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Q&A:

 
Published Feb. 22, 2013

Gun control in Australia

There recently was an article in another paper that said Australia has not had a mass shooting since 1996, when it made major changes to their gun control laws. Two questions: Is this true, and if so, what gun control laws does Australia currently have?

There hasn't been a mass murder in Australia since April 1996, when 35 people were killed at a tourist spot in Tasmania. Twelve days after the shootings, the Australian government — spurred by John Howard, the prime minister from 1996-2007 — passed the National Firearms Agreement, which banned all semiautomatic rifles and semiautomatic and pump-action shotguns. It also imposed a stricter licensing system that includes background checks and waiting periods on other firearms, according to published reports.

A gun buyback program was launched, and the government bought and destroyed "more than 631,000 of the banned guns at a cost of $500 million," from Oct. 1, 1996, to Sept. 30, 1997, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Philip Alpers, an adjunct associate professor at the University of Sydney who runs GunPolicy.org, which tracks gun violence and gun laws, told ABCNews.com: "Tens, if not hundreds of thousands of gun owners simply, voluntarily gave up guns that they did not need to give up. You could not be a gun owner during that period and not feel terribly persecuted, terribly under threat from public opinion. The commentaries were vicious."

Australians must demonstrate a "justifiable need" — such as being a farmer or sport shooter — to own a gun.

February and the Romans

Why did February get stuck with the fewest days? Why should it have 28 when others have 31? Why didn't they even it out?

You can blame the ancient Romans for this.

Slate, the online magazine, looked into this a few years ago and reported that Romulus, the first king of Rome who reigned from 753-717 B.C., created a calendar consisting of 10 months that represented the time between the spring equinox in March and ended in December. It's likely there were no months created between March and December because winter was not important in the harvest.

The second king, Numa Pompilius (715-673 B.C.), refined the calendar by aligning it with lunar activity, making it 354 days and adding two months — January and February — each with 28 days. Numa added a day to January to stretch the year to 355 days, perhaps because even numbers were considered bad luck. Why February was left with 28 is unknown.

Then, in about 45 B.C., Julius Caesar revised the calendar again, this time following the Egyptians and basing it on the sun. Caesar added 10 days to the year, bringing it to 365, and an extra day every four years to February. That calendar was followed until 1582, when Caesar's calendar was judged to be off by 10 days, and Pope Gregory XIII had it reworked.