Opponents of gun control have long argued that any restrictions on the purchasing and use of guns to prevent criminals from obtaining the weapons would be ineffective. Criminals steal their guns, they maintain, not buy them. Therefore, the gun rights advocates assert, gun control regulations merely restrict the rights of legal buyers who want to exercise their Second Amendment rights.

A study released late in 1998 using data from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms appears to refute that argument, however. The study traced the origins of guns that were used in homicides and other crimes and found that 20 percent of them had been purchased from a federally licensed gun dealer within one week of the murder. Furthermore, nearly half of the guns traced had been purchased from a dealer within three years of the commission of a crime. Gun control supporters...