o understand why gun makers are caving in to gun control, and why high-paid gun lobbyists have gone nuclear, you have to peer through the smoke.
Literally. Because what happened to cigarette makers is what is happening to gun makers. As went the merchants of nicotine go the merchants of firearms. Light 'em up, baby. It was the concerted legal efforts of governments and of shrewd, well-organized, and indefatigable activist groups that brought the mighty influence peddlers to heel.
Smith & Wesson smelled the coffee last week, giving in to the Clinton administration's muscle and the fear of being bankrupted by lawsuits that assail gun makers now just as the cigarette makers have been buried in legal challenges. The largest handgun maker agreed to curbs on gun show loopholes and dealers and to restrict multiple sales, install gun locks, research ''smart gun'' technology, and stop foot-dragging on regulation.
All the millions lavished on right-wing congressmen over the years, all the attack ads bought in the closing days of tough campaigns to croak gun-control candidates, all the greasy commercials designed to keep America drenched in guns (200 million-plus on the loose, more than one for every adult), that all went up in (antigun) smoke.
Just as Liggett Group jolted the cigarette lobby by breaking ranks in 1996 to settle with antitobacco interests, the Smith & Wesson move will likely trigger, pardon me, an industry-wide cave. High time.
Because the National Rifle Association bosses are starting to sound a little too screwy for comfort. The NRA's lobbyist, Wayne LaPierre, accused the president of murder, disgusting most Americans, embarrassing conservative Republican allies in Congress, and shaming those of the 3 million dues-paying NRA members with any sense of decency. This nutcake inhabits some sort of Wayne's World where he thinks he can get away with traducing Clinton as ''willing to accept a certain level of killing to further his political agenda ... he needs a certain level of violence in this country,'' and holding Clinton personally responsible for a gun murder.
With Republicans wincing all over Washington, we recall Wayne's 1995 NRA fund-raising letter denouncing federal agents as ''jack-booted government thugs.'' That prompted President George Bush to quit the NRA. What Bush understood, and LaPierre does not, is that after Waco and Oklahoma City, words can be as lethal as bullets. Now the legal system is about to exact enormous settlement penalties against gun makers for the hundreds of thousands of gun deaths, 651,000 since 1979, the year before Ronald Reagan became president. The gun guys saw the handwriting on the wall and the whites of the antigun lawyers' eyes.
A jury in Miami may shortly return a colossal punitive judgment against tobacco, which could force the industry to post billions in a bond, threatening bankruptcy for even the largest manufacturers. If you're Mr. Big at the Shoot'em-up Gun Corp., you're looking at these kinds of statistics:
Every 18 minutes, an American dies of gunshots; every two years, more Americans die from guns than perished in the Vietnam war - 15,000 suicides, 11,000 murdered, another 1,500 in accidents, logs New York Times columnist Bob Herbert. And the bill is coming due. Twenty-nine cities and counties are suing gun makers. The legal posses are circling.
Smith & Wesson copped a plea, took a deal, and won immunity from a huge Excedrin Headache of a legal mess. ''This agreement is a major victory for American families,'' said Clinton, speaking for every clan that buried a gunshot victim. He even had a kind word for British-owned Smith & Wesson's ''courage and vision.'' The No. 2 manufacturer, Glock, announced it was thinking of going along, but not gracefully. ''We are still weighing the idea of bleeding to death with legal bills vs. the cost of complying,'' grumped an executive of the Austrian-owned gun maker, which sells more than half of all police weapons, a market share very much now in jeopardy.
Even Moses got into the act. Charlton Heston, who had an easier time parting the Red Sea in Hollywood than dealing now with public opinion, made an NRA TV commercial castigating Clinton as a liar. But if Moses is reading a script from ''Wayne's World,'' more than 40 nervous House Republicans were sensing a change in the public's attitude. They voted to pressure their leadership to bring together a House-Senate conference committee, which has met only once since last summer.
''America is waiting to see whether Congress can really produce a bill that responds to the interests of our children and not the intimidation of the NRA,'' Clinton said. Republicans in tough reelection fights need some cover after Columbine and other outrages.
Governor George W. Bush, who speedily disavowed LaPierre's rhetorical low blows against Clinton, now scoots leftward, saying he's for trigger locks, too. But Bush has a time bomb in his saddlebags: He signed a right-to-carry law that lets Texans lug their six-shooters, concealed, just about anywhere. So the candidate in cowboy boots will need to hide his holster by November.
David Nyhan is a Globe columnist.
