20210420 Gun control survey by political party - Pew Research

Gun politics within American politics is defined by two primary opposing ideologies about civilian gun ownership. Those who advocate for gun control support increased regulation of gun ownership; those who advocate for

gun rights The right to keep and bear arms (often referred to as the right to bear arms) is a right for people to possess weapons (arms) for the preservation of life, liberty, and property. The purpose of gun rights is for self-defense, including securi ...

oppose increased restriction of gun ownership. These groups often disagree on the interpretation of laws and court cases related to firearms and of the effectiveness of firearms regulation on crime and public safety. It is estimated that U.S. civilians own 393 million firearms, and that 40% to 42% of the households in the country have at least one gun. The U.S. has by far the highest estimated number of guns per capita in the world, at 120.5 guns for every 100 people.Briefing Paper. Estimating Global Civilian-Held Firearms Numbers
June 2018 by Aaron Karp. Of

Small Arms Survey The Small Arms Survey (SAS) is an independent research project located at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva, Switzerland. It provides information on all aspects of small arms and armed violence, as a resou ...

. See box 4 on page 8 for a detailed explanation of "Computation methods for civilian firearms holdings". See country table in annex PDF
Civilian Firearms Holdings, 2017
Se

Debates regarding firearm availability and gun violence in the United States have been characterized by concerns about the

right to bear arms The right to keep and bear arms (often referred to as the right to bear arms) is a right for people to possess weapons (arms) for the preservation of life, liberty, and property. The purpose of gun rights is for self-defense, including securi ...

, such as found in the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, and the responsibility of the

United States government The federal government of the United States (U.S. federal government or U.S. government) is the national government of the United States, a federal republic located primarily in North America, composed of 50 states, a city within a feder ...

to serve the needs of its citizens and to prevent crime and deaths. Firearms regulation supporters say that indiscriminate or unrestricted gun rights inhibit the government from fulfilling that responsibility, and causes a safety concern. Gun rights supporters promote firearms for

self-defense Self-defense (self-defence primarily in Commonwealth English) is a countermeasure that involves defending the health and well-being of oneself from harm. The use of the right of self-defense as a legal justification for the use of force ...

– including security against tyranny, as well as

hunting Hunting is the human practice of seeking, pursuing, capturing, or killing wildlife or feral animals. The most common reasons for humans to hunt are to harvest food (i.e. meat) and useful animal products ( fur/ hide, bone/tusks, horn/antler, ...

and sporting activities. Firearms regulation advocates state that restricting and tracking gun access would result in safer communities, while gun rights advocates state that increased firearm ownership by law-abiding citizens reduces crime and assert that criminals have always had easy access to firearms. Gun legislation in the United States is augmented by judicial interpretations of the Constitution. The Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution reads: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed." In 1791, the United States adopted the Second Amendment, and in 1868 adopted the Fourteenth Amendment. The effect of those two amendments on gun politics was the subject of landmark

U.S. Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...

decisions in ''

District of Columbia v. Heller ''District of Columbia v. Heller'', 554 U.S. 570 (2008), is a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution protects an individual's right to keep and bear arms, unconnected with service i ...

'' (2008), where the Court affirmed for the first time that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to possess firearms independent of service in a state militia and to use them for traditionally lawful purposes such as self-defense within the home, and in '' McDonald v. City of Chicago'' (2010), where the Court ruled that the Second Amendment is incorporated by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and thereby applies to both state and federal law. In so doing, it endorsed the "individual-right" theory of the Second Amendment's meaning and rejected a rival interpretation, the "collective-right" theory, according to which the amendment protects a collective right of states to maintain militias or an individual right to keep and bear arms in connection with service in a militia.

History

The American hunting tradition comes from a time when the United States was an agrarian, subsistence nation where hunting was a profession for some, an auxiliary source of food for some settlers, and also a deterrence to animal predators. A connection between shooting skills and survival among rural American men was in many cases a necessity and a '

rite of passage A rite of passage is a ceremony or ritual of the passage which occurs when an individual leaves one group to enter another. It involves a significant change of status in society. In cultural anthropology the term is the Anglicisation of ''rite ...

' for those entering manhood. Today, hunting survives as a central sentimental component of gun culture as a way to control animal populations across the country, regardless of modern trends away from subsistence hunting and rural living. Prior to the

American Revolution The American Revolution was an ideological and political revolution that occurred in British America between 1765 and 1791. The Americans in the Thirteen Colonies formed independent states that defeated the British in the American Revoluti ...

