Switzerland to Banish Guns from Homes

In beautiful Switzerland they're preparing for a referendum concerning the famous gun laws. Service in the militia is compulsory for men aged between 19 and 31 and in between call-ups they store their weapons at home. CNN reports.

A coalition led by the country's Social Democrat party and the Greens has collected nearly 120,000 signatures to force a national referendum on whether the weapons should be stored at military bases.

The coalition of 74 groups says the weapons are involved in too many suicides and murders in the country and tighter controls are needed.

Switzerland's armed forces consist of just a few thousand permanent full-time staff, with the rest essentially a militia.

Perhaps it would be easier to discuss this issue using another country as the backdrop. I found it very interesting that the Swiss coalition behind this initiative seems to think the availability of guns causes an increase in suicide and murder rates. I guess the Brady Campaign and I aren't the only ones singing this song. What do you think about that?

Another interesting aspect of this story is that in 2007 the law changed, banning the storage of ammunition in homes. Doesn't that beg the question of how, if there's no ammunition allowed, do so many people use these weapons to commit suicide and murder? I guess the miscreants had some ammo left over from before the 2007 law, or perhaps bullets aren't that hard to come by. What do you think?

Removal of the right of part-time soldiers to keep their weapons at home is not the end of it. The dreaded registration of all guns is what the coalition is really after.

Green lawmaker Josef Lang said more than 1.5 million unused weapons were kept in Swiss homes.

Lang said their presence "at the heart" of the population could not be justified.

He said a national register had to be created to keep track of the weapons, something police had long been seeking.

Lang said the weapons had to be "banished" from homes.

Is "banished" the same as "banned?" Maybe that's our problem in America, we're using the wrong term for what to many people is a common sense operation. Josef Lang says quite simply, keeping all those guns in homes "could not be justified."

What's your opinion? Is the Swiss move to "banish" guns from homes some sinister movement akin to treason, as David Codrea says? Do the Swiss lawmakers who are striving to make these changes motivated by anything other than what they say, to reduce suicide and murder? What do you think?