Guns in American Society: An Encyclopedia of History, Politics, Culture, and the Law [3 volumes] [3 ed.] 9781440867736, 9781440867743, 9781440867750, 9781440867767, 9781440867774, 1440867739

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Guns in American Society

Guns in American Society AN ENCYCLOPEDIA OF HISTORY, POLITICS, CULTURE, AND THE LAW Third Edition Volume 1: A–F

Jaclyn Schildkraut and Gregg Lee Carter, Editors

Copyright © 2023 by ABC-CLIO, LLC All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Carter, Gregg Lee, 1951- editor. | Schildkraut, Jaclyn, editor. Title: Guns in American society : an encyclopedia of history, politics, culture, and the law / Jaclyn Schildkraut and Gregg Lee Carter, editors. Description: Third edition. | Santa Barbara, California : ABC-CLIO, [2023] | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2022012539 | ISBN 9781440867736 (hardcover ; 3 vol. set) | ISBN 9781440867743 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Gun control—United States—Encyclopedias. | Firearms—Law and legislation—United States—Encyclopedias. | Firearms—Social aspects—United States—Encyclopedias. | Violent crimes—United States—Encyclopedias. | Social movements—United States—Encyclopedias. Classification: LCC HV7436 .G8783 2022 | DDC 363.330973—dc23/eng/20220603 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022012539 ISBN: 978-1-4408-6773-6 (set) 978-1-4408-6775-0 (vol. 1) 978-1-4408-6776-7 (vol. 2) 978-1-4408-6777-4 (vol. 3) 978-1-4408-6774-3 (ebook) 27 26 25 24 23  1 2 3 4 5 This book is also available as an eBook. ABC-CLIO An Imprint of ABC-CLIO, LLC ABC-CLIO, LLC 147 Castilian Drive Santa Barbara, California 93117 www.abc-clio.com This book is printed on acid-free paper Manufactured in the United States of America

Contents

List of Entries, vii Preface, xiii Introduction, xv Chronology, xxi A–Z Entries, 1 Appendix 1: Key Federal Gun Laws, 967 Appendix 2: Key State Gun Laws, 977 Appendix 3: List of Judicial Developments, 993 Appendix 4: Organizations Concerned with the Role of Guns in Contemporary American Society, 1015 About the Editors and Contributors, 1033 Index, 1051

v

List of Entries

Accidents Acoustic Gunshot Detection Technologies Acquisition of Guns African Americans and Gun Violence AK-47 Alcohol and Gun Violence American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) American Bar Association (ABA) American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) American Jewish Congress (AJC) American Medical Association (AMA) American Revolution Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) Ammunition, Regulation of Ammunition, Types of Amnesty Programs Armed Teacher Policies Armor-Piercing Ammunition Arms Trade Treaty Articles of Confederation and Gun Control Assault Weapons Assault Weapons Ban, Renewal Attempts of Assault Weapons Ban of 1994 Association of Firearm and Tool Mark Examiners (AFTE) Aurora Theater Shooting Automatic Weapons Laws Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime Average-Joe Thesis Background Checks Ballistic Identification System

Bartley-Fox Carrying Law Baton Rouge Police Officers Shooting Beard, Michael K. Biden, Joseph, Jr. Black Codes Black Lives Matter Black Market for Firearms Bloomberg, Michael Body Armor Boston Gun Project (BGP) Bowling for Columbine Boxer, Barbara Brady, James S. Brady, Sarah Kemp Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill) Brady Legal Brady: United against Gun Violence Branch Davidians Brown, Michael, Shooting of Brown Bess Browning, John Moses Bullet Button Bulletproof Consumer Products Bump Stocks Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) Bush, George H. W. Bush, George W. Campus Carry Cartridges vii

viii | List of Entries

Castle Doctrine Categories of People Prohibited from Owning Firearms Cease Fire, Inc. Center for Gun Policy and Research Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence (CSPV) Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Charleston Church Shooting Chicago, IL Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws Children’s Defense Fund (CDF) Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA) Civil War and Small Arms Clinton, William J. Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV) Collectors Colleges and Gun Violence Colt, Samuel Columbine High School Shooting Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) Concealed Weapons Laws Congressional Voting Patterns on Gun Control Consumer Product Safety Laws Cook, Philip J. Copycat Shootings CornerShot Guns Crime and Gun Use Crime Prevention Research Center Dallas Police Officers Ambush DC Project Defensive Gun Use (DGU) Democratic Party and Gun Control Demonization of Guns Derringers DeVos, Betsy Dingell, John D. District of Columbia v. Heller Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership (DRGO)

Drive-By Shootings Dueling Dum-Dum Bullet Eddie Eagle Elections and Gun Control Enforcement of Gun Control Laws Ergonomics and Firearms Design Everytown for Gun Safety Extreme Risk Protection Orders Families vs. Assault Rifles Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Federal Firearms Act of 1938 (Public Law No. 75-785) Federalism and Gun Control Federation for NRA Feinstein, Dianne Felons and Gun Control Fifty Caliber Shooters Association, Inc. (FCSA) Firearm Dealers Firearm Sentence Enhancement (FSE) Laws Firearms Industry Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986 Firearms Shooting Accuracy Rates Florida Carry, Inc. Fourteenth Amendment Fourth Amendment Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) Frontier Violence Giffords, Gabrielle Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence Gottlieb, Alan Merril Gun Buyback Programs Gun Clubs Gun Control Gun Control Act of 1968 Gun Control, Attitudes toward Gun Courts Gun Culture Gun Lobby Gun Owners’ Action League (GOAL) Gun Owners of America (GOA)



Gun Owners of California (GOC) Gun Ownership Gun Registration Gun Rights Policy Conference (GRPC) Gun Sales Records Gun Shows Gun Violence Archive (GVA) Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem Gun-Free Business Practices Gun-Free School Laws Gunpowder Guns in the Home Gunshot Detection Technologies (GDTs) Gunshot Wounds (Wound Ballistics) Halbrook, Stephen P. Hammer, Marion P. Handguns Health Care Professionals and Gun Violence Hellfire Trigger Helmke, Paul Hemenway, David A. Henigan, Dennis A. Heston, Charlton High-Capacity Magazine Ban High-Capacity Magazines Hinckley, John Warnock, Jr. Hirsch, Margot Hollow Point Bullet Holocaust Imagery and Gun Control Homicides, Gun The Huey P. Newton Gun Club Hunting Hupp, Suzanna Gratia Hurricane Katrina and Gun Control Ideologies—Conservative and Liberal Immigrants and Guns Independent Firearm Owners Association, Inc. (IFOA) Institute for Legislative Action (ILA) Intelligent Gun Safety Systems International Firearms Laws Iron Pipeline Izaak Walton League of America (IWLA)

List of Entries | ix

Johnson, Lyndon B. Juvenile Gun Courts Kates, Don B., Jr. Kellermann, Arthur L. Kennesaw, Georgia Killeen, Texas, Shooting Kleck, Gary Knox, Neal Kopel, David B. Ku Klux Klan (KKK) LaPierre, Wayne R., Jr. Las Vegas Shooting Lautenberg, Frank R. Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers League of Women Voters and Gun Control Legal Implications of Firearms Characteristics Lethality Effect of Guns Libertarianism and Gun Control Licensing Loaded-Chamber Indicator Loesch, Dana Long Gun Long Island Railroad Shooting Long Rifle (Pennsylvania/Kentucky) Lost and Stolen Firearms Reporting Lott, John R., Jr. Mailing of Firearms Act of 1927 Mail-Order Guns March for Our Lives Movement Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting Martin, Trayvon, Shooting of Mass Murder (Shootings) Massachusetts Gun Law McCarthy, Carolyn McDonald v. City of Chicago McNamara, Robert G. Medicine and Gun Violence Mental Disabilities and Gun Use and Acquisition Metal Detectors Methodologies for Studying Gun Violence Microstamping (Bullet Serial Numbers)

| List of Entries x Miller v. Texas Million Mom March Miniguns Minimum Ages to Purchase and Possess Firearms Modular Weapons System Moms Demand Action More Guns, Less Crime Thesis Motor Vehicle Laws as a Model for Gun Laws NAACP and Gun Control National Association of Firearms Retailers (NAFR) National Board for the Promotion of Rifle Practice (NBPRP) National Center for Injury Prevention and Control (NCIPC) National Council of Churches (NCC) and Gun Control National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) National Firearms Act of 1934 National Instant Criminal Background Check System National Institute of Justice (NIJ) National Rifle Association (NRA) National School Safety Center (NSSC) National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) National Student Safety and Security Conference (NSSSC) National Tracing Center (NTC) National Violent Death Reporting System Native Americans and Gun Violence Needle-in-the-Haystack Problem News Media and Gun Control NICS Improvement Act Obama, Barack Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act One-Gun-per-Month Laws Open Carry Laws Periodicals, Guns Pittsburgh Synagogue Shooting

Plastic Guns Police Shootings Political Victory Fund (PVF) Poverty and Gun Violence Pratt, Larry Preemption Laws Product Liability Lawsuits Project Exile Project Safe Neighborhoods Project Triggerlock Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005 Pulse Nightclub Shooting Racism and Gun Control Reagan, Ronald Wilson Recreational Uses of Guns Regional Gun Violence Research Consortium Remington, Eliphalet, II Republican Party and Gun Control RFID Guns Right to Self-Defense, Philosophical Bases Roberti-Roos Assault Weapons Control Act of 1989 Ruby Ridge Ruger, William Batterman SAFE Act of 2013 Safety Courses San Bernardino Shooting Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting Sandy Hook Promise Saturday Night Specials Sawed-off Shotguns School Marshal and Guardian Programs School Shootings Schumer, Charles E. Second Amendment Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) Self-Defense, Legal Issues Self-Defense, Reasons for Gun Use Semiautomatic Weapons Shooting Ranges SHUSH Act Silencers



Slippery Slope Argument Smart Guns Smith & Wesson (S&W) Smith & Wesson Settlement Agreement Soto et al. v. Bushmaster Firearms International, LLC et al. South (U.S.) and Gun Violence Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers’ Institute (SAAMI) Sporting Purposes Test (SPT) States United to Prevent Gun Violence Stop Handgun Violence (SHV) Student Pledge against Gun Violence Students for Concealed Carry on Campus Substitution Effects Suicide, Guns and Suicide, International Comparisons Sullivan Law Surplus Arms Sutherland Springs Church Shooting Tactical Training Target Shooting Tartaro, Joseph P. Techno-Polymers Tenth Amendment Terrorist Screening Database and Firearms 3D Gun Printing Tommy Gun Toy Guns Trigger Locks Trump, Donald J. Tucson, Arizona, Shooting Uniform Crime Reports (UCR)

List of Entries | xi

United Nations (UN) United States Concealed Carry Association (USCCA) United States Conference of Mayors United States Constitution and Gun Rights Universal Background Checks Urbanism and Gun Violence Victimization from Gun Violence Vigilantism Violence Policy Center (VPC) Violence Prevention Research Program (VPRP) Violent Crime Rate Violent Video Games and Gun Violence Virginia Tech Shooting Waiting Periods Washington, DC Washington, DC, Sniper Attacks Washington Navy Yard Shooting Weapons Instrumentality Effect Winchester, Oliver Fisher Women Against Gun Control (WAGC) Women Against Gun Violence (WAGV) Women and Guns Workplace Shootings Wright, James D. Youth and Guns Youth Crime Gun Interdiction Initiative (YCGII) Youth Gun Control Legislation: The Juvenile Justice Bill of 1999 Zimring, Franklin E. Zip Guns

Preface

In the United States, the topic of guns is one that appears to touch everyone in some way. Some people have grown up around guns that were used for hunting, while others have witnessed the devastating effects of firearm violence in their communities. Some see guns as a tool for sport, and others view them as a means of self-defense; even still, some view them as weapons to harm others. Many people across the country have direct, firsthand experience with guns; for others, what they know is based on what they see and read about through the media. Inevitably, most find themselves on one of two sides of an extremely contentious debate about these weapons—pro-gun rights or pro-gun control. This polarized discourse is often grounded in emotion and personal experience rather than research and scholarship, largely because the latter is both vast in scope and contradictory at the same time. Guns in American Society: An Encyclopedia of History, Politics, Culture, and the Law is a three-volume set that can help anyone—whether a member of the public or a policy maker—tackle the broad array of topics that surround the gun debate. Now in its third edition, this encyclopedia is arguably the most comprehensive single source on this topic published to date. It approaches the subject matter from a multidisciplinary

approach, drawing on research and expertise from scholars and practitioners in criminal justice, criminology, sociology, history, law, public health, and more. The set also covers a wide range of topics, including, but certainly not limited to, gun violence, gun control, gun rights, historical events, legislation, court decisions, gun organizations (both gun control and gun rights), and attitudes toward guns. With over 400 individual entries and several additional appendixes, this encyclopedia leaves no facet of this topic unexplored. At a time when gun violence in the United States is on the rise, it is even more imperative that discussions about how to combat this epidemic are grounded in research. Importantly, there are no easy answers or quick fixes. This is a complex, multifaceted, and dynamic problem that requires a comprehensive foundation from which to build policy and responses. Guns in American Society provides that base of information. Importantly, the articles in the encyclopedia are neither for nor against gun control or gun rights. Instead, they offer an objective look at different dimensions of firearms in American society and allow readers to draw their own conclusions by having the needed information from both sides and being able to find common ground between these differing perspectives. xiii

xiv | Preface

Guns in American Society would not be possible without the insight and expertise of Gregg Lee Carter, who conceptualized this project and shepherded it through its first two editions. While he entrusted me to carry on his vision, he has been an incredible mentor and supporter through this process, offering guidance whenever needed and answering what probably seemed like a million (and one) questions. I hope that the finished product makes him proud and that I have done this project justice. I am also grateful for the support of Kevin Hillstrom, the publisher’s editor on the project, who also has championed this encyclopedia and my role within it. I am grateful to my research assistants Courtney Baxter, Daniel Beutler, Jacob Sheingold, and Brian Monahan, who helped keep the project running smoothly and moving forward. Additionally, I must thank each contributor who helped make this possible, who dedicated their time and expertise to making an incredibly complex topic both accessible and understandable to a host of readers. On a personal note, I want to thank my family for their support, particularly my mom, Bevan Schildkraut, who always was so proud of the work that I do and was excited about this project. Unfortunately, she passed away while this book was in progress, so she will not get to read it. I am also beyond grateful to my friend and colleague Cheryl Lero Jonson for stepping up in her absence and cheering this project on until the very end. Editing this volume has been a humbling and rewarding experience for me, but it also has been a personal one. As a national expert on mass shootings, I have seen the devastating effects that gun violence can have on a community. This became even

more impactful when, just before signing on to the project, the area where I grew up—Parkland, Florida—experienced what remains, at the time of this writing, the most lethal mass shooting in a U.S. high school. Working to prevent other communities and individuals from experiencing gun violence tragedies will take the effort of many, and I believe the information in this encyclopedia can provide an important starting point to have a meaningful conversation about how to combat gun violence while still respecting the indelible place firearms have carved out in American society. I also believe it is important that, while we acknowledge the place that firearms have in our nation, we also remember and honor those who have been impacted by their use. As such, all editor royalties stemming from this project have been donated to the Rebels Project (www.theRebelsProject.org), a support group for mass shooting survivors founded and operated by other survivors that provides services to victims and survivors of gun violence that is unmatched. Guns in American Society has been written from many perspectives with many others in mind. This encyclopedia will benefit teachers, students, policy makers, criminal justice professionals, journalists, researchers, and the broader public who have an interest in firearms and their role in our nation’s past, present, and future. I hope not only that readers will find this material informative, but also that it will move the conversation about firearms and related key issues forward. Jaclyn Schildkraut Coeditor State University of New York at Oswego

Introduction

society. To scholars, policy makers, politicians, and thoughtful citizens who believe in strong gun control, the problem is the massive destruction to human life created by the presence of guns in the United States— mainly from homicide and suicide, much less so—but no less important—from accidents (in the 2020s, some 45,000 lives lost annually to homicides, suicides, and accidents; there were also serious injuries numbering in the tens of thousands). They view this state of affairs as a “public health” problem, akin to the classic public health problems of infectious diseases or uncontrolled dangerous products and substances (e.g., lead-based paint). The public health approach does not ignore the importance of individual choices, attitudes, and behaviors, but the emphasis tends toward the more sociological, the more structural, the more regulatory. That is, set up the situation so that when bad individual choices are made, the cumulative negative effects are minimized. The conquest of infectious disease via vaccination, sewage control, and quarantine is the archetype of this approach. More closely related to the public health problem of gun violence is the muchheralded achievement of the public health approach in reducing the fatalities, injuries, and economic-social-personal costs of motor vehicle accidents. In the early 1950s,

There is hardly a more contentious issue in American politics than the ownership of guns and various proposals for gun control. —National Research Council, Firearms and Violence (2005, 1) [G]un control advocates assume that if they win the argument about the public health consequences of gun violence, they will win the broader debate about how to regulate firearms. This line of thinking fails to account for our opponents’ claims about the importance of guns to our cultural and political values. Gun control advocates have spent the past three decades trying to persuade the public that guns are dangerous, while gun rights groups have been arguing that guns are essential to our freedom. —Joshua Horwitz and Casey Anderson, Guns, Democracy, and the Insurrectionist Idea (2009, 226) Politics is inherently controversial because human beings are passionately attached to their opinions by interests that have nothing to do with the truth. —Harry V. Jaffa, Distinguished Fellow, Claremont Institute (2011, BR16)

Ultimately, the debate over guns in U.S. society boils down to a philosophical argument about the role of government in modern society, and more particularly in American xv

xvi | Introduction

such accidents and their resultant deaths and injuries were considered a major problem of public health. The focus of the times was on bad drivers and their bad driving behaviors: they did not get enough training; they did not follow traffic laws very well; they did not sleep enough before driving; they drank alcohol or took drugs and then drove. Focusing on drivers and bad driving habits yielded some returns, but not nearly the returns achieved when the focus turned to the situations of accidents—and then to alter these situations so that bad driving yielded the minimum of harm. Thus, for example, roads were widened, shoulders were added, and street lighting was improved; guardrails were redesigned and their use increased; at the vehicle level, collapsible steering wheel columns were developed, shatterproof glass replaced the hard-glass windshields that formerly sliced and shredded the heads and necks of accident victims, shoulder straps were added to seat belts and their use made easier, bumpers were redesigned to absorb more shock, airbags were developed, headlights were made brighter—and the list goes on. Changing the focus from who caused the accident to what caused the death or injury resulted in huge gains: deaths from car accidents today are fewer than they were in the early 1950s (e.g., 38,310 deaths in 1953 versus 37,595 deaths in 2019), despite the huge increases in the number of drivers and the number of vehicles on the road (24.3 deaths per 100,000 population in 1953, versus 11.5 per 100,000 population in 2019). Many in the public health community, as well as some in the general public itself, see the parallels and possibilities for reducing gun violence. To be sure, let individuals know that they must be trained to use their firearms, that they should be licensed to carry concealed weapons (even though a

growing number of states no longer mandate licensing), and that they will be dealt with severely by the criminal justice system if they commit crimes with their weapons. However, beyond this focus on the individual, there are many more situational, more sociological, and more regulatory actions that can reduce gun violence and its manifold costs to society (economically speaking, $229 billion a year, according to one sophisticated estimate). Here are a few examples: (1) trigger pressure can be increased—reducing the chances of a small children firing it; (2) as is common knowledge, it is an “unloaded gun” that is often involved in accidents (the shooter is playing around, incorrectly thinking the gun is empty—which often seems believable for semiautomatic handguns when the ammunition magazine has been removed—but in fact there can still be a round in the chamber), and thus simple “loaded chamber” indicators can reduce the likelihood of these kinds of accidental shootings; (3) although purchases from retailers require a background check of the buyer, there is no federal law requiring that purchases in the private market involve a background check (even though some states do require such checks—note that the need for standardized laws across all fifty states is a paramount goal of those in the gun control camp, as a little driving can often overcome the strict law of state A versus the absence or more lenient version of the law in state B); (4) technologies exist—and can be further refined—that imprint unique markings/ numbers on shell casings and bullets that allow spent ammunition to be traced to a particular gun and a particular retail dealer (rogue dealers, willing to cut corners and even break the law to sell more guns, are a central focus of the gun control movement)—though only California and

Introduction | xvii

the District of Columbia have developed regulations in this area; relatedly, more traditional bullet identification systems could be used much more widely—for instance, two states require “ballistic fingerprinting” in which handguns have spent bullets and cartridge casings scanned and saved digitally in a database; when a spent bullet or casing is found at a crime scene, it can then be checked against the database to identify the gun and its last owner—but much better would be a federal requirement that all new guns be test-fired at the manufactory and the digital images of spent casings and bullets be added to the existing National Integrated Ballistic Information Network (which currently keeps only images of cartridge cases and bullets found at crime scenes); (5) critical to the success made in reducing the human and economic costs of motor vehicle accidents was the development of a sophisticated, comprehensive system of data reporting, so that the manifold details about the conditions of accidents could be used to make situational changes to reduce death, injuries, and damages (the Fatality Analysis Reporting System operated by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration); such a system for violent deaths (most of which occur from firearms via homicide and suicide) has the same potential; although federal and state funding on such a project was sporadic and incomplete until very recently, as of 2021, all fifty states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico have begun participating in using such a system (the National Violent Death Reporting System). Overall, any one policy, any one regulation, or any one program would be expected to have only small effects at the margins; that is, it would produce only a small reduction in the total number of deaths or injuries related to firearms. However, these effects

are often cumulative, and thus a multitude of such policies/regulations/programs can combine to produce significant reductions of death and injuries. High-profile public health organizations, such as the University of Pennsylvania’s Firearm and Injury Center, the Violence Prevention Research Program at the University of California–Davis, and the Harvard Injury Control Research Center, repeatedly argue in their evidencebased publications that public health research now provides a variety of paths for specific changes in the law and in health care practices that can reduce the deaths, disabilities, and societal costs created by firearm violence. Indeed, the federal Centers for Disease Control (2021) concludes that “using a public health approach is essential to addressing firearm violence and keeping people safe and healthy,” which echoes a 2019 National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine report concluding that “there are effective interventions that health systems can implement to address firearm injury and death” (98). As a final point, for many of those in the gun control camp, who are joined in this sentiment by a good many gun owners, the gun issue is not simply about the deaths and injuries associated with firearms but also about the insecurity they feel when guns are in their presence. They shudder at the thought of being in a tavern or restaurant or sporting arena—or any public gathering— where there are individuals strapping firearms (legal or not, concealed weapons permits and “open-carry” laws be damned). To scholars, policy makers, politicians, and thoughtful citizens who believe in strong gun rights, the problem of the significant destruction to human life created by the presence of guns in American society is regrettable, but it is also one that can and should be mitigated by vigorous government

xviii | Introduction

enforcement of existing laws against gun misusers—as well as by lawful armed selfdefense. Some in the gun rights camp acknowledge the power of the public health approach in solving human misery—and even those who believe in the absolute minimum of government regulation often recognize the validity of public health-related, research-based government regulations that require, say, that lead be removed from paint or that private septic systems be maintained to prevent the pollution of groundwater. This said, those in the gun rights camp believe that guns and paint, and guns and many of the products that are regulated to increase the safety of consumers, are very different entities with very different purposes. Although guns and paint can increase the happiness of the individual (from feeling the satisfaction of accurately sighting and then shattering a flying clay target, to feeling the pleasure of looking at a freshly painted room, or house, or portrait), the ultimate aim of guns in the hands of the average nonviolent and mentally stable citizen is to ensure that the individual, the home, the neighborhood, the community, the commonwealth, and property connected with any and all of these, is protected (via the efforts of law enforcement agencies and state-organized militias, yes, but also, as is sometimes required, via individual wherewithal). It is protected from marauders and villains when public law enforcement is not up to the task; protected from the government when those in power pervert it to serve their needs and not those of the people—and are willing to use violence to ensure this. The venerated right to keep and bear arms guaranteed in the Second Amendment is not primarily about protecting the joy of hunting or target shooting; it is about protecting the people— individually and collectively, as affirmed by the 2008 (Heller) and 2010 (McDonald)

landmark decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court. In short, to those in the gun rights camp, the difference between all other consumer products and guns is fundamental, and they thus believe the public health approach misses the point. Guns are not germs; rather, they are critical tools in the quest for greater individual and public safety. As for the discomfort many might feel being in public places where some citizens are carrying concealed firearms, or even openly so, this is a function of culture— “shall-issue” concealed-carry and opencarry laws are relatively new, and most Americans, even those who grew up in areas where guns are common, are not accustomed to the idea of armed citizens in their midst. However, gun rights advocates hold that people must become used to the civil right of lawful concealed and open carry and, moreover, that the recent history of American society reveals multiple examples of significant cultural shifts in how we view the world, in what we think is proper, and in how we act. Examples include the dramatic changes in gender roles and race relations since the early 1970s; the transformation of smoking thought to be somewhat cool to becoming a near stigma since the 1980s; the increasing acceptance of openly gay and lesbian individuals, couples, and families since the 1990s—and the list goes on. Given this fundamentally different worldview of those strongly for gun control versus those strongly for gun rights, the data really do not matter. This may sound startling to the average lay reader. But even partial immersion in the writings of gun control versus gun rights organizations, and even scholars, makes this conclusion easier to see. For the past several decades, gun control advocates have been quick to promulgate cross-national studies showing that

Introduction | xix

firearms availability and gun violence are positively correlated: The more guns that circulate in society, the greater the gun violence and—because a gunshot generally magnifies the wound trauma that would have been inflicted by a fist, foot, club, or knife—the greater the overall homicide rate, the greater the serious-injury rate, and, for selected subpopulations (e.g., adolescents), the greater the suicide rate. At the same time, those in the gun rights camp promulgate the “more guns, less crime” thesis, with both cross-national and crossU.S.-state tour-de-force statistical analyses; they also point to empirical studies extolling the reality and salience of defensive gun use (by ordinary, armed citizens against criminal attacks). But the data each camp promotes do not sway the other side. To wit, as avid and well-known gun control advocate Dennis Henigan (2009, 6) sees it: “critics of gun regulation . . . dress up their arguments in the arcane language of academia and in mountains of statistics, but their basic claims [can] be boiled down to . . . the bumper sticker arguments of the National Rifle Association and its allies” (e.g., “Guns don’t kill people—people kill people”; “When guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns”; and “An armed society is a polite society”). And owning up to how the gun rights camp sees much of the data and statistical analyses emanating from the public health research community, high-profile gun control advocates Josh Horwitz and Casey Anderson (2009, 226) concede that the arguments for more control are “based on contested factual claims” (emphasis added). Given this fundamentally different worldview, there is a strong tendency in the gun rights camp not to compromise. Such compromise, they fear—and some scholarship indicates that their fear is

justified—will result in a slippery slope ending in guns being viewed no differently than lead-based paint. This little-tono-compromise approach frustrates, enormously, those in the gun control camp. This frustration stems from one of the major tenets of the public health approach—the approach whose research dominates the home pages of gun control organization—namely, that from each single gun control regulation, policy, or program, we can only expect modest marginal returns. Thus, if one regulation is opposed by the gun rights side, okay, we don’t have to go that way (at least not right now) — but can’t we agree to work together to bring about this other regulation? (Tit for tat, quid pro quo, can’t we negotiate a deal that gives each side a little satisfaction?) Going with the other regulation might well still produce some positive benefits. But “no” is the reply from the gun rights side: the stakes are too high and the risk of the slippery slope too great. The debate is sometimes muddied because many from the gun rights side believe, more generally, in minimal government regulation of the ordinary affairs of the citizenry, while many in the gun control camp take a more communitarian approach—that the free market, or individual choice, cannot solve many of our most vexing social and economic problems (at least not as many as those with a more libertarian bent believe). But, as already stated, the real point is that no matter how the core of one’s more general political philosophy is constituted, those with the strongest gun rights orientation hold that guns are unique: they need to be readily accessible; they need to be reasonably commercially available; they need to be regulated no more than is truly necessary for public safety; and no matter what, the government must not keep a

xx | Introduction

registry of who owns them (lest these individuals be more easily disarmed should the government make war on its own citizens, as so often been the case in human history—right up to the present day). As there can be no compromise on any of these tenets, why even bother to talk with the other side? In the words of NRA executive Wayne LaPierre, “Why should I or the NRA go sit down with a group of people that have spent a lifetime trying to destroy the Second Amendment in the United States?” (as quoted in Calmes 2011, A24). Gregg Lee Carter Coeditor Bryant University

Further Reading Calmes, Jackie. “N.R.A. Declines to Meet with Obama on Gun Policy.” New York Times, March 15, 2011. http://www .ny times.com /2011/ 03/15/us /politics /15guns.html (accessed October 10, 2021). Centers for Disease Control. “Firearm Violence Prevention.” U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National

Center for Injury Prevention and Control, Division of Violence Prevention, May 4, 2021. https://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/firearms/fastfact.html (accessed October 11, 2021). Henigan, Dennis A. Lethal Logic: Exploding the Myths that Paralyze American Gun Policy. Dulles, VA: Potomac Books, 2009. Horwitz, Joshua, and Casey Anderson. Guns, Democracy, and the Insurrectionist Idea. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2009. Jaffa, Harry V. “Aristotle and the Higher Good.” New York Times, July 3, 2011. ht t p://w w w.ny times.com /2011/ 07/ 03 /books /review/book-review-aristotles -nicomachean-ethics.html (accessed October 10, 2021). National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine. Health Systems Interventions to Prevent Firearm Injuries and Death. Washington, DC: National Academies Press, 2019. http://nap.edu/25354 (accessed October 11, 2021). National Research Council. Firearms and Violence: A Critical Review. Washington, DC: National Academies Press, 2005. http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?isbn =0309091241 (accessed October 10, 2021).

Chronology

This chronology presents the long and broad range of watershed events that have shaped the contemporary gun debate in American society. 1787–1791 The place of militias in the new nation is one of myriads of issues during the U.S. Constitutional Convention’s deliberations in 1787. States’ rights advocates emphasize that citizens in new republics should fear standing armies at all costs. This zeal of some such advocates is tempered by the ineffective governance existing under the Articles of Confederation (1778–1789), which have kept the federal government weak and the governments of the states strong. Many are concerned about the need for a strong central government to suppress uprisings such as the recent Shays’ Rebellion in Massachusetts. Federalists are also fearful of standing armies, but they see the survival of the United States depending upon a strong national government—a government that, among many other things, has its own army and navy (which does not depend upon grants from the individual states for its support). One of the compromises between proponents and opponents of federalism is reflected in Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution and the Second Amendment of the Bill of Rights. In Article I, Section 8, Congress is granted the power to raise and

support an army (8.12); provide and maintain a navy (8.13); call forth the militia to execute the laws of the Union, suppress insurrections, and repel invasions (8.15); and provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States (8.16). Concessions to satisfy the Anti-Federalists include the right of the states to appoint officers to the militia and to train militiamen (according to standards set by Congress). State militias are seen as counteracting forces to the potential might of a standing federal army, as well as reducing the need for a large standing army in the first place. Fears of a standing army are further assuaged by giving the civilian Congress control over the military’s purse strings and by limiting military appropriations to no more than two years. Nagging doubts over the power of the states to maintain and control militias are addressed in the First Congress and eventually alleviated with the passage of the Second Amendment. States’ rights advocates want certainty that federal power will not be used to annul state sovereignty. As ratified in 1791, the Second Amendment declares: “A well xxi

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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.” These twenty-seven words eventuate in a furor of controversy in the last decades of the twentieth century and the first decades of the twenty-first century—controversy over their original meaning and controversy on their applicability to contemporary U.S. society. Federal appeals courts, with the backing of many historians and legal scholars, interpret the amendment as a collective right granted to the states to maintain the capacity for arming their own militias— this is also the interpretation emphasized by most gun control activists. Selected scholars and many from the gun rights camp agree with this interpretation but see it as only a partial understanding of the amendment—which they see as also guaranteeing the right of individuals to keep and bear arms for personal self-defense. Finally, a few scholars hold that neither the collectiveright interpretation (which focuses on the first clause of the amendment) nor the individual-right interpretation (focusing on the second clause) truly hits the mark. Rather, the amendment was intended to outline a civic duty, that is, individuals were indeed granted the right to keep and bear arms, but only to meet their duty to serve in a wellregulated militia, as to ensure the common defense. Not surprisingly, those in the gun control camp are much more likely to accept the civic-duty interpretation than their counterparts in the gun rights camp. 1792 On May 1 and 8, 1792, President George Washington signs the First and Second Militia Acts of 1792, which set a minimum standard for the federal militia. The acts require free, able-bodied, eighteen- to

forty-five-year-old white men to enroll in the militia (men employed as postmen, stagecoach drivers, and ferrymen are exempted). Each militiaman is required to supply his own gun, powder, ammunition, shot-pouch, powder horn, and knapsack and to “appear so armed, accoutered, and provided, when called out to exercise or into service” (Annals of Congress 1792, 1392). Washington uses the act to muster the militia and put down the “Whiskey Rebellion” of August 1794. The act is amended in 1795. It is revised in 1862 to allow all African Americans to serve. In the Militia Act of 1903, the “organized militia” is revamped into the “National Guard” and separated from the “unorganized militia” (able-bodied male citizens—or immigrants on the path to citizenship—between the ages of seventeen and forty-five). In 1916, Congress passes the National Defense Act, increasing federal support for the Guards, and also further subsumes them under national military rules, organization, and authority. Starting in 1933, they operate under a dual enlistment system, whereby a guard member is simultaneously part of the relevant state Guard and the National Guard; and Congress asserts that its authority over the National Guard is based on Congress’s army power, not its militia power. Federal authority over the state Guards is recognized by the Supreme Court in 1990 in Perpich v. Department of Defense, where it rules that state governors have control over their state Guards for state purposes, but that the governors cannot prevent the U.S. government from using the state Guards as it sees fit, such as sending them to Central America. As the Supreme Court observes in its 1965 Maryland v. United States decision, “The National Guard is the modern Militia reserved to the States by Art. I . . . of the Constitution” (Justia 1965).

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1800–1900 Even though stories of frontier violence are popular, the level of violence—especially gun violence—in nonfrontier America is but a fraction of that actually occurring on the frontier, which itself is considerably less than that depicted in the Wild West shows and dime novels of the latter part of the era. As soon as a frontier area is secured and towns established, violence quickly recedes—especially personal violence—and so does gun carrying. In established metropolitan areas, violence tends to be at the group level, coming in periodic waves in the form of riots. Such frays pit older immigrant groups against more recent arrivals: Protestants against Catholics, Yankees against Irishmen, Blacks and their white abolitionist friends against Irishmen and other whites, Chinese against whites, Mexicans against “Anglos.” The issues are usually economic and involve disputes over jobs, turf, and the public largess. Even though some killing occurs, most egregiously during the 1863 New York City draft riots where Irish immigrants ran amuck and murdered dozens of African Americans, the fighting in New York and elsewhere rarely involves guns and is often limited to fisticuffs. When fists are not the order of the day, bats, rocks, swords, and fire are the weapons of choice. In response to the group violence, cities start organizing police forces in the 1840s. By the middle of the 1870s, all major cities have professional police forces, and by the century’s end, so do most smaller communities. In the last quarter of the nineteenth century, urban police forces are buttressed by state National Guard units, which are formed to help deal with the labor violence that is becoming common in northern and Midwestern cities. Frontier peoples’ readiness to cooperate for their mutual protection belies the myth

of frontier individualism and of the lone pioneer—as extolled in dime novels— conquering the West with rifle and sixshooter. The gun violence associated with famous range wars (as in Johnson County, Wyoming, in 1891), gunfighters (like Billy the Kid, Bat Masterson, and Wild Bill Hickok), cattle towns (such as Dodge City and Abilene, Kansas), mining towns (à la Deadwood, South Dakota; Tombstone, Arizona; Virginia City, Nevada), and stagecoach robberies (as of the Butterfield line and of Wells Fargo) are, for the most part, the vivid exaggerations and often outright creations of pulp fiction writers. As frontier settlements become “civilized,” local officials are quick to put controls on guns. Thousands of municipal, county, and state gun control laws are passed to protect the public and maintain law and order. A typical gun law is the Indiana statute that “every person, not being a traveller, who shall wear or carry any dirk, pistol, sword in a sword-cane, or other dangerous weapon concealed, shall upon conviction thereof, be fined in any sum not exceeding one hundred dollars” (Laws of Indiana, 1831; as quoted in Cramer 1994, 72). Prohibitions against concealed weapons are increasingly common by the mid1800s, as are laws against the discharging of a weapon within city limits. By the late 1800s, many communities have laws dictating that firearms cannot be carried publicly unless a person is hunting, taking the weapon for repair, or going to or from a military muster. With few exceptions, challenges of such laws in the courts fail. Most of the legal arguments are based on right-to-bear-arms provisions of state constitutions, and occasionally on the Second Amendment. However, the courts routinely rule along the lines of an 1840 judgment by the Alabama

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Supreme Court: “A Statute, which, under pretence of regulating the manner of bearing arms, amounts to a destruction of the right, or which requires arms to be so borne as to render them wholly useless for the purpose of defence, would be clearly unconstitutional. But a law which is intended merely to promote personal security, and to put down lawless aggression and violence, and to that end inhibits the wearing of certain weapons in such a manner as is calculated to exert an unhappy influence upon the moral feelings of the wearer, by making him less regardful of the personal security of others, does not come in collision with the constitution” (State v. Reid, 1 Ala. 612 [1840]). In other words, Alabama could ban concealed carry of handguns, as open carry is allowed. A few decisions from the South, after white supremacists regain control of state governments following Reconstruction, are more restrictive—upholding laws making any carrying difficult and inconvenient (e.g., mandating that the handgun be actually carried in the hand). 1865–1866 In the post–Civil War South, Black Codes are enacted in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas. These statutes deprive African Americans of many basic rights, including the right to own and carry firearms. For example, a Mississippi law dictates that “no freedman, free Negro, or mulatto not in the military service of the United States government, and not licensed so to do by the board of police of his or her county, shall keep or carry firearms of any kind, or ammunition, dirk, or Bowie knife” (as quoted in Cramer 1994, 72). Such laws contribute to keeping African Americans servile.

1871 The National Rifle Association (NRA) is founded in 1871. In its early years, it is a small shooting association sponsoring rifle matches and sharpshooter classes. Prestigious retired army officers, such as former President Ulysses Grant and 1880 Democratic presidential nominee Winfield Scott Hancock, serve as early presidents, supporting the NRA’s purpose of helping to keep the general population militia ready. As part of this task, the NRA is commissioned to train members of the New York National Guard to shoot well, as well as to create a marksmanship training model to be adopted by other state militias. However, its state funding is cut off in 1879, and by 1892, the organization falls into disarray. Revived a few years later, the NRA receives a substantial boost in 1903, when Congress creates the National Board for the Promotion of Rifle Practice (NBPRP) to promote civilian rifle practice (another attempt by the military to ensure that civilians are militia ready). An appendage of the War Department, the civilian-run NBPRP includes all eight NRA trustees on its executive board, pursuant to congressional command. This is a critical turning point for the organization, as these trustees work with Congress to achieve passage in 1905 of Public Law 149, authorizing the sale of surplus military weapons, at cost, to rifle clubs meeting NBPRP standards. As implemented, one of these standards is that the club must be affiliated with the NRA, and Congress formally makes this a requirement in 1924. The NRA is also chosen to run the National Matches, the rifle championships created by the 1903 law. In 1910, Congress authorizes the giving away of surplus weaponry to NRA-sponsored clubs, and in 1912, Congress begins funding NRA rifle championships. The

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association benefits greatly, and membership climbs from several hundred to several thousand by 1917. The end of World War I greatly increases the number of surplus weapons made available to the NRA, and membership rises steadily as prospective members are motivated by the allure of a free new rifle and a place to shoot it. Closely focusing on supporting the National Guard during the early twentieth century, the NRA in the 1920s broadens itself into a more general organization for participants in the shooting sports; at the same time, its political agenda broadens beyond the promotion of rifle and handgun marksmanship, and it is generally successful in defeating proposals for handgun control (Gilmore 1974). By the mid-1930s, the organization’s membership grows to 35,000. Compared to the organization it will become in the 1970s, the NRA of the 1930s is moderate and restrained in its attempts to influence public policy. In response to the proposed National Firearms Act of 1934, the NRA rejects provisions for federal registration and a $200 tax for owning a handgun, but it has no objection to the same restrictions applied to automatic firearms. Handguns are for virtuous citizens, and machine guns are not, in the NRA’s view at the time. The NRA likewise blocks attempts to impose federal gun registration in 1937– 1938 and 1957–1958. This philosophy is refined over the years until the late 1970s, when it is solidified to its present status, which is that virtually all new gun control regulations should be resisted, existing ones being more than sufficient, if enforced. (Note: the NRA supports the National Instant Criminal Background Check System [NICS], which goes into effect in 1998, and supports state versions of the system starting in 1989. The NRA also supports the NICS Improvement Act of 2007, which is

aimed at improving the record keeping necessary to perform adequate background checks of potential firearms purchasers; however, the organization does so only because it claims that the improved instant check system does not represent any new form of “gun control”—that is, there are no new restrictions placed on those who are legally qualified to buy firearms.) The decision to oppose the gun registration portion of the 1934 bill is accompanied by a set of tactics that remains with the NRA to the present day. It circulates editorials, press releases, and open letters throughout the sporting and gun-owning communities. It urges its members and potential sympathizers to telegram or write congressional representatives. The NRA is rewarded with a huge influx of antiregistration mail, resulting in the eventual deletion of the reference to handguns in the final version of the National Firearms Act of 1934. The NRA’s growing involvement in public policy results in an invitation to work with the Justice Department and Congress in the developing the Federal Firearms Act of 1938. As with the earlier legislation, the NRA accepts minimal regulation but makes sure strong restrictions, such as a system of national registration, are kept out of the law. Although the NRA is not especially large or well funded in the 1930s, it finds its interests more or less readily accepted, because there is no gun control movement and no organization dedicated to gun control (like the modern-day Brady: United Against Gun Violence organization). After World War II, nine million demobilized veterans reenter civilian life with a new interest in firearms. Tens of thousands of ex-GIs join the NRA, giving it a much greater potential to wield power over public policy. However, the vast majority of these

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new members have little interest in gun control issues per se but great interest in recreational shooting. The NRA’s programs and publications begin to reflect this transformation in membership. The NRA changes from an organization motivated by the nation’s need for military preparedness to one reflecting the interests of hunters, target shooters, and other recreational gun enthusiasts. Through the 1960s, the NRA continues on a moderate course. For example, some in the NRA of the late 1960s and early 1970s endorse the banning of Saturday night specials (cheaply made handguns). In 1968, the NRA editorializes: “Shoddily manufactured by a few foreign makers, hundreds of thousands of these have been peddled in recent years by a handful of U.S. dealers. Prices as low as $8 or $10 have placed concealable handguns within reach of multitudes who never before could afford them. Most figure in ‘crimes of passion’ or amateurish holdups, which form the bulk of the increase in violence. The Administration . . . possesses sufficient authority to bar by Executive direction these miserably-made, potentially defective arms that contribute so much to rising violence” (National Rifle Association 1968a, 16; as quoted in Sugarmann 1992). The NRA reaffirms its stance against Saturday night specials by observing that it does “not necessarily approve of everything that goes ‘Bang!’” (National Rifle Association 1968b, 16; as quoted in Sugarmann 1992). In what sounds astounding by the position of the NRA today, Executive Vice President Franklin L. Orth testifies before Congress that “the National Rifle Association concurs in principle with the desirability of removing from the market crudely made and unsafe handguns . . . [because] they have no sporting purpose, they are

frequently poorly made. . . . On the Saturday Night Special, we are for [banning] it 100 percent. We would like to get rid of these guns” (as quoted in Sugarmann 1992, 42). As for the place of the Second Amendment in debate over gun control, the official NRA Fact Book on Firearms Control in the 1970s notes that the amendment is of “limited practical utility” in arguing against gun control (as quoted in Sugarmann 1992, 48). The voices of moderation and compromise within the NRA recede in 1977, when Second Amendment hard-liners oust those leaders wanting to withdraw the NRA from politics and move the headquarters to Colorado Springs (see “Revolt at Cincinnati” below). 1876 In United States v. Cruikshank, the U.S. Supreme Court renders its first major decision on the Second Amendment. The case arises out of the infamous “Colfax massacre” on Easter Sunday 1873; after a disputed election, a gang of whites attacks a courthouse being guarded by Blacks and their white Republican allies. The gang slaughters the Blacks and, among other things, takes away their guns. Some of the gang leaders, including William Cruikshank, are convicted of conspiring to deprive the Black individuals of their First Amendment right to assemble and of their Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms—in violation of a federal statute (enacted under Congress’s Fourteenth Amendment powers) against violations of civil rights on account of color. The court rules that the Second Amendment applies only to the federal government, not to state governments. The states do not have to honor it. Despite this decision supporting their contention that the Second Amendment should pose no barrier to the enactment of strict gun control laws, at least at the state

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level, many advocates of the gun control movement are not particularly eager to tout United States v. Cruikshank. The racist ruling prevents Congress from acting against racist gangs, which, unrestrained by state or local governments, can keep former slaves unarmed and in a position of vassalage in the South, thereby partly counteracting the effect of the Emancipation Proclamation. This fact is not lost either on many African American and Jewish jurists or on interest groups opposing gun control such as the National Rifle Association. Even though African Americans and Jews generally tend to support strict gun control, some contend that regulations on gun possession are a means for suppressing a society’s minorities and for allowing unjust rulers to hold sway because they control most weaponry. 1886 The U.S. Supreme Court addresses the Second Amendment for a second time in Presser v. Illinois. Herman Presser, the leader of a German-American labor group called the Lehr und Wehr Verein (the “Learning and Defense Club”), is arrested for parading the group through downtown Chicago while carrying a sword, and while club members were carrying unloaded rifles. He is accused of conducting an “armed military drill,” which could legally be done only with a license, under Illinois statutes in force at the time. Presser appeals, invoking the Second Amendment in his defense. The Supreme Court rules against him, citing the United States v. Cruikshank decision noted above. Again, the court contends that the Second Amendment does not directly apply to the individual states, and is not made applicable to them by the Privileges or Immunities Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. And, as was the case with Cruikshank, the Supreme Court’s

decision smacks of bigotry—in this instance, through the repression of exploited immigrant laborers trying to improve their collective lot via unionization. 1903 Congress passes the Militia Act of 1903, also known as the Dick Act (named after the Ohio congressman who sponsors the legislation, Rep. Charles Dick, himself a National Guard officer). The act separates the organized militia, to be known as the “National Guard” of the state, from the “unorganized militia” (which, in actuality, has not existed for decades). It provides federal support for state governments to arm, train, and drill the Guards. In 1916, Congress passes the National Defense Act, increasing federal support for the Guards, and also further subsumes them under national military rules, organization, and authority. They operate under a dual enlistment system, whereby a guard member is simultaneously part of the relevant state National Guard and the U.S. National Guard. Federal authority over the state Guards is recognized by the Supreme Court in 1990 in Perpich v. Department of Defense, where it rules that state governors have control over their state Guards for state purposes, but that the governors cannot prevent the U.S. government from using the state Guards as it sees fit—and more particularly to deploy them outside of the country without gubernatorial consent. As the Supreme Court observes in its 1965 Maryland v. United States decision, “The National Guard is the modern Militia reserved to the States by Art. I . . . of the Constitution” (Justia 1965). 1911 New York State passes the Sullivan Law, requiring a license for both the purchase and

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carry of handguns. Such licenses are rarely issued for carrying. However, gun rights advocates point out that it has little effect on violent crime and is motivated, at heart, by xenophobic fears within the mainstream leadership of New York, who want to keep firearms out of the hands of Italian and other recent immigrants. It is estimated that seven of ten of those arrested during the first three years of the law are of Italian descent. While the Sullivan Law applies to the entire state, it is actually aimed at New York City, where the large foreign population is thought overly turbulent and prone to criminal activity (Beckman 2002). Due to the xenophobic nature of the Sullivan Law, some critics point to it as an example of using “gun control” to quash minority interests. 1927 Congress passes the Mailing of Firearms Act of 1927, also known as the Miller Act, prohibiting sending concealable firearms through the U.S. Post Office. As originally proposed, the act would ban the interstate shipping of all handguns except service revolvers. However, strong opposition from legislators in gun manufacturing states combined with similarly strong opposition from legislators in the southern and western states, many of whom believe it violates the Second Amendment’s right to keep and bear arms, almost completely neutralize the act by restricting its provisions to the U.S. Post Office. The law is easy to skirt until passage of the Gun Control Act of 1968, because mailers can legally send guns via private mail-delivery companies such as UPS (United Parcel Service). 1929 The Saint Valentine’s Day Shooting in Chicago shocks the nation. Four members of Al Capone’s gang, two dressed as police

officers, ruthlessly mow down seven members of a rival Chicago gang using Thompson submachine guns. The murders prompt several gun control proposals in Congress, two of which eventually pass (the National Firearms Act of 1934 and the Federal Firearms Act of 1938). 1934 The first major federal gun control legislation is passed as the National Firearms Act of 1934. It mandates all persons engaged in the business of selling gangster-type weapons—machine guns, sawed-off shotguns, and silencers—and all owners of these to register with the collector of internal revenue and pay applicable taxes for the firearm transfer. Because criminals are unlikely to register their weapons, the effect is to give law enforcement authorities a new reason to arrest gangsters (possession of an unregistered weapon). Lawful trade in these weapons is also dramatically reduced due to the hefty taxes. 1938 The second major federal gun control legislation is passed as the Federal Firearms Act of 1938. It imposes the first federal limitations on the sale of ordinary firearms. It requires manufacturers, dealers, and importers of guns and handgun ammunition to obtain a federal firearms license. Dealers must maintain records of the names and addresses of persons to whom firearms are sold. Gun sales to persons convicted of violent felonies are prohibited. 1939–1942 In United States v. Miller (1939), the U.S. Supreme Court makes its third major ruling bearing on the Second Amendment. The court rules that the federal government has the right, which it exercised in the National

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Firearms Act of 1934, to control the transfer of (and in effect, to require the registration of) certain firearms. In this particular case, the sawed-off shotgun, a favorite weapon of gangsters, is deemed unprotected by the Second Amendment. The ruling reads, in part: “In the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of ‘shotgun having a barrel of less than eighteen inches in length’ at this time has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, we cannot say that the second amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument.” Lower court decisions involving the National Firearms Act and the kindred Federal Firearms Act use even more direct language. In upholding the National Firearms Act, a Florida district court declares in United States v. Adams (1935) that the Second Amendment “refers to the Militia, a protective force of government; to the collective body and not individual rights.” A later Third Circuit Court of Appeals decision, United States v. Tot (1942), cites this ruling in upholding the Federal Firearms Act. These court decisions make clear that no personal right to own arms exists under the federal Constitution. On the other hand, gun rights advocates point out that in its Miller ruling, the Supreme Court noted that the writers of the Constitution clearly intended that the states had both the right and the duty to maintain militias and that a “militia comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense. . . . And, further, that ordinarily when called for service, these men were expected to appear bearing arms supplied by themselves and of the kind in common use at the time. . . . This implied the general obligation of all adult male inhabitants to possess arms, and with

certain exceptions, to cooperate in the work of defense. The possession of arms also implied the possession of ammunition, and authorities paid quite as much attention to the latter as to the former.” Thus, the full text of the Supreme Court decision mitigates the impact of its ruling on sawed-off shotguns. Such weapons have no place in a militia and thus are not protected, but the general principle of ordinary citizens owning arms and ammunition is clearly preserved. 1961 An amendment to the Federal Aviation Act of 1958—by Public Law 87-197 of 1961— bars individuals from bringing on board a passenger aircraft any concealed firearm (except in the form of check-in luggage). 1963 Using a false name, Lee Harvey Oswald buys an imported Italian military rifle for less than $20 from a mail-order dealer in Chicago. He uses it to assassinate President John F. Kennedy on November 22. The ease with which he has obtained the weapon stuns many Americans, and soon there are numerous bills brought before Congress to regulate the gun market. These bills are combined and reformulated many times until they result in the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 and its sister legislation, the Gun Control Act of 1968. 1966 The Texas Tower shooting shocks the nation. On August 1, a former Marine sharpshooter climbs the clock tower on the University of Texas campus in Austin with seven firearms. He methodically kills fifteen people and wounds thirty-one others. The victims include the unborn child of an

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eighteen-year-old pregnant student, whom he shot through the abdomen. The shooting spree ends when two Austin police officers and a civilian subdue and kill the sniper. An autopsy reveals a golf-ball sized tumor in the shooter’s brain. The Texas Tower shooting and its immediate aftermath are played out many times over the next five and a half decades: A mass-murder shooting shocks the nation and sparks local, state, and national legislative proposals to control guns; within a few months, however, emotions die down and almost all proposals fail enactment. 1968 The assassinations of Reverend Martin Luther King and Senator Robert F. Kennedy, like the urban riots exploding in hundreds of urban areas since 1965, increase national attention on gun violence and, according to many observers, the need for stronger gun control. Congress is finally motivated to pass twin bills containing serious gun control measures—the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 and the Gun Control Act of 1968 (GCA). More recent federal gun laws, including the 1993 Brady Law and the 1994 federal Assault Weapons Ban, are enacted as amendments to the GCA statutes (or, less often, to the 1934 National Firearms Act). The GCA places severe restrictions on the importation of firearms and on the sale of guns and ammunition across state lines. Interstate pistol sales are banned. Interstate long gun sales are also banned, except when contiguous states enact laws to authorize such sales. Mail-order and package delivery service (e.g., UPS) gun sales are prohibited. Interstate ammunition sales are prohibited. The GCA also creates a “prohibited persons” list of those barred from possessing guns. The list originally comprises convicted

felons, alcoholics, drug users, “mental defectives,” fugitives, persons dishonorably discharged from the military, and persons who renounced their citizenship. In 1994, the list is expanded to include those convicted of domestic violence or subject to a domestic violence restraining order (for a concise, comprehensive, and current list of the criteria prohibiting a person from possessing a firearm, see U.S. Department of Justice 2020, 18). The GCA leads to the creation of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF)—upgraded from its previous status as a division—within the Department of the Treasury (and moved to the Department of Justice in 2003). The ATF is the key federal agency assigned to effectuate gun control, but its advocates complain that it is hampered by lack of funding and by restrictions placed on it by the gun rights–leaning Congresses of 1986 and of the post-1994 era. 1972 The Consumer Product Safety Commission is created to “protect against unreasonable risks of injuries associated with consumer products.” However, firearms are excluded from the commission’s oversight. Congress further clarifies its intent with a follow-up piece of legislation, the Firearms Safety and Consumer Protection Act of 1976, which excludes ammunition from regulations by the Consumer Product Safety Commission. Gun control advocates rue these exclusions. Toward the end of the century, these advocates begin pointing to Massachusetts as an example of the potential of consumer product laws to promote the cause of gun control: In 1996, Massachusetts attorney general Scott Harshbarger uses the state’s Consumer Protection Act to create strict regulations over handguns— declaring them as inherently unsafe consumer

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products unless they meet a number of stringent criteria, such as having a “loaded chamber indicator” (letting a user know that a round is in the chamber, even if the ammunition magazine has been removed from the gun). In 1998, the state legislature codifies the Harshbarger requirements into state law. 1973 From October 1973 through April 1974, the Zebra Killings in the San Francisco area captivate the public’s attention and eventually strengthen the gun control movement both locally and nationally. The label given the killings is attributed to the fact that the killers are Black and the victims white. Fourteen people are murdered and seven wounded during the five-month killing spree. Eight members of a Black Muslim cult called the “Death Angels” are eventually arrested; their motive is to incite a race war. Four are released for a lack of evidence, but the other four are convicted in 1976 and sentenced to life in prison. The Zebra Killings, as well as the 1978 handgun murders of Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk, are instrumental in strengthening political and public support for stricter gun control measures within the San Francisco Bay Area. The City and County of San Francisco approve a handgun ban in 1982, though it is subsequently overturned in state court. The Zebra killing of college student Nick Shields leads his father, Pete Shields, to become a gun control activist. Shields leaves an executive position with DuPont to become executive director of a fledging advocacy group, Handgun Control Inc. He plays a critical role in developing it into the premier organizational advocate for strengthening gun controls in the United States (it is

retitled multiple times until settling on its current name of Brady: United against Gun Violence). 1974 The modern gun control movement begins in 1974 when Mark Borinsky founds the National Council to Control Handguns in Washington, DC. In the late 1970s, it is renamed Handgun Control Inc., and eventually calls itself Brady: United against Gun Violence. Borinsky had been robbed at gunpoint as a graduate student. The traumatic experience stays with him, and upon graduation, he decides to join a national group promoting gun control. Alas, none exists. He fills the void by starting his own. The new organization finds sympathy for its cause abounding within the federal government. Many members of Congress are eager to work with an organization devoted to gun control. Indeed, many of them were part of the 78th Congress that had passed the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 and the kindred Gun Control Act of 1968. Though the acts ban the sale and possession of guns to felons, drug addicts, illegal aliens, and the mentally incompetent, they include no serious enforcement mechanisms to block such sales, as opposed to simply prosecuting such persons who are caught possessing guns. Many members of Congress feel that rectifying this shortcoming is critical to realizing effective gun control. The Treasury Department’s Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) welcomes an organization that will help in its fight to regulate and monitor firearms. ATF’s efforts to fulfill the promise of the federal gun control legislation of 1968 are stymied every step of the way by gun rights legislators (prodded, in part, by the NRA), and it is

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looking for allies. Perhaps most notably, the ATF’s proposal to begin a computerized system to record the serial numbers of all new weapons and every firearms transaction of the nation’s 160,000 federally licensed firearms dealers provokes the U.S. House in 1978 to vote down the idea 314–80; and because the ATF says it can implement the $5 million registration system from its existing budget, ATF’s budget is cut by that amount. Other divisions of the Department of Justice also welcome an organization devoted to gun control. For example, the department’s recently formed Bureau of Justice Statistics has many staffers who are shocked by the gun violence statistics they are amassing and are subsequently eager to provide these statistics in editorialized format (“guns are bad, just look at these data!”) to an organization like Borinsky’s. In the 1990s, the organization finds an ally in the federal government’s Centers for Disease Control (CDC), whose staffers are emotionally affected by the gun violence data they are analyzing in much the same way as the emotions of their counterparts in the Bureau of Justice Statistics. In the early 1990s, through its National Center for Injury Prevention and Control division, the CDC produces several studies that frame gun violence as a serious public health problem and that include recommendations for the control of firearms that inflame many in the gun rights community, including the strong gun rights members of Congress. Congress responds by demanding that the CDC not publish papers that “may be used to advocate or promote gun control” (this demand is enforced by denying funding for gun violence research in each year’s federal budget and becomes known as the “Dickey Amendment,” as its original sponsor was Arkansas congressman Jay Dickey).

Between 1996 and 2018 (when the Amendment is finally removed from the annual budget), funding and motivation for gun violence research is severely constrained. The 1990s and early 2000s also sees Handgun Control Inc., now known as Brady: United against Gun Violence, greatly develop—through its tax-exempt educational arm, the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence—its Legal Action Project, which uses lawsuits to push firearms manufacturers and dealers to develop products and practices aimed at reducing gun violence. After a mostly unsuccessful string of suits involving private plaintiffs, starting in 1998, the Legal Action Project assists more than two dozen city governments, as well as the state of New York, to file suits to recover the costs of gun violence to the general public—including those associated with the police and courts, as well as with emergency medical care. The government claims that gun manufacturers fail to take advantage of safe gun technologies and that their distribution system encourages straw purchases and the flow of firearms into the black market. (A “straw purchaser” is an individual who can pass a federal background check, but who buys a gun for someone who cannot pass such a check; the black market consists largely of stolen guns and those acquired through straw purchases.) Although many in the gun control community see promise for the strategy (cases are not won in court but sometimes result in out-of-court settlements), it is rejected by most courts, hamstrung by laws enacted by thirty-two states to block such suits, and finally brought to a near halt with the 2005 passage of the federal Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act—which shields gun and ammunition dealers and manufacturers from civil liability suits based on the criminal misuse of their products. Subsequent court challenges to the act fail.

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1977 The “Revolt at Cincinnati” occurs at the annual meeting of the NRA. It is a watershed event that will change the organization from one largely dedicated to promoting the sporting uses of firearms to one best known for fighting any and all forms of gun control. Although some of the NRA’s membership and leadership in the 1960s and early 1970s are radically opposed to any form of gun regulation, they are in the minority. In 1972, however, this minority begins an allout—and eventually successful—effort to redefine the meaning and the primary mission of the NRA. Executive committee member Harlon B. Carter leads this redefinition effort. In a July 1972 address to the NRA executive committee, Carter argues that the NRA philosophy on gun control—that some was necessary and good for society—is wrongheaded and needs to be replaced by a new philosophy, one of absolute resistance to any and all forms of gun regulation: “Any position we took [on gun control] back at that time is no good, it is not valid, and it is simply not relevant to the problem that we face today. The latest news release from NRA embraces a disastrous concept . . . that evil is imputed to the sale and delivery, the possession of a certain kind of firearm, entirely apart from the good or evil intent of the man who uses it and/or . . . that the legitimate use of a handgun is limited to sporting use” (as quoted in Sugarmann 1992). Carter further argues that every gun has a legitimate purpose and that every lawabiding person should have the right to choose his or her own weapon according to what he or she thinks best. Largely through Carter’s efforts, the minority view begins appearing more and more in the NRA’s public statements. The

moderate editorials that had occasionally appeared in the NRA’s leading publication, the American Rifleman, vanish as its editor is replaced, partly through pressure applied by Carter, by a new editor who promotes the idea that there can be nothing good about any kind of gun control aimed at law-abiding citizens, and there are no bad guns, only bad gun owners. During the mid-1970s, only 25 percent of the organization—according to the NRA’s own estimate—consists of “nonshooting constitutionalists” (people who do not own firearms but who join the NRA to support its political agenda). But this does not prevent the complete takeover of NRA leadership positions by the hardest of the hard-liners against gun control at the NRA’s 1977 annual meeting. The coup is led by Neal Knox (at the time, editor of the gun magazines Rifle and Handloader), Robert Kukla (the new head of the NRA’s lobbying wing, the Institute for Legislative Action), and Joseph Tartaro (the editor of Gun Week). Knox, Kukla, and Tartaro lay the foundation for their revolt by using their access to gun publications to condemn the moderate direction the NRA is taking (on being a hunting and conservation organization). At the convention itself, they use their knowledge of parliamentary procedure to methodically replace top leaders with hard-core gun rights advocates such as themselves. The “New NRA,” as Carter called it, would become almost synonymous with the “gun lobby.” 1980 On the evening of December 8, a deluded twenty-five-year-old man uses a .38-caliber revolver to gun down John Lennon in New York City. Lennon’s murder stokes national interest in gun control, and the

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still-fledgling Handgun Control Inc. (later renamed Brady: United against Gun Violence) rockets from 5,000 to 80,000 contributing members in a matter of weeks. In Lewis v. United States, the Supreme Court upholds a provision of the Gun Control Act of 1968; in a footnote, it states that “restrictions on the use of firearms are neither based upon constitutionally suspect criteria, nor do they trench upon any constitutionally protected liberties,” and it cites the 1939 United States v. Miller case for support. In Lewis, the court addresses the case of an individual convicted of a burglary in Florida in 1961, whose conviction for the offense is never overturned, even though it is ruled unconstitutional under the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments (the individual had not been provided with counsel to assist in his defense). The court holds, however, that the constitutionality of the petitioner’s conviction has no bearing on his liability under the Gun Control Act of 1968. The court maintains that any felony conviction, even an invalid one, is sufficient to prohibit possession of a firearm. 1981 A twenty-four-year-old man uses a cheap handgun in March to wound President Ronald Reagan and his press secretary, James Brady, as well as Secret Service Agent Timothy McCarthy and local police officer Thomas Delahanty. The assassination attempt results in a boon for Handgun Control Inc. and the gun control movement. The event generates huge media focus on handguns—where the emphases are on their easy acquisition and their strong connections to crimes of violence (especially homicide). The event motivates Sarah Brady, James Brady’s wife, to dedicate herself to the gun control movement; she joins

HCI, takes on a variety of leadership roles, and eventually becomes its chairwoman from 2000 until her death in 2015. The assassination attempt also moves Congress to renew its discussions on gun control and encourages its support of legislation that eventually becomes the 1988 Undetectable Firearms Act (banning the manufacture, importation, possession, receipt, and transfer of “plastic guns”—those with less than 3.7 ounces of metal, which could potentially defeat metal detectors; a symbolic victory for the gun control movement, as commercially manufactured guns have always met this standard) and the 1993 Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (requiring a five-day waiting period and a criminal background check before an individual can purchase a handgun). Relatedly, the assassination attempt is in the mind of Congress when, at the urging of Handgun Control Inc., it retains the 1968 Gun Control Act’s ban on the interstate sale of pistols when enacting the 1986 Firearms Owners’ Protection Act. The act also bars the future possession and sale of machine guns but is otherwise seen as gun rights legislation because of its relaxing of several provisions of the 1968 Gun Control Act and of its improving due process protections for gun owners and licensed firearms dealers. 1982 In Quilici v. Village of Morton Grove, the Seventh Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals upholds a ban on the possession of handguns by ordinary persons in Morton Grove, Illinois. The court declares that the Second Amendment preserves the collective right of a state’s citizens to form a militia, and not the absolute right of an individual to keep and bear firearms. The 1981 Morton Grove law exempts those needing a handgun for occupational

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purposes—such as police officers, prison officials, members of the armed forces, and security guards. It also exempts licensed gun collectors. A resident owning a handgun before the ban is enacted can keep it, as long as the gun is stored at a local gun club (although nonworking, antique firearms may be kept at home). Soon after enactment, gun rights advocates file a lawsuit claiming that the Morton Grove law is in violation of both the U.S. and Illinois State Constitutions. A lower federal court rules in favor of Morton Grove, as does the appeals court. The appeals court declares that “construing the [Second Amendment] according to its plain meaning, it seems clear that the right to bear arms is inextricably connected to the preservation of a militia.” The plaintiffs ask the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the case, but the court declines. The ruling in Quilici is consistent with other federal court decisions finding a militia-based meaning of the Second Amendment—though in 2001, a federal appeal court rules in United States V. Emerson that the amendment guarantees an individual right to possess and bear firearms (see below). Quilici v. Village of Morton Grove receives enormous publicity and fuels the increasingly hot fires of the national debate over gun control. The village’s law banning handguns, as well as the lower and appeals court decisions in favor of it, are huge symbolic victories for those favoring stricter gun control. Ironically, the Morton Grove case turns out well for the NRA in other states. The Morton Grove ban (plus a similar 1983 ban in Chicago) and other bans in Chicago suburbs enacted in the next several years, are the perfect examples for the NRA to use to convince many state legislatures to enact “preemption

laws”—a statute forbidding local governments to enact gun control laws. In addition, gun rights advocates work with public officials in the small town of Kennesaw, Georgia, to pass a local ordinance requiring that all heads of households own a firearm and ammunition. The law is entirely symbolic, as there is no provision for enforcement; moreover, the law itself includes several clauses “excusing” those not wanting to own a gun for moral or religious reasons, or because they are a convicted felon or mentally or physically disabled. 1984 On July 18, 1984, a forty-one-year-old man leaves his home, announcing to his wife that he is “going to hunt humans.” He enters a McDonald’s restaurant in San Ysidro, California, and uses three high-powered weapons to methodically slaughter twenty patrons and employees, wounding another nineteen. The carnage stops when he is mortally wounded by a police sniper. Because one of his weapons is an Uzi semiautomatic rifle, gun control advocates press state legislators for restrictions on assault weapons, but it will take another California shooting, four and a half years later in Stockton, before action is finally taken. Soon after an unemployed drifter uses a semiautomatic assault rifle to kill five children in a Stockton schoolyard, the state legislature passes the Roberti-Roos Assault Weapons Control Act of 1989. The Armed Career Criminal Act of 1984 increases the penalties for firearm possession by convicted felons as specified in the Gun Control Act of 1968. The 1984 act is amended in 1986 and 1988, and its guidelines receive several updates over the years. These amendments and updates represent an effort to meet the true spirit of the

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legislation, which is aimed at incapacitating hardened criminals—those with three or more previous violent felony or serious drug offense convictions—by putting them in prison for a minimum of fifteen years if they are found in possession of a firearm (Levine 2009). 1986 The Firearms Owners’ Protection Act (FOPA)—also known as the McClureVolkmer Act—is passed against the protests of gun control advocates. FOPA curtails many of the more stringent provisions of the Gun Control Act of 1968. Most notably, it (1) allows federally licensed firearms dealers to sell guns not only at their principal place of business, but also at gun shows as long as the sales comply with all relevant laws; (2) limits the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms’ (ATF) compliance inspections of a gun dealer to once per year, while allowing unlimited inspection as part of a “bona fide” criminal investigation; (3) prohibits the ATF from creating a national gun registry; (4) removes federal restrictions on interstate ammunition sales; and (5) relegalizes interstate long gun sales (if the seller is a federally licensed firearms dealer, and the sale is legal in both states). The Law Enforcement Officers Protection Act bans so-called cop killer handgun bullets—or more accurately, bullets with very dense cores made from certain metals that can pierce some bullet-resistant vests and other body armor. Amended in 1994, the statute defines “armor piercing ammunition” as a handgun bullet “constructed entirely” from “tungsten alloys, steel, iron, brass, bronze, beryllium copper, or depleted uranium,” or with a jacket having a weight greater than one-quarter of the projectile’s total weight (18 U.S.C. § 922(a)(7) and 18 U.S.C. § 921(a)(17)(B)). Because rifles are

more effective in defeating police body armor than any handgun, cop-killer bullets represent a symbolic, rather than substantive, issue in the debate over gun control (Vizzard 2000)—an issue won by gun control advocates, an issue they use to rail at the NRA in public discourse. (“How could any organization not support legislation aimed at removing ‘cop-killer bullets’ from the market?”) 1989 On January 17, a twenty-four-year-old drifter with a lengthy criminal record enters a Stockton, California, schoolyard and fires 105 rounds from a semiautomatic assault rifle, killing five children and wounding twenty-nine others. The attack mobilizes public and political support for gun control throughout the nation. California responds quickly and enacts the Roberti-Roos Assault Weapons Control Act of 1989. Over the next few years, six other states follow with legislation restricting the sale of assault weapons (Connecticut, Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and New York). At the federal level, President George H. W. Bush, even though a member of the NRA and a gun rights proponent during his election campaign, responds in March by placing a temporary ban on the importation of assault rifles and selected similar weapons. Several bills are introduced in Congress to outlaw or restrict assault pistols, rifles, and shotguns. President Bill Clinton eventually pushes one of these through Congress as part of the Violent Crime Control and Enforcement Act of 1994. 1990 Enacted as Public Law 101-647, the Crime Control Act of 1990 bans the importing of certain semiautomatic firearms designated as “assault weapons,” as well as

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manufacturing them domestically with some foreign parts. The act also creates gun-free school zones, making it a federal crime to carry a firearm with 1,000 feet of a school; however, this provision is overturned in a circuit court ruling in 1993, which is subsequently upheld by the Supreme Court in United States v. Lopez (1995). Congress, however, soon reenacts the ban with small changes. 1991 The Killeen, Texas, shooting unfolds on the afternoon of October 16, 1991, when a thirty-five-year-old man plows his truck into Luby’s Cafeteria. Screaming “all women . . . are vipers!” he repeatedly fires and then reloads two handguns; he slaughters twenty-three people and wounds twenty-one others. Two of his victims are the parents of Suzanna Gratia. Gratia normally travels with a handgun for self-protection but keeps it in her car to follow Texas law, which in 1991 does not allow ordinary citizens to carry concealed weapons. She testifies ruefully at a public hearing that she might have been able to save her parents if she had had her gun in her purse: “I had a perfect shot at him. It would have been clear. I had a place to prop my hand. The guy was not even aware of what we were doing. I’m not saying that I could have saved anybody in there, but I would have had a chance” (as quoted in Kopel 2002, 335). Gratia’s testimony becomes instrumental in changing the political climate in Texas and many other states regarding right-tocarry laws. And in the mid-1990s, eleven states, including Texas, adopt a right-tocarry law. (Note that as of 2022, seventeen states are classified as “shall-issue”—allowing an ordinary citizen to obtain a concealed-carry permit with a background

check [usually based on fingerprints] and, in most cases, after having passed a safety course, but with little or no discretion on the part of law enforcement to otherwise deny a permit; another twenty-five states allow for law-abiding citizens to carry concealed weapons without any permit [known as “Constitutional Carry” or “permitless carry” states: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, West Virginia, and Wyoming]; while in the remaining eight states [California, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and New York], local and state authorities have considerable discretionary power—with permits sometimes being denied; see Giffords Law Center 2022a.) Along with the wave of state laws allowing concealed carry, the 1990s see “preemption laws” passed or judicially clarified in dozens of states. Such laws preempt local ordinances that would be more restrictive than state gun laws. By 2011, all states but Hawaii have at least limited preemption, while the majority have complete preemption of all local firearm laws. Massachusetts, a limited preemption state, allows more restrictive local ordinances if approved by the state legislature. In 2002, the California Supreme Court rules that the state’s limited preemption law, which prohibits local licensing or registration of gun sales, does not preempt a county’s ban on gun shows on county-owned property. In Ohio, in Cleveland v. State (2010), the Ohio Supreme Court upholds the state’s preemption law on a 5-2 vote and thus ends a Cleveland ban on assault weapons, as well as the gun laws of many other Ohio municipalities.

