brother who described himself in a Politico op-ed as a gun owner, hunter and NRA member. "This problem is about illegal guns."

Allie Wright and Rachel Jackson of the Hearst Newspapers Washington Bureau contributed to this report.

dan@hearstdc.com