In the United States, they dropped. Gun control advocates are not being truthful when they say they are only attempting to ban assault rifles. Al the various bills incorporate language that applies them to most classes of semiautomatic firearms capable of accepting detachable magazines above a certain capacity, and accordingly they sweep up in their net millions of firearms that Americans have been legally able to won since the beginning of the century. Soldier of Fortune Technical Editor Peter Kokalis has compiled a list of more than 270 different models of rifles, shotgun and pistols that would be restricted under the bills. Included on it are firearms such as the Colt M1911 .45 pistol, more than four million of which are in existence.
Assault rifles indeed.
Three years after passage of a highly restrictive gun law in West Germany compliance was estimated to have reached 20 percent. A survey of Illinois gun owners taken two years later found that 73 percent of them indicated they would not comply with gun prohibition. Estimates of the number of illegal handguns in New York City, where firearms ownership is almost completely prohibited, range from one million to two million. In other words, the near certain consequence of passage of the semiautomatic firearms restrictions now before Congress and a number of state governments would be to create tens of millions of new criminals. It will also in all likelihood create an enormous and easily serviced black market.