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1993 On July 1, 1993, a disgruntled former client enters the law office of Pettit and Martin at 101 California Street in San Francisco. Armed with three handguns, two of them TEC-DC9 assault pistols, he kills eight people and wounds another six in the law office and in neighboring offices. The police quickly arrive and corner him in a stairwell, where he commits suicide. Although California had banned the sale of assault weapons after the Stockton schoolyard shooting of 1989, the perpetrator easily obtains his at a gun show and pawnshop in Nevada. The 101 California Street shooting sparks outcries for stronger gun controls and contributes to the passage of the 1994 federal Assault Weapons Ban. The shooting also spawns the historic lawsuit Merrill v. Navegar, resulting in the first appeals court decision to rule that under certain circumstances, a gun manufacturer can be held negligent when its weapons are used in the commission of crime. Navegar, under the business name Intratec Firearms Inc., is manufacturing high-capacity assault pistols under the names KG-9 and TEC-9 during the 1980s. The weapons are popular with criminals and street gang members. When the District of Columbia and other jurisdictions enact laws restricting the TEC-9 (and other assault weapons by model name), Navegar responds by making a minor alteration to the pistol and renaming it the “TEC-DC9” to evade the laws (according to some former employees, the “DC” is inserted to mock the Washington “DC” Assault Weapons Control Act of 1990; DeBell 2002). The features appealing most to criminals remain unchanged—a high-capacity magazine and a threaded barrel to screw on a silencer. The company touts the TEC-DC9’s “firepower” and “excellent resistance to fingerprints” (Henigan 2002).

The Merrill v. Navegar lawsuit is filed in May 1994. California (101) Street victims and their families argue that Navegar’s negligent actions contributed to the shooting. The company’s advertising is said to appeals to criminals. Indeed, Navegar executives testify that they are aware of their product’s stature as the preeminent assault weapon used in crimes, and that they welcome the publicity stemming from its use in notorious acts of violence because of the resulting spike in sales. A California Superior Court judge dismisses the suit before trial, ruling that Navegar’s guns are legally manufactured and sold, and that the company cannot be held liable for what others do with their guns. In a landmark ruling in September 1999, the California Court of Appeals disagrees. The court holds that Navegar owes the plaintiffs and the general public a duty to exercise reasonable care and not to create risks above and beyond those inherent in the presence of firearms in society. On August 6, 2001, the California Supreme Court votes 5-1 to reverse the court of appeals ruling on other grounds, finding that a California statute, passed in 1983, bars imposing any liability on Navegar. On November 30, 1993, President Clinton signs the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, requiring a five-governmentbusiness-day waiting period for the purchase of a handgun. The waiting period allows time for at least a minimal background check of the prospective buyer; it also allows for a “cooling-off” period to minimize impulse purchases that might lead to suicide or criminal violence. Five years after enactment, the five-day waiting period sunsets by its own terms and is replaced by the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), which allows background checking

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for both handgun and long gun sales (rifles and shotguns). The check must be completed within three days; firearms dealers sometimes get a response in a matter of seconds, while in some states the check can take several hours, due to backlogs. When the dealer is told to “delay” the transaction (because of inadequate information to determine whether there is a true match with the “prohibited persons” list on file, e.g., a criminal conviction is not noted whether it is a felony or misdemeanor), a decision can often be completed within several hours. However, over 90 percent of the calls involve buyers not on any computer list that would delay or deny their purchases, and in these cases the background check is completed in less than a minute (U.S. Department of Justice 2020, 6). Several county sheriffs, with the assistance of the National Rifle Association, challenge the Brady Act as a violation of states’ rights under the Tenth Amendment. In 1997, the U.S. Supreme Court strikes down the provision requiring local police to conduct background checks in Printz v. United States. Despite the ruling, handgun background checks continue on a voluntary basis in most areas until the NICS is operational in late 1998 (Kopel 1999a). Gun control advocates bemoan that background checks only apply to licensed retail dealers. Private, informal sales by unlicensed individuals—including at flea markets and many gun show venues—are legal in most states. On December 7, 1993, a man shoots twenty-five people, killing six of them, on a Long Island commuter train in Garden City, New York. Carolyn McCarthy’s husband is killed and her son seriously injured in the attack. She successfully runs for Congress in 1996 after her representative, Dan Frisa,

votes to repeal the federal Assault Weapons Ban. McCarthy’s campaign focuses heavily on one issue: gun control. 1994 The Gun Free Schools Act of 1994 requires that any state receiving federal education funds “shall have in effect a State law requiring local educational agencies to expel from school for a period of not less than one year a student who is determined to have brought a weapon to a school.” Enacted under Title XI as part of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, the federal “Assault Weapons Ban” prohibits for ten years the future manufacture and transfer of nineteen named assault weapons and approximately 200 firearms covered by the law’s generic definition of an “assault weapon.” It also bans large-capacity ammunition-feeding devices (“magazines”)—those that can hold more than ten rounds. The ban does not apply to assault weapons or magazines already in circulation. Although gun rights advocates complain that it is impossible to give a generic, operational definition of an “assault weapon,” Congress agrees with gun control groups that there are certain characteristics differentiating military-style from sporting arms. Among these characteristics are a pistol grip or thumbhole stock, a folding or telescoping grip, a threaded barrel for adding a silencer or flash suppressor, and the ability to receive a detachable ammunition magazine. Gun rights members of Congress organize to repeal the Assault Weapons Ban but lose support in the wake of an April 19, 1995, terrorist attack on the Alfred P. Murrah federal building in Oklahoma City. Anti-terrorism legislation in 1996 originally contains gun control language, which is removed before final passage of the

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Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act. Both the gun control and the gun rights camps are in strong agreement that the swift and effective enforcement of existing firearms laws is critical to solving the problem of gun violence. Two promising strategies are developed during the 1990s: gun courts and gun-focused, place-oriented community policing. The first modern gun court is created in Providence, Rhode Island, in September 1994 (note that Chicago had created one in the 1930s to handle an onslaught of gun crime in that era). Before its existence, the average time for the disposition of a gun case—via a plea bargain or the start of a trial—is 518 days, with a conviction rate of 67 percent. After the court is created, the maximum time for the disposition of a gun case falls to 126 days, while the conviction rate rises to 87 percent (U.S. Department of Justice 2000, Profile No. 37). These impressive results encourage the creation of gun courts in other cities, with high-profile courts appearing in Birmingham, Boston, Detroit, Indianapolis, New York City, Philadelphia, Seattle, Washington, DC, and Wilmington. However, subsequent empirical analyses of the effectiveness of gun courts to reduce violent crime are not encouraging: A time-series quantitative analysis of violent crime rates before and after the creation of the Philadelphia gun court and a focused case study on Birmingham’s Jefferson County Youth Gun Court. In the quantitative study, Nobles (2008, 9–10) finds that there are “no statistically significant declines in the aggregate rates of four gun-related crime categories in Philadelphia in the 24 months after the introduction of the court program.” In the case study, University of Alabama researchers compare a group of Birmingham youth who are

processed through the Youth Gun Court with two other groups over a four-year period (1995–1999): a group of Birmingham youths who serve time at the state detention center and are not processed through the gun court and its programs, but who receive limited postrelease supervision; and a group of youths who are processed through the juvenile court system of the nearby community of Bessemer, which does not include postrelease supervision. On the positive side, the group that had gone through gun court has the lowest recidivism rate (17%), compared with 37 percent for the other Birmingham youths and 40 percent for the Bessemer youths. On the other hand, even though violent crime in Birmingham drops dramatically during the four-year period (by 57%), it has a comparable drop in Bessemer (54%). Despite this outcome, the U.S. Department of Justice (2010) still advises local communities to include gun courts as a part of more comprehensive crimefighting plans, as the courts are clearly effective regarding speed of disposition, conviction rates, and severity of sentences. The U.S. Department of Justice, working in conjunction with state and local authorities, and coordinating key law enforcement groups (the ATF, FBI, and Drug Enforcement Administration [DEA]), develops Project Triggerlock in 1991. Over the years, Triggerlock is expanded and reformulated—to accommodate the unique circumstances of various metropolitan areas—under dozens of guises in hundreds of local and regional jurisdictions (program titles include Project Exile, Operation Ceasefire, Project Felon, Project Safe Neighborhoods, Triggerlock II, and many others). Funding for most of these comes through Project Safe Neighborhoods, the centerpiece of the federal government’s

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efforts to control gun violence during President George W. Bush’s two terms in office. Other funding is channeled through the Community Oriented Policing Services (created as part of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994), and the Safe Streets Violent Crime Initiative. These programs use federal firearm statutes—for example, those barring the possession of firearms by high-risk individuals, including convicted felons, drug dealers, and domestic abusers—to prosecute gun-carrying offenders in federal (U.S. District) courts, where conviction rates are typically much higher and penalties much stiffer than in state and local courts. For example, during the mid-1990s, approximately 86 percent of those arrested on a federal weapons charge are convicted, and 92 percent of them serve prison time, averaging 107 months. In contrast, only about 16 percent of those arrested on a state or local weapons charge are convicted, while 67 percent of them end up in prison, averaging only 45 months (Southwick 2002, Table 1; cf. Scalia 2000 and Bureau of Justice Statistics 2004). The programs often contain media campaigns to increase public awareness of gun crime and its ramifications, including the death and maiming of innocent victims, the financial losses suffered by the community, and the stern penalties gun-carrying criminals will face when turned over to the federal judicial system. Sometimes the programs incorporate a “carrot” approach— for example, increasing funding for school and community development agencies, especially those that seek to take teens and young adults off the streets through recreational, educational, and job-placement programs. Triggerlock-type programs suffer two setbacks during their first decade. First, in

December 1995, the U.S. Supreme Court rules in Bailey v. United States (516 U.S. 137, 116 S. Ct. 501) that persons in possession of a gun when arrested for a violent or drug-trafficking crime must have actually used it (e.g., firing or brandishing) if they are to be charged with the separate offense of having used a gun in the crime. This immediately reduces the number of weapons charges filed in federal district courts (Scalia 2000). Before Bailey, for example, if a college student selling drugs has an unloaded rifle in an upstairs closet, while selling marijuana in his downstairs living room, federal prosecutors charge the individual not only with drug dealing, but also with using a weapon in the commission of a crime; the additional weapons charge adds significant prison time if the individual is convicted on the drug charge. However, if the drug dealer is already a convicted felon, then an illegal firearm possession charge can of course still be made. A second setback comes at the end of 2004, when Congress cut $45 million that is directly earmarked to fund gun prosecutions from the proposed budget for Project Safe Neighborhoods. Another $106 million is cut from the budget that would have funded an ATF program meant to track and intercept illegal purchases of guns by youths. However, both setbacks are temporary. In the case of Bailey v. United States, federal prosecutors begin channeling many of the weapons-possession cases for first-time drug and violent-crime offenders to state court systems (where many are prosecuted for violations of particular state-level firearms laws). More importantly, there are an increasing number of gun-focused, placeoriented, community-policing efforts. Thus, even though the two years immediately following the Bailey decision (1996–1997) see

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consecutive decreases in the number of federal firearms cases brought to U.S. district courts (bottoming out at 3,162), by 1998, the number climbs back to pre-Bailey levels and rises every year until 2005, peaking at 9,617. As national crime rates fall, so do firearms arrests, but the 2010 figure of 8,327 is still well above 1980s and 1990s numbers—when gun crimes are at their peak levels (Maguire and Pastore 2004, Table 5.10: 405, as well as the Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics Online 2011a–e). The larger figures after 1998 also reflect the impact of 1998 federal legislation commonly referred to as the “Bailey Fix,” which dictates that the mere possession of a firearm during a crime of violence or drug-trafficking crime allows for an additional charge and for enhanced sentencing (18 U.S.C. § 924[c]). 1996 The Lautenberg Amendment to the Gun Control Act of 1968, also called the Domestic Violence Offender Gun Ban, expands prohibition of gun purchase, ownership, or possession to include persons convicted of domestic violence misdemeanor offenses (18 U.S.C. § 922[g][9]). The amendment strengthens the existing regulation that prevents gun possession by a person under a court order that restrains him or her “from harassing, stalking, or threatening an intimate partner or child of such intimate partner” (18 U.S.C. § 922[g][8]; per the “Wellstone Amendment” in the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994). 1997 On June 4, 1997, Massachusetts attorney general Scott Harshbarger sets forth the state’s new Consumer Protection Regulations on Handgun Safety. Harshbarger bases the sweeping new gun controls on a state

statute against “unfair or deceptive trade practice.” He claims it is unfair or deceptive to sell handguns that (1) do not have tamper-resistant serial numbers; (2) do not meet high standards for accidentally discharging when dropped on a hard surface; (3) do not have trigger locks; (4) do not have strong trigger pulls (that can prevent the average five-year-old child from firing it); and (5) have a barrel less than three inches long. In protest, gun industry representatives file a lawsuit claiming that Harshbarger has overstepped his authority. Harshbarger loses, but the Massachusetts Supreme Court overturns the decision in June 1999. To prevent further suits, the Massachusetts legislature enacts a law giving the attorney general the necessary authority to create the new handgun regulations. The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence and other gun control organizations extol Harshbarger’s efforts as a model for emulation by other states. 1998 A wave of school shootings stuns the nation and spark dozens of state and federal legislative proposals to tighten up gun laws, almost none of which are enacted. The most shocking shootings occur in 1999, in Littleton, Colorado, and in 2005, in Red Lake, Minnesota. In Littleton, two Columbine High School students kill twelve fellow students, one teacher, and then themselves; while in Red Lake, a sixteen-year-old shoots to death his grandfather and his companion in their home, followed by seven others on his high school campus—the murdering halts when he shoots himself to death. In this same late 1990s–early 2000s era, many other shooting sprees by teenage boys gain national attention, including those in Santee, California; Springfield, Oregon; Pearl, Mississippi; West Paducah, Kentucky;

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Jonesboro, Arkansas; Edinboro, Pennsylvania; Richmond, Virginia; and Conyers, Georgia. Typical of the reaction following each of these shootings is the introduction of a bill in the U.S. Congress following the Columbine tragedy that would have required background checks on all gun purchasers, not just those buying their weapons from federally licensed dealers. Much of the general public and many members of Congress are motivated to support this particular legislation when it is learned that three of the weapons used at Columbine were acquired through straw purchases from private vendors at a gun show (a friend of one of the killers made the “straw purchases”— that is, she bought the guns not for herself, but to give them to the boys). Legislation is proposed in both houses of Congress aimed at closing the “gun show loophole,” but none survives. 2000 President Clinton announces the Smith & Wesson Settlement Agreement on March 17, 2000. The agreement involves the gun manufacturer and industry giant Smith & Wesson, the federal government, the states of New York and Connecticut, and several cities and counties. In return for the dismissal of lawsuits that the governmental bodies had filed (seeking compensation for the gun-related violence they had incurred), Smith & Wesson agrees to implement major changes in the design and distribution of its guns. More specifically, the company promises to begin incorporating the following safety features: internal locking systems; “authorized user technology” (making the gun functional only for an authorized user, normally the owner); “chamber loaded” indicators; child safeties; and hidden serial numbers to prevent obliteration. Moreover, Smith & Wesson agrees to distribute their

guns only to dealers willing to make no sales at gun shows unless there are background checks on all purchasers at the show; make sales only to individuals passing a certified firearms safety course or exam; pass a comprehensive exam on recognizing suspect buyers (e.g., “straw purchasers”); and implement security procedures to prevent gun thefts. Finally, Smith & Wesson agrees that all of its future practices will be overseen by a monitoring board. The landmark agreement represents the first time that any gun manufacturer has been willing to alter its sales and distribution practices to prevent criminals, juveniles, and other high-risk individuals from obtaining guns. However, fierce opposition to the agreement quickly arises from other gun manufacturers, gun retailers, gun rights organizations, and many gun owners. The opposition is successful. Indeed, the agreement never goes into effect. Smith & Wesson’s sales plummet. Its United Kingdom corporate owners (who had ordered Smith & Wesson to make the deal) sell the company to Saf-T-Hammer, which renames the manufacturer the Smith & Wesson Holding Corporation. Even though Saf-T-Hammer produces safety devices that prevent unauthorized gun use and unintentional firearm accidents, it wants to reverse Smith & Wesson’s plummeting sales and introduces a .50-caliber revolver in 2003. Its introduction receives huge criticism from gun control advocates. However, gun rights organizations applaud Smith & Wesson’s return to the fold. For example, in the NRA publication the American Rifleman, there is the acclamation that “Smith & Wesson has re-established itself as an American handgun icon—a status it lost in the backlash of its now infamous agreement with the Clinton administration” (Mayer 2003, 55).

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Many seasoned political observers credit the power of the NRA and the gun rights movement for George W. Bush’s victory over Al Gore in the 2000 presidential election (e.g., Feldman 2008, 274–75; Carville and Begala 2006, 49–50; Wilson 2007, 162– 63). More particularly, Gore loses in his home state of Tennessee, Bill Clinton’s home state of Arkansas, and the normally strongly Democratic state of West Virginia. A win in any of one of these would have given the presidency to Gore. The NRA had strongly targeted these states, railing against Gore for his generally strong support of gun control legislation, both existing (e.g., the Brady Act; the Assault Weapons Ban) and proposed (e.g., handgun licensing, closing the “gun show loophole,” and opposing protections for gun dealers and manufacturers against civil liability suits). Although this interpretation for Gore’s loss is disputed by some (e.g., Henigan 2009, 2; Spitzer 2004, 98), because NRA-backed candidates lose other and just-as-crucial races (to wit, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin), it is given more credibility when Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry loses the hotly contested state of Ohio in the 2004 election. Had he triumphed, he would have won the Electoral College. Gun rights observers contend that Kerry’s association with the gun control movement cost him several hundred thousand Ohio votes—and he loses by 120,000 (Feldman 2008, 277– 78). In the 2004 congressional races, NRA-backed candidates win fourteen of eighteen Senate seats and 241 of 251 House races (Gottlieb and Tartaro 2004). However, gun control groups like the Brady Campaign are quick to withhold any credit to the NRA and explain the victories as the result of most of the seats belonging to incumbents—who have a strong edge in most elections.

The various interpretations of the 2000 and 2004 elections reveal how difficult it is for the average citizen, even if well educated, to uncover the truth. Nevertheless, it seems clear that elections increasingly favor the gun rights camp. The 2006 and 2008 elections demonstrate, however, that the curve of change is jagged, as NRAbacked candidates do not fare well in either the 2006 midterm congressional races (Violence Policy Center 2006) or in the 2008 presidential and congressional elections (Editorial Board 2008). But the trend favoring gun rights candidates rebounds in 2010 with a vengeance—as nineteen of twenty-five NRA-endorsed Senate candidates and 227 of 272 NRA-endorsed House candidates are victorious in the midterm elections (Horwitz and Grimaldi 2010). Indeed, some observers, including former NRA insider Richard Feldman, contend that the 2006 midterm elections, the worst faring of the NRA in nearly fifteen years, is a blessing in disguise: It allows the organization to whip up fear in its members resulting in increased donations and increased campaign efforts on behalf of the organization’s favorite candidates (“the National Rifle Association ha[s] enemies again . . . [it] ‘could not have bought itself better results’ ” [Feldman 2008, 282, in part, quoting one of his friends—a highprofile executive in the firearms industry]; compare the similar assessment of Cummins 2007). By the early 2000s, many, if not most, politicians favoring gun control (mainly Democrats) begin to mute their cries for more regulation—in part, because they fear public challenges from the NRA (if not its outright wherewithal to make them lose in the next election), and, in part, because they see efforts in this area as wasted. For example, gun control advocate and representative

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Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) complains that the lack of any real national movement for stronger regulations on the sale and possession of firearms is because the “NRA has pretty much set the agenda for the Congress” regarding guns (as quoted in Cummings 2007). Similarly, gun control advocate and representative Alcee L. Hastings (D-FL) observes that that most congressional representatives are in one way or another “captives . . . of the NRA” (as quoted in Cummings 2007). Brady Campaign president Paul Helmke complains that attempts to increase gun regulations represent an uphill fight and that “if anything, we’ve gone backwards” (as quoted in Cummings 2007). Helmke’s colleague—and founder of the Brady Center’s Legal Action Project—Dennis Henigan concurs that the gun lobby is winning, in part, because of the “fear of the gun issue . . . within the Democratic Party . . . [indeed] the perception continues to persist that crossing the NRA is risky business” (Henigan 2009, 4). At the end of 2010, the Washington Post publishes a lengthy, analytical article on how and why “The NRA-led gun lobby wields powerful influence over [the] ATF [and] U.S. politics” (Horwitz and Grimaldi 2010). 2001 In United States v. Emerson, the New Orleans–based Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals becomes the first federal appeals court to decide a case based on the determination that the Second Amendment guarantees ordinary individuals—as opposed to members of groups such as the National Guard—the right to own guns. The court concludes “that the history of the second amendment reinforces the plain meaning of its text, namely that it protects individual Americans in their right to keep and bear

arms whether or not they are a member of a select militia.” The Emerson ruling is a striking departure from many previous federal court decisions, which emphasize that the Second Amendment is meant to grant a collective right to the citizens of a state to maintain a militia. Gun control advocates criticize the court’s interpretation but take heart that the court also makes clear that the federal government has the right to regulate arms. More specifically, the court notes that the individual-rights interpretation of the Second Amendment “does not mean that those rights may never be made subject to any . . . restrictions.” In this particular instance, the court upholds the indictment of Dr. Timothy Joe Emerson, who has challenged his criminal prosecution for possessing a gun after being served with a domestic-violence-related restraining order (Dr. Emerson was challenging 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(8)I(ii), as it amended the 1968 Gun Control Act). On September 11, 2001, the United States suffers the deadliest terrorist attack in its history, with nearly 3,000 people dying on a single day. Over the next decade, attempts are made to strengthen gun control via legislation aimed at antiterrorism, but all fail. Most contentious is that being on the FBI’s Terrorist Screening Center’s watch list does not prevent an individual (if otherwise qualified, e.g., not being a convicted felon) from legally buying a firearm (General Accounting Office 2010; also see Lillis 2009; Riggs 2011; Syracuse.com 2011). If anything, the 9/11 attack enhances public attitudes toward self-defense and gun rights legislation— including of the Arming Pilots against Terrorism Act of 2002, allowing airline pilots to carry firearms on passenger flights (if they so desire, and after having gone through a TSA training program; Elias 2003). Also signed into law is the 2004 Law

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Enforcement Officers Safety Act (LEOSA), allowing current and retired, qualified law enforcement offices to carry concealed firearms throughout the country without a concealed carry permit, with a few restrictions (e.g., they may not carry into state government buildings in contravention of state law; they cannot carry their firearms into federal courtrooms, buildings, and lands where firearms are banned). The LEOSA is amended in 2010, refining the definition of “qualified,” and is extended to include Amtrak police and selected other federal agents. The operational definition of “qualified” is straightforward and fits commonsense notions regarding its meaning, e.g., the officer, whether currently employed or retired, is in good standing with his or her agency; the officer has (or had) authorization from his agency to carry a firearm; the officer’s firearms training is current. Between the original 2004 and the amended 2010 versions of the law, LEOSA is tested in court. Manuel Rodriguez is a Pennsylvania state constable. The state gives its constables the authority to cross state lines to serve warrants. While doing so in New York City, he is arrested for criminal weapons possession. In People v. Rodriguez (2006), he uses as his main defense LEOSA; the judge agrees and dismisses the case. In 2007, gun rights advocates in Florida push for legislation barring physicians from asking routine questions about firearms ownership and storage, as well as recording any such information they might receive in interviews with patients. The advocacy effort comes to fruition on June 2, 2011, when Florida governor Rick Scott signs HB-155 into law. HB-155 “Provides that [a] licensed practitioner or facility may not record firearm ownership information in [a] patient’s medical record . . . unless [the] information is relevant to [the] patient’s

medical care or safety or safety of others,” [furthermore] “inquiries regarding firearm ownership or possession should not be made”; [and it . . .] “prohibits harassment of [a] patient regarding firearm ownership during examination; prohibits denial of insurance coverage, increased premiums, or other discrimination by insurance companies issuing policies on [the] basis of [an] insured’s or applicant’s ownership, possession, or storage of firearms or ammunition” (Florida House of Representatives 2011). Within days, three Florida physicians and the Florida chapters of the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Academy of Family Physicians, and the American College of Physicians file suit in federal district court requesting that it declare the law unconstitutional and enjoin its enforcement (Wollschlaeger et al. v. Scott et al. [2011]); although six years pass before a final appeals court ruling is rendered, the suit is eventually successful (Hersher 2017). More broadly, the legislation represents the long-held distrust of scholars and activists associated with the gun rights camp of public health research showing harmful outcomes of gun ownership, gun carrying, and having guns in the home (e.g., see the conclusion of Kates, Lattimer, and Boen [1997, 123] that “medical and public health discussion of firearms issues have consistently exemplified . . . inventing, selecting, or misinterpreting data to validate preordained conclusions”; compare Faria’s [2001] similar assessment). The controversial 2010 Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission 5-4 ruling by the U.S. Supreme removes key restrictions on campaign contributions by private corporations, including nonprofit organizations. It allows strong gun rights groups like the NRA to contribute tens of millions of dollars more to the campaigns of strong gun rights Republican candidates than

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heretofore. But gun control organizations also take advantage of the loosened restrictions; for example, strong gun control advocate Michael Bloomberg gives less than $1 million to federal candidates and groups in the two decades before Citizens; but gives $163 million between 2010 and 2020; his efforts helping gun control groups to outspend gun rights groups since 2018 (OpenSecrets.org 2020a, 2020b, 2020c). 2002 Two men use a Bushmaster assault rifle in October to murder 10 people and injure 3 others in the Washington, DC, area. The shooting spree prompts gun control advocates to call for the creation of a national ballistic fingerprinting database, in which all firearms would have digital images of their shell casing and (in the case of rifles and handguns) bullet markings on file. They contend that such a database would have led law enforcement authorities to identify the snipers much sooner. These advocates also contend that the shooting spree is strong evidence for strengthening and extending the federal ban on assault weapons. Over the next two decades, both the database and the ban receive periodic discussion in the media and in Congress, though no national legislation is ever passed. The U.S. Customs Service and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) announce that they will begin enforcement of the Nonimmigrant Aliens Firearms and Ammunition Amendments to the Gun Control Act of 1968 (as enacted by Congress in 1998 as Public Law 105-277). These amendments require nonimmigrant aliens wanting to bring firearms or ammunition into the United States for hunting or sporting purposes to obtain an import permit from ATF prior to entering the country.

2004 Tucked away in an omnibus spending package approved by both houses of Congress in January are provisions reducing the length of time the Department of Justice can maintain background check records on firearm sales: from ninety days to twenty-four hours. Records are kept on file to ensure that if an individual prohibited from buying guns (e.g., a convicted felon) is inadvertently allowed to make such a purchase, the mistake can be corrected. Gun control advocates complain that requiring these records to be destroyed within twenty-four hours makes it nearly impossible for the Justice Department to correct errors, and the result will be the arming of more criminals. This contention has empirical support: In a 2002 study, the federal government’s General Accounting Office asserts that if background records are destroyed within 24 hours “the FBI would lose certain abilities to initiate firearm-retrieval actions when new information reveals that individuals who were approved to purchase firearms should not have been. Specifically, during the first 6 months of the current 90-day retention policy, the FBI used retained records to initiate 235 firearm-retrieval actions, of which 228 (97%) could not have been initiated under the proposed next-day destruction policy” (General Accounting Office 2002, 4). On the other hand, supporters of the legislation point out that the congressional statute creating the National Instant Check System already requires the government, after approving a sale, to “destroy all records of the system with respect to the call (other than the identifying number and the date the number was assigned) and all records of the system relating to the person or the transfer.” They also point out that existing federal law forbids the creation of

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any national registry of guns or gun owners, and that keeping records for all retail firearms sales in the United States approved by NICS in the previous ninety days amounts to an illegal registry. Also passed in 2004 is the so-called Tiahrt Amendment (named for one of its sponsors, Rep. Todd Tiahrt, R-KS), which removes from public access a government database of traces of guns. Guns may be traced because they are recovered at crime scenes, or because they are stolen and then recovered, or for various other reasons. Gun control advocate Chuck Wexler, director of the Police Executive Research Forum, calls the amendment “the most offensive thing you can think of . . . the tracing data, which is now secret, helped us see the big picture of where guns are coming from” (as quoted in Grimaldi and Horwitz 2010). Gun control advocates point to a study of ATF tracing data by criminologists Glenn Pierce, LeBaron Briggs, and David Carlson (1995) showing that a very small fraction of dealers are the original sellers of more than half the guns found at crime scenes. Gun rights advocates retort that the Tiahrt Amendment protects gun dealers from lawsuits that would unfairly hold the dealers liable for the crimes committed with the guns they have sold. Moreover, some scholars and many gun rights activists question the legitimacy of ATF trace-data studies, contending the findings are more reflective of the political agenda of gun control advocates than of any social scientific depiction of reality (e.g., Blackman 1999; Kopel 1999b). For example, NRA Institute for Legislative Action representative Paul H. Blackman (1999, 58–59) observes that “[c]riminological research based on firearm tracing data conducted by the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) is suspect because ATF is asked to conduct traces on a

small minority of firearms used in crimes, including homicide. . . . It is not representative of all firearms recovered by police. . . . Because of these data deficiencies, while ATF trace data may be useful for law enforcement purposes, it is not useful for research purposes.” Gun rights advocates also dispute the claim that a relatively high number of traces proves that a particular firearms store is a rogue operation. Rather, stores that sell the most guns will usually have the most traces, since some customers’ guns will eventually be stolen. More broadly, the advocates point that out ATF itself has unlimited access to its own trace data and can use that data for whatever law enforcement purposes it sees best, including investigating a particular store. The trace information should not be made available to any and all comers, including anti-gun politicians who might use it to persecute local gun owners. Finally, gun rights advocates point out that if the trace reports are available to local politicians, they are also, under the federal Freedom of Information Act, available to anyone else. So sophisticated criminals could obtain trace reports to get a list of the gun owners in an area, the better to burglarize their homes while the gun owner is at work and put more guns into the black market. Over the objections of many gun right advocates, the Tiahrt Amendment becomes less restrictive in 2008 and then again in 2010. Law enforcement agencies are now given access to the data to not only investigate individual crimes, but also to investigate firearm trafficking patterns and networks via statistical reports based on aggregated trace data (Giffords Law Center 2022e). Despite the protests of gun control advocates, the 1994 federal Assault Weapons

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Ban, originally enacted to last for ten years, is allowed to expire in September. U.S. manufacturers had been generally successful in evading the ban by making cosmetic changes to their assault weapons. The most infamous example is the Bushmaster assault rifle used in the October 2002 Washington, DC-area killing spree. A Department of Justice study reveals that the use of assault weapons in crime dropped significantly in the years following the ban, and that this drop was not explainable by the overall drop in gun crime during the late 1990s. Assault weapons specifically named in the 1994 ban declined from about 5 percent of all crime guns, according the ATF National Tracing Center data, to about 1 percent between 1993 (the year before it took effect) and 2001 (Koper, Roth, and Woods 2004; Roth and Koper 1999; note that some scholars and gun rights advocates challenge the study because it is based on gun-tracing data—see the Blackman quote above for criticisms of these data). In December, the U.S. attorney general’s office publishes a lengthy memorandum concluding that “the Second Amendment secures a personal right of individuals, not a collective right that may only be invoked by a State[,] or a quasi-collective right restricted to those persons who serve in organized militia units” (U.S. Department of Justice 2004). Gun rights activists applaud the opinion, even though its interpretation of the Second Amendment is disputed by some constitutional historians and all organizations advocating for strong gun control. 2005 In June of 2005, a landmark gun control bill is introduced in the California state legislature requiring that semiautomatic pistols be equipped with technology that can imprint microscopic identifying information on the

shell casing fired from a particular gun. Microstamping the firing pin involves the laser engraving of unique identifying numbers. When fired, the pin imprints the numbers on the spent shell casing—the numbers identifying the make, model, and serial number of the gun. California requires this technology be employed on all new semiautomatic handgun sales starting in May of 2013. In response, two major gun manufacturers, Smith & Wesson and Ruger, stop selling new semiautomatic handguns in California. In support of the companies, two gun rights organizations, Calguns Foundation Inc. and the Second Amendment Foundation, sue the state—arguing that since no manufacturers can reasonably be expected to comply with the microstamping regulation that it amounts to a ban on guns and a violation of the Second Amendment. However, they lose in district federal court (“The law barring sales of handguns without the microstamping technology doesn’t violate the Constitution’s Second Amendment because gun owners don’t have a right to buy specific types of firearms, U.S. District Judge Kimberly Mueller in Sacramento says in her ruling”; Pettersson 2015). The case is appealed to the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, where the district court decision is affirmed in 2018 (Justia 2018). The gun rights groups make a final appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, but in June of 2020, the Court refuses to hear their appeal. The District of Columbia enacts a similar provision in 2017, as does the state of New York in 2022. However, as of 2022, no manufacturers actually produce handguns that have microstamping technology, thus ultimately this potentially promising technology for reducing gun violence has yet to be empirically assessed. Congress passes the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, which takes effect

| Chronology l on August 26, 2005. The act prohibits civil liability actions against manufacturers, distributors, dealers, and importers of firearms or ammunition products, and their trade associations, for any harm caused by the criminal or unlawful misuse of firearms or ammunition. The act does not exempt those in the gun industry breaking the law or selling defective weapons or ammunition. However, gun control advocates see this legislation as a major setback. Although civil lawsuits are not won in the courtroom, they have the potential for yielding out-of-court settlements that promote reform in the gun industry. For example, a $2.5 million settlement against gun retailer Bulls Eye and gun manufacturer Bushmaster is reached in 2004 for their responsibility in the 2002 Washington, DC-area sniper shootings. Both the retailer and the manufacturer revise their inventory-control procedures to reduce the probability of the theft of their guns and to let law enforcement know immediately if a theft actually occurs. Hurricane Katrina devastates the Gulf Coast states of Mississippi and Louisiana on August 29, 2005. Severe flooding in New Orleans breaks down the public safety system, and government responses, at all levels (federal, state, local), are inadequate. In reaction to looting and criminal assaults, some area residents arm themselves—but on September 8, city officials announce a ban on possession of firearms and instruct law enforcement to confiscate all guns they come across. Local and state police join in the effort, as does the National Guard (Berenson and Broder 2005). Gun rights advocates as well as many in the gun control camp are outraged, and numerous lawsuits and modifications to state laws ensue over the next year. In 2006, the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act is signed into federal law,

banning the disaster-related confiscation of guns. Many states, including Louisiana, enact similar legislation. Florida’s stand-your-ground law goes into effect on October 1, 2005, the second state to do so after Utah’s had done in 1994, but the first to gain widespread publicity. Stand-your-ground laws do not require an individual to retreat in the face of a violent threat, as opposed to the common legal tradition of a duty to retreat whenever possible to avoid the loss of human life. The Florida law gains notoriety in February of 2012, when unarmed Black teenager Trayvon Martin is shot and killed in a confrontation with a community-watch volunteer. Martin is not caught in the act of committing a crime, but only seems suspicious because he is a young black man wearing a hooded sweatshirt (a “hoodie”). The tragedy receives huge media attention, much of it focusing on public outrage that the shooting is race-based. Many observers believe that the community-watch volunteer is encouraged by Florida’s stand-yourground law—though he does not use it as a defense at his trial for second-degree murder and is subsequently acquitted. Despite such notoriety, by 2022, stand-your-grand laws are eventually passed by legislation or court decision in thirty-six other states. Franks’s (2016) review of the impact of these laws concludes that they “have not only failed to deter crime, but have been instrumental in promoting and defending escalation to deadly force in situations that do not call for it. Homicide rates increased in states after they passed stand-yourground laws, and states with stand-yourground laws have higher homicide rates than states without them” (compare the similar conclusions of the Giffords Law Center 2022d, and Humphreys, Gasparrini, and Wiebe 2017).

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2007 On the morning of April 16, 2007, a Virginia Tech student uses two semiautomatic pistols to slay a total of thirty-two students and faculty. Before authorities can stop the carnage, he turns one of his guns on himself. The shock of the Virginia Tech shooting is magnified when it is discovered that despite the shooter’s lifelong history of mental illness, he had obtained his firearms legally in the preceding months. Gun control proponents use the tragedy to bemoan the inadequacy of current U.S. gun regulations, whereas gun rights proponents note that had the shooter’s adjudicated mental illness been properly registered with the federal government, he would have failed a background check and never been sold the guns he used in the shooting. In a rare display of cooperation (albeit motivated for different reasons), the major gun control organization in the nation, the Brady Campaign, and the major gun rights organization, the NRA, work with congressional representatives to fashion the NICS Improvement Act—intended to improve the quality and quantity of criminal, mental health, and related data used by the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS)—with which federally licensed firearms retailers check the backgrounds of prospective gun buyers. More hardline groups on both sides of the gun issue (e.g., the Gun Owners of America, and the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence) are disappointed by the final legislation. But many on both sides of the gun debate extol the act’s carrot-andstick approach to getting the states to improve and then to submit their relevant computerized data to the NICS system in a timely manner, while enhancing the ability of prospective gun buyers previously judged as ineligible because of having been placed

under a court order related to mental illness to seek relief. On December 17, 2007, the NICS Improvement Act is passed with strong bipartisan support and signed into law (PL 110-180) by President George W. Bush on January 8, 2008. The Act is subsequently strengthened and receives increased funding a decade later when Congress passed the Fix NICS Act of 2018. As of 2022, the NICS Improvement Act has seen mixed success: Gun rights groups are pleased to see mental health-related provisions of the act regarding restoration of gun rights being increasingly adopted by more and more states. One such provision ends gun bans on people who have never been adjudicated mentally ill but have simply sought counseling at some point—e.g., military veterans who received Veterans Administration counseling for post-traumatic stress disorder. Likewise, a provision making it easier for those having lost their gun rights due to mental disabilities to have them restored (e.g., a person who was temporarily committed to an institution for a few days several decades ago during a personal crisis) is being increasingly adopted by the states. Even though some states are still lax in reporting their records on arrests, domestic violence orders, and court-ordered treatments, the Act has multiple indications of being successful. With the assistance of its grants, state and local governments increase the availability of mental health– and domestic violence-related records to NICS. For example, from CY2007 to CY2018, the number of mental health records in the NICS system surges from 518,499 to 5,419,894, a 9.5-fold increase. The number of misdemeanor domestic violence records increases from 46,286 to 175,376, nearly tripling (a 278.9% increase; Krouse 2019, 23). The increased number of mental health records yields significant

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growth in the failure to pass a background check for mental health reasons, from constituting 2.5 percent of all federal background checks, on average, prior to 2018, to 6.5 percent since then (Krouse 2019, 36). Another outcome of the Virginia Tech shooting is the invigoration of the gun rights movement to allow college students and employees with concealed carry licenses to bring their handguns to campus. Founded on the evening of the shooting, Students for Concealed Carry grows to more than 36,000 members by 2022, which has 350 chapters at various college and university campuses; the organization observes that the eleven universities allowing campus carry in some form since Virginia Tech have “not seen any resulting incidents of gun violence, gun accidents, or gun thefts” (Students for Concealed Carry 2022; also see Kopel [2009] for an extended discussion on state legislative initiatives to allow students, faculty, and staff—who would otherwise be legally allowed to possess a firearm—to carry and store a gun while on campus; Kopel further argues that the passage of such initiatives would, on balance, make for safer campuses). Other survivors of the Virginia Tech shooting and members of the public have a completely opposite reaction from those founding and joining Students for Concealed Carry. For example, survivor Colin Goddard—shot four times and one of the seventeen who survived their gunshot wounds—examines the gun control literature and finds a few themes very prominent, one being the “gun show loophole.” He tests the contention that just about anyone can buy a gun at selected gun shows by attending several in Ohio and Texas. Indeed, without any background checking, he has little problem purchasing an

AK-47-style rifle, several 9 mm semiautomatic handguns, and other weapons. Though not touted in the gun control literature, he finds that some of those selling him guns without a background check consider it a “service” and thus charge him slightly higher prices than dealers doing background checks. He eventually takes a highprofile job with the Brady Campaign and tells his story in the much-heralded documentary film Living for 32, which includes hidden-camera scenes of some of his gun show purchases. (The “32” is a double entendre, representing the thirty-two victims of the Virginia Tech shooting and the average of 32 gun murders each day in the contemporary United States; see Goddard [2011].) 2008 In June 2008, in the landmark 5-4 District of Columbia v. Heller decision, the U.S. Supreme Court holds that the District’s ban on handgun possession in the home and its prohibition against rendering any lawful firearm in the home operable for the purposes of immediate self-defense violates the Second Amendment. The court holds that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia and to use that firearm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home. The majority rules the Constitution guarantees that “the right of the people, to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed,” and this mandate is independent of the “well regulated militia.” Preserving the militia is the foremost reason that led the Founders to protect the right to keep and bear arms, but the right they guaranteed is not just for service in the militia (Supreme Court of the United States 2008).

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2010 In a follow-up 5-4 vote in June 2010, the sharply divided court extends its ruling to include the 50 U.S. states and their municipalities in McDonald v. City of Chicago. The majority—Justices Alito, Roberts, Scalia, and Kennedy basing their decision on the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, and Justice Thomas on the basis of the amendment’s privileges or immunities clause—holds that the Fourteenth Amendment makes the Second Amendment applicable to state and local governments, as it does most of the rest of the Bill of Rights. Both decisions are watershed victories for the gun rights movement, though gun control activists note that the Supreme Court acknowledges in both cases that the individual-right interpretation does not mean the right is unlimited. To quote from the Heller decision, “Like most rights, the Second Amendment right is not unlimited. It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose: For example, concealed weapons prohibitions have been upheld under the Amendment or state analogues. The Court’s opinion should not be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms [nor on . . .] the historical tradition of prohibiting the carrying of dangerous and unusual weapons” (such as sawed-off shotguns or submachine guns). And in the McDonald case, the majority opinion included the statement that their ruling would allow for “[s]tate . . . and local experimentation with reasonable firearms

regulations [to be] continue[d] under the Second Amendment” (Supreme Court of the United States 2010). Gun control advocates also take solace in Justice Breyer’s dissenting observation: “Since Heller, historians, scholars, and judges have continued to express the view that the Court’s historical account was flawed” (Breyer’s dissent is joined by Justices Ginsburg and Sotomayor). The separate dissent of Justice Stevens, his last opinion as a Supreme Court justice, is a paragon of the thinking of gun control activists and scholars regarding the limitations of the Second Amendment to contemporary American society. Among Stevens’s observations these activists and scholars extol are: “The practical impact of various gun control measures may be highly controversial, but this basic insight should not be. The idea that deadly weapons pose a distinctive threat to the social order—and that reasonable restrictions on their usage therefore impose an acceptable burden on one’s personal liberty—is as old as the Republic. . . . The idea that States may place substantial restrictions on the right to keep and bear arms short of complete disarmament is, in fact, far more entrenched than the notion that the Federal Constitution protects any such right. Federalism is a far ‘older and more deeply rooted tradition than is a right to carry,’ or to own, ‘any particular kind of weapon.’ ” Thus, the strong dissent of Justices Breyer, Ginsburg, Sotomayor, and Stevens in the McDonald case leaves open the possibility that a change in the court’s composition might eventuate in a reversal of the Heller and McDonald decisions. Before any such reversal, however, both sides of the gun debate expect many lower court cases in which the constitutionality of particular

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gun laws is challenged. The Supreme Court cases do not include a detailed standard against which to judge the reasonability of restrictions on the right to keep and bear firearms, thus opening up an onslaught of especially difficult litigation in the lower courts. A growing consensus among legal scholars is that new and existing gun control laws must hold up to “intermediate scrutiny,” meaning the law in question should be substantially related to an important government interest (see Giffords Law Center 2022c). The expected onslaught of gun rights groups’ challenges of various state and local gun control laws is realized in the coming years: from the 2008 Heller decision through the beginning of 2022, an average of 120 cases challenging local, state, and federal gun laws comes before lower state and federal courts each year— cases in which the courts are asked to rule on the legality of selected gun laws. The challenges include critical components of the agenda of the pro-gun control movement, including banning possession of firearms by those convicted of a felony; similarly banning possession by those convicted of a domestic violence crime, even if only a misdemeanor (per current federal law); granting law enforcement officials discretion in issuing concealed carry permits; prohibiting military-style assault weapons and large-capacity (greater than ten rounds) ammunition magazines; requiring the registration of firearms; forbidding firearm possession to those involuntarily committed to a mental institution; and prohibiting the sale of firearms to those under the age of twenty-one. Of these cases, over 90 percent have been upheld (Carter 2017, 49; Giffords Law Center 2022c). Thus, even though challenges to gun control laws are expected to clog the courts for years to come, especially because the three most

recent Supreme Court appointees are conservatives who lean toward the gun rights side of the national gun debate (Justices Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett, confirmed in 2017, 2018, and 2020, respectively), the language of the Court’s rulings in Heller and McDonald, as well as the overwhelming majority of lower court decisions that have followed, clearly support the notion that strong gun laws are constitutional (regardless of whether they can be determined as effective). 2011 Gun control advocates are especially prone to emphasize the importance of these postMcDonald court cases, as national legislative efforts seem doomed with a Republican-controlled House of Representatives and the president of the United States declaring that the “Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to bear arms” (Obama 2011). Moreover, his aides report to the New York Times that the president “has no plans to take the lead in proposing further gun control legislation” (Calmes 2011; though Obama’s attitude changes after the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School mass murder shooting of twenty-six- and sevenyear-olds, plus six school staff members). These comments are especially disturbing to gun control advocates because they come on the heels of the horrific January 8, 2011, shooting in Tucson, Arizona, where a gunman uses a legally purchased semiautomatic handgun, a Glock 19, to severely wound U.S. congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and kill six others—including federal district court judge John Roll and nine-year-old Christina Taylor-Green. Traditionally, gun control legislation is motivated by terrible acts of violence, and some in the gun control advocacy community have thoughts, if not hopes, that the Tucson shooting will motivate

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federal movement in the areas of stronger background checking and restrictions on high-capacity (greater than ten rounds) ammunition holders (magazines) for semiautomatic weapons. The shooter passes a computerized background check when he purchases the handgun in late 2010; however, it is unlikely that he would have passed a traditional background check (involving law enforcement officials interviewing acquaintances, neighbors, coworkers). The shooter empties a thirty-one-round magazine, which magnifies the destruction wrought; indeed, it is while he is trying to switch to a fresh magazine that bystanders tackle and disarm him (thus a “regular” tenshot magazine would have reduced the damage). The Washington Post (2011) soon publishes an article detailing that many of the nation’s deadliest shooting sprees/mass murders having involved high-capacity (eleven-plus round) magazines—including the killings of six schoolchildren in Stockton, California (1989), twenty-three customers in Luby’s Cafeteria in Killeen, Texas (1991), eight workers in a San Francisco office building (1993), twelve students and a teacher at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado (1999), thirty-two students and faculty at Virginia Tech (2007), thirteen at Fort Hood in Texas (2009), and eight employees in Manchester, Connecticut (2010). A follow-up Washington Post analysis reveals that by 2019, more than half of the mass shootings in the United States involve high-capacity magazines—including the particularly devastating shootings at a nightclub in Orlando, Florida (forty-nine killed) in 2016, an outdoor concert in Las Vegas (fiftyeight killed), and a church in Sutherland Springs, Texas (twenty-six killed) in 2017, and at a high school in Parkland, Florida (seventeen killed), in 2018. In the words of ATF special agent David Chipman: “The

high-capacity magazine is what takes it to a whole other level of carnage; it’s the primary driver for why we’re seeing more mass shootings more regularly” (Witte 2019). Only a handful of states have retained the (now expired) 1994 federal Assault Weapons Ban legislation limiting semiautomatic firearms’ magazines to ten rounds or fewer (California, Colorado, Connecticut, Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, and Vermont—plus the District of Columbia). Adding fuel to the disappointment of gun control advocates in Obama’s performance as president is his signing of pro-gun rights legislation between the landmark 2008 Heller and 2010 McDonald Supreme Court decisions. In May 2009, he signs a credit card reform bill that has tucked away in it a provision to allow the legal carry of firearms in the national park system (Editorial Board 2009). And in December 2009, he signs an appropriations bill that includes a reversal of a post-9/11 ban on the transporting of firearms in locked luggage on Amtrak trains. Notably, these changes in federal law are enacted when Democrats hold large majorities in both the House and the Senate. In the spring of 2011, a secret ATF operation, “Fast and Furious,” is exposed for having gone wrong and is heavily criticized in the media. The program allows selected “straw buyers”—those believed to be supplying Mexican drug cartels with weapons—to purchase assault-style and other firearms at U.S. retailers along the border; the intent is to follow the buyers and to document their handing-over of the weapons to drug cartel members. However, many of the weapons are lost track of, smuggled into Mexico, and two are eventually recovered at the scene of a shootout where a U.S. Border Patrol agent is killed. When Holder is asked

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about details of the operation, he claims ignorance of many of them—and almost immediately, the NRA starts a national petition to have him fired. Other fallout includes the call for ATF acting director Kenneth Melson’s resignation, as well as calls for the dissolving of the bureau itself (Gerstein 2011; Stolberg 2011)—long a target of the gun rights movement and continually hamstrung, at least in the eyes of gun control advocates, from enforcing federal gun control laws (in the words of a New York Times editorial, the ATF is “perennially hogtied by the gun lobby’s power over Congress”; Editorial Board 2011). Public attitudes in support of strong gun control laws are at nearly all-time lows during the early years of President Barack Obama’s first term in office (2009–2011); for instance, the Gallup Poll tracking of gun control with the question, “In general, do you feel that the laws covering the sale of firearms should be made more strict, less strict, or kept as they are now?” reveals that those favoring more strict laws has declined from 78 percent in 1990 to 44 percent in 2010. And the Gallup item “Do you think there should or should not be law that would ban the possession of handguns, except by the police and other authorized persons?” reveals a drop from 43 percent in 1990 to 29 percent in 2010 (Newport and Saad 2011). The combination of declining public support and fear of the NRA prompts more liberal—generally Democratic—candidates for congressional Senate and House seats to continue avoiding the topic of gun control, as has been the situation since vocal gun control advocate Al Gore lost in the 2000 presidential election. As a Washington Post column entitled “Aiming to Win” concludes at the end of 2010, “lawmakers have come to fear the [NRA’s] 4 million members” (Washington Post 2010).

2012 Although 2012 begins with gun control advocates observing that at the national level—the level at which the most important policies, programs, and legislation must occur—recent court decisions, legislative measures, executive actions, and public opinion polls reveal little pointing to success for their movement in the coming decade, the national mood changes after the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting of twenty young students and six school staff members on December 14, 2012, in Newtown, Connecticut. Bipartisan gun control legislation (a rarity, with Democrats generally strongly in favor of such legislation and Republicans generally strongly in opposition) is introduced in both the house and senate to enact universal background checks for gun purchases and transfers; federal law requires computerized background checking for purchases made from federally licensed firearms dealers, but not so for private transactions between individuals— even at public events such as yard sales, flea markets, and gun shows. To the shock of many observers, the proposed legislation fails to pass—even though public opinion polls consistently show that 80–90 percent of U.S. adults favor universal background checks (Carter 2017, 61–62). 2013 Given the failure of Congress to act, on July 16, 2013, President Obama invokes a series of twenty-three executive orders to move forward the agenda of gun control advocates, among the most notable of which are directing the Centers of Disease Control to produce new analyses of the gun violence problem (which it had not done since the Dickey Amendment of 1996, which barred the CDC from using federal funds to research gun violence) and improving

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incentives for states to share information with NICS. On May 8, 2013, the U.S. State Department orders the company posting the blueprints online for the manufacture of a three-dimensional (3D) printable gun, named the Liberator, to remove them. The public posting violates the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), which governs access to the technical details for the production of firearms (Terbush 2013). Three-dimensional printable guns become a new issue in the gun control debate. They are plastic and made with relatively inexpensive 3D printers—which avoids any knowledge or tracking by law enforcement agencies. Gun control advocates argue that these guns can be readily made by terrorists and violent criminals, as well as those whose guns have been removed from the home because they’re on suicide watch or are domestic abusers. Because plastic guns are undetectable to metal-seeking security scanners at public venues, they have been illegal in the United States since 1988 (the Undetectable Firearms Act). However, to conform with this law, the Liberator’s final design includes adding 6 ounces of steel in the handle so that it can be readily spotted by security systems (note that federal law requires at least 3.7 ounces of metal). But the step to add steel is easily sidestepped, as the metal is not necessary to the operation of the firearm (Carter 2018). The founder of Defense Distributed, the company distributing the blueprints online, protests the removal—contending it violated his First Amendment right to free speech. On June 29, 2018, the federal government eventually settles with him, giving him the right to release the 3D blue prints publicly “in any form.” Gun control advocacy groups immediately file for a federal court injunction to stop the publication of the plans on-line (not

only the Liberator but for AR-15 style semiautomatic rifles as well). Before the blueprints are uploaded, in deference to public safety, a federal judge in Seattle places a nationwide temporary injunction on their release. In his ruling, Judge Robert S. Lasnik observes that there are “serious First Amendment issues” that need to be sorted through in the future, but in the short term, to prevent “irreparable harm,” that there should be “no posting of instructions of how to produce 3-D guns on the internet” (Shear, Hsu, and Johnson 2018). Judge Lasnik makes the injunction permanent in a final ruling on November 19, 2019. However, Defense Distributed does not accept defeat and intends to upload the plans in the spring of 2020, claiming that it constrains downloaders to just U.S. residents—and thus is not in violation of International Traffic in Arms Regulations. In response, twenty-five state attorneys general petition the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Department of State to immediately halt any scheduled internet distribution of the plans, contending that they are violation of both the ITAR and Undetectable Firearms Act (Ferguson 2020). As of August 2020, Defense Distributed isn’t actively distributing plans (Frankel 2020). However, between legal rulings and changes in federal policies, the Liberator’s plans slip through to online circulation and are downloaded thousands of times. On September 25, 2013, the United States signs the United Nations’ Arms Trade Treaty (ATT); however, over the next five and a half years, the ATT is never ratified by Congress because of serious Second Amendment concerns in the gun rights community. The most important of these involve the ATT’s requirement that crossnational gun sales must be registered as a means for keeping track of civilian-owned,

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traded, and manufactured arms; many UN member states see these as a potentially effective method for reducing the international market in illegal firearms. Acting on the concerns of the gun rights community, President Donald Trump, while on stage at the National Rifle Association’s annual convention in Indianapolis on April 26, 2019, officially rescinds the United States’ signing of the treaty. 2015–2019 Although Democratic nominee Hillary Rodham Clinton loses the 2016 presidential election to Republican Donald J. Trump, she returns to the pre-2000 tradition of Democrats of putting forth gun control as a major election issue. She openly touts that if elected, she will “take on the gun lobby.” Her vocal anti-NRA stance is, in part, prompted by the June 17, 2015, mass shooting at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina, in which nine African Americans are murdered during a late-evening Bible study (Rucker 2015). The openly white supremacist shooter should have been denied purchasing his Glock .45 caliber semiautomatic pistol, as he has previously been arrested for drug possession, which should have put him immediately on the NICS list of prohibited purchasers; however, a clerical error prevents his name being added (Knapp 2021). In December of 2016, the Obama administration works with the Social Security Administration to improve the NICS mental health database reporting by requiring approximately 75,000 individuals receiving Social Security benefits for mental disability, and who also have “representative payees” (because the recipient is incapable of handling important aspects of their own finances), to be added to the database. Mental incapacity is one of ten reasons an

individual can be denied possessing or purchasing a firearm under the Gun Control Act of 1968. The NICS Improvement Act of 2007 sought to improve reporting from the states to the federal databases that are checked before a prospective purchaser of a firearm from a federally licensed gun dealer. The new regulation is framed as an implementation of this act. The regulation provides adjudication procedures for individuals believing they have been unfairly denied the acquisition of firearm to seek relief and to potentially acquire a firearm (Federal Register 2016). However, before it can be implemented, the new Trump administration works with a Republican Congress to successfully rescind it in February of 2017 (Federal Register 2017). Gun control advocates are stunned that individuals so incapable of making important decisions that they have been assigned a representative payee to receive and manage their Social Security checks are not stopped, or at least slowed down so that further checks can be made, from purchasing a firearm. Gun rights advocates argue that the regulation represents a Second Amendment violation; they are joined by selected mental health advocacy groups, who contend that “equating the need for assistance in managing one’s finances with a false presumption of incapacity in other areas of life, including possession of a firearm, unnecessarily and unreasonably deprives individuals with disabilities of a constitutional right and increases the stigma that [affects] those who may need a representative payee” (National Council on Disability 2017). In 2015, the American Psychiatric Association publishes a “Resource Document on Access to Firearms by People with Mental Disorders” (Pinals et al. 2015), which highlights the ineffectiveness of current gun

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laws, especially regarding the most common form of gun violence—suicide (with suicides typically accounting for about 60 percent of total gun-related deaths in any one year). The document propels a new type of gun control law into the forefront of public discussion, extreme risk protection orders (ERPO) laws (also known as “red flag” laws). An ERPO authorizes local law enforcement to temporarily remove firearms from individuals deemed by a court to be at a high risk for committing gun violence against themselves or others. Depending on the jurisdiction, law enforcement, family members, or medical professionals can petition a local court for such an order. Since many mass shooters and many of the victims of gun-related suicide announce their intentions beforehand, ERPO laws appeal to many state legislatures. And because some observers contend that the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on February 14, 2018, in Parkland, Florida (seventeen deaths) potentially could have been averted had an ERPO law been in effect, such laws gain additional traction. By 2022, nineteen states, plus the District of Columbia, enact an ERPO law (California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, and Washington). Research on the effectiveness of these laws reveals that they may have a small effect in preventing suicides in older adults (those over the age of fifty-four), though not on gun-related homicides, including mass shootings (RAND 2020; Saadi et al. 2020; however, see Giffords Law Center [2022b] for examples of where ERPOs have prevented both mass shootings and school shootings).

The Marjory Stoneman Douglas tragedy motivates survivors of the shooting and supportive students across the country to organize the March for Our Lives rally in Washington, DC on March 24, 2018, with estimates as high as 800,000 participants— and with hundreds of much smaller concomitant rallies being held across the country. March for Our Lives solidifies into a gun control advocacy group, with chapters in in all fifty states plus Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands (March for Our Lives 2020). Some companies use the mass shooting as an opportunity to distance themselves from the NRA; for example, Delta Airlines, United Airlines, Hertz, and MetLife all announce they will no longer offer discounts to NRA members. Dick’s Sporting Goods and Walmart announce they will no longer sell firearms to those under the age of twenty-one. In Florida, under pressure from Marjory Stoneman Douglas students and their allies, the state legislature passes the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Act, which raises the minimum age for firearm purchase to twenty-one, bans bump stocks, funds increased school security, and includes a red-flag provision allowing law enforcement to confiscate the firearms of an individual undergoing a mental health crisis and making a threat of violence. At the national level, the Marjory Stoneman Douglas tragedy motivates Congress to pass the Students, Teachers, and Officers Preventing School Violence Act in March of 2018. The act provides $75 million to fund a variety of school violence prevention strategies, including improvements in threat assessments and in communication between schools and law enforcement when threats do arise to ensure quick police response. Although some gun control advocates bemoan its failure to include any gun

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control measures, others applaud its approach. For example, Sandy Hook Promise, a nonprofit school safety advocacy group born out of the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School mass shooting tragedy, observes: “Four out of five school shooters tell someone about their plans ahead of time—and 69% tell more than one person. When our students and educators are trained in how to identify signs of gun violence and to intervene, . . . they can prevent tragedies in their communities and save lives . . . the legislation [funds] training students, school personnel, and law enforcement to identify signs of violence and intervene to prevent people from hurting themselves or others. The legislation also encourages the development and operation of anonymous reporting systems, as well as the formation of school threat assessment and intervention teams to help schools . . . triage threats before tragedy strikes” (Sandy Hook Promise 2019). In response to the November 5, 2017, mass shooting at a church in Sutherland Springs, Texas (twenty-six killed), Congress passes the Fix NICS Act, which is signed into law on March 23, 2018. The Sutherland Springs shooter should have been denied purchasing the semiautomatic rifle he uses in the shooting, but he passed a computerized federal background check at the sporting goods store selling it to him. He had a conviction for domestic violence while in the Air Force, and his name should have been in the National Instant Check System, which would have prohibited the purchase. But the Air Force fails to forward a notification of the conviction to the FBI and thus his name never finds its way into any of NICS’s three databases. The Act requires government agencies to develop four-year plans to improve their submission of records to NICS and

provides incentivizing grants. The Department of Justice completes its first evaluation of Fix NICS in November of 2019 and concludes that the implementation of the act during its first year was highly successful, with “strong compliance” on the part of government agencies in submitting their records; over six million new records were added (U.S. Department of Justice 2019). A similar conclusion is made in a followup evaluation in July of 2021: The Department concludes that “compliance with the Act continues to be strong . . . [and] paying dividends. Between April 2018 (immediately after passage of the Act) and February 2021, there was an increase of 11,502,916 records in the three national databases searched with every NICS check—an 11.4 percent increase” (U.S. Department of Justice 2021, 2). The most lethal mass shooting in the United States (as of the time of this book’s publication) occurs on October 1, 2017, at an outdoor concert in Las Vegas (fiftyeight deaths). The shooter uses “bump stocks” to convert his .22 semiautomatic rifles into automatic weapons. The bump stocks allow him to fire over 1,000 rounds in matter of minutes. Prior to this tragedy, bump stocks were unheard of in the gun control debate. Federal legislation to ban them is supported by both Democrats and Republicans in both houses of Congress but is never voted on. This lack of action is in line with Republican leadership’s unwillingness to support any new gun laws; however, it does support outlawing bump stocks by administrative edict, which eventually occurs in December of 2018; the new regulation bans new sales and requires current owners to surrender or destroy their bump stocks (effective March 26, 2019). Soon after, a school shooting occurs at Santa Fe High School in Santa Fe, Texas, on

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May 18, 2018 (ten killed)—and, then a horrific mass shooting at a Walmart store in El Paso, Texas, on August 3, 2019 (twentythree killed), extreme risk protection order (“red flag”) laws are discussed in the Texas state legislature. These discussions stall, and no legislation is passed. After the Walmart shooting, President Donald Trump lends support to the national adoption of a red-flag law: “We must make sure that those judged to pose a grave risk to public safety do not have access to firearms and that if they do, those firearms can be taken through rapid due process. . . . That is why I have called for red flag laws, also known as extreme risk protection orders” (Dezenski 2019). In response, senators Lindsey Graham and Richard Blumenthal introduce a bipartisan bill to establish a grant program for states to implement their own ERPO policies. The bill stalls in the Senate Judiciary Committee and fails enactment. These state and federal failures occur despite a July 2019 national poll showing the majority of U.S. adults—regardless of age, gender, educational level, political party, region, and gun ownership status (owner vs. nonowner)—support such legislation (APM Research 2019). Trump’s above remarks, as well as the Graham and Blumenthal bill, are also in reaction to a second mass shooting in Dayton, Ohio, less than a day after the Walmart shooting. In the early morning hours of August 4, 2019, a twenty-four-year-old man uses a “ghost gun” equipped with a 100-round magazine to murder nine individuals in a popular downtown nightlife district. The shooting brings to light a new issue in the gun control debate: “ghost guns.” Federal law requires gun manufacturers to imprint a serial number on each gun produced. But the law had been applied only to fully finished weapons,

“meaning that those that are not technically finished and require a few additional steps before they can be used to make a fully functional gun are not subject to these legal requirements” (Parsons, Vargas, and Bhatia 2020). Prior to 2022, guns that are only partially made can be sold without the restrictions of federal gun laws (e.g., evading a NICS background check); purchasers can then access online tutorials and use simple tools to make the guns fully functional. Without a serial number, these ghost guns are untraceable when recovered after use in a crime. Ghost guns represent “a robust segment of the gun industry” (Parsons, Vargas, and Bhatia 2020). However, in the spring of 2022, President Joseph Biden fixes this loophole in the law; working with the Deputy Attorney General, the president “bans the business of manufacturing the most accessible ghost guns, such as unserialized ‘buy-buildshoot’ kits that individuals can buy online or at a store without a background check and can readily assemble into a working firearm in as little as 30 minutes with equipment they have at home. This [ban] clarifies that these kits qualify as ‘firearms’ under the Gun Control Act, and that commercial manufacturers of such kits must therefore become licensed and include serial numbers on the kits’ frame or receiver, and commercial sellers of these kits must become federally licensed and run background checks prior to a sale— just like they have to do with other commercially-made firearms.” The ban includes a rule that also helps turn some ghost guns already in circulation into serialized firearms. The Justice Department now requires “federally licensed dealers and gunsmiths taking any unserialized firearm into inventory to serialize that weapon. For example, if an individual

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builds a firearm at home and then sells it to a pawn broker or another federally licensed dealer, that dealer must put a serial number on the weapon before selling it to a customer” (White House Briefing Room 2022). In response to the horrific mass shooting of the preceding three years—including in those in Florida, Nevada, and Texas—Congress passes an omnibus spending bill in December of 2019 that authorizes the CDC and the National Institutes of Health to renew research into gun violence—research that had essentially ceased since the 1996 Dickey Amendment (that had forbidden the CDC to advocate for “gun control,” which research into gun violence invariably speaks to). Moreover, the spending bill includes $25 million in funding specifically earmarked “to research gun violence” (NPR 2019). The CDC uses its funding to provide generous multiyear grants to support research in nine different problem areas of gun violence, with project titles like “Exposure to Violence and Subsequent Weapons Use” and “Prevalence of Community Gun Violence and Exposure and Consequences for Adolescent Well-Being” (CDC 2020). 2020–2022 (and beyond) The COVID-19 pandemic leaves its devastating impacts on society in manifold and entwined ways. State and local shutdowns of a wide variety of businesses create job losses that are the highest since the Great Depression; the overall unemployment rate peaks at 14.7 percent in April of 2020, with those in the leisure and hospitality industry suffering a rate of 39.3 percent (Congressional Research Service 2020). Economic adversities beset minority communities the hardest. Gun violence rates in many of these communities are already much higher than

the national average (e.g., African American men suffer firearm homicide rates 8.3 times the national average; Carter 2017, 14), but the COVID crisis pushes them even higher. For the nation’s fifty largest cities, homicides rise by an average of 17.4 percent compared to 2019 (Asher 2021), with threefourths of these committed by firearm (CDC 2020). Selected cities are especially hard hit—among them St. Louis (homicides up 90.4%), Baltimore (55.8%), Detroit (47.6%), and New Orleans (46.4%). In addition to the stresses imposed by job losses, other contributing factors include increased gun availability (with record-breaking gun sales, many of which are to first-time gun buyers; FBI 2020), a reduced presence of law enforcement and the subsequent mitigation of community policing outreach efforts (Fuller and Arango 2020), and increased alcohol sales (alcohol sales outside of bars and restaurants surge 24% between March and September of 2020; Mann 2020). Although rates of increase lessen, the nation’s largest cities continue to have increased homicides rates during 2021 and into 2022, five percent greater than in 2020, and forty-four percent greater than in 2019; similar increased rates are reported for both aggravated assault (up 4% in 2021 compared to 2020) and gun assault (up 8%; Rosenfeld and Lopez 2022). Gun control is not a major topic in the 2020 presidential campaigns of either the Republican or Democratic Parties. The COVID-19 pandemic and President Donald Trump’s handling of it (mishandling of it, in the eyes of most Democrats) take center stage, as well as the economic crisis created by state-level mitigation efforts (e.g., the closing of wide range of businesses, including restaurants, bars, gyms, and sports and other entertainment venues; the restriction of travel and sheltering-at-home mandates).