, there was neither budget nor manpower nor government desire to maintain a full-time army. Therefore, the armed citizen-soldier carried responsibility. Service in militia, including providing one's own ammunition and weapons, was mandatory for all men. Yet, as early as the 1790s, the mandatory universal militia duty evolved gradually to voluntary militia units and a reliance on a

regular army A regular army is the official army of a state or country (the official armed forces), contrasting with irregular forces, such as volunteer irregular militias, private armies, mercenaries, etc. A regular army usually has the following: * a standin ...

. Throughout the 19th century the institution of the organized civilian militia began to decline. The unorganized civilian militia, however, still remains even in current U.S. law, consisting of essentially everyone from age 17 to 45, while also including former military officers up to age 64, as codified in . Closely related to the militia tradition is the frontier tradition, with the need for self-protection pursuant to westward expansion and the extension of the American frontier. Though it has not been a necessary part of daily survival for over a century, "generations of Americans continued to embrace and glorify it as a living inheritanceas a permanent ingredient of this nation's style and culture".

Colonial era through the Civil War

Minute Man Statue Lexington Massachusetts cropped

In the years prior to the

, the British, in response to the colonists' unhappiness over increasingly direct control and taxation of the colonies, imposed a gunpowder embargo on the colonies in an attempt to lessen the ability of the colonists to resist British encroachments into what the colonies regarded as local matters. Two direct attempts to disarm the colonial militias fanned what had been a smoldering resentment of British interference into the fires of war. These two incidents were the attempt to confiscate the cannon of the Concord and Lexington militias, leading to the Battles of Lexington and Concord of April 19, 1775, and the attempt, on April 20, to confiscate militia powder stores in the armory of Williamsburg, Virginia, which led to the

Gunpowder Incident The Gunpowder Incident (or Gunpowder Affair) was a conflict early in the American Revolutionary War between Lord Dunmore, the Royal Governor of the Colony of Virginia, and militia led by Patrick Henry. On April 20, 1775, one day after the Battle ...

and a face-off between

Patrick Henry Patrick Henry (May 29, 1736June 6, 1799) was an American attorney, planter, politician and orator known for declaring to the Second Virginia Convention (1775): " Give me liberty, or give me death!" A Founding Father, he served as the first a ...

and hundreds of militia members on one side and the Royal Governor of Virginia, Lord Dunmore, and British seamen on the other. The Gunpowder Incident was eventually settled by paying the colonists for the powder. According to historian

Saul Cornell Saul Cornell, is the Paul and Diane Guenther Chair in American History at Fordham University. He was Professor of history at Ohio State University and the Director of the Second Amendment Research Center at the John Glenn Institute. Life He re ...

, states passed some of the first gun control laws, beginning with Kentucky's law to "curb the practice of carrying concealed weapons in 1813." There was opposition and, as a result, the individual right interpretation of the Second Amendment began and grew in direct response to these early gun control laws, in keeping with this new "pervasive spirit of individualism." As noted by Cornell, "Ironically, the first gun control movement helped give birth to the first self-conscious gun rights ideology built around a constitutional right of individual self-defense." The individual right interpretation of the Second Amendment first arose in '' Bliss v. Commonwealth'' (1822), which evaluated the right to bear arms in defense of themselves and the state pursuant to Section 28 of the Second Constitution of

Kentucky Kentucky ( , ), officially the Commonwealth of Kentucky, is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States and one of the states of the Upper South. It borders Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio to the north; West Virginia and Virginia ...

(1799). The right to bear arms in defense of themselves and the state was interpreted as an individual right, for the case of a concealed sword cane. This case has been described as about "a statute prohibiting the carrying of concealed weapons

hat A hat is a head covering which is worn for various reasons, including protection against weather conditions, ceremonial reasons such as university graduation, religious reasons, safety, or as a fashion accessory. Hats which incorporate mecha ...

was violative of the Second Amendment". The United States. Anti-Crime Program. Hearings Before Ninetieth Congress, First Session. Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1967, p. 246. The first state court decision relevant to the "right to bear arms" issue was ''Bliss v. Commonwealth''. The Kentucky court held that "the right of citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the State must be preserved entire,..." Also during the Jacksonian Era, the first

collective right Group rights, also known as collective rights, are rights held by a group '' qua'' a group rather than individually by its members; in contrast, individual rights are rights held by individual people; even if they are group-differentiated, which ...

