By Ed Stoddard DALLAS, May 6 (Reuters) - The shotgun I ordered on a Friday was mine by the following Tuesday, but then being a foreigner is no obstacle to acquiring a firearm in Texas or many other parts of the United States. The ease with which I purchased my hunting gun has made me pause in the wake of the rampage by Seung-Hui Cho, who shot dead 32 students at Virginia Tech University before killing himself. Cho was reported to have paid $571 for a 9 mm Glock 19 handgun just over a month before the shooting spree on April 16. He was a foreign national and a legal resident. So am I and I had no trouble buying my gun, which is a 10-gauge single-shot and an unlikely weapon for criminal use. The bureaucracy was pretty straightforward. I had to show my Texas driver's license and fill in a form. No, I had not been convicted of any felonies. As a Canadian citizen working in Texas, I had to provide some additional documentation such as 3 months of utility bills in my name and proffer a special reason for buying the gun. Mine was the fact that I had a Texas hunting license. I also had to give what is known as an I-94 number on my work visa. I initially put in the incorrect number, so the request was at first denied by federal authorities. A telephone call to the extremely helpful people at the FBI's National Instant Criminal Background Check System, known as NCIS, helped clear up the matter. I did not need to go through an appeal process. I simply had to reapply with the correct number, which I promptly did. And I am now the proud owner of a shotgun which kicks like a mule. "Do I need a permit to carry this around in my vehicle?" I asked the affable clerk at the Bass Pro store where I made my purchase. He seemed a bit surprised at the question but said I needed only my driver's license. PART OF THE CULTURE The notion that citizens should have an almost divine right to gun ownership is an entrenched part of American culture, especially in a place like Texas where hunting is hugely popular and the political outlook is conservative. Critics say the easy over-the-counter acquisition of firearms helps fuel the country's high rates of violent, gun-related crime. Critics of gun control say law-abiding citizens need arms to defend themselves. All of this has predictably been brought into focus again by the horrible events in Virginia. In South Africa, where I lived for many years, the government has introduced stringent gun ownership and acquisition laws as part of the strategy in its own war on violent crime, which is far more rampant than in the United States. This includes police checks and tests and courses in firearms proficiency. In my native Canada gun laws have also gotten progressively stiffer over the years though the current Conservative government has signalled it wants to scrap a long gun registry, which many hunters regard as an annoyance. But permits and courses remain part of the process for acquiring a gun or obtaining a hunting license. To hunt in the first place in my home province of Nova Scotia I needed to take a "Hunter's Safety Course" almost three decades ago when I was 14. My driver's license was all I needed to get a Texas hunting license. If you can drive, I guess they reckon you can shoot.