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However, the election is critical for the direction the gun control debate will take over the coming four years. The 2020 Democratic Party Platform includes the goal of reducing gun violence by enacting the major agenda of gun control advocates— including universal background checks, regulation of online sales, banning militarystyle assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, supporting the individual states in the passage of red flag laws (extreme risk protection orders), safe storage, and repealing the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005 (PLCAA), which prohibits civil liability actions against firearm and ammunition manufacturers and dealers for any harm caused by the criminal or unlawful misuse of their products (Democratic Party Platform 2020, 47–48). In contrast, the 2020 Republican Party Platform (identical to the 2016 Platform) stresses that the party will uphold the right of individuals to keep and bear arms, and that it will resist legislation reviled by gun rights advocates, including banning assault weapons (which the Platform relabels as “common modern rifles”), restricting the size of ammunition magazines, and overturning the PLCAA (Republican Party Platform 2020, 12–13). The eventual victory of Democrat Joseph Biden in November of 2020 assures that proposed congressional legislation aimed at strengthening gun regulations will receive presidential attention and assistance in passing. The 1993 Brady Act had required Democratic President Clinton to vigorously reach out to Republican members of both houses of Congress to assure passage. Similar efforts are put forth by President Biden, though the prospects of success are reduced because new legislation requires at least a handful of Republican senators to be in support to reach the minimum of sixty “yea” votes required for the enactment of most

senate legislation—but Republican support for new gun control laws is minimal, and it seems unlikely that even a small handful will break the decades-long practice of refusing to join Democrats in supporting such laws. However, in May and June of 2022, two high-profile mass shootings—in a Buffalo, New York supermarket (10 killed) and in an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas (21 murdered, included 19 children)—finally motivate at least ten members of the Republican caucus in the senate to move, at least slightly, toward supporting tighter gun regulations; these ten are willing to join the forty-eight Democrats and two independent in the senate to support the passage of several new laws, the three most important being: (a) funding to encourage the individual states to adopt extreme risk protection orders (ERPO) laws (also known as “red flag” laws); an ERPO authorizes local law enforcement to temporarily remove firearms from individuals deemed by a court to be at a high risk for committing gun violence against themselves or others (31 states lack ERPO laws as of 2022); (b) closing of the so-called “boyfriend loophole” in the 1996 the Domestic Violence Offender Gun Ban amendment to the Gun Control Act of 1968; the proposed law treats unmarried partners the same as married partners and bars possession of a firearm by an individual found guilty of violence against a dating partner; and (c) requiring a more in-depth review process for individuals between the ages 18 and 21 wanting to purchase a long gun (a rifle or shotgun; those under 21 are already barred from purchasing a handgun); in both the Buffalo and Uvalde tragedies the shooters are under 21; traditionally, juvenile criminal records are sealed when an individual turns 18, but a background check via the

lxiv | Chronology

National Instant Criminal Background Check System will now include contacting state and local law enforcement to search for any disqualifying mental health or juvenile records. Importantly, none of the 50-member Republican caucus in the senate is willing to support key legislation advocated by all gun control/gun safety organizations, including universal background checks, the banning of militarystyle assault rifles and high-capacity ammunition magazines, waiting periods before a purchaser can take possession of their firearm, implementing a federal “redflag” system, requiring safe-storage standards for firearms and ammunition, and raising the minimum age to buy any gun, not just handguns, to 21. Although Democrats in both the house and senate believe the new legislation only nibbles at the edges of serious gun safety reforms, they are glad to make at least some progress in federal gun safety legislation and are expected to support its passage before the end of 2022. Democratic efforts to strengthen gun laws also get a small boost by the internal turmoil and disarray befalling the NRA. In August of 2020, the New York state attorney general concludes a high-profile investigation into the financial dealings of the NRA and files a suit in State Supreme Court to have the association dissolved—a severe sanction but one that is allowable by state law because it is headquartered in New York. The investigation gathers evidence supporting allegations of millions of dollars of misused funds for the personal gain of the NRA leadership, as well as for the awarding of contracts to friends, family members, and loyal former employees (James 2020). An NPR report reveals that the New York investigation, and a related one underway in Washington, DC, cost the

organization $100 million in legal fees and lost revenue (Mak 2020, 2021). At the very least, it is expected that the association will not be able to maintain its high level of spending on federal elections (e.g., $24,418,757 in 2020, according to Opensecrets.org 2020d). In sum, as 2022 comes to a close, both sides of the gun debate believe there is much to be accomplished in the coming days, months, and years. In the words of the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action news page, “[the] truth [is]Joe Biden is coming for your guns . . . the Biden-Harris administration is devot[ed] to banning and confiscating law-abiding Americans’ firearms,” and it must be obstructed in any and all attempts at gun control (National Rifle Association 2022); meanwhile, Brady PAC Executive Director Brian Lemek believes that “the thumb of the NRA has been lifted . . . we see a real opportunity . . . for meaningful common-sense solutions to this very complex problem we have here in the United States” (Myers 2020). Gregg Lee Carter

References Note: In addition to the materials cited below, this chronology draws selectively from the following sources: Chapters 1–2 in Gregg Lee Carter, Gun Control in the United States: A Reference Handbook, 2nd ed. (Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2017); Chapters 1–5 in Gregg Lee Carter, The Gun Control Movement (New York: Twayne Publishers, 1997); and selected entries in Gregg Lee Carter, ed., Guns in American Society: An Encyclopedia of History, Politics, Culture, and the Law, 2nd ed., vols. 1–2 (Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2012). Annals of Congress. 2nd Cong., 1st sess. (1791–92). http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin /ampage?collId=llac&fileName=003/llac003 .db&recNum=68 (accessed June 14, 2022).

Chronology | lxv APM Research. “APM Survey: Americans’ Views on Key Gun Policies, Part One— Opinions on ‘Red Flag’ Laws.” APM Research Lab, August 20, 2019. https:// www.apmresearchlab.org/gun-survey-red -flag (accessed June 14, 2022). Asher, Jeff. “Murders Are Rising. Blaming a Party Doesn’t Add Up.” New York Times, September 22, 2021. https://www.nytimes .com/2020/09/28/upshot/murders-2020 -election-debate.html (accessed June 15, 2022). Beckman, James A. “Sullivan Law.” In Guns in American Society: An Encyclopedia of History, Politics, Culture, and the Law, edited by Gregg Lee Carter, vol. 2, 568. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2002. Berenson, Alex, and John M. Broder. “Police Begin Seizing Guns of Civilians.” New York Times, September 9, 2005. http:// www.nytimes.com/2005/09/09/national /nationalspecial/09storm.html (accessed June 14, 2022). Blackman, Paul. “The Limitations of BATF Firearm Tracing Data for Policymaking and Homicide Research.” In National Institute of Justice Research Forum: Proceedings of the Homicide Research Working Group Meetings, 1997 and 1998, 58–59. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Office Justice Programs, May 1999 (NCJ-175708). https://www.ncjrs .gov/pdffiles1/nij/175709.pdf (accessed June 14, 2022). Bureau of Justice Statistics. State Court Sentencing of Convicted Felons, 2002: Statistical Tables. Washington, DC: Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice, 2004.

Carter, Gregg Lee. “3-D Guns—A Bad Idea.” Issues: Understanding Controversy and Society, ABC-CLIO, August 3, 2018. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1qQziUEuI pT9sw41RCwDB8gQGtIJdeQJT/view (accessed June 15, 2022). Carville, James, and Paul Begala. Take It Back: Our Party, Our Country, Our Future. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2006. CDC. “Assault or Homicide.” Centers for Disease Control, National Center for Health Statistics, November 17, 2020a. https:// www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/homicide.htm (accessed June 14, 2022). CDC. “Firearm Violence Prevention: Funded Research.” Centers for Disease Control, National Center for Health Statistics, September 22, 2020b. https://www.cdc.gov /violenceprevention /f irear ms /f unded -research.html (accessed June 14, 2022). Cleveland v. State (128 Ohio St.3d 135, 2010Ohio-6318). Decided December 29, 2010. http://www.supremecourt.ohio.gov/rod /docs /pdf/0/2010/2010-Ohio-6318.pdf (accessed June 14, 2022). Congressional Research Service. “Unemployment Rates during the COVID-19 Pandemic: In Brief.” November 6, 2020. https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R46554.pdf (accessed June 14, 2022). Cramer, Clayton E. For the Defense of Themselves and the State: The Original Intent and Judicial Interpretation of the Right to Keep and Bear Arms. Westport, CT: Praeger, 1994. Cummings, Jeanne. “Why the Gun Lobby Usually Wins.” Politico, April 17, 2007. http://www.politico.com /news /stories /0407/3563.html (accessed June 14, 2022).

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Shootings: Less Support for Gun Control in Recent Years, Evidence of Increased Polarization.” Gallup, January 10, 2011. http://www.gallup.com/poll/145526/gallup -review-public-opinion-context-tucson -shootings.aspx (accessed June 14, 2022). Nobles, Matthew Robin. “Evaluating Philadelphia’s Gun Court: Implications for Crime Reduction and Specialized Jurisprudence.” PhD diss., University of Florida, 2008. https://www.semanticscholar.org /paper/Evaluating-Philadelphia%27s-gun -court%3A-Implications-Nobles/c5448e02 2a6c89f 86491ed3b59aae0dd98f 99a6f (accessed June 15, 2022). NPR. “Some Big Health Care Policy Changes Are Hiding in the Federal Spending Package?” National Public Radio, December 18, 2019. https://www.npr.org/sections /health-shots/2019/12/18/789291340/some -big-health-care-policy-changes-are-hiding -in-the-federal-spending-package (accessed June 14, 2022). Obama, Barack. “We Must Seek Agreement on Gun Reforms.” Arizona Daily Star, March 13, 2011. https://obamawhitehouse. archives.gov/realitycheck/the-press-office /2011/03/13/op-ed-president-obama-arizona -daily-star-we-must-seek-agreement-gun -refo (accessed June 14, 2022). OpenSecrets.org. “Gun Control.” 2020a. https://www.opensecrets.org/industries /indus.php?ind=Q12++ (accessed June 14, 2022). OpenSecrets.org. “Gun Rights.” 2020b. https://www.opensecrets.org/industries /indus.php?cycle=2016&ind=Q13 (accessed June 14, 2022). OpenSecrets.org. “More Money, Less Transparency: A Decade under Citizens United.” 2020c. http://www.opensecrets.org/news /reports/a-decade-under-citizens-united (accessed June 14, 2022). OpenSecrets.org. “National Rifle Assn: Outside Spending Summary 2020.” 2020d. https:// www.opensecrets.org/outsidespending /detail.php?cycle=2020&cmte=National +Rifle+Assn (accessed June 14, 2022).

lxx | Chronology Parsons, Chelsea, Eugenio Weigend Vargas, and Rukmani Bhatia. “The Gun Industry in America: The Overlooked Player in a National Crisis.” Center for American Progress, August 6, 2020. https://www .americanprogress.org/article/gun-industry -america/ (accessed June 15, 2021). People v. Rodriguez. “Indictment Number 2917/06, Decision & Order.” Supreme Court of the State of New York, County of New York, 2006. http://www.handgunlaw.us /documents/agopinions/NYCtLEOSARulingPeoplevsRodriguez.PDF (accessed June 14, 2022). (Note: Because this case was dismissed, it was not published on any courtrelated websites maintained by the state of New York.). Pettersson, Edvard. “California CartridgeMicrostamp Law Upheld in Gun Group Loss.” Bloomberg, February 27, 2015. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles /2015-02-27/california-gun-microstamping -law-is-upheld-by-federal-judge (accessed June 14, 2022). Pierce, Glenn L., LeBaron Briggs, and David A. Carlson. “The Identification of Patterns in Firearms Trafficking: Implications for Focused Enforcement Strategies: A Report to the United States Dep’t of Treasury, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms Office of Enforcement.” Boston: Northeastern University, December 13, 1995. Pinals, Debra A., Paul S. Appelbaum, Richard J. Bonnie, Carl E. Fisher, Liza H. Gold, and Li-Wen Lee. “Resource Document on Access to Firearms by People with Mental Disorders.” Behavioral Sciences and the Law 33 (2015): 186–94. RAND. “The Effects of Extreme Risk Protection Orders.” April 22, 2020. https://www .rand.org/research/gun-policy/analysis /ext reme-r isk-protection-orders.ht ml (accessed June 14, 2022). Republican Party Platform 2020. https:// prod-cdn-static.gop.com/docs/Resolution _Platform_2020.pdf (accessed June 14, 2022). Rosenfeld, Richard, and Ernesto Lopez. “Pandemic, Social Unrest, and Crime

in U.S. Cities, 2021 Year-End Update.” Washington, DC: Council on Criminal Justice, January 2022. https://counciloncj .org/crime-trends-yearend-2021-update/ (accessed June 15, 2022). Riggs, Mike. “House Democrat Tries, Fails, to Use Patriot Act to Pass New Federal Gun Control Law.” Reason.com, May 13, 2011. http://reason.com/blog/2011/05/13 /house-democrat-tries-fails-to (accessed June 15, 2022). Roth, Jeffrey A., and Christopher S. Koper. Impacts of the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban: 1994–96. Washington, DC: National Institute of Justice, U.S. Department of Justice, March 1999 (NCJ 173405). https://www .ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/173405.pdf (accessed June 15, 2022). Rucker, Philip. “Hillary Clinton’s Push on Gun Control Marks a Shift in Presidential Politics.” Washington Post, July 9, 2015. https:// www.washingtonpost.com/politics/clinton -makes-big-gun-control-pitch-marking -shift-in-presidential-politics/2015/07/09/43 09232c-2580-11e5-b72c-2b7d516e1e0e _story.html (accessed June 15, 2022). Saadi, Altaf, Kristen R. Choi, Sae Takada, and Fred J. Zimmerman. 2020. “The Impact of Gun Violence Restraining Order Laws in the U.S. and Firearm Suicide among Older Adults: A Longitudinal State-Level Analysis, 2012–2016.” BMC Public Health (2020): 1–8. https://bmcpublichealth .biomedcentral.com /track/pdf/10.1186 /s12889-020-08462-6 (accessed June 15, 2022). Sandy Hook Promise. “STOP School Violence Act Creates Opportunity for Schools to Get Grants and Prevent Gun Violence.” Press Release, August 9, 2019. https://www .sandyhookpromise.org/press-releases/stop -school-violence-act-creates-opportunity-for -schools-to-get-grants-and-prevent-gun -violence/ (accessed June 15, 2022). Scalia, John. Federal Firearm Offenders, 1992–1998. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice (NCJ-180795), June 2000. Shear, Michael D., Tiffany Hsu, and Kirk Johnson. “Judge Blocks Attempt to Post

Chronology | lxxi Blueprints for 3-D Guns Image.” New York Times, July 31, 2018. https://www.nytimes .com/2018/07/31/us/politics/3d-guns-trump .html (accessed June 15, 2022). Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics Online. “Criminal Defendants Disposed of in U.S. District Courts, 2006.” 2011a. http://www.albany.edu/sourcebook/pdf /t5242006.pdf (accessed June 15, 2022). Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics Online. “Criminal Defendants Disposed of in U.S. District Courts, 2007.” 2011b. http://www.albany.edu/sourcebook/pdf /t5242007.pdf (accessed June 15, 2022). Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics Online. “Criminal Defendants Disposed of in U.S. District Courts, 2008.” 2011c. http://www.albany.edu/sourcebook/pdf /t5242008.pdf (accessed June 15, 2022). Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics Online. “Criminal Defendants Disposed of in U.S. District Courts, 2009.” 2011d. http://www.albany.edu/sourcebook/pdf /t5242009.pdf (accessed June 15, 2022). Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics Online. “Criminal Defendants Disposed of in U.S. District Courts, 2010.” 2011e. http://www.albany.edu/sourcebook/pdf /t5242010.pdf (accessed June 15, 2022). Southwick, Lawrence, Jr. “Enforcement of Gun Control Laws.” In Guns in American Society: An Encyclopedia of History, Politics, Culture, and the Law, edited by Gregg Lee Carter, vol. 1, 86–90. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2002. Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021. State v. Reid. 1 Ala. 612, 35 Am. Dec. 44 (1840). https://guncite.com/court/state /1al612.html (accessed June 15, 2022). Stolberg, Sheryl Gay. “Firearms Bureau Finds Itself in a Rough Patch.” New York Times, July 4, 2011. https://www.nytimes .com/2011/07/05/us/politics/05guns.html (accessed June 15, 2022). Students for Concealed Carry. “About.” 2022. ht t ps : //concealedca mpu s.org /about / (accessed June 15, 2022).

Sugarmann, Josh. National Rifle Association: Money, Firepower, Fear. Washington, DC: National Press Books, 1992. Supreme Court of the United States. District of Columbia, et al., Petitioners v. Dick Anthony Heller. No. 07-290. 554 U.S. 570; 128 S. Ct. 2783; 171 L. Ed. 2d 637; 2008 U.S. LEXIS 5268; 76 U.S.L.W. 4631; 21 Fla. L. Weekly Fed. S 497. March 18, 2008, Argued. June 26, 2008, Decided. http://www.supremecourt .gov/opinions/07pdf/07-290.pdf (accessed June 15, 2022). Supreme Court of the United States. Otis McDonald, et al., Petitioners v. City of Chicago, Illinois, et al. No. 08-1521. 130 S. Ct. 3020; 177 L. Ed. 2d 894; 2010 U.S. LEXIS 5523; 22 Fla. L. Weekly Fed. S 619. March 2, 2010, Argued. June 28, 2010, Decided. http://www.supremecourt.gov /opinions/09pdf/08-1521.pdf (accessed June 15, 2022). Syracuse.com. “247 on Terror Watch List Bought Guns.” April 28, 2011. https://www .syracuse.com/news/2011/04/247_people _on_terror_watch_lis.html (accessed June 15, 2022). Terbush, Jon. “The Obama Administration Takes Aim at 3D-Printed Guns.” The Week, May 9, 2013. https://theweek.com/articles /464504/obama-administration-takes-aim -3dprinted-guns (accessed June 15, 2022). U.S. Department of Justice. “Attorney General William P. Barr Releases First-Ever Semiannual Report on the Fix NICS Act.” Washington, DC: Office of Public Affairs, United States Department of Justice, November 14, 2019. https://www.justice .gov/opa/pr/attorney-general-william-p-barr -releases-first-ever-semiannual-report-fix -nics-act (accessed June 15, 2022). U.S. Department of Justice. “National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) Section: 2019 Operations Report.” Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2020. https://www.fbi.gov/file -repository/2019-nics-operations-report .pdf/view (accessed June 15, 2022). U.S. Department of Justice. “OJJDP Model Programs Guide: Gun Courts.” Washing-

lxxii | Chronology ton, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2010. http://www.ojjdp.gov/mpg/Resource /LitReviews (accessed June 15, 2022). U.S. Department of Justice. “Semiannual Report on the Fix NICS Act.” Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, July 2021. https://www.justice.gov/dag/page /f ile /1417981/download (accessed June 15, 2022). U.S. Department of Justice. “Whether the Second Amendment Secures an Individual Right: Memorandum Opinion for the Attorney General.” August 24, 2004. https://www.hsdl.org/?abstract&did=742066 (accessed June 15, 2022). Violence Policy Center. “National Rifle Association Suffers Self-Proclaimed ‘Biggest Election Disaster in Nearly 15 Years.’” Violence Policy Center, November 8, 2006. https://vpc.org/press/press-release-archive/ national-rif le-association-suffers-self -proclaimed-biggest-election-disaster-in -nearly-15-years/ (accessed June 15, 2022). Vizzard, William J. Shots in the Dark: The Policy, Politics and Symbolism of Gun Control. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000. Washington Post. “Aiming to Win.” December 15, 2010. https://www.washingtonpost .com /wp-sr v/special /nation /guns /nra

- endor sement s- ca mpaig n-spend i ng / (accessed June 15, 2022). Washington Post. “Bursts of Gunfire.” January 12, 2011. http://www.washingtonpost .com/wp-dyn/content/graphic/2011/01/23 /GR2011012300266.html?sid=ST201012 1406431 (accessed June 15, 2022). Whitehouse Briefing Room. “Fact Sheet: The Biden Administration Cracks Down on Ghost Guns, Ensures That ATF Has the Leadership It Needs to Enforce Our Gun Laws.” April 11, 2022. https://www.whitehouse .gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2022 /04/11/fact-sheet-the-biden-administration -cracks-down-on-ghost-guns-ensures-that -atf-has-the-leadership-it-needs-to-enforce -our-gun-laws/ (accessed June 15, 2022). Wilson, Harry L. Guns, Gun Control, and Elections: The Politics and Policy of Firearms. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007. Witte, Griff. “As Mass Shootings Rise, Experts Say High-Capacity Magazines Should Be the Focus.” Washington Post, August 18, 2019. https://www.washingtonpost.com /national/as-mass-shootings-rise-experts -say-high-capacity-magazines-should-be -the-focus/2019/08/18/d016fa66-bfa3-11e9 -a5c6-1e74f7ec4a93_story.html (accessed June 15, 2022).

A Accidents

NVDRS shows that males were even more likely to be the shooters than the victims in unintentional firearm fatalities. Alcohol was known to be involved in almost a quarter of all unintentional firearm fatalities, with the highest proportion of alcoholrelated unintentional firearm fatalities among those aged twenty to twenty-nine years (almost 50%). A study using NVDRS data found that for child victims (aged zero through fourteen), two-thirds of the time, the shooter was also a child (aged zero through fourteen) (Hemenway and Solnick 2015). In about one-third of the fatalities, the victim shot themselves; about one-third of the time, they were shot unintentionally by another child (typically an older brother or a close friend). About one-sixth of the time, they were shot by a somewhat older teen, and one-sixth by an adult, usually the parent. Child victims aged zero through ten were typically shot at home, while victims aged eleven through fourteen were sometimes shot while visiting a friend. Playing with a firearm was the most common circumstance of the unintentional firearm fatalities. Most of the firearms were owned by a family member of the victim. Not surprisingly, where there are more guns, there are more accidental gun deaths. One study found that for every age group, sex, and race, those living in states with more guns were far more likely to die of gun accidents (Miller et al. 2005). The differences were enormous. This study, published in 2001, found that the typical resident from one of the four states with the

Unintentional firearm deaths, often called gun accidents in the popular press, are only a small fraction of all firearm fatalities, but still represent a substantial public health problem. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), between 1965 and 2007, over 66,000 Americans died from accidental firearm shootings, more Americans than were killed in all the wars during that period (CDC 1997). From 2008 to 2018, another 5,700 Americans were killed unintentionally with firearms. The CDC’s Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System (WISQARS) reports Vital Statistics data for all fifty states but contains few details about each incident. In 2018, it showed that the highest rates of unintentional firearm death were for youth ages fifteen to twenty-four. Native Americans and African Americans were at high risk, as were residents of the South. Males accounted for over 90 percent of the fatalities. The CDC’s National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS) provides circumstantial information on every shooting fatality. In 2017, when thirty-six states provided data, three-quarters of unintentional firearm deaths occurred in someone’s home (including driveways, porches, and yards). About one-third of unintentional firearm deaths occurred while someone was playing with the firearm, and 14 percent occurred when the firearm was thought to be unloaded. Almost 8 percent of those unintentionally shot were current or former military. 1

| Accidents 2 most guns (Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, and Arkansas) was eight times more likely to die in a gun accident than someone from one of the four states with the fewest guns (Hawaii, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and New Jersey) (Miller, Azrael, and Hemenway 2001). Between 1979 and 1997, with virtually the same number of children in both groups of states, 104 children aged zero through four died from accidental gunshot wounds in the high-gun states, compared to only 6 in the low-gun states. Among five- to fourteen-year-olds, 565 children died from accidental gunshot wounds in the high-gun states, compared to only 42 in the low-gun states. It is not only the levels of household gun ownership but the way the firearms are stored that seems to matter. A case-control study found that firearms from case households (i.e., those with involvement in an incident where someone aged zero through nineteen was the fatal victim of an unintentional shooting or firearm suicide) were less likely to be stored unloaded, less likely to be stored locked, less likely to be stored separately from ammunition, and less likely to have ammunition that was locked compared with control firearms (Grossman et al. 2005). The fatal injury problem is, of course, only the tip of the iceberg. One study of all accidental shootings found that for every unintentional firearm fatality, there were more than ten individuals whose gunshot wounds were serious enough to be treated in hospital emergency rooms (Annest et al. 1995). In other words, almost twenty Americans each day were shot unintentionally but did not die. This number does not include any of the more than forty-five people each day who were treated in emergency rooms for BB/pellet-gun wounds, or the many others injured unintentionally by

firearms in other ways (e.g., powder burns, struck with a firearm, injured by the recoil of a firearm). A study of nonfatal accidental firearm injuries found that over one-third required hospitalization, most involved handguns, and many occurred during fairly routine gun handling—cleaning a gun, loading and unloading, hunting, or target shooting (Sinauer, Annest, and Mercy 1996). Unintentional firearm injuries are costly. The collective estimated lifetime costs— medical and work loss costs—of all unintentional firearm injuries that occurred between 2010 and 2012 equaled $1.4 billion (Fowler et al. 2015). Like death rates from most other types of unintentional injury, death rate data (i.e., WISQARS) indicate that the U.S. unintentional firearm fatality rate has been falling over the past four decades, as has the unintentional firearm fatality rate in other developed nations. There was a 50 percent decrease in the unintentional firearm fatality rate in the United States between 1993 and 1999 (from 0.6 to 0.3 per 100,000), and another smaller decrease between 1999 and 2012 (from 0.3 to 0.2 per 100,000). The reduction is probably due to a rising standard of living (injury rates are lower among higher-income populations), improvements in emergency medicine (e.g., helicopter transport, prehospital advanced life support), and increased suburbanization (accidental gun fatality rates are higher in rural than in non-rural areas). The percentage of the population who are hunters in the United States also has fallen over time. It is important to note that many studies have identified errors in coding unintentional firearm injuries. Unintentional fatalities were often miscoded as homicides, particularly among young children, while conversely, many undetermined causes of

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death among adults were misidentified as unintentional. Now that NVDRS is operating in all states, national data should be more accurate which are important for understanding and preventing this public health issue. Many policies can reduce the number of accidental gun injuries. Currently, there are no federal safety standards for domestically manufactured firearms. New regulations might require that firearms do not go off when dropped and that guns have minimum trigger-pull standards to help prevent very young children from being able to pull a gun’s trigger. One study found that three safety devices—a loaded-chamber indicator, magazine safeties (that prevent a gun from firing once the ammunition magazine has been removed), and personalization devices—could have prevented over 40 percent of unintentional gun deaths in Maryland and Milwaukee, with no change in the gun owners’ behavior (Vernick et al. 2003). Prevention advocates argue that there are more safety standards for toy guns than for real guns. They find it difficult to justify why childproof guns are not being sold to parents when child-resistant packaging of aspirin and prescription drugs prevents hundreds of deaths among children (most two- to four-year-old fatality victims shoot themselves). A simulation of an intervention showed that even modest improvements in firearm storage practices could result in reductions in fatal unintentional firearm injuries among young people in the United States (Monuteaux, Azrael, and Miller 2019). Unintentional firearm injuries remain a serious public health problem in the United States. In the early 2000s, when thirty-four injury prevention experts were asked to prioritize home injury hazards for young children, based on frequency, severity, and

preventability of the injury, the experts rated access to firearms in the home as the most significant hazard (Katcher et al. 2006). David Hemenway and Erin Grinshteyn See also: Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Guns in the Home; Loaded-Chamber Indicator; Victimization from Gun Violence; Violence Prevention Research Program (VPRP)

Further Reading Annest, Joseph L., James A. Mercy, James A. Gibson, and George W. Ryan. “National Estimates of Nonfatal Firearm-Related Injuries: Beyond the Tip of the Iceberg.” JAMA 273, no. 22 (1995): 1749–54. Barber, Catherine, and David Hemenway. “Too Many or Too Few Unintentional Firearm Deaths in Official US Mortality Data?” Accident Analysis & Prevention 43, no. 3 (2011): 724–31. CDC (Centers for Disease Control & Prevention). “Fatal Firearm Injuries in the United States, 1962–1994.” Violence Surveillance Summary Series, no 3, 1997. See also CDC WISQARS https://webappa.cdc.gov /sasweb/ncipc/mortrate (accessed May 18, 2022). Fowler, Katherine A., Linda L. Dahlberg, Tadesse Haileyesus, and Joseph L. Annest. “Firearm Injuries in the United States.” Preventive Medicine 79 (2015): 5–14. Griffin, Russell, Joseph B. Richardson, Jeffrey D. Kerby, and Gerald McGwin. “A Decompositional Analysis of FirearmRelated Mortality in The United States, 2001–2012.” Preventive Medicine 106 (2018): 194–99. Grossman, David C., Beth A. Mueller, Christine Riedy, M. Denise Dowd, Andres Villaveces, Janice Prodzinski, Jon Nakagawara, John Howard, Norman Thiersch, and Richard Harruff. “Gun Storage Practices and Risk of Youth Suicide and

| Acoustic Gunshot Detection Technologies 4 Unintentional Firearm Injuries.” JAMA 293, no. 6 (2005): 707–14. Hemenway, David. Private Guns, Public Health. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2017. Hemenway, David, and Sara J. Solnick. “Children and Unintentional Firearm Death.” Injury Epidemiology 2, no. 1 (2015): 26. Katcher, Murray L., A. N. Meister, Christine A. Sorkness, A. G. Staresinic, S. E. Pierce, B. M. Goodman, N. M. Peterson, P. M. Hatfield, and J. A. Schirmer. “Use of the Modified Delphi Technique to Identify and Rate Home Injury Hazard Risks and Prevention Methods for Young Children.” Injury Prevention 12, no. 3 (2006): 189–94. Miller, Matthew, Deborah Azrael, and David Hemenway. “Firearm Availability and Unintentional Firearm Deaths.” Accident Analysis and Prevention 33, no. 4 (2001): 477–84. Miller, Matthew, Deborah Azrael, David Hemenway, and Mary Vrinoitis. “Firearm Storage Practices and Rates of Unintentional Firearm Deaths in the United States. Accident Analysis and Prevention 37, no. 4 (2005): 661–67. Monuteaux, Michael C., Deborah Azrael, and Matthew Miller. “Association of Increased Safe Household Firearm Storage with Firearm Suicide and Unintentional Death among U.S. Youths.” JAMA Pediatrics 173, no. 7 (2019): 657–62. Sinauer, Nancy, Joseph L. Annest, and James A. Mercy. “Unintentional, Nonfatal Firearm-Related Injuries: A Preventable Public Health Burden.” JAMA 275, no. 22 (1996): 1740–43. Solnick, Sara J., and David Hemenway. “Unintentional Firearm Deaths in the United States 2005–2015.” Injury Epidemiology 6, no. 1 (2019): 42. Vernick, Jon S., M. O’Brien, Lisa M. Hepburn, Steven B. Johnson, Daniel W. Webster, and Steven W. Hargarten. “Unintentional and Undetermined Firearm

Related Deaths: A Preventable Death Analysis for Three Safety Devices.” Injury Prevention 9, no. 4 (2003): 307–11.

Acoustic Gunshot Detection Technologies Acoustic gunshot detection systems are the latest trend in gunshot detection and police response. These systems use sounddetecting technology to identify, classify, and report gunshots to the police within seconds of firing using a series of sensors that are placed on lampposts or buildings. Whenever a gunshot is fired, the sensors will detect the acoustic signature and relay it to the police. The systems relay the information on the time and location where the gunshot was fired so that police officers can respond. However, the systems do not detect a specific location; rather, police officers responding estimate the correct area using statistical procedures. Acoustic sensors are the size of a thick stick of gum. They are enclosed in a watertight box, which is similar in size to a cup and is usually fixed on top of telephone poles or a roof. The detectors are sensitive to the extent that they can distinguish between gunfire and the backfiring of a car. A field trial conducted indicated that the systems are capable of accurately sensing 84 percent of gunshots with a maximum error of forty-one feet in pinpointing the exact location of the shooter (Mazerolle et al. 2000). Usually, the sensors are installed strategically in public areas that are known to have higher rates of crime. However, for the detection to be effective, at least three sensors should concurrently detect acoustic sound waves originating from gunshots so that the exact location can be triangulated (National Institute of Justice 2016). For the



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efficiency of the systems to be guaranteed, sensors must be functional, possess minimal false alarm rates, maintain robustness to contextual noises, and have minimal processing time (Ahmed et al. 2013). A significant number of nations across the world, including the United States, England, South Korea, and Australia, are using acoustic gunshot detection technologies to help law enforcement in their daily crime detection practices. Acoustic gun detection systems’ use in urban areas was initiated by the United States’ Department of Defense in the 1990s (National Institute of Justice 2016). The technology’s aim was to combat the widespread cases of shootings in cities that made up 69.5 percent of murders in 1993 (Gun Violence Archive 2019; National Institute of Justice 2016). Despite their use in law enforcement, acoustic gunshot detection technologies remained unknown to the public until the late 1990s, when the FBI used it to locate the Beltway Snipers in Washington (National Institute of Justice 2016). Acoustic gunshot detection systems are advantageous to alternative methods like 911 calls to report a crime. Considering that acoustic detection system notification is faster than the time it would take for a person to call 911 and report the necessary information, police response is expedited, thereby reducing the likelihood of additional crime incidents. In the event that criminals perceive the likelihood of being arrested, they will have a lower motivation for committing a crime. Importantly, acoustic gunshot detection systems increase criminals’ perception that they will be apprehended. The leading manufacturers of acoustic gunshot detectors include Trilon Technology, which develops ShotSpotter; Alliant Tech Systems that manufactures Secures;

and Safety Dynamics, which makes Sentri. ShotSpotter has maintained a competitive advantage over time, thus, attracting the highest market share. However, its initial cost limits its use across every neighborhood. Moreover, its ongoing maintenance costs, including software updates and replacement sensors, remain high, though its competitors still attract similar costs. A primary drawback of the system is that it cannot ensure 100 percent accuracy when detecting gunshots and pinpointing their locations (Choi et al. 2014). Therefore, law enforcement cannot exclusively rely on data from these systems to lead their responses. Gunshot detections are effective if they are supplemented with citizen reports. Acoustic gunshot detection systems notify the police that there is a possibility that criminal activity is taking place. The police can then conduct further investigations regarding the source and cause of the gunshots. Even though acoustic gunshot detection systems have shortcomings of inaccuracy and cost, their value could still be improved. The acoustic gunshot system should be complemented with closed circuit television (CCTV) to increase the reliability of detection systems. When the two technologies are paired, the cameras can automatically pick up the videos from the suspected scene of crime once the gunshot was detected acoustically. In that case, the CCTV will serve as the “eye,” while the acoustic sensors are the “ears.” That way, a higher police response rate will be achieved. In case the sensors detect a gunshot, but the CCTV cameras show that the sound was from a car backfiring, the event is closed immediately instead of sending police officers to the scene. Acoustic gunshot detection systems should eliminate the need for a dispatcher (Choi et al. 2014). Choi and colleagues

| Acoustic Gunshot Detection Technologies 6 argued that police cars should be fitted with dispatch screens that alert them about gunshots. Previously, the alerts were made on the police department’s main dispatch center. That way, response time would be reduced as officers would respond to the signals instead of waiting for dispatch orders from the department. Acoustic gunshot detection systems should also be mobile such that they can be moved from one place to another when the need arises, rather than only fixing them in particular localities. Acoustic gunshot detection technology cannot detect gunshots fired indoors or those fired from guns fitted with silencers. For the system to detect gunfire, the shots must occur in an open place. A study in 2016 found that 22 percent of violent attacks occurred indoors, whereas 20 percent happened on the way to or from work. In that regard, a significant number of gunshotrelated crimes will go undetected if acoustic gunshot detection systems are not completed by other methods. However, research on the application of acoustic gunshot detectors in indoor environments is ongoing. South Carolina’s Charleston International Airport, for example, is piloting indoor gunshot detection systems in their passenger terminals (Wise 2018). Previous studies have found acoustic gunshot detection systems to have an impact on police workloads. For instance, a 1998 study reported that acoustic gunshot detection systems affect police response times and their overall workloads (Mazerolle et al. 1998). The study also investigated police dispatched to 151 scenes detected by technology and 39 other scenes reported by citizens through 911. The two dispatches accounted for a 287 percent rise in the number of law enforcement officers responding to suspected crime scenes

(Mazerolle et al. 1998). In that regard, technology increased the police workload significantly. However, acoustic gunshot detection systems reduced police response time by 7 percent or approximately one minute (Mazerolle et al. 1998). According to a 2012 study, emergency calls from citizens decreased by 25 percent when acoustic gunshot detection systems were installed in 2013 but increased in 2016 when they technologies were stopped due to budgetary constraints. However, the effectiveness of the technology remains questionable, considering that only thirteen arrests were made out of the more than 19,000 police responses to acoustic gun detections (Mares and Blackburn 2012). In that regard, the technology is appropriate in aiding police response, but it does not necessarily translate to arrests. Installation and use of acoustic gunshot detection systems have been found to reduce residents’ willingness to contact the police when they hear gunshots (Mares and Blackburn 2012). The reduced willingness among residents to report crime instances could be informed by a perception that technology is highly effective and, therefore, it has already alerted the police (Mares and Blackburn 2012). The residents, therefore, feel that their efforts are insignificant. The residents also assume that someone else in their neighborhood has already contacted the police, and, therefore, they do not make any effort (Mazerolle et al. 1998). In that case, the installation of acoustic gunshot detection technologies coupled with residents’ assumptions creates a perception among residents that police do not require public input in locating the gunshot origins and the criminals involved. The use of acoustic gunshot detection systems is associated with their availability in the market. Acoustic gunshot detection



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systems were developed at a time when the country was experiencing rising crime rates. According to the National Institute of Justice (2016), the adoption of acoustic gunshot detection technologies has caused a decline in gun crimes in the United States. Mares and Blackburn (2012) noted that the acoustic gunshot detection technologies’ market has been manipulated to increase purchases. Mares and Blackburn (2012) cited highly broadcasted crime instances where acoustic gunshot detection technology resulted in high-profile arrests or halted active shooting. The cases are meant to amplify the technology’s effectiveness and prompt politicians and police administrators to make purchase decisions. A majority of the manufacturers hold the technologies’ data and keep it secret, thus, making it difficult for administrators to evaluate the efficiency and effectiveness of these technologies. Mares and Blackburn (2012) argued that manufacturers also publish misleading information on their websites, for instance, that before the widespread use of acoustic gunshot detection technologies, members of the society were only reporting an average of 20 percent of gunshot instances via 911. The information is wrong because police officers estimate that residents report approximately 80 percent of the crime cases in their neighborhood (National Institute of Justice 2016). A consistent recommendation related to acoustic gunshot detection technologies is that the implementation such systems in police departments should be backed by scientific studies and data (Mares and Blackburn 2012; Mazerolle et al. 1998). Manufacturers and retailers can market their acoustic gun detection technologies through the media by paying for widespread coverage of crime scenes to paint the technology as the facilitator to arrests of

criminals so that they can attract customers (Mares and Blackburn 2012). Studies paint a thin line between the effectiveness of acoustic gunshot detection technologies and relying on 911 calls. Gunshots reported through acoustic gunshot detection systems are rarely classified as crime acts (Mares and Blackburn 2012). In that case, the system faces a higher risk of being classified as ineffective due to the negligible crime rates it detects. Rakeem (Rocky) Means See also: Assault Weapons; Crime and Gun Use; Drive-By Shootings; Washington, DC, Sniper Attacks

Further Reading Ahmed, Talal, Momin Uppal, and Abubakr Muhammad. “Improving Efficiency and Reliability of Gunshot Detection Systems.” 2013 IEEE International Conference on Acoustics, Speech and Signal Processing. IEEE, 2013. Choi, Kyung-Shick, Mitch Librett, and Taylor J. Collins. “An Empirical Evaluation: Gunshot Detection System and Its Effectiveness on Police Practices.” Police Practice and Research 15, no. 1 (2014): 48–61. Gun Violence Archive. 2019. https://www .gunviolencearchive.org/reports /mass -shooting (accessed October 1, 2019). Mares, Dennis, and Emily Blackburn. “Evaluating the Effectiveness of an Acoustic Gunshot Location System in St. Louis, MO.” Policing 6, no. 1 (2012): 26–42. Mazerolle, Lorraine G., James Frank, Dennis Rogan, and Cory Watkins. Field Evaluation of the ShotSpotter Gunshot Location System: Final Report on the Redwood City Field Trial. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2000. Mazerolle, Lorraine G., Cory Watkins, Dennis Rogan, and James Frank. “Using Gunshot Detection Systems in Police Departments: The Impact on Police Response Times and

| Acquisition of Guns 8 Officer Workloads.” Police Quarterly 1, no. 2 (1998): 21–49. National Institute of Justice. Baseline Specifications for Law Enforcement Service Pistols with Security Technology. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2016. Wise, Warren L. “Charleston Airport First to Install Active Shooter Alert System in Public Areas.” The Post and Courier, October 15, 2018. https://www.postandcourier.com /business/charleston-airport-first-to-install -active-shooter-alert-system-in-public -areas/article_bcb81f16-cd75-11e8-8a66 -5762ed285a27.html (accessed June 12, 2022).

Acquisition of Guns Patterns of acquisition of guns have changed over the years. In the eighteenth century, civilian firearms were custom-made by gunsmiths and obtained directly from them. With the expansion of mass production in the nineteenth century, firearms were commonly ordered direct from the manufacturer. By the twentieth century, manufacturers had established marketing systems whereby the manufacturer sold to a wholesaler, or “jobber,” who in turn sold to local dealers. An exception to this pattern was the mail-order house, which sold arms (mostly military surplus) and shipped them direct to its customers; mail-order houses vanished after the Gun Control Act of 1968, which generally prohibited interstate sales to nondealers. A lively trade in used firearms, either person-to-person or through a dealer, exists in addition to these commercial outlets. Gun shows are especially popular, as many federal firearm regulations—such as background checks—are often sidestepped. The total number of firearms acquired and owned by Americans can only be roughly approximated. In 2018, the National

Opinion Research Center reported that 35 percent of American households reported owning a firearm, a figure that has fallen steadily over the past four decades (e.g., in 1973, it was 49.1%). Although Smith (2001) documents several reasons for the decline in gun ownership (e.g., there has been a steady decline in the popularity of hunting), studies of underreporting errors suggest the real figure may be higher. Most households claiming to possess firearms report that they own several guns. The total number of firearms owned by Americans in 2018 was estimated at 393 million (Ingraham 2018). The acquisition of firearms by criminal elements has been the subject of a U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics survey of prison inmates in 2016 (2019). Of the 20,064 state and 4,784 federal inmates who were surveyed for the study, 13.9 percent and 5.0 percent, respectively, reported using a firearm during the commission of their crime (including both violent and nonviolent offenses). Notably, an even larger proportion were in possession of a gun at the time of their arrest (state: 20.9%; federal: 20.0%). The inmates reported the following sources of the firearms they used: an underground/illegal market (43.2%), a friend or relative (25.3%), a licensed gun dealer (8.2%), theft (6.4%), and a private seller (1.2%). Those groups suspicious of strong gun control efforts are especially quick to highlight these data, as they show that a large portion of the criminal population is able to sidestep regulations meant to keep guns out of their hands, while rarely resorting to gun shows. David T. Hardy See also: Black Market for Firearms; Felons and Gun Control; Firearm Dealers; Gun Control Act of 1968; Gun Shows; Mail-Order Guns



African Americans and Gun Violence | 9

Further Reading

gun violence has increased among African Americans. African American youth, especially young males, have been particularly affected by gun violence. In addition to higher rates of violent crime, suicide rates among members of the African American community have also increased. This has led community leaders to decry the selfdestruction of younger generations and call for increased gun control measures. In 1619, the first African Americans were brought as slaves to the region that would become the United States. Within the first few decades after the establishment of the initial colonies, laws were passed that denied African Americans, both slaves and freemen, access to firearms. In 1640, Virginia became the first colony to enact legislation that prohibited African Americans from carrying weapons in public. This was followed by legislation throughout the colonies that prohibited African Americans from even possessing firearms. The fear of a slave revolt was the main rationale for these laws. However, they also served to further disenfranchise and alienate African Americans from full participation in the socioeconomic mainstream. Following the American Revolution (1775–1783), laws were passed at the national level to deny African Americans access to firearms. In 1792, Congress enacted the Uniform Militia Act. This legislation called upon every “able-bodied white citizen” to be a member of his respective state militia and possess a rifle, bayonet, and ammunition if called up for service. This effectively banned African Americans from service in the militias. Even as northern states outlawed slavery, many continued bans or added new bans on gun ownership among the African American community. Concurrently, southern states continued to restrict gun ownership.

Bureau of Justice Statistics. “Source and Use of Firearms Involved in Crimes: Survey of Prison Inmates, 2016.” Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2019. https:// www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/suficspi16 .pdf (accessed July 13, 2020). Ingraham, Thomas. “There are More Guns than People in the United States, According to a New Study of Global Firearm Ownership.” Washington Post, June 19, 2018. https://www.washingtonpost.com /news /wonk /wp /2018/ 06/19/there-are -more-guns-than-people-in-the-united -st ates-accord i ng-to -a-new-st udy- of -global-firearm-ownership/ (accessed July 13, 2020). National Opinion Research Center. General Social Survey, 2018 (“Do You Happen to Have in Your Home [or Garage] Any Guns or Revolvers?” If Yes, “Is It a Pistol, Shotgun, Rifle, or What?”). http://gss.norc.org/ (accessed July 13, 2020). National Shooting Sports Foundation. “Quarterly Firearm and Ammunition Taxes Up 29 Percent.” http://www.nssf.org/news room /releases /show.cfm?PR= 020110. cfm&path=2010 (accessed February 14, 2011). Smith, Tom W. 2001 National Gun Policy Survey of the National Opinion Research Center: Research Findings. Chicago: National Opinion Research Center, 2001.

African Americans and Gun Violence Gun violence has disproportionately affected the African American community. For much of U.S. history, firearms were used as a means to subjugate African Americans and deny them full economic and political rights. Whereas overall crime rates, including gunrelated crime, have declined among the general population during the past decade,

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A law passed in 1825 even allowed the Florida militia and law enforcement to arbitrarily search African American homes for guns. As new slave states joined the Union, they also enacted bans on gun ownership by slaves. Texas passed such laws in 1840. When challenges to these laws were brought in state courts by free African Americans, they were uniformly rejected on the basis that African Americans, whether slave or free, were not considered to be citizens of the United States. Examples of these cases included the North Carolina case State v. Newsom in 1840 and Georgia’s Cooper v. Savannah in 1848. In the infamous Supreme Court case Dred Scott v. Sandford in 1857, the nation’s highest court held that African Americans who were slaves or the descendants of slaves were not entitled to the rights of citizenship, including the right to carry or possess firearms. Until the Civil War (1861–1865), guns were the primary tools used to keep African Americans in bondage. The inequity of power that resulted from the white monopoly on gun ownership meant that African Americans could not effectively resist slavery. The most significant slave revolt in American history, Nat Turner’s Revolt in Virginia in 1831, demonstrated the inability of African Americans to overcome the wellarmed state militia. Turner and his band of about sixty followers killed fifty-five white men, women, and children. However, within a week, the revolt was put down by the militia. Turner and the majority of his supporters were either hanged or summarily executed. Whites throughout the state undertook reprisals against suspected sympathizers of Turner, killing dozens of innocent African Americans. When the Civil War ended, various measures were passed to try to integrate African Americans into the broader society.

However, in the immediate aftermath of the conflict, southern states such as Mississippi, Louisiana, and Alabama again passed laws that forbade African Americans from owning or possessing weapons. Such laws were part of the “Black Codes,” which were designed to restrict the newly won freedoms of African Americans. Congress attempted to overturn the Black Codes through the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which specifically stated that laws prohibiting African Americans from “having firearms” were illegal. The Civil Rights Act was bolstered by the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868, which made African Americans full citizens of the United States and guaranteed all Americans equal protection of the law. The passage of the Fourteenth Amendment led white supremacists to seek other means to prevent African Americans from having access to guns. From the end of the Civil War onward, African Americans faced terror and harassment from such groups as the Ku Klux Klan (KKK). These groups sought to intimidate African Americans into leaving the South or to keep them subservient by maintaining the prewar social order. If African Americans had been able to defend themselves, such intimidation would not have been successful. Therefore, state legislatures throughout the nation-enacted legislation to deny access to weapons based on economic constraints. In 1870, Tennessee banned the sale of all handguns, except the expensive models (which most whites already owned as a result of their service in the Civil War). Other states, including Arkansas, Alabama, and Texas, passed similar laws. These laws affected new sales of weapons, so that the white population was able to retain the firearms it already possessed. African Americans suffered a further setback in their efforts to acquire firearms



African Americans and Gun Violence | 11

to protect themselves when the Supreme Court ruled in United States v. Cruikshank (1875) that the national government did not have the power to stop the KKK from disarming African Americans. Instead, African Americans had to rely on state and local law enforcement to protect them. These institutions were often dominated by white supremacists or were unwilling to act for fear of alienating themselves from the white population. Throughout the early period of the twentieth century, guns continued to be concentrated in the hands of white citizens, and African Americans continued to face terror and oppression. The revival of the KKK in 1915 led to a renewed wave of lynchings and racially motivated killings in the South and Midwest. Such violence continued through the modern civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s. Efforts to empower African Americans in the South were met with resistance, often armed in nature, and those working to expand civil rights were frequently targeted for violence. The 1964 slaying of three civil rights workers in Mississippi exemplified this trend. Frustration over continued discrimination and economic disparities sparked a series of race riots in the mid-1960s. For instance, the 1965 Watts riot in Los Angeles left thirtyfour dead, while riots in Newark, New Jersey, in 1967 killed twenty-six, and similar riots in Detroit killed at least forty. These dramatic periods of violence occurred simultaneously with a general rise in violent crime rates. From the end of World War II onward, the availability of inexpensive handguns, often called Saturday night specials, was partially responsible for this upswing in violence. Public reaction to the growth in crime rates and the 1968 assassinations of both Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy prompted Congress to

pass the Gun Control Act of 1968. This was followed by a number of state Saturday night special laws that banned certain types of inexpensive handguns. Violent gun crime in the United States peaked in the 1970s. However, although overall crime rates have declined since then, gun violence continued to increase in the African American community. The dramatic increase in violent crime as a result of the proliferation of certain illicit drugs, including crack cocaine, has been worsened by a new wave of inexpensive handguns. Since 1993, half of all new firearms have been handguns, and since 1973, more than forty million new handguns have become available in the United States. From 1985 through 1992, both homicide and arrest rates for homicide among African American males doubled. Concurrently, homicide rates among the general population decreased by 27 percent. African Americans are three times as likely to be victims of handgun violence as are whites. In addition, rates of gun violence among African American youth increased by 300 percent, and these same youth were four times as likely as their white counterparts to be victims of gun violence. Although African Americans make up about 12 percent of the population, almost 50 percent of homicide victims are African American. Significantly, the majority of gun violence that is now directed toward African Americans is perpetuated by African Americans. By 2000, almost 90 percent of gun violence suffered by African Americans was committed by other African Americans. Meanwhile, African Americans reported far lower rates of gun ownership than other groups. For instance, whereas 44 percent of white households reported owing a firearm in 2010, only 27 percent of African American homes owned a gun (Sourcebook of

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Criminal Justice Statistics 2011b). There were also differences in attitudes toward gun control. Whereas 42 percent of whites agree with the notion that controlling gun ownership is more important than protecting gun rights, 66 percent of African Americans agree (Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics 2011a). Through the early 2000s, African Americans continued to be disproportionately affected by gun violence, even as violent crimes declined across the nation. Between 2002 and 2007, homicide rates among African Americans increased by more than 30 percent, while homicide rates by firearms rose by more than 50 percent. By 2008, the murder rate for African Americans was 18 per 100,000, whereas the national average was approximately 5 per 100,000. The majority of the victims were male, more than 85 percent, and the average age was thirty. By 2016, the murder rate for African Americans was 20.44 per 100,000, compared to the national average of 5.1 per 100,000, and the homicide rate for African American males was 37.12 per 100,000, compared to the national average of 8.29 per 100,000 males (Federal Bureau of Investigation 2018). Handguns continued to be the most common weapons used in homicides in the African American community. On average, handguns were used in approximately 65–70 percent of homicides each year from 2010 through 2018. Higher gun-crime rates among African Americans were concentrated in seventeen states and in specific urban areas in those states, including cities such as Chicago, Illinois; St. Louis, Missouri; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Detroit, Michigan; New Orleans, Louisiana; and Memphis, Tennessee. Studies indicate that urban areas with significant gang activity had higher rates of gun crime. Moreover,

California, New York and Texas, states with the largest urban populations, were the states with the highest total incidents of gun crimes among African Americans (Violence Policy Center 2011). Tom Lansford See also: Black Codes; Crime and Gun Use; Ku Klux Klan (KKK); NAACP and Gun Control; Police Shootings; Poverty and Gun Violence; Vigilantism; Youth and Guns

Further Reading Alexander, Rudolph, Jr., ed. Race and Justice. Huntington, NY: Nova Science Publishers, 2000. Carter, Gregg Lee. The Gun Control Movement. New York: Twayne, 1997. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Uniform Crime Reporting Program Data: Supplementary Homicide Reports, United States, 2016. Washington, DC: Department of Justice, 2018. Griffin, Sean Patrick. Black Brothers, Inc.: The Violent Rise and Fall of Philadelphia’s Black Mafia. New York: Milo, 2005. Kedia, P. Ray, ed. Black on Black Crime: Facing Facts, Challenging Fictions. Bristol, IN: Wyndham Hall Press, 1994. Ogletree, Charles, Jr. Beyond the Rodney King Story: An Investigation of Police Conduct in Minority Communities. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1995. Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics. “Table 2.0040.2010: Respondents Reporting Whether They Think Gun Control or the Right to Own a Gun is More Important—by Demographic Characteristics, United States, 2010 (Question: ‘What Do You Think Is More Important–to Protect the Right of Americans to Own Guns, or to Control Gun Ownership?’).” 2011a. http:// w w w.alba ny.edu /sou rcebook /tost _ 2 .html#2_ak (accessed June 8, 2020). Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics. “Table 2.60.2010: Respondents Reporting

AK-47 | 13 Having a Gun in their Home or on Property. By Demographic Characteristics, United States, 2010.” 2011b. http://www .albany.edu/sourcebook/tost_2.html#2_ak (accessed June 8, 2020). Sulton, Anne T., ed. African-American Perspectives on Crime Causation, Criminal Justice Administration, and Crime Prevention. Englewood, CO: Sulton Books, 1994. Tolnay, Stewart E., and E. M. Beck. A Festival of Violence: An Analysis of Southern Lynchings, 1882–1930. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1995. Violence Policy Center. Black Homicide Victimization in the United States: An Analysis of 2008 Homicide Data. Washington, DC: Violence Policy Center, January 2011. http://www.vpc.org/studies/ (accessed June 25, 2011).

AK-47 The AK-47 was one of the first assault rifles ever built and is the most numerous and widely used assault rifle in the world. Millions of this model and its close cousins (such as the AKM, a modernized version of the AK-47 first produced in 1959, and the Norinco Type 56, a Chinese copy) were used as standard infantry weapons in the Soviet Union, the former Warsaw Pact countries, China, and many other countries, starting in the late 1940s. In later decades, it continued to see wide use in military, revolutionary, insurgent, and terrorist forces around the world, including Afghanistan, Colombia, Iraq, and other locations. The Israeli Galil and Finnish Valmet assault rifles use the same basic action. The AK-47 was replaced in Soviet service with the very similar AKM, which was subsequently replaced with the similar but smaller-caliber AK-74. The name AK-47 is short for “Automatic Kalashnikov model 1947.”

The AK-47 is a selective-fire (capable of semiautomatic or automatic fire at the flip of a switch), gas-operated assault rifle that feeds 7.62 × 39 mm ammunition from a detachable thirty-round magazine and has an effective range of about 300 meters. It weighs nearly 10 pounds and is about 34 inches long. It is generally regarded as robust, reliable, and easy to manufacture. AK-47s, like all automatic weapons, are subject to rigorous control in the United States. This has been the case since the passage of the National Firearms Act of 1934. Very few AK-47s are in civilian hands. However, thousands of semiautomatic derivatives of the AK-47 have been sold in the United States, including the Chinese Norinco Type 56S. Although the semiautomatic versions meet the definition of an “assault weapon” under U.S. and state statutes, they are not “assault rifles” per se—since an assault rifle is a selective-fire automatic rifle (Defense Intelligence Agency 1988), a semiautomatic rifle cannot be an assault rifle. Conversely, an AK-47 assault rifle is not an “assault weapon” as the term has been defined in the United States Code because an “assault weapon” is semiautomatic while an AK-47 is automatic. Although semiautomatic derivatives of the AK-47 have a reputation for being particularly dangerous or lethal, this reputation is not entirely accurate. Semiautomatic versions of the AK-47 have a shorter range and less penetration and wound-causing potential than many ordinary center-fire hunting rifles. (The AK-47’s intermediate-power 7.62 mm cartridge produces wounds less serious than common deer-hunting cartridges such as the .308 Winchester or .30-06, especially when military-type full metal jacket bullets are used.) Their rate of fire is similar to that of other semiautomatic rifles, and their rate of accurate, aimed fire is not dramatically higher than that of bolt-action rifles.

14 | Alcohol and Gun Violence

An instructor at a shooting range demonstrates how to use a Kalashnikov rifle. (guruXOOX/ iStockphoto.com)

In 1989, Patrick Purdy used a Norinco Type 56S, which looks like an AK-47 but is semiautomatic, in his infamous attack on an elementary school playground in Stockton, California. He killed 5 people and wounded 30. As is not unusual in notorious mass shooting cases, the Stockton murders galvanized gun control efforts. California responded by passing the Roberti-Roos Assault Weapon Control Act of 1989, and President George H. W. Bush banned the importation of several kinds of semiautomatic weapons that same year, including the Norinco Type 56S. Matthew DeBell

New Atlantis 32 (2011): 140–47. https:// www.jstor.org/stable/43152665 (accessed May 18, 2022). Jenzen-Jones, N. R., and Matt Schroeder, eds. An Introductory Guide to the Identification of Small Arms, Light Weapons, and Associated Ammunition. Geneva: Small Arms Survey, 2018. https://www.small armssurvey.org/resource /introductory -guide-identification-small-arms-light -weapons-and-associated-ammunition (accessed May 18, 2022). Rottman, Gordon L. The AK-47: Kalashnikov-series Assault Rifles. London: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2011.

See also: Assault Weapons; Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; National Firearms Act of 1934

Alcohol and Gun Violence

Further Reading Hanson, Victor D. “The World’s Most Popular Gun: The Long Road to the AK-47.” The

Alcohol is identified as a root cause of gun violence in only a small percentage of cases. However, alcohol, drugs, and firearms are designated “criminogenic commodities”



because they are each so frequently involved in crime, especially violent crime (Moore 1983). Since the failure of Prohibition, its proponents’ identities and concerns have been obscured by decades of uncomprehending ridicule. Its proponents were truly the best and the brightest of three generations of humane, progressive Americans: William Lloyd Garrison, Horace Mann, Frederick Douglass, Susan B. Anthony, the Beechers (Harriet, Lyman, and Henry), Horace Greeley, Jane Addams, and William Jennings Bryan. Far from being narrowly religious, they were motivated by the involvement of alcohol in a vast amount of violent criminal behavior, including sex crimes and all varieties of homicide, particularly domestic homicide. “The Bottle,” a late nineteenthcentury cartoon by D. W. Moody, typifies their attitudes. It shows a husband being dragged off by the police in front of his children, who also witnessed the father beating their mother to death with the liquor bottle that now lies broken next to her head. The caption reads, “The husband in a state of furious drunkenness, kills his wife with the instrument of all their misery.” Indeed, the arguments for Prohibition closely parallel modern arguments for banning handguns. Comparatively, 28.7 percent of violent crimes involve firearms (primarily handguns), and roughly 31–36 percent of violent crimes are committed by offenders who were drinking (National Center for Alcohol Law Enforcement 2006). Handguns are the weapons used in approximately 62 percent of murders (Federal Bureau of Investigation 2020), and nationally, an estimated 46 percent of murderers were positive for alcohol (Kuhns et al. 2014). Additionally, an estimated 33 percent of robbers were intoxicated (Felson and Staff 2010), and roughly 36 percent of robbers use firearms

Alcohol and Gun Violence | 15

(Federal Bureau of Investigation 2020). More generally, a study by epidemiologists at the University of Pennsylvania found that risk of being a victim of gun violence increases with higher alcohol consumption and proximity to places that sell alcohol to go (Branas et al. 2009). Beyond the toll of intentional crime is that from liquor-induced accidents. Drunk drivers kill over 10,000 people annually. There were more than 500 accidental gun deaths each year in the second decade of the twenty-first century; though there are no figures on how many of these are alcoholrelated, the kinds of people who cause such accidents tend to have records of alcohol and drug abuse. Adding in alcohol-related illnesses, alcohol is involved in 4 percent of all American deaths annually, while handguns are involved in 1 percent or fewer. At the same time, it should be emphasized that these problems are not associated with either drinking or gun ownership by ordinary people. If the incidence of alcoholrelated criminal violence seems very large viewed on its own, it is minuscule compared to the vast number of Americans (roughly half of all adults) who drink without causing any harm. Alcohol-related crimes and accidents are usually linked to heavy drinkers. Even so, the great majority of heavy drinkers do not harm anyone. By the same token, the incidence of gun violence (27.8% of all serious violent crime) is infinitesimal if viewed in the context of 393 million firearms contained in about 40 percent of American households. Serious violent crime is not “caused” by the possession of alcohol or guns by normal people. Rather, violent crimes are committed by abnormal individuals as part of a pathology of highly aberrant behavior that includes regularly inebriating themselves (with alcohol or narcotics, or both) and inflicting

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harm on others with firearms or other weapons. Another area in which firearms may be compared to alcohol is the ease with which restrictions, or total prohibition, of each are enforceable. Prohibiting or severely restricting guns among the general populace raises more or less the same enforceability problems as did alcohol prohibition—only more so. The single most important difference is that guns are not consumed by their use. Temperance advocates recognized that many drinkers might defy Prohibition, but they nevertheless counted on the fact that continued drinking would expose drinkers to the risks of detection as they made repeated purchases of alcohol. But for the owners of the nation’s 250 million guns, defying a ban would require merely doing nothing, that is, the low-visibility, low-risk failure to turn in their guns. (Of course, for the gun to continue to be useful for either criminal activity or for self-defense, the owner would need to procure fresh ammunition at least once every twenty to forty years.) Motivations for gun owners to violate a ban in many ways parallel the motivations that impelled even otherwise law-abiding drinkers to violate Prohibition. One motivation for violation in each case is the feeling by responsible drinkers/gun owners that they are being blamed, and their liberty circumscribed, for the misbehavior of a tiny minority of highly aberrant drinkers/gun owners whom the responsible majority despises and sharply differentiates from themselves. The outrage and anger this generates among the responsible majority inclines them to regard the ban as egregiously unjust. In the case of gun owners, anger and outrage are fueled by the deep belief (whether it is correct or not is irrelevant) that the ban is unconstitutional because the right to bear arms is guaranteed

in the Bill of Rights. This argument was not available to drinkers because Prohibition was unquestionably legally valid, having been enacted by constitutional amendment. Also crucially important is the immediate impetus for defying the law. Obviously, alcoholics during Prohibition experienced severe pressure to continue drinking, regardless of the law. But for the great majority of drinkers, namely, social drinkers, the pressure to continue drinking was far less. In contrast, those who believe a gun is a vital tool for defending themselves and their families clearly have a greater impetus for violating a gun ban. None of this should be misunderstood as meaning that defiance of a firearms-confiscation measure would be universal. After all, despite the mythology that grew up after its repeal, many Americans did stop drinking in response to Prohibition. However, in gun prohibition as in alcohol prohibition, the result is likely to be less than desirable: the people most likely to comply are the responsible, law-abiding people whose drinking or gun ownership represents no problem, whereas those most likely to resist are the people whom it is most desirable to affect. Don B. Kates Jr. See also: Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime; Average-Joe Thesis

Further Reading Branas, Charles C., Michael R. Elliott, Therese S. Richmond, Dennis P. Culhane, and Douglas J. Wiebe. “Alcohol Consumption, Alcohol Outlets, and the Risk of Being Assaulted with a Gun.” Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research (2009): 906–15. Bureau of Justice Statistics. Alcohol and Crime: An Analysis of National Data on the Prevalence of Alcohol Involvement in Crime. Washington, DC: U.S. Department

of Justice, 1998. http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov /content/pub/pdf/ac.pdf (accessed December 28, 2011). Federal Bureau of Investigation. Crime in the United States 2019 [Uniform Crime Reports online]. Baltimore, 2020. https://ucr.fbi .gov/cr i me-i n-the-u.s /2019 /cr i me-i n -the-u.s.-2019 (accessed January 20, 2022). Felson, Richard B., and Jeremy Staff. “The Effects of Alcohol Intoxication on Violent versus Other Offending.” Criminal Justice and Behavior 37, no. 12 (2010): 1343–60. Kates, Don B. “Handgun Banning in Light of the Prohibition Experience.” In Firearms and Violence: Issues of Public Policy, edited by Don B. Kates, 139–65. Cambridge, MA: Ballinger, 1989. Kleck, Gary. Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyer, 1997. Kuhns, Joseph B., M. Lyn Exum, Tammatha A. Clodfelter, and Martha C. Bottia. “The Prevalence of Alcohol-Involved Homicide Offending: A Meta-Analytic Review.” Homicide Studies 18, no. 3 (2014): 251–70. Moore, Mark H. “Controlling Criminogenic Commodities: Drugs, Guns and Alcohol.” In Crime and Public Policy, edited by James Q. Wilson, 125–44. San Francisco: Institute for Contemporary Studies, 1983. National Center for Alcohol Law Enforcement. Alcohol and Violent Crime: What is the Connection? What Can Be Done? Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Bureau of Justice Assistance, 2006. https://www . n l le a .o r g / d o c u m e nt s /A lc oh ol _ a n d _Crime.pdf (accessed June 12, 2022).

American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) is a nationwide medical association dedicated to the health of all children. The

American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) | 17

AAP takes one of the strongest firearm policy positions in the medical community, calling for the banning of handguns, assault weapons, and deadly air guns. The AAP’s activities include supporting model gun control legislation, educating pediatricians and lay people about the dangers of firearms for children, and providing resources related to firearm injuries and violence. On its Healthy Children website, the AAP succinctly states its position on gun safety. Founded in 1930 by 35 pediatricians, the AAP of 2021 had 67,000 members, including over 45,000 board-certified Fellows. The mission of the AAP is “to attain optimal physical, mental, and social health and well-being for all infants, children, adolescents, and young adults.” AAP programs in relation to firearms reflect that commitment and its position that gun violence is a public health issue. Through its “Periodic Survey of Fellows,” the AAP gets feedback from members. The latest survey on guns and children indicates widespread agreement with AAP positions on gun control and on the importance of pediatricians educating parents about firearm safety. The AAP published its first policy statement related to firearms in 1992. The statement was subsequently updated in 2000 (reaffirmed in 2004) and 2012 (reaffirmed in 2016). In each available statement, the AAP examined data on firearm-related deaths and injuries over the past decade. Although acknowledging continued decreases in gun violence in recent years, the AAP noted that 2,993 firearm-related deaths of children and adolescents (through age nineteen) occurred in 2009; nearly 85 percent of all homicides and just over 60 percent of all suicides for adolescents aged fifteen through nineteen were committed with a firearm; 114 adolescents died from unintentional gun-related injuries in 2009; and the rates of

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firearm-related deaths for the United States are the highest among industrialized countries. In fact, the overall rate of firearmrelated deaths for U.S. children under fifteen is nearly ten times greater, and the rate of firearm-related suicide is nearly eight times higher, than that for twenty-five other industrialized countries. Reaffirming its long-standing position that children are safest when there are no guns in their environment, the AAP policy statement renewed its support for banning handguns, semiautomatic assault weapons, and dangerous air guns. The policy states, “Because firearm-related injury to children is associated with death and severe morbidity and is a significant public health problem, child health care professionals can and should provide effective leadership in efforts to stem this epidemic.” In supporting such bans, the AAP had suggested that the Second Amendment does not grant individuals the right to bear arms. Recommendations for firearm safety to parents stress that the safest thing is not to have a gun in the home, especially a handgun. The Healthy Children initiative includes concise advice to parents titled “Guns in the Home.” For homes in which there are guns, the AAP emphasizes the importance of securely locking guns and ammunition in separate, secure places. The AAP also recommends ensuring that children do not have access to keys to the locations of guns and ammunition, asking police for advice on safe storage and gunlocks, and talking with children about the risk of gun injury outside of the home. The AAP also strongly urges parents to work at making their homes safe, nonviolent places, discouraging overt displays of hostility between parents and among siblings. The AAP has also expressed concern with the level of violence depicted in mass

media, especially television. Reflecting this concern, the AAP made eleven recommendations for pediatricians in regard to media violence. These include recommending that pediatricians urge the entertainment industry to be more sensitive to media violence issues, contact local stations regarding violent programming, urge parents to monitor and limit their children’s television viewing, and become better educated about media violence. In regard to parents, the AAP recommends limiting children’s television watching to one to two hours a day, talking to children about television violence, and discussing with children nonviolent ways of resolving disagreements and solving problems. In its Violence Intervention and Prevention Program Database, the AAP provides additional resources on firearms, some developed by other groups or organization. These include a Speaker’s Kit on “Preventing Firearm Injury: Protecting Our Children”; the brochure “Keep Your Family Safe from Firearm Injury” for distribution by pediatricians; the “Firearm Injury Prevention Resource Guide,” a directory of groups working to prevent firearm injuries; and the “Steps to Prevent (STOP) Firearm Injury Kit,” developed jointly with the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence and available to health care professionals. Many of these resources are available on the AAP website, and the website provides information on where other such resources are located. The AAP has supported various pieces of legislation aimed at preventing or reducing firearm injuries to children. These include the Children’s Gun Violence Prevention Act of 1998, the Children Firearm Access Prevention Act, and a model bill, the Protection of Children from Handguns Act. The AAP has also supported legislation to close the



gun show loophole and also supported the Student Pledge against Gun Violence and First Monday 2001, which focused on gun issues. A special article that appeared in Pediatrics in 2006 discussed and disapproved legislation introduced that year in the Virginia and West Virginia state legislatures that would prohibit pediatricians from asking parents if they owned firearms if they did so to counsel the parents. Both bills were defeated at that time. The AAP is a member of the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV). Walter F. Carroll See also: Accidents; Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws; Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV); Million Mom March; Suicide, Guns and; Trigger Locks; Youth and Guns; Youth Gun Control Legislation: The Juvenile Justice Bill of 1999

Further Reading American Academy of Pediatrics. http:// www.aap.org (accessed November 2, 2021). Committee on Injury and Poison Prevention, American Academy of Pediatrics. “Firearm-Related Injuries Affecting the Pediatric Population.” Pediatrics 105 (2000): 888–95. Revised October 1, 2004: https:// publications.aap.org/pediatrics /article - a b s t r a c t /105 / 4 / 888 / 65769 / Fi r e a r m -Related-Injuries-Affecting-the-Pediatric (accessed February 28, 2011). Committee on Psychosocial Aspects of Child and Family Health, American Academy of Pediatrics. “The New Morbidity Revisited: A Renewed Commitment to the Psychosocial Aspects of Pediatric Care.” Pediatrics 108 (2001): 1227–30. Council on Injury, Violence, and Poison Prevention Executive Committee. “Firearm-Related

American Bar Association (ABA) | 19 Injuries Affecting the Pediatric Population.” Pediatrics 130, no. 5 (2012): e1416–e1423. https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2012-2481. Healthy Children. http://healthychildren.org (accessed January 21, 2022). Vernick, Jon S., Stephen P. Teret, Gary A. Smith, and Daniel W. Webster. “Counseling about Firearms: Legislation Is a Threat to Physicians and Their Patients.” Pediatrics 118 (2006): 2168–72. http://www.ncbi .nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17079591 (accessed January 21, 2022).