(or group right) interpretation of the Second Amendment arose. In '' State v. Buzzard'' (1842), the Arkansas high court adopted a militia-based, political right, reading of the right to bear arms under state law, and upheld the 21st section of the second article of the Arkansas Constitution that declared, "that the free white men of this State shall have a right to keep and bear arms for their common defense", while rejecting a challenge to a statute prohibiting the carrying of concealed weapons. The Arkansas high court declared "That the words 'a well-regulated militia being necessary for the security of a free State', and the words 'common defense' clearly show the true intent and meaning of these Constitutions .e., Arkansas and the U.S.and prove that it is a political and not an individual right, and, of course, that the State, in her legislative capacity, has the right to regulate and control it: This being the case, then the people, neither individually nor collectively, have the right to keep and bear arms." Joel Prentiss Bishop's influential ''Commentaries on the Law of Statutory Crimes'' (1873) took Buzzard's militia-based interpretation, a view that Bishop characterized as the "Arkansas doctrine," as the orthodox view of the right to bear arms in American law. The two early state court cases, ''Bliss'' and ''Buzzard'', set the fundamental dichotomy in interpreting the Second Amendment, i.e., whether it secured an individual right versus a collective right.

Post Civil War

In the years immediately following the

Civil War A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country). The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies ...

, the question of the rights of freed slaves to carry arms and to belong to the militia came to the attention of the federal courts. In response to the problems freed slaves faced in the Southern states, the Fourteenth Amendment was drafted. When the Fourteenth Amendment was drafted, Representative John A. Bingham of

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

used the Court's own phrase "privileges and immunities of citizens" to include the first Eight Amendments of the Bill of Rights under its protection and guard these rights against state legislation. The debate in Congress on the Fourteenth Amendment after the Civil War also concentrated on what the Southern States were doing to harm the newly freed slaves. One particular concern was the disarming of former slaves. The Second Amendment attracted serious judicial attention with the

Reconstruction Reconstruction may refer to: Politics, history, and sociology *Reconstruction (law), the transfer of a company's (or several companies') business to a new company *'' Perestroika'' (Russian for "reconstruction"), a late 20th century Soviet Unio ...

era case of '' United States v. Cruikshank'' which ruled that the

Privileges or Immunities Clause The Privileges or Immunities Clause is Amendment XIV, Section 1, Clause 2 of the United States Constitution. Along with the rest of the Fourteenth Amendment, this clause became part of the Constitution on July 9, 1868. Text of the clause The cl ...

of the Fourteenth Amendment did not cause the Bill of Rights, including the Second Amendment, to limit the powers of the State governments, stating that the Second Amendment "has no other effect than to restrict the powers of the national government." Akhil Reed Amar notes in the '' Yale Law Journal'', the basis of Common Law for the first ten amendments of the U.S. Constitution, which would include the Second Amendment, "following John Randolph Tucker's famous oral argument in the 1887 Chicago anarchist

Haymarket Riot The Haymarket affair, also known as the Haymarket massacre, the Haymarket riot, the Haymarket Square riot, or the Haymarket Incident, was the aftermath of a bombing that took place at a labor demonstration on May 4, 1886, at Haymarket Square in ...

case, ''

Spies Spies most commonly refers to people who engage in spying, espionage or clandestine operations. Spies or The Spies may also refer to: * Spies (surname), a German surname * Spies (band), a jazz fusion band * Spies (song), "Spies" (song), a song by ...

v. Illinois''":

20th century

First half of 20th century

Since the late 19th century, with three key cases from the pre-incorporation era, the U.S. Supreme Court consistently ruled that the Second Amendment (and the Bill of Rights) restricted only Congress, and not the States, in the regulation of guns. Scholars predicted that the Court's incorporation of other rights suggested that they may incorporate the Second, should a suitable case come before them.Levinson, Sanford: ''The Embarrassing Second Amendment'', 99 Yale L.J. 637–659 (1989)

=National Firearms Act

= The first major federal firearms law passed in the 20th century was the National Firearms Act (NFA) of 1934. It was passed after

Prohibition Prohibition is the act or practice of forbidding something by law; more particularly the term refers to the banning of the manufacture, storage (whether in barrels or in bottles), transportation, sale, possession, and consumption of alcohol ...

