GUN CONTROL

Gun Control

Gun Control

Introduction

The furor over gun control has raged across the American landscape for decades, with a sustained intensity and intractability found among few other issues. Despite all that has been written on the subject, no comprehensive political and policy analysis on gun control exists, even though the gun debate is precisely a political dispute over the proper scope and consequences of government policy.

Gun control is an action of the government that is presumed to reduce crime. Congress has passed many laws on this subject and there really has not been an effect. Gun control has been a controversial issue for years, but the citizens of the United States have a right to own guns. Banning more and more guns may reduce gun violence, but it will not exterminate guns from society and will only lead to more and bigger problems.

Effectiveness of the Gun Control

Certain local jurisdictions, such as New York, had begun trying to restrict firearms ownership from minorities with registration schemes as early as 1911 and the former slave states had tried to prohibit black Americans from owning any sort of firearms starting shortly after the 13th Amendment was enacted officially freeing all slaves in 1865.

Some gun control advocates claim that only those types of weapons available to the public at the time the Second Amendment was ratified are protected by the Second Amendment; thus, they claim, Americans should be allowed only flint-lock muskets. Critics of that stance, however, contend that by that logic, freedom of speech should be restricted to the manual printing press, and word-of-mouth.

While the technology of firearm known to the Founding Fathers was primitive by comparison to today's weapons, individuals at that time were free to own a greater amount of destructive force than today. At the time of the nation's founding, individuals were free to own any weapon known, including cannons, field pieces and even fully-armed warships of the day. In fact, up until the National Firearms Act of 1934, there was no Federal law against ordinary Americans' owning any weapons available anywhere, including anything the US military used, such as tanks, artillery, bombs and even high-explosives. No licenses and no registration were required.

Gun Control Conspiracy Theory

Most people on both sides agree that so-called "Weapons of Mass Destruction" (i.e., biological, chemical and nuclear weapons) cannot have any legitimate purpose in the hands of individuals and that even in non-hostile hands these weapons pose a serious threat due to the risk of even simple accidents during storage or transport. As such, most agree that even the broad protections of the Second Amendment for the right to keep and bear arms do not apply to "WMD's".

However, a few on the gun-rights side (notably Vin Suprynowicz) point out that all American government powers originate with the people. Therefore, they argue, if the American government has the power to own WMDs, the people must have the same power or else they wouldn't have been able to give it to the ...