American Bar Association (ABA) The American Bar Association (ABA), the national professional association for lawyers, consistently advocates the enactment of stronger gun control measures. The ABA’s policy making group, the House of Delegates, has drafted a number of positions in support of restricting the use and sale of guns. In addition to taking policy positions on gun control, the ABA has also been active in presenting its strong gun control stances to congressional committees considering firearm regulation bills. These actions have been controversial among some members of Congress. Some conservative lawmakers have expressed concern that the ABA has no special expertise in the issue of gun control and that it thus should not advocate positions on an issue divided along ideological lines. However, the ABA has remained committed to reducing gun violence in society through careful regulation of firearms. In fact, the ABA House of Delegates has deemed gun control to be one of its critical legislative priority issues. After the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963, the ABA responded by forming a task force to examine the regulation of firearms. As a result, the House of

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Delegates, in 1965, advocated requiring the licensing of firearm dealers; prohibiting sales to felons, mental incompetents, and minors; and controlling importation of firearms. In subsequent years, the House of Delegates continued to support a number of bills and proposals aimed at reducing gun violence in society by regulating the use and sale of guns. In 1973, the House of Delegates supported legislation limiting the sale and possession of inexpensive imported handguns. In 1975, the ABA supported amending the Gun Control Act of 1968 to tighten up the licensing requirements of firearm dealers and to require background checks and waiting periods prior to firearm purchases. In 1983, the group opposed efforts to repeal parts of the Gun Control Act of 1968. In 1993, ABA policy supported legislation to regulate assault weapons. In 1994, the ABA endorsed providing the federal government authority to regulate firearms as consumer products, adopting required safety features such as gunlocks and load indicators, and requiring gun owners to obtain and maintain a current handgun license. In 1996, the ABA supported amending the Gun Control Act of 1968 to include a private cause of action for persons suffering injury or damage as a result of a violation of gun control laws. And, in 1998, they backed a program to address gun violence by youths at schools that included peer mediation programs, firearm education programs, and enforcement and enactment of gun laws emphasizing prevention, adult responsibility, and safety. The ABA believes gun control provisions are consistent with a proper legal interpretation of the Second Amendment. In 1998, the chairperson of the ABA’s Coordinating Committee on Gun Violence submitted to the Senate Subcommittee on the Constitution, Federalism, and Property Rights a

statement of the ABA’s views on issues arising under the Second Amendment. In it, the group wrote that federal and state court decisions have been consistent in the view that the Second Amendment gives all levels of government broad authority to limit private access to firearms. The statement closed by urging Congress to enact appropriate gun control measures to reduce tragic gun-related deaths and injuries in the United States, emphasizing that the Second Amendment is not a valid reason for failing to adopt appropriate gun control measures. In 2008, the ABA filed an amicus curiae brief in support of gun control in District of Columbia v. Heller. In 2021, a similar brief was filed by the ABA in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen, the first major gun case to be heard by the Supreme Court since Heller. In the brief, the ABA encouraged the court to uphold its prior rulings to allow states to adapt firearm regulations under the Second Amendment based on the needs and conditions of that specific location. However, the ABA’s focus on reducing violent crime in society reaches beyond the advocacy gun control positions in Congress. For example, in 1994, the group committed to a joint effort with colleagues in the public health, law enforcement, and religious communities to reduce gun violence. The ABA held a “Summit on Crime and Violence” where leading members of the bar, representatives of other organizations, and government officials planned strategies on the war against crime and violence. The organization’s Standing Committee on Gun Violence continues to engage with the public on this issue through webinars and research. They also have adopted resolutions on key issues, such as the presence of guns in polling locations. Keith Rollin Eakins and Andrea Boggio

See also: Gun Control Act of 1968; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Second Amendment

Further Reading American Bar Association. “American Bar Association Standing Committee on Gun Violence.” 2021. https://www.americanbar .org/groups/public_interest/gun_violence/ (accessed December 24, 2021). American Bar Association. “Legislative and Governmental Advocacy: Letters and Testimony.” ABA Network, 2010. http:// www.abanet.org/poladv/letters (accessed December 24, 2021). American Bar Association. “Opposition to Guns in Polling Places.” ABA Network, 2021. https://www.americanbar.org/groups /public_interest /gun _violence /policy /21m111/ (accessed December 24, 2021). Brief of Amicus Curiae, American Bar Association, District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 290 (2008) (No. 07-290). Brief of Amicus Curiae, American Bar Association, New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen (2021) (No. 20-843). Cottrol, Robert J., ed. Gun Control and the Constitution: Sources and Explanations on the Second Amendment. New York: Garland, 1994. McMillion, Rhonda. “Targeting Gun Control Again.” ABA Journal 86 (2000): 104. O’Connor, Karen, and Graham Barron. “Madison’s Mistake? Judicial Construction of the Second Amendment.” In The Changing Politics of Gun Control, edited by John M. Bruce and Clyde Wilcox, 74–87. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998. Patterson, Samuel C., and Keith R. Eakins. “Congress and Gun Control.” In The Changing Politics of Gun Control, edited by John M. Bruce and Clyde Wilcox, 45–73. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998. Podgers, James. “Tackling Crime in the Streets.” ABA Journal 80 (1994): 104.

American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) | 21 Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021.

American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Founded in 1920, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) describes itself as “our nation’s guardian of liberty,” devoted to defending and preserving the “individual rights and liberties” guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution and laws (ACLU 2011a). The ACLU supports a collective interpretation of the Second Amendment. In a statement on Gun Control, the organization disagreed with the U.S. Supreme Court decision for District of Columbia v. Heller—in which the court supported the individual-right interpretation. Some of the organization’s efforts are lauded by gun control advocates, while, ironically, some of its other efforts are supported by those in the opposing gun rights camp. These varying efforts reflect the organization not having an official position on gun control; no position is taken because the ACLU does not see the possession or regulation of guns as a civil liberties issue (ACLU 2011b). The ACLU was formed during a period when fundamental personal freedoms were under serious government attack. For example, in its first year, it joined battle with U.S. attorney general A. Mitchell Palmer over the rights of union and anti-war activists to organize, hold meetings, and distribute materials. In 1925, it arranged the services of renowned attorney Clarence Darrow to defend biology teacher John T. Scopes, charged for teaching evolution, in the famous criminal trial in Tennessee. The ACLU also was instrumental in overturning a U.S. Customs Service ban on importing James Joyce’s novel Ulysses; fought the

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unconstitutional 1942 internment of Japanese Americans; supported the civil rights movement; opposes attempts to criminalize flag-burning; and litigates against racism, sexism, homophobia, religious intolerance, and censorship of unpopular speech. A national board of directors in New York sets ACLU policy. The policy is implemented through a network of autonomous affiliate offices in all fifty states, Washington DC, and Puerto Rico. The organization has approximately 1.5 million members, about 200 staff attorneys, and 2,000 volunteer attorneys. ACLU lawyers take on about 2,000 cases each year. The organization receives no government funding. Some ACLU statements on gun control present a sore point with gun rights activists. It holds, for example, that “the individual’s right to bear arms applies only to the preservation of efficiency of a wellregulated militia. Except for lawful police and military purposes, the possession of weapons by individuals is not constitutionally protected. Therefore, there is no constitutional impediment to the regulation of firearms,” according to ACLU Policy #47 (’Lectric Law Library 2011). To the ACLU, the question is not whether to restrict gun ownership, but how much to restrict, a question it concludes is for Congress to decide. Some local affiliates of the ACLU have been involved in opposing restrictions on firearm ownership when collateral civil liberties issues are implicated. For example, local affiliates opposed as excessive and ineffective the imposition of enhanced additional prison terms for use of guns in crimes in California, as well as legislation in Connecticut authorizing law enforcement officials to confiscate the firearms of anyone found to be an immediate danger to himself and others.

At the national level, the ACLU joined forces in the 1990s with the Gun Owners of America (GOA), a group that relentlessly criticizes the National Rifle Association for being too soft. Headed by Larry Pratt, often credited with being one of the founders of the “militia” movement, the GOA forged a coalition with the ACLU and other civil libertarian groups to fight legislation perceived as infringing on other civil rights. Thus, for example, although the GOA and the ACLU opposed different parts of an omnibus anti-terrorism bill, they joined forces and were thus able to lobby effectively both conservative and liberal members of Congress, whom one or the other would have otherwise had difficulty engaging. As of July 2020, the ACLU has numerous legal battles going on. They publicly sided with the Black Lives Matter movement, emphasizing the need to reduce funding to police departments and reinvest in community-led initiatives. They also filed numerous lawsuits across the U.S. on behalf of citizens and journalists who were subjected to police brutality and unconstitutional law enforcement while protesting. The ACLU also filed an amicus curiae brief in Trump v. Vance, a 2020 case in which President Donald J. Trump responded to a lawsuit filed by the District Attorney of Manhattan to have his personal tax returns released as part of an ongoing investigation. In their brief, the ACLU argued that failing to require President Trump to release his tax returns would “would allow a sitting President to refuse to provide relevant evidence in a criminal investigation and that would immunize not only a President’s official conduct, but his purely personal conduct as well.” Thomas Diaz, Walter F. Carroll, and Abbie Finnerty

See also: District of Columbia v. Heller; Gun Owners of America (GOA); National Rifle Association (NRA); Pratt, Larry

Further Reading ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union). “About the ACLU.” 2011a. http://www.aclu .org/about-aclu-0 (accessed July 15, 2020). ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union). “FAQ: What Is the ACLU’s Position on the Second Amendment?” 2011b. http://www .aclu.org/faqs#3_5 (accessed July 15, 2020). ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union). “Heller Decision and the Second Amendment.” Updated July 1, 2008. https://www .aclu.org/blog/heller-decision-and-second -amendment (accessed June 30, 2021). ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union). “Organization News and Highlights: Second Amendment: March 4, 2002, Gun Control.” Updated July 8, 2008. http:// www.aclu.org/organization-news-and -highlights/second-amendment (accessed April 12, 2011). ACLU Blog of Rights, July 1, 2008. http:// www.aclu.org/2008/07/01/heller-decision -and-the-second-amendment (accessed July 22, 2020). Diaz, Tom. Making a Killing: The Business of Guns in America. New York: New Press, 1999. The ’Lectric Law Library. “ACLU Policy #47: Gun Control.” 2011, 21. http://www.lectlaw .com/files/con11.htm (accessed April 12, 2011). Mehren, Elizabeth. “Knocking Guns from the Hands of Potential Killers.” Los Angeles Times, October 2, 1999, A1.

American Jewish Congress (AJC) The American Jewish Congress (AJC) is a lobbying, legal, and cultural organization. In recent years, the AJC has become a strong proponent of restrictive gun laws.

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World War I had a profound effect on Jewish life in the United States. The war was accompanied by a marked awakening of Jewish consciousness among those who had earlier stood aloof from their Jewish heritage. As the United States prepared to enter the war, a group of American Jews believed that a united American Jewish voice could best protect their convictions, desires, and dreams. This resulted in a preliminary conference held in Philadelphia in 1916. The first American Jewish Congress was convened in Philadelphia’s Metropolitan Opera House in December 1918. In 1920, Rabbi Stephen Wise was charged with the task of transforming the succession of haphazardly planned Jewish gatherings into a permanent organization intended to safeguard Jews everywhere—in the United States, overseas, and especially in what was then the British colony of Palestine. After the threat of Nazi Germany had passed with the end of World War II, the AJC broadened its scope of activism to include extensive work on civil rights for Blacks and many other issues. The AJC has a membership of approximately 50,000 and is headquartered in New York City. It also maintains an Israeli office in Jerusalem. The group holds a convention every two years, at which time it sets the organization’s agenda and elects a president who serves a two-year term. Policy is formulated in the interim by the AJC’s Governing Council and the Executive Committee. The American Jewish Congress is sometimes confused with a separate group, the American Jewish Committee, which shares the same acronym. The centerpiece of the AJC’s gun control work is a petition campaign called “Stop the Guns: Protect Our Kids!” The petitions demand that the U.S. Congress enact legislation to require that (1) all gun buyers pass

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a government test to receive a license; (2) all guns be registered with the government; (3) prospective gun buyers provide fingerprints and a photograph to receive a license; (4) firearm manufacturers be “required to install safety devices to prevent accidental and inadvertent firing”; and (5) licensing and registration rules that currently apply to retail firearm dealers be applied to all firearm transfers. The petition campaign is supported by a variety of gun prohibition and gun control organizations, and the AJC coordinates its work with other anti-gun lobbies and works in support of a wide variety of other proposed gun laws. The AJC was party to an amicus curiae brief in the U.S. Supreme Court case District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), supporting the District’s de facto ban on firearms as a means of self-defense. The brief stated that “the Second Amendment was designed to protect state authority” and did not protect an individual’s right to keep and bear arms. Opinion polls typically show that Jews are strongly supportive of gun control, though some American Jews do not share the AJC’s views on firearm ownership. For example, Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership (JPFO) calls gun control “victim disarmament” and charges that the AJC’s gun control activism undermines traditional Jewish values. The JPFO believes that “Jews, like everyone else, have a duty to protect and defend themselves and their families against violence.” In response to the March 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, the AJC united with nineteen other national Jewish organizations in penning an open letter detailing their multifaceted approach to end gun violence. The proposal includes universal background checks, registration and tracking for all

firearms, and ensuring all persons have access to quality mental health care if they are in need (Jewish Council for Public Affairs 2019). Paul Gallant, Joanne Eisen, and Allyson Florczykowski See also: District of Columbia v. Heller; Gun Control

Further Reading American Jewish Congress. https://ajcongress.org/ (accessed July 20, 2020). Jewish Council for Public Affairs. “American Jews Speak Out against Gun Violence in Open Letter.” https://www.jewishpublicaf fairs.org/american-jews-speak-out-against -gun-violence-in-open-letter/ (accessed July 20, 2020). Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership. http://www.jpfo.org/ (accessed July 20, 2020).

American Medical Association (AMA) The American Medical Association (AMA) is an organization of physicians whose goal is “to promote the art and science of medicine and the betterment of public health.” The AMA believes that private firearm ownership is a public health menace and has consistently advocated strong gun control provisions to reduce citizen access to firearms. The AMA was founded in 1847 by Nathan Davis at the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia. In 2019, approximately 19 percent of practicing physicians in the United States belonged to the organization, and it had a combined membership of approximately 250,000 medical students and physicians (significantly fewer than in



2000, when this total was closer to 300,000; see AMA 2011, 27; Campbell 2019; see Peck 2010 for a discussion of the decline). According to the AMA, the ownership and use of firearms, especially handguns, pose serious threats to public health. The AMA believes that handguns are one of the main causes of intentional and unintentional injuries and death in the United States. In 1992, the AMA’s Council on Scientific Affairs promulgated a report and position paper on assault weapons (guns with a military appearance) and declared them to be a public health hazard in the United States. It recommended legislation to restrict the sale and private ownership of such firearms. Among the critics of the AMA report was Dr. Edgar A. Suter. In 1994, Suter said, “The AMA Council on Scientific Affairs did not conduct a rigorous scientific evaluation before supporting a ban on assault weapons. The Council appears to have unquestioningly accepted common misperceptions and even partisan misrepresentations regarding the nature and uses of assault weapons. . . . While an assault weapon ban may have appeared to the Council to be a simple solution to America’s exaggerated ‘epidemic’ of violence, a scholarly review of the literature finds no reliable data to support such a ban. Unfortunately the Council’s faulty call for prohibition may distract legislators and the public from addressing effective methods of controlling violence” (1994b). The AMA encourages its members to use regular checkups as an opportunity to inquire from patients whether firearms are present in their household, to educate patients about the dangers of firearms, to advise patients to educate their children and neighbors about the dangers of firearms, and to remind patients to obtain firearm

American Medical Association (AMA) | 25

safety locks, lockup all firearms, and store ammunition separately. The AMA supports numerous legislative initiatives dealing with firearms. These include waiting periods and background checks for all handgun purchases; the requirement that manufacturers incorporate a variety of features in all firearms, including visible loaded-gun indicators, trigger locks, and an increased minimum force needed to activate a trigger; increased licensing fees for firearm dealers; increased federal and state surtaxes on manufacturers, dealers, and purchasers of handguns and semiautomatic firearms, as well as on the ammunition such firearms use, with the revenue allocated for health and law enforcement activities related to the prevention and control of violence in the United States; mandatory destruction of any firearms obtained in gun-surrender programs; a ban on certain types of bullets; and a ban on the possession and use of firearms and ammunition by unsupervised youths under the age of eighteen. In his inauguration address delivered at its annual meeting on June 20, 2001, incoming President Richard F. Corlin renewed the AMA’s push for more restrictive firearm laws. In a speech devoted entirely to the issue of firearm-related violence, Corlin declared that “gun violence—both selfinflicted and against others—is now a serious public health crisis,” one that is “a uniquely American epidemic.” According to Corlin, “The very language of the Second Amendment refutes any argument that it was intended to guarantee every citizen an unfettered right to any kind of weapon. . . . [W]e don’t regulate guns in America. We do regulate other dangerous products like cars and prescription drugs and tobacco and alcohol. . . . In fact, no other consumer industry in the United States—not even the

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tobacco industry—has been allowed to so totally evade accountability for the harm their products cause to human beings. Just the gun industry.” Corlin called for the re-funding of firearm research by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and its National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, including the establishment of a National Violent Death Reporting System for both fatal and nonfatal gun injuries. (CDC funding for firearm research was terminated by Congress in 1996. Though Corlin blamed the loss of funding on “heavy lobbying by the antigun control groups,” critics had charged that the CDC’s research on firearms was biased, promoted an antigun agenda, and failed to address any of the benefits accruing to private firearm ownership, such as self-defense. The outcome of the congressional action was a prohibition on public funding by the CDC “to advocate or promote gun control.”) A few physician groups have been highly critical of the AMA and its position on private firearm ownership. For example, Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership (DRGO) believes that social activists in the medical and public health fields (including the AMA) have used their authority to misrepresent gun ownership as a “disease.” According to DRGO, organized medical groups like the AMA use discredited advocacy research and poor medical scholarship to justify their political stand against firearms and gun owners. Furthermore, they ignore legitimate criminological research because it generally proves that good citizens use guns wisely. DRGO has criticized the AMA’s practice of encouraging doctors to use their professional authority and patient trust as a means of advancing a political agenda for gun control. A doctor’s responsibility is to place the

patient’s needs above all else. However, a physician reverses this priority when, because of passionate political beliefs, he or she tries to influence a patient about guns and firearm ownership. In doing so, that doctor crosses the line from healer to political activist. DRGO maintains that this approach places such intervention in the area of unethical physician conduct called “boundary violations” (see Claremont Institute 2011). The AMA’s best-known publication is the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), published weekly. Although JAMA explicitly states that its editorials do not reflect the views of the AMA, they nevertheless often mirror its philosophy. Each year, JAMA publishes a number of “theme” issues. One of these is usually on the subject of violence. The editorials accompanying these issues articulate the empathy, anguish, and frustration physicians face in the aftermath of violence, and their desire to prevent and eliminate violence. However, while many of JAMA’s violence “theme” issues have contained articles dealing with guns and firearm-related violence, none of them has addressed the positive elements of firearm ownership (e.g., self-defense) that may prevent violence. Although the vast majority of JAMA articles on firearms have supported gun control, a notable exception was an article in 2000 by Jens Ludwig and Philip Cook, which found that the Brady Bill had no significant effect on homicide rates or on overall suicide rates. A JAMA editorial that accompanied the study by Ludwig and Cook argued that the flaw in the Brady Bill was that its provisions applied only to sales by licensed gun dealers and not to informal transactions among family, friends, or other acquaintances. For a full policy statement on firearms and a discussion of the AMA’s fundamental



contention that “uncontrolled ownership and use of firearms, especially handguns, is a serious threat to the public’s health,” see the organization’s National Advisory Council on Violence and Abuse, Policy Compendium April (2008, 30–33). Paul Gallant and Joanne Eisen See also: Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws; Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership (DRGO); Gun Buyback Programs; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; National Violent Death Reporting System; Trigger Locks

Further Reading American Medical Association. 2011. http:// www.ama-assn.org/ (accessed June 12, 2011). American Medical Association. National Advisory Council on Violence and Abuse, Policy Compendium. April 2008. http:// w w w.ama-assn.org /ama1/pub /upload /mm/386/vio_policy_comp.pdf (accessed June 14, 2011) American Medical Association. 2010 AMA Annual Report: Moving Medicine Forward. April 2010. http://www.ama-assn .org /resou rces /doc /about-a m a / 2010 -annual-report.pdf (accessed June 14, 2011). Campbell, Kevin. “Don’t Believe AMA’s Hype, Membership Still Declining.” MedPage Today, June 20, 2019. https:// www.medpagetoday.com/opinion/campbells-scoop/80583 (accessed January 20, 2022). Claremont Institute for the Study of Statesmanship and Political Philosophy. “Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership.” 2011. http://www.claremont.org/projects /projectid.39/project_detail.asp (accessed June 12, 2011). Cook, Philip J., Bruce A. Lawrence, and Jens Ludwig. “The Medical Costs of Gunshot Injuries in the United States.” Journal of

American Revolution | 27 the American Medical Association 282 (1999): 447–54. Council on Scientific Affairs. “Assault Weapons as a Public Health Hazard in the United States.” Journal of the American Medical Association 267 (1992): 3067–70. Faria, Miguel A., Jr. “Public Health and Gun Control—A Review.” Medical Sentinel 6 (2001): 11–18. http://www.haciendapub.com /gunpage4.html (accessed June 12, 2011). Ludwig, Jens, and Philip J. Cook. “Homicide and Suicide Rates Associated with Implementation of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act.” Journal of the American Medical Association 284 (2000): 585–91. McAfee, Robert E. “Physicians and Domestic Violence: Can We Make a Difference?” Journal of the American Medical Association 273 (1995): 1790–91. Peck, Peggy. “AMA: Little to Cheer About as AMA Meetings Open.” MedPage Today, June 13, 2010. http://www.medpagetoday .com/PublicHealthPolicy/GeneralProfessionalIssues/20640 (accessed June 14, 2011). Rosenfeld, Richard. “Tracing the Brady Act’s Connection with Homicide and Suicide Trends.” Journal of the American Medical Association 284 (2000): 616–18. Suter, Edgar A. “‘Assault Weapons’ Revisited —An Analysis of the AMA Report.” Journal of the Medical Association of Georgia 83 (1994a): 281–89. Suter, Edgar A. “Guns in the Medical Literature—A Failure of Peer Review.” Journal of the Medical Association of Georgia 83 (1994b): 133–48. Wheeler, Timothy. “Boundary Violations: Gun Politics in the Doctor’s Office.” Medical Sentinel 4 (1999): 60–61.

American Revolution Personal firearms were vitally important for the success of the American Revolution. The brunt of the initial fighting during the

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war was borne by state militias, composed of citizen-soldiers who carried their own hunting rifles and personal weapons into combat. However, ultimate victory over the British rested on the ability of the Continental army to acquire heavy military weapons, including artillery. Nonetheless, the importance of a well-armed citizenry in the struggle for independence would continue to influence U.S. politics as debate over the role and necessity of firearms in society continues into the twenty-first century. In many ways, the American Revolution was an anomaly. Compared to people in Europe and other areas of the world, the white citizens of the British colonies of North America had greater political freedom and higher standards of living. Since their initial establishment, the various colonies had been granted considerable political latitude by the British Crown. In fact, the colonies were left essentially to run themselves, with the exception of trade and foreign policy. However, this tradition of “benign neglect” came to an end following the French and Indian War (1756–1763). The colonial militias had not been able to defend the thirteen colonies, and London had been forced to send troops to North America and spend considerable sums on the defense of the colonies. Following the war, London attempted to recoup its expenditures, but the British met considerable resistance from the colonies. Because the colonists had no direct representation in the British Parliament, many felt that it was unfair for them to be subject to “taxation without representation.” The colonists undertook sporadic acts of civil disobedience against the new tax measures, including the famous Boston Tea Party. Colonists also opposed the issuance of writs and general warrants that allowed the British to search homes and seize property without

specific search warrants. Finally, the quartering of British troops in personal homes, without the consent of the owners, was a source of resentment toward the Crown. In response to British actions, the colonists established a Continental Congress in 1774 to organize their resistance efforts and coordinate their policies toward the Crown. The colonies had several significant advantages in their conflict with the British. The most obvious was the great distance between Great Britain and the colonies. In addition, since their formation, the defense of the colonies had rested on the white male population, rather than the regular British army. During instances of conflict with Native American tribes or when there were bandit gangs or pirates in operation or during episodes of civil disturbance, it usually fell to each colony’s individual militia units to take action. All able-bodied white males over the age of eighteen were liable for service in the militia. In addition, many colonies also mandated militia service by free African Americans and slaves under specific conditions. Each individual was expected to provide his own firearm, and mounted units required the militiaman to provide his own horse and equipment. Each colony maintained a variety of military equipment and supplies for use by the militia. Such equipment included cannon and artillery equipment, firearms, and such miscellaneous military supplies as tents, carriages, and entrenching equipment. The colonies also maintained supplies of ammunition. As tensions grew between the colonies and London, the various militia units were reorganized. The main purpose behind the reforms was to ensure that the militia units would be loyal to the individual colonies and not to the Crown. The militias were also given expanded training to ready them for potential military action against regular



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A line of Minute Men are fired upon by British troops at the Battle of Lexington, April 19, 1775. (Library of Congress)

British forces. There were alarm systems in place to alert the citizen-soldiers to hostile action so they could be called up and deployed quickly. Each individual militiaman was supposed to be ready to muster at a moment’s notice. Because of this, the militia troops began to be popularly known as “minutemen.” The first shots of the American Revolution came during an attempt by the British to seize the ammunition and heavy weapons of the New England colonies’ militias. In April 1775, British troops moved to confiscate the militia stores of the Massachusetts colony at the depot in Concord. On April 19, the first shot of the revolution was fired at Lexington, and eight minutemen were killed and nine wounded during the ensuing skirmish with British regulars. The militia retreated, and the British marched to Concord, where they captured some minor equipment (the militia had hidden most of the supplies). After a second brief skirmish, the British marched back to Boston. However, during the British retreat, the minutemen used the

unconventional guerrilla tactics that they employed against Native Americans and sniped at the British troops. The militia inflicted 273 casualties on the regulars while suffering 90 dead and wounded. In many ways, the battles at Lexington and Concord foreshadowed much of the combat of the coming war. The American forces were able to inflict significant casualties on the British, but they had difficulty beating the regular British forces in pitched battles. On July 4, 1776, the Continental Congress approved the Declaration of Independence from Great Britain. Following the Declaration, the Continental Congress dispatched envoys to Europe to seek support against the British. The Americans specifically sought foreign aid to help offset British naval superiority and to acquire military weapons, especially heavy artillery. The American forces also needed standard firearms, as the militia forces brought their own guns, which often used different ammunition. In addition, the American forces needed military training.

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The minutemen had several distinct advantages over the British. They were more mobile than the British forces and could exist without the large supply infrastructure required by the Crown’s forces. More significantly, many of the American forces had superior firearms. At the start of the war, the most common weapon was the smoothbore Brown Bess musket. The highly disciplined British troops could fire three times as fast as their American counterparts, but the massed volley fire of the British was fairly inaccurate. Americans tended to have slower rates of fire, but they were more accurate. However, the accuracy range of the Brown Bess was only about sixty yards. As the revolution progressed, more and more Americans began using the Pennsylvania or Kentucky rifle. This firearm was rifled with twisting groves through the barrel, which made the bullet spin. It also has a longer barrel than the Brown Bess. These factors greatly increased the accuracy and range of the weapon. In the right hands, the rifled firearms of the minutemen were accurate at 200 yards and had an extreme range of 400 yards. These guns made American soldiers highly effective as snipers and irregular troops. Throughout the American Revolution, the majority of American soldiers served in their respective state militia units. Usually, the troops preferred militia service because it kept them closer to their homes and they were only called to service for short periods of time. After the Battle of Bunker Hill, Gen. George Washington realized that to defeat the British, the Americans would need to establish a regular standing military force with the kind of training and discipline that was the hallmark of the British army. The result was the Continental army. During the winter of 1777–1778, Washington camped his army in Valley Forge. With the aid of foreign soldiers who had been attracted to the

American cause, Washington transformed the collection of militia units and volunteers into an effective fighting force. The American victory at Saratoga in 1778 was a major turning point in the revolution since it demonstrated to the major European powers the capability of the Continental army. After the victory, France and Spain began offering active support to the Americans. The French supplied the Americans with weapons and troops under the command of the Comte de Rochambeau. The French delivered thousands of Charleville muskets. These guns fired a smaller musket ball than the Brown Bess (.70 caliber versus the .75-caliber ball of the Brown Bess) and had a greater range and accuracy. In addition, the French muskets were fitted with bayonets, whereas most of the Brown Bess muskets and Pennsylvania rifles had been the personal weapons of the Americans and did not have bayonets. The Charleville musket was so effective and popular with the American forces that it was widely copied and served as the basis for the Springfield Model 1795 musket, which became the standard weapon for the nation’s regular army at the end of the eighteenth century. The superior firearms of the Continental army allowed the Americans to engage the British forces before the enemy could bring their own weapons to bear. In addition, the military intervention of the French expanded the American Revolution into a world war, which caused the British to have to defend their colonies around the globe. Following the British surrender at Yorktown in 1781, the two sides began to work toward a settlement of the conflict. The war ended with the Treaty of Paris in 1783. The importance of the militia units during the conflict and the fact that most of the firearms used by the American troops were privately owned have colored American



Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) | 31

attitudes toward gun ownership throughout the nation’s history. In 2009, a new conservative political movement emerged, the Tea Party. Supporters of the grouping self-identified with the participants of the 1773 Boston Tea Party and their opposition to taxation. Tea Party adherents even used a Revolutionary War– era flag and slogan, “Don’t Tread on Me.” Tea Party–backed candidates won a number of seats in the 2010 midterm elections. Tom Lansford See also: Brown Bess; Second Amendment

Further Reading Barnes, Ian. The Historical Atlas of the American Revolution. New York: Routledge, 2000. Hoffman, Ronald, and Peter J. Albert, eds. Diplomacy and Revolution: The FrancoAmerican Alliance of 1778. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1981. Huston, James A. Logistics of Liberty: American Services of Supply in the Revolutionary War and After. Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1991. Middlekauff, Robert. The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution, 1763–1789. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007. Neimeyer, Charles Patrick. America Goes to War: A Social History of the Continental Army. New York: New York University Press, 1996. Werner, Kirk D., ed. The American Revolution. San Diego, CA: Greenhaven Press, 2000.

Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) is an independent, liberal, political organization founded in 1947. Among its founders

were such leading political, academic, religious, and labor leaders as Eleanor Roosevelt, John Kenneth Galbraith, Arthur Schlesinger Jr., Reinhold Niebuhr, Walter Reuther, and Hubert Humphrey. Having over 65,000 members, ADA has taken positions on a broad range of social and political issues. It strongly favors gun control and opposes militarism. ADA is one of over forty religious, labor, medical, educational, and civic organizations that belong to the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence. ADA has consistently taken strong stands in favor of gun control measures. Its issue paper 251, Handgun Control, clearly states its position. The measures it supports include a comprehensive ban on the sale of assault weapons; prohibiting concealed weapons; stricter gun registration requirements; holding adults liable for selling or providing guns to minors; holding adults culpable if, due to their negligence, a juvenile used a gun to commit a crime; and strenuously enforcing existing handgun laws. The statement also opposes any attempts to weaken gun control legislation. Issue paper 251 was adopted in 2001, reaffirmed in 2004, amended in 2006, and reaffirmed in 2007. At the national level, ADA backs liberal candidates for Congress and rates legislators on their votes on important issues, with support for firearm control legislation receiving a positive rating. The ADA Education Fund provides information on issues and legislation. The local chapters of ADA carry out grassroots organizing efforts to reduce gun violence and lobby to elect liberal candidates. ADA strongly supported passage of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill), and has defended the act against attempts to weaken it. ADA saw the Brady Bill and the ban on assault weapons

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as the foundation of a national policy to reduce gun violence. ADA also has supported legislation calling for child safety locks on firearms, reasonable time periods for background checks for gun purchasers, and a minimum age of twenty-one for purchasing a handgun. ADA emphasizes the importance of gun control by noting that the gun-related murder rate in the United States greatly exceeds those of other industrialized democracies. It argues that only effective firearm-related legislation can reduce high levels of firearm-related murders and injuries. Walter F. Carroll See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Background Checks; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws; Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV); Democratic Party and Gun Control; Ideologies— Conservative and Liberal; Lautenberg, Frank R.

Further Reading Americans for Democratic Action. http:// www.adaction.org/ (accessed November 9, 2021). Brock, Clifton. Americans for Democratic Action: Its Role in National Politics. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1985. Gillon, Steven M. Politics and Vision: The ADA and American Liberalism, 1947– 1985. New York: Oxford University Press, 1987.

Americans for Responsible Solutions. See Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence

Ammunition, Large Capacity Magazines. See Assault Weapons Ban of 1994 Ammunition, Regulation of Federal Law The Gun Control Act of 1968 requires a federal license to make (except for personal use) or deal in ammunition. Dealers may not sell long gun ammunition to a person under eighteen, or handgun ammunition to a person under twenty-one. The sale of ammunition to any person who is prohibited by federal law from possessing a firearm is forbidden. Likewise, a person forbidden to possess a firearm may not possess ammunition, either. As with firearms, any participation in the sale or transport of ammunition that is known to be stolen is illegal. When ammunition is shipped in interstate or foreign commerce, it must be labeled, and the carrier must obtain a written acknowledgment of receipt. Congress is sometimes careful to ensure that general laws are not implemented by administrators so as to ban ammunition. For example, the 1972 Consumer Product Safety Act specifically forbade its use as an administrative vehicle to restrict firearms. But in response to requests from gun control advocates, the Consumer Product Safety Commission declared that although it had no jurisdiction over firearms, it had jurisdiction to consider outlawing handgun ammunition. So Congress enacted the Firearms Safety and Consumer Protection Act of 1976, to make it clear that the commission had no authority over ammunition, either. Similarly, the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) gives the Environmental



Protection Agency broad powers to ban almost anything that EPA determines to “present an unreasonable risk of injury to health or the environment.” But the statute specifically forbids TSCA from being used to regulate firearms or ammunition (15 U.S.C. § 2602(B)). A petition for EPA to regulate the lead component of ammunition was rejected by the agency in 2010, as forbidden by the statute. In 1991, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service prohibited use or possession of lead shot during the hunting of waterfowl. The ban was accomplished by an administrative regulation, based on powers granted by the Endangered Species Act. Critics objected that the protection of endangered avian predators did not require an all-out ban in every waterfowl-hunting area in every state. Twenty-three states impose some type of additional, but limited, restrictions on the use of lead shot in the hunting of some upland game-bird species. Like firearms, ammunition is subject to an 11 percent federal excise tax, pursuant to the 1937 Pittman-Robertson Act (16 U.S.C. § 669). The revenues are used for a matching grant program to the states to foster wildlife conservation, game management, hunter safety education, and the construction of shooting ranges. As the tax is moderate and the revenues are used to foster Second Amendment activities, the tax appears constitutionally valid. In contrast, there have sometimes been proposals to impose punitive taxes on handgun ammunition. For example, in 1993, Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D-NY) proposed a 50 percent tax on all center-fire handgun ammunition (essentially, anything but .22-caliber ammunition) and a 10,000 percent tax on Winchester’s “Black Talon” brand of defensive ammunition. Taxes

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intended to discourage the exercise of a constitutional right are generally considered unconstitutional. For example, when Louisiana Governor Huey Long and the state legislature retaliated against press criticism of them by imposing a 2 percent gross revenue tax on large-circulation newspapers, the Supreme Court ruled it unconstitutional (Grosjean v. American Press Co., 297 U.S. 233 (1936)). Likewise, when Minnesota, apparently without malign intent, imposed a special tax on paper and ink, the court ruled it unconstitutional (Minneapolis Star & Tribune Co. v. Minnesota Commissioner of Revenue, 460 U.S. 575 (1983)).

Armor-Piercing Ammunition A 1986 federal law (amended in 1994) prohibits armor-piercing ammunition for handguns. The statute specifies that “armor piercing ammunition” is a handgun bullet “constructed entirely” from “tungsten alloys, steel, iron, brass, bronze, beryllium copper, or depleted uranium,” or with a jacket whose weight constitutes more than 25 percent of the projectile’s total weight (18 U.S.C. § 922(a)(17)(B)). Some persons—such as the producers of the film Lethal Weapon 3—imagine that a Teflon coating gives a bullet special penetrating powers; this is not correct, and the federal definition has nothing to do with Teflon. Teflon reduces the lead abrasion caused by the bullet's movement down the barrel of the gun. Thus, the barrel is kept cleaner and is protected from excessive wear. Also, reduced abrasion means that fewer tiny lead air particles are produced, so the air is cleaner—an especially important consideration at indoor shooting ranges. In addition, a Teflon coating on a bullet also makes the bullet safer to use in a selfdefense context. The Teflon helps the bullet

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“grab” a hard surface such as glass or metal, and thus significantly reduces the risk of a dangerous ricochet. Similarly, canes or walking sticks are often coated with Teflon, so that they will not slip on hard, smooth surfaces. The federal definition is a content standard, based on the bullet’s composition. From time to time, gun control advocates, such as President Clinton and Senator Edward Kennedy, have attempted to replace the content standard with a “penetration standard”: any ammunition that could penetrate a standard police vest would be outlawed. Because police vests are designed to block handgun ammunition but not rifle ammunition (which is more powerful, in part because of higher velocity), most rifle ammunition would become illegal. Neither before 1986 nor thereafter has there ever been a case of an American police officer killed because a bullet penetrated his or her vest, or killed with “armor-piercing ammunition.” The federal ban prohibits the manufacture or import of certain ammunition, but it does not apply to (1) the manufacture or importation of such ammunition for the use of the United States or any of its departments or agencies, or for the use of any state or any of its departments, agencies, or political subdivisions; (2) the manufacture of such ammunition for the purpose of exportation; and (3) the manufacture or importation for the purposes of testing or experiment authorized by the secretary of the treasury. Federal law also prohibits any manufacturer or importer to sell or deliver armor-piercing ammunition, with the same use and purpose exceptions as for the manufacture or import of such ammunition. In addition, federal law requires that licensed importers and licensed manufacturers mark all armor-piercing projectiles and packages containing such projectiles

for distribution in the manner prescribed by the secretary of the treasury by regulation. The secretary must furnish information to each licensed dealer defining which projectiles are considered to be armor-piercing. Before the 1986 law, many persons possessed such ammunition, typically acquired from military surplus. Federal law does not criminalize the continuing possession or private transfer of these now-old, pre-1986 supplies. However, if a federally licensed firearms dealer sells some of the old ammunition, he or she must keep records of the residence and identity of the purchaser, similar to the records that must be kept for the sale of firearms. Except for armor-piercing ammunition, licensed dealers do not have to keep records of ammunition sales. Federal law mandates an extra prison term of not less than five years for committing a federal crime of violence or a drugtrafficking crime by using or while carrying a firearm and at the same time possessing armor-piercing ammunition that can be fired in that firearm.

State and Local Laws Most states have parallel provisions to the federal laws. A few states go further. For example, Massachusetts and Illinois require a firearm identification card to purchase and possess any ammunition. A number of states have complex regulations on armorpiercing ammunition—California and New Jersey, for example—as well as on incendiary ammunition—California, for example. New Jersey bans hollow-point ammunition, with some exceptions. New York City bans the possession of ordinary rifle and shotgun ammunition, except for persons who hold a New York City rifle-shotgun license; when a consumer purchases such ammunition, he or she must display the license to the dealer. There is a variety of other state and local



laws on ammunition, although the spread of statewide preemption laws in the last three decades has considerably reduced special local laws. Even so, prudence dictates that a person become familiar with the laws of a particular state and locality on the subject before attempting to possess, acquire, or transfer ammunition.

Case Law In the 1939 case United States v. Miller, the Supreme Court stated that historically, the militiaman’s “possession of arms also implied the possession of ammunition, and the authorities paid quite as much attention to the latter as to the former.” The court also noted the seventeenth-century Massachusetts laws that provided that two-thirds of every militia company should be musketeers and that each of them should have not only a musket but also other equipment, including ammunition comprising “one pound of powder, twenty bullets, and two fathoms of match.” As the court explained, mandatory ammunition ownership by militiamen (comprising most of the able-bodied adult male population) continued after independence. For example, a 1784 Massachusetts law directed that the militia comprise all able-bodied men under sixty years of age and required that every noncommissioned officer and private soldier of the militia “shall equip himself [with ammunition], and be constantly provided with a good fire arm” (180). A 1786 New York law required that all militiamen—that is, all able-bodied male citizens of the state between sixteen and forty-five years of age residing within New York—had to provide themselves with a “good Musket or Firelock” as well as, among other things, “Twenty-four Cartridges . . . each Cartridge containing a proper Quantity of Powder and Ball” (181).

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And a 1785 Virginia militia statute required that every noncommissioned officer and private should appear at the appropriate muster field “armed, equipped, and accoutered . . . with a good, clean musket carrying an ounce of ball . . . a cartridge box properly made, to contain and secure twenty cartridges fitted to his musket . . . and . . . one pound of good powder, and four pounds of lead, including twenty blind cartridges” (181–82). Thus, to the court, arms and ammunition were inextricably interwoven. Second Amendment arms possession necessarily implied the possession of suitable ammunition. The Supreme Court’s modern cases on the Second Amendment agree. McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010) explained that the Fourteenth Amendment was enacted in part to prohibit states from violating Second Amendment rights. Among such violations was a post–Civil War law in Mississippi, which said that no freedman “shall keep or carry fire-arms of any kind, or any ammunition.” Dissenting in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), Justice Breyer argued that the D.C. handgun ban was permissible because “The law concerns one class of weapons, handguns, leaving residents free to possess shotguns and rifles, along with ammunition.” As Justice Breyer recognized, the right to arms, whatever its scope, implies a parallel right to suitable ammunition. The majority opinions in both Heller and McDonald both cited an 1871 Tennessee case, Andrews v. State (50 Tenn. 165) as correctly construing the Second Amendment. In Andrews, the Tennessee Supreme Court ruled that, pursuant to the Tennessee Constitution, all Tennessee citizens had a right to keep and bear arms and that the “right to keep arms necessarily involves the

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right . . . to purchase and provide ammunition suitable for such arms” (178). David B. Kopel and David I. Caplan See also: Ammunition, Types of; ArmorPiercing Ammunition; Ballistic Identification System; Cartridges; District of Columbia v. Heller; Gun Control Act of 1968; McDonald v. City of Chicago; Preemption Laws

Further Reading Halbrook, Stephen P. Firearms Law Deskbook: 2010–2011 Edition. Eagan, MN: Thomson Reuters, 2010.

Ammunition, Types of Ammunition types can be classified roughly by rim design, ignition system, and projectile type. For four centuries, humankind has struggled to “marry” projectile, powder, and ignition system into a conveniently loaded unit. In the seventeenth century, musketeers carried bandoliers of wooden capsules filled with powder and ball; as the musketeer also carried a burning match, these proved extremely dangerous to the user. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, tubular paper cartridges, secured in a leather cartridge box, were employed; the user removed the cartridge, tore the paper open with his teeth, and emptied the contents down the barrel. As repeating firearms evolved in the nineteenth century, the modern “fixed” cartridge came into use, with powder contained in a brass case with the projectile held by friction at one end and the ignition system mounted at the other. Brass was used due to its springy nature; a brass cartridge would expand when the powder ignited, sealing the breech of the barrel, but spring back to nearly its original diameter to allow the fired cartridge to be easily

removed from the gun. Mild steel has sometimes been used as a cartridge case material, but it is much less satisfactory. Untreated steel cases will rust, and varnished ones can cause jamming as the varnish rubs off inside the chamber. Fixed cartridges can be classified by their rim type, their ignition system, or their projectile. A repeating firearm must be able to mechanically extract and remove the empty cartridge after firing, a task accomplished by a metal hooklike device known as an extractor. The cartridge, in turn, must have a feature that the extractor can grasp. In a rimmed cartridge, the base of the cartridge extends outward in a disk—the rim—which the extractor can grasp. In a rimless cartridge, there is no protruding rim, but a groove is cut around the base of the cartridge, and the extractor grasps the groove. Variations include the semirimmed cartridge, which has a groove and a rim that protrudes only slightly; and the belted cartridge, in which the base of the cartridge case expands outward into a strengthening belt with a cut groove. Cartridges can also be classed by their ignition system, the principal ones being rimfire and center fire. Rimfire cartridges are rimmed, but the rim is hollow. An explosive primer compound is placed inside the rim, and when the firing pin strikes and crushes the rim, the compound explodes and ignites the powder. As the metal of the rim must be quite thin to be crushable, rimfire ignition is restricted to cartridges of very low power. Today, only low-power .22-caliber cartridges are made in rimfire form. In the center-fire cartridge, the priming compound is placed in a metal capsule, the primer. The primer is mounted in the center of the cartridge’s base; a cartridge of center-fire form can withstand considerably higher pressures than a rimfire.



In addition to these main types, there are some rare forms of ignition. A few modern rifles use electronic ignition, in which an electric current passes through the primer to detonate it. Early cartridges (c. 1850) sometimes used a pin firing method in which the hammer struck a pointed pin extending sideways through the cartridge. The Prussian “needle gun” of the 1850s had a paper cartridge with primer located at the base of the bullet; a very long firing pin penetrated the cartridge and struck the primer. Cartridges may further be classified by the nature of the projectile mounted in them. The earliest projectiles were simply solid lead or lead alloy. These materials were, however, too soft to take the higher velocities that arms designers reached in the late nineteenth century. At that point, jacketed bullets, with a lead core encased in a harder metal jacket, came into use; the harder jacket could take the higher velocities without smearing the inside of the barrel with lead. A copper-nickel alloy was first used for the jacket; it was found that this tended to leave hard-to-remove metal deposits inside the barrel, so “gilding metal,” a copper alloy, then became standard jacket material. Mild steel has also been employed as a jacket material. Jacketed bullets took several forms. In the full-metal-jacketed projectile, required for warfare by sundry international conventions, the copper alloy jacket covers the bullet’s nose, inhibiting its expansion after impact. In the soft-point projectile, the jacket does not cover the nose; the exposed soft lead nose crushes upon impact and causes the projectile to expand. (The soft point originated as the military “DumDum,” whose use was subsequently outlawed in warfare.) In the hollow-point projectile, a hollow cavity of varying size is

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located in the nose, likewise promoting bullet expansion. Bullet designers have also evolved variations on these forms, in which the bullet’s point is composed of a plastic or bronze tip, enabling it to keep a sharp point but still expand. Military cartridges take an even greater variety of projectiles. The full-metal-jacketed bullet, described above, is the traditional form. Armor-piercing projectiles contain a large, pointed, steel core; currently many forms of full-metal-jacketed ammunition also contain a small steel penetrator under the nose. Incendiary projectiles contain compounds that produce an incendiary flash when the bullet nose is crushed by impact. Tracer projectiles contain a manner of flare compound that burns during the bullet’s flight, making its path visible so that a machine gunner can correct his aim. Additionally, there have been experiments with small-caliber explosive projectiles. Different features are sometimes combined, the ultimate combination being the armor-piercing incendiary tracer (APIT) projectile. These essentially comprise the forms of ammunition used in rifles and handguns; shotgun ammunition takes different forms. The most commonly produced form has a plastic cartridge case on which a brass base and rim are mounted, strengthening it at the most critical areas. After powder, a plastic wad, and the shot are loaded, the forward end of the cartridge is sealed by folding it inward. On occasion, shotgun cartridges have also taken an all-brass or all-plastic form, and prior to the evolution of plastic cartridges, rolled paper shells were standard. Common loading material are birdshot (small pellets used for birds and small game), buckshot (larger pellets used for deer and large game), and a slug (a single large projectile, also used for large game).

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Specialty loads are also available—flares for signaling, firecrackers to drive birds away from crops, tear gas, tracer pellets, plastic pellets for riot control, incendiaries, tiny steel darts, and virtually anything else that can fit into a shotgun barrel. Ammunition has generated fewer legislative controversies compared to firearms. In the 1970s, when efficient handgun softpoint and hollow-point ammunition became available, there were proposals to ban them on the grounds that they were too deadly. In the 1990s, issues arose regarding armorpiercing handgun ammunition, whose projectile had a solid bronze core that increased its ability to penetrate. Critics charged that these projectiles would also pierce body armor and labeled them “cop-killer bullets.” Congress ultimately outlawed civilian production of handgun ammunition with solid cores made of certain hard metals. A later controversy involved the “Black Talon” hollow-point ammunition produced by Winchester and aggressively marketed as an expanding projectile that inflicted greater injuries. After some of these rounds were used in the “101 California Street” murders, the marketing approach backfired on Winchester. The controversy ended after Winchester retitled the bullet the “Ranger Talon” and restricted sales to law enforcement personnel. David T. Hardy See also: Cartridges; Dum-Dum Bullet; Hollow Point Bullet

Further Reading Bocetta, Sam. “The Complete History of Small Arms Ammunition and Cartridges.” Small Wars Journal, October 15, 2017. https:// smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/complete -histor y-small-ar ms-ammunition-and -cartridges (accessed January 26, 2022).

Hogg, Ian. Jane’s Directory of Military Small Arms Ammunition. New York: Jane’s Publishing, 1985. Logan, Herschel C. Cartridges: A Pictorial Digest of Small Arms Ammunition. Harrisburg, PA: Stackpole, 1959.

Amnesty Programs Gun amnesty programs, often run in conjunction with gun buyback programs, have been used by law enforcement agencies to remove firearms from circulation. In such programs, weapons that are turned in (often for cash or some other material inducement) are accepted with “no questions asked.” Also, those turning in illegal guns are not prosecuted for illegal possession of a firearm. Typically, no background checks or criminal investigations of participants are conducted. Not all gun buyback programs include amnesty provisions. Individuals who turned in guns through local programs funded by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (1999–2001) were required to show identification. The guns were then checked to determine whether they were stolen or used in a crime. Though amnesty and buyback programs have been politically popular (Callahan, Rivara, and Koepsell 1994, 472), there is no empirical evidence that they actually succeed in reducing gun violence. Many of the guns that are turned into these programs are obsolete and therefore not likely to be used in criminal activity. In 2009, a World War II–era mortar launcher was turned into the Syracuse, New York, police (Baker 2009). Also, those who turn in guns tend to be older people, who are less likely to be engaged in criminal activity. A study of the gun amnesty program in



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Sacramento, California, found that 40 percent of the program participants were fiftyfive years of age or older, and none was under the age of twenty-five (Romero, Wintemute, and Vernick 1998). There has also been some concern about amnesty programs in which guns are not checked. A gun used in a crime might be turned in anonymously. The gun is then destroyed, depriving the authorities of evidence and allowing a criminal to escape prosecution. Even gun control advocates have recognized the limitation of such programs. In a 1998 interview, Robin Terry, a spokesperson for Handgun Control Inc. (now called the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence), said that “any effort to get guns off the street is worthwhile. But I think they are more effective when they are used in connection with gun violence programs” (Newark Star-Ledger 1998, 4). In recent years, advocates of these programs have tended to emphasize the safety aspects of the programs rather than crime control. Representative of this point of view was Newark, New Jersey, mayor Cory Booker, who, when announcing the 2009 amnesty program, said, “Many residents of Newark and surrounding communities may have unwanted firearms in their homes, inherited from family members, left behind by a building’s previous occupants, or weapons discarded by fleeing criminals. These weapons could fall into the hands of dangerous criminals or persons unskilled in their use, and lead to tragedy. If you have an unwanted gun in your home, turn it in. You may save the life of yourself or a loved one” (Newark Press Information Office 2009). Jeffrey Kraus

Further Reading

See also: Crime and Gun Use; Gun Buyback Programs; Guns in the Home

As of 2019, two federal laws regulate gun activity on K–12 school campuses: the

Baker, Robert A. “Artillery Piece Received during Gun Amnesty Program.” Syracuse. com, February 11, 2009. http://www .syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2009/02 /syracusans_turn_in_more_illega.html (accessed June 16, 2011). Callahan, Charles M., Frederick P. Rivara, and Thomas D. Koepsell. “Money for Guns: Evaluation of the Seattle Gun Buy-Back Program.” Public Health Reports 109 (1994): 470–77. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc /ar ticles / PMC1403522 /pdf/pubhealth rep00059-0010.pdf (accessed June 16, 2011). Newark Press Information Office. “Newark Gun Amnesty Buyback Program Resumes.” http://www.thejerseytomatopress.com /stor ies / N EWA R K-GU N-A M N ESTY -BUYBACK-PROGR AM-R ESUMES, 2714?print=1 (accessed June 16, 2011). “Newark Resurrects Gun Swap Program.” Newark Star-Ledger, February 10, 1998. Plotkin, Martha, ed. Under Fire: Gun BuyBacks, Exchanges and Amnesty Programs. Washington, DC: Police Executive Research Forum, 1996. Romero, Michael, Garren Wintemute, and Jon Vernick. Reduction in Prevalence of Risk Factors for Firearm Violence among Participants in a Gun Amnesty Program. Monterey, CA: Program on Security and Development, Monterey Institute of International Studies, 1998. http://blogs.miis.edu/sand/files/2011 /02/sacgbb.pdf (accessed January 26, 2022). Van Horn, Dwight. “What’s Wrong with Gun Amnesty Programs.” Law Enforcement Alliance of America Newsletter (1992): 2.

Armatix LLC. See Intelligent Gun Safety Systems Armed Teacher Policies

40 | Armed Teacher Policies

Gun-Free Schools Act and the Gun-Free School Zones Act. President Bill Clinton signed the legislation into law on March 31, 1994; it was amended in 2000. This act focuses primarily on deterring student gun carrying and requires states to mandate student expulsion for possession of a firearm while on a school campus. The Gun-Free School Zones Act, passed in 1990 with further amendments passed in 1996, prohibits individuals from possessing a firearm at or within 1,000 feet of a school zone. However, neither law specifically prohibits gun carrying by nonstudent individuals who have a conceal carry permit. Since the passage of these two laws, there has been no major federal legislation to address gun possession on K–12 school campuses. Though each state has laws related to firearm possession and use, they vary with regard to firearm policies for K–12 non-law enforcement school personnel (e.g., teachers, staff, principals, other administrators, coaches) and circumstances under which guns can be carried on school grounds. While most state laws explicitly say that guns cannot be carried on K–12 school grounds, school buses, or at school-related events, many contain exceptions to this general rule. In six states (AL, AK, NH, OR, RI, UT), the law permits any nonstudent, adult citizens with a concealed carry permit to carry a firearm on school grounds. Eight states (ID, KS, LA, MS, SD, TN, TX, WY) have provisions in their laws that allow certain school personnel (other than law enforcement or school resource officers) with specific criteria (often including a valid concealed carry permit) to possess a firearm on school ground. In twenty-four states, the laws allow individual school districts the authority to permit firearm possession at their K–12 schools. Though allowed, many school districts have not

instituted the practice. For example, at the end of 2018, roughly 30 percent of the school districts in Texas had policies that allowed school personnel to carry on school grounds. Finally, two states’ laws (HI, NH) do not contain specific language related to firearm possession on K–12 campuses. The training requirements of school personnel who may be allowed to carry concealed firearms on school grounds also can vary by location or the districts themselves. School personnel in this sense refer to teachers, administrators, staff, and coaches, not to law enforcement or school resource officers. Training requirements of school personnel are often not specified in the state laws and are instead left to the individual school districts. Further, there are no national standard requirements on the quantity, frequency, or content of training required for school personnel to conceal carry at educational institutions. Some school districts have contracted with companies to train school personnel to carry firearms on school grounds. However, some of these trainings have been criticized for being brief, not requiring actual shooting, and focusing on state conceal carry laws rather than school-related carry issues and decision-making. Other states, however, have created special programs for select personnel to carry. For example, South Dakota law allows school sentinels who undergo a screening process and who complete eighty hours of training to carry on K–12 school grounds. Likewise, some Texas school districts have guardians who may carry on campus following five days of initial training, with more days required annually. However, other Texas school districts have school marshals who are only required to complete sixteen hours of training before being allowed to carry on campus.



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Public school teachers practice firearms handling during a training class in Florida in 2013. Armed teacher policies gained particular traction following the 2012 shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. (Reuters/Alamy Stock Photo)

Further, school districts must consider budgetary concerns related to school personnel carrying on school grounds. Reports indicate trainings can cost from $0 (with local groups donating the training) to over $1,200 per teacher. In addition to training, school districts could incur costs related to the weapons themselves, increases in insurance premiums, and creating/maintaining systems of verifying concealed carry personnel. With armed school resource officers (SROs) costing approximately $75,000–$97,000 per year each (taking into account salary, benefits, annual training, equipment, and supervision), school districts have to determine if arming school personnel is more cost effective than having an SRO.

Though pragmatic concerns abound, much political debate centers around the human costs/benefits of having armed personnel on school grounds. Proponents of arming school personnel point to the deterrent effect and cite that mass shootings often occur in gun-free environments. Having armed school personnel, they argue, would serve as a deterrent to would-be shooters and would provide immediate protection during a shooting situation instead of waiting for a law enforcement response. They argue that although schools may implement safety measures, things like metal detectors will not keep a motivated offender out, especially considering the number of entrances to any school. Given that school personnel would carry

42 | Armed Teacher Policies

concealed, students would not necessarily know who was or was not carrying, much like in day-to-day public interactions, thus reducing concerns about student fear and anxiety. Opponents argue that gun violence in schools, though devastating, is relatively rare, citing that less than 3 percent of youth homicides occur at school (Musu-Gillette et al. 2018) and that in 2018, there were twenty-four school shootings that resulted in injury or death (“School Shootings in 2018” 2019). Likewise, they argue that students’ feelings of school safety decrease with less invasive procedures like metal detectors and armed security guards, suggesting that adding other armed personnel would heighten student fear and anxiety. Further, they cite studies indicating that police officers, who are required to receive initial and ongoing firearms training, often miss their intended targets during a gunfight, posing questions about how well school personnel would perform in active gunfights. In addition, research on active shooter incidents from 2000 to 2013 found that in 13.1 percent of these incidents, an unarmed citizen was able to stop the shooter. Opponents also note that arming teachers creates a dual role where teachers are both educators, concerned with the safety and well-being of students, and potentially guards asked to shoot at these same students. Finally, police responding to an active shooter situation may be unable to distinguish a teacher from a shooting suspect, resulting in harm or even death to the armed school personnel. Surveys of different constituency groups reveal conflicting viewpoints on this issue. A study of over 10,000 teachers found that about three-fourths of the teachers surveyed indicated they would not carry a firearm to school even if allowed, though

those teachers who owned a gun were slightly more likely to indicate they would. Similar results were found in a sample of over 1,000 National Education Association members, with 82 percent indicating they would not carry a gun in school (though only 62% of those who own a gun said the same). A national sample of 349 principals were split, with 46 percent thinking that allowing select school personnel to carry firearms on school grounds would be “very effective” (16%) or “somewhat effective” (30%) and another 46 percent thinking it would be “not every effective” (Price et al. 2016). In a national study of parents’ perceptions, a slight majority of parents (54.1%) did not support school personnel carrying firearms at school (Payton et al. 2017). Using a national probability sample of American adults, public perceptions were drastically different based on gun ownership, with 43 percent of gun owners (versus 19% of nonowners) in support of a person carrying concealed on school grounds (Barry et al. 2018). Several professional organizations have issued statements and/or briefs related to arming school personnel. The National Association of School Nurses, The National Association of School Psychologists, The American Academy of Pediatrics, The American Bar Association, and The National Association of School Resource Officers oppose the practice of arming non-security school personnel for reasons, including the lack of initial and ongoing training, lack of research supporting the practice, and the safety of school-age children. The National Rifle Association supports arming specific highly trained school personnel through its National School Shield program. The program also argues for other Armed Citizen Volunteers (such as retired law



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enforcement officers) who have extensive firearms training to be used as security officers in schools. Jennifer Roberts, Alexandra Murphy, and Chelsea Clark

“School Shootings in 2018: How Many and Where.” Education Week online. Last updated: August 9, 2019. https://www .edweek.org /ew /sect ion /mu lt i med ia /school-shootings-2018-how-many-where .html (accessed May 18, 2022).

See also: Campus Carry; Gun-Free School Laws; School Marshall and Guardian Programs

Armor-Piercing Ammunition

Further Reading Barry, Colleen, Daniel Webster, Elizabeth Stone, Cassandra Crifasi, Jon Vernick, and Emma McGinty. “Public Support for Gun Violence Prevention Policies Among Gun Owners and Non-Gun Owners in 2017.” American Journal of Public Health 108 (2018): 878–81. Education Commission of the States. “50 State Comparison: Weapons in Schools.” 2019. https://c0arw235.caspio.com/dp/b7f93000 ca98a2eae2374845afef (accessed May 18, 2022). Hutchinson, Asa. “Report of the National School Shield Task Force.” National Rifle Association, April 2, 2013. https://www .documentcloud.org/documents/673448 -nss-final-full.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Musu-Gillette, Lauren, Anlan Zhang, Ke Wang, Jizhi Zhang, Jana Kemp, Melissa Dilibert, and Barbara Oudekerk. “Indicators of School Crime and Safety: 2017.” National Center for Education Statistics and Bureau of Justice Statistics, March 2018. https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf /iscs17.pdf (accessed May 18, 2022). Payton, Erica, Jagdish Khubchandani, Amy Thompson, and James Price. “Parents’ Expectations of High Schools in Firearm Violence Prevention.” Journal of Community Health 42 (2017): 1118–26. Price, James, Jagdish Khubchandani, Erica Payton, and Amy Thompson. “Reducing the Risk of Firearm Violence in High Schools: Principal’s Perceptions and Practices.” Journal of Community Health 41 (2016): 234–43.

The penetration of any projectile or bullet depends upon its velocity, mass, and composition. The military has long classified some small-arms ammunition as armor piercing, although no uniform standard for penetration exists. This ammunition, commonly used in machine guns, has greater penetration against targets such as vehicles because of the bullet design and composition but is not capable of penetrating armor plate on tanks and other armored vehicles. Penetration of this armor plate requires projectiles from larger, crew-served weapons. The concept has had little application to the civilian ammunition market. Beginning in the mid-1970s, bullet-resistant vests became standard equipment for most of the uniformed police in the United States. The vests became practical with the development of Kevlar, a synthetic fabric that, when layered, could resist penetration by bullets. The rising violent crime rate of the period ensured demand. None of the vests would stop the penetration of rifle bullets, which routinely travel at over 2,000 feet per second, without the addition of heavy metal or ceramic plates that made the vests too cumbersome for routine police wear. Vests adequate to protect against most handgun and shotgun projectiles could be worn under the officer’s uniform shirt on a regular basis. Armor-piercing handgun rounds had existed for many years but failed to gain any popularity with police or civilian purchasers.

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Dealers seldom stocked the ammunition, and few buyers showed any interest in ordering it. Interest in pistol ammunition had primarily focused on development of more effective soft-point handgun ammunition that increased trauma by expanding when it struck a target. Armor-piercing ammunition had a sharp, pointed bullet that reduced rather than increased trauma in the target. As the bullet resistance of soft body armor resulted from the number of layers of fabric and the penetration characteristics of various cartridges varies, one cannot rationally define an absolute point at which a cartridge becomes armor piercing. The issue of armorpiercing bullets and body armor reflects the historically shifting balance between offensive weapons that dates to castle walls and catapults. However, when a small ammunition company marketed Teflon-coated pistol bullets, capable of penetrating soft body armor, the symbolism generated widespread attention, particularly among the police (Davidson 1993). In 1981, Representative Mario Biaggi (D-NY), a former New York police officer, became the visible advocate of federal legislation to outlaw these “cop-killer bullets.” A dispute exists over the actual originator of the strategy to use armor-piercing ammunition as a wedge issue, but Handgun Control Incorporated (now the Brady Campaign) clearly assumed the lead role in advancing it (Vizzard 2000). The strategy called for pursuing a ban on the ammunition with police support, forcing the National Rifle Association (NRA) to either give tacit support to a gun control measure, or oppose it and alienate law enforcement and the public. The NRA responded by attempting to invoke a new paradigm: technology. Cop-killer bullets clearly constituted a symbolic, rather than substantive, policy issue (Vizzard 2000). Unfortunately for the NRA, their

effort to invoke a rational technological paradigm in relation to this symbolic conflict proved unsuccessful. The issue defined them as unwilling to accept reasonable compromise on even the smallest issue. The resulting legislation banned the manufacture or importation of pistol ammunition with specific armor-piercing components, except for military and law enforcement use (18 U.S.C. § 922(a)(7) and 18 U.S.C. § 921(a)(17)(B)). As of 2021, twenty-one states ban the manufacture, transfer, purchase, or possession of armor-piercing ammunition—but New York is not among them (Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence 2021). Since the 1980s, the issue has essentially faded from the gun control debate, with two short exceptions. President Clinton and some members of Congress again addressed the issue in 1995, proposing a broader definition of armor piercing to include any pistol ammunition capable of penetrating body armor. This initiative never gained traction, and the issue quickly faded. In 2005, the issue again arose when the Department of Homeland Security issued a bulletin regarding the capability of the FN Herstal 5.7 mm pistol to penetrate soft body armor, once again faded from the public agenda (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives 2005). The proliferation of compact, semiautomatic, military-style rifles, commonly referred to as “assault weapons,” proved to be far more effective in defeating police body armor than any pistol or revolver. In March 2010, two Oakland, California, SWAT officers wearing protective vests were killed by a barricaded subject using an AK-47-style rifle. Two weeks later, three Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, officers were killed while responding to a domestic disturbance by a similar weapon, followed in May by the killing of two officers and the



wounding of two more in West Memphis, Arkansas, by suspects armed with similar weapons. William J. Vizzard See also: Ammunition, Types of; Body Armor

Further Reading Bruce, John M., and Clyde Wilcox, eds. The Changing Politics of Gun Control. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives. FR 5.7 (Fabrique Nationale) Pistol Is a Semiautomatic Pistol in 5.7 X 28 MM Caliber. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2005. https://www .atf.gov/file/97441/download (accessed June 12, 2022). Davidson, Osha Grey. Under Fire: The NRA and the Battle for Gun Control. Washington, DC: National Press Books, 1982. Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Ammunition Regulation.” 2021. https://giffords.org/lawcenter/gun-laws /policy-a reas / ha rdwa re -a m mu n it ion /ammunition-regulation/ (accessed December 23, 2021). National Rifle Association. “History of Federal Ammunition Law.” https://www .nraila.org/articles/19990729/history-of -federal-ammunition-law (accessed December 24, 2021). Vizzard, William J. Shots in the Dark: The Policy, Politics and Symbolism of Gun Control. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000.

Arms Trade Treaty The Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) is an international regulation of the export of a variety of firearms and ammunitions developed and sanctioned by the United Nations (UN). In 2006, the UN began efforts to promote global peace and reduce violence through

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the control of weapons transfers. The ATT aimed to establish standards for the export of arms between countries. However, according to the UN, the ATT does not impact domestic gun laws and sales within individual countries (United Nations n.d.). This provision ensures the autonomy of member states to establish gun control and firearm ownership for their citizens. After years of negotiating, on April 2, 2013, the UN reached an agreement and adopted the ATT in a vote of 154 (yes) to 3 (no), with 23 abstentions. The UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon declared the ATT “a historic diplomatic achievement” and “a victory for the world’s people” (United Nations 2013). The decision was viewed as successful not only due to its broad approval but also its relatively quick enaction; in less than two years, more than 100 nations ratified the treaty, placing it into effect on December 14, 2014. The support, or lack thereof, from the United States is of great importance. Though the United States is only 1 of 193 the UN’s member states, it holds significant influence. The United States is the third largest country by population and the largest exporter of arms at 36 percent of the total global exports (Stockholm International Peace Research Institute 2019; World Bank 2019). The UN’s active involvement with the ATT began in 2006 when the UN General Assembly approved Resolution 61/89, authorizing the UN secretary-general to create a committee to examine the development of a treaty to regulate the transfer of arms. This resolution was borne out of calls for the control of arms by Nobel Peace Prize laureates of the 1980s and in 1997 by the former president of Costa Rica, Óscar Arias (Lustgarten 2015). In December 2006, the United States alone voted “no” to the

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resolution, while 153 states voted in support, and 24 abstained. The George W. Bush administration voiced concerns about loopholes in the treaty and the need to protect the United States’ right to self-defense and national security. Additional government criticism of the treaty identified the necessity of UN consensus to ensure the effectiveness of the treaty, as well as concerns regarding “watered down international standards” which were subpar with those currently in place in the United States (Bureau of International Security and Proliferation 2008). However, in 2009, presidential support shifted when the Barack Obama administration demonstrated its backing of the ATT by voting to further the committee’s progress. Later, President Obama stated that the ATT would contribute to world peace and the reduction of violence and that the treaty aligned with the rights and regulations already in place in the United States (Obama 2016). Though the United States signed the ATT in 2013, it did not move to ratify the treaty. In 2019, President Donald Trump stated that the United States would not ratify the ATT during his tenure. His administration took the position that the ATT threatens the sovereignty and constitutional rights of United States citizens (White House 2019). The ATT regulates a variety of practices associated with arms transfers, including the “export, import, transit, trans-shipment, and brokering” (United Nations n.d.). The scope of weapons addressed in Article 2 of the ATT is quite broad, covering seven categories: battle tanks, armored combat vehicles, large-caliber artillery systems, combat aircraft, attack helicopters, warships, missiles and missile launchers, as well as small arms and light weapons (SALW). The treaty also addresses the transfer of ammunition, treaty

members’ reporting requirements, and the registration of importers, exporters, and firearms dealers (Lustgarten 2015). Incidentally, during the time of the development and ratification of the ATT, the first functioning 3D printed gun was successfully created; however, the ATT does not address the printing and trading of 3D firearms or their components (Flores 2016). Support for an international arms agreement was born out of the desire to continue disarmament efforts post–Cold War. The push to regulate arms transfers was further motivated by the need to reduce intrastate violence occurring in Global South U.N. nations, most notably in sub-Saharan Africa (Lustgarten 2015). The mindset is that by reducing the trafficking of small arms from Northern states, conflict, violence, and human suffering will be reduced. Other supporters view the transfer of arms as a source of corruption, in which states stockpile arms to later be used as currency to trade for services, bribes, and other transactions (Lustgarten 2015). Countries that oppose the ATT often cite concerns for their right to maintain national sovereignty (White House 2019). Other critics state that the ATT will have limited impact, as only the nations already complying with the law will continue to do so, and the lack of enforcement will not compel other countries to fall in line. Within the United States, pro-gun groups argue that the ATT encroaches on domestic gun rights. Citizens and gun rights groups voice the importance of protecting the individual rights of citizens, as well as constitutional rights, particularly that of the Second Amendment. Sherah L. Basham See also: International Firearms Laws; 3D Gun Printing; United Nations (UN)



Articles of Confederation and Gun Control | 47

Further Reading Bureau of International Security and Proliferation. “Fact Sheet: U.S. Position on Arms Trade Treaty.” U.S. Department of State, October 31, 2008. https://2001-2009.state .gov/t/isn/rls/fs/112223.htm (accessed May 18, 2022). Flores, Alex Catalan. “Click, Print, Fire: 3D Printing and the Arms Trade Treaty.” ANU Undergraduate Research Journal 8 (2016): 185–97. G.A. Res. 61/89, U.N. Doc A/RES/61/89, December 18, 2006. G.A. Verbatim Report 67. A/61/PV.67, December 6, 2006. Lustgarten, Laurence. “The Arms Trade Treaty: Achievements, Failings, Future.” International and Comparative Law Quarterly 64, no. 3 (2015): 569–600. Obama, Barack. “Message to the Senate: Arms Trade Treaty.” The White House, December 9, 2016. https://obamawhite hou se.a rch ives.gov /t he -press- of f ice /2016/12/09/message-senate-arms-trade -treaty (accessed May 18, 2022). Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. “Global Arms Trade: USA Increases Dominance; Arms Flows to the Middle East Surge, Says SIPRI.” Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, March 11, 2019. https://www.sipri .org /media /press-release /2019/global -arms-trade-usa-increases-dominance -arms-flows-middle-east-surge-says-sipri (accessed May 18, 2022). United Nations. “Secretary-General’s Statement on the Adoption of the Arms Trade Treaty.” April 2, 2013. https://www.un.org /sg/en/content/sg/statement/2013-04-02 /secretary-generals-statement-adoption -arms-trade-treaty (accessed May 18, 2022). United Nations. “United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs.” n.d. https://www .un.org /disar mament /convar ms /ar ms -trade-treaty-2/# (accessed May 18, 2022). The White House. “Fact Sheet: President Donald J. Trump Is Defending our Sovereignty

and Consitutional Rights from the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty.” The White House, April 26, 2019. https://www.white house.gov/briefings-statements/president -donald-j-trump-is-defending-our-sover eignty-and-constitutional-rights-from-the -united-nations-arms-trade-treaty/ (accessed May 18, 2022). The World Bank. Population. 2019. https:// data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.POP .TOTL (accessed May 18, 2022).