-era gangsterism peaked with the Saint Valentine's Day massacre of 1929. The era was famous for criminal use of firearms such as the

Thompson submachine gun The Thompson submachine gun (also known as the "Tommy Gun", "Chicago Typewriter", "Chicago Piano", “Trench Sweeper” or "Trench Broom") is a blowback-operated, air-cooled, magazine-fed selective-fire submachine gun, invented by United Sta ...

(Tommy gun) and

sawed-off shotgun A sawed-off shotgun (also called a sawn-off shotgun, short-barreled shotgun, shorty or a boom stick) is a type of shotgun with a shorter gun barrel—typically under —and often a shortened or absent stock. Despite the colloquial term, ...

. Under the NFA, machine guns, short-barreled rifles and shotguns, and other weapons fall under the regulation and jurisdiction of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) as described by Title II.

=''United States v. Miller''

= In ''United States v. Miller'' (1939) the Court did not address incorporation, but whether a sawn-off shotgun "has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well-regulated militia." In overturning the indictment against Miller, the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Arkansas stated that the National Firearms Act of 1934, "offend dthe inhibition of the Second Amendment to the Constitution." The federal government then appealed directly to the Supreme Court. On appeal the federal government did not object to Miller's release since he had died by then, seeking only to have the trial judge's ruling on the unconstitutionality of the federal law overturned. Under these circumstances, neither Miller nor his attorney appeared before the Court to argue the case. The Court only heard argument from the federal prosecutor. In its ruling, the Court overturned the trial court and upheld the NFA.

Second half of 20th century

President Johnson signs Gun Control Act of 1968

The Gun Control Act of 1968 (GCA) was passed after the assassinations of President

John F. Kennedy John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK and the nickname Jack, was an American politician who served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 until his assassination ...

, Senator

Robert Kennedy Robert Francis Kennedy (November 20, 1925June 6, 1968), also known by his initials RFK and by the nickname Bobby, was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 64th United States Attorney General from January 1961 to September 1964, a ...

, and African-American activists

Malcolm X Malcolm X (born Malcolm Little, later Malik el-Shabazz; May 19, 1925 – February 21, 1965) was an American Muslim minister and human rights activist who was a prominent figure during the civil rights movement. A spokesman for the Nation of I ...

and

Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister and activist, one of the most prominent leaders in the civil rights movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968 ...

in the 1960s. The GCA focuses on regulating interstate commerce in firearms by generally prohibiting interstate firearms transfers except among licensed manufacturers, dealers, and importers. It also prohibits selling firearms to certain categories of individuals defined as "prohibited persons." In 1986, Congress passed the Firearm Owners Protection Act. It was supported by the National Rifle Association because it reversed many of the provisions of the GCA. It also banned ownership of unregistered fully automatic rifles and civilian purchase or sale of any such firearm made from that date forward. The assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan in 1981 led to enactment of the

Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act The Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act ( Pub.L. 103–159, 107 Stat. 1536, enacted November 30, 1993), often referred to as the Brady Act or the Brady Bill, is an Act of the United States Congress that mandated federal background checks on ...

(Brady Law) in 1993 which established the national background check system to prevent certain restricted individuals from owning, purchasing, or transporting firearms. In an article supporting passage of such a law, retired chief justice

Warren E. Burger Warren Earl Burger (September 17, 1907 – June 25, 1995) was an American attorney and jurist who served as the 15th chief justice of the United States from 1969 to 1986. Born in Saint Paul, Minnesota, Burger graduated from the St. Paul Colleg ...

wrote:

Americans also have a right to defend their homes, and we need not challenge that. Nor does anyone seriously question that the Constitution protects the right of hunters to own and keep sporting guns for hunting game any more than anyone would challenge the right to own and keep fishing rods and other equipment for fishingor to own automobiles. To 'keep and bear arms' for hunting today is essentially a recreational activity and not an imperative of survival, as it was 200 years ago. '
Saturday night special Saturday night special is a colloquial term in the United States and Canada for inexpensive, compact, small-caliber handguns made of poor quality metal. Sometimes known as junk guns, some states define these guns by means of composition or mate ...
s' and machine guns are not recreational weapons and surely are as much in need of regulation as motor vehicles.

