HARTFORD, Conn. — The sparse turnout outside City Hall had to be discouraging last Thursday for a phalanx of government leaders intent on bringing public pressure to bear on the nation's wavering lawmakers to enact gun controls.
"The overwhelming majority of Americans have been on our side," noted Sen. Richard Blumenthal, who had to concede, "but they have been the silent majority."
He underlined the central question: Are the strong public opinion poll numbers for gun controls, which registered at 90 percent immediately after the December school massacre in nearby Newtown, already fading in the bewildering maw of gun politics on Capitol Hill?
On Main Street, the art of suffocating needed reform by Congress felt palpable. The proposed ban on the sort of assault rifle used in Newtown is sagely called a political nonstarter even before the Senate votes.
Hope fades for a ban on high-capacity ammunition magazines. And the call for universal background checks for gun ownership is increasingly in doubt as Senate Republicans, sensing dwindling interest, resort to usual vows to filibuster.
The gathering here of a few score of people was one of more than 100 rallies organized by the Obama administration and mayors as part of a national grass-roots campaign. Hopeful speeches were made, but it seemed clear that a far more fully aroused public will be required to budge lawmakers from their obeisance to the gun lobby. Gov. Dannel Malloy of Connecticut made no secret of his frustration with the pace of nonaction in Congress. He denounced the "silliness" of a long police investigation that has kept basic information about the tragedy secret for three months — information the public and lawmakers need to know in driving for a solution.
Some grisly details were recently leaked at a police convention about the rapid-fire execution of the 20 Newtown children and six school personnel.
Yet victimized parents and lawmakers were shut out as the gun control debate lost traction. A fuller knowledge of the truth of gun violence is needed, in grasping the outsized firepower of the assault rifle that destroyed the Newtown victims in a spray of 154 rounds.
"The more we know, the more compelling argument at the national level," Blumenthal said.
In Washington, President Barack Obama sounded no less frustrated than Malloy. "Shame on us if we've forgotten," Obama said at the White House.
Platitudes bunch like flowers across the nation's history of trying to achieve effective gun controls. After the Columbine school massacre, a Mother's Day march in 2000 on the National Mall drew hundreds of thousands of citizens demanding action. It was an impressive sight participants thought could not be ignored by Congress.
Its agenda also included the same plan for universal background checks for gun owners now being sought, nearly 13 years later, as the only responsible way to mark the Newtown tragedy.
Francis X. Clines writes for The New York Times.