Published: December 12, 2009

Like deer that scatter when they hear the crack of a rifle shot in the cold December air, too many Pennsylvania lawmakers bolt in fear when they hear the soft tread of National Rifle Association lobbyists in the Capitol hallways.

The politicians fear offending the NRA for fear of alienating voting members in Pennsylvania, where widespread gun ownership and hunting are deeply embedded in the state's history and culture.

But a new poll by a deeply conservative Republican pollster indicates that politicians, generally, wrongly assume that the official positions of the NRA leadership are shared uniformly by rank-and-file members.

The results are deeply significant relative to federal and state legislation regarding sensible, safety-oriented regulations that would not prevent any eligible citizen from owning a gun.

Conservative pollster Frank Luntz, whose best known recent enterprise has been advising Republicans who are against Democratic proposals for health-care reform, conducted the survey for Mayors Against Illegal Guns.

Mr. Luntz surveyed 832 gun owners, 401 of whom are NRA members.

Remarkably, federal law does not prohibit people on terrorist watch lists from purchasing guns. Mr. Luntz found an overwhelming majority of the gun owners favored such a restriction, including 82 percent of the NRA members.

Pennsylvania is among the states where laws requiring gun owners to report the loss or theft of guns have been under debate. In Pennsylvania, the measure has been defeated at the state level but passed by 21 city governments.

Mr. Luntz found, nationally, overwhelming support by gun owners for such a provision, including among 69 percent of NRA members.

Many gun owners seem to believe that gun ownership and gun safety are complementary, rather than contradictory concepts. In the poll, 86 percent of the gun owners agreed with this statement: "We can do more to stop criminals from getting guns while also protecting the rights of citizens to freely own them."

The NRA opposes many common-sense public safety measures relative to guns because it fears the "slippery slope," that passage of any gun restriction inevitably will lead to sweeping restrictions.

Common sense is a powerful weapon, however. Many gun owners, including the NRA members in the Luntz poll, disagree with the official NRA positions. Pennsylvania and federal lawmakers should use that weapon, stop cowering before the NRA and make the streets safer for everyone.