A Stockton, California, schoolyard shooting in 1989 led to passage of the Federal Assault Weapons Ban of 1994 (AWB or AWB 1994), which defined and banned the manufacture and transfer of "semiautomatic assault weapons" and "large capacity ammunition feeding devices." According to journalist

Chip Berlet John Foster "Chip" Berlet (; born November 22, 1949) is an American investigative journalist, research analyst, photojournalist, scholar, and activist specializing in the study of extreme right-wing movements in the United States. He also stu ...

, concerns about gun control laws along with outrage over two high-profile incidents involving the ATF (

Ruby Ridge Ruby Ridge was the site of an eleven-day siege in 1992 in Boundary County, Idaho, near Naples. It began on August 21, when deputies of the United States Marshals Service (USMS) initiated action to apprehend and arrest Randy Weaver under a bench ...

in 1992 and the

Waco siege The Waco siege, also known as the Waco massacre, was the law enforcement siege of the compound that belonged to the religious sect Branch Davidians. It was carried out by the U.S. federal government, Texas state law enforcement, and the U.S. ...

in 1993) mobilized the

militia movement The American militia movement is a term used by law enforcement and security analysts to refer to a number of private organizations that include paramilitary or similar elements. These groups may refer to themselves as militia, unorganized milit ...

of citizens who feared that the federal government would begin to confiscate firearms. Though gun control is not strictly a partisan issue, there is generally more support for gun control legislation in the Democratic Party than in the Republican Party.Spitzer, Robert J.: ''The Politics of Gun Control'', Page 16. Chatham House Publishers, Inc., 1995. The

Libertarian Party Active parties by country Defunct parties by country Organizations associated with Libertarian parties See also * Liberal parties by country * List of libertarian organizations * Lists of political parties Lists of political part ...

, whose campaign platforms favor limited government regulation, is outspokenly against gun control.

=Advocacy groups

= The National Rifle Association (NRA) was founded to promote firearm competency in 1871. The NRA supported the NFA and, ultimately, the GCA. After the GCA, more strident groups, such as the

Gun Owners of America Gun Owners of America (GOA) is a gun rights organization in the United States. It makes efforts to differentiate itself from the larger National Rifle Association (NRA) and has publicly criticized the NRA on multiple occasions for what it consi ...

(GOA), began to advocate for gun rights. According to the GOA, it was founded in 1975 when "the radical left introduced legislation to ban all handguns in California." The GOA and other national groups like the

Second Amendment Foundation The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) is a United States nonprofit organization that supports gun rights. Founded in 1974 by Alan Gottlieb and headquartered in Bellevue, Washington, SAF publishes gun rights magazines and public education materials ...

(SAF), Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership (JPFO), and the Second Amendment Sisters (SAS), often take stronger stances than the NRA and criticize its history of support for some firearms legislation, such as GCA. The

National Association for Gun Rights The National Association for Gun Rights (NAGR) is a gun rights advocacy group in the United States. They maintain an affiliated PAC and a nonprofit legal foundation. Officially incorporated in Virginia on March 29, 2000, NAGR was founded by Du ...

(NAGR) has been an outspoken critic of the NRA for a number of years. According to the Huffington Post, "NAGR is the much leaner, more pugnacious version of the NRA. Where the NRA has looked to find some common ground with gun reform advocates and at least appear to be reasonable, NAGR has been the unapologetic champion of opening up gun laws even more." These groups believe any compromise leads to greater restrictions. According to the authors of ''The Changing Politics of Gun Control'' (1998), in the late 1970s, the NRA changed its activities to incorporate political advocacy. Despite the impact on the volatility of membership, the politicization of the NRA has been consistent and the NRA-Political Victory Fund ranked as "one of the biggest spenders in congressional elections" as of 1998. According to the authors of ''The Gun Debate'' (2014), the NRA taking the lead on politics serves the gun industry's profitability. In particular when gun owners respond to fears of gun confiscation with increased purchases and by helping to isolate the industry from the misuse of its products used in shooting incidents. The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence began in 1974 as Handgun Control Inc. (HCI). Soon after, it formed a partnership with another fledgling group called the National Coalition to Ban Handguns (NCBH) – later known as the

Coalition to Stop Gun Violence The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV) and the Educational Fund to Stop Gun Violence (EFSGV or Ed Fund), its sister organization, are two parts of a national, non-profit gun control advocacy organization that is opposed to gun violence. Since 1 ...

