by Christina Dyrness

It's not surprising that the National Rifle Association — a big-spending special interest group with a long history of legislative involvement — is opposed to a bill headed for the State Assembly floor that would ban the sale and manufacture of so-called “junk guns.”

The long list of reasons that Steve Helsley, Sacramento-based NRA spokesman, recites over the telephone and outlines in letters to legislators makes his position very clear.

What may be surprising, though, is that some of them are enough to make many people think twice.

First, Helsley says that he doesn't believe that “Saturday Night Specials” even exist.

“To believe in the notion that unsafe guns are being made, you have to believe that there's no California Trial Lawyers Association,” he said. “There would be lawsuits. They'd swoop in on them and sue and sue and sue.”

Secondly, Helsley points out that it's difficult to define what a junk gun is. Because of that, AB 488 exempts police officers from the ban, in case any guns they carry can be described as “junk guns.”

“People like the bill initially, but then they gag when they realize that [Assemblyman Louis Caldera] had to exempt police,” Helsley said.

The NRA also makes the accusation that a “junk gun” ban would be detrimental to the economically disadvantaged who are unable to purchase more expensive handguns.

While gun control advocates say this is a ludicrous argument, Helsley said that the history of gun control laws have had a racist bent.

According to a history compiled by the NRA, the first ban on cheap handguns in the Tennessee of 1870 was passed by an all-white legislature, most of whom owned or could afford more expensive guns.

The literature quotes B. Bruce Biggs, author of an article called "The Great American Gun War" for a law review called The Public Interest. “It is difficult to escape the conclusion that the `Saturday Night Special' is emphasized because it is cheap and being sold to a particular class of people. The name is sufficient evidence — the reference is to `niggertown Saturday night.'”

Franklin Zimering, a professor at UC Berkeley's Boalt School of Law, has been studying handgun control efforts since the 1960s.

"It's a very popular topic right now," he said.

Zimering maintains that passing laws against cheap handguns is "totally unprincipled" because the more expensive handguns are just as dangerous and used in just as many crimes.

"First we pass laws against cheap handguns that aren't coherent, then we discover that the expensive and middle-priced guns are just as dangerous ... maybe the problem is just handguns," he said.

The San Francisco Gun Exchange carries impressive array of handguns, displayed in a glass case. They range in price from $200 to over $1,000 for an antique replica. A salesman named Armando Souza said they don't carry "Saturday Night Specials," which have their own price range, but don't cost more than $100.

"You'd have to go to a pawn shop for something like that," he said.

Souza said such "junk guns" are cheaply made because they have a shorter life expectancy. "People want to have them for the one time they're going to have to use it save their lives."

Helsley said that the NRA is all for gun safety laws, but that laws that ban certain types of guns are flawed.

“Let's define the problem. Clearly kids are getting a hold of guns,” he said. “But guns were proliferated a long time ago. What has changed is the behaviors. Firearms have remained constant, what has changed is that there are more young males without safe parental control.”

Helsley, like the rest of us, doesn't have a solution to offer for that problem.