Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, February 5, 1993 TAG: 9302050075
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MARGARET EDDS STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
HANDGUN FOES GET WARNER AID
U.S. Sen. John Warner weighed into the handgun-control battle Thursday with a television ad urging state legislators to "stiffen their backs, stiffen the law and stiffen the penalties."The commercial, paid for by Virginians Against Handgun Violence, is the latest salvo in a lobbying cross-fire illuminating State Capitol switchboards and targeting uncommitted lawmakers.
Key committee votes are scheduled in the House today and the Senate on Sunday.
"We're getting not hundreds, not thousands, but zillions of calls," said Carmela Bills, a General Assembly staffer whose office's phone number is featured in both pro- and anti-gun-control ads. "It's nonstop. I keep hoping they're going to pass the bill soon."
Hoping otherwise is the National Rifle Association, which is committing its considerable resources to fighting a proposal by Gov. Douglas Wilder to limit handgun sales to one per person per month. The NRA is airing three television spots in major markets, including one questioning Wilder's commitment to crime control.
"Instead of enforcing the criminal laws we've got, Gov. Wilder thinks another gun law is the answer to violent crime," an announcer says. "But then, as a senator, he voted against mandatory jail time for gun-toting criminals, even against the death penalty for mass murderers."
Virginians Against Handgun Violence, a bipartisan group of business and community leaders, is using about $81,000 raised in the last month to finance its ad campaign, a spokesman said. NRA officials declined to reveal their media budget.
With the crucial committee votes coming this weekend, efforts on both sides are increasingly spotlighting members of the Courts of Justice committees.
"I've got a bull's-eye here, and a bull's-eye here," quipped Del. William Mims, R-Leesburg, tapping his chest and his back. "And everybody's shooting." Mims, a member of the House Courts of Justice Committee, voted for Wilder's bill in subcommittee this week after a GOP alternative failed.
"It's madness," agreed Brewer Moore, administrative assistant to Sen. Frederick Quayle, R-Chesapeake. Quayle sits on the Senate Courts of Justice Committee, and is a co-sponsor of the Republican alternative. That plan would allow multiple sales to individuals whose identity and address are certified by police.
The issue "has brought out all the extremes on both side," said Moore, who has heard from a woman who thinks everyone should own a gun and others who'd happily see a total ban on handguns. "It's just about worn everybody in this building out."
Few lawmakers have more immediate interest in the lobbying than Sen. Thomas Norment, a Williamsburg Republican whose district stretches to the Eastern Shore. Norment, in his second year in the assembly, is last on the roster for roll call votes on the 15-member Senate committee.
The committee is split 8-7 between Democrats and Republicans, and that could make Norment's ballot critical. He's received several hundred phone calls and letters on the gun issue, and an aide estimated that the communiques are running 60 percent to 40 percent against gun control.
But Norment - who was never asked to take a position on gun control during his Senate campaign, and has remained mum this year - said he is more persuaded by an in-house survey of his district than by organized lobbying.
"I recognize that at this stage of the General Assembly, most of that [the calls and letters] is orchestrated," he said.
Eighty-six percent of the respondents to Norment's questionnaire said they'd favor a waiting period for purchase of a handgun, and 79 percent favored limiting purchases to one a month. The results dovetail with his view that the state needs to keep handguns out of criminal hands, Norment said, and so he intends to back some form of handgun legislation.
But as a Republican, Norment faces another question - whether to back Wilder's bill, the GOP alternative or something in between. The pressures of partisan politics "put one in something of a dilemma," he said.
The need for Republican support prompted Wilder to enlist Warner, the only statewide GOP officeholder. Like most federal officials, Warner generally stays out of state legislative debates; he agreed to do the commercial for Wilder and U.S. Attorney Richard Cullen, another Republican, when he was in Richmond last week.
Norment said he hopes the GOP caucus and Wilder can cut a deal within the next few days. He expects drafts of a possible compromise to be circulated today.
"If each side makes good-faith commitments, I'd be supportive of it," he said. Regardless of the specific form, Norment said, he's convinced "some piece of handgun legislation must emerge out of this session. I'm going to cast my one-fortieth vote of the Senate to ensure it."