(CSGV). The partnership did not last, as NCBH generally took a tougher stand on gun regulation than HCI. In the wake of the 1980

murder of John Lennon On the evening of 8 December 1980, English musician John Lennon, formerly of the Beatles, was shot and fatally wounded in the archway of the Dakota, his residence in New York City. The killer was Mark David Chapman, an American Beatles fan wh ...

, HCI saw an increase of interest and fundraising and contributed $75,000 to congressional campaigns. Following the Reagan assassination attempt and the resultant injury of James Brady, Sarah Brady joined the board of HCI in 1985. HCI was renamed in 2001 to Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence.Spitzer, Robert J.: ''The Politics of Gun Control''. Chatham House Publishers, Inc., 1995

=Centers for Disease Control (CDC) restriction

= In 1996, Congress added language to the relevant appropriations bill which required "none of the funds made available for injury prevention and control at the

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is the national public health agency of the United States. It is a United States federal agency, under the Department of Health and Human Services, and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgi ...

may be used to advocate or promote gun control." This language was added to prevent the funding of research by the CDC that gun rights supporters considered politically motivated and intended to bring about further gun control legislation. In particular, the NRA and other gun rights proponents objected to work supported by the

National Center for Injury Prevention and Control The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Injury Prevention and Control's mission is to provide leadership in preventing and controlling injuries, i.e., reducing the incidence, severity, and adverse outcomes of injur ...

, then run by Mark L. Rosenberg, including research authored by Arthur Kellermann.

21st century

In October 2003, the

published a report on the effectiveness of gun violence prevention strategies that concluded "Evidence was insufficient to determine the effectiveness of any of these laws." A similar survey of firearms research by the National Academy of Sciences arrived at nearly identical conclusions in 2004. In September of that year, the Assault Weapons Ban expired due to a sunset provision. Efforts by gun control advocates to renew the ban failed, as did attempts to replace it after it became defunct. The NRA opposed bans on handguns in Chicago, Washington D.C., and San Francisco while supporting the

NICS Improvement Amendments Act of 2007 The NICS Improvement Amendments Act () was passed in 2007 in the wake of the Virginia Tech shootings in order to address loopholes in the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, commonly known as NICS, which enabled Seung-Hui Cho to bu ...

(also known as the School Safety And Law Enforcement Improvement Act), which strengthened requirements for background checks for firearm purchases. The GOA took issue with a portion of the bill, which they termed the "Veterans' Disarmament Act." Besides the GOA, other national gun rights groups continue to take a stronger stance than the NRA. These groups include the Second Amendment Sisters, Second Amendment Foundation, Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership, and the

Pink Pistols The Pink Pistols are an LGBTQ gun rights organization in the United States and Canada. Their motto is "Pick on someone your own caliber". History Inspired by a Salon.com article written by Jonathan Rauch, Krikket (aka Doug Krick), a libertaria ...

. New groups have also arisen, such as the Students for Concealed Carry, which grew largely out of safety-issues resulting from the creation of gun-free zones that were legislatively mandated amidst a response to widely publicized

school shootings A school shooting is an attack at an educational institution, such as a primary school, secondary school, high school or university, involving the use of firearms. Many school shootings are also categorized as mass shootings due to multiple ...

. In 2001, in '' United States v. Emerson'', the Fifth Circuit became the first federal appeals court to recognize an individual's right to own guns. In 2007, in '' Parker v. District of Columbia'', the

D.C. Circuit The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (in case citations, D.C. Cir.) is one of the thirteen United States Courts of Appeals. It has the smallest geographical jurisdiction of any of the U.S. federal appellate cou ...

became the first federal appeals court to strike down a gun control law on Second Amendment grounds.

Smart guns

Smart guns only fire when in the hands of the owner, a feature gun control advocates say eliminates accidental firings by children, and the risk of hostile persons (such as prisoners, criminal suspects, an opponent in a fight, or an enemy soldier) grabbing the gun and using it against the owner. Gun rights advocates fear mandatory smart gun technology will make it more difficult to fire a gun when needed.

