Nationwide, serious crime is down for the seventh straight year. The murder rate is the lowest in 31 years, the robbery rate the lowest in 29. The news is so positive that President Clinton and Attorney General Janet Reno warned against complacency.
Experts are in little agreement on the precise cause of the decline.
They cite a constellation of reasons, and the relative weight they attach to the reasons tends to reflect where they stand on the political spectrum. The percentage of murders committed with guns dropped to 65 percent from 68 percent in 1997, and the percentage of robberies with guns from 40 percent to 38 percent. Gun control advocates credit background checks, buyback programs and stepped-up enforcement of existing gun laws. Others credit more police officers, longer sentences and higher incarceration rates. Certainly, the waning of the crack cocaine epidemic is a factor.