Handguns in reality are not a very useful tool. Short range, low power, inaccurate.

There are very few use cases where a rifle wouldn't be better. The only advantage of a handgun is portability.

This when there was a push to ban handguns, gunowners were willing to compromise.

When a decision was made to attack semiautomatic rifles by using made-up terms, the room to compromise no longer was possible. Next would be "sniper" rifles.