Smith & Wesson Smith & Wesson Brands, Inc. (S&W) is an American firearm manufacturer headquartered in Springfield, Massachusetts, United States. Smith & Wesson was founded by Horace Smith and Daniel B. Wesson as the "Smith & Wesson Revolver Company" in 1856 ...

reached a settlement in 2000 with the administration of President Bill Clinton, which included a provision for the company to develop a smart gun. A consumer boycott organized by the NRA and NSSF nearly drove the company out of business and forced it to drop its smart gun plans. The New Jersey Childproof Handgun Law of 2002 requires that 30 months after "personalized handguns are available" anywhere in the United States, only smart guns may be sold in the state. Some gun safety advocates worry that by raising the stakes of introducing the technology, this law contributes to the opposition that has prevented smart guns from being sold anywhere in the United States despite availability in other countries. In 2014, a Maryland gun dealer dropped plans to sell the first smart gun in the United States after receiving complaints.

''District of Columbia v. Heller''

In June 2008, in ''District of Columbia v. Heller'', the Supreme Court upheld by a 5–4 vote the ''Parker'' decision striking down the D.C. gun law. ''Heller'' ruled that Americans have an individual right to possess firearms, irrespective of membership in a militia, "for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home." However, in delivering the majority opinion, Justice Antonin Scalia argued that the operative clause of the amendment, "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed," codifies an individual right derived from English common law and codified in the English Bill of Rights (1689). The majority held that the Second Amendment's preamble, "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State," is consistent with this interpretation when understood in light of the framers' belief that the most effective way to destroy a citizens' militia was to disarm the citizens. The majority also found that ''United States v. Miller'' supported an individual-right rather than a collective-right view, contrary to the dominant 20th-century interpretation of that decision. (In Miller, the Supreme Court unanimously held that a federal law requiring the registration of sawed-off shotguns did not violate the Second Amendment because such weapons did not have a "reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia.") Finally, the court held that, because the framers understood the right of self-defense to be "the central component" of the right to keep and bear arms, the Second Amendment implicitly protects the right "to use arms in defense of hearth and home." The four dissenting justices said that the majority had broken established precedent on the Second Amendment, and took the position that the Amendment refers to an individual right, but in the context of militia service.

''McDonald v. City of Chicago''

In June 2010, a Chicago law that banned handguns was struck down. The 5–4 ruling incorporated the Second Amendment, stating that "The Fourteenth Amendment makes the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms fully applicable to the States." Justice Samuel Alito's

plurality opinion A plurality opinion is in certain legal systems the opinion from one or more judges or justices of an appellate court which provides the rationale for the disposition of an appeal when no single opinion received the support of a majority of th ...

attributed incorporation to the Amendment's Due Process Clause.

''New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen''

In June 2022, the Supreme Court struck down the Sullivan Act's requirement for New York residents to show proper cause to obtain a license for concealed carry of handguns. The Supreme Court's 6-3 majority opinion authored by Justice

Clarence Thomas Clarence Thomas (born June 23, 1948) is an American jurist who serves as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. He was nominated by President George H. W. Bush to succeed Thurgood Marshall and has served since 1 ...

rejected a two-part test previously used by federal courts to review challenges to gun-control measures. It found that carrying a handgun in public for self-defense is protected under the Second Amendment, while still allowing for restrictions on carrying handguns in "sensitive places."

Advocacy groups, PACs, and lobbying

One way advocacy groups influence politics is through "outside spending," using political action committees (PACs) and

501(c)(4) A 501(c) organization is a nonprofit organization in the federal law of the United States according to Internal Revenue Code (26 U.S.C. § 501(c)) and is one of over 29 types of nonprofit organizations exempt from some federal income taxes. ...

organizations. PACs and 501(c)(4)s raise and spend money to affect elections. PACs pool campaign contributions from members and donate those funds to candidates for political office. Super PACs, created in 2010, are prohibited from making direct contributions to candidates or parties, but influence races by running ads for or against specific candidates. Both gun control and gun rights advocates use these types of organizations. The NRA's Political Victory Fund super PAC spent $11.2 million in the 2012 election cycle, and as of April 2014, it had raised $13.7 million for 2014 elections. Michael Bloomberg's gun-control super PAC, Independence USA, spent $8.3 million in 2012 and $6.3 million in 2013.

Americans for Responsible Solutions Americans for Responsible Solutions (ARS) was a United States non-profit organization and super PAC that supports gun control. The group's stated goal was "to encourage elected officials to stand up for solutions to prevent gun violence and pro ...

, another gun-control super PAC started by retired Congresswoman

Gabby Giffords Gabrielle Dee Giffords (born June 8, 1970) is an American retired politician and gun control advocate who served as a member of the United States House of Representatives representing from January 2007 until January 2012, when she resigned ...