Articles of Confederation and Gun Control As the first written constitution of the United States, the Articles of Confederation neither contained any expressed provisions guaranteeing the alleged individual right to keep and bear arms nor gave to the new centralized government any means by which it could regulate guns or firearm possession or use. As the Articles of Confederation only created a league of thirteen sovereign independent states and a nominal centralized government, any constitutional protection for gun ownership was derived, if at all, from each of the thirteen state governments and constitutions. Similarly, any gun regulations or laws were instituted, if at all, on the state level as well. Under the Articles of Confederation, the centralized government lacked the basic authority to regulate interstate commerce and lacked a taxing power—two of the chief ways in which federal gun controls such as the National Firearms Act of 1934 and the Gun Control Act of 1968 have been enacted by the federal government in modern times. The centralized government also lacked the ability to enforce laws it could enact; there was no provision allowing for a chief executive or federal court system, and all “law enforcement” was left to the individual

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states. The centralized Congress, which was a unicameral body composed of delegates from each state, could not exert any of its limited powers over individuals. Lastly, in the only section of the Articles of Confederation to mention “arms,” Article VI required that “every state shall always keep up a well regulated and disciplined militia, sufficiently armed and accoutred, and shall provide and constantly have ready for use, in public stores, a due number of field pieces and tents, and a proper quantity of arms, ammunition and camp equipage.” This provision, which laid the foundation for the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution that followed later, illustrates the importance of the “militia” and the “collective right” theory to bear arms within the underpinnings of the Second Amendment. Ratified in 1781 and remaining in effect until 1788, the Articles of Confederation established a loose confederation or league of states, rather than a strong centralized federal government as was eventually created by the U.S. Constitution in 1787. The Articles of Confederation were literally born from the conflict with Great Britain. From the onset of the American Revolution, influential state leaders stressed the need for a stronger government sufficiently powerful to defeat Great Britain and, presumably, defend against future aggressions. However, most Americans remained overly suspicious of a new powerful centralized state. Thus, each state retained its “sovereignty, freedom and independence.” Article III of the Articles of Confederation illustrates this concept of a limited union best by describing the confederation of American states as “a firm league of friendship” of states “for their common defense, the security of their liberties, and their mutual and general welfare.” While the new centralized government was given some limited enumerated powers, these powers

largely dealt with the handling of foreign affairs issues (e.g., power to declare war, power to raise and support an army and navy, and power to make treaties). Thus, regarding most domestic issues, the government created by the Articles of Confederation was largely a loose confederation or agency that supported the actions of the individual states in their respective sovereign spheres. James A. Beckman See also: Federalism and Gun Control; Gun Control Act of 1968; National Firearms Act of 1934; Second Amendment

Further Reading Articles of Confederation (ratified March 1, 1781). http://www.usconstitution.net /articles.html (accessed January 26, 2022). Bowen, Catherine. Miracle at Philadelphia. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1966. Jensen, Merrill. The Articles of Confederation: An Interpretation of the Social Constitutional History of the American Revolution, 1774–1781. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1940.

Assault Weapons Assault weapons, first developed for military use, were designed as light machine guns, capable of firing in semiautomatic or fully automatic modes; they were subject to some federal regulation in the 1990s. Manufactured in rifle, pistol, and shotgun forms, these weapons began to come into civilian hands in large numbers with the sale of surplus M1 carbines in the 1960s, Chinesemade semiautomatic rifles (modeled after the Russian AK-47) in the 1980s, semiautomatic pistols like the MAC-10 in the 1980s, and the semiautomatic TEC-9 in the 1990s. A semiautomatic weapon fires one bullet with each pull of the trigger without manual



rechambering; a fully automatic weapon fires bullets continuously and in rapid succession while the trigger is depressed until the bullet clip or magazine is empty. U.S. law dating to the 1930s has made possession of fully automatic weapons (usually called machine guns) difficult. Traditional machine guns were heavy, and it required more than one individual to properly operate them. The first significant departure from the crew-operated machine gun was the Tommy gun, developed at the end of World War I for use by a single soldier and popularized by gangster use in the 1920s. Though modern fully automatic assault weapons are relatively lightweight, they were already regulated if they fired in a fully automatic fashion. The spread of semiautomatic assault weapons in recent decades and their increasing use in sensational crimes, such as the Stockton, California, schoolyard shooting in 1989, prompted calls for stricter regulation. Despite such incidents, civilian sales of semiautomatic assault weapons increased dramatically in the late 1980s and 1990s. They were popularized not only by manufacturers’ intensive advertising but also through movies and television programs. They also proved popular among right-wing survivalist and self-created militia movements. In some instances, legally obtainable semiautomatic weapons could be easily altered to fire in full automatic mode. Critics of proposed new regulations of assault weapons argued that it was difficult to produce an acceptable definition of what constitutes an assault weapon. They also noted that the firing process for many hunting rifles was the same as that of militarystyle assault weapons, rendering the distinction between legitimate semiautomatic hunting rifles and allegedly illegitimate semiautomatic assault weapons merely cosmetic.

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Some assault weapons were finally subjected to national regulation when Congress passed the Assault Weapons Ban of 1994. This law resolved the definition problem by defining an assault weapon, configured specifically for military use, as having such characteristics as a more compact design, a barrel less than twenty inches in length, extensive use of stampings and plastics in its construction, lighter in weight (six to ten pounds), a pistol grip or thumbhole stock, a folding or telescoping stock, a grenade launcher, a bayonet fitting, a barrel shroud, a threaded barrel for adding a silencer or flash suppressor, and the ability to receive a large magazine that holds twenty to thirty bullets. Gun control supporters argued that these guns’ lighter weight and smaller size made them more appealing for criminal use—especially in the case of semiautomatic pistols—because their design facilitated concealability and spray fire, a firing technique incompatible with typical hunting or sporting purposes. The Assault Weapons Ban of 1994, passed as part of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, banned nineteen named types of assault weapons and several dozen copycat weapons. It also specifically exempted 661 sporting rifles. Existing assault-style weapons were also exempted from the ban. The Assault Weapons Ban lapsed in 2004 when Congress failed to reenact it. Repeated attempts to reinstate the ban or introduce a different version of the legislation similarly have failed to pass through Congress (Schildkraut and Carr 2020). Although, as of 2021, there is no federal legislation to ban assault weapons, seven states and the District of Columbia do have such restrictions in place. These include California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and New York. Notably, Hawaii bans only assault pistols,

50 | Assault Weapons Ban, Renewal Attempts of

whereas the remaining states ban both handguns and long guns that possess certain characteristics to qualify them as assault weapons. Additionally, both Minnesota and Virginia have regulations in place for these types of weapons, though they do not explicitly ban them (Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence n.d.). Robert J. Spitzer See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Automatic Weapons Laws; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF); Semiautomatic Weapons; Sporting Purposes Test (SPT)

Further Reading Avery, Derek. Firearms. Ware, UK: Wordsworth, 1995. Diaz, Tom. Making a Killing. New York: New Press, 1999. Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Assault Weapons.” n.d. https://giffords.org /lawcenter/gun-laws/policy-areas/hardware -ammunition/assault-weapons/ (accessed January 20, 2022). Schildkraut, Jaclyn, and Collin M. Carr. “Mass Shootings, Legislative Responses, and Public Policy: An Endless Cycle of Inaction.” Emory Law Journal 69, no. 5 (2020): 1043–76. Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021. Vizzard, William J. Shots in the Dark: The Policy, Politics, and Symbolism of Gun Control. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000.

Assault Weapons Ban, Renewal Attempts of Included as part of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, the Public Safety and Recreational Firearms

Use Protection Act (also known as the Federal Assault Weapons Ban or “AWB”) restricted and prohibited the manufacture and sale to civilians of certain types of semiautomatic firearms (defined therein as assault weapons) and high-capacity ammunition magazines. According to Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), the architect of the AWB, the ban’s purpose was to “reduce the frequency and deadliness of mass shootings” (Ingraham 2018). The AWB included a sunset provision that required renewal after a period of ten years. The U.S. Congress opted not to renew the ban, and it expired on September 13, 2004 (Ingraham 2018). Between 2003 and 2008, a number of attempts were made to renew the AWB, including the introduction of multiple bills with clearer, revised definitions for assault weapons. During these efforts to renew the ban, a number of law enforcement organizations and over 1,100 police chiefs and sheriffs from across the U.S. requested that Congress and then-President George W. Bush push for renewing and strengthening the ban (Carter 2009). Despite the supports from law enforcement as well as the level of public approval for the ban, which hovered just above 50 percent, efforts to renew it were unsuccessful and all of the aforementioned bills died in committee (Swift 2016). Later, after the election of Barack Obama in 2008, the new administration made renewing the AWB a legislative priority. However, due to resistance from a number of organizations and entities, including the National Rifle Association (NRA) and various members of Congress, the push for renewal did not lead to any legislative changes to the law regarding assault weapons. One of the key arguments against renewal is based on a 2004 study conducted for the



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U.S. Department of Justice by Koper, Woods, and Roth. The findings of that study suggest that any reduction in gun violence cannot be clearly or directly credited to the AWB. Perhaps even more importantly, though, one of the conclusions reached in the report is that if the ban were to be renewed, its “effects on gun violence are likely to be small at best and perhaps too small for reliable measurement” (Koper, Woods, and Roth 2004, 3). The NRA and other opponents of renewal point to this finding as one of the most significant reasons for not doing so. Simply put, the argument is that any AWB will be ineffective in much the same way that the original 1994 AWB was, at least according to the results of the 2004 study. To contrast this, emerging research suggests that the AWB is associated with a 25 percent reduction in the frequency of gun shootings (defined as public mass shootings with six or more gun-related deaths) and a 40 percent drop in the number of fatalities in those shootings when compared to the ten-year period before the ban was adopted (Donahue and Boulouta 2019). According to the same research, the number of fatalities in gun shootings in the fifteen-year period since the AWB expired in 2004 has increased by 347 percent (Donahue and Boulouta 2019). In other words, the periods both before and after the ban have demonstrably higher numbers of both gun shootings and fatalities, and this trend will likely continue into the foreseeable future. It is important to note that this research is still forthcoming in a peer-reviewed academic journal (Stockler 2019). After the school shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in December 2012, the Obama administration and the public’s attention once again turned to renewing or reinstating the AWB. Senator

Feinstein again introduced legislation designed to curb the manufacture and sale of military-style assault weapons such as the one used at Sandy Hook. The bill was substantially similar to the 1994 version but without an expiration date or sunset clause and with a clearer, more defined test for how to qualify certain firearms as assault weapons. As with the original AWB and other subsequent renewal attempts, the NRA remained vocally opposed to this legislation, and they were joined in their opposition by the entire GOP congressional delegation from Texas, among others. Although a version of Senator Feinstein’s bill was approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee along party lines in 2013, the bill eventually failed to pass in the Senate as a whole by a vote of 40–60 (U.S. Congress 2013). In January of 2019, and again in March of 2021, Senator Feinstein reintroduced the AWB. As of this writing, neither bill has advanced beyond the committee stage. The 2021 AWB is currently being reviewed by the Senate Judiciary Committee (U.S. Congress 2021). If the measure fails to pass, it is all but assured that attempts to renew or pass a new AWB will continue. Alexander D. Clayton See also: Assault Weapons; Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Semiautomatic Weapons

Further Reading Carter, Jimmy. “What Happened to the Ban on Assault Weapons.” New York Times, April 26, 2009. https://www.nytimes .com/2009/04/27/opinion/27Carter.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Donahue, John, and Theodora Boutoula. “That Assault Weapon Ban? It Really Did Work.” New York Times, September 4, 2019. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09

52 | Assault Weapons Ban of 1994 / 04/opinion /assault-weapon-ban.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Ingraham, Christopher. “The Real Reason Congress Banned Assault Weapons in 1994—And Why It Worked.” Washington Post, February 22, 2018. https://www .washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2018 /02/22/the-real-reason-congress-banned -assault-weapons-in-1994-and-why-it -worked /?noredirect = on&utm_ter m = .7007ad7f7314 (accessed May 18, 2022). Koper, Christopher S., Daniel J. Woods, and Jeffrey A. Roth. “An Updated Assessment of the Federal Assault Weapons Ban: Impacts on gun markets and gun violence, 1994-2003.” University of Pennsylvania, June 2004. http://dev.journalistsresource . o r g / w p - c o n t e n t / u p l o a d s / 2 01 2 / 1 2 /UPennAssaultBan.pdf (accessed May 18, 2022). Stockler, Asher. “Clinton-Era Assault Weapons Ban Did Work, According to New Research.” Newsweek, September 28, 2019. https://www.newsweek.com/assault -weapons-ban-1994-gun-rights-1461951 (accessed May 18, 2022). Swift, Art. “In U.S., Support for Assault Weapons Ban at Record Low.” Gallup, October 26, 2016. https://news.gallup.com /poll/196658/support-assault-weapons -ban-record-low.aspx (accessed May 18, 2022). U.S. Congress, Senate. Assault Weapons Ban of 2013, S.150, 113th Congress, Introduced in Senate January 24, 2013. https://www .congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/senate -bill/150 (accessed May 18, 2022). U.S. Congress, Senate. Assault Weapons Ban of 2019, S.66, 116th Congress, Introduced in Senate January 9, 2019. https://www .congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate -bill/66 (accessed May 18, 2022). U.S. Congress, Senate. Assault Weapons Ban of 2021, S.736, 117th Congress, Introduced in Senate March 11, 2021. https://www .congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate -bill/736 (accessed June 12, 2022).

Assault Weapons Ban of 1994 Enacted under Title XI as part of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 (PL 103-322; 108 Stat. 1796), this provision banned for ten years the future manufacture and transfer of nineteen named assault weapons and approximately 200 firearms covered by the law’s generic definition of “assault weapon.” Under the terms of the law, semiautomatic assault weapons were defined under three categories: rifles, pistols, and shotguns. Semiautomatic rifles and pistols fell under the law if they had the ability to accept a detachable magazine and possessed at least two other characteristics of such weapons; shotguns were considered assault weapons if they possessed at least two of the assault weapon features. The law also specifically exempted 661 named weapons. In addition, it banned large-capacity ammunition-feeding devices (those that could hold more than ten rounds). The ban did not apply to assault weapons already in circulation. Guns neither banned nor protected by the law were exempted from its regulations. In the 1980s, several factors converged to build support for some kind of legal restriction on assault weapons (firearms designed for military use), including spiraling crime rates, the increasing availability of such weapons, and the belief that such weapons served no legitimate hunting or sporting purpose. The key event spurring control supporters was a senseless 1989 schoolyard shooting in Stockton, California, when five children were killed and twenty-nine others were wounded in a shooting spree by a drifter, who used a Chinese AK-47 assault rifle. Within weeks, thirty states and many localities were considering bans on these weapons. Two years later, an even more violent shooting occurred in Killeen, Texas,



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President Bill Clinton signs the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act into law on September 13, 1994, in Washington, D.C. Among the act's most well-known provisions was the Federal Assault Weapons Ban, which was in place from 1994 until 2004, when it expired under a sunset provision. (William J. Clinton Presidential Library)

when a man killed twenty-two people and himself, and wounded twenty-three others, in a cafeteria. Concern that criminals found assault weapons particularly appealing was supported through studies of guns used in crimes. Assault weapons accounted for 6–8 percent of gun crimes in the United States during the 1990s, despite such weapons comprising only about 2–3 percent of all firearms owned in the United States. Aside from the fierce political opposition to the ban from the National Rifle Association (NRA), regulation of such weapons posed a practical problem, as the definition of a semiautomatic weapon is one that fires a round with each pull of the trigger, which would include woodenstocked hunting rifles. Assault-style semiautomatic weapons are distinguished from

others in that they have large magazines holding twenty to thirty bullets, are more compact in design, have barrels under twenty inches in length, take intermediatesized cartridges, include extensive use of stampings and plastics, are lighter in weight (about six to ten pounds), and were designed for military use. In addition, they often have folding or telescoping stocks, heat-dispersing shrouds, pistol grips, grenade launchers, flash suppressors, and bayonet fittings. President George H. W. Bush responded by passing an executive order in March 1989 placing a temporary ban on the import of certain assault rifles. The temporary ban became permanent and was later expanded to include a larger number of weapons, earning Bush the ire of the NRA. President Bill

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Clinton expanded the scope of the import ban in 1993, also by executive order, to include assault-style handguns, like the Uzi. Clinton expanded the order again in 1998. In Congress, several bills aimed at curbing or banning assault weapons were introduced and debated in 1989, 1990, and 1991. In November 1993, the Senate passed a ban on the manufacture of nineteen assault weapons, but it also included a provision allowing gun dealers to sell guns that had already been produced. The measure, added to a crime bill, also exempted over 650 types of hunting weapons. In the spring of 1994, the House took up the Assault Weapons Ban. From the start, ban supporters shared little optimism that the House would approve the measure. Though the majority of Democrats in Congress were more sympathetic to the measure, some of their leaders, such as Speaker Tom Foley (D-WA), were not. In April, Clinton weighed in strongly for the ban, enlisting the help of several Cabinet secretaries, most notably treasury secretary and gun owner Lloyd Bentsen. Ban supporters received unexpected help from Rep. Henry Hyde (R-IL), a staunch conservative who had opposed gun measures in the past. Thanks in part to Hyde’s support, the measure was approved by the Judiciary Committee on April 28, despite the opposition of committee chair Jack Brooks (D-TX). Even though a final preliminary tally showed that the measure lacked the necessary votes for passage, the Assault Weapons Ban managed to pass in the House in a stunning finale by a two-vote margin, 216– 214, on May 5. The drama was heightened when Rep. Andrew Jacobs Jr. (D-IN), at the urging of several colleagues, switched his vote to support the ban in the final seconds of the roll-call vote. As with other gun control legislation, the political pressures were

intense. A staff person for one freshman Republican representative who supported the bill commented, “You don’t know the threats we received.” As the Assault Weapons Ban was part of a larger crime bill that had passed in different versions in the two houses, a conference committee was called to iron out those differences. Typically, a bill that survives the legislative gauntlet up to the point of conference committee is all but assured final passage. Such was not the case for the Assault Weapons Ban. Bill supporters initially predicted that the conference committee would complete its work by the end of May. Yet it did not report a bill back to the House and Senate until the end of July, during which time Representative Brooks, a member of the House-Senate conference, attempted repeatedly to kill the Assault Weapons Ban. Brooks’s efforts failed, but he did succeed in inserting provisions that exempted pawnbrokers from the Brady Bill and that barred all anti-hunting protests from taking place on federal lands. Meanwhile, Republican leaders launched a full-scale assault on the $33 billion crime bill, calling it a wasteful piece of legislation laden with pork-barrel spending. Anxious to win final approval, and with an eye toward the fall elections, Clinton and his congressional allies pushed for an early vote in the House. This proved to be a serious tactical blunder, however, because they had not lined up the necessary support. In a dramatic reversal on a procedural vote to adopt a rule for the bill, the House rejected the crime bill on August 11 by a vote of 225–210. Under normal circumstances, a defeat on a rules vote would spell the end of the legislation. Yet Clinton would not accept the bill’s defeat. He launched an intense public campaign, enlisting the assistance of police organizations and several members of his



Association of Firearm and Tool Mark Examiners (AFTE) | 55

Cabinet. Congressional leaders vowed to bring the bill back, and in another departure from normal procedure, they negotiated a new version of the bill, this time cutting the bill’s spending by about 10 percent. On August 21, after three days and two nights of intense negotiation, the revised bill was again brought before the House in a highly unusual Sunday session. This time, with the help of moderate Republicans and four members of the Black Caucus who were persuaded to vote with the president, the bill passed by a vote of 235–195. The bill then went to the Senate, where, after considerable partisan wrangling, the bill was passed. Clinton signed the bill, HR 3355, on September 13. After the Republicans won control of Congress in the 1994 elections, party leaders promised to repeal the ban. In 1996, a measure to repeal passed in the House, but no Senate vote was taken, ending the effort to repeal. Despite public support for renewal of the Assault Weapons Ban, the law lapsed in 2004, as Republican congressional leaders opposed its renewal, and President George W. Bush did nothing to boost its reenactment. Subsequent attempts to reinstate the ban have been made nearly every year since its lapse without success. Robert J. Spitzer See also: Assault Weapons; Clinton, William J.; Congressional Voting Patterns on Gun Control; Killeen, Texas, Shooting; National Rifle Association (NRA); Semiautomatic Weapons; Sporting Purposes Test (SPT)

Further Reading Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021. Vizzard, William J. Shots in the Dark: The Policy, Politics, and Symbolism of Gun Control. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000.

Windlesham, Lord. Politics, Punishment, and Populism. New York: Oxford University Press, 1998.

Assize of Arms. See Appendix 3— List of Judicial Developments Association of Firearm and Tool Mark Examiners (AFTE) The Association of Firearm and Tool Mark Examiners (AFTE) was formed in 1969 to professionalize the identification of firearms and tool marks. The main issue was, and is, to render professional opinions both in investigations and in court on matching and identification of firearms and tool marks. As of 2021, it had more than 850 members. Members are expected to abide by a code of ethics that requires that they testify only to what their analyses can conclude with a high degree of certainty. The AFTE Journal is “dedicated to the sharing of information, techniques, and procedures.” AFTE also provides scholarships for research. A tool mark (or toolmark) is a mark made on some piece of evidence that has been made by a tool. This may be as simple as a chisel or a hammer and the item cut or the surface hit. The idea is that tools such as these may have slight but identifiable differences resulting from the manufacturing processes or to the later usages to which it has been put. Frequently, these differences may be identifiable only microscopically. The receiving surface may record these marks if it is an appropriate surface. The next steps in a criminal case are to connect the tool to the person charged and the mark to the victim. This will establish the chain of connection between the person

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charged and the victim. These latter two connections are generally done by others than the professionals who make the connection from the tool to the mark. A major part of this work at present is the connection of a firearm to a bullet fired. Most handguns and rifles have rifling, which is a spiral groove inside the barrel that imparts a spin to the bullet. This spin makes the bullet more accurate. Shotguns typically do not have this rifling. The “twist rate” is the distance the bullet has to travel down the barrel to revolve once. Some guns have twist rates that increase as the bullet travels down the barrel; as the bullet increases in speed traveling down the barrel, the speed of rotation will increase. This may result as incidental to the gunsmith’s desire to ensure that there not be a reduction in twist that would decrease accuracy and range. The result of all this is small differences in the marks made on the bullet by the gun. Given the varying characteristics of different firearms as well as the differences across firearms of a given type or manufacturer, it may be possible to make the connection using the marks on the bullet and comparing them with the marks on another bullet fired by the tester from the gun under consideration. The particular similarities and differences need to be analyzed and presented as part of the chain of evidence in court. In making the connection between the tool and the mark, it is important that the witness cannot be impeached in court; otherwise, the testimony is essentially worthless. Thus, having professional certification (as with CPA, MD, etc.) is valuable to the person giving the testimony. The AFTE has a program that provides certification in three areas: firearms, toolmarks, and gunshot residue/distance. As of 2021, there

were 164 members certified in firearms, 37 certified in toolmarks, and 29 certified in GSR/distance. The written examinations are given at AFTE’s annual training seminar, and the practical examinations are offered at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives Laboratory in Annandale, Maryland. For any expert witness, not only may certification be useful, but also a reputation for integrity and thoroughness. Ideally, the presentation to the court should be the same and the conclusions the same whether the expert is working for the defense or for the prosecution (this is true for any expert). By creating methodology and databases that help standardize the work, the AFTE is working to help in that outcome. Lawrence Southwick Jr. See also: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF)

Further Reading Hamby, James E., and James W. Thorpe. “The History of Firearm and Toolmark Identification.” Association of Firearm and Tool Mark Examiners Journal 31 (1999): 266–84. Science Daily. “Using Telltale Toolmarks to Fight Crime.” http://www.sciencedaily .com/releases/2004/04/040414004703.htm (accessed January 20, 2022).

Attitudes toward Gun Control. See Gun Control, Attitudes toward Aurora Theater Shooting In the early morning hours of July 20, 2012, twenty-four-year-old PhD student James Eagan Holmes attended a midnight premiere



of the Dark Knight Rises film, the latest installment of the Batman series, in Aurora, Colorado. Shortly after the start of the film, he engaged in a deadly mass shooting, killing twelve other moviegoers, as well as an unborn child, and injuring seventy others. He was arrested by law enforcement outside of the theater without incident. The perpetrator purchased a ticket to the film twelve days before its release. On the night of the premiere, he arrived at the Century 16 movie theater and parked his vehicle at the rear of the building, just outside the emergency exit for Theater 9. After entering the building, he made his way first to the concession stand and then into the auditorium he had parked behind, taking a seat in the front row. Approximately twenty minutes into the film, the perpetrator exited the theater to the rear parking lot through the emergency exit, having pretended to get a phone call. While outside, the perpetrator outfitted himself with head-to-toe ballistics gear, including a tactical vest and helmet, as well as a gas mask. He returned to the theater from the rear exit, armed with a Smith & Wesson semiautomatic rifle with detachable 100-round drum magazine, a Remington 870 tactical shotgun, and a Glock .40 caliber pistol. As he entered, he threw two canisters of tear gas into the audience before opening fire into the crowd of approximately 400 movie patrons. He first fired with the shotgun before switching to the rifle. He was able to get off sixty-five rounds before the drum magazine jammed, forcing the perpetrator to switch to his handgun. In addition to firing in the crowd, one round went into Theater 8, adjacent to the auditorium where the shooting took place, and struck three people. In just under seven minutes, he fired seventy-six total rounds. Twelve people

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died in the theater: Jonathan Blunk, Alexander Boik, Jesse Childress, Gordon Cowden, Jessica Ghawi, Matt McQuinn, John Larimer, Micayla Medek, Veronica Moser-Sullivan, Alex Sullivan, Alexander Teves, and Rebecca Wingo. Veronica’s mother Ashley, who was pregnant at the time, was injured in the shooting, causing her to lose the baby. An additional fiftyseven people were injured from gunfire; four sustained injuries from the tear gas, and eight others were harmed while trying to escape the theater. Law enforcement arrived on scene within minutes and noticed the perpetrator next to his car at the rear of the theater. Due to the tactical gear he was wearing, police initially mistook him for law enforcement before realizing he was the perpetrator and taking him into custody without incident. A fourth gun, a Glock 22 handgun, also was recovered in the vehicle. During the arrest, the perpetrator informed law enforcement that his apartment had been rigged with explosives designed to go off when they went there to respond to a noise complaint he had constructed by setting his music to play loudly at a certain time. Within minutes, officers arrived on scene at the apartment and began evacuating the building and then the surrounding buildings. More than thirty explosive devices were littered around the perpetrator’s apartment, all wired to a central control box in the kitchen, with gasoline and other accelerants also spread throughout. It took several days before the bombs could be disarmed, evidence collected, and residents allowed to return home. During the pretrial proceedings that started three days after the shooting, the perpetrator appeared dazed and confused, which fueled speculation about his mental state that would take center stage during the

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Mourners gather at the Aurora Municipal Center in Aurora, Colorado, on July 22, 2012, to honor the victims of a mass shooting at the city's Century 16 movie theater complex two days earlier. The attack, which took place during the midnight premier of The Dark Knight Rises, took the lives of 12 people and left 58 others injured. (UPI/Alamy Stock Photo)

trial. On July 30, 2012, ten days after the attack, the perpetrator was formally charged with 24 counts of first-degree murder (one for murder with deliberation and one for extreme indifference for each of the 12 victims), 116 counts of attempted murder (later revised to 140), possession of explosive devices, and inciting violence. He pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity on June 4, 2013, after prosecutors declined the perpetrator’s offer to plead guilty to avoid the death penalty, instead stating the state planned to seek death at trial. After several delays, jury selection began on January 20, 2015. Over nearly three months, 9,000 potential jurors were summoned, making it the largest in U.S. history. In the final pool of twelve jurors, one was a

former student of Columbine and friends with the shooters; another was the aunt of someone who had been in the school during the attack. Opening statements for the trial were presented on April 27, 2015. The prosecution’s case, presented first, centered on refuting the defense’s claim of insanity, with a court appointed psychiatrist testifying that the perpetrator was mentally ill (schizotypal personality disorder) but legally sane at the time of the crime. The prosecution also focused on the premeditation of the crime, evidenced not only by the explosive devices but also the nearly 6,000 rounds of ammunition the perpetrator purchased, along with other firearms-related equipment, in the months leading up to the



shooting. The defense emphasized his mental illness and suicidal tendencies in their case presentation. Closing arguments were made on July 14, 2015. After twelve hours of deliberation, the jury returned guilty verdicts on all 166 counts. At the end of the sentencing phase, on August 26, 2015, the perpetrator was sentenced to twelve life terms plus an additional 3,318 years for the attempted murder and explosive charges. On December 4, 2015, restitution in the amount of $955,000 to the state victims’ compensation fund ($851,000) and the victims themselves ($103,000) was added. The perpetrator originally was housed at the Colorado State Penitentiary in Cañon City. The month after his arrival at the institution, however, he was assaulted by another inmate, leading him to be transferred to an undisclosed location. According to the Federal Bureau of Prisons, as of June 2020, he was incarcerated at USP Allenwood in Union County, Pennsylvania. Jaclyn Schildkraut and Daniel Beutler See also: Assault Weapons; Columbine High School Shooting; Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting; Semiautomatic Weapons

Further Reading Patterson, Thom. “Police Chief: Suspect Bought Over 6,000 Rounds of Ammunition Through Internet.” CNN, July 21, 2012. https://www.cnn.com/2012/07/20 /justice/colorado-shooting-weapons/index .html (accessed June 16, 2020). TriData Division, System Planning Corporation. Aurora Century 16 Theater Shooting: After Action Report for the City of Aurora, CO. Arlington, VA: Author, 2014. https:// www.policefoundation.org/wp-content /uploads /2016/ 08/Aurora-Cent ur y-16 -Theater-Shooting_AAR.pdf (accessed June 16, 2020).

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Automatic Weapons Laws Federal government regulation of automatic weapons—those capable of firing bullets in rapid succession by depressing and holding down the gun trigger—dates to 1934. The use of submachine guns, such as the infamous Tommy gun, by gangsters in the 1920s and 1930s sparked public outrage and calls for government regulation. Created for military use at the end of World War I, the Tommy gun was developed by U.S. Army colonel John M. Thompson for use in trench warfare. Referred to by Thompson as a “trench broom,” it was designed so that a single soldier could deliver numerous shots in a brief space of time, comparable to the heavier and more cumbersome machine guns used so devastatingly in the war. After the war, Thompson tried to market his gun, but he had little success until Chicago gangsters began using the gun in 1925. Soon, other gangsters followed suit. Because automatic weapons could fire hundreds of rounds in a minute and produced recoil that made aim and control difficult to impossible, they had no legitimate hunting or sporting use and posed a considerable danger to anyone in the vicinity of such a weapon. In response, several states passed anti– machine gun laws, but the federal government failed to act until 1934. In a bill backed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt and referred to as the “Anti-Machine Gun Bill,” Congress considered a measure that would have required national registration and taxation of several types of firearms that were considered appealing to criminals, including handguns, sawed-off shotguns, cane guns, and automatic weapons. The original proposal also called for fingerprinting individuals who purchased such weapons. This proposal drew opposition from the National

60 | Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime

Rifle Association and other gun interests. Responding to these pressures, the bill that was reported out of committee omitted pistols. As enacted, the National Firearms Act of 1934 (48 Stat. 1236) requires automatic weapons to be registered with the U.S. Treasury Department. The owner must be fingerprinted, undergo a background check, and pay a fee. There were no major changes in the law until the Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986, which barred future possession or transfer of automatic weapons. However, pre-1986 weapons can be sold by federally licensed Class III firearm dealers if the buyer passes the necessary background check and pays the federal tax. About a quarter of a million fully automatic weapons are registered in the United States. Half are owned by private individuals and the other half by various law enforcement and other government agencies. Law enforcement officials have noted that automatic weapons hold special appeal for criminals, especially those involved in drug trafficking, but crime statistics do not support the idea that such weapons are widely used by criminals, probably owing to the government’s early and strict regulation of such weapons. Robert J. Spitzer See also: Assault Weapons; Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986; Gun Control; National Firearms Act of 1934; Tommy Gun

Further Reading Druzin, Heath. “Automatic Weapons Are Legal, but It Takes a Lot to Get One of the 630,000 in the U.S.” Boise State National Public Radio, December 21, 2018. https:// w w w.boisestatepublicradio.org /news / 2018 -12-21/aut om at ic -weap on s -a re -legal-but-it-takes-a-lot-to-get-one-of-the

-630-000-in-the-u-s (accessed January 26, 2022). Kennett, Lee, and James LaVerne Anderson. The Gun in America. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1975. Leff, Carol Skalnik, and Mark H. Leff. “The Politics of Ineffectiveness: Federal Firearms Legislation, 1919–38.” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 455 (1981): 48–62. Yenne, Bill. Tommy Gun: How General Thompson’s Submachine Gun Wrote History. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2009.

Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime Multiple theories have been offered as to the effect of gun availability on crime, including the following.

Guns Facilitate Crime by Those Inclined to It Besides being almost self-evident, this is amply supported by empirical evidence. Gun robberies net far more than do robberies in which other weapons are used, because without a gun, a robber is basically limited to attacking individuals. Also, guns allow robbers to attack such lucrative targets as banks and stores, whose proprietors might be armed (Kleck 1997, 239). By the same token, American and foreign data both show victims are less likely to suffer injury from robbers using guns. This is because victims are much more likely to comply if confronted with a gun; and robbers armed with lesser weapons may feel the need to start out by gratuitously hurting the victim to preempt resistance. Of course, if a gun robber actually shoots a victim, death is likelier than from injury with some lesser weapon (Cook 1987, 361; Kleck 1997, 238). Also, guns enable the weak to prey on



the strong, though, in fact, criminals are mostly younger and stronger than victims.

Guns Allow Victims to Resist Attack Neither martial-art skills nor chemical sprays provide a real option for victims faced by attackers who are stronger or armed. Indeed, sprays like Mace are ineffective against attackers who are high on alcohol or drugs, or are intensely angry or excited—that is, just the people who are most likely to attack and be the most dangerous (Jacobs 1989). It bears emphasis that those who deprecate self-defense with guns do not recommend using any other kind of weapon instead. Their advice to victims threatened with robbery or rape is “the best defense against injury is to put up no defense—give them what they want or run” (Handgun Control Staff 1976; Shields 1981; Zimring and Zuehl 1986). That advice is only partly supported by the evidence. Victims resisting with a lesser weapon than a gun are about twice as likely to suffer injury as victims who submit. But victims who pull guns find criminals generally flee. As a result, analysis of decades of national data shows victims who resist with a gun are only half as likely to suffer injury as those who submit—and, of course, are much less likely to be robbed or raped (Kates 1991; Kleck 1997). There is intense controversy as to just how often victims armed with guns actually do confront attacking felons. Though the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) compiles and publishes annual data on crimes, there is no protocol for self-defense incidents; so, even when they are reported, police agencies do not record them as such. In surveys of prison inmates sponsored by the National Institute of Justice, “Seventy percent of the respondents reported having

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been ‘scared off,’ shot at, wounded, or captured by a [gun-]armed crime victim” (Sheley and Wright 1995, 63; Wright and Rossi 1986, 154). From responses to more than fifteen national and state surveys in which the general populace was asked about defensive gun use, Gary Kleck (1995, 1997) estimated that 2 million to 2.5 million victims annually use handguns to repel criminal attackers. Handguns are used by citizens to defend against crime about three times as often annually as by criminals to commit crimes. (Many of these incidents do not involve victims confronting criminals with guns, however. Around 26 percent of all violent crime involves guns [Perkins 2003]; for instance, guns are involved in only 31 percent of robberies and 23 percent of aggravated assaults [Federal Bureau of Investigation 2020].) Kleck’s estimate has been vindicated by subsequent research (Southwick 1997) and proved persuasive even to a criminologist who was deeply antipathetic to firearms (Wolfgang 1995). Many others have felt Kleck’s estimate to be highly exaggerated. But the principal critics’ own national survey yielded the even-higher figure of 3 million defensive uses annually. At that point, they decided that surveys cannot provide a reliable index to defensive firearm use (Cook and Ludwig 1998). They and other scholars opposed to defensive firearm ownership point to a different survey vehicle (the National Crime Victimization Survey) that suggests— but without directly posing the question— the incidence of defensive gun use is less than 100,000 annually (Cook and Ludwig 2000; McDowall and Wiersema 1994; however, contrast Kleck and Kates 2001).

Guns Deter Criminal Attack The National Institute of Justice prison surveys found that “36% of the respondents

62 | Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime

[imprisoned felons] in our study reported having decided at least ‘a few times’ not to commit a crime because they believed the potential victim was armed.” Between 34 and 36 percent of the inmates said that in contemplating a crime, they either “often” or “regularly” worried they “[m]ight get shot at by the victim.” Fifty-seven percent of inmates agreed that “[m]ost criminals are more worried about meeting an armed victim than they are about running into the police” (Sheley and Wright 1995, 63; Wright and Rossi 1986, 154). Many U.S. states now allow law-abiding, responsible adults to carry concealed handguns. From a study of twenty-five years of crime data in those states compared to states without such laws, University of Chicago economists concluded that the prospect of encountering an armed victim has deterred criminals from committing thousands of rapes, robberies, and/or murders. Predictably, this conclusion has been a subject of great controversy (see criticisms in Black and Nagin 1998 and Dezhbakhsa and Rubin 1998; for responses, see Shugart 1999 and Lott 2000).

Firearm Availability “Causes” Violence The theoretical basis for seeing firearm availability as “causing” murder (rather than just facilitating it) is that law-abiding people kill because they have access to a gun in a moment of ungovernable passion. This is incorrect because murderers are almost never ordinary people. Rather, they are extreme aberrants with histories of violence, other crime, psychopathology, and substance abuse. Gun availability to such aberrants does facilitate their violence, but it does not “cause” ordinary people to kill. The theory that increased gun availability generally does increase homicide seemed

plausible in the late 1960s when a substantial increase in guns coincided with a doubling of the American homicide rate. But correlation does not prove causation. Instead of more guns causing more crime, it appears that the vast crime increases of that era caused more people to buy guns. If more guns were, as is often asserted, “the major cause” of high American murder rates, the vast increases in guns since the 1960s should have coincided with vast increases in homicide. In fact, the reverse is true: despite an approximately 160 percent increase in the number of handguns (from 36.9 million to 94.9 million) over the twenty-five-year period (1973–1997), and a 103 percent increase in guns of all kinds (from 128 million to 254.5 million), the homicide rate actually dropped 27.7 percent (Kates and Polsby 2000). Neither do the much lower murder rates of Western Europe prove that it is widespread gun ownership that drives American homicide. When the twentieth century began, Western Europe had no gun laws, yet it still had much lower homicide rates than the United States (where guns were more restricted legally). European gun laws were adopted in the tumultuous post–World War I era to prevent political crime, not curb apolitical homicide. Moreover, Switzerland, where guns are nearly as widespread as in the United States—and even less legally controlled—has a lower homicide rate than most of its gun-banning neighbors (Barnett and Kates 1996, 1236–42). What all this suggests is that homicide rates reflect basic socioeconomic and cultural factors, not the mere availability of any particular form of weaponry. This is reinforced by two more facts. If gun availability accounted for the differences in national homicide rates, those differences



should be confined to gun homicides, but they are not. Despite its lower population, the United States has more knife murders annually than Western Europe and Japan have murders committed with guns, knives, and every other kind of weapon combined. Once again, it is not the weaponry that makes the United States so violent, but the existence of a relatively larger number of violent aberrants in this country than in Western Europe and Japan. This is further evidenced by the more relevant comparison of the United States to another extremely violent society, Russia, which remains violent despite many decades of laws and enforcement that have virtually eliminated gun ownership there. Citing data only recently available, Pridemore (2001) denies that the United States is the world’s most homicidal society, claiming the Russian murder “rate has been comparable with or greater than in the United States for at least the past three and a half decades.” The Russian example also contradicts the idea that the 1960s–1970s doubling of the American homicide rate reflects the effect of increased gun ownership; for during that same period the Russian homicide rate also doubled, though virtually none of Russia’s homicides were or are with guns. In 1965, the U.S. rate was 5.4 homicides per 100,000 population, and the Russian rate was 5.9. By 1980, the U.S. rate was 10.5 homicides per 100,000 population, and Russia’s was 13.0. When Russia went through its political chaos in the early 1990s, the Russian homicide rate almost tripled. Though Russian conditions had largely stabilized as of 1999, the Russian homicide rate “of a little more than 21 per 100,000 population was nearly four times greater than the [American] rate of 5.7” (Pridemore 2001). Don B. Kates Jr.

Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime | 63 See also: Average-Joe Thesis; Defensive Gun Use (DGU); International Firearms Laws; Lethality Effect of Guns; National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS)

Further Reading Barnett, Randy E., and Don B. Kates. “Under Fire.” Emory Law Journal 45 (1996): 1139–259. https://scholarship.law.george town.edu /cgi /viewcontent.cgi?ar ticle =2550&context=facpub (accessed January 20, 2022). Black, Dan A., and Daniel S. Nagin. “Do Right-to-Carry Laws Deter Violent Crime?” Journal of Legal Studies 27 (1998): 209–19. http://johnrlott.tripod.com /Black_and_nagin.pdf (accessed February 23, 2011). Bureau of Justice Statistics. Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics—1997. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 1998. Cook, Philip J. “Robbery Violence.” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 78 (1987): 357–76. Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. “Defensive Gun Uses: New Evidence from a National Survey.” Journal of Quantitative Criminology 14 (1998): 111–31. https://doi.org /10.1023/A:1023077303928. Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. Gun Violence: The Real Costs. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. Dezhbakhsa, Hashem, and Paul Rubin. “Lives Saved or Lives Lost: The Effects of Concealed Handgun Laws on Crime.” American Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 88 (1998): 468–74. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Crime in the United States 2019 [Uniform Crime Reports online]. Baltimore, 2020. https:// ucr.f bi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2019/crime -in-the-u.s.-2019 (accessed January 20, 2022). Handgun Control Staff (Matthew G. Yeager, Joseph D. Alviani, and Nancy Loving). How Well Does the Handgun Protect You

64 | Average-Joe Thesis and Your Family? Handgun Control Staff Technical Report 2. Washington, DC: United States Conference of Mayors, 1976. Jacobs, James B. “The Regulation of Personal Chemical Weapons: Some Anomalies in American Weapons Law.” University of Dayton Law Review 15 (1989): 141–59. Kates, Don B. “The Value of Civilian Arms Possession as Deterrent to Crime or Defense against Crime.” American Journal of Criminal Law 18 (1991): 113–67. ht t ps : //paper s.ssr n.com /sol3 /paper s .cfm?abstract_id=2940813 (accessed January 20, 2022). Kates, Don B., and Daniel D. Polsby. “Long Term Non-Relationship of Firearm Availability to Homicide.” Homicide Studies 4 (2000): 185–201. Kleck, Gary. “Guns and Violence: An Interpretive Review of the Field.” Social Pathology 1 (1995): 12–47. Kleck, Gary. Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1997. Kleck, Gary, and Don B. Kates. Armed: New Perspectives on Gun Control. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2001. Lott, John R., Jr. More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws. 2nd ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000. McDowall, David, and Brian Wiersema. “The Incidence of Defensive Firearm Use by U.S. Crime Victims, 1987 through 1990.” American Journal of Public Health 84 (1994): 1982–84. http://ajph.aphapublications.org /cgi /repr int / 84 /12 /1982.pdf (accessed February 23, 2011). Perkins, Craig. Weapons Use and Violent Crime. Washington, DC: Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. Department of Justice, 2003. https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf /wuvc01.pdf (accessed January 20, 2022). Pridemore, William A. “Using Newly Available Homicide Data to Debunk Two Myths about Violence in an International

Context: A Research Note.” Homicide Studies 5 (2001): 267–75. Sheley, Joseph, and James D. Wright. In the Line of Fire: Youth, Guns, and Violence in Urban America. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1995. Shields, Pete. Guns Don’t Die—People Do. New York: Arbor House, 1981. Shugart, William F. “More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws.” Southern Economic Journal 65 (1999): 978–81. Southwick, Lawrence. “Do Guns Cause Crime? Does Crime Cause Guns? A Granger Test.” Atlantic Economic Journal 25 (1997): 256–73. Wolfgang, Marvin E. “A Tribute to a View I Have Long Opposed.” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 86 (1995): 188–92. Wright, James D., and Peter H. Rossi. Armed and Considered Dangerous: A Survey of Felons and Their Firearms. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1986. Zimring, Franklin E., and Gordon Hawkins. The Citizen’s Guide to Gun Control. New York: Macmillan, 1987. Zimring, Franklin E., and James Zuehl. “Victim Injury Death in Urban Robbery: A Chicago Study.” Journal of Legal Studies 15 (1986): 1–40.

Average-Joe Thesis The central conundrum of gun control is that those for whom it is most urgent to disarm are at the same time least subject to being disarmed, while those likely to comply are the law abiding—for whom it is least important to disarm. This conundrum is dismissed by those who assert that murderers are mostly otherwise law-abiding people (“average Joes”) who would comply with a law banning firearms and who killed only because a gun was available in



a moment of ungovernable anger (Christoffel 1991, 300; National Coalition to Ban Handguns n.d.). If that were true, banning guns would be a cheap and effective way of reducing murder. However, murders are rarely, if ever, committed by ordinary, law-abiding persons. For as long as homicide studies have been done, they have shown murderers to be people who are unlikely to comply with either gun laws or laws against violence in general. In almost every instance, murderers’ lives are characterized by violence (often irrational) and other crime, substance abuse, psychopathology, and automobile, firearm, and other dangerous accidents (e.g., Federal Bureau of Investigation 2020; Hanlon et al. 2016; Loeber and Farrington 2011; Parker et al. 2011; Richardson and Hemenway 2011; Rosenfeld and Fox 2019). Indeed, even those responsible for fatal gun accidents have a similar profile (Cook 1982; Kleck 2017). These are people who have remarkably little concern for laws or lives— even their own lives. Although it is estimated that upward of one-third of Americans have any kind of criminal record (Friedman 2015) national, state, and local studies consistently show criminal records for upward of 70–80 percent of arrested murderers. For instance, the Bureau of Justice Statistics study of felony convictions in the nation’s seventy-five most populated counties found 67 percent had any prior criminal history, with 21 percent having ten or more prior arrest charges (Reaves 2006). These findings have been confirmed by other researchers: Cook, Ludwig, and Braga (2005), for example, found that among homicide offenders arrested in Illinois in 2001, nearly 43 percent of offenders had at least one felony conviction, and 72 percent had been arrested one or more times in the ten years prior.

Average-Joe Thesis | 65

Neither would it be correct to assume that if 70–80 percent of murderers have prior adult records, the other 20–30 percent must be the kind of ordinarily law-abiding people who would comply with a gun-confiscation order. In the first place, 5–10 percent of murderers are juveniles who, by definition, cannot have adult criminal records. However, insofar as their juvenile records are available, they show the same pattern as for adult murderers. Researchers who have obtained access to criminal records for juvenile murderers in Minneapolis, Boston, Baltimore, and Kansas City describe them as “a relatively small number of very scary kids” (Kennedy, Piehl, and Braga 1997; cf. Dowd, Knapp, and Fitzmaurice 1994; Kennedy and Braga 1998). So extensive are their records that the combined priors of the 125 minors who killed other minors in Boston in the years 1990–1994 totaled 3 previous murder charges; 160 armed violent crimes; 151 unarmed violent crimes; 71 firearms offenses and 8 involving other weapons; and hundreds of property offenses, drug offenses, and other crimes (Kennedy, Piehl, and Braga, 1997). More recently, Farrington and colleagues (2012) found that of 1,000 boys randomly sampled from the Pittsburgh Youth Study, 57 percent of those who had been convicted of homicide offenses had prior convictions before the age of fourteen. Different forms of violent offenses, such as aggravated and simple assault, weapons, and threats, were most predictive of homicide offending among the youth, although property infractions also were significant predictors. Assuming adult murderers have juvenile crime records similar to these Boston juvenile murderers, their combined juvenile and adult records would average ten to fourteen priors per murderer. Another reason 20–30 percent of murderers have no official record

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of prior crime is that much or all of their violence has been directed against their family members. Such victims are less likely to press charges, and the police are loath to interfere in a family matter. Koppa and Messing (2021), for instance, found that in 91 percent of intimate partner femicides, police were contacted within the three years prior to the murder. Among these cases, nearly 45 percent of the callouts resulted in arrest, and there were an average of more than six visits with the victim before their murder. For male domestic homicide victims, just over 73 percent had contacted law enforcement prior to their deaths, with 38 of cases resulting in arrest. Thus homicide— of a stranger or someone known to the offender—is “usually part of a pattern of violence, engaged in by people who are known . . . as violence prone” (Robin 1991, 47–48). Perpetrator studies that delve beyond crime records find that whether or not murderers also have such records of deviance, virtually all have life histories studded with violence and other crimes that may not have led to arrest. A study of 238 multiple homicide offenders (familicides) using data from ten years of the Supplementary Homicide Report found that although 80 percent of perpetrators had a prior record of intimate partner problems, just 29 percent had a restraining order issued against them (Liem and Reichelmann 2014). Another form of aberrant behavior sharply distinguishing murderers from ordinary people is that often during childhood or adolescence, the former tortured and/or killed animals. To some extent, the myth that murderers are just “average Joes” stems from a misunderstanding of the often-used description “domestic and acquaintance murder.” That does not mean murderers are ordinary, lawabiding people. National data show that the

largest proportion of gun murders occurring in homes involve people who became acquainted through prior illicit drug dealings. One study of Colorado violent death victims from 2004 to 2009 found that cocaine and marijuana were more common among those who died by homicide than suicide, though opiates were less common (Sheehan et al. 2013). In Arizona, nearly 85 percent of juvenile arrestees victimized by gun crime identified as current gang members (Katz et al. 2011). Of these, 76 percent were threatened with a gun, 73 percent were shot at, and 13 percent were shot. In Philadelphia, approximately one-third of homicides in 2016 were categorized as being drugrelated (Eichel and Howell 2017). A larger study assessing data from the National Violent Death Reporting System found that across sixteen states, nearly one-quarter of homicide decedents tested positive for marijuana, while 10 percent and 9 percent were positive for cocaine and opiates, respectively (Karch et al. 2012). In that same study, nearly 12 percent of homicides stemmed from drug involvement; 18 percent of cases were domestic violence–related, and more than 5 percent were gang-related. In sum, although “domestic and/or acquaintance murder” literally describes many homicides, it does not refer to murders by “average Joes” in ordinary neighborhoods and families. Typical domestic and/or acquaintance murders involve gang members; drug dealers, their competitors, and/or customers; and men who kill women they have brutalized on prior occasions. Though it is only sensible to prohibit firearm possession by such people, the fact that our laws already do so attests to the difficulty of disarming those who are inclined toward violence and determined to possess arms for that purpose. Don B. Kates Jr. and Jaclyn Schildkraut

See also: Crime and Gun Use; Homicides, Gun; Women and Guns

Further Reading Braga, Anthony, Anne M. Piehl, and David M. Kennedy. “Youth Homicide in Boston: An Assessment of the Supplementary Homicide Report Data.” Homicide Studies 3 (1999): 277–99. Christoffel, Katherine Kaufer. “Toward Reducing Pediatric Injuries from Firearms: Charting a Legislative and Regulatory Course.” Pediatrics 88 (1991): 294–305. Cook, Philip J. “The Role of Firearms in Violent Crime.” In Criminal Violence, edited by Marvin E. Wolfgang and Neil Alan Weiner, 236–91. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage, 1982. Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. Gun Violence: The Real Costs. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Cook, Philip J., Jens Ludwig, and Anthony A. Braga. “Criminal Records of Homicide Offenders.” Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) 294, no. 5 (2005): 598–601. Dowd, M. Denise, Jane F. Knapp, and Laura S. Fitzmaurice. “Pediatric Firearm Injuries, Kansas City, 1992: A PopulationBased Study.” Pediatrics 94 (1994): 867–76. Eichel, Larry, and Octavia Howell. “Philadelphia’s Drug-Related Homicides Continue to Rise.” Pew Research, September 28, 2017. https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research -and-analysis/articles/2017/09/28/philadel phias-drug-related-homicides-continue-to -rise (accessed January 23, 2022). Farrington, David P., Rolf Loeber, and Mark T. Berg. “Young Men Who Kill: A Prospective Longitudinal Examination From Childhood.” Homicide Studies 16, no. 2 (2012): 99–128. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Crime in the United States 2019 [Uniform Crime

Average-Joe Thesis | 67 Reports online]. Baltimore, 2020. https:// ucr.f bi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2019/crime -in-the-u.s.-2019 (accessed January 20, 2022). Friedman, Matthew. “Just Facts: As Many Americans Have Criminal Records as College Diplomas.” Brennan Center for Justice, November 17, 2015. https://www .brennancenter.org/our-work /analysis -opinion/just-facts-many-americans-have - cr i m i nal-record s- college - d iplomas (accessed January 23, 2022). Hanlon, Robert E., Michael Brook, Jason A. Demery, and Mark D. Cunningham. “Domestic Homicide: Neuropsychological Profiles of Murderers Who Kill Family Members and Intimate Partners.” Journal of Forensic Sciences 61, no. S1 (2016): S163–S170. Karch, Debra L., Joseph Logan, Dawn McDaniel, Sharyn Parks, and Nimesh Patel. “Surveillance for Violent Deaths— National Violent Death Reporting System, 16 States, 2009.” Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report 61, no. 6 (2012): 1–43. Katz, Charles M., Vincent J. Webb, Kate Fox, and Jennifer N. Shaffer. “Understanding the Relationship Between Violent Victimization and Gang Membership.” Journal of Criminal Justice 39 (2011): 48–59. Kennedy, David, and Anthony Braga. “Homicide in Minneapolis: Research for Problem Solving.” Homicide Studies 2 (1998): 263–90. Kennedy, David, Anne M. Piehl, and Anthony Braga. “Youth Violence in Boston: Gun Markets, Serious Youth Offenders, and a Use Reduction Strategy.” Law and Contemporary Problems 59 (1997): 147–96. Kleck, Gary. Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control. London: Routledge, 2017. Koppa, Vijetha, and Jill T. Messing. “Can Justice System Interventions Prevent Intimate Partner Homicide? An Analysis of Rates of Help Seeking Prior to Fatality.” Journal of Interpersonal Violence 36, no. 17–18 (2021): 8792–816.

68 | Average-Joe Thesis Liem, Marieke, and Ashley Reichelmann. “Patterns of Multiple Family Homicide.” Homicide Studies 18, no. 1 (2014): 44–58. Loeber, Rolf, and David P. Farrington. Young Homicide Offenders and Victims: Risk Factors, Prediction, and Prevention from Childhood. New York: Springer, 2011. National Coalition to Ban Handguns. A Shooting Gallery Called America. Washington, DC: Author, n.d. Parker, Robert N., Kirk R. Williams, Kevin J. McCaffree, Emily K. Acensio, Angela Browne, Kevin J. Strom, and Kellie Barrick. “Alcohol Availability and Youth Homicide in the 91 Largest US Cities, 1984–2006.” Drug and Alcohol Review 30, no. 5 (2011): 505–14. Reaves, Brian A. State Court Processing Statistics, 1990–2002: Violent Felons in Large Urban Counties. Washington, DC: Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2006. https://bjs.ojp

.gov/content/pub/ascii/vfluc.txt (accessed January 23, 2022). Richardson, Erin G., and David Hemenway. “Homicide, Suicide, and Unintentional Firearm Fatality: Comparing the United States With Other High-Income Countries, 2003.” Journal of Trauma and Acute Care Surgery 70, no. 1 (2011): 238–43. Robin, Gerald D. Violent Crime and Gun Control. Cincinnati, OH: Anderson Publishing, 1991. Rosenfeld, Richard, and James A. Fox. “Anatomy of the Homicide Rise.” Homicide Studies 23, no. 3 (2019): 202–24. Sheehan, Connor M., Richard G. Rogers, George W. Williams, and Jason D. Boardman. “Gender Differences in the Presence of Drugs in Violent Deaths.” Addiction 108, no. 3 (2013): 547–55.

Ayoob, Massad. See Miniguns

B Background Checks

citizenship. Opponents of the law, including the NRA, filed suit against the Brady Bill, challenging its constitutionality—not as a violation of the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms, but as a violation of states’ rights under the Tenth Amendment. In 1997, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the law’s provision requiring local police to conduct background checks in the case of Printz v. United States (521 U.S. 898). The ruling did not challenge the propriety of restricting handgun sales. Despite the ruling, handgun background checks generally continued. In 1998, the five-day waiting period lapsed, as per the terms of the law, and was replaced by the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). This system is designed to allow an immediate background check to occur. The check must be completed within three days, but 95 percent of the background checks are completed within two hours, according to a U.S. Justice Department report. From 1994 to 2008, about 1.8 million handgun purchases have been blocked as the result of background checks. This represented a rejection rate of about 2 percent of all handgun purchases. In 2009, the government passed its 100 millionth background check. Most states conduct their own background checks; the rest relied on FBI data. State checks result in a slightly higher rejection rate, probably owing to better and more complete state data. Even though waiting periods are no longer required by the national government, eleven states have

A background check entails an examination of the background of prospective gun buyers, conducted to determine whether the buyer has a criminal record, a history of mental illness, or other circumstances that should bar the individual from completing the gun purchase. The idea of conducting background checks of prospective gun buyers dates back at least to the 1930s, when a forty-eight-hour waiting period was applied in the District of Columbia; the drafting of that rule was assisted by the National Rifle Association (NRA), which continued to support the idea until the 1970s, when it reversed its position. A concerted effort to enact a national waiting period for the purchase of a handgun to conduct background checks began in 1986. Those efforts succeeded in 1993 with the passage of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, which imposed a fivebusiness-day waiting period for handgun purchases, during which time local law enforcement authorities were to conduct the necessary background checks. According to the law, handgun purchases are to be rejected if the applicant has been convicted of a crime that carries a sentence of at least a year (not including misdemeanors); if there is a violence-based restraining order against the applicant; or if the person has been convicted of domestic abuse, has been arrested for using or selling drugs, is a fugitive from justice, is certified as mentally unstable or is in a mental institution, or is an illegal alien or has renounced U.S. 69

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A gun store employee reviews the paperwork for a purchaser's background check in 2013. Background checks are required to be completed for all gun purchases conducted by federal firearms licensees. (Jim West/Alamy Stock Photo)

their own, ranging from a few days to several months. Control proponents have argued for a restoration of a national threeday waiting period, in part because of the perceived value of a cooling-off period before handgun purchases. Since 2004, federal law has required the destruction of background check data within twenty-four hours (known as the Tiahrt Amendment, named after Rep. Todd Tiahrt (R-KS), who sponsored the measure), making it unavailable for law enforcement examination. One area of gun sales continues to be omitted from nationally mandated background checks. In most places, “secondarymarket” gun sales by unlicensed individuals can occur without background checks. Referred to generally as the “gun-show loophole,” these sales at gun shows, flea markets, and other unregulated venues

account for as much as 40 percent of gun sales. As of 2021, sixteen states and the District of Columbia required background checks for all handgun purchases, even those from unlicensed sellers (Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence 2021). Robert J. Spitzer See also: Black Market for Firearms; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV); Gun Shows; National Rifle Association (NRA); Safety Courses; Waiting Periods

Further Reading Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Universal Background Checks.” 2021. https://giffords.org/lawcenter/gun -laws/policy-areas/background-checks

/universal-background-checks/ (accessed December 23, 2021). Hemenway, David. Private Guns, Public Health. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2004. Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021.

Ballistic Fingerprinting. See Ballistic Identification System Ballistic Identification System In 1999, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) established the National Integrated Ballistic Information Network (NIBIN) to administer and provide Integrated Ballistic Identification System (IBIS) equipment to federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies. This equipment acquires digital images of markings on spent ammunition taken from crime scenes or from test-fired crime guns. The IBIS equipment then automatically compares the markings to a database of digital images taken from earlier crime scenes or guns. If the equipment scores a match, or “hit,” the firearms examiner compares the two to confirm. This system allows NIBIN partners to discover links between crimes much more quickly, in a matter of hours, and in some cases making connections that would have been undiscovered without the technology (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives 2021). The ATF’s annual appropriations by Congress prohibit the agency from collecting information related to the capture or storage of ballistic information relating to the manufacture, importation, or sale of guns. Therefore, the equipment is limited to collecting ballistic information related

Bartley-Fox Carrying Law | 71

to criminal investigations. However, the technology has allowed 220 NIBIN partner agencies to record over 4.2 million acquisitions, resulting in 223,000 leads linking two or more crime scene investigations to the same weapon. Importantly, the system does not match the bullets or casings fired from the same weapon, which is the duty of the firearms examiner. These “hits” have occurred 126,500 times over the lifespan of the NIBIN. However, the system does provide a list of probabilities for a match according to a numerical scoring system, which greatly speeds up the process for matching and aids the examiner by eliminating unlikely candidates (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives 2021). Robert H. Wood See also: Association of Firearm and Tool Mark Examiners (AFTE); Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF)

Further Reading Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives. ATF Fact Sheet—National Integrated Ballistic Information Network (NIBIN). September 2021. https://www.atf .gov/resource-center/fact-sheet/fact-sheet -national-integrated-ballistic-information -network (accessed December 23, 2021).

Bartley-Fox Carrying Law The 1974 Bartley-Fox law in Massachusetts imposed a mandatory one-year prison sentence for carrying a gun without a permit. This was the first law of its kind in the nation. The law is considered a model by gun control advocates and a horror story by gun rights advocates. The Bartley-Fox law became effective on April 1, 1975 (Mass. Statutes 1975, chapter

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113, section 2). Although widely described as a carrying law, it actually applies to any unlicensed possession of any gun (whether loaded or unloaded), or even a single round of ammunition, outside one’s “residence or place of business” (Mass. Gen. Laws Ann. chapter 269, section 10, 2001 ed.). Though one year is the mandatory minimum, the sentence can be up to two and a half years in city or county jail or from two and a half to five years in state prison. In 1994, a White House working group convened by the Clinton administration issued a secret (but leaked) report setting forth objectives for future national gun control laws. Among the objectives was a national law modeled on Bartley-Fox, providing a mandatory sentence for carrying a gun without a permit. In Massachusetts, local police chiefs and sheriffs have complete discretion about the issuance of handgun-carrying permits (Mass. Gen. Laws Ann. ch. 140, section 131; Chief of Police of Shelburne v. Moyer, 16 Mass. App. 543, 453 N.E.2d 461 [1983]; MacNutt v. Police Com’r of Boston, 30 Mass. App. 632, 572 N.E.2d 577 [1991]). In practice, this means that in most jurisdictions, no one can obtain a carry permit, while some jurisdictions issue to friends of the chief or people with other political connections. The Massachusetts Civil Liberties Union (CLU) opposed Bartley-Fox because of the risk that nondangerous people might be sent to prison. The Massachusetts legislature’s Black Caucus also opposed the bill because of concern about discriminatory licensing and arrests. The enactment of Bartley-Fox did generate some of the kinds of cases that the Massachusetts CLU had warned about. The first prosecution under Bartley-Fox was of an old woman who was passing out religious literature in a rough part of Boston.

An early test case of the law was the successful prosecution of a young man who had inadvertently allowed his gun license to expire. To raise money to buy his high school class ring, he was driving to a pawnshop to sell his gun. Stopping the man for a traffic violation, a policeman noticed the gun. The teenager spent the mandatory year in prison (Commonwealth v. McQuoid, 369 Mass. 925, 344 N.E. 2d 179 [1976]). The most famous Bartley-Fox case, however, involved a man who started carrying a gun after a coworker assaulted him and repeatedly threatened to kill him. The coworker did attack later, and the victim successfully defended himself. The crime victim was then sentenced to the mandatory one year in prison for carrying a gun without a permit. The Massachusetts high court summarized as follows: The threat of physical harm was founded on an earlier assault by Michel with a knife and became a real and direct matter once again when Michel attacked the defendant with a knife at the MBTA [subway] station. . . . [D]efendant is a hardworking, family man, without a criminal record, who was respected by his fellow employees (Michel excepted). Michel, on the other hand, appears to have lacked the same redeeming qualities. He was a convicted felon with serious charges pending against him. . . . It is possible that defendant is alive today only because he carried the gun that day for protection. Before the days of a one-year mandatory sentence, the special circumstances involving the accused could be reflected reasonably in the sentencing or dispositional aspects of the proceeding. That option is no longer available in the judicial branch of government in a case of

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this sort. (Commonwealth v. Lindsey, 396 Mass. 840, 489 N.E. 2d 666 [1986]) The Lindsey case generated such an outcry that the defendant, Lindsey, was eventually pardoned by Massachusetts governor Michael Dukakis, even though Dukakis was a staunch gun prohibition advocate. The Bartley-Fox law is vigorously enforced, regardless of the circumstances of possession. Even new residents have received the mandatory year sentence, including a college student from Louisiana (Commonwealth v. Wood, 398 Mass. 135, 495 N.E. 2d 835 [1986]). Although the law is, on its face, nondiscretionary, the effect has been to remove judicial discretion in sentencing, leaving prosecutors with discretion about whether to bring charges. Police, who lack the discretion about whether to make an arrest when they find a gun, will sometimes avoid conducting frisks on some persons who they do not believe deserve to be arrested. Scholarly evaluations of Bartley-Fox have generated mixed results. Part of the problem is that studies assume that the only thing Bartley-Fox did was impose the mandatory sentence for unlicensed carrying. But in fact, Bartley-Fox also imposed mandatory sentences for use of a gun in a crime. Accordingly, it has been difficult to disentangle the effects of the two different parts of the Bartley-Fox law—one aimed at violent criminals, the other aimed at citizens who merely lack a permit. One study was conducted by the U.S. Department of Justice, which concluded that “the effect may be to penalize some less serious offenders, while the punishment for more serious offenses is postponed, reduced, or avoided altogether” (Carlson 1982, 15). The Wright, Rossi, and Daly study Under the Gun—conducted

under the auspices of the National Institute of Justice—found that the law reduced the casual carrying of firearms but did not significantly affect the gun-use patterns of determined criminals. David B. Kopel See also: Gun Control; Massachusetts Gun Law; Wright, James D.

Further Reading Beha, James A., II. “And Nobody Can Get You Out”: The Impact of a Mandatory Prison Sentence for the Illegal Carrying of a Firearm on the Use of Firearms and on the Administration of Criminal Justice in Boston—Part I and Part II.” Boston University Law Review 57 (1977): 96–146, 289. Carlson, Kenneth. “Mandatory Sentencing: The Experience of Two States.” Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice Policy Brief. Washington, DC: Abt Associates, 1982. Pierce, Glenn L., and William J. Bowers. “The Bartley-Fox Gun Law’s Short-Term Impact on Crime in Boston.” Annals American Academy of Political and Social Science 455 (1981): 120–37. Wright, James, Peter Rossi, and Kathleen Daly. Under the Gun: Weapons, Crime and Violence in America. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1983.

Baton Rouge Police Officers Shooting(2016) On July 17, 2016, his twenty-ninth birthday, Gavin Eugene Long of Kansas City, Missouri, shot six police officers in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The shooting left three dead and three others wounded. The incident sparked outrage across the country as individuals on both sides sought a path forward in the shooting’s aftermath.

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On the morning of the shooting, Long, wearing black clothing and a ski mask, parked a stolen rental car near a beauty supply store on the 9600 block of Airline Highway. Armed with a semiautomatic rifle, he checked an unoccupied police car outside a nearby convenience store, returned to his car, and drove away. After reports that a man was seen outside with a rifle, three officers responded to the beauty store. Long drove back to the area and parked his car outside a nearby fitness studio. He walked toward the beauty supply store with his gun drawn, bypassing citizens, before opening fire on police (Schuppe 2016). After about fourteen minutes of exchanging fire with police, Long was shot dead by a SWAT team officer. An autopsy found that Long had traces of crystal meth in his system, as well as a low level of alcohol (.02%) (Allen 2017).

Suspect Long, a former marine and self-proclaimed spiritual adviser, claimed to be a victim of “gang-stalking,” an intense form of government and corporate surveillance covering every aspect of a subject’s life (Swaine 2016). After five years of military service, including a year in Iraq, he also claimed to suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Following the shooting, Long’s mother indicated that he had not “been the same” since leaving the marines (Allen 2017). Under the pseudonym Cosmo Setepenra, Long published a series of videos, photographs, and writings about perceived injustices against Black people. Online posts indicate that Long spent a prolonged period in Africa in 2015, apparently visiting Ethiopia, Uganda, Kenya, and Egypt (Swaine 2016). Although law enforcement and media associated Long with sovereign

citizen and Black identity extremist movements, he rejected the idea that these groups influenced his actions (Swaine 2016). Court records show Long married Aireyona Hill in 2009, but the two divorced two years later. According to divorce records, the couple had no children (Swaine 2016). Long had no known police record prior to the shooting (CBS News 2016).

Motivation The police killing of Alton B. Sterling and the deadly ambush of police officers by a citizen weeks before the attack may have motivated Long (Schuppe 2016). On July 5, 2016, two white police officers shot and killed Alton Sterling, a Black man, in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Two days later, at an event protesting the Sterling shooting, a Black Army veteran shot and killed five police officers and injured nine other officers, as well as two civilians, in Dallas, Texas. On July 7, 2016, the day of the Dallas shooting, Long searched the internet for the home addresses, phone numbers, and biographical information of the two police officers involved in the Alton Sterling shooting in Baton Rouge. The following day, he traveled to Dallas, where he recorded body camera footage of himself criticizing protests of police killings. In a video posted to YouTube on July 10, 2016, Long advocated “revenue and blood[shed]” in lieu of protesting (Allen 2017). Long had no known connections to Baton Rouge but recorded footage canvassing the area for days leading up to the attack, engaging with citizens to proselytize his ideology. An attorney for one of the officers involved in the Alton Sterling shooting claimed that Long was in Baton Rouge to target Sterling’s shooters specifically. The attorney also claimed that when he could



not find them, he settled for other officers (Allen 2017). In videos posted online, Long espoused increasingly radical ideologies that took on an anti–law enforcement inclination. Some videos called for violence in response to police treatment of African Americans (Associated Press 2017). Although Long did not leave behind any writings specifically referring to his actions in Baton Rouge, he penned a letter before his death in which he wrote, “I must bring the same destruction that bad cops continue to inflict upon my people, upon bad cops as well as good cops” (Litten 2017). Long plagiarized parts of his suicide letter from a manifesto written by Christopher Dorner, a Los Angeles police officer who shot five other officers, killing two, in 2013.

