CRIME: Muzzling Handguns

With his customary bluntness, Chicago's Mayor Richard Daley summed up his side of the argument: "It is the obligation of Government to prevent its citizens from being shot. It is the obligation of Government, therefore, to eliminate the handgun, as much as possible, from our society."

Daley was appearing as the lead-off witness at hearings on the need for stricter federal gun controls that were being held in Chicago last week by a subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee. The mayor's views were hotly opposed by James Valentino Jr., president of the Illinois...