, raised $12 million in 2013, and planned to raise $16 to $20 million by the 2014 elections. The group's treasurer said that the funds would be enough to compete with the NRA "on an even-keel basis." Another way advocacy groups influence politics is through

lobbying In politics, lobbying, persuasion or interest representation is the act of lawfully attempting to influence the actions, policies, or decisions of government officials, most often legislators or members of regulatory agencies. Lobbying, which ...

; some groups use lobbying firms, while others employ in-house lobbyists. According to

OpenSecrets OpenSecrets is a nonprofit organization based in Washington, D.C., that tracks data on campaign finance and lobbying. It was created from a merger of the Center for Responsive Politics (CRP) and the National Institute on Money in Politics (NIMP) ...

, gun politics groups with the most lobbyists in 2013 were: the NRA's Institute for Legislative Action ( NRA-ILA);

Mayors Against Illegal Guns Everytown for Gun Safety is an American nonprofit organization which advocates for gun control and against gun violence. Everytown was created in 2013 when Mayors Against Illegal Guns and Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America joined forc ...

(MAIG); the

National Shooting Sports Foundation The National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) is an American national trade association for the firearms industry that is based in Newtown, Connecticut. Formed in 1961, the organization has more than 8,000 members: firearms manufacturers, distrib ...

(NSSF); and the Brady Campaign. Gun rights groups spent over $15.1 million lobbying in Washington D.C. in 2013, with the

(NAGR) spending $6.7 million, and the NRA spending $3.4 million. Gun control groups spent $2.2 million, with MAIG spending $1.7 million, and the

Brady Campaign Brady: United Against Gun Violence (formerly “Handgun Control, Inc”., the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence and the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence) is an American nonprofit organization that advocates for gun control and again ...

spending $250,000 in the same period.

3D printed firearms

In August 2012, an open source group called

Defense Distributed Defense Distributed is an online open-source hardware organization that develops digital schematics of firearms in CAD files, or "wiki weapons", that may be downloaded from the Internet and used in 3D printing or CNC milling applications. Among ...

launched a project to design and release a blueprint for a handgun that could be downloaded from the Internet and manufactured using a

3D printer 3D printing or additive manufacturing is the construction of a three-dimensional object from a CAD model or a digital 3D model. It can be done in a variety of processes in which material is deposited, joined or solidified under computer co ...

. In May 2013, the group made public the STL files for the world's first fully 3D printable gun, the Liberator .380

single shot Single-shot firearms are firearms that hold only a single round of ammunition, and must be reloaded manually after every shot. The history of firearms began with single-shot designs, then multi-barreled designs appeared, and eventually many cent ...

pistol.

Proposals made by the Obama Administration

On January 16, 2013, in response to the

Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting The Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting occurred on December 14, 2012, in Newtown, Connecticut, United States, when 20-year-old Adam Lanza shot and killed 26 people. Twenty of the victims were children between six and seven years old, and t ...

and other mass shootings, President

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the ...

announced a plan for reducing gun violence in four parts: closing background check loopholes; banning assault weapons and large capacity magazines; making schools safer; and increasing access to mental health services. The plan included proposals for new laws to be passed by Congress, and a series of executive actions not requiring Congressional approval. No new federal gun control legislation was passed as a result of these proposals. President Obama later stated in a 2015 interview with the

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...

History

Colonial era through the Civil War

Post Civil War

20th century

First half of 20th century

=National Firearms Act

=''United States v. Miller''

Second half of 20th century

=Advocacy groups

=Centers for Disease Control (CDC) restriction

21st century

Smart guns

''District of Columbia v. Heller''

''McDonald v. City of Chicago''

''New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen''

Advocacy groups, PACs, and lobbying

3D printed firearms

Proposals made by the Obama Administration

2013 United Nations Arms Treaty

Proposals made by the Trump administration

Proposals made by the Biden Administration

Public opinion

Polls

Gallup poll

National Rifle Association

Media depictions and public opinion

Political arguments

Rights-based arguments

Fundamental right

Second Amendment rights

Defense of self and state

Protection of marginalized people

Security against tyranny

Public policy arguments

Gun violence debate

Criminal violence

=Homicide

Suicide

Federal and state laws

Federal laws

State laws and constitutions

See also

Articles

Organizations

Notes

References

Further reading

Books

Journals

News

External links