Weapons During the shooting, Long fired at least fortythree rounds from a tan, Israeli-made, militarystyle 223 Rem/5.56 NATO caliber IWI Tavor semiautomatic rifle with green-tip steel penetrator ammunition. He also carried a Springfield XD-9 semiautomatic pistol, and authorities found a black Stag Arms semiautomatic rifle in his rental car (Moore III 2017). Whytnee M. Foriest See also: African Americans and Gun Violence; Assault Weapons; Dallas Police Officers Ambush (2016); Hollow Point Bullet

Further Reading Allen, Rebekah. “Gavin Long Was Looking for 2 Officers Involved in Alton Sterling Shooting during 2016 Attack.” Advocate, June 30, 2017. https://www.theadvocate.com/baton _rouge/news/crime_police/article_5d0cd146 -5dc9-11e7-bed4 - 6f 2b3845350e.ht m l (accessed December 18, 2019). Associated Press. “Gavin Long of KC, Who Ambushed Baton Rouge Police Last

Baton Rouge Police Officers Shooting | 75 Summer, Left a Suicide Note.” Kansas City Star, July 1, 2017. https://www.kansascity .com/news/local/article159145529.html (accessed December 18, 2019). CBS News. “Personal Videos Offer Clues about Baton Rouge Shooter’s Motives.” July 18, 2016. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/baton -rouge-police-shooting-former-marine -gavin-long-sovereign-citizen-domestic -threat/ (accessed December 18, 2019). Litten, Kevin. “Read the Suicide Note Left by Baton Rouge Police Shooter Gavin Long.” Nola.com, June 30, 2017. https://www .nola.com/news/politics/article_a030b605 - 438c-575e-bf 8a-bb061b7 b5267.ht m l (accessed December 18, 2019). Moore, Hillar C., III. “In re: Gavin Long. East Baton Rouge.” 19th Judicial District Attorney Parish Of East Baton Rouge. June 30, 2017. https://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews .com/theadvocate.com/content/tncms/assets /v3/editorial/3/4e/34e2d538-5da8-11e7-ad2d -27ac20fa9429/59566d6af0eba.pdf.pdf (accessed December 18, 2019). Mustian, Jim, Bryn Stole, Maya Lau, and Matt Sledge. “Before Bloodshed: Where Gavin Long Stayed, What He Preached, Odd Encounters All on Video.” Advocate, July 19, 2016. https://www.theadvocate.com /baton_rouge/news/baton_rouge_officer _shooting/article_8f85899e-4df1-11e6-b6ca -73975a8c13ab.html (accessed December 18, 2019). Ortiz, Erik, and Alex Johnson. “Alton Sterling Shooting by Baton Rouge Police Sparks Outrage, DOJ to Investigate.” CNBC News, July 6, 2016. https://www.cnbc.com /2016/07/06/alton-sterling-shooting-by -baton-rouge-police-sparks-outrage-doj-to -investigate.html. Schuppe, Jon. “Baton Rouge Gunman Gavin Long Stalked Cops with Military Focus, Police Say.” NBC News, July 18, 2016. https://www.nbcnews.com/storyline / bat on-rouge -pol ice -a mbu sh / bat onrouge-gunman-gavin-long-stalked-cops -military-focus-police-n611901 (accessed December 18, 2016).

76 | Beard, Michael K. Swaine, Jon. “Baton Rouge Suspect Gavin Long Was Marine with Alias Cosmo Setepenra.” The Guardian, July 18, 2016. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news /2016/jul/17/baton-rouge-gunman-gavin - e -long- cosmo -setepen r a-ma r i nes (accessed December 18, 2016). Visser, Steve. “Baton Rouge Shooting: 3 Officers Dead; Shooter Was Missouri Man, Sources Say.” CNN, July 18, 2016. https:// www.cnn.com/2016/07/17/us/baton-route -police-shooting/index.html (accessed December 18, 2019).

Beard, Michael K.(1941–) Michael K. Beard, president emeritus of the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV), headed the organization from its founding in 1974 until his retirement several decades later. The organization, originally named the National Coalition to Ban Handguns, is composed of many groups with interests in social justice, public health, religion, and child welfare—all of which strive for the reduction of firearms-related death and injury. An important branch of CSGV is the Educational Fund to Stop Gun Violence (EFSGV). CSGV and EFSGV have focused their efforts on trying to close illegal gun markets, creating a greater grassroots gun control movement, strengthening laws regulating firearms, and filing litigation against the gun industry. Their latest campaign focuses on guns, democracy, and freedom. Beard graduated from the School of Government and Public Administration and the School of International Service at American University. He appears frequently on television and radio talk shows, where he promotes stronger gun control, and his writing on the topic regularly appears in newspapers across the country. In addition, he has testified before the U.S.

House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate, during which he spoke against the McClure-Volkmer (Firearm Owners Protection) Act of 1986. Before founding CSGV, he was executive director of the Communication for Congressional Reform, Self-Determination for DC, and the World Federalist Youth. He was a staff member for Representative Walter E. Fauntroy (D-DC), Representative Walter Moeller (D-OH), and Senator John F. Kennedy (D-MA). Beard belongs to the Screen Actors Guild and the American Federation of Radio and Television Artists. Gregg Lee Carter and Walter F. Carroll See also: Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV)

Further Reading Carter, Gregg Lee. Gun Control in the United States: A Reference Handbook. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2017. Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV). https://www.csgv.org/ (accessed March 31, 2022).

Biden, Joseph, Jr.(1942–) As the longtime Democratic U.S. senator from Delaware, Joseph Biden Jr. made significant contributions to gun control policy, including cosponsoring the Crime Control Act of 1990 and writing the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994. However, his contributions as Barack Obama’s vice president were more limited. Although a gun owner himself, Biden’s voting record over the course of his political career displays a strong commitment to gun control, a stance he has carried into his new role as president of the United States. As a result, the National Rifle Association (NRA)



assigned him the lowest grade, an “F,” for failing to protect gun rights. Biden was born in Scranton, Pennsylvania, on November 20, 1942. At the age of ten, he moved to Delaware, where he served as senator from 1973 to 2009. During his tenure in the Senate, Biden was a member of the Judiciary Committee and the Foreign Relations Committee, in both of which he served for a time as chair. On the Judiciary Committee, Biden focused on issues of crime, illegal drugs, and civil liberties, which placed him at the center of debates concerning guns. The Crime Control Act, cosponsored by Biden and signed into law by President George H. W. Bush on November 29, 1990, increased penalties for those found guilty of gun-related crimes. A key provision allowed the federal government to crack down on the transfer of firearms across state lines, the trafficking of stolen guns, and the importation of parts for banned semiautomatic weapons by extending Congress’s power to regulate interstate commerce. An additional section of the law, the Gun-Free School Zones Act, also drew upon this expanded interpretation of the Commerce Clause but was later declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in United States v. Lopez (1995)—though, after revision, it passed judicial review in its 1994 form. Biden was also the primary author of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, signed into law by President Bill Clinton on September 13, 1994, which further increased penalties for all gun-related crimes. However, its most well-known and controversial provision was the Public Safety and Recreational Firearms Use Protection Act, commonly referred to as the federal Assault Weapons Ban, which prohibited the manufacture of nineteen types

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of semiautomatic weapons and their possession or transfer unless legally owned prior to the act’s passage. The Assault Weapons Ban was not reauthorized by Congress and thus was allowed to expire in 2004. As Obama’s running mate in 2008, Biden campaigned for repealing the Tiahrt Amendment, which limits law enforcement access to gun trace information, reinstating the expired federal Assault Weapon Ban, closing the gun show loophole, and making guns childproof. He also provided rhetorical cover for Obama, accused of planning to take away Americans’ guns, by speaking proudly as a gun owner and reassuring voters. However, upon taking office, the Obama administration notably avoided the gun issue. The one significant exception occurred in the immediate wake of the shooting of Representative Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) and eighteen others in Tucson, Arizona, on January 8, 2011. The vice president’s office was involved in meetings with gun control advocates during early efforts to reform federal gun policy, though no legislation has resulted. During the 2020 election cycle, Biden campaigned on a strong gun violence prevention platform, including emphasizing safety and accountability, banning assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, and requiring universal background checks for all sales. He defeated incumbent president Donald J. Trump and assumed office on January 20, 2021. At the time he took office, the United States was facing an unprecedented epidemic of gun violence, including record rates of homicides. During his first hundred days in office, he issued executive orders to crack down on ghost guns and tighten regulations on pistol-stabilizing braces. Other measures that he supported, such as expanded background checks and expanding the waiting

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Vice President Joe Biden speaks on firearms violence in the United States at an event in Iowa on August 10, 2019. Biden served as vice president under Barack Obama and then became the nation's 46th president. In both capacities, as well as when he was a senator for Delaware, he has been a strong advocate for gun violence prevention measures. (CJH Photography LLC/ Dreamstime.com)

period for checks to be conducted, stalled out in the Senate after clearing the House of Representatives. It remains to be seen whether Biden will be successful in enacting more comprehensive measures as his presidency progresses. Richard Holtzman and Drew Green See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Clinton, William J.; Gun Shows; Gun-Free School Laws; National Rifle Association (NRA); Obama, Barack; Smart Guns; Trigger Locks; Tucson, Arizona, Shooting

Further Reading Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021.

Biofire Technologies. See Smart Guns

Black Codes After the Civil War, southern legislatures, determined to maintain their control over former slaves, passed comprehensive sets of repressive regulations known as “Black Codes.” These codes deprived the freedmen of a variety of rights, including the right to travel, the right to serve on a jury, the right to engage in certain businesses, the right to testify against whites, and the right to possess firearms. As U.S. Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas put it in his 2010



meticulous concurring opinion with the McDonald v. City of Chicago opinion, southern legislatures took “particularly vicious aim at the rights of free blacks and slaves to . . . keep and bear arms for their defense.” Drafted during this time that represents the dusk of slavery and the dawn of freedom, the codes were passed by the legislatures of Mississippi, South Carolina, Alabama, and Louisiana in 1865; and they were passed in Arkansas, Florida, Virginia, Georgia, North Carolina, Texas, and Tennessee in 1866. Antislavery Pennsylvania Congressman Thaddeus Stevens vividly described the motivating sentiment of the day: “When it was first proposed to free the slaves, and arm the blacks, did not half the nation tremble? The prim conservatives, the snobs, and the male waiting-maids in Congress, were in hysterics.” Mississippi planter E. G. Baker’s letter to members of the state legislature on October 22, 1865, provides additional unvarnished insight into the discriminatory mindset motivating the drafting of these codes: “It is well known here that our negroes through the country are well equipped with fire arms, muskets, double barrel shot guns, and pistols—and furthermore, it would be well if they are free to prohibit the use of fire arms until they had proved themselves to be good citizens in their altered state.” Mississippi was in fact the first state to adopt these means of social and economic control over the newly freed Black population. Its code, tellingly titled an “Act to Regulate the Relation of Master and Apprentice Relative to Freedmen, Free Negroes, and Mulattoes,” provided in part that “no freedman, free negro or mulatto, not in the military . . . and not licensed to do by the board of police of his or her county, shall keep or carry fire-arms of any kind, or any

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ammunition, . . . and all such arms or ammunition shall be forfeited to the former.” Though varied in approach, at their heart, the Black Codes sought to ensure continued economic and social domination of white over Black in the South. It is important to remember that the U.S. Constitution, as well as the various state constitutions, all guaranteed citizens the right to bear arms (and were during this time popularly viewed as guaranteeing such). Attempts by southern legislators to use the Black Codes to disarm the South’s Black population were consequently a direct affront to those northern and southern abolitionists who sought equality. Furthermore, these codes represented a willful blindness to the fact that the former slaves were now full citizens entitled to all of the rights held by their white countrymen. Aside from the symbolic and theoretical effect of the racially discriminatory Black Codes, they also had a very direct impact on those Black citizens who were prevented from lawfully arming themselves for purposes of self-defense. An 1867 Special Report of the Anti-Slavery Conference recognized that Blacks were “forbidden to own or bear firearms, and thus were rendered defenseless against assaults.” In fact, two weeks after the Mississippi code was enacted, Calvin Holly, a Black private assigned to the Freedmen’s Bureau in Mississippi, wrote a letter relating an article in the Vicksburg Journal to bureau commissioner Howard. In the letter, Holly said that “the Rebels are going about in many places through the State and robbing the colored people of arms, money and all they have and in many places killing.” The southern legislators who proposed, drafted, and enacted the Black Codes knew well that an armed Black populace was far less likely to be preyed upon by white mobs,

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and would be in an improved position to prevent re-enslavement by those white southerners who were willing to use any means necessary to preserve antebellum social order. What is more, an armed Black populace in the South could potentially play a part in maintaining the Union. Whereas former Confederate soldiers could keep their firearms, Black Codes sought to disarm the one group with unionist sympathies, namely freedmen. Northern Republicans, able to see clearly the discriminatory motivations reflected in the Black Codes, grew increasingly concerned and irritated. They considered these codes blatant attempts to de facto relegalize and relegitimize slavery in the South. Their concern over the South’s perceived attempts to circumvent the freeing of slaves provided the backdrop to the thirty-ninth Congress’s drafting of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Senator Jacob Howard introduced the Fourteenth Amendment in the Senate. He stated that the amendment would protect the personal rights in the Bill of Rights from state deprivation, specifically mentioning the right of the people to keep and bear arms. This period of congressional Reconstruction, fueled by northern anger over southern intransigence, ultimately resulted in the repeal of the onerous and unjust Black Codes. T. Markus Funk See also: African Americans and Gun Violence; Fourteenth Amendment; Ku Klux Klan (KKK); McDonald v. City of Chicago; NAACP and Gun Control; Racism and Gun Control

Further Reading Demby, Gene, and Natalie Escobar. “From Negro Militias to Black Armament.” Code Switch: National Public Radio. December

22, 2020. https://www.npr.org/sections /codeswitch/2020/12/22/949169826/from - n eg r o - m i l it i a s - t o - bl a ck- a r m a me nt (accessed January 26, 2022). Funk, T. Markus. “Is the True Meaning of the Second Amendment Really Such a Riddle? Tracing the Origins of an Anglo-American Right.” Howard Law Journal 39 (1995): 411–36. Halbrook, Stephen P. “Personal Security, Personal Liberty, and the Constitutional Right to Bear Arms: Visions of the Framers of the Fourteenth Amendment.” Seton Hall Constitutional Law Journal 5 (1995): 341–434.

Black Lives Matter Black Lives Matter is a social justice movement and organization that advocates for peaceful protests against violence toward Black people. Black Lives Matter was founded in the summer of 2013 by three community organizers: Alicia Garza, a domestic worker rights organizer from Oakland, California; Patrisse Cullors, an anti–police violence organizer in Los Angeles, California; and Opal Tometi, an immigration rights organizer in Phoenix, Arizona. The movement was initially founded in cyberspace as a sociopolitical media forum, represented by the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter. Garza, Cullors, and Tometi created Black Lives Matter in response to the acquittal of Trayvon Martin’s killer, George Zimmerman, who shot and killed Martin, an unarmed Black teen, during a struggle in 2012. After the shooting, protests erupted across the nation as many felt the incident was racially charged (Black Lives Matter 2019; Ruffin II 2015). Before founding Black Lives Matter, Garza, Cullors, and Tometi met through Black Organizing for Leadership & Dignity



(BOLD), a national organization that facilitates social transformation and improves the living conditions of Black people by (re) building the social justice infrastructure required to organize Black communities. The members of BOLD all responded similarly to Zimmerman’s acquittal and decided to work together to respond to “the assault on and the devaluation” of Black lives after members in their social forums petitioned for help in the matter (Ruffin II 2015). As an initial response, Garza wrote a Facebook post entitled “A Love Note to Black People,” encouraging Black people to “get active,” “get organized,” and “fight back” (Ruffin II 2015). Garza categorized the injustice against Black people as a disease called institutional racism that required a sophisticated response. She argued that traditional strategies alone (e.g., voting, education, and agency) would not suffice against institutional racism. Garza ended her pivotal post by telling her readers that “Our Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter.” Cullors responded to the post with the hashtag “#BlackLivesMatter”—thus sparking a movement. Tometi cosigned the two posts, and from there, the Black Lives Matter organization was born (Ruffin II 2015). Although other organizations, such as Dream Defenders, Million Hoodies Movement for Justice, and Baltimore Bloc were formed as a response to the Trayvon Martin shooting, Black Lives Matter is distinct in its focus on social media. Black Lives Matter took advantage of Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr to develop a political agenda and mobilize for action, quickly reaching thousands of like-minded reformists across the nation (Ruffin II 2015). Today, Black Lives Matter is an international, memberled global network of more than forty chapters, with the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter shared on Twitter almost thirty million

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times (Black Lives Matter 2019; Cohen 2018). The current structure of the Black Lives Matter movement is decentralized, with chapters operating independently and leaders emphasizing the importance of local organizing over national leadership (Miller 2016).

Inspiration Black Lives Matter is inspired by several historical social justice movements that appeal to marginalized populations: the civil rights and Black Power (1960s), Black feminist/womanist (1980s), anti-apartheid/ Pan African (1980s), hip-hop (1980s), LGBTQ (2000s), and Occupy Wall Street (2011) movements. The all-female-founded movement explicitly rejects the charismatic male-centered, top-down movement structure that had been the model for most previous efforts. Instead, like Black Youth Project 100, Black Lives Matter incorporates those on the margins of traditional Black freedom movements, including women, the working poor, the disabled, undocumented immigrants, atheists and agnostics, and those who identify as queer and transgender (Ruffin II 2015). Since its inception, Black Lives Matter chapters around the world have held thousands of protest demonstrations. Their call for social justice has ranged from targeting wellknown police-involved deaths to lesserknown cases. Michael Brown On August 9, 2014, Black Lives Matter members participated in their first official initiative, the Black Lives Matter Freedom Ride to Ferguson, Missouri. After just one year of operations, more than 500 Black Lives Matter members from across the nation descended on Ferguson (Ruffin II 2015). While in Ferguson, they participated

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Marchers hold Black Lives Matter signs at the Martin Luther King Jr. Kingdom Day Parade in Los Angeles, California, on January 19, 2015. The Black Lives Matter movement was launched in July 2013 after George Zimmerman was acquitted on second-degree murder for the death of Trayvon Martin, an unarmed African American teenager. (Joe Sohm/Dreamstime.com)

in nonviolent demonstrations for justice in the wake of the controversial murder of unarmed eighteen-year-old African American Michael Brown, who was shot and killed by police officer Darren Wilson after a robbery in which he was a suspect. Like the Trayvon Martin killing that sparked Black Lives Matter, the Michael Brown murder garnered national attention, many enraged by the idea that the killing was racially motivated. Also, like Martin’s killer, the officer who killed Michael Brown went uncharged, generating further outrage. With raised hands, Black Lives Matter protestors in Ferguson chanted, “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot,” in replication of what is believed to be Michael Brown’s last gesture and words before he was killed. Another

distinctive factor in Brown’s case that angered protestors is the fact that officials allowed his body to lie in the street for four hours before it was eventually taken to the city morgue. This inspired Black Lives Matter to host “die-ins” across the country to memorialize slain minorities where protestors lie inanimate in public spaces, simulating death (Mirzoeff 2015). On November 28, 2014, Black Lives Matter protestors formed a human barrier to the Bay Area Rapid Transit system by chaining themselves to trains in Oakland, CA. The action, part of their #blackout Black Friday campaign, led to major transportation delays (Serna 2014). The same day, a similar protest in St. Louis saturated a mall during the Black Friday morning shopping rush, and earlier that week, another group crowded



the 101 Freeway near downtown L.A. during peak pre-Thanksgiving travel time.

Eric Garner Like “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot,” another staple of the Black Lives Matter movement is the phrase, “I Can’t Breathe,” inspired by the death of Eric Garner. On July 17, 2014, forty-three-year-old African American Eric Garner died on a Staten Island sidewalk after New York Police Department officers placed the 350-pound asthmatic man in a chokehold during an arrest for selling cigarettes without tax stamps. When approached by police, Garner denied selling cigarettes, but officers still pursued the arrest. Garner resisted, and officers moved to restrain him. According to reports, officer Daniel Pantaleo put his arm around Garner’s neck and took him down onto the ground. He then pushed Garner’s face into the ground after removing his arm from the man’s neck. According to witnesses, upon being wrestled to the ground, Garner repeated, “I can’t breathe” eleven times while lying face down on the sidewalk. He was pronounced dead at the hospital approximately one hour later (Baker et al. 2015). Although the medical examiner ruled Garner’s death a homicide, on December 3, 2014, a grand jury declined to indict Pantaleo (Goodman 2018). Garner’s death led to the most active protests since the 1960s (Glenza and Laughland 2015). Black Lives Matter protestors held die-ins to raise awareness of Garner’s death that popularized Garner’s last words, “I can’t breathe,” sparking a movement that continues to live on years later. By the summer of 2015, Black Lives Matter began publicly challenging politicians, including 2016 presidential candidates, to state their positions on racial issues and how their policies will lead to the improvement of Black communities.

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On July 18, 2016, Black Lives Matter members interrupted the NetRoots national annual convention of progressive cyberactivists in Phoenix, Arizona. Partially in protest of the death of Sandra Bland, who was found hanged in a jail cell, Black Lives Matter cofounder Patrisse Cullors publicly challenged Martin O’Malley and Bernie Sanders, candidates for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination. Cullors asked the candidates, “What will you do to stop police unions from battering our names after law enforcement kills us?” Cullors also challenged the candidates to develop a specific agenda: “I want to hear concrete actions. I want to hear an action plan. That’s what we want to hear.” Sanders became defensive and retorted: “I’ve spent fifty years of my life fighting for civil rights. If you don’t want me to be here, that’s okay” (Lind 2015). Under pressure, O’Malley responded, “All lives matter” (Resnikoff 2015). O’Malley quickly retracted his words after Black Lives Matter activists persuaded him that statements like that, while appearing innocent and fair, in fact marginalize the campaign to focus attention on the lives of impoverished African Americans and other people of color (Ruffin II 2015). On August 8, 2015, Black Lives Matter protestors interrupted and ultimately shut down another Bernie Sanders event in Seattle, Washington, preventing him from speaking. The activists sought to draw attention to the anniversary of the Michael Brown killing by demanding four and a half minutes of silence and criticized Sanders’ campaign for paying insufficient attention to issues related to race and criminal justice, even while pandering the Black vote (Lind 2015). The following day, Black Lives Matter announced that it would not endorse any presidential candidate or affiliate with a political party (Ruffin II 2015). By the first

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Democratic debate in October 2015, both Sanders and O’Malley changed their tone, with both candidates exclaiming that “Black Lives Matter” (Flores 2015).

Jamar Clark In 2015, Black Lives Matter also protested the police-involved shooting death of twentyfour-year-old Jamar Clark in Minneapolis, Minnesota. According to some accounts, Clark was handcuffed and shot “execution style,” whereas police maintain that he was resisting arrest (Woolf 2016). After the shooting, Black Lives Matter activists and supporters protested information being hidden for two weeks outside the Minneapolis Police Department’s fourth precinct. Protestors demanded the release of dashcam and bodycam videos containing material evidence that could have settled the truth of police accounts of the incident. On November 20, 2015, Black Lives Matter supporters, alongside NAACP members, held a vigil and marched in memory of Clark. Three days later, five people were shot at the precinct where protestors were gathered. Officers in riot gear came to quell the protests and, after being evicted from the precinct, Black Lives Matter protestors converged upon Minneapolis City Hall. On December 19, 2015, upward of 300 protestors returned to the fourth precinct before again marching to City Hall. Two days later, hundreds of Black Lives Matter protestors briefly gathered at the Mall of America before moving the protest to the Minneapolis–St. Paul International Airport. The protest closed security lines for about forty-five minutes and snarled traffic leading to the airport (KARE 2017). Alton Sterling and Philando Castile Though Black Lives Matter advocates peaceful protests and nonviolence, in some instances, as noted above, protests have

taken a turn for the worse. This trend continued with the protests of the deaths of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile. On July 5, 2016, Baton Rouge police shot and killed Alton Sterling at close range. Multiple witnesses recorded the shooting (Berlinger et al. 2016). The following day, on July 6, 2016, police officer Jeronimo Yanez shot and killed thirty-two-year-old Philando Castile in his vehicle in front of his girlfriend and her four-year-old daughter. The immediate aftermath of the shooting was live-streamed via Facebook (Miller et al. 2016). The timing of these two killings, combined with the amateur video footage, prompted public outrage. On the night of Sterling’s death, more than one hundred demonstrators in Baton Rouge shouted, “No Justice, No Peace!”; set off fireworks; and blocked an intersection to protest Sterling’s death. At least one officer was injured by a concrete block while attempting to arrest protestors (Gyan 2019). On July 7, 2016, Black Lives Matter organized a joint protest of Sterling and Castile’s murders in Dallas, Texas. After a peaceful protest, army veteran Micah Xavier Johnson opened fire in an ambush, killing five police officers and wounding seven others and two civilians. Before he was killed by a robot-delivered bomb, Johnson told police negotiators that he was upset about Black Lives Matter (Kennedy and Brown 2016). Writings found after the attack indicated that he was critical of the Black Lives Matter movement and was upset about police shootings of Black Americans. Black Lives Matter leaders were quick to condemn Johnson’s actions (Madhani 2016). After the Dallas ambush, protests continued to erupt across the nation, in some cases turning violent. During the weekend of July 9, 2016, Black Lives Matter protestors shut down



I-94 in St. Paul, Minnesota, blocking traffic for more than five hours. During this protest, more than one hundred people were arrested, and twenty-one officers, from multiple agencies, were injured. The injuries were primarily caused by fireworks, rocks, bricks, glass bottles, and chunks of concrete that were directed at officers, some hitting them in the head. St. Paul Police said someone threw a Molotov cocktail at officers as well (KARE 2016). One of the officers suffered a spinal fracture after a large concrete block was dropped on his head. Valerie Castile, the mother of Philando Castile, spoke out against the violence, urging protestors to remain peaceful throughout their fight for justice (KARE 2016).

Impact and Reception Surveys reveal racial differences in support for the Black Lives Matter movement, with Blacks more likely to support Black Lives Matter than whites. A 2016 Pew Research Center survey of 3,769 adults concluded that the vast majority of Blacks (65%) support Black Lives Matter, whereas only 40 percent of whites said they at least somewhat support the movement (Pew Research Center 2016). A 2017 Harvard-Harris survey found that 35 percent of whites and 83 percent of Blacks have a favorable view of the movement (Easley 2017). Many celebrities have expressed solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement. The 2016 ESPYs opened with a Black Lives Matter message from NBA players Chris Paul, Dwayne Wade, Lebron James, and Carmelo Anthony. The athletes denounced violence, acknowledged the positive contributions of law enforcement, and called out the names of police shooting victims (Stedman 2016). During the Eric Garner protests in 2014, celebrity couple John Legend and Chrissy Teigen hired several food trucks to

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feed Black Lives Matter demonstrators. In October 2015, rapper Jay-Z’s music streaming service, Tidal, held a charity concert in Brooklyn that raised $1.5 million for social justice groups, including Black Lives Matter. In 2016, singer The Weeknd donated $250,000 to the Black Lives Matter network. Kim Kardashian West penned a heartfelt open letter entitled, “#BlackLivesMatter,” in July 2016. In response to the killings of Blacks by police, Kardashian West wrote, “Hashtags are not enough. This must end now” (Price 2016). Although officer convictions are still rare, partly as a result of the public outcry organized and promoted by Black Lives Matter, the U.S. Department of Justice has investigated police misconduct in a number of cities, including those that have had officerinvolved shootings of Black men (Ruffin II 2015). Black Lives Matter has also been influential in efforts to maintain records of individuals killed by police. On December 18, 2014, the U.S. Congress enacted the Death and Custody Reporting Act, which now requires states receiving federal funds to document and report all deaths at the hands of police in local jurisdictions that occur in the process of arrest (Ruffin II 2015). The Black Lives Matter movement’s influence reached the national popular entertainment media for the first time in February 2015 when some members made an appearance in a Law & Order: SVU episode, protesting a white character who murdered an unarmed Black teenager who “fit the description” of a serial rapist (Daly 2016). The episode, “Stay Woke: The Black Lives Matter Movement,” was produced by actor Jesse Williams and aired in May 2016. It “chronicles the birth and growth of the Black Lives Matter movement, and its transformative power in amplifying black voices and issues” (Workneh 2016).

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Black Lives Matter has also expanded globally. Solidarity protests have emerged all over the world (Winsor 2016). In 2015, Black Lives Matter protestors gathered in Toronto, Ontario, Canada to protest the police shooting deaths of two Black Canadians, Andrew Loku and Jermaine Carby. Demonstrators shut down the southbound Allen Expressway, blocking traffic. The Toronto chapter of Black Lives Matter made several demands, including the immediate release of the names of the officers involved in the shooting, charges against the officers, removal of the officers from duty, the release of video footage from the murders, and monetary compensation for the victims’ families (Miller and Russell 2015). While neither of the victims’ shooting officers were charged or removed from duty, the name of Carby’s shooter, Const. Ryan Reid, was eventually released (Sachgau 2016). Two years after Loku’s death, 911 audio, surveillance video, and the name of his shooter, Const. Andrew Doyle, were also revealed (Gillis 2017). In 2016, 3,500 protestors took the streets of Melbourne, Australia, touting Black Lives Matter signs in the wake of the Philando Castile and Alton Sterling murders. Protestors in Australia also drew attention to the treatment of aboriginals by the Australian government (Stayner 2016). Black Lives Matter protests also spread to London in 2016, where demonstrators formed a human blockade to Heathrow Airport. Protestors were gathered to commemorate the five-year anniversary of the murder of twenty-nine-year-old Mark Duggan, a Black man who was shot and killed by police in north London. Members of the group also blocked roads near Birmingham Airport in England’s West Midlands region. In the town center of Nottingham, in the East Midlands region of England, protestors

also lay across tramlines, bringing transportation to a standstill (McKenzie 2016). The Black Lives Matter movement also ignited an international movement where Black cyberactivists in Europe, Africa, the Caribbean, and Latin America drew inspiration from and modeled their efforts on both the Black Lives Matter and the Arab Spring campaigns. In a play on words, many of these young overseas activists called their efforts the “Black Spring” movement (Ruffin II 2015). Whytnee M. Foriest See also: Baton Rouge Police Officers Shooting (2016); Brown, Michael, Shooting of; Dallas Police Officers Ambush (2016); Police Shootings

Further Reading ABC News. “#BlackLivesMatter Hits Australia.” ABC News, July 17, 2016. https:// www.abc.net.au/triplej/programs/hack /black-lives-matter-australian-protests /7635708 (accessed April 1, 2021). Baker, Al, J. David Goodman, and Benjamin Mueller. “Beyond the Chokehold: The Path to Eric Garner’s Death.” New York Times, June 14, 2015. https://www.nytimes.com /2015/06/14/nyregion/eric-garner-police -chokehold-staten-island.html (accessed April 1, 2021). Berlinger, Joshua, Nick Valencia, and Steve Almasy. “Alton Sterling shooting: Piecing together what happened before the videos.” CNN, July 7, 2016. http://www .cn n.com /2016/ 07/ 07/us / baton-rouge -alton-sterling-shooting/ (accessed April 1, 2021). Black Lives Matter. “Herstory,” 2019. https:// blacklivesmatter.com /about /herstor y/ (accessed April 1, 2021). Cohen, David. “The #BlackLivesMatter Hashtag Has Been Used on Twitter Almost 30 Million Times.” Adweek, July 11, 2018. ht t ps://w w w.adweek.com /digital /the

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-blacklivesmatter-hashtag-has-been-used -on-twitter-almost-30 -million-times / (accessed April 1, 2021). Daly, Sean. “‘Law & Order SVU’ Recap: Shooting of Unarmed Black Man Sends Shockwaves through NYPD.” Fox News, May 2, 2016. https://www.foxnews.com /ent er t ai n ment / law- order-sv u-recap -shooting-of-unarmed-black-man-sends -shockwaves-through-nypd (accessed April 1, 2021). Easley, Jonathan. “Poll: 57 Percent Have Negative View of Black Lives Matter Movement.” The Hill, August 2, 2017. http:// thehill.com/homenews/campaign/344985 -poll-57-percent-have-negative-view-of -black-lives-matter-movement (accessed April 1, 2021). Fernandez, Lisa, and Christie Smith. “#Blackout Black Friday Protest Shuts Down BART.” NBC Bay Area, November 28, 2014. https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news /local /Blackout-Black-Fr iday-Protest -Shuts-Dow n-BA RT-284160231.ht m l (accessed April 1, 2021). Flores, Rena. “Democratic Debate: Do Black Lives Matter?” CBS News, October 13, 2015. https://www.cbsnews.com/news /democratic-debate-do-black-lives-matter/ (accessed April 1, 2021). Gillis, Wendy. “Andrew Loku Coroner’s Inquest Revealed Crucial New Details.” The Star, June 23, 2017. https://www.thestar .com/news/crime/2017/06/23/andrew-loku -coroners-inquest-revealed-crucial-new -details.html (accessed April 1, 2021). Glenza, Jessica, and Oliver Laughland. “One Year Later: Eric Garner’s Death Led to Most Active U.S. Protests since the 60s.” The Guardian, July 17, 2015. https://www .theguardian.com /us-news /2015/jul/17 /one -yea r-ago - er ic-ga r ner-new-york (accessed April 1, 2021). Goodman, J. D. “Eric Garner Died in a Police Chokehold. Why Has the Inquiry Taken So Long?” New York Times, November 7, 2018. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11

/07/nyregion/eric-garner-trial-nypd.html (accessed April 1, 2021). Gyan, Joe, Jr. “Injured BRPD officer can sue Black Lives Matter activist DeRay Mckesson, court says.” The Advocate, April 24, 2019. https://www.theadvocate.com/baton _ r o u g e / n e w s / c r i m e _ p ol i c e / a r t i cl e _071ec624-66ee-11e9-98a0-73787f4c25ab .html (accessed April 1, 2021). KARE. “Jamar Clark Timeline: How Did We Get Here?” KARE, March 20, 2017. https://www.kare11.com /ar ticle /news /investigations/jamar-clark/jamar-clark -timeline-how-did-we-get-here/89-99906515 (accessed April 1, 2021). KARE. “Officer Suffers Spinal Fracture during I-94 Shutdown.” KARE, July 10, 2016, https://www.kare11.com/article /news /off icer-suffers-spinal-f ract ure -during-i-94-shutdown /89-268434384 (accessed April 1, 2021). Kennedy, Merrit, and Tanya Ballard Brown. “What We Know about the Dallas Suspected Gunman.” National Public Radio, July 8, 2016. https://www.npr.org/sections /thetwo-way/2016/07/08/485239295/what -we-know-about-the-dallas-suspected -gunman (accessed April 1, 2021). Lind, Dara. “Black Lives Matter vs. Bernie Sanders, Explained.” Vox, August 11, 2015. https://www.vox.com/2015/8/11/9127653 / b e r n ie - s a n d e r s - bl a ck-l ive s - m a t t e r (accessed April 1, 2021). Madhani, Aamer. “Black Lives Matter: Don’t Blame Movement for Dallas Police Ambush.” USA Today, July 8, 2016. https:// w w w.usatod ay.com /stor y/news /2016 / 07/ 08/black-lives-matter-dont-blame -movement- d alla s-police -a mbu sh /86866014/ (accessed April 1, 2021). McKenzie, Sheena. “Black Lives Matter Blocks London’s Heathrow Airport.” CNN, August 5, 2016. https://www.cnn.com/2016 / 08 / 05/eu rope / black-lives-mat ter-u k -heathrow-shutdown/ (accessed April 1, 2021). Miller, A., and Russell, A. “Black Lives Matter Protesters Shut Down Section of Allen

88 | Black Lives Matter Expressway.” Global News, 2015. https:// globalnews.ca/news/2134082/hundreds -protest-deaths-of-jermaine-carby-and -andrew-loku-in-toronto/ (accessed April 1, 2021). Miller, Ryan W. “Black Lives Matter: A primer on What It Is and What It Stands For.” USA Today, July 11, 2016. https:// www.usatoday.com /story/news /nation /2016/07/11/black-lives-matter-what-what -stands/86963292/ (accessed April 1, 2021). Mirzoeff, Nicholas D. “#BlackLivesMatter Is Breathing New Life into the Die-In.” The New Republic, August 10, 2015. https:// newrepublic.com /article /122513/black l ive s m a t t e r- b r e a t h i n g- n ew-l i fe - d ie (accessed April 1, 2021). Pew Research Center. “On Views of Race and Inequality, Blacks and Whites Are Worlds Apart.” Pew Research Center, June 27, 2016. https://www.pewsocialtrends.org / 2 016 / 0 6 / 27 / o n -v i e w s - of- r a c e - a n d -inequality-blacks-and-whites-are-worlds -apart/ (accessed April 1, 2021). Price, Lydia. “How The Weeknd, Kim Kardashian West and More Stars Have Supported Black Lives Matter.” People, August 12, 2016. https://people.com/celebrity/how -celebrities-have-supported-black-lives -matter/ (accessed April 1, 2021). Resnikoff, Ned. “Black Lives Matter Disrupts Martin O’Malley, Bernie Sanders Event.” Al Jazeerah, July 18, 2015. http://america .aljazeera.com/articles/2015/7/18/black -lives-matter-disrupts-martin-omalley -bernie-sanders-event.html (accessed June 12, 2022). Ruffin, Herbert G., II. “Black Lives Matter: The Growth of a New Social Justice Movement.” Black Past, August 23, 2015. https:// w w w.blackpast.org /african-american -history/black-lives-matter-growth-new -social-justice-movement/ (accessed April 1, 2021). Sachgau, Oliver. “Officer Who Shot Jermaine Carby Says He Wouldn’t Do Anything Differently.” The Star, May 13, 2016. https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2016

/05/13/officer-who-shot-jermaine-carby -says-he-wouldnt-do-anything-differently .html (accessed April 1, 2021). Serna, Joseph. “Bay Area Train Service Restored after Ferguson Protest Shutdown.” Los Angeles Times, November 28, 2014. https://www.latimes.com/local /lanow/la-me-ln-bart-protest-20141128 -story.html (accessed April 1, 2021). Shapiro, T. Rees, Lindsey Beaver, Wesley Lowery, and Michael E. Miller. “Police Group: Minn. Governor ‘Exploited What Was Already a Horrible and Tragic Situation.’” Washington Post, July 9, 2016. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news /morning-mix/wp/2016/07/07/minn-cop -fatally-shoots-man-during-traffic-stop - a f t e r m at h - b roa d c a s t- on -fa c eb o ok / (accessed April 1, 2021). Stayner, Guy. “Mounted Police Prepare to Lead the Black Lives Matter Rally.” ABC News, July 16, 2016. https://www.abc.net.au /news/2016-07-17/black-lives-matter-rally -melbourne,-july-17,-2016-7/7636122?nw=0 (accessed June 12, 2022). Stedman, Alex. “ESPYs Kick Off With Black Lives Matter Speech: ‘We All Have to Do Better.’” Variety, July 13, 2016. https:// variety.com /2016/tv/news /espys-black -l ive s - m a t t e r- d w y a n e -w a d e -le b r o n -james-1201813858/ (accessed April 1, 2021). Winsor, Morgan. “Black Lives Matter Protests Go Global, from Ireland to South Africa.” ABC News, July 13, 2016. https:// abcnews.go.com/International/black-lives -matter-protests-global-ireland-south -africa/story?id=40546549 (accessed April 1, 2021). Woolf, Nicky. “Jamar Clark shooting: no criminal charges for Minneapolis police officers.” The Guardian, March 30, 2016. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news /2016/mar/30/jamar-clark-shooting-no -criminal-charges-for-minneapolis-police -officers (accessed April 1, 2021). Workneh, Lilly. “Jesse Williams Wants You to ‘Stay Woke’ in New Film on Black Lives

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Matter.” Huffington Post Black Voices, May 16, 2016. https://www.huffpost.com/entry /jesse-williams-stay-woke-documntary -black-lives-matter_n_5739516ee4b077d 4d6f3688a (accessed April 1, 2021).

Black Market for Firearms The black market for firearms in the United States consists of transactions in which stolen and/or purchased firearms (including both new and secondhand guns) are illegally transferred between buyers and sellers. Individuals who divert firearms from the legal to the illegal marketplace are engaged in firearms trafficking. Though not all guns bought and sold on the black market are involved in the commission of crimes, trafficking (or firearms diversion) is the primary source of guns used in criminal activity, with approximately five out of six firearms used in crime having been obtained illegally. As many as one-quarter of individuals identified as gun traffickers are convicted felons, and almost half of all firearms-trafficking investigations involve convicted felons as either the buyer or seller. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosive (ATF), an arm of the U.S. Department of Justice, is the agency with primary responsibility for combating gun trafficking and curtailing the black market for firearms. There are four basic means by which firearms make their way onto the black market: licensed sellers (including pawnbrokers) selling to prohibited purchasers (e.g., convicted felons), unlicensed individuals (e.g., private collectors) selling to prohibited purchasers, individuals purchasing guns on behalf of prohibited purchasers (i.e., straw purchases), and firearms theft. Federal law requires firearms dealers to obtain a federal firearms license from the

Federal Firearms Licensing Center. In addition to meeting federal regulations, gun dealers are required to abide by all local and state laws regarding the sale and possession of firearms. Firearms dealers are prohibited from selling firearms to certain classes of individuals, including juveniles, convicted felons, those who have been adjudicated to be mentally defective, illegal aliens, and dishonorably discharged members of the armed services. Firearms dealers are also prohibited from selling guns (except for rifles and shotguns) to unlicensed individuals from outside their state. Licensed dealers serve as a source of firearms for the black market when they choose to sell to purchasers without conducting the federally required background check (through the National Instant Check System operated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation) or knowingly sell to prohibited purchasers who have provided falsified information. Though licensed firearms dealers are involved in only a minority of ATF firearms investigations, they account for almost half of all firearms recovered in those investigations. Not all individuals are required to obtain a federal dealer’s license to sell firearms. Collectors and hobbyists who make only occasional sales and trades to enhance personal collections or who sell their collections in part or in whole are not required to do so. Although such individuals are prohibited from knowingly selling guns to prohibited purchasers, they are not required to conduct background checks, as licensed dealers are required to do. Firearms make their way into the black market when unlicensed sellers knowingly sell guns from their private collections to prohibited buyers, or when they legally purchase guns with the intention of reselling them illegally. Common venues for such illegal sales include gun shows (for both

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licensed and unlicensed individuals), flea markets, and want ads (both print and electronic). Unlicensed sellers account for almost a third of all firearms involved in ATF investigations. Individuals who purchase guns on behalf of prohibited purchasers are called straw buyers and also contribute to the black market for guns. The straw buyer is legally eligible to purchase a gun but does so illegally by providing false information to the federally licensed seller regarding who the actual purchaser is. Friends (especially fellow gang members), relatives, and spouses are commonly used as straw buyers. As many as one-quarter of straw buyers are juveniles. Individual straw buyers tend to be involved with the purchase of only one or a few firearms rather than the bulk purchase of firearms. However, the number of individuals who act as straw buyers can be quite substantial, leading to a heavy influx of firearms into the black market. Working with the National Shooting Sports Association, the ATF instituted a special program christened “Don’t Lie for the Other Guy,” directed specifically at reducing straw purchases. The program is educational in nature and involves educating dealers about the detection of straw buyers as well as to prospective buyers regarding what constitutes a straw buy. Not all stolen firearms make their way to the black market, but firearms stolen from individual owners as well as federally licensed dealers are an important source of guns for the black market. Less frequently, firearms are also stolen during shipping. However, though such transport thefts are relatively few in number compared to thefts from residences and licensed dealers, they typically involve large numbers of guns per incident. In addition, guns stolen during shipment are more likely to be newer guns,

including semiautomatic pistols, which are preferred over older revolvers. The ATF combats firearm trafficking and the black market for guns through a variety of programs administered by the agency’s criminal enforcement division. Enforcement activities include inspection of federal licensees, background checks for gun purchasers, and criminal investigations of suspected firearm traffickers. Project Gunrunner is a recent initiative of the ATF directed at gun trafficking, specifically targeting the trafficking of guns to Mexico from the United States. Under the auspices of Project Gunrunner, and working in conjunction with state, local, tribal, and Mexican law enforcement, the ATF has undertaken about 4,500 investigations, resulting in the seizure of over 10,000 firearms destined for Mexico. Recently, however, Project Gunrunner (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms 2011) has come under fire after guns involved in a sting operation were associated with the scenes where two law enforcement officers were killed. Wendy L. Martinek See also: Background Checks; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF); Felons and Gun Control; Firearm Dealers; Gun Shows; Licensing; National Instant Criminal Background Check System; National Tracing Center (NTC)

Further Reading Bradford, Kevin D., Gregory T. Gundlach, and William L. Wilkie. “Countermarketing in the Courts: The Case of Marketing Channels and Firearms Diversion.” Journal of Public Policy & Marketing 24 (2005): 284–98. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. Commerce in Firearms in the United

States. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of the Treasury, 2000. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. Following the Gun: Enforcing Federal Laws against Firearms Traffickers. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of the Treasury, 2000. Bureau of Justice Assistance. Reducing Illegal Firearms Trafficking: Promising Practices and Lessons Learned. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2000. Pierce, Glenn L., et al. “Characteristics and Dynamics of Illegal Firearms Markets: Implications for a Supply-Side Enforcement Strategy.” Justice Quarterly 21 (2004): 391–422.

Bloomberg, Michael(1942–) An American businessman, philanthropist, and author turned politician, Michael Bloomberg is a staunch supporter of gun control, particularly as a means of reducing violence. Bloomberg, who served as the mayor of New York City from 2002 to 2013, also has financed gun control activities, including lobbying for related legislation and campaigning against candidates strongly supported by the National Rifle Association (NRA). He supports gun control measures such as the use of more effective and elaborate background checks, banning the use of assault weapons, keeping guns away from the hands of criminals, spending more on the enforcement of firearm laws, and intervention programs to stop violence from occurring. He also continues to advocate against the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005. A lifelong Democrat, Bloomberg switched his affiliation to Republican in 2001 to run for mayor of New York City. Outspending his Democratic opponent five-to-one, he won the election with 50.3 percent of the vote,

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becoming the successor of Rudy Giuliani. Despite his Republican Party affiliation, however, Bloomberg helped to pass new laws targeting gun violence in the city. He successfully lobbied for an increase in mandatory minimum sentencing, from one to three and a half years, for the possession of an illegal, loaded gun. In 2006, Bloomberg signed four bills into law designed to decrease the prevalence of firearms on the city’s streets. The first banned paint kits that could be used to make real guns look like toys. The second created a registry of “gun offenders,” designed to require individuals with firearm-related convictions to report their status to the New York City Police Department (NYPD) for four years. The third established an inventory-control system, designed to prevent guns from entering the black market, that required dealers to examine their firearms inventories and certify their process and results to the NYPD every six months. Finally, a “one gun a month” law was instituted that required sellers to ensure their buyers had not purchased another firearm in the ninety days prior to the transaction. Bloomberg also filed suit against twentyseven out-of-state firearms dealers who were identified as top sources of crime guns being used in the city. Nearly all dealers sued agreed to a settlement in which the courts monitored their sales, resulting in a decrease of 84 percent in their identification among crime guns sold. That same year, Bloomberg joined with then-Boston mayor Thomas Menino to form Mayors against Illegal Guns, a bipartisan coalition. The organization comprised more than 1,000 current and former mayors and also garnered the support of more than 1.5 million grassroots supporters. Mayors against Illegal Guns was instrumental in helping shape the national gun debate,

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including authoring a blueprint for action later used by the Obama administration in its proposal to reduce gun violence across the nation. The coalition also was instrumental in helping to lobby for increased funding by the Senate Appropriations Committee for improvements to the National Incident Criminal Background Check System and funding for more federal prosecutors and training for law enforcement, as well as helping to pass universal background check legislation in several states. In 2013, the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene published a report that effectively touted the success of Bloomberg’s efforts to reduce gun violence in the five boroughs (Stayton et al. 2013). Between 2000 and 2011, firearm fatalities overall had decreased 32 percent (6.3 to 4.3 per 100,000). This decrease was due in large part to a similar reduction in gunrelated homicides, which also had declined 33 percent (5.4 to 3.6 per 100,000). At a time when these figures were declining, the national rates of firearms fatalities and homicides had remained largely stable, further highlighting the success of these efforts. Firearm injury hospitalizations also declined during the same study period, down 21 percent in the eleven-year period, largely due to decreases in gun-related assaults. Bloomberg left the mayor’s office in 2013 after having successfully run for reelection in both 2005 and 2009; he was succeeded by Democrat Bill DeBlasio. He continued to lobby for gun control measures designed to combat violence at both the state and federal levels through Mayors against Illegal Guns. The organization subsequently joined in 2014 with Moms Demand Action, a grassroots organization formed in the wake of the December 14, 2012, shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in

Newtown, Connecticut. The newly formed organization, Everytown for Gun Safety, has become one of the nation’s leading advocates for gun violence prevention. Within three months of its formation, Everytown had grown to more than one million supporters. Bloomberg also continued to fund gun violence initiatives outside of Everytown, for whom he remains the largest financial contributor; in 2016, his philanthropic arm donated $300 million to the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health to research a number of issues, including gun violence. In 2018, Bloomberg reregistered as a Democrat and worked to fund candidates in the party during the midterm elections to flip the Republican-controlled House of Representatives. On March 5, 2019, Bloomberg announced that he did not seek to run for president in 2020 but changed his stance on November 24, 2019, when he formally entered the race after expressing dissatisfaction with the large pool of candidates whom he did not believe could not beat incumbent Donald Trump. Unlike other candidates, Bloomberg did not accept any campaign contributions, instead funding his efforts himself. His platform included an aggressive take on gun control efforts, including (but not limited to) an enhanced background check system requiring permits for all new purchasers, stricter regulation of unlicensed sellers online and at gun shows, notification of law enforcement when individuals become prohibited from possessing firearms, and red-flag screening to prevent firearms from being acquired from prohibited persons. As a late entrant, however, he failed to gain the necessary momentum, particularly with poor showings in the first two Democratic debates and despite a record-breaking investment of $696 million



into his campaign efforts. He subsequently suspended his campaign on March 4, 2020, and endorsed former Vice President Joe Biden, who became the party’s nominee and ultimately won the election. Bloomberg continues to work with Everytown and Mayors against Illegal Guns to help combat the rising epidemic of gun violence in the United States. Rakeem (Rocky) Means and Jaclyn Schildkraut See also: Democratic Party and Gun Control; Everytown for Gun Safety; Gun Control; Moms Demand Action; Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005; Republican Party and Gun Control; Trump, Donald J.

Further Reading News 12 Staff. “Mayor Bloomberg Signs Anti-Violence Gun Bills into Law.” News 12, July 27, 2006. https://brooklyn.news12 .com/mayor-bloomberg-signs-anti-gun -v i o l e n c e - b i l l s - i n t o - l a w-3 479 6 814 (accessed July 7, 2021). “Public Safety: Guns.” MikeBloomberg.com. https://www.mikebloomberg.com/mayoral -record/public-safety/guns/ (accessed July 7, 2021). Stayton Catherine, Rebecca Yau, Kacie Seil, Hannah Seoh, Jennifer Marcum, Lawrence Fung, and Anna Caffarelli. “Firearms Deaths and Injuries in New York City.” New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, April 2013. http://www .nyc.gov/ ht ml /om /pdf /2013/f irear ms _report.pdf (accessed July 7, 2021).

Body Armor The concept of body armor dates well into antiquity; however, until the development of synthetic fabrics capable of resisting highvelocity projectiles in the latter half of the

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twentieth century, only steel provided significant protection from modern firearms. Prior to the development of Kevlar, socalled bulletproof vests were essentially updates on medieval armor. However, Kevlar made possible lighter, more flexible vests that could be worn under clothing for extended periods. Beginning in the early 1970s, police agencies began to require uniformed officers to wear these vests when working. Officers in other assignments began wearing them for specific purposes, such as raids or arrests. As use increased, the number of police officer deaths reversed a rising trend and began a sustained decline (National Law Enforcement Memorial Fund 2010). The National Institute of Justice credits body armor with saving over 3,000 law enforcement lives over the past four decades (National Institute of Justice 2010). Like all defensive armor, from medieval castles to modern tanks, soft body armor is not “bulletproof” but rather bullet resistant. As the velocity, mass, and density of the projectile increases, the difficulty of stopping it also increases. In addition to velocity, mass, and composition, bullet shape influences penetration. In heaviercaliber weapons, designed specifically to defeat armor plate, explosives are incorporated into the projectile and focus energy on the target and literally melt through the armor. Vests are rated by level of protection (National Institute of Justice 2008). Types IIA, II, and III are composed of bulletresistant fabric and capable of stopping pistol and revolver bullets ranging from 9 mm to .40 caliber; Type IIA, to .357 SIG, and Type III, up to a .44 Magnum. The additional resistance of the Type II and IIIA vests is attained by adding layers of fabric, which results in more weight and less flexibility. Thus, Type II and IIA vests are most

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A police officer patrolling a local event in Beaverton, Oregon, wears a Kevlar vest. These lightweight, bullet-resistant vests can be worn either over or under the officer's clothes to protect them from gunfire. (Alexander Oganezov/Dreamstime.com)

commonly used for daily wear. Resistance to all types of high-velocity military and civilian rifle bullets requires the addition of metal or ceramic inserts. These vests, rated as Type III and IV, are heavy, bulky, and conspicuous. They are primarily utilized by the military and SWAT teams. Federal law places prohibits possession of body armor by persons convicted of violent felonies (18 U.S.C. § 931), and several states have laws restricting felons from possessing body armor. William J. Vizzard See also: Ammunition, Types of; ArmorPiercing Ammunition

Further Reading National Institute of Justice. Ballistic Resistance of Body Armor NIJ Standard–0101.06.

Washington, DC: National Institute of Justice, 2008. National Institute of Justice. “Body Armor.” December 16, 2012. http://www.nij.gov/ topics/technology/body-armor/welcome. htm (accessed January 26, 2022).

Boston Gun Project (BGP) The Boston Gun Project (BGP) was part of a set of linked programs aimed at reducing gun violence among young people in Boston in the 1990s. Levels of violent crime, usually involving firearms, had reached epidemic proportions in the late 1980s to the early 1990s. For example, homicides of those under twenty-four years of age increased 230 percent from 1987 (22) to 1990 (73). After this jump, the rates remained high, averaging



forty-four youth homicides a year from 1991 to 1995. Some criminologists predicted that crime rates would climb even higher in the coming years, due largely to a group of young men they referred to as “superpredators.” The subsequent crime drop in the 1990s occurred all over the country in cities that had adopted differing crime reduction strategies. Under the rubric of the Boston Strategy to Prevent Youth Violence, funded by the National Institute of Justice (NIJ), the BGP was a gun suppression and interdiction strategy linked to Operation Ceasefire, an enforcement strategy initiated in 1996 to lessen gang gun violence. The connected programs succeeded in reducing youth homicide in Boston and provided model programs for reducing gun violence nationally. The Boston Strategy to Prevent Gun Violence involved a wide spectrum of federal, state, and local agencies; nonprofit community service organizations; businesses; religious leaders; parents; and others. The BGP itself involved the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF); the Boston Police Department (BPD); the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office; and the U.S. Attorney’s Office. These individuals and organizations had long been concerned about youth violence, and the epidemic of violence heightened their desire to take effective action. Researchers at the Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government joined with these constituencies to develop the BGP. David M. Kennedy, of the Kennedy School, and his colleagues Anthony Braga and Anne M. Piehl directed the project. They wanted to find out whether gun violence could be reduced by limiting access to guns. The BGP, a supply-side initiative, attempted to interdict gun trafficking. Based on close cooperation between the ATF and BPD, the project received resources that

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enabled it to investigate gun-trafficking cases, trace recovered handguns, and inspect federally licensed firearms dealers to monitor their compliance with regulations. The inspections led 80 percent of the licensed dealers in Boston to give up their licenses. ATF agents worked with BPD ballistics and crime laboratories, attempting to trace recovered handguns through the ATF’s National Tracing Center. The working group developed guidelines to help it disrupt illegal gun markets and also developed a local tracing data set. They gave priority to tracing guns that had been used in a crime in within the previous thirty months and focused on semiautomatic pistols, because research had revealed that those were the most popular guns used by youth; guns with obliterated serial numbers that had been restored; those found in high-risk neighborhoods; and those associated with gangs and gang areas. The group also emphasized federal prosecution for gun crimes, which typically had longer sentences and took those convicted far from home (Office of Justice Programs 1999; Kennedy et al. 2001). The local trace database was also helpful for Operation Ceasefire, a demand-side initiative. The Boston Police Department’s Youth Violence Strike Force developed this part of the Boston Strategy to Prevent Youth Violence and implemented it in May 1996. It was based, in part, on findings from the Kansas City Gun Experiment (KCGE). The KCGE was based on the premise that additional patrols in a given area could result in increased gun seizures and a reduction in gun crime. Rogan, Shaw, and Sherman (1995) matched two beats that had exceptionally high-crime rates—including many homicides and drive-by shootings. Over a twenty-nine-week period in 1992, one beat (the “target area”) received extra patrols focused on gun crime. The other beat (the

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“control area”) received the usual amount of patrol and police presence. There were several promising, although not statistically significant, findings. Gun seizures in the target area increased, gun crimes decreased in the target area, and fear of crime declined significantly in the target area. The latter constituted the only statistically significant findings; however, the researchers concluded that focusing on particular areas showed great promise. The upbeat conclusions of the KCGE led to creation of Operation Ceasefire, an enhanced version of the KCGE. The program focused on reducing gang violence by going to gang leaders and telling them there would be a crackdown on any violations, regardless of how minor they were. Response to violence would take the form of swift prosecutions. Gang violence dropped as a result of this approach, together with the other aspects of the Boston Strategy. Another part of the overall program was Operation Night Light, which had begun in 1992 as a police and probation collaboration to deter juvenile violence. The success of the Boston Gun Project and its linked programs was evident in major reductions in homicides in Boston. In 1995, there were forty-five homicides, and that that dropped to twenty-six in 1996 and fifteen in 1997. The programs were recommended as promising strategies to reduce gun violence (Office of Justice Programs 1999) and were used as models in other cities. For example, a successful gun violence strategy based on the Boston model but modified for local conditions was successful in East Los Angeles in the late 1990s (Tita et al. 2003). More generally, as a result of the Kansas City and Boston programs, “directed patrol” strategies are now seen as critical in

combating gun crime (Ludwig 2005; Walker 2006). They are viewed as most successful when combined with interagency cooperation—such as the aggressive sentencing of the Boston-area U.S. Attorney General combined with the aggressive and directed street patrols of the Boston police. In 1995, Chicago created the Chicago Project for Violence Prevention, which includes a Ceasefire component. The project takes a public health approach to reducing violence. The Ceasefire program, adapted from successful programs in other cities, notably Boston, was initiated in 2000. The success of these programs gave birth to the broader and more comprehensive U.S. Department of Justice’s Project Safe Neighborhoods initiative in 2001. Walter F. Carroll and Sean Maddan See also: Black Market for Firearms; Firearm Dealers; National Tracing Center (NTC); Project Exile; Project Safe Neighborhoods; Project Triggerlock

Further Reading Braga, Anthony. “Serious Youth Gun Offenders and the Epidemic of Youth Violence in Boston.” Journal of Quantitative Criminology 19 (2003): 33–54. Kennedy, David M., et al. Reducing Gun Violence: The Boston Gun Project’s Operation Ceasefire. Research Report NCJ 188741. Washington, DC: National Institute of Justice, 2001. http://www.ncjrs.gov /pdffiles1/nij/188741.pdf (accessed January 26, 2022). Ludwig, Jens. “Better Gun Enforcement, Less Crime.” Criminology and Public Policy 4 (2005): 677–716. Office of Justice Programs. Promising Strategies to Reduce Gun Violence. Report NCJ 173950. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, February 1999. http://www.ojjdp.gov/pubs

/gun_violence/contents.html (accessed January 26, 2022). Rogan, Dennis, James W. Shaw, and Lawrence W. Sherman. “The Kansas City Gun Experiment.” National Institute of Justice Research in Brief. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice, January 1995. https://www .ncjrs.gov/pdffiles/kang.pdf (accessed January 26, 2022). Sheppard, David. Strategies to Reduce Gun Violence. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, OJJDP, 1999. http://www.ojjdp.gov/pubs /gun_violence/173950.pdf (accessed January 26, 2022). Tita, George K., et al. Reducing Gun Violence: Results from an Intervention in East Los Angeles. Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 2003. http://www.rand.org/content/dam /rand /pubs /monog raph _ repor ts /2010 /RAND_MR1764-1.pdf (accessed January 26, 2022). Walker, Samuel. Sense and Nonsense about Crime and Drugs. Belmont, CA: Thompson-Wadsworth, 2006.

Bowling for Columbine(2002) Bowling for Columbine is a 2002 documentary film written, directed, produced, and narrated by renowned documentarian Michael Moore. The film examines a number of facets related to the 1999 mass shooting at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado—as well as a number of other prominent gun-related incidents—in an attempt to answer the question of why firearm violence is so prominent in the United States. The film includes running commentary from Moore, interviews with a number of people from across the political and ideological spectrum, a cartoon illustrating a brief “history” of the United States as it relates to gun ownership, and portrayals of

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a number of other interesting encounters and incidents related to the theme of the film (Moore 2002). Considered by some to be among the best documentaries ever produced, it achieved both tremendous critical and commercial success (POV Staff 2012). It won the 2003 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature and, at the time, was one of the highest-grossing documentaries of all time in the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, and Austria (Welk 2018). Nearly twenty years after its release, it remains not only popular but also highly controversial. The title of the film comes from a widely circulated story that the two perpetrators of the Columbine shooting, who were also students at the school, went bowling at 6:00 a.m. on the morning of the shooting. This was later determined by investigators with the nearby Golden Police Department to be untrue (Cullen 2005). However, the apocryphal story helps to illustrate Moore’s narrative in the film that there are so many different suggestions as to why the perpetrators committed the attack, but there are also no definitive answers either. According to Moore, then, bowling is perhaps just as plausible an explanation for the attack as other suggestions are, including listening to Goth or heavy metal music, watching the television show South Park, or the bombing of Kosovo by the U.S. government. In a general sense, this is the main theme of the film: exploring many of the proffered answers to the question of why the United States have so many gun-related deaths and incidents when compared to other countries around the world. Some of the most prominent explanations addressed in the film include the extremely high rate of gun ownership in the United States, the particularly bloody and violent history of the United States, the fear-inducing

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A promotional poster for the film Bowling for Columbine (2002) by Michael Moore. The documentary explores the prevalence of firearm violence in the United States. (Metro Goldwyn Mayer/Album/Alamy Stock Photo)

nature of how the news is portrayed in the United States, the ease of access to violent and unsavory media in a general sense (TV, movies, video games, and music), and more generalized answers such as poverty and alienation. Each of these explanations is addressed throughout the film, often in comparison with other countries. In particular, Moore focuses on comparisons with Canada, America’s “neighbor to the north,” Germany, Australia, and the UK because of their cultural similarities to the United States. In relation to the high rate of gun ownership in the United States, Moore examines the rate of gun ownership in Canada. Although there are certainly fewer guns per capita in Canada, the ownership rate is still fairly high, and there are close to seven

million guns in a country with a population of about thirty million (all figures are from 1997, which is the best data available for the time that Columbine occurred) (Department of Justice 2015). The ownership rate is therefore just below 25 percent. In the United States there are far more guns, but the number of gun-related homicides in both countries is disproportionate to the number of firearms present. In other words, Canada’s homicide rate is much, much lower than that of the United States, even when taking the number of guns into account. Although Moore does not tell the audience how to think about this issue, he does suggest that the prevalence of guns in the United States is not necessarily a sufficient explanation for the prevalence of gunrelated violence because Canada also has a relatively large number of firearms as well. Moore also addresses the “violent history” of the United States and whether or not this could be a contributing factor to the prevalence of gun violence. Toward the end of the film, he interviews Charlton Heston, who at that time was the president of the National Rifle Association (NRA). In the interview, Heston makes the claim that perhaps the country’s history of violence (slavery, the Civil War, the displacement of Native Americans, the turmoil of the civil rights era, etc.) is partly responsible for the prevalence of violence in the United States. Moore’s response is to highlight the violent history of countries like Germany, with the Nazis and the Holocaust, and Great Britain, where they ruled the world “at the barrel of a gun” for nearly 300 years (Moore 2002). In essence, Moore is dismissing the United States’ violent history as the primary explanation for gun violence because so many other countries have a violent past as well— in some cases perhaps even more violent than that of the United States.



Ultimately, Moore essentially leads the viewer to conclude that the way the news media in the United States chooses to portray the news is among the best explanations for a culture or “climate of fear” and violence in the United States. In subsequent documentaries and interviews, he has reiterated this point. For example, in a 2018 interview with IndieWire, he stated, “For almost 30 years, I’ve been trying to sound a warning siren that the wealthy in this country are on a rampage to take whatever they can from the middle class. I’ve been trying to highlight a 20th-century form of capitalism that’s all about making as much money as possible at the suffering and expense of others, often by manipulating white people into being afraid of those others” (Ehrlich 2018). In the case of Bowling for Columbine, though, Moore argues that this climate of fear leads to a hypersensitivity to danger, making people all too eager to pull the trigger on one another. In one of the more powerful and poignant moments in the climax of the film, Moore partners with two victims of the Columbine shooting, Mark Taylor and Richard Castaldo, to confront the retailer K-Mart for the sale of handgun ammunition in their stores. Moore and the students make the argument that handguns are only intended to harm other people and that the sale of handgun ammunition should be more closely regulated in retail settings. They travel to the company’s headquarters in Troy, Michigan, to ask for a refund on the bullets that are still lodged in the bodies of Taylor and Castaldo. On the first day, the company sends a number of representatives to deflect criticism and deflate the situation without directly engaging the issue that Moore and the students are trying to raise. On the second day, however, in a shocking reversal, K-Mart issues a statement that

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they will change their policy and phase out the sale of handgun ammunition. Moore, Taylor, and Castaldo are surprised but also very excited for this announcement, with Moore saying, “We’ve won. . . . That was more than we asked for” (Moore 2002). Despite the film’s commercial and critical success, it remains highly controversial. In large part, this is due to the subject matter and the view that Moore skews his facts to make his arguments instead of letting the facts speak for themselves, leading to accusations of biased filmmaking (Stone 2003). Despite these critiques, Bowling for Columbine remains a highly popular documentary. In 2018, it was rereleased on DVD and Blu-ray with a special edition as part of the highly renowned Criterion Collection, a distribution company that specializes in updating important classic and contemporary films and documentaries for posterity and preservation (Ehrlich 2018). As of this writing, Moore continues to produce controversial but thought-provoking films that extend or expand the conversation around contentious but important issues in U.S. society. Alexander D. Clayton See also: Columbine High School Shooting (1999); Gun Control; Gun-Free School Laws; International Firearms Laws

Further Reading Cullen, Dave. “A Little Unfinished Business on Bowling and Columbine.” Salon, April 16, 2005. https://web.archive.org/web / 20110715233749 / ht t p : // blogs.s a lon .com/0001137/2005/04/16.html (accessed May 16, 2022). Department of Justice. “Firearms, Accidental Deaths, Suicides, and Violent Crime: An Updated Review of the Literature with Special Reference to the Canadian

100 | Boxer, Barbara Situation.” Government of Canada, January 7, 2015. https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng /r p-pr/csj-sjc /jsp-sjp /wd98_4-dt98_4 /p2.html (accessed May 16, 2022). Ehrlich, David. “Michael Moore on ‘Bowling for Columbine’ in the Trump Era: ‘I’m Seriously Fed Up with Having to Make These Movies.’” IndieWire, June 21, 2018. ht t ps ://w w w.i nd iew i re.com /2018 / 06 /michael-moore-interview-bowling-for -columbine-donald-trump-1201977069/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Moore, Michael. Bowling for Columbine. DVD. Directed by Michael Moore. Beverly Hills: MGM Distribution Co., 2002. POV Staff. “The 25 ‘Greatest’ Documentaries of All Times.” POV, December 3, 2012. http://archive.pov.org/blog/news/2012/12 /the-25-greatest-documentaries-of-all -time/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Stone, Alan A. “Cheap Shots.” Boston Review, June 1, 2003. http://bostonreview.net/film /alan-stone-cheap-shots (accessed May 16, 2022). Welk, Brian. “15 Top Grossing Documentaries at the Box Office.” The Wrap, July 12, 2018. https://www.thewrap.com/top -grossing-documentar ies-box-off ice / (accessed May 16, 2022).

Boxer, Barbara(1940–) Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) was a forceful advocate for gun control in the U.S. House of Representatives (1983–1992) and in the U.S. Senate (1993–2016). Boxer used her position as a senator from the most populous state to garner media attention to her gun control policies, but she also worked quietly in the Senate to introduce bills and amendments, to alter language in bills, and to direct appropriations to gun control projects. When the Democrats were the majority party, Boxer was an influential player in promoting gun control, and in the years

when the Republicans controlled the Senate, she was active in countering pro-gun legislation. Throughout her career, Boxer was routinely rated F by the National Rifle Association (NRA), which, upon her announcement of imminent retirement in 2015, noted that “Boxer has had a near ‘perfect’ record of support for every cockamamie anti-gun bill that has come down the pike since her election to the Senate” (NRAILA 2015). Working as a stockbroker and newspaper editor before entering politics, Boxer first served as a congressional aide from 1974 to 1976. She was elected to the Marin Board of Supervisors in 1976 and served for six years. She was elected to the House in 1983, where she served four terms. In 1992, she was elected to the Senate in the “Year of the Woman” (Cook, Thomas, and Wilcox 1993). She has been called “the iconoclastic feminist, environmentalist, anti-war and anti-corporate crusader that has made her a hero to liberals in home state and around the country” (Koszczuk and Angle 2007, 71). Boxer supported the Brady Bill and the Assault Weapons Ban passed in the early 1990s. In 1996, she introduced the American Handguns Standards Act, which sought to ban Saturday night specials and other cheap handguns. Three years later, she introduced the Firearms Rights, Responsibilities, and Remedies Act in an effort to protect the ability of cities and groups to sue gun manufacturers, dealers, and importers for civil damages resulting from gun violence. In the wake of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Boxer wrote the legislation that required air marshals be on board high-risk flights and supported laws that would allow passenger and cargo pilots to carry firearms in the cockpit. Later, she was among a small handful of Democrats



who spoke out against legislation that would exempt gun makers from civil liability lawsuits (the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act [PLCAA] of 2005). She was an outspoken advocate of renewing the Assault Weapons Ban following its expiration in 2004. More recently, she criticized proposed legislation that would permit visitors to national parks to carry loaded and concealed weapons and another that would allow individuals with permits in their home states to carry concealed weapons into another state. She also voted “no” on legislation that would allow firearms in checked baggage on Amtrak trains. In the wake of the attempted assassination of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) in Tucson, Arizona, in January 2011, which left six individuals dead and thirteen others (including Giffords) wounded, Boxer became a cosponsor of a trio of legislation introduced by Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ)—the Large Capacity Ammunition Feeding Device Act, which would prohibit the make and sale of ammunition magazines with a more-than-tenround capacity; the Denying Firearms and Explosives to Dangerous Criminal Act, which closes the “Terror Gap” loophole; and the Gun Show Background Check Act. During the opening days of the 112th Congress (2011–2013), she also singly introduced the Common-Sense Concealed Firearms Act, which would require minimum standards for granting permits in states that allowed concealed weapons. Aside from the legislation front, Boxer also argued for the importance of images and rhetoric in the discussion on gun issues. With the advent of social media, Boxer routinely tweeted about the need for gun control after most of the endless string of mass shootings. Even after her retirement, she has continued to tweet about the need for gun control legislation.

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Much of Boxer’s legislative activity centered on protecting children from gun violence. In 1997 and again in 1999, she joined Sen. Herb Kohl (D-WI) to introduce the Child Safety Lock Act, which would have required child safety locks on all handguns sold in the United States. A version of this bill was adopted as an amendment to a Juvenile Justice Bill, but the legislation did not pass the House. In 2005, the amendment passed successful by a 70-27 vote in a broader legislation that prohibited civil liability lawsuit against gun makers (the PLCAA). She proposed another amendment to the Juvenile Justice Bill that directed the Federal Trade Commission to study manufacturers’ efforts to market guns to children; this amendment was also adopted. In the floor debate, Boxer argued that gun manufacturers are targeting children as young as four years of age. She also introduced the Youth Access to Firearms Act in 1999, which would ban the sale or transfer of guns to people under eighteen, with exceptions for parents, grandparents, and guardians. After the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School, Boxer and Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) pushed hard for a renewal of the assault weapons ban and for a package of gun control measures that failed to overcome a Senate filibuster. These efforts to control guns were part of a larger legislative agenda to reduce violence among youth. Boxer introduced the School Safety Fund Act in 1999, which would direct funds to local school districts for a variety of programs aimed at identifying and counseling potentially violent students, as well as for establishing violence prevention programs. She also worked on funding for after-school programs, more police on campus, and more funding for hiring police.

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Boxer was one of the most liberal members of the Senate. Although she worked on military procurement issues (especially those dealing with California contractors), her greatest focus was on women’s issues. She sponsored the Violence against Women Act while serving in the House and helped to pass it in the Senate. She was also a strong supporter of abortion rights and the environment. Boxer is the author of Strangers in the Senate: Politics and the New Revolution of Women in America and is a coauthor of Nine and Counting: The Women of the Senate. Upon her retirement, her seat was won by California Attorney General Kamala Harris. In early 2020, Boxer joined the lobby firm Mercury Public Affairs as cochair. Clyde Wilcox and Christine Kim See also: Assault Weapons Ban, Renewal Attempts of; Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Democratic Party and Gun Control; Feinstein, Dianne; Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005; Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting; Tucson, Arizona, Shooting

Further Reading Barone, Michael, and Grant Ujifusa. The Almanac of American Politics 2000. Washington, DC: National Journal Group, 1999. Boxer, Barbara. Strangers in the Senate: Politics and the New Revolution of Women in America. Washington, DC: National Press Books, 1994. Boxer, Barbara. “Pac for a Change.” 2020. https://pacforachange.com (accessed July 1, 2020). Boxer, Barbara, Catherine Whitney, and Dianne Feinstein. Nine and Counting: The Women of the Senate. New York: HarperCollins, 2001.

Cook, Elizabeth Adell, Sue Thomas, and Clyde Wilcox. Women of the Year. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1993. GovTrack. Congress: Voting Records. 2020. https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes (accessed July 1, 2020). Koszczuk, Jackie, and Martha Angle. “Boxer, Barbara, D-California.” Politics in America 2008: The 110th Congress. Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2007. NRA-ILA. “Bell Rings for Anti-Gun Senator Barbara Boxer.” 2015. https://www.nraila .org/articles/20150109/bell-rings-for-anti -gun-senator-barbara-boxer (accessed July 1, 2020).

Brady, James S.(1940–2014) James S. Brady was a lifelong member of the Republican Party and career public servant when he was wounded in the 1981 assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan. He subsequently became a staunch advocate for gun control. After he left public service in 1989, Brady and his wife, Sarah, led the effort to enact the Brady Bill, which mandated background checks and a waiting period before the purchase of a handgun. In 2001, the gun control advocacy organization Handgun Control Inc. was renamed the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, and the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence was renamed the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, in honor of the efforts of James and Sarah Brady. On the twentyfifth anniversary of the Brady Bill, the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence and the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence were rebranded to Brady: United against Gun Violence. This announcement came shortly before the U.S. House of Representatives voted to expand the background check to be required for all firearm purchases, one of the first major votes on gun legislation in years.



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James Brady, wounded during the 1981 assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan, attends a press conference with the president and first lady. The Brady Handgun Violence and Prevention Act is named after James Brady. (Ronald Reagan Library)

James Scott Brady was born on August 29, 1940, in Centralia, Illinois. He attended the University of Illinois, where he majored in political science and communications. He graduated in 1962. Brady became interested in politics at an early age and was a staunch Republican. While in college, he served as a staff member for Sen. Everett M. Dirksen, who was the Republican minority leader in the U.S. Senate. During the summer of 1962, Brady worked for the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division as an honor intern. After college, Brady worked for a number of private firms before reentering public service. In 1973, he married Sarah Kemp, and the couple went on to have a son, James S. Brady Jr. The same year that he married, Brady became a communications consultant for the U.S. House of Representatives.

He soon joined the Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford administrations, accepting the post of special assistant to the secretary of housing and urban development. This post was followed by a stint from 1975 to 1976 as special assistant to the director of the Office of Management and Budget. Brady finished out the Ford administration as an assistant to the secretary of defense. He then joined the staff of Sen. William V. Roth Jr. (R-DE). Brady left Roth’s staff in 1979 to serve as the press secretary of presidential candidate John Connally of Texas. He joined the team of presidential candidate Ronald Reagan as the director of public affairs and research. Following Reagan’s election, Brady was appointed spokesman for the office of the president-elect. In January 1981, Brady became the assistant to the president and White House press secretary.

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On March 30, 1981, John Hinckley Jr. tried to assassinate President Reagan. During the attempt, Reagan, Brady, and two others were wounded. Brady was seriously injured by a gunshot to the head, which struck him just above his left eye. The injury left Brady partially paralyzed and permanently disabled. Although Brady was unable to continue to carry out all of the functions of his demanding position, Reagan retained Brady as the official press secretary for the remainder of both of his terms in office, leaving on January 20, 1989. Since the assassination attempt in 1981, Brady has worked with a number of groups that advocate for the disabled. He traveled the nation as a spokesperson for the National Head Injury Foundation. Brady eventually became vice chair of the organization as well as vice chairman of the National Organization on Disability. In 1996, President Bill Clinton awarded Brady the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the country’s highest civilian medal; and in 2000, Clinton named the White House Press Briefing Room the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room. This honor was in recognition of Brady’s work on behalf of the disabled and his contributions to gun control efforts. It was Brady’s work on behalf of gun control legislation that led to his greatest impact on American politics. While he remained Reagan’s press secretary, Brady supported the president’s staunch anti–gun control stance. However, once out of office, Brady joined his wife in championing gun control legislation. The centerpiece of Brady’s efforts was the bill that soon came to bear his name—the Brady Bill. Brady undertook a seven-year effort to gain passage of the bill. The Brady Bill was signed into law by Clinton on November 30, 1993. The law required a mandatory five-day waiting period and a background check before a

handgun could be purchased. Brady later worked to secure passage of the federal Assault Weapons Ban of 1994, which forbade the manufacture and sale of such weapons. Brady continued to lobby at both the state and national levels, advocating on behalf of his twin causes—gun control and the rights of the disabled. After a 2007 shooting at Virginia Tech, Brady supported a bill to close the loophole that allowed firearms to be purchased by people that had prior histories of mental illness that President George W. Bush signed into law in late 2008. However, he also became estranged from the Republican Party. He did not support George W. Bush’s presidential campaigns in 2000 and 2004, or Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) in the 2008 election. Instead, Brady increasingly backed pro-gun control Democrats for state and national office. In 2008, he endorsed then-candidate Barack Obama, whom he later criticized for not pursuing gun control measures more aggressively. Brady died on August 4, 2014. His death was ruled a homicide caused by the longterm complications from his 1981 gunshot wound. Tom Lansford and Kaytlin Dorris See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Brady, Sarah Kemp; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Brady Legal; Brady: United against Gun Violence; Hinckley, John Warnock, Jr.; Reagan, Ronald Wilson; Republican Party and Gun Control

Further Reading Barron, James. “Taking a Bullet, Gaining a Cause: James S. Brady Dies at 73.” New York Times, August 4, 2014. https://www .ny times.com /2014 / 08 / 05/us /politics /james-s-brady-symbol-of-fight-for-gun -control-dies-at-73.html (accessed April 12, 2020).

Brady, Sarah, with Merrill McLoughlin. A Good Fight. New York: Public Affairs, 2002. Brady United. “History of Brady.” 2020. htt ps://w w w.brady united.org / histor y (accessed April 15, 2020). Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. Gun Violence: The Real Costs. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Dickinson, Mollie. Thumbs Up: The Life and Courageous Comeback of White House Press Secretary Jim Brady. New York: William Morrow, 1987. Gangitano, Alex. Brady Gun Control Group Gets Rebranding. The Hill, February 26, 2019. https://thehill.com/business-a-lobby ing/business-a-lobbying/431718-brady -g u n- cont rol-g roup -gets-rebra nd i ng (accessed April 10, 2020).

Brady, Sarah Kemp(1942–2015) Sarah Brady is the wife of former White House press secretary James S. Brady. After her husband was seriously wounded in an assassination attempt against President Ronald Reagan in 1981, Sarah became active in the gun control movement. She became the chair of Handgun Control Inc. (HCI) and later chair of the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence. Sarah Brady is best known for her efforts to enact the Brady Bill, which mandated a waiting period and background check before the purchase of a handgun. Sarah Kemp was born on February 6, 1942, in Missouri, although she grew up in Alexandria, Virginia. She attended the College of William and Mary. After graduation in 1964, she became a teacher in the Virginia public school system. However, in 1968, she began a career in politics, serving in a variety of positions within the Republican Party. From 1968 to 1970, she was an assistant to the campaign director of the National Republican Congressional Committee. She then

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accepted a position as an administrative aide for Rep. Mike McKevitt (R-CO). In 1972, she accepted the same position in the office of Rep. Joseph J. Maraziti (R-NJ) and held that post for the next two years. In 1973, she married James Brady. The couple has one son, James Scott Brady Jr. From 1974 through 1978, Sarah held the posts of coordinator of field services and director of administration for the national Republican Party. She also served as a delegate to five Virginia Republican Party conventions. On March 30, 1981, Sarah’s husband James was seriously wounded in an assassination attempt on President Reagan. He became partially paralyzed and remained disabled. The episode prompted Sarah to become active in the gun control movement. She advocated for what she termed “sensible” gun laws that did not infringe extensively upon the ability of responsible citizens to own or acquire weapons, but which limited access by criminals. As such, she initially sought to forge a compromise between the extremes of both sides of gun control issues. In 1989, Sarah became the chair of HCI, an advocacy group that worked to promote gun control laws. While still in this capacity, Sarah became chair of HCI’s sister organization, the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence (CPHV). Both organizations were private, nonprofit groups that lobbied on behalf of gun control legislation and supported educational programs. They also helped coordinate legal work in challenges against the gun industry and specific state and/or national laws through the CPHV’s Legal Action Project. Under Sarah’s leadership, HCI worked to ensure passage of a 1993 measure in Virginia that limited handgun purchases to one per month. Both HCI and the CPHV also lobbied on behalf of the Assault Weapons Ban that was passed by Congress and signed

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into law by President Bill Clinton in 1994. However, the main accomplishment of Sarah (and both organizations) was the passage of the Brady Bill, named in honor of her husband. The Brady Bill mandated background checks and required a five-day waiting or cooling-off period for those attempting to purchase handguns. After an intensive multiyear lobbying effort, the Brady Bill was passed in 1993. In the wake of the Assault Weapons Ban of 1994 and the Brady Law, Sarah led the CPHV in an intensive campaign to develop a series of educational programs. For instance, the CPHV launched Steps to Prevent Firearm Injury (STOP) in coordination with the American Academy of Pediatrics in 1995 to train physicians to counsel families with small children on the potential risks of gun ownership. She also directed the CPHV to support legal action against the gun industry, including the 1998 lawsuit brought by New Orleans against firearm manufacturers. However, her increased efforts on behalf of gun control led many of her former supporters in the Republican Party to perceive that Sarah had abandoned her moderate position. When she spoke at the 1996 Democratic National Convention on gun control, her credibility as a moderate within the Republican Party was further eroded. In the 2000 election, HCI and the CPHV actively worked to defeat Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush. In 2001, HCI and the CPHV were renamed in honor of Sarah and Jim Brady. Handgun Control Inc. became the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. The Center to Prevent Handgun Violence became the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence. Sarah and her husband emerged as fierce critics of the NRA and typically opposed candidates endorsed by the pro-gun group. The Bradys opposed Bush in the 2004

presidential election and backed Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) in the 2008 balloting. Sarah Brady passed away on April 3, 2015, at the age of seventy-three. Her death was the result of pneumonia. Her husband, James, preceded her in death, having passed away nearly eight months to the day earlier. Tom Lansford See also: Brady, James S.; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Brady Legal; Brady: United against Gun Violence; Hinckley, John Warnock, Jr.; One-Gun-perMonth Laws; Reagan, Ronald Wilson; Republican Party and Gun Control

Further Reading Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. “Biographies: Sarah Brady.” 2011. http:// www.bradycampaign.org/about/bio/sarah (accessed July 10, 2011). Brady, Sarah, with Merrill McLoughlin. A Good Fight. New York: Public Affairs, 2002. Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. Gun Violence: The Real Costs. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. DeConde, Alexander. Gun Violence in America: The Struggle for Control. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2001. Dickinson, Mollie. Thumbs Up: The Life and Courageous Comeback of White House Press Secretary Jim Brady. New York: William Morrow, 1987. Stack, Liam. 2015. “Sarah Brady, Gun Control Activist, Is Dead at 73.” New York Times, April 3, 2015. https://www.nytimes .com /2015/ 04/ 04/us /sarah-brady-gun -control-activist-is-dead-at-73.html.

Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill) The Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, or Brady Bill, is a 1993 law passed by



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Congress (PL 103-159; 107 Stat. 1536) that required a five-business-day waiting period for the purchase of a handgun, for the purpose of conducting a background check on the prospective buyer and to provide a cooling-off period to minimize impulse purchases that might lead to violence. Five years after enactment of the law, the fiveday waiting period was eliminated and replaced by an instant background check system, as per the terms of the law. From 1987 to 1993, gun control proponents, led by Handgun Control Inc. (HCI; later renamed the Brady Campaign), placed their primary political emphasis on the enactment of a national waiting period for handgun purchases. The purpose of such a rule was twofold: first, to provide authorities with the opportunity to conduct a background check on the prospective purchaser to void handgun purchases by felons, the mentally incompetent, or others who should not have handguns; and second, to provide a cooling-off period for those who seek to buy and perhaps use a handgun in a fit of temper or rage. On its face, the proposal represented a modest degree of government regulation, as it merely postpones a handgun purchase by a few days and denies handguns only to those whom everyone agrees should not have them. Yet the struggle over enactment of a waiting period took on epic proportions in the form of a bitter power struggle between regulation opponents and proponents. The Brady Bill was named after James Brady, the former White House press secretary and subsequent gun control advocate who was seriously injured in the assassination attempt against President Ronald Reagan in 1981. It was first introduced in Congress in 1987—in the Senate by Howard Metzenbaum (D-OH) and in the House of Representatives by Edward F. Feighan

(D-OH). It quickly became the top priority of HCI and Sarah Brady, James Brady’s wife and HCI leader. The National Rifle Association (NRA) opposed the measure, saying that it would merely be a prelude to stronger regulation, that it would not stop criminals from getting guns, and that it merely inconvenienced those entitled to guns. As late as the mid-1970s, however, the NRA had supported the idea of waiting periods. The Brady Bill was put up to a chamberwide vote in the House for the first time in 1988, when opponents led by the NRA succeeded in defeating the bill by substituting an NRA-backed amendment for the waiting period, despite a concerted effort by HCI and a coalition of police organizations called the Law Enforcement Steering Committee. By its own account, the NRA spent from $1.5 million to $3 million in the successful effort to kill the bill, mostly on a media campaign and grassroots efforts. Assessing the failed effort, Representative Feighan noted that at least two dozen House members had privately spoken of their support for the bill but had refused to vote for it not because they feared losing their seats, but because of “the aggravation” that accompanied opposing the NRA. Two years later, both chambers voted to approve the Brady Bill. Initial House approval for a seven-day waiting period came in May 1991 (by a 239-186 vote), with Senate approval (by a 71-26 vote) following a month later. Before passing the Brady Bill, the House defeated an NRAbacked substitute, sponsored by Rep. Harley O. Staggers (D-WV), which called instead for an instant computerized background check of prospective handgun purchasers, a measure that would eventually become a part of the final bill. The problem with the proposal at the time it was first offered was that for such a

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system to work, it would require the full automation of pertinent records from all the states. Yet in 1991, only ten states had such automation; eight states still handled files manually, and nine states did not even maintain the necessary felony records. These data problems were mostly resolved in the late 1990s. President George H. W. Bush publicly opposed the Brady Bill throughout 1991 and 1992 but linked it with the larger crime bill to which it was attached, saying that he would sign the measure even if Brady was included—but only if the larger crime bill was to his liking. Bush’s veto threat hung over the bill, yet it also opened the door to presidential approval, as it provided a means whereby he could sign the measure into law without seeming to entirely abandon his inclination to oppose most gun control measures. The Brady Bill struggle climaxed in 1993, when supporters promoted a five-business -day waiting period bill. House Judiciary Committee approval was won on November 4, despite the objections of committee chair and gun control opponent Jack Brooks (D-TX), who also boosted the bill’s chances by reluctantly consenting to separate the measure from a new crime bill. Six days later, the full House approved the Brady Bill after fending off several amendments (sponsored by Republicans and Brooks) designed to weaken the bill. One such amendment, to phase out the waiting period after five years, was adopted. The final vote to pass the bill, H.R. 1025, was 238-189. Following the lead of the House, the Senate separated the Brady Bill (S.R. 414) from the larger crime package. The bill faced a Republican filibuster almost immediately, but this move was forestalled by an agreement between the political party leaders to allow floor consideration of a substitute

version that included two NRA-backed provisions. The first called for all state waiting periods to be superseded by the federal fiveday waiting period (twenty-four states had waiting periods of varying lengths in 1993; twenty-three also had background checks). This was objectionable to Brady supporters because many states had waiting periods longer than five days, and the move was seen as a violation of states’ rights. This amendment was stricken from the bill by a Senate floor vote. The second measure called for ending the five-day waiting period after five years. It survived a vote to kill it. The Senate then faced a filibuster, which looked as though it would be fatal to the bill. Brady supporters and congressional allies all conceded that the bill was dead for the year. The postmortems proved to be premature, however, because within a couple of days, the Republicans decided to end their opposition on November 20, sensing a rising tide of impatience and no sense that they could win further concessions from Democratic leaders. The bill was passed that day by a 63-36 vote. The bill then went to a contentious House-Senate conference on November 22. Opposing factions finally reached an accommodation, and the bill was approved in the Senate by voice vote on November 24, with a promise to consider several modifications in early 1994. President Bill Clinton signed the bill into law on November 30. As enacted, the Brady Law codified a five-business-day waiting period for handgun purchases for the succeeding five years. According to the law, handgun purchases are to be rejected if the applicant has been convicted of a crime that carries a sentence of at least a year (not including misdemeanors); if there is a violence-based restraining order against the applicant; if the person has been convicted of domestic abuse, arrested



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for using or selling drugs, is a fugitive from justice, is certified as mentally unstable or is in a mental institution, or is an illegal alien or has renounced U.S. citizenship. The law also authorized $200 million per year to help states improve and upgrade their computerization of criminal records; increased federal firearm license fees from $30 to $200 for the first three years and $90 for renewals; made it a federal crime to steal firearms from licensed dealers; barred package labeling for guns being shipped to deter theft; required state and local police to be told of multiple handgun sales; and said that police must make a “reasonable effort” to check the backgrounds of gun buyers. In addition, it provided for ending the five-day wait after five years and replacing it with an instant background check, which began in December 1998. Such checks are conducted through information provided by the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). The check must be completed within three days, but 95 percent of the background checks are completed within two hours, according to a U.S. Justice Department report. Even though waiting periods are no longer required by the national government, eleven states have their own, ranging from a few days to several months. Opponents of the law, including the NRA, challenged its constitutionality—not as a violation of the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms but as a violation of states’ rights under the Tenth Amendment. In 1997, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the law’s provision requiring local police to conduct background checks in the case of Printz v. United States (521 U.S. 898). The ruling did not challenge the propriety of restricting handgun sales. Despite the ruling, handgun background checks

generally continued. From the time of the law’s enactment through 2008, about 1.8 million handgun sales were blocked as the result of the law (about 2 percent of all handgun purchases). In 2009, the government passed its 100 millionth background check. In addition, the increase in federal firearm license fees helped reduce the number of license holders from nearly 300,000 to about 50,000 by 2007, as most license holders were not storefront dealers but private individuals who were willing to pay the low fee to save money on their own gun purchases. The Clinton administration issued regulations to monitor dealers more closely as well. Critics argued that the federal government failed to prosecute most Brady Law violators. In response, the Clinton administration proposed hiring several hundred additional Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms agents and federal prosecutors to focus on gun-law violators. Congress approved the proposal in 2000. Brady Law supporters also continued to note that the background check provision only applied to licensed dealers. At gun shows and flea markets in most states, guns can be bought and sold by unlicensed individuals. Between sales occurring at such events and those purchased privately in other ways (e.g., between individuals in person or online), estimates suggest that 50 percent of firearms obtained privately are done so without a background check (Miller, Hepburn, and Azrael 2017). National legislative efforts to close this socalled gun-show loophole have failed. As of 2021, sixteen states and the District of Columbia required background checks for all handgun purchases, even those from unlicensed sellers (Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence 2021). Since 2004, federal law has required the destruction of background check data within twenty-four

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hours (known as the Tiahrt Amendment, named after Rep. Todd Tiahrt [R-KS], who sponsored the measure), making it unavailable for law enforcement examination. Robert J. Spitzer See also: Background Checks; Brady, James S.; Brady, Sarah Kemp; Brady Legal; Brady: United against Gun Violence; Enforcement of Gun Control Laws; Gun Shows; National Instant Criminal Background Check System; National Rifle Association (NRA); NICS Improvement Act; Reagan, Ronald Wilson; Waiting Periods

Further Reading Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. Gun Dealer Licensing and Illegal Gun Trafficking. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of the Treasury, 1997. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. Gun Shows: Brady Checks and Crime Gun Traces. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of the Treasury, 1999. Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Universal Background Checks.” 2021. https://giffords.org/lawcenter/gun -laws/policy-areas/background-checks /universal-background-checks/ (accessed December 23, 2021). Miller, Matthew, Lisa Hepburn, and Deborah Azrael. “Firearm Acquisition without Background Checks.” Annals of Internal Medicine 166, no. 4 (2017): 233–39. https:// doi.org/10.7326/M16-1590. Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021.

Brady Legal Brady Legal is the only public interest law organization in the country dedicated to fighting in the courts on behalf of victims, survivors, and communities for an America

free from gun violence. From its headquarters in Washington, DC, Brady Legal provides pro bono legal representation and advice to victims and survivors of gun violence as well as to public entities throughout the United States. In its thirty-year history, Brady Legal has won over $60 million in verdicts and settlements, as well as other precedent-setting rulings holding that gun companies can be liable for injuries resulting from negligently sold or made guns. Brady Legal has litigated in over forty-five states, winning major victories in the Supreme Courts of Kansas, Missouri, Ohio, Indiana, and Alaska, as well as appellate and trial courts in California, Florida, Mississippi, New York, Massachusetts, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Utah, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and more. Brady Legal’s success would not be possible without its partners in the Brady Legal Alliance, a network consisting of hundreds of lawyers and firms that work alongside Brady Legal to prevent gun violence on the state and local levels. At the same time, Brady Legal has expanded its purview to issues of racial justice and its intersection with gun violence. Brady Legal has brought lawsuits that have sought to impose liability on gun manufacturers and sellers for negligent gun distribution, unsafe gun designs, and deceptive gun advertising, requiring many to reform their dangerous practices. The team has also filed over 120 amicus briefs defending common-sense state and federal gun laws and published numerous articles, including “The Right Not to Be Shot.” In recognition of its precedent-setting victories and the legal expertise of its staff, Brady Legal has gained national attention through dozens of media outlets, including MSNBC, the New York Times, and the Washington Post.



The Legal Action Project (now called Brady Legal) was founded in 1989 with the hope that in the nation’s courts, the principles of justice and accountability could prevail over the gun industry’s lobbying clout. Success soon followed when Brady Legal attorneys achieved the nation’s first appellate court ruling that a gun manufacturer could be held liable for negligent conduct that increases the risk of criminal violence. In the case, called Merrill v. Navegar, Brady Legal represented the relatives of four victims of a July 1993 mass shooting in San Francisco. Brady Legal attorneys argued that Navegar, the manufacturer of the assault pistol used in the shooting, should be held liable for negligently selling to the general public a weapon that had no legitimate self-defense or sporting value and that was particularly well adapted for a military-style assault. In a September 1999 decision, a California appeals court agreed, holding that gun manufacturers have a common-law duty to avoid creating “risks above and beyond those [that] citizens may reasonably be expected to bear in a society in which firearms may legally be acquired and used and are widely available.” The California Supreme Court later reversed the ruling on the grounds that a California statute provided gun makers immunity from certain common-law negligence claims. Largely as a result of that decision, the California legislature repealed the immunity statute in 2002. In 1995, Brady Legal brought the first case ever filed against a gun manufacturer for failing to “personalize” guns to prevent their inadvertent use by children. The suit was filed in a California Superior Court by the parents of fifteen-year-old Kenzo Dix, whose friend accidentally shot him with a Beretta 9 mm pistol. Dix’s friend took the gun from under his father’s bed, removed a full ammunition magazine, replaced it with

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an empty magazine, and fired without realizing that a bullet was still loaded in the chamber. In Dix v. Beretta U.S.A. Corp., Brady Legal argued that the pistol was defective because the manufacturer failed to equip it with childproof safety features and an adequate indicator that the chamber was loaded. As a result of the case, the California legislature passed legislation requiring clear chamber-loaded indicators and mechanisms that render guns inoperable without inserted bullet magazines—a victory for Brady Legal. In the early 2000s, Brady Legal brought a number of high-profile cases against irresponsible gun dealers, manufacturers, and distributors. Brady Legal represented victims of the 2002 Washington, DC, sniper shootings in Johnson v. Bull’s Eye, winning a court ruling that the manufacturer and dealer could be liable for negligence that enabled the snipers to obtain their gun, and obtaining a $2.5 million settlement for the victims, paid out by both the dealer, Bull’s Eye Shooter Supply, and the manufacturer, Bushmaster Firearms. Bushmaster’s payment represented the first time a gun manufacturer had paid damages for negligence leading to criminal violence. In 2004 alone, Brady Legal attorneys recovered over $4.4 million in damages for gun violence victims in liability lawsuits. Brady Legal also led the effort by cities and counties to hold the gun industry legally accountable for the public costs of gun violence. From 1998 to 2002, Brady Legal served as cocounsel for many of the thirty cities and counties that brought lawsuits against gun manufacturers and sellers. The lawsuits, the first of their kind, charged that the industry failed to implement reasonable safety mechanisms to prevent children and other unauthorized individuals from obtaining weapons, and it had helped create and

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maintain the illegal gun market by distributing guns without adequate controls. Brady Legal helped win several victories for the cities, including appeals court rulings holding that the suits stated valid legal claims. In a lawsuit filed by the city of Cincinnati, for instance, Brady Legal set precedent in holding irresponsible members of the firearms industry accountable for supplying the criminal gun market. The Ohio Supreme Court ruled that a city could seek damages from handgun manufacturers whose negligently produced firearms contributed to costly violence. Brady Legal scored another major victory against the gun industry just a few years later in a lawsuit filed by the city of Gary, Indiana, against multiple gun manufacturers. In 2003, the Indiana Supreme Court denied the companies’ first motion to dismiss the case, holding that Gary could obtain damages and injunctive relief to change gun companies’ behavior if the allegations proved true. And in Boston, a trial court allowed a lawsuit filed by the city— with Brady Legal’s assistance—against major gun manufacturers to go to trial. The case remains ongoing as of 2020. Discovery in these municipal lawsuits led to the disclosure of previously confidential gun industry documents and the emergence of industry “whistleblowers.” Brady Legal presented this evidence in a 2003 report entitled Smoking Guns: Exposing the Gun Industry’s Complicity in the Illegal Gun Market. In response to these successful municipal lawsuits in the late 1990s and early 2000s, Smith & Wesson, one of the nation’s largest gun manufacturers, agreed to a major settlement with the Clinton administration, reforming its sales and manufacturing practices to reduce the risk of supplying the criminal gun market and to

include life-saving safety features on its products. A number of city suits were dismissed after Congress passed the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA) in 2005. The law has been construed to shield the gun industry from many claims that other private industries must face for negligent conduct. But despite the barriers imposed by PLCAA, Brady Legal continued to successfully bring liability cases against the gun industry, overcoming the industry’s sweeping claims of immunity. In 2012, in Williams v. Beemiller, a New York Appellate Division court held for the first time in the PLCAA era that a gun manufacturer and distributor could be held liable for a shooting resulting from guns sold to traffickers. In 2013, Brady Legal won another major victory in the Kansas Supreme Court in a case seeking to hold a gun dealer liable for arming a straw purchaser. In the case, Shirley v. Glass, the Kansas Supreme Court ruled that a gun dealer could be deemed negligent and therefore liable for a wrongful death. The Court also declared that gun dealers must use the “highest standard of care” to avoid selling guns to dangerous individuals. In 2015, Brady Legal won another major victory in a liability case against one of the nation’s top crime gun sellers, Milwaukeebased Badger Guns. In a landmark jury verdict in Norberg and Kunisch v. Badger Guns, the company was found liable to two Milwaukee police officers for $5.7 million in damages. Brady Legal again gained a victory in 2016 at the Missouri Supreme Court in the case of Delana v. Odessa Gun and Pawn. The Court held that PLCAA did not bar a liability lawsuit against a gun dealer for the negligent sale of a murder weapon; the case was later settled for $2.2 million. In addition to bringing liability lawsuits, Brady Legal has worked to defend gun laws



and regulations by filing amicus briefs in virtually every major lawsuit across the country challenging the constitutionality of gun laws. The briefs have helped secure favorable rulings upholding local and state gun laws in Ohio, Colorado, Oregon, New York, Connecticut, Arizona, and California, and they have been cited by the U.S. Supreme Court and other courts. The defense of gun laws has become an increasingly important part of Brady Legal’s work following the Supreme Court’s decisions in District of Columbia v. Heller (554 U.S. 570 [2008]), interpreting the Second Amendment as guaranteeing an individual right to possess guns in the home for self-defense, and McDonald v. City of Chicago (561 U.S. 742 [2010]), applying the Heller ruling to states. These cases have led to a flood of largely unsuccessful legal challenges to state and local gun laws. Brady Legal has also been on the front lines of challenging laws that hinder gun violence prevention efforts. In 2009, Brady Legal succeeded in overturning an executive order permitting concealed carry within certain National Park Service lands. And in 2017, Brady Legal won a landmark case, informally known as “Docs v. Glocks,” that struck down a Florida law infringing on doctors’ rights to ask patients about gun safety and offer advice on safe storage as violative of the First Amendment. The court forced Florida to pay over $1 million in legal fees. Brady Legal also successfully challenged an ordinance passed by the city of Nelson, Georgia, requiring all heads of households to have a gun in the home. As a result of the lawsuit, the city of Nelson rescinded the ordinance and recognized that the Second Amendment protects the rights of people to keep their households safe by not having a gun in the home.

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Brady Legal has also crafted unique and groundbreaking legal arguments aimed at protecting sensible gun safety laws in the courts, including that the Constitution protects the “right to live” and that such a right must take precedence over expansive gun rights when the two come into conflict. Most recently, Brady Legal used this argument in an amicus brief submitted in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association Inc (NYSRPA) v. City of New York, New York (140 S. Ct. 1525 [2020]), a Supreme Court case in which NYSRPA, a lawsuit backed by the NRA, challenged a now-repealed New York City regulation restricting handgun transport within and outside of the city. It marked the first gun-related case heard by the court in a decade and had the potential to vastly expand the Second Amendment’s reach. Brady Legal’s brief argued, in part, that “the Court should reaffirm the longstanding and broad power of the people, through the organs of self-government, to adopt reasonable measures to protect public safety and to safeguard the most precious right of all—the right to live.” Brady has employed this argument in other cases, including Rodriguez v. City of San Jose, which sought to overturn an extreme risk protection order. A detailed outline of the argument that Americans have a constitutional right to live was published in the Georgetown Journal of Law & Public Policy in an article entitled “The Right Not to Be Shot: Public Safety, Private Guns, and the Constellation of Constitutional Liberties” (2016). Brady Legal attorneys have influenced the legal and policy debate through numerous other publications and special reports, including Without a Trace: How the Gun Lobby and the Government Suppress the Truth about Guns and Crime (2006); No Gun Left Behind: The Gun Lobby’s Campaign to

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Push Guns into Colleges and Schools (2007); No Check. No Gun: Why Brady Background Checks Should Be Required for All Gun Sales (2009); and The Second Amendment and Public Safety after Heller (2018). Brady Legal also has a long history of fighting for government and gun industry transparency and accountability, bringing numerous FOIA requests and litigation, and drawing public attention to government action and inaction to combat gun violence and how gun industry practices contribute to supplying the crime gun market. In recent years, Brady Legal lawyers have also presented to the private bar on gun-related litigation, including how gun violence intersects with racial justice. After thirty years of fighting for an America free from gun violence, Brady Legal’s message is clear: nobody is above the law—and for those who try to violate it, there will be a price to pay. Dennis A. Henigan, Matt Harron, and Jonah Berger

Law and Public Policy 14 (2016): 187–206. Rostron, Allen. Smoking Guns: Exposing the Gun Industry’s Complicity in the Illegal Gun Market. Washington, DC: Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, 2003. Rostron, Allen, and Brian Siebel. No Gun Left Behind: The Gun Lobby’s Campaign to Push Guns into Colleges and Schools. Washington, DC: Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, 2007. Siebel, Brian J. “City Lawsuits against the Gun Industry: A Roadmap for Reforming Gun Industry Misconduct.” St. Louis University Public Law Review 18 (1999): 247–90. Siebel, Brian J. No Check. No Gun: Why Brady Background Checks Should Be Required for All Gun Sales. Washington, DC: Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, 2009. Scharff, Joshua, Anna M. Kelly, Madeleine Bech, Suzan Charlton, and Joseph DuChane. The Second Amendment and Public Safety after Heller. Washington, DC: Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, 2018.

See also: Brady: United against Gun Violence; Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005; Washington, DC, Sniper Attacks

Brady: United against Gun Violence

Further Reading Brady: United against Gun Violence. https:// www.bradyunited.org/ (accessed August 10, 2020). Haile, Elizabeth S. Without a Trace: How the Gun Lobby and the Government Suppress the Truth about Guns and Crime. Washington, DC: Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, 2006. Lowy, Jonathan E., and Kelly Sampson. “Right Not to Be Shot: Public Safety, Private Guns and the Constellation of Constitutional Liberties.” Georgetown Journal of

Brady works across Congress, the courts, and communities, uniting gun owners and non-gun owners alike, to take action, not sides, to end America’s gun violence epidemic. As a nonprofit organization funded largely through grassroots donations, Brady proudly employs a nonpartisan approach to achieving its mission of reducing gun deaths 25 percent by the year 2025. That approach—of taking action, not sides—has been at the core of Brady’s mission since its inception. Founded as the National Council to Control Handguns (NCCH) in 1974 by Chicago graduate



student Mark Borinsky, the organization was, at that time, one of the only groups in the nation’s capital advocating for stronger gun laws. In 1980, NCCH was renamed Handgun Control Inc. (HCI) under the leadership of N. T. “Pete” Shields, an executive at the DuPont Company, whose son, Nick, was the victim of a gruesome murder by firearm. Shields, a Republican, also founded HCI’s sister organization, the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence, to conduct research, education, litigation, and outreach. On March 30, 1981, a tragic shooting forever altered the trajectory of HCI and the movement to prevent gun violence at large. During an assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan, White House Press Secretary James Brady was shot in the head and seriously wounded, leaving him partially paralyzed for life. Brady, a gun owner, and his wife, Sarah Kemp Brady, soon became prominent voices within HCI. As lifelong Republicans with deep bipartisan connections in Washington, DC, they were uniquely positioned to unite lawmakers from across the aisle to rally behind common-sense gun safety legislation. Yet their efforts did not yield results immediately or without years of tremendous sacrifice. With Sarah maneuvering James’s wheelchair around the Capitol, the duo worked day and night for more than half a decade to achieve their ultimate goal: passing the Brady Bill. In 1993, after six votes over seven years and three presidencies, their lobbying finally bore fruit when the movement to prevent gun violence achieved its largest and longest-lasting victory to date with the passage of the eponymous Brady Bill. The law, which passed Congress with broad bipartisan support, mandated federal background checks on all gun sales conducted through licensed dealers. As of 2020, the

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Brady Background Check System has stopped nearly four million gun sales to prohibited purchasers. Before the law’s passage, anyone could simply sign a form attesting that he or she was not a prohibited purchaser and walk out with a weapon with no follow-up or verification. This simple step requiring verification may have prevented the man who shot Jim Brady and tried to assassinate President Reagan from carrying out the attack, given that he had lied about his address on the form when purchasing a firearm. HCI won another legislative victory just a year later, in 1994, when it helped shepherd through a federal law banning militarystyle assault weapons and magazines holding more than ten bullets. The law expired in 2004, despite bipartisan support for its renewal and convincing evidence of its success in reducing mass shootings. To complement its legislative efforts, HCI created its own in-house legal team in 1989 devoted to representing victims of gun violence, defending gun safety laws, and holding the gun industry accountable when its negligence facilitated unnecessary firearm deaths. Over thirty years later, Brady Legal—which has won over $60 million in verdicts and settlements in over forty-five states—remains the most successful in the country at fighting gun violence in the courts. In 2001, HCI and the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence were officially renamed the “Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence” and the “Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence,” respectively, in honor of James and Sarah Brady. In the ensuing decade, the landscape for the gun violence prevention movement grew more inhospitable in the midst of the growing political influence of the National Rifle Association (NRA). In 2005,

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Congress passed the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA), immunizing the gun industry from many civil lawsuits. A spate of horrific school shootings, including at Sandy Hook Elementary and Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, illustrated the unspeakable devastation wrought by gun violence but also sparked a reawakening of activism around the issue that helped pave the way for many legislative triumphs. Although a 2013 bill requiring universal background checks narrowly failed in Congress despite garnering support from fiftyfour members of the Senate, the Brady Campaign found more success at the state level. For instance, Brady played a central role in lobbying for a New York law, passed in 2013, that implemented universal background checks and banned certain assault weapons. Grassroots activism has long been an integral part of Brady’s identity. In 2001, the organization entered into a partnership with the Million Mom March, a grassroots movement founded in the wake of the 1999 Columbine High School shooting, to call attention to the tragic deaths of children and teenagers by firearm. The movement, composed of 236 grassroots chapters, helped Brady expand its purview to statehouses across the country, where much of the legislative action on guns has taken place in recent decades. In the run-up to the 2018 midterm elections, Brady grassroots supporters knocked on doors, made phone calls, and used their platforms to campaign for candidates committed to gun safety. As part of the most powerful and well-financed gun violence prevention movement in history, Brady helped elect a gun violence prevention majority in the U.S. House of Representatives. When the new congressional class took office, Brady immediately

jumped in, lobbying for legislation, including H.R. 8 and H.R. 1112—two bipartisan bills that ultimately both passed in the House—that would strengthen and expand the Brady Background Check System to include private and online gun sales. In the weeks leading up to the bills’ passage, Dr. Joseph Sakran, a former Brady board member, and Aalayah Eastmond, a Parkland shooting survivor and member of Team ENOUGH Executive Council, a youth-led initiative supported by Brady, provided testimony on their firsthand experiences with gun violence. In 2019, Brady’s grassroots team helped oust NRA-backed legislators in Virginia, paving the way for the passage of ten landmark gun safety laws in 2020. Coming over a decade after the Virginia Tech shooting and just a year after another tragic mass shooting in Virginia Beach, the laws represented a victory for survivors and activists who had tirelessly advocated in the face of intransigence from legislators who were cozy with the gun industry. Also in 2019, Brady underwent a rebrand. In addition to consolidating the Brady Center and Campaign under one umbrella, simply called Brady, with the tagline “United against Gun Violence,” the organization revamped its logo; with blue and red planes coming together to form purple, Brady has highlighted the importance of working in a bipartisan fashion to reduce gun violence. James and Sarah’s commitment to forging bipartisan consensus provided a lodestar for the rebrand, which also expanded Brady’s purview to new arenas, focused in particular on youth-led grassroots organizing and community outreach and education. Reflecting on the importance of student organizing, Brady created Team ENOUGH, its youth-led initiative, which educates and



mobilizes young people to fight for solutions to reduce gun violence. Composed of diverse voices from across the country, Team ENOUGH’s purview encompasses not just gun policy itself but also the underlying issues that contribute to gun violence’s disproportionate impact on communities of color, such as systemic racism, poverty, and a lack of affordable housing. As part of its rebrand, Brady also established a program aimed at combating crime guns, an issue that Brady Legal has been fighting against for decades. Rather than concentrating solely on the shooter after a gun crime occurs, Brady’s Combating Crime Guns initiative employs a supplyside approach, highlighting the contribution of negligent and complicit gun dealers in facilitating crimes. After all, less than 5 percent of gun dealers account for approximately 90 percent of the crime guns recovered by police. With offices in Milwaukee, Los Angeles, and Oakland, Brady’s Combating Crime Guns initiative works with local community members in stemming the flow of crime guns from dealers outside their cities or states. Finally, in keeping with its commitment to work across the aisle with gun owners and non-gun owners alike, Brady partnered with the nonprofit Ad Council to create the End Family Fire Campaign (EFF). The initiative, which encourages the safe storage of firearms, was motivated by two unfortunate realities: 4.6 million children live in homes where a gun is both loaded and unlocked, and each day, eight children are unintentionally killed or injured by a gun. EFF—following in the footsteps of an initiative called the Asking Saves Kids (ASK) campaign that launched at the Million Mom March in 2000—encourages gun owners to store their weapons locked, unloaded, and with ammunition in a

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separate location. The campaign relies on public service announcements aired on television, radio, and on the internet to disseminate its message. Less than two years after its launch, nearly 60 percent of U.S. gun owners are aware of EFF, helping to facilitate countless conversations across the country about safe gun storage. Brady is joined in its efforts to promote safe storage by multiple other advocacy groups, including the American Psychological Association and Veterans for Gun Reform. In September 2020, EFF added a focus on gun suicide, with the hope that by promoting safe storage of guns and ammunition, Brady can reduce the deadly toll of suicide by gun in the United States. Based in Washington, DC, and led by President Kris Brown, Brady has grown to a staff of over forty. The organization remains focused on achieving its longheld goals of banning military-style assault weapons, overturning PLCAA, expanding and strengthening the Brady Background Check System, and passing extreme risk protection laws, but has also been on the frontlines of confronting emerging issues like untraceable (“ghost”) guns, 3D printed weapons, and the intersection of police violence and guns. Brady has recently employed new means of disseminating its message, including a podcast called “Red, Blue, and Brady,” launched in October of 2019. Available on all major podcast platforms, it features discussions with activists, survivors, politicians, and academics who offer unique perspectives on often overlooked issues relating to gun violence prevention. Brady has also cultivated relationships with major national outlets to ensure that the views of the gun violence prevention movement are adequately represented in the media. By uniting gun owners and

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non-gun owners in a nonpartisan, grassroots-powered movement, Brady hopes to ensure every American can live free of the fear of gun violence. Dennis A. Henigan, Matt Harron, and Jonah Berger See also: Background Checks; Brady, James S.; Brady, Sarah Kemp; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Brady Legal; National Rifle Association (NRA); Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005

Further Reading Brady: United against Gun Violence. https:// www.bradyunited.org/ (accessed August 10, 2020).

Branch Davidians The Branch Davidians are an obscure offshoot of the Seventh-Day Adventist Church who achieved sudden worldwide notoriety on February 28, 1993, when a bungled attempt by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) to serve a search-andarrest warrant concerning illegal weapons went horribly wrong. The mismanaged raid and the intense firefight that it provoked resulted in the deaths of four agents and six residents of the Branch Davidians’ Mount Carmel Center outside Waco, Texas. The ATF justified the raid with the claim that the residents of Mount Carmel were illegally converting semiautomatic weapons into machine guns, among other things. During the ensuing fifty-one-day siege, however, those inside Mount Carmel countered that many of them knew nothing at all about any illegal guns and that only a few of them were involved in the purchase and resale of firearms at local gun shows. In

negotiations, first with the ATF and then with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Branch Davidians portrayed themselves as a peaceful group of Bible students who had gathered at Mount Carmel to study with David Koresh, whom they believed to be the only man ever to unravel the mysteries of the biblical book of Revelation and its message about the imminent end of the world. Government agents, in turn, portrayed Koresh as a deranged con man who had duped gullible people into following him, exploited them for his own purposes, and would willingly lead them to their deaths. The tense standoff ended on April 19, 1993, when, after a prolonged attempt by armored vehicles to punch holes in the rickety wood-framed building, the Mount Carmel Center was consumed in flames, taking the lives of seventy-four residents and leaving only nine survivors. Despite reports from the U.S. Departments of Treasury and Justice, hearings by Senate and House committees, a July 2000 report from Special Counsel John Danforth, and extensive reviews of the evidence by journalists and scholars, many aspects of the “Waco” incident remain in contention. Not the least of these is the role of firearms, and violence, in the beliefs and practices of the Branch Davidians and in the teaching of David Koresh.

History The Branch Davidians and their predecessors, the Davidians, had been a presence in the Waco area for nearly sixty years at the time of the raid. For virtually all of that time, they had lived in peaceful coexistence with their neighbors. They could trace their spiritual lineage to Victor Houteff, a dissident Seventh-Day Adventist who preached about the imminent, literal establishment of



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A ball of fire erupts at the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, on April 19, 1993. By the end of the 51-day standoff, four agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives and 81 Davidians, including leader David Koresh, had died. (Tribune Content Agency LLC/Alamy Stock Photo)

a millennial “Davidian” kingdom in Palestine. In 1935, Houteff bought a 189-acre tract of land outside of Waco to serve as the headquarters for his tiny movement. He intended to gather together a group of 144,000 “servants of God,” as mentioned in Revelation chapter 7, and lead them to the land of ancient Israel where they would soon meet Christ at his messianic return. Although their move to Israel did not occur as soon as expected, throughout the 1940s, Houteff’s group conducted a vigorous international missionary enterprise from its Texas headquarters. That largely unsuccessful effort was funded in part by selling off sections of the original parcel of land. Houteff died in 1955 and was succeeded by his wife Florence. In 1957, she sold the original parcel of land and relocated the group to 941 acres of land in Elk, nine miles east

of Waco. That was the same land on which David Koresh would take up residence and eventually assume leadership of the group. Florence became convinced that the end of the world and the dawning of the kingdom of God would begin during the Passover season in 1959. When her expectations went unfilled, the community was shattered, and it dwindled to fewer than fifty people during the mid-1960s. The group was revived under the leadership of first Ben and then Lois Roden during the 1970s and 1980s. David Koresh, then known as Vernon Howell, came to Mount Carmel in 1981, an aimless high school dropout with twin passions for the electric guitar and the Bible. Like Houteff and the Rodens before him, Koresh believed that the Seventh-Day Adventist Church had become corrupted and could not claim to represent those who

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would be saved at God’s imminent judgment. Lois Roden quickly recognized Koresh’s facility with the Bible and, to the dismay of her son George, recognized him as her successor. Lois Roden died in 1986, and by the summer of 1988, after several conflicts with George, Koresh assumed the leadership of the community.

David Koresh, the “Lamb of God” Soon after joining the group of Bible students led by Lois Roden, the young man then known as Vernon Howell began to fashion a unique identity for himself. The turning point came during a 1985 visit to Israel, where Howell claimed to have had an extraordinary religious experience. Although his comments to those outside the group were very cryptic, it appears that he understood his experience as an ascent into the heavens, similar to the one recounted by the apostle Paul in 2 Corinthians 12 and to the “night journey” attributed to Muhammad in the Islamic tradition. On March 5, for example, he told one of the FBI negotiators that he had been taken up into the heavens, shown everything concerning the seven seals, and commissioned by God to spread the truth to all humanity. The 1985 experience thus lay behind Koresh’s most provocative assertion, that he was a “Christ,” an anointed one. That assertion, however, did not involve a claim of identity with Jesus Christ but rather a similarity of function. Like Jesus and others who are called “Christs” or “messiahs” in the Bible, Koresh saw himself as having been chosen to execute God’s will on earth. One of those “Christs,” the sixth-century-BCE Persian king Cyrus who liberated the people of Israel from their captivity in Babylon, gave Howell the surname that he legally adopted in 1990, Koresh. Koresh’s specific task was to reveal, for the first time in human history, the message

of the scroll sealed with seven seals that is mentioned in the book of Revelation, in chapters 4 and 5. Koresh’s message concerned not only the imminent last judgment and the cataclysmic end of the world as we know it but also the roles that he and his devoted followers would play in that apocalyptic scenario. Koresh identified himself as the Lamb of Revelation, and his students fervently hoped that they would be among the 144,000 who would be saved. Revelation was the fixed point around which all Branch Davidian discourse revolved. All of Koresh’s interpretive forays into the rest of the Christian scriptures, which ranged widely through the prophets and Psalms in his “Bible Studies,” were explicitly designed to clarify and extend the message of the seven seals. Koresh’s message included references to all of the violent natural, social, and cosmic upheavals that are typical of biblical apocalypticism. He embraced Revelation’s image of a climactic battle between the forces of good and evil at Armageddon and anticipated that he and his small band of followers might be called upon to fight on behalf of God. There is, however, no evidence that Koresh urged his followers to take matters into their own hands to hasten the apocalypse; nor is there evidence that the cache of weapons at the Mount Carmel Center was intended to be used to provoke the battle that would signal the end of the world. Koresh did not doubt that the day of judgment would hold terrible violence for those who had shunned the truth, but that violence would be enacted by God alone.

After Koresh Only nine Branch Davidians survived the April 19 fire. Many of those who were outside Mount Carmel at the time of the siege have not kept the faith, and few new



believers have been added since 1993. Nonetheless, two prominent representatives have emerged to continue, and even expand upon, David Koresh’s teaching. Livingstone Fagan, who had been sent out of Mount Carmel on March 23 to serve as a theological spokesperson for the community, has written several small tracts and a larger manuscript, Mt. Carmel: The Unseen Reality, during his incarceration on charges of conspiracy to commit murder. Fagan’s writings constitute a faithful representation of Koresh’s teaching and he has continued to write tracts since his release from prison and deportation from the United States in 2007. Another figure, known only as “The Chosen Vessel” but identified as the Mount Carmel survivor Renos Avraam, has attempted to supplement Koresh’s teachings with his own innovations, most recently focusing on August 2012 as the time of the end. In neither body of writings, however, is there any indication of an endorsement of violence on the part of the faithful. The responsibility of the students of the seven seals is still to study the apocalyptic message of Revelation and prepare themselves for the imminent judgment of the Lord. Eugene V. Gallagher See also: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF)

Further Reading Gallagher, Eugene V. “The Persistence of the Millennium: Branch Davidian Expectations of the End after ‘Waco.’” Nova Religio 3 (2000): 303–19. Moore, Carol. The Davidian Massacre: Disturbing Questions about Waco Which Must Be Answered. Franklin, TN, and Springfield, VA: Legacy Communications and Gun Owners Foundation, 1995.

Brown, Michael, Shooting of | 121 Reavis, Dick. The Ashes of Waco: An Investigation. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1995. Tabor, James D., and Eugene V. Gallagher. Why Waco? Cults and the Battle for Religious Freedom in America. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995. Thibodeau, David, and Leon Whiteson. A Place Called Waco: A Survivor’s Story. New York: Public Affairs, 1999. Wessinger, Catherine. How the Millennium Comes Violently: From Jonestown to Heaven’s Gate. New York: Seven Bridges Press, 2000. Wright, Stuart A. Armageddon at Waco: Critical Perspectives on the Branch Davidian Conflict. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995.

Brown, Michael, Shooting of On August 9, 2014, twenty-eight-year-old Darren Wilson, a white police officer, shot Michael Brown, Jr., an unarmed Black eighteen-year-old in Ferguson, MO. According to Wilson, Brown attacked him in his police vehicle and attempted to gain control of the officer’s service weapon. Brown was allegedly shot when the weapon discharged during the struggle. Brown’s friend, twentytwo-year-old Dorian Johnson, was also at the scene. According to Johnson, Officer Wilson initiated the confrontation by grabbing Brown by the neck through his car window, threatening him, and then shooting at him. At some point after the initial confrontation, both Brown and Johnson fled the scene, and Wilson pursued Brown shortly thereafter. According to Wilson, Brown stopped and charged him after a short pursuit. According to Johnson, however, Brown turned around to face Wilson with his hands raised after the officer shot at him from behind; Wilson then shot Brown multiple times until he fell to the ground

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(Clarke and Lett 2014). Wilson fired a total of twelve shots, including two during the struggle in the police vehicle. Six bullets hit Brown from the front. According to the autopsy report, Brown survived the first five shots but was killed by the sixth shot. The weapon was Wilson’s Sig Sauer S&W .40 caliber semiautomatic pistol. On the morning of the shooting, police received a call about a robbery at Ferguson Market and Liquor in the St. Louis suburb. The suspect, identified as Brown, allegedly grabbed a box of Swisher Sweets cigars and turned to leave without paying for them. According to reports, someone in the store tried to stop Brown, who grabbed the man and pushed him away before leaving the store with Johnson. An officer arrived at the robbery scene and took a description of the suspect from an employee and a customer. Witnesses said the suspect (Brown) was wearing a white T-shirt, khaki shorts, yellow socks, and a red St. Louis Cardinals baseball hat. The employee said Brown and Johnson were headed in the direction of a nearby QuikTrip store (Engel 2014). Shortly afterward, the pair had their first encounter with Officer Wilson. Though reports of this encounter differ, witnesses agree that Brown and Johnson were walking in the middle of the street when Wilson confronted them for blocking traffic. Words were exchanged, a struggle ensued, and minutes later, another officer arrived on the scene. By that time, Brown had already been shot (Clarke and Lett 2014; Engel 2014). The robbery withstanding, Police Chief Thomas Jackson stated that Wilson did not know Brown was a suspect in the robbery that happened moments before the shooting (Brown 2015). Although he was not formally charged in the incident, Wilson was placed on administrative leave following the shooting. On

November 24, 2014, a grand jury declined to press charges against Wilson for the shooting death of Brown (Brown 2015). Wilson resigned on November 29, 2014, after the department told him it had received threats of violence via social media.

Protests The decision not to charge Wilson drew national attention, infuriating many. On August 10, 2014, a candlelight vigil to honor Brown in Ferguson turned violent. More than a dozen businesses were vandalized and looted. Over thirty people were arrested, and two police officers suffered injuries (Brown 2015). The next day, the first day of school for students in Jennings, near Ferguson, was canceled due to safety concerns. That morning, hundreds of protestors gathered outside the Ferguson Police Department to demand justice for Brown’s death. Police arrested at least seven people. Hours later, the parents and attorney of Brown held a press conference, where they asked for a stop to violence and demanded justice for their son. Ferguson protests continued throughout the evening, and police used tear gas to disperse crowds that did not protest peacefully. The following day, officials charged nine protestors in relation to looting. On August 13, 2014, after a third night of tension-fueled protests, the City of Ferguson asked protests and vigils for Michael Brown to be held during the daytime. That day, the Ferguson-Florissant School District also postponed the first day of school due to safety concerns for its students (Brown 2015). By August 14, 2014, sixteen people had been arrested and two officers injured in protest-related incidents. Two days later, Governor Jay Nixon issued a state of emergency for the Ferguson area and imposed a curfew. Despite the curfew, the next day,



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A memorial sits in Ferguson, Missouri, where mourners gather to remember Michael Brown. Brown, an 18-year-old unarmed Black man, was shot and killed by Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson on August 9, 2014. (Gino Santa Maria/Shutterfree, LLC/Dreamstime.com)

seven more people were arrested and one person shot as police and protestors clashed again in a haze of tear gas (Brown 2015). On August 18, 2014, Governor Nixon ordered the National Guard into Ferguson after protestors shot at police, threw Molotov cocktails at officers, looted local businesses, and carried out a “coordinated attempt” to block roads and overrun the police command center (Brown 2015). In the following days, dozens more protestors were arrested, more officers were injured by thrown rocks and bottles, at least two people were shot, and two fires were set. By August 21, 2014, many of the protestors had left the area, and tensions were defused by community leaders, a more relaxed posture by police, the arrival of U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, and the weather. By noon,

Governor Nixon ordered the National Guard to begin withdrawing from Ferguson. After the grand jury decision was announced, protests reemerged and the National Guard was again called in briefly to quell the unrest (Brown 2015).

Stranger Fruit Controversy The 2017 film, Stranger Fruit, directed by James Pollock, chronicles Brown’s shooting. The documentary includes controversial surveillance footage from Ferguson Market and Liquor, where the robbery was reported. The footage, which sparked debates, depicts Brown in the convenience store hours before the reported robbery. Pollock and Brown’s mother, Lesley McSpadden, believed that the footage shows Brown trading marijuana for cigarillos.

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According to Pollock, “Mike . . . left his items at the store and he went back the next day to pick them up. Mike did not rob the store” (Neal 2017). Others, however, claim the footage is misleading. Jay Kanzler, an attorney for the convenience store, claimed that Brown did offer store employees marijuana for cigarillos but his offer was refused by clerks.

Hands Up, Don’t Shoot In the aftermath of the shooting, the slogan “Hands Up Don’t Shoot,” went viral. Protestors believed that before he was killed, Brown said, “Don’t shoot,” and had both of his hands up in surrender. An FBI report found this narrative inconsistent with evidence and witness testimony (Department of Justice 2015). Wilson also claimed that Brown did not have his hands up when he fatally shot Brown (Brown 2015). Despite the inconsistencies, “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot” remains popular in the struggle for justice. The Black Lives Matter activist movement staged its first in-person national protest in the form of a “Black Lives Matter Freedom Ride” to Ferguson three weeks after the shooting. One of the rallying cries at those protests was “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot.” This became a common chant at Black Lives Matter protests (Ruffin 2015). On November 30, 2014, several players on the Los Angeles Rams (then St. Louis Rams) entered the field during an NFL game, making the “hands up” gesture to protest the shooting and police brutality (Woody and Geary 2014). On December 1, 2014, several lawmakers in the United States House of Representatives also made the gesture (McCalmont 2014). “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot” has also been invoked internationally: from September to December 2014, protestors in Hong Kong rallied against the Chinese government’s

reversal of its promise to grant them full democratic rights. During what became known as the Umbrella Revolution, protestors reacted to the heavy-handed tactics of the police by invoking the “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot” chant (Fisher 2014).

Justice Department Investigation On March 3, 2015, a Justice Department review found that the Ferguson Police Department engaged in a broad pattern of racially biased law enforcement that permeated the city’s justice system, including the use of unreasonable force against African American suspects. In 88 percent of cases in which Ferguson police documented the use of force, the targets were African Americans (Brown 2015). Despite these findings, the federal government did not file civil rights charges against Wilson (Lopez 2016). Following the report, police chief Tom Jackson, along with the city manager and municipal judge, were forced out of their jobs (Brown 2015). President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing President Barack Obama signed an executive order to initiate the President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing in December 2014 (Noble 2015). Obama created the task force in response to unrest following the shooting of Michael Brown. On May 18, 2014, the task force released its final report, calling for, among other things, more data on police shootings and on civilians’ attitudes toward the police as well as for the removal of predatory law enforcement policies. In another report released a year later, the task force released an update indicating that at least nine states and cities in the United States had adopted the task force’s recommendations (Rhodan 2016). Whytnee M. Foriest

See also: Baton Rouge Police Officers Shooting (2016); Black Lives Matter; Dallas Police Officers Ambush (2016); Police Shootings

Further Reading Associated Press. “Prosecutor Says Film’s Edit of Michael Brown Shooting Distorts Incident.” The Guardian, March 14, 2017. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news /2017/mar/14/michael-brown-shooting -documentary-film-ferguson-str.anger -fruit (accessed May 16, 2022). Brown, Emily. “Timeline: Michael Brown Shooting in Ferguson, Mo.” USA Today, August 10, 2015. https://www.usatoday.com /story/news/nation/2014/08/14/michael -brow n-fe rg u son-m issou r i-t i mel i ne /14051827/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Clarke, Rachel, and C. Christopher Lett. “What Happened When Michael Brown Met Officer Darren Wilson.” CNN, November 11, 2014. https://www.cnn.com/interactive /2014/08/us /ferguson-brown-timeline / (accessed May 16, 2022). Department of Justice. “Department of Justice Investigation regarding the Shooting Death of Michael Brown by Ferguson, Missouri Police Officer Darren Wilson.” Department of Justice, March 4, 2015. https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files /opa/press-releases/attachments/2015/03 /04/doj_report_on_shooting_of_michael_ brown_1.pdf (accessed May 16, 2022). Engel, Pamela. “Here’s Everything We Know about The Day Michael Brown Was Killed.” Business Insider, August 15, 2014. https:// www.businessinsider.com/timeline-of-the -day-michael-brown-was-shot-2014-8 (accessed May 16, 2022). Fisher, Max. “Hong Kong’s Protesters Are Using the Same ‘Hands Up, Don’t Shoot’ Gesture Used in Ferguson.” Vox, September 28, 2014. https://www.vox.com/2014 /9/28/6860493/hong-kong-protests-mike -brown-ferguson (accessed May 16, 2022). Lopez, German. “Ferguson Police Officer Darren Wilson Won’t Face Criminal Charges

Brown, Michael, Shooting of | 125 for Killing Michael Brown.” Vox, November 24, 2014. https://www.vox.com/2014 /11/24/7087825/darren-wilson-not-indicted -michael-brown-ferguson (accessed May 16, 2022). Lopez, German. “What Did the Investigations into the Michael Brown Shooting Conclude?” Vox, January 27, 2016. https:// w w w.vox .c o m / 2 015 / 5 / 31/17937838 /michael-brown-shooting-darren-wilson -investigations (accessed May 16, 2022). McCalmont, Lucy. “Lawmakers Make ‘Hands Up’ Gesture on House Floor.” Politico, December 2, 2014. https://www.politico .com/story/2014/12/lawmakers-ferguson -hands-up-113254 (accessed May 16, 2022). Neal, Al. “What Really Happened to Mike Brown? New Questions in Ferguson.” People’s World, March 29, 2017. https://www .peoplesworld.org /ar ticle /what-really -happened-to-mike-brown-new-questions -in-ferguson/ (accessed June 12, 2022). Noble, Breana. “What Is President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing?” Newsmax, July 28, 2015. https://www.newsmax .com/FastFeatures/president-policing-task -force/2015/07/28/id/659347/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Rhodan, Maya. “Why President Obama’s Police Reform Is a Work in Progress.” Time, July 8, 2016. http://time.com/4398392 /obama-police-reform-report-task-force -on-21st-century-policing/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Ruffin II, Herbert. “Black Lives Matter: The Growth of a New Social Justice Movement.” BlackPast, August 23, 2015. https:// w w w.blackpast.org /african-american -history/black-lives-matter-growth-new -social-justice-movement/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Woody, Christopher, and Molly Geary. “NFL Won’t Discipline Rams Players for ‘Hands Up, Don’t Shoot’ Gesture.” Sports Illustrated, December 2, 2014. http://time.com /3613211/rams-ferguson-nfl-gesture-fine/ (accessed May 16, 2022).

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Brown Bess “Brown Bess” is the familiar name for the pattern muskets that served the British military between the 1720s and the 1840s. The “Bess” was the first pattern musket produced for a national army. The Brown Besses were fabricated under the direction of the British Army’s Board of Ordinance for the Land Service. This close oversight of arms production by the Board of Ordinance led the way in centralizing arms procurement. Private contractors fabricated musket components (locks, stocks, and barrels) from patterns. Though individual weapons were filed and fit by hand (not interchangeable), use of patterns made the completed weapons interchangeable in the hands of the soldiers who carried them. The development of standard ordinance allowed the development of closely coordinated units firing virtually identical weapons. Thus, the pattern musket and its associated socket bayonet provided the basis for the tactical revolution that eliminated pikemen from European battlefields while also ending the tactical dominance of cavalry on the battlefield. Strictly applied, the name Brown Bess refers only to the Long Land Pattern Musket produced for the British army from the 1720s to the 1790s. More commonly, however, the name is appropriate for several variants that remained in regular use until the 1840s. Less appropriately, the name Brown Bess is often applied as a generic term for all eighteenth-century muzzleloading flintlocks, especially those carried by the Continental army of the American Revolution. In fact, the Bess was not standard issue among the Continentals, nor were the British Besses favored among the Americans.

“Brown Bess” is a nickname British troops gave their flintlock muskets. The first use of the term in print appeared in the 1780s but it must have been in common use earlier. The best explanations for the name make it a corruption of a number of Dutch or German terms related to gun barrels: bus, büsse, byssa, or busche. Originally, then, the name meant simply “brown barrel.” Weight and ruggedness set the Besses apart. Besses were heavy .75-caliber weapons. Other muskets were of lesser caliber and weight. The Charleville that the French sent their American allies, for example, was a .69-caliber weapon that was considerably easier to handle. France supplied the Americans with more than 80,000 Charlevilles. The British had never equipped American militias with the Brown Bess, and the 17,000 Besses in the American arsenals were captured arms. The French Charlevilles served the American military into the 1790s, and the muskets produced at the Springfield Armory were copied from the Charleville, as were Eli Whitney’s muskets. The Bess was heavy and difficult to master. Its ball was heavy; it stood up to violent use in bayonet charges; turned end-for-end, it served as a club. Besses fired with more “kick” than the Charleville, and effective use required training and discipline. Efficient use of the Bess, in fact, gave British regulars their reputation for discipline and coolness under fire. Looking back, especially in light of the mythology surrounding sharpshooters and the use of irregular troops armed with rifles, it is tempting to marvel at the foolishness of battlefield tactics that had red-coated regulars marching forward in their closely packed ranks. In fact, the red-coated regular marching forward in the serried ranks of the American Revolution had a better statistical chance of survival on a battlefield than



did the combat infantryman crouching in the trenches of World War I or the GIs huddled in the foxholes of World War II. The British infantry square of the Napoleonic era was a truly formidable fighting formation, and its effectiveness was built on training and discipline designed to make effective use of the Bess. The ball was very large and heavy (sixteen balls to the pound), and it produced smashing and shattering effects in wounds. Given the relatively low muzzle velocities possible with black powder, the inertia of this very large ball (threefourths of an inch in diameter) gave it considerably greater stopping power than weapons of lesser caliber. The discipline and training in close-order drill for the redcoats packed the troops together in order to maximize a unit’s rate of fire. Three lines of troops could effectively deploy one musket for each fourteen inches of firing line. At least for short periods, such lines could produce a screen of projectiles that bear comparison with the effects of modern automatic weapons. An effectively trained soldier equipped with smoothbore muskets could fire at least three rounds per minute on command. Firing by platoons grouped into three lines, a welltrained battalion of redcoats equipped with the Brown Bess could keep a screen of musket balls in the air in front of their formation at all times. With a smoothbore musket, even a good marksman cannot expect to hit a man-sized target at any more than forty to fifty yards. Individual aiming, however, was not called for with musket fire. The Brown Bess, in fact, was not fitted with any sights at all; infantrymen were trained to point and shoot without aiming at any individual target. A compact infantry formation could establish an effective screen of musket fire out to at least 150 yards, making it very dangerous

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for either cavalry or infantry to approach a trained infantry formation. It thus became possible for a formation to move at will on a battlefield unless opposed by a comparably equipped force or by field artillery. The muzzle-loading pattern musket, the socket bayonet, and associated training produced a tactical revolution on eighteenthcentury battlefields. The Bess as the first (and most rugged) of the eighteenth-century pattern muskets led the way in that tactical revolution while also making it possible for the British army to develop its long-standing a reputation for the effectiveness of its infantry units. David S. Lux See also: American Revolution; Long Rifle (Pennsylvania/Kentucky)

Further Reading Jones, Archer. The Art of War in the Western World. New York: Oxford University Press, 1987. Neumann, George C. “The Redcoat’s Brown Bess.” American Rifleman Magazine 149 (April 2001): 49. Wilkinson, Frederick. The World’s Great Guns. London: Hamlyn Publishing Group, 1977.

Browning, John Moses (1855–1926) John Browning revolutionized the gun industry. He was a prodigious inventor and one of the most successful gun manufacturers in modern history. Although he died in 1926, many of his weapons remain in use in the twenty-first century. Browning became noted for his innovations and the reliability of his designs. Among Browning’s most celebrated designs were the Colt .45-caliber

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pistol, the Browning automatic rifle, and the Browning automatic shotgun. John Moses Browning was born on January 23, 1855, in Ogden, Utah, to Mormon parents. His father was a gunsmith, and the younger Browning learned his trade working in his father’s shop. At age fourteen, John Browning built his first gun—a single-shot rifle that he gave to his brother Matt. After the death of their father in 1879, the two brothers opened their own gunsmith shop, which they named the Browning Arms Company. That same year, Browning married Rachel Teresa Child. The couple went on to have eight children. Soon after starting the company, Browning patented his first weapon, a single-shot rifle. Though Browning created a variety of designs, the family arms business remained small and limited, as the brothers could not expand their sales beyond their small town. However, in 1883 a representative of the Winchester Arms Company became interested in one of Browning’s designs. Winchester paid Browning $8,000 for the rights to produce his rifle. This marked the start of a lengthy relationship between Browning and the Winchester Company. Ultimately, Browning gained forty-four patents for Winchester. Browning utilized his genius to design a variety of weapons and different styles of firearms. Besides working for Winchester, Browning also designed guns for such firearm companies as Remington, Colt, and the Belgian company Fabrique Nationale (FN). Browning greatly preferred to work on his inventions rather than manage the family’s company. Browning’s business relationship with Winchester proved fruitful for both parties. In 1887, Browning invented one of the most popular and widely used weapons in the American West, the Winchester Model

1887 lever-action repeating rifle. This gun used a lever to reload and cock the weapon prior to firing. This gave the gun a high rate of fire compared with the single-action rifles commonly in use at the time. Browning produced this design in a shotgun for Winchester as well. Browning followed these innovations with a pump-action mechanism for shotguns—the basic model for all pump-action shotguns manufactured through contemporary times. One of Browning’s most important innovations involved the use of compressed gas to operate weapons. Browning’s inspiration for this new design came when he observed the tremendous amount of gas and air produced by the explosion that occurred when a bullet was fired. The gunsmith sought to utilize this power in such a way that would allow the gun to reload automatically. His design did just that. The gases produced when a shell was fired created a recoil that moved the weapon’s firing pin back. This allowed the spent bullet to be ejected and a new round to enter the chamber. This automatic system was an integral component in the development of the modern machine gun. Browning personally designed two highly effective and popular machine guns. The first was the 1895 Colt Peacemaker, which became the standard heavy machine gun for the U.S. Army. His second design was the Browning automatic rifle (BAR), a lighter machine gun that could be fired by an individual. The BAR would be used in both world wars and the conflicts in Korea and Vietnam. One of Browning’s greatest contributions to gunsmithing came with his development of automatic pistols. His first automatic handgun was a .32-caliber pistol that automatically reloaded using a slide mechanism. This model was followed by a variety of weapons, including the famous Colt .45-caliber M1911

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government model. This heavy pistol became the standard sidearm for both the military and law enforcement. Browning also developed a lighter 9-mm pistol known as the P-35, which was widely used by military and police forces around the world. Browning also developed an automatic shotgun. However, Winchester decided not to produce the weapon because it was deemed too expensive to manufacture, and the market was thought to be too small. Browning found a new partner in Belgium’s FN. Not only did FN reap significant financial rewards by producing Browning’s shotgun, but other companies, including Remington and Savage, contracted to use Browning’s design in the production of their automatic shotguns. The Browning automatic (A5) shotgun, which was first produced in 1902, is still produced and sold today. The association between the Browning Arms Company and FN survived long after Browning’s death; in 1977, the Belgian corporation actually purchased the Browning Company. Browning has continued to operate under its own name, and through the 1990s, it recorded average annual sales of $100 million. All of Browning’s firearms were noted for both their reliability and their durability. The weapons were popular with the military and law enforcement because of their effectiveness and their consistency. The weapons were also marked by their simplicity of design and utility of function. The automatic weapons also provided far more firepower than contemporary firearms when Browning first introduced the weapons. Eventually, Browning would patent over one hundred different weapons. These ranged from pistols to artillery pieces for the army. A testament to Browning’s design genius has been the continued manufacture of his weapons decades after his death on

June 21, 1926. In fact, at the time of his death, there were still several new designs left that kept arms companies busy for a decade. It was not until 1935 that his final handgun design went into production. Tom Lansford See also: Colt, Samuel; Firearm Dealers; Ruger, William Batterman; Smith & Wesson (S&W); Winchester, Oliver Fisher

Further Reading Miller, David. The History of Browning Firearms: Fortifications around the World. Guilford, CT: Lyons Press, 2006. Winders, Gertrude Hecker. Browning: The World’s Greatest Gunmaker. New York: John Day Co., 1961.

Bullet Button A magazine release allows a user to reload a firearm with a new magazine holding ready-to-fire ammunition. A bullet button is a small, recessed magazine release embedded in a block and attached to a semiautomatic rifle in place of a standard magazine release. The device is so named because the user must employ a small tool, such as a bullet tip, to release the magazine. Users do not need to disassemble the firearm to release the magazine. Bullet buttons are sold in the United States as either accessories or, particularly prior to 2016, as devices integrated into firearms targeted for the California market. The bullet button was invented in 2007 and trademarked in 2009 under USPTO trademark registration number 77663672 (U.S. Patent and Trademark Office 2015) by Darin Prince, a California resident. California law prohibits the sale and transfer of firearms deemed assault weapons.

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Under California law, assault weapons are defined as semiautomatic firearms possessing specified features, such as a thumbhole stock, flash suppressor, or detachable magazine (California Legislature 2016). At the time of the bullet button’s invention, California law specified that a firearm would be classified as an assault weapon if the magazine could be detached without use of a tool. By requiring a small tool for magazine release, the bullet button bypassed this requirement and allowed sale of firearms with detachable magazines. In 2009, California resident Mark Haynie was arrested by the Pleasanton Police Department for possession of an assault weapon. Haynie’s rifle was equipped with a bullet button. Haynie was released that day upon determination that his firearm did not violate California law. Similarly, Brendan Richards was arrested by the Rohnert Park Police Department in 2010 for possession of an unregistered assault weapon. One of the firearms confiscated from Richards was equipped with a bullet button. As with Haynie, Richards was released and charges were dismissed. In 2010, the two individuals filed suit against the California Department of Justice citing concern that by not explicitly making a statement about the legality of bullet buttons, improper arrests might continue to occur (Haynie et al v. City of Pleasanton, 2010). In a combined decision, the suit was dismissed; the dismissal was upheld on appeal. On December 2, 2015, Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik took part in a mass shooting and attempted bombing in San Bernardino, California. Later investigation revealed that two AR-15 rifles outfitted with bullet buttons were used in the attack (Luckerson 2015). The California legislature passed Assembly Bill 1135 /

Senate Bill 880 in 2016, a state law mandating registration of all semiautomatic assault rifles equipped with bullet buttons. Additionally, the new law amended past statutes to indicate that even those firearms where a magazine can be easily removed with use of a tool would be classified as assault weapons. The bullet button assault weapon registration period closed on June 30, 2018. Those caught with unregistered bullet button firearms face penalties of up to a year in jail and firearm confiscation. Lacey Wallace See also: Assault Weapons; San Bernardino Shooting; Semiautomatic Weapons

Further Reading California Legislature. Bill Text—SB-880 Firearms: Assault Weapons. 2016. Vol. Assembly Bill 1135 / Senate Bill 880. https://leginfo .legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient .xhtml?bill_id=201520160SB880 (accessed May 16, 2022). Luckerson, Victor. “San Bernardino Shooting: California Gun Law under Scrutiny.” Time, December 4, 2015. http://time.com/4136757 /san-bernardino-shooting-gun-law-bullet -button/ (accessed May 16, 2022). U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. “Bullet Button.” Trademark Status & Document Retrieval. 2015. http://tsdr.uspto.gov/#case Number=77663672&caseType=SERIAL _NO&searchType=statusSearch (accessed May 16, 2022).

Bullet Serial Numbers. See Micro-stamping (Bullet Serial Numbers) Bulletproof Consumer Products Mass shootings, particularly those in schools, have spurned the development of a



wide array of bulletproof products, from backpacks to ballistics film to clothing. The premise behind these products is that in such situations, the protective gear and devices will help to improve survivability. Many of these products, however, are untested in this capacity, particularly in real-world solutions. The most common type of bulletproof consumer product is backpacks. Their use gained considerable traction after the highprofile mass shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012 and Marjory Stoneman Douglas (MSD) High School in 2018. Bulletproof or bullet-resistant backpacks, as they also are commonly marketed as, are made one of two ways: either wholly out of bulletproof material like Kevlar, which is used to make ballistic vests for law enforcement, or by supplementing regular backpacks made of generic materials with ballistics panels. The panels may be made from Kevlar or other lightweight synthetic bulletproof materials, or they may be ceramic or steel, which is considerably heavier. Bulletproof backpacks range in cost from $99 to nearly $500 each and can be purchased through numerous retailers, including Amazon, Staples, and Office Depot. These products are regularly heavily advertised around the back-to-school period but also are highly sought after following mass shootings, in some cases leading to a 300 percent spike in sales (O’Neil 2019). Importantly, these backpacks have not been tested or certified by the National Institute of Justice (NIJ), which certifies equipment and body armor for law enforcement and the military. Most bulletproof backpack products are consistent with the Level IIIA protection (National Institute of Justice 2008). This standard means that the materials can withstand 9-mm, .44 magnum, and shotgun ammunition. It cannot,

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however, withstand bullets fired from a semiautomatic assault-style rifle, which travel at a much higher velocity than handgun and shotgun rounds. In order to withstand rounds from these rifles, the backpacks would need to include the ceramic or metal plates that are graded at a higher level (Level IV). Additionally, they cover approximately 25 percent of the body when worn (McDonald 2019), leaving major extremities such as the head and legs (femoral artery) exposed. Some schools that are undergoing renovations or are newly built, including the new building that replaced Sandy Hook Elementary School after the 2012 shooting (Weller 2017), are installing bullet-resistant glass, which often is made from polycarbonate plastic coated with glass or tempered glass that is designed to withstand bullets and bomb blasts. This glass is particularly expensive and can range anywhere from $1,000 to $50,000 per door (Martin 2014); though windows would be somewhat less, it is still particularly prohibitive in terms of cost for schools. An alternate strategy has been to install bullet-resistant films over existing windows, which costs between $15 and $25 per square foot (Gay 2015). A challenge with these films, however, is that many are not actually bulletproof but instead shatter-resistant, meaning that when the window is shot, it holds the glass together rather than it splintering off as many tiny projectiles (Schachter 2018). Concerns also have been raised that during an emergency, such as a fire, there may be greater injury and/or loss of life if people are not able to break the glass and escape (Hsu 2018). Bulletproof whiteboards are another product that has been marketed to schools. These devices are marketed to be able to withstand a shotgun blast from a foot away

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and to be used as shields in the event of an attack. These come in two sizes—clipboard, which is 10 x 13 inches and costs $109 each, and a larger shield size, which is 18 x 20 inches and costs $299 each (Kooser 2013). In 2014, the University of Maryland Eastern Shore purchased 200 of these whiteboards for faculty, investing nearly $60,000 (Connor 2013), and other educational institutions have followed similar suit. Like bulletproof backpacks, however, these products do not provide full body coverage, thereby leaving more of an individual exposed than is shielded. Numerous other products touted as being bulletproof have flooded the consumer market. These include, but are by no means limited to, seat cushions, three-ring binders, desk calendars, and iPad cases. Clothing options, including “blast boxers” (bulletproof underwear) and tank tops also have been made available to consumers at significant costs. Like the other options described here, these products are not graded for semiautomatic rifles and have not been found to be successful in reducing casualties during an active shooter situation. With a booming school security market, averaging around $3 billion per year annually (Cox and Rich 2018), ensuring that money is well-spent on evidence-based solutions is imperative, particularly as schools struggle with fiscal challenges and other significant concerns that require similar resources. Jaclyn Schildkraut

NBC News, August 21, 2013. https://www .nbcnews.com/news/us-news/bulletproof -school-supplies-get-low-grades-safety -experts-flna6c10963127 (accessed May 16, 2022). Cox, John W., and Steven Rich. “Armored School Doors, Bulletproof Whiteboards and Secret Snipers.” Washington Post, November 13, 2018. https://www.washingtonpost .com/graphics/2018/local/school-shootings -and-campus-safety-industry/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Gay, Michele. “5/18/15 School Safety Q & A: Bullet Proof Glass for Schools?” Safe and Sound Schools (blog), May 18, 2015. https://www.safeandsoundschools.org /2015/ 05/18 /51815-school-safet y- q-a -bullet-proof-glass-for-schools/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Hsu, Tiffany. “Threat of Shootings Turns School Security into a Growth Industry.” New York Times, March 4, 2018. https:// www.nytimes.com/2018/03/04/business /school-security-industry-surges-after -shootings.html (accessed May 16, 2022). Kooser, Amanda. “Bulletproof Whiteboard Designed for Classroom Defense.” CNet News, January 23, 2013. https://www.cnet .c o m / n ew s / b u l le t p r o of-w h it e b o a r d - d e s i g n e d - f o r- c l a s s r o o m - d e f e n s e / (accessed May 16, 2022). Martin, Claire. “Out of Tragedy, a Protective Glass for Schools.” New York Times, December 27, 2014. https://www.nytimes .c om / 2014 /12 / 28 /t e ch nolog y / out- of -tragedy-a-protective-glass-for-schools .html (accessed May 16, 2022).

Further Reading

McDonald, Scott. “Bulletproof Backpack Sales Soar after Deadly Mass Shootings.” Newsweek, August 5, 2019. https://www .newsweek.com /bulletproof-backpack -sales-soar-after-deadly-mass-shootings -are-they-worth-it-1452701 (accessed May 16, 2022).

Connor, Tracy. “Bulletproof School Supplies Get Low Grades from Safety Experts.”

National Institute of Justice. “Ballistic Resistance of Body Armor NIJ Standard-

See also: Body Armor; Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting; Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting

0101.06.” Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, 2008. https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/nij /223054.pdf (accessed May 16, 2022). O’Neil, Luke. “Bulletproof Backpacks See 300% Spike in Sales in the Week after Mass Shootings.” The Guardian, August 13, 2019. h t t p s : / / w w w. t h e g u a r d i a n . c o m / u s -news/2019/aug/12/bulletproof-backpacks -mass-shootings-sales-spike (accessed May 16, 2022). Schachter, Ken. “Execs: Fear of Terror Attacks Fuels Demand for Window Security Film.” Newsday, March 4, 2018. https://www .newsday.com/business /chb-industries -w i n d ow- s e c u r it y-f i l m -1.170 0 70 86 (accessed May 16, 2022). Schildkraut, Jaclyn, and Glenn W. Muschert. Columbine, 20 Years Later and Beyond: Lessons from Tragedy. Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger, 2019. Weller, Chris. “Sandy Hook Elementary School Was Rebuilt After the Shooting – And It Hides High Security in Beautiful Design.” Business Insider, December 14, 2017. https://www.businessinsider.com /new-sa ndy-hook- element a r y- desig n -2016-8 (accessed June 12, 2022).

Bump Stocks Bump stocks, or bump fire stocks, sometimes referred to as “trigger cranks,” are devices that can be affixed to semiautomatic rifles that allow them to fire nearly as fast as automatic machine guns. Bump stocks use the recoil, or kickback, from a fired semiautomatic weapon to continue shooting ammunition in rapid succession. The trigger is “bumped” against the finger of the shooter by the pressure from the recoil, as opposed to them having to continuously pull the trigger to release each shot. A semiautomatic weapon with a bump stock can

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achieve a rate of fire between 400 and 500 rounds per minute, depending on the type of gun. By comparison, machine guns can fire up to several thousand rounds per minute. This uninterrupted firing results in a loss of accuracy for the shooter as it becomes difficult to aim the weapon. In 2002, Bill Akins invented the Akins Accelerator, one of the first bump stock– type devices. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) determined that it did not qualify as a machine gun because the trigger moved for each individual shot. The ATF interpreted a “single function of the trigger” as a “single movement of the trigger” until 2006, when they reinterpreted the language to mean a “single pull of the trigger.” This new interpretation, upheld by the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals in 2009, effectively reclassified the Akins Accelerator as a machine gun because it caused semiautomatic weapons to continue to fire after one trigger pull using pure recoil via an internal springloaded mechanism. Under the Firearm Owners’ Protection Act of 1986, which revised provisions of the National Firearms Act of 1934, it has been illegal for U.S. citizens to transfer or possess fully automatic firearms produced after May 19, 1986. Bump stocks, as they exist and are referred to today, were invented by Jeremiah Cottle, founder of Slide Fire Solutions, as a replacement stock for people who have limited hand mobility. Importantly, while the first version of a bump stock had an internal spring to force the firearm forward, these required constant forward pressure by a nonshooting arm in order to maintain continuous fire. These more recent bump stocks were classified as “firearm parts”— components that are unregulated by the ATF but can be combined to create a

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A bump stock is a device that attaches to a semiautomatic rifle and is used to increase the rate at which the gun can fire. (Reuters/Alamy Stock Photo)

gun—between 2008 and 2017. In 2018, a crowdfunding campaign was created to fund the creation of a bump stock attachment for semiautomatic pistols, but it seems that the bump stock ban was passed before any could be created. The impetus for stricter bump stock regulation was the October 1, 2017, Las Vegas shooting, where a gunman used these devices on numerous weapons to fire into the Route 91 Harvest music festival, killing fifty-eight people and injuring hundreds. Public opinion polls reflected American citizens’ feelings of outrage and helplessness; in late February 2018, 56 percent of a sample of U.S. adults supported banning bump stocks, and 65 percent supported stricter laws covering gun sales, up 8 percent from December 2017 (CBS News 2018). This increased support for gun regulation was bipartisan, with 75 percent of both Republican and Democrat–identifying Americans polled in an NPR/Ipsos poll indicating that they supported stricter gun laws. This was up 7 percent from October

2017. Moreover, 81 percent of those same respondents said that they would also support the banning of bump stocks (Khalid 2018). A separate poll of registered voters showed that 72 percent of respondents supported a bump stock ban—68 percent of Republicans and 79 percent of Democrats (Sanger-Katz and Bui 2017). California first barred the sale of bump stocks in 1990, and after the Las Vegas shooting, other states began to follow suit. Massachusetts was the first, with legislation that went into effect on February 1, 2018, followed by New Jersey, where the law was effective as of April 15, 2018, and Florida and Vermont in October 2018. Cities such as Denver and Boulder, Colorado; Columbia, South Carolina; and Northbrook, Illinois, also banned the sale and possession of bump stocks. In all, eleven states and the District of Columbia have legislation banning bump stocks. The National Rifle Association (NRA) released a statement calling for additional regulations on the purchase of “devices designed to allow semi-automatic



rifles to function like fully-automatic rifles” in the aftermath of the Las Vegas shooting. On February 20, 2018, President Donald Trump issued a memorandum instructing the U.S. Attorney General to “dedicate all available resources to . . . propose for notice and comment a rule banning all devices that turn legal weapons into machine guns.” In response, the ATF reviewed more than 186,000 public comments and made the decision to clarify that the term “machine gun” as used in both the National Firearms Act of 1934 and the Gun Control Act of 1968 includes all bump stock–type devices. As of December 18, 2018, ATF regulations state that bump stocks fall within the definition of “machine gun” under federal law, as such devices allow a shooter of a semiautomatic firearm to initiate a continuous firing cycle with a single pull of the trigger. Those in possession of bump stocks were required to divest themselves of the devices by March 26, 2019. Options for divestment included destroying the device or abandoning it at the nearest ATF office. Possible methods of destruction included completely melting, shredding, or crushing the device. If the owner chose to destroy the bump stock, it had to be destroyed in such a way that it would be rendered incapable of being readily restored to function. During the ninety-day period between the regulation change and the deadline to destroy the devices, bump stocks were still being sold by dealers like RW Arms, based out of Texas (Kaste 2019). As of March 26, 2019, there is a federal ban on selling, owning, or manufacturing bump stocks in the United States. No devices will be “grandfathered in.” Specifically, this refers to “devices that allow a semiautomatic firearm to shoot more than one shot with a single pull of the trigger by harnessing the recoil energy of the semiautomatic firearm to which it is

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affixed so that the trigger resets and continues firing without additional physical manipulation of the trigger by the shooter” (ATF 2018). A number of lawsuits, stay requests, and emergency appeals to courts were filed after the ATF began reclassifying bump stocks as machine guns. The U.S. Supreme Court rejected stay requests from Washington, DC, and Michigan, which would have halted the ban on bump stocks until other cases challenging the ban had been decided. Although the DC Circuit Court granted a temporary exception to the ban for members of the Firearms Policy Foundation and other organizations pursuing legal remedies, they ultimately denied an injunction to challengers of the new regulations. In these lawsuits, gun rights activists accused the government of bowing to political pressure to change the regulation, as the ATF had originally found in 2002 that bump stocks were legal. Additionally, instead of going through Congress to change the laws, the ATF altered their definition of machine gun. They also objected to the fact that the new designation effectively deprived people of their property without compensation. Bump stock owners were expected to destroy property that may have cost them anywhere from about $100 to $500. To address this, the State of Washington set aside $150,000 and offered $150 per bump stock (up to five devices) to owners who were willing to turn them in, but the money was used up within weeks. On the day that bump stocks were redefined as machine guns, a class-action lawsuit was filed in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims on behalf of those who purchased these or similar devices from June 7, 2010, to the time the suit was filed. On May 20, 2018, Slide Fire Solutions, the inventor, patent holder, and leading

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manufacturer of bump stocks, permanently halted sales and production of its products. RW Arms turned over its entire remaining inventory of 60,000 bump stocks to the ATF. Those in the United States still found to be in possession of a bump stock face felony charges and can be punished by up to ten years’ federal imprisonment and up to $250,000 in fines. An estimated 500,000 bump stocks have been sold nationwide since 2010, though the ATF has not released any information about how many of these may have been turned in. In May of 2019, the Offensive Weapons Act 2019 banned bump stocks in the UK. On March 25, 2019, in the Federal 6th Circuit Court of Appeals, the Cato Institute and Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) filed an amicus curiae brief in the case of Gun Owners of America et al. v. Attorney General Barr, et al. That application for a stay of the bump stock law was denied by Supreme Court Justice Sonya Sotomayor. On June 13, 2019, the same groups filed an amicus brief in the case of Aposhian v. Attorney General Barr et al., which challenged the bump stock ban in the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals. The motion for injunction in this case was ultimately denied, meaning that bump stocks continue to fall under the ATF’s definition of machine guns. In total, three district courts denied preliminary relief of the enactment of this law. Guedes, et al. v. ATF et al., which argues that the ATF rule contradicts the previous federal definition of machine guns and is therefore arbitrary and capricious, is scheduled to be heard in the Supreme Court in 2020. Jessica Trapassi Migliaccio See also: Assault Weapons; Automatic Weapons Laws; Las Vegas Shooting; Semiautomatic Weapons

Further Reading ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives). “Bump Stocks.” ATF.gov, February 21, 2019. https://www.atf.gov /r u les-a nd-reg u lat ions / bu mp -stock s (accessed July 14, 2019). CBS News. “Poll: Support for Stricter Gun Laws Rises; Divisions on Arming Teachers.” CBS News, February 12, 2018. https://www .cbsnews.com /news /poll-suppor t-for -stricter-gun-laws-rises-divisions-on-arming -teachers/ (accessed July 14, 2019). Kaste, Martin. “Bump Stocks Will Soon Be Illegal, but That’s Not Stopping Sales.” National Public Radio, February 4, 2019. h t t p s : / / w w w. n p r . o r g / 2 01 9 / 0 2 / 0 4 /691287471/bump-stocks-will-soon-be -i l lega l-but-t h at s -not-slow i ng-sa les (accessed July 14, 2019). Khalid, Asma. “NPR Poll: After Parkland, Number of Americans Who Want Gun Restrictions Grows.” National Public Radio, March 2, 2018. https://www.npr .org /2018 / 03/ 02 /589849342 /npr-poll -after-parkland-number-of-americans -w h o -w a n t- g u n - r e s t r i c t io n s - g r ow s (accessed July 14, 2019). Sanger-Katz, Margot and Quoctrung Bui. 2017. “A Bump Stock Ban Is Popular with the Public. But Experts Have Their Doubts.” New York Times, October 12, 2017. https:// www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/10/12 /upshot/a-bump-stock-ban-is-popular-but -experts-have-their-doubts.html (accessed July 14, 2019).

Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) is a federal law enforcement organization located within the Department of Justice. It is responsible for enforcing laws related to the illegal diversion of alcohol and tobacco products as well as the illegal use and trafficking of



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firearms. The ATF is also responsible for administering and enforcing both criminal and regulatory laws regarding bombs, explosives, and arson. Previously, the ATF possessed regulatory functions related to the permitting, labeling, and marketing of tobacco and alcohol. However, the Homeland Security Act of 2002 vested those responsibilities in the newly created Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB). While the TTB is located within the Department of Treasury, the former home of the ATF, the Homeland Security Act moved the ATF to the Department of Justice. The ATF is headquartered in Washington, DC, with field divisions located in over two dozen states and additional field offices located in several foreign countries, including Canada, Colombia, Iraq, and Mexico. The director of the ATF reports to the deputy attorney general in the Department of Justice. A chief of staff, chief counsel, and deputy director assist the director. The deputy director serves as the chief operating officer for the bureau and oversees eight separate offices that constitute the ATF. Those offices include Enforcement Programs and Services, Field Operations, Management, Professional Responsibility and Security Operations, Public and Governmental Affairs, Science and Technology, Strategic Intelligence and Information, and Training and Professional Development. The earliest predecessors of contemporary ATF agents were the individuals charged by Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton with collecting a federal spirits tax imposed in 1791, a levy that later gave rise to the Whiskey Rebellion of 1794. The first twentieth-century precursor to the ATF was the Prohibition Unit, an organization within the Bureau of Internal Revenue of the Treasury Department devoted to the

enforcement of the Eighteenth Amendment and the Volstead Prohibition Enforcement Act. Perhaps the most colorful character in the bureau’s history was Eliot Ness, whose story spawned both a television series and movies. Ness and his agents, nicknamed the Untouchables, became famous during the Prohibition period for pursuing gangster Al Capone and helping to build a successful case against him on tax evasion charges. Tobacco came within the purview of the ATF during the 1950s, when the bureau was given the responsibility to collect a federal tobacco tax. Even before the tobacco- and alcoholrelated regulatory functions of the ATF were moved to the TTB, firearms regulation and enforcement dominated the bureau’s agenda, both in terms of expenditures and regulatory activity. The regulation of firearms possession (including licensing firearm dealers) and criminal investigations (including tracing guns used in criminal activity) are the bureau’s major firearmsrelated activities. The National Firearms Act of 1934 (aimed at curtailing the easy availability of firearms for criminal activities) and the Federal Firearms Act of 1938 (prohibiting certain classes of people from owning firearms) gave the bureau its original entry into firearms regulation. Its current responsibilities with regard to firearms derive mostly from the Gun Control Act of 1968 and its subsequent amendments, including the Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986 and the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act of 1998. As part of its responsibilities with regard to firearms, the ATF is tasked with issuing federal licenses for gun manufacturers and dealers. The ATF’s National Licensing Center is based in Atlanta and handles these licensing responsibilities. Dealers are required to maintain a permanent place of

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business from which to conduct their firearms business and are barred from selling to prohibited classes of individuals, including felons, juveniles, and those adjudicated to be mentally incompetent. Individuals who collect guns for personal collections and make sales only occasionally as part of their hobby are also required to obtain a federal collector’s license. To ensure compliance with licensing requirements, the ATF conducts occasional inspections of existing licensees but has historically been plagued with insufficient personnel for effective monitoring. The Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act requires dealers to obtain a criminal background check on a prospective buyer prior to making a sale. They do so through the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), which is operated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Though the ATF does not operate the NICS, it is responsible for ensuring dealer compliance with this provision of the Brady Bill, including the background check requirement. In addition, the ATF operates the National Tracing Center (NTC) located in Martinsburg, West Virginia. The NTC is responsible for tracing the ownership of guns recovered from criminal investigations. The NTC collects information on firearms sales, stolen guns, and chains of possession (from manufacturer to purchaser) to aid local, state, and national law enforcement agencies. Such information is part of a computerized database used to identify firearms-trafficking corridors and black markets for guns. In fiscal year 2009, the NTC processed more than 340,000 requests from domestic and international law enforcement agencies to trace guns related to crimes. The NTC also serves as the repository for firearms transaction records

from federal firearm licensees that discontinue business, maintains records of multiple sales (i.e., the sale of two or more handguns to the same person within five consecutive business days), and provides assistance in identifying firearms with altered or destroyed serial numbers. The ATF’s current responsibilities with regard to arson and explosives derive from the Gun Control Act of 1968, which gave the ATF federal jurisdiction for destructive devices, and the Organized Crime Control Act of 1970, which established regulations regarding the manufacture, storage, and sale of explosives. As part of its role in the enforcement of laws regarding explosives and arson, the ATF administers the Federal Explosives License (FEL) Program. There are approximately 11,000 licensees working with commercial explosives, including fireworks and those used in the mining industry. The ATF also maintains a cadre of explosives specialists, fire investigators, and criminal profilers who engage in explosives investigations, assist with bomb disposal, and provide technical assistance to the commercial explosives industry. In conjunction with the U.S. Bomb Data Center, the ATF maintains the Bomb Arson Tracking System, which provides arson and explosives information to aid police officers, bomb technicians, and fire investigators at the state and local level. No longer playing a role in the regulation of the alcohol or tobacco industries, the ATF’s focus in this area is now strictly on the reduction of alcohol smuggling and contraband tobacco trafficking. The objective is to reduce or remove sources of revenue for criminal and terrorist organizations. The ATF directs more of its efforts at tobacco trafficking than at alcohol smuggling because tobacco trafficking is more common. Tobacco has become increasingly



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more attractive to trafficking organizations that previously focused only on weapons and drugs, as some states have dramatically increased their tobacco taxes. Tobacco diversion is estimated to cost federal, state, and local governments upward of $5 billion in unpaid excise taxes each year. The relationship between the firearms industry and the ATF is volatile and exacerbated by the intense opposition of anti–gun control groups, such as the National Rifle Association (NRA). The ATF has been the target of a number of intense attacks and efforts to dismantle it. For example, when the bureau proposed to computerize records to facilitate meeting its regulatory obligations in the 1980s, Congress prohibited the ATF from spending any of its funds to do so and went so far as to cut the funds the ATF had estimated computerization would have cost from the bureau’s budget. During his 1980 presidential campaign, Ronald Reagan included promises to dissolve the bureau, spurred in part by NRA lobbying and analyses conducted by conservative groups suggesting that major budget savings would accrue from folding the ATF into other agencies. Most recently, the ATF has attracted intense scrutiny and the ire of lawmakers and gun rights groups over its Operation Fast and Furious—a sting operation intended to trace weapons moving illegally across the border between the United States and Mexico and result in the prosecution of illegal drug sellers. Guns sold to suspects in the sting operation were later traced to the scenes of death for two U.S. border agents. When U.S. attorney general Eric Holder was asked about details of the operation, he claimed not to know many of them; almost immediately, the NRA launched a failed petition to have him fired. Other fallout included calls for the dissolving of the bureau itself (Gerstein 2011; Stolberg

2011)—which has been the aim of many in the gun rights camp for more than three decades. The agency has remained a political lightning rod since then, with nominations for leadership positions and funding requests often mired in political gamesmanship and maneuvering. As a result, ATF funding and staffing levels have often remained flat and have been criticized as insufficient to meet its mandates. In 2019, for example, the gun control group Giffords pointed out that the agency employed fewer federal agents than the Las Vegas Police Department (Chipman 2019). Wendy L. Martinek See also: Background Checks; Black Market for Firearms; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Branch Davidians; Federal Firearms Act of 1938 (Public Law No. 75-785); Firearm Dealers; Gun Control Act of 1968; Gun Registration; Gun Shows; National Firearms Act of 1934; National Instant Criminal Background Check System; National Rifle Association (NRA); National Tracing Center (NTC); Ruby Ridge; Youth Crime Gun Interdiction Initiative (YCGII)

Further Reading Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. An Introduction to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms and the Regulated Industries. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of the Treasury, 1998. Chipman, David. “ATF Is Already Small: President Trump Wants It to Be Even Smaller.” Giffords [blog], March 14, 2019. https://giffords.org/blog/2019/03/atf-is -already-small-president-trump-wants-it -to-be-even-smaller/ (accessed January 26, 2022). Gerstein, Josh. “Could Controversy Kill the ATF?” Politico.com, July 8, 2011. http:// w w w.politico.com /news /stories / 0711 /58532.html (accessed January 26, 2022).

140 | Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) Martinek, Wendy L., Kenneth J. Meier, and Lael R. Keiser. “Jackboots or Lace Panties? The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms.” In The Changing Politics of Gun Control, edited by John M. Bruce and Clyde Wilcox, 17–44. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998. Meager, Tom. “ATF’s Greatest Hits.” Marshall Project, May 19, 2015. https://www .themarshallproject.org/2015/05/19/atf-s -greatest-hits (accessed January 26, 2022). Moore, James. Very Special Agents: The Inside Story of America’s Most Controversial Law Enforcement Agency—The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. New York: Pocket Books, 1997. Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021. Stolberg, Sheryl Gay. “Firearms Bureau Finds Itself in a Rough Patch.” New York Times, July 4, 2011. http://www.nytimes.com /2011/ 07/ 05/us /politics / 05g u ns.ht ml (accessed January 26, 2022). Vizzard, William J. In the Cross Fire: A Political History of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 1997.

Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS)

The BJS annually publishes statistical findings on federal criminal offenders and case processing, correctional populations, and criminal victimization. The BJS periodically publishes statistical findings on a series of other topics, including felony convictions, practices, and policies of state and federal prosecutors; the administration of law enforcement agencies and correctional facilities; and the characteristics of correctional populations. The BJS will also undertake special data collections and analyses to respond to the policy and legislative needs of the Department of Justice, the administration, Congress, and the criminal justice community. The BJS has made its data accessible in both print and digital format, with many of the BJS databases being accessible via the internet. The BJS maintains more than two dozen major data collection series, which it publishes and distributes nationwide. The BJS website also contains links to several helpful reports on firearms usage. James A. Beckman See also: National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS)

Further Reading The Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS), a component of the Office of the Justice Program in the U.S. Department of Justice, is the primary source for criminal justice statistics in the United States. The BJS collects, analyzes, publishes, and disseminates information to the criminal justice community on crime, crime rates, criminal offenders, victims, and the operation of the justice system at all levels of government. These data are critical to policy makers at all levels in promulgating legislation that ensures the administration of justice is efficient and fair while effectively combating crime.

Bureau of Justice Statistics. http://bjs.ojp. usdoj.gov/ (accessed January 24, 2022). Office of the Federal Register, National Archives and Records Administration. The United States Government Manual. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1997.

Bush, George H. W.(1924–2018) George Herbert Walker Bush was elected as the forty-first president of the United States in 1988. During the campaign, he emphasized his opposition to gun control and his



lifetime membership in the National Rifle Association (NRA). As president, Bush provided rhetorical support for the NRA, but he also implemented a ban on imported assault rifles, along with other modest gun control measures. In 1994, Bush publicly resigned from the NRA and issued a letter denouncing fundraising efforts by the organization that described federal agents as “jackbooted government thugs.” In 2000, his son, George W. Bush, was elected president of the United States. Like his father, Bush campaigned in opposition to gun control. George H. W. Bush was born on June 12, 1924, in Milton, Massachusetts, to Dorothy Walker Bush and Prescott Bush (who later served as a Republican senator for Connecticut from 1952 to 1962). Bush ran unsuccessfully for the Senate in 1964 and then won a seat in the House of Representatives in 1966 representing Texas’s Seventh District. Bush served on the Ways and Means Committee and was reelected to the House in 1968 with no opposition. In 1970, he again lost a bid for the Senate. During the 1970s, Bush held a number of appointed positions. In 1971, he was named U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. In 1973, he was appointed chair of the Republican National Committee. In 1974, he became chief of the U.S. Liaison Office in Peking during a period of normalizing relations between the United States and the People’s Republic of China. In 1976, Bush became director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Bush ran for the Republican presidential nomination in 1980. He won the Iowa caucuses but lost in New Hampshire to Ronald Reagan, who eventually won the nomination. Reagan picked Bush to be his running mate. Bush went on to serve two full terms as vice president. As vice president, Bush oversaw the administration’s anti-terrorism

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George H. W. Bush served as the 41st president of the United States. Prior to taking office, he served as a congressman, United Nations ambassador, Republican National Committee chair, director of the Central Intelligence Agency, and vice president under President Ronald Reagan. (George Bush Presidential Library)

policy and coordinated the war on drugs. He also headed a task force on regulatory relief. In 1988, Bush won the GOP nomination for president and came from far behind to defeat Democrat Michael Dukakis in the general election. As president, he assembled an international coalition to drive Iraq from Kuwait in 1991 and for a time enjoyed the highest popularity ratings of any incumbent president. But the economy slipped into recession, and Bush was defeated in his bid for reelection by Bill Clinton in 1992. As a candidate, Bush emphasized his opposition to gun control. He repeatedly claimed that states with the strictest gun

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controls had the highest crime rates and called for stricter sentencing for criminals. In 1988, Bush won the endorsement of the NRA. While in office, Bush introduced Operation Triggerlock, a program that directed U.S. attorneys to vigorously prosecute violations of gun laws committed by convicted felons and drug traffickers. This program provided increased support to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF), an agency that had already benefited from Bush’s backing as part of his strategy for the war on drugs as vice president. This operation reinvigorated the ATF and changed its mission. Bush’s opposition to gun control was tested in 1989, when a gunman armed with a semiautomatic assault rifle shot seventeen schoolchildren in Stockton, California. Two years later, a gunman killed twenty-three people and wounded more than twenty others before committing suicide at a cafeteria in Killeen, Texas. Political pressure built during this period for controls on semiautomatic weapons and large weapon clips. Bush’s advisers were divided, with drug czar William Bennett and many police groups urging that limits be placed on the weapons but others pushing Bush to focus instead on an anticrime policy. Bush waffled and vacillated on the subject before finally issuing an executive order in early 1989 temporarily banning the import of certain assault weapons. He later made the ban permanent and expanded the number of guns covered by the policy. The NRA reacted angrily and refused to endorse Bush in 1992. Yet Bush’s ban did not cover domestically produced weapons, thereby avoiding a clash with gun manufacturers. In May 1995, after the bombing in Oklahoma City, Bush made public a letter to

the NRA in which he resigned his lifetime membership. Bush angrily denounced statements by NRA president Wayne LaPierre defending the group’s characterization of federal law enforcement agents as “wearing Nazi bucket helmets and black storm trooper uniforms” and “attack[ing] law abiding citizens.” The strongly worded letter served as a coda on Bush’s complicated relationship with the NRA. Bush’s break with the NRA has been continually referenced, particularly in regard to the NRA’s endorsement of presidential candidates. Among Bush’s Republican successors, Bob Dole failed to garner a NRA endorsement in 1996, but Bush’s son, George W. Bush, did receive the official nod in 2000 and 2004, as did John McCain in 2008. On January 8, 2011, nineteen individuals, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ), fell victim to a mass shooting at a public meeting held by the congresswoman for her constituents. Six, including a nine-year-old girl and the chief federal judge in Arizona, did not survive. The tragedy, like other recent mass shootings, such as the Virginia Tech shooting in 2007, reawakened the gun control debate. In the wake of the Tucson event, the National Institute for Civil Discourse, a new nonpartisan center for debate, research, education, and policy about civility in public discourse, was established at the University of Arizona. George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton served as inaugural honorary chairs. Bush was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2011 by Barack Obama. He supported Mitt Romney (R-UT) during his 2012 presidential campaign, ultimately losing to Obama, but openly opposed the 2016 Republican nominee and eventual winner, Donald Trump, criticizing his policies and instead voting



for the Democratic candidate, Hillary Clinton (wife of former President Bill Clinton). On November 30, 2018, Bush lost his longtime battle with Parkinson’s disease, passing away at his home in Houston, Texas. Following his death, Bush lay in state at the U.S. Capitol Rotunda and received a state funeral at the Washington National Cathedral before being returned to Texas, where he was buried next to his wife, Barbara, at the presidential library in College Station bearing his name. Clyde Wilcox and Christine Kim See also: Clinton, William J.; Killeen, Texas, Shooting; LaPierre, Wayne R., Jr.; National Rifle Association (NRA); Republican Party and Gun Control; Tucson, Arizona, Shooting; Virginia Tech Shooting

Further Reading Carter, Gregg Lee. The Gun Control Movement. New York: Twayne, 1997. Davidson, Osha Gray. Under Fire: The NRA and the Battle for Gun Control. Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 1998. Duffy, Michael. Marching in Place: The Status Quo Presidency of George Bush. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1992. George Bush Presidential Library and Museum. http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu/ (accessed July 5, 2021). National Institute for Civil Discourse. http:// nicd.arizona.edu/ (accessed July 5, 2021). Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021. Vizzard, William J. Shots in the Dark: The Policy, Politics, and Symbolism of Gun Control. New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000. The White House. “George H. W. Bush.” https://www.whitehouse.gov/about-the -white-house/presidents/george-h-w-bush / (accessed July 5, 2021).

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Bush, George W.(1946–) George W. Bush was elected president in 2000 and reelected in 2004, with strong support from the National Rifle Association (NRA). Although never a NRA member himself, Bush’s position in favor of an individual’s right to bear arms led the vice president of the association to declare to supporters: “If we win [in the 2000 election], we’ll have a president . . . where we’ll work out of their office” (Connolly and Neal 2000, A01). The major gun-related issues that marked Bush’s tenure in the White House were the DC sniper case in 2002, the expiration of the federal Assault Weapons Ban in 2004, the passage of federal legislation shielding gun manufacturers and sellers from lawsuits in 2005, the Virginia Tech shootings in 2007, and the Supreme Court decision in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008). Bush was born in New Haven, Connecticut, on July 6, 1946. The eldest son of Barbara and George H. W. Bush, who served as vice president from 1981 to 1989 and president from 1989 to 1993, he grew up in Midland, Texas. After an unsuccessful run for Congress in 1978, Bush worked in business until elected governor of Texas in 1994. During his six years as governor of one of the most gun-friendly states in the country (he was reelected in 1998), Bush was a strong advocate for gun rights policy, signing bills allowing concealed handguns and barring cities from suing gun manufacturers. In his first campaign for the White House, Bush defeated former vice president Al Gore, whose strong gun control stance likely cost him rural votes. Running for national office only a year after the shootings at Columbine High School in Colorado, Bush used campaign rhetoric that appealed to more moderate voters, while

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signaling support to gun rights advocates. As a candidate, he voiced support for stronger enforcement of already existing guns laws, more resources to prosecute those who commit crimes with guns, instant background checks at gun shows, voluntary trigger locks, moving the purchase age for firearms from eighteen to twenty-one years old, and extending the federal Assault Weapons Ban. As president, however, Bush never pushed for these policies, apart from designating a minimal increase in funding for the prosecution of those charged with gun crimes. Instead, upon taking office, he frustrated gun control advocates by nominating John Ashcroft, an outspoken supporter of individual gun rights, to lead the Department of Justice. During the search for the DC sniper in 2002, Bush pleased the NRA by deflecting calls to implement a nationwide ballistic fingerprinting system, which would allow law enforcement to track the origins of bullets using a centralized database. Beginning in 2003, Bush focused on passing a federal law that would indemnify gun manufacturers and sellers from lawsuits, just as he had done in Texas as governor. As the expiration of the ten-year-old federal Assault Weapons Ban approached prior to the 2004 election, broad bipartisan support emerged in the Senate for a comprehensive gun policy that would extend the ban, establish background checks for purchases at gun shows, and shield manufactures and sellers from lawsuits. However, despite public opinion polls indicating that a majority of Americans supported the renewal of the ban, House Republicans balked at the gun control restrictions, and Bush ignored his campaign promises by failing to pressure members of his party to take action. Although many members of the NRA felt betrayed that the president had offered

rhetorical support for extending the ban, after he let it lapse on September 13, gun rights groups organized large-scale efforts to assure his reelection. In 2005, the long-sought indemnity bill for gun manufacturers and sellers was overwhelmingly passed, without previously proposed gun control amendments, by a new Republican-majority Congress. Bush signed the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act into law on October 26. Despite this early success, Bush’s second term in office was marked by a spate of school shootings, which increased public pressure from gun control advocates. In 2006, there were four school shootings during a two-week period, including the killing of ten girls in a oneroom Amish schoolhouse in Pennsylvania. In response, the Bush administration organized an invitation-only White House Conference on School Safety, which included neither Democrats nor gun control advocates. During the one-hour discussion moderated by the president, he never once used the word “guns.” On April 16, 2007, a student gunman killed thirtythree people (including himself) at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. The deadliest shooting in U.S. history, this event reignited calls by gun control advocates for additional restrictions on the acquisition of firearms. Unable to ignore the issue, Bush supported the subsequent bipartisan legislation aimed at preventing the mentally ill from purchasing guns by improving the record-keeping of the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS)—and he signed the NICS Improvement Act on January 8, 2008. The most significant change to gun policy that occurred during Bush’s tenure was the Supreme Court’s decision in District of



Columbia v. Heller, announced on June 26, 2008, which significantly reinterpreted the Second Amendment of the Bill of Rights. Specifically, this decision declared that the possession of a gun was an individual right, rather than a collective right, as in the case of a militia. This interpretation supported the position that had been administration policy since Attorney General Ashcroft declared it in a letter to the NRA in 2001. In his official public statement regarding this decision, Bush stated: “As a longstanding advocate of the rights of gun owners in the America, I applaud the Supreme Court’s historic decision today confirming what has always been clear in the Constitution: The second amendment protects an individual right to keep and bear firearms” (Bush 2008, 921). Richard Holtzman

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Further Reading

.org/images/ashcroft.pdf (accessed July 14, 2011). Baum, Dan. “Bush and Guns.” Rolling Stone (July 6, 2000): 64–66. Bush, George W. “Statement on the United States Supreme Court Ruling on Individual Gun Rights, June 26, 2008.” Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents 44 (2008): 921. http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/WCPD -20 08- 06 -30 /pdf / WCPD -20 08- 06 -30 -Pg921-2.pdf (accessed January 26, 2022). Connolly, Ceci, and Terry M. Neal. “Bush Denies He’d Toe the NRA Line; Gore Seizes on Video for Gun Control Attack.” Washington Post, May 4, 2000, A01. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive /politics/2000/05/05/bush-denies-hed-toe -the-nra-line/98e592e8-7cb8-479a-942f -a37e7e868b7e/ (accessed June 12, 2022). Dao, James. “N.R.A. Open an All-Out Drive for Bush and Its Views.” New York Times, April 16, 2004. https://www.nytimes.com /2004/04/16/us/2004-campaign-gun-group -nra-opens-all-drive-for-bush-its-views .html (accessed January 26, 2022). Milbank, Dana. “Guns Are in Schools but Not in the President’s Vocabulary.” Washington Post, October 11, 2006, A02. http:// w w w.w a s h i n g t o n p o s t .c o m / w p - d y n /content/article/2006/10/10/AR200610 1001390.html (accessed January 26, 2022).

Ashcroft, John. “Letter to the National Rifle Association Regarding Bush Administration’s Interpretation of the Second Amendment, May 17, 2001.” http://www.nraila

Buyback Programs. See Gun Buyback Programs

See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Ballistic Identification System; District of Columbia v. Heller; National Rifle Association (NRA); Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005; Virginia Tech Shooting; Washington, DC, Sniper Attacks

C Campus Carry

that create and establish policies through a different process. In establishing their procedures, some states have included specific requirements or exclusions for persons carrying on campus. Some states, such as Mississippi (mandated in 2011), Idaho (mandated in 2014), and Tennessee (mandated in 2016), require that individuals wanting to carry a firearm have an enhanced license to do so (Koshak and Roger 2018). Mississippi also stipulates that individuals wanting to bring concealed weapons to campus must have taken a course on safe handling and use of firearms by a certified instructor (NCSL 2019). As of the time of this writing, Tennessee’s law does not extend to students or the general public (NCSL 2019). Other states exclude weapons in certain areas; for example, the legislation in Kansas (mandated in 2014) allows public institutions to prohibit concealed carry laws if they are able to prove that buildings have adequate security measures, while Wisconsin (mandated in 2011) can restrict firearms from buildings with sufficient posted signage stating that weapons are prohibited (NCSL 2019). Georgia’s law (mandated in 2017) states that students cannot bring firearms into faculty, staff, or administrative offices; rooms where disciplinary proceedings are conducted; spaces being used for childcare or a college/career academy; classrooms where there is a high school student; or buildings used for athletic events or student housing (Koshak and Roger 2018). As of 2019, there is no federal law banning states from allowing campus carry.

Campus carry refers to the permitting of firearms on college or university campuses in the United States. According to the National Conference of State Legislators [NCSL] (2019), all fifty states allow their citizens to carry concealed weapons if requirements are met, but each state has its own discretion when it comes to permitting firearms on college campuses. The Gun Free School Zones Act (18 U.S.C. § 922(q)) forbids the possession of firearms in school zones, but, in this context, schools are generally defined as elementary or secondary institutions as determined by state legislation. Therefore, colleges and universities may be excluded from the rule. For the states that allow firearms on campuses, individuals are still required to follow laws on obtaining the proper permits and licenses and, depending on the state and their concealed weapons laws, following the policies and procedures for those. As of 2019, the following ten states, and the year campus carry was mandated, permitted concealed campus carry by students, faculty, and staff on public institutions: Arkansas (2017), Colorado, (2003), Georgia (2017), Idaho (2014), Kansas (2014), Mississippi (2011), Oregon (2011), Texas (2016), Utah (2006), and Wisconsin (2011) (NCSL 2019). The state laws, policies, and procedures mandated for universities concerning campus carry are only applied to statefunded public institutions. Private universities have separate decision-making bodies 147

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There are, however, sixteen states that ban carrying a concealed weapon at statefunded public institutions: California, Florida, Illinois, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, South Carolina, and Wyoming (NCSL 2019). Additionally, twenty-three states allow institutions to decide if campus carry is allowed on their campus: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Indiana, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia, and Wyoming (NCSL 2019). Campus carry laws have created nationwide discussions concerning rights of individuals, particularly as it relates to the Second Amendment and the right to bear arms. According to Koshak and Roger (2018), the Firearms Control Regulations Act of 1975 required that guns remain inoperable in the home and prohibited the possession of a handgun without a license and trigger. When challenged in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), the Supreme Court held that the Second Amendment protects an individual’s right to keep and bear arms outside of military purposes (Koshak and Roger 2018). Though this ruling allowed citizens to keep operable guns in their homes or apartments, it did specify that the use of firearms was not unlimited and still forbade carrying them in sensitive spaces, such as schools and buildings used for governmental purposes. The issue of gun rights was revisited in McDonald v. Chicago (2010), where the Supreme Court held that the Second Amendment applied to states through the Due Process Clause (majority opinion) and the Privileges and Immunities Clause

(concurrence by Justice Clarence Thomas) of the Fourteenth Amendment. Using selective incorporation for the rationale, the Supreme Court concluded that the federal jurisdiction for gun laws, like the Second Amendment, is applicable to both state and local governments. This decision allowed state legislatures to interpret federal law and create policies based on their constituents’ and representatives’ opinion. Heller and McDonald have created opportunities for further interpretation on gun rights laws and have led some states to introduce legislation, such as Georgia’s HB280, on campus carry. Arguments by those in favor of campus carry parallel the general ideas of those who support gun rights. Two nationwide organizations, Gun Owners of America and Leadership Institute, have shaped the debate in favor of campus carry. Both of these organizations have donated resources to support the enactment of laws for open carry, campus carry, permitless carry, and stand your ground laws (Somers and Phelps 2018). These organizations also helped to increase membership in the organization called Students for Concealed Carry, which now has over 36,000 members and 350 established chapters (Students for Concealed Carry 2019). Individuals who support campus carry laws discuss the idea of self-defense and vulnerability. They promote the Second Amendment and the rights it grants them to protect themselves with a firearm. Students for campus carry state that they believe students, faculty, and members of the community with concealed handgun licenses should have the same right to self-defense on campus that they enjoy virtually everywhere else (Students for Concealed Carry 2019). The arguments of those against campus carry parallel ideas of those who support gun control. Three main concerns surface



when discussing campus carry: college students being a sensitive population, the infringement of academic freedom, and safety issues. Individuals opposed to campus carry indicate that adding firearms to an already sensitive population such as college students can increase injuries or deaths by firearms (Satterfield and Wallace 2020). Two focal points are alcohol consumption and mental health. It is well known that alcohol consumption is prevalent for college students and that it inhibits the decisionmaking part of the brain. Price and colleagues (2014) found that alcohol was involved in 95 percent of the violent crimes occurring on college campus. Adding firearms into an environment that already sees a correlation between alcohol use and violent crime could result in a greater risk of accidental or intentional firearm incidences. Some suggest that campus carry laws allow mentally unstable students to bring firearms to campus, which could increase the number of suicides or shootings (Satterfield and Wallace 2020). Garlow and colleagues (2008) found that depression was relatively common among college students (85% had moderate to severe depression) and that the severity of symptoms had a strong relationship with suicidal ideation (84% had some form of current suicidal ideation). In 2018, the use of firearms accounted for 48.4 percent of all suicide deaths, and suicide was the second leading cause of death for individuals aging from eighteen to twenty-two (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 2018). A recent survey of Directors of College Counseling Centers at colleges and universities revealed that campuses permitting firearms reported that nearly 43 percent of student suicides were from the use of a firearm, compared to only 13 percent on campuses where firearms were prohibited (Sanfilippo 2017).

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Individuals opposed to campus carry indicate that these laws could infringe on academic freedom. Academic freedom guarantees that faculty members and students are allowed to engage in intellectual debate and academic expression without the fear of censorship or retaliation (Inside Higher Education 2010). Justice Brennan, in Keyishian v. Board of Regents of the University of the State of New York, stated that “America is deeply committed to safeguarding academic freedom and would not tolerate laws that ‘cast a pall of orthodoxy’ over campuses” (p. 385 U.S. 603) and argued that academic freedom should be a constitutionally protected value. Many national organizations of university faculty and staff, including the American Association of University Professors, the American Federation of Teachers, the Association of American Colleges and Universities, and the Association of Governing Boards of Universities and Colleges, have presented their position agreeing that campus carry laws infringe on academic freedom and do not create a safer environment. Somers and Phelps (2018) discuss how individuals argue that campus carry policies create a more hostile environment that can inhibit research, learning, and participation. For example, discussion of controversial topics between professors and students could be curtailed due to fear of an armed individual responding violently. The final argument relates to safety issues. This is generally discussed in two ways, firearms and campus safety and the possible confusion for responding law enforcement. Though a common argument posed by supporters is that allowing individuals to carry guns on campus could reduce the injuries and/or fatalities if a shooting were to happen (Satterfield and Wallace 2020), there is no evidence to

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support such a claim. In fact, mass shooting events have been stopped successfully by unarmed civilians. For example, a shooting at Seattle Pacific University was stopped by the use of a safety monitor and pepper spray, and a shooting at the University of North Carolina was stopped when a student tackled the perpetrator hard enough that he quit firing. Moreover, stressful situations can influence decision-making, and regardless of training, an individual with good intentions can accidentally harm someone else. Individuals who oppose campus carry argue that “good guys with guns” can impede or hamper the process for law enforcement officers and first responders (Lipka 2008). Additionally, when officers respond to an active shooter event, they may have difficulty determining if the armed citizen is the active shooter or not. There are many factors that influence perceptions about campus carry, including the student’s major, political alignment, demographics, and geographic location of the university. Price and colleagues (2014) noted that those who were more likely to support campus carry policies were male, owned a firearm themselves or had one in the home growing up, or were more likely to have a political affiliation other than Democrat. Cavanaugh and colleagues (2012) collected survey data from undergraduate students at two public universities, which wish to remain anonymous, one in southeastern Texas and one in eastern Washington. They found that students surveyed at both universities were more comfortable with guns in the community than on campus, but students from Texas were slightly more comfortable with guns on campus than students from Washington. Support of campus carry legislation also varies. Schildkraut, Carr, and Terranova (2018) found that although the majority

(48%) of student respondents from a New York university did not support the passage of campus carry legislation, the disapproval level had fallen from previous studies. In an additional study, Schildkraut, Jennings, Carr, and Terranova (2018) compared student perceptions of concealed campus carry laws from a university in New York and a university in Georgia. They found that students from Georgia were more likely to support the passage of campus carry laws compared to those students in New York (50.3% v. 30.6%), but students from both states maintained that they would stay enrolled if such a law passed. A study examining faculty perceptions by Bennett, Kraft, and Grubb (2012) found that the majority (72%) opposed allowing licensed gun owners the ability to carry on campus. Perceived safety is another issue that is often discussed. Some students noted that having a firearm for personal protection in a possible crisis situation made them feel safer about going to class, whereas others argued that allowing firearms onto campuses would make students and faculty members feel unsafe about their environment (Satterfield and Wallace 2020). Patten, Thomas, and Wanda (2013) found that the majority of faculty and student respondents (70%) did not feel safer with concealed guns on campus. In sum, evidence is divided when it comes to whether allowing firearms on campus will keep individuals safer or cause more issues. Members of the campus community have expressed their concerns and fears about these new laws and how they will affect their safety and academic expression moving forward, but those opposing it are fewer in number than in the past. As more states allow guns on campus, research should focus on the impact it has on crime and suicide. Additional studies assessing perceptions and



outcomes will be necessary and noteworthy when attempting to conclude whether firearms on campus are beneficial. Melissa J. Tetzlaff-Bemiller and Savannah Brown See also: Gun-Free School Laws; Students for Concealed Carry on Campus; Virginia Tech Shooting

Further Reading Bennett, Katherine, John Kraft, and Deborah Grubb. “University Faculty Attitudes Toward Guns on Campus.” Journal of Criminal Justice Education 23, no. 3 (September 2012): 336–55. Cavanaugh, Matthew, Jeffrey Bouffard, William Wells, and Matt Nobles. “Student Attitudes Toward Concealed Handguns on Campus at Two Universities.” American Journal of Public Health 102, no. 12 (December 2012): 2245–47. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “WISQARS—Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System.” 2018. https://www.cdc.gov/injury/wisqars/index .html (accessed March 4, 2020). Garlow, Stephen, Jill Rosenberg, J. David Moore, Ann P. Haas, Bethany Koestner, Herbert Hendin, and Charles B. Nemeroff. “Depression, Desperation, and Suicidal Ideation in College Students: Results from the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention College Screen Project at Emory University.” Depression and Anxiety 25, no. 6 (June 2008): 482–88. Inside Higher Education. “Defining Academic Freedom.” 2010. https://www.insidehighered .com/views/2010/12/21/defining-academic -freedom (accessed March 4, 2020). Koshak, Taylor M., and Nicholas J. Roger. “HB 280- Campus Carry.” Georgia State University Law Review 34, no. 1 (Fall 2018): 1–23. Lipka, Sara. “Campaigns to Overrule Campus Gun Bans Have Failed in Many States.”

Campus Carry | 151 Chronicle of Higher Education, April 18, 2008. https://www.chronicle.com/article /Campaigns-to-Overrule-Campus/9639 (accessed May 16, 2022). NCSL (National Conference of State Legislators). “Guns on Campus: Overview.” 2019. http://www.ncsl.org/research/education /guns-on-campus-overview.aspx (accessed October 1, 2019). Patten, Ryan, Matthew Thomas, and James Wada. “Packing Heat Attitudes Regarding Concealed Weapons on College Campuses.” American Journal of Criminal Justice 38, no. 4 (November 2013): 551–69. Price, James, Amy Thompson, Joseph Drake, and Jagdish Khubchandani. “University Presidents’ Perceptions and Practice Regarding the Carrying of Concealed Handguns on College Campuses.” Journal of American College Health 62, no. 7 (October 2014): 461–69. Sanfilippo, Marjorie. “Concealed Carry on Campus – Research Can Inform the National Debate.” Campus Law Enforcement Journal 47 (2017): 45–48. Satterfield, Sierra J., and Lacey Nicole Wallace. “College Student Attitudes towards Campus Gun Carrying in the United States.” Social Science Journal (January 2020). https:// doi.org/10.1016/j.soscij.2018.10.012. Schildkraut, Jaclyn, Collin M. Carr, and Victoria Terranova. “Armed and Academic: Perceptions of College Students On Concealed Carry On Campus Policies.” Journal of School Violence 17, no.4 (February 2018): 487–99. Schildkraut, Jaclyn, Kevin Jennings, Collin M. Carr, and Victoria Terranova. “A Tale of Two Universities: A Comparison of College Students’ Attitudes about Concealed Carry on Campus.” Security Journal 31, no. 2 (November 2018): 591–617. Somers, Patricia, and Nicolas Phelps. “Not Chilly Enough? Texas Campus Carry and Academic Freedom.” Journal of Academic Freedom 9 (2018): 1–15.

152 | Cartridges Students for Concealed Carry. “FAQs.” 2019. https://concealedcampus.org/faq/ (accessed March 3, 2020).

Cartridges Cartridge names follow one of two broad customs. Nonmetric cartridges are commonly referred to by their caliber (in theory, in hundredths or thousandths of an inch). Metric cartridges are commonly referred to by their caliber in millimeters followed by the case length in millimeters: thus a 7 × 57 mm refers to a cartridge with a 7 mm diameter bullet and an empty cartridge case 57 mm long. Some American metric cartridges are used with an additional designation (e.g., the 6 mm Remington). The nonmetric designation has a problem in that there may be a multitude of cartridges firing bullets of the same diameter, so an additional designation is needed. This takes a near-universe of forms. In cartridges of the black powder era, it was customary to hyphenate the weight of black powder that the cartridge would hold. Thus a .30-30 and a .45-70 held 30 and 70 grains of black powder, respectively. More modern cartridges were often named for the company that first introduced them (e.g., the .280 Remington, .308 Winchester, and .45 ACP, or Automatic Colt Pistol), the nation or group that adopted them (the .303 British, 7.62 mm Russian, and .223 NATO), or sometimes for its individual inventor (the .257 Roberts). The venerable .30-06, on the other hand, takes its descriptor from the date of its introduction (1906). Sometimes the designation is simply a trade label suggesting velocity: the .22 Hornet, the .220 Swift, the .219 Zipper, or the .250-3000 (the first factory cartridge to exceed 3,000 feet per second in velocity).

Particularly high-power cartridges may be designated “magnum”; when that description is already used in a given caliber, “maximum” is sometimes used to designate an even more powerful round. From time to time, individual gunsmiths or enthusiasts have created “wildcat” cartridges, a type not made by any factory, usually by taking a factory cartridge and “necking it down” to fire a smaller-caliber bullet, “necking it up” to take a larger one, or “blowing it out” to reduce its taper and increase its powder capacity. These may be designated in a variety of ways, such as by hyphenating its original caliber (e.g., .22250 refers to a .25 caliber cartridge necked down to .22), using its inventor’s name (e.g., .35 Whelen), or in other ways (e.g., a .30-06 necked down to .25 becomes the .25-06, and if “blown out” becomes the .25-06 Improved). As if the above were not sufficiently complicated, it must be noted that a given cartridge may have multiple names. For example, the .308 Winchester, .308 NATO, and 7.62 × 51 all refer to the same cartridge, and the .22-250 began its life as the .22 Varminter. A further complication is that the cartridge name may not reflect the actual bullet diameter! Most .38 and .44 handguns fire bullets of .357 and .429 diameter. The .3840 is actually .40 caliber. The .219 Zipper, .222 Remington, .223 Remington, and .224 Weatherby all fire bullets of the same diameter, but the .45-70, .45 ACP, and .45 Long Colt use three slightly different bullet diameters. Prior to invention of the modern metallic cartridge, military firearms used paper cartridges. These were tubes of waxed or greased paper, with the bullet at one end and powder at the other. The shooter bit the end of the powder side, poured the gunpowder

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Rifle cartridges, like those pictured here, combine a projectile (e.g., bullet), a propellant (powder), and a primer or ignition device within a casing. The complete cartridge is convenient to transport and handle while shooting. (Stocksnapper/Dreamstime.com)

down the barrel, and then rammed the bullet home. David T. Hardy See also: Ammunition, Types of; Dum-Dum Bullet; Gunpowder

Further Reading Hogg, Ian. Jane’s Directory of Military Small Arms Ammunition. New York: Jane’s Publishing, 1985. Logan, Herschel C. Cartridges: A Pictorial Digest of Small Arms Ammunition. Harrisburg, PA: Stackpole, 1959.

Cases v. United States. See United States Constitution and Gun Rights

Castle Doctrine The castle doctrine deals with the rights and responsibilities of persons to defend themselves or others, in their home. In some cases, the law also deals with a person outside the home. The major question is when a person has the right to use deadly force against a potential attacker and when the person has the responsibility to retreat. In 2010, twenty-five states had some form of a castle doctrine or “stand-your-ground” statute (Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Hawaii, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, Ohio, Oregon, New Jersey, North Carolina, Rhode Island, Texas, Utah, West Virginia, and Wyoming). Generally, the intruder

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must be making or have made an attempt to illegally enter the home or place occupied by the potential victim(s). The occupant must believe that the intruder plans to inflict bodily harm or commit another felony by entering the home. If those conditions are met, then the occupant may use deadly force against the intruder. Some statutes also provide civil liability immunity to the occupant. Castle doctrine statutes usually replace a “duty to retreat” law that requires the occupant to retreat as much as possible in the house and verbally warn the intruder that they intend to shoot prior to discharging any firearm. Both the duty to retreat and the castle doctrine trace their roots to English law. William Blackstone wrote of the duty to retreat, and English law recognized that only the state had the right to sanction homicide. English common law, though, did recognize the right of an individual in their home to defend themselves against intruders. Early American jurisprudence recognized the castle doctrine, and in the nineteenth century, the courts and state legislatures began to expand the sphere of protection beyond the home itself. A flurry of legislative activity in the late twentieth century was ignited by the 2005 passage of a castle doctrine law in Florida. Some critics of the law predicted a bloodbath of vigilantism, while supporters argued that law-abiding citizens would now be able to protect themselves without fear of prosecution. The Florida statute is more of a standyour-ground law in that it expanded the area that could be legally defended to any space that was legally occupied. It clearly eliminated the duty to retreat as a legal requirement. It also created a media frenzy, and it was followed by increased legislative

activity in the area in many other states that continues today. The statute came under intense scrutiny in 2012 when George Zimmerman fatally shot Trayvon Martin, an unarmed Black teenager, during an altercation in Sanford, Florida. A jury acquitted Zimmerman, who claimed self-defense, of second-degree murder and manslaughter in 2013. Castle doctrine laws may be framed in a cultural or politically ideological framework. Some see the laws as recognition of individual rights, whereas others see them as an attempt to reintroduce the Wild West and individual justice. Some cast the laws as the result of ascendance of a conservative political philosophy. Others see the laws as part of a movement toward enhanced rights for victims of crime. Still others see them as preempting the police power of the state. The impact of castle doctrine statutes is difficult to assess. Though anecdotal evidence on both sides may be found, at present there are no systematic, sound studies of the impact of castle doctrine laws. Harry L. Wilson See also: Martin, Trayvon, Shooting of; Right to Self-Defense, Philosophical Bases; SelfDefense, Legal Issues

Further Reading Alvarez, Lisette, and Cara Buckley. “Zimmerman Is Acquitted in Trayvon Martin Killing.” New York Times, July 13, 2013. https://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/14/us /george-zim mer man-verdict-t ray von -martin.html (accessed May 16, 2022). Barros, D. Benjamin. “The Evolution of Home as Castle.” n.d. http://lawprofessors.typepad .com/property/2005/11/the_evolution_o .html (accessed May 25, 2011). Boots, Denise Paquette, Jayshree Biharn, and Euel Elliott. “The State of the Castle: An Overview of Recent Trends in State Castle



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Doctrine Legislation and Public Policy.” Criminal Justice Review 34 (2009): 515–35. CNN. “Trayvon Martin Shooting Fast Facts.” CNN, May 6, 2013. https://www.cnn.com /2013/06/05/us/trayvon-martin-shooting -fast-facts/index.html (accessed May 16, 2022). Levin, Benjamin. “A Defensible Defense?— Reexamining Castle Doctrine Statutes.” Harvard Journal of Law 47 (2010): 523–54. http://www.harvardjol.com/wp-content /uploads/2010/07/523-554.pdf (accessed May 25, 2011). National Rifle Association, Institute for Legislative Action. “Fortifying the Right to Self Defense.” https://www.nraila.org /articles/20060206/fortifying-the-right -to-self-defense (accessed June 12, 2022). Total Criminal Defense. “What Is the Castle Doctrine?” http://www.totalcriminaldefense .com /over v iew /castle - doct r i ne.aspx (accessed May 25, 2011).

Castle Law. See Castle Doctrine

Categories of People Prohibited from Owning Firearms There are nine distinct categories of people prohibited from owning a firearm or ammunition according to 18 U.S.C. § 922 (d) (1–9). These categories include fugitives from the law or those under indictment with a penalty greater than one year imprisonment; an immigrant unlawfully present in the United States or those who have renounced U.S. citizenship; those dishonorably discharged from the armed service; addicts or mentally defective individuals; and those with some types of restraining orders or who have been convicted for

misdemeanor domestic violence. The classes of people prohibited from owning a firearm vary in number. For example, those renouncing citizenship is a much smaller number than those convicted of a crime punishable by more than one year in prison. According to the U.S. Treasury, 5,133 citizens renounced their citizenship in 2017. By contrast, in 2017, federal and state corrections admitted a total of 606,600 prisoners sentenced for more than one year (Bureau of Justice Statistics 2019). In addition to the previous nine categories, a person must also be a minimum of eighteen years old to possess a rifle or shotgun and twenty-one years old to possess a handgun (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives [ATF] 2005). Therefore, according to 18 U.S.C. § 922 (x)(1), it is unlawful to sell or transfer a handgun or ammunition to a juvenile. However, federal law does not restrict purchases of firearms by persons with juvenile convictions once they are legally an adult (Giffords Law Center 2019). The prohibition of felons owning firearms applies to both violent and nonviolent offenders under 18 U.S.C. § 922 (d)(1). In other words, the prohibition refers not to the act but to the maximum punishment associated with the act. In the case of Binderup v. Attorney General of the United States of America (2016), the U.S. Court of Appeals justices ruled that it is a violation of the Second Amendment to not allow a person to keep and bear arms. This ruling opens the door for many who have been convicted of a crime with a punishment of more than one year in jail to apply to own and possess a firearm. The ruling is based on case law focusing on felon-in-possession statues. The most cited case law is District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), which challenged the constitutionality of a total ban on handgun possession. In addition to being

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indicted, being a fugitive from the law leads to prohibition of owning a firearm. This too is regardless of what crime the fugitive committed. Another category of persons who cannot own a firearm or ammunition are “aliens” or persons who are unlawfully present in the United States. A legal question arises regarding who constitutes the “people” in the Constitution, and more specifically, the Second Amendment (Nichols 2016). There has been division in federal circuit court rulings as to whether undocumented persons are considered part of “the people” in the Second Amendment. If a restrictive view is taken, undocumented persons are not part of “the people,” whereas an expansive view finds the opposite for Second Amendment purposes (Nichols 2016). A Supreme Court case decision, Rehaif v. United States (2019), set the precedent that an individual must know that he or she is in the country illegally and is prohibited from owning a firearm or ammunition (France 2019). This case involved a foreign student who was unknowingly dismissed from their school. After his dismissal, Rehaif purchased ammunition to fire a gun at a gun range. The justices in the majority decision stated the defendant did not knowingly commit a crime when he fired a gun at the gun range. The court explained that the government did not prove Rehaif knew he was in a prohibited category when he shot the gun. The justices offering the dissenting opinion expressed concerns for future prosecutions for this type of offense (France 2019). In a similar category, persons who have renounced their citizenship are permanently barred from owning a firearm or ammunition in the United States. Commonly referred to as expatriates, these individuals lose all rights and privileges afforded to citizens. If they return to the United States

as an immigrant with a visa, the prohibition stands. According to Hogden (2018), renouncing citizenship is irreversible and invokes the ban on owning guns and ammunition if one returns. Hogden (2018) additionally points out that few expatriates ever return, so this prohibition affects only a small number of people. Persons who have been dishonorably discharged from the armed services are prohibited from owning a firearm or ammunition. A dishonorable discharge can occur when, according to Veteran’s Affairs (n.d.), there has been a pattern of continued misconduct, a serious act of misconduct, abuse of authority, or fraternization. The constitutionality of this prohibition was challenged and decided in United States v. Jimenez (2018) by stating that, in District of Columbia v. Heller, the court ruled that rights were in the interest of “law-abiding, responsible citizens.” Jimenez was not within this core right found in Heller and therefore was not within his right to own a firearm or ammunition. If a service member is dishonorably discharged for committing an offense with a maximum penalty exceeding one year of imprisonment, the person is viewed as falling under two prohibitive categories. Additionally, persons prohibited from owning firearms or ammunition include those who are addicted to any controlled substance and/or those who have been declared by a court as mentally defective or committed to a mental institution. Although drug addiction and mental illness have been found to be strongly correlated with violence, it is important to understand that both of these are difficult to enforce as not all individuals with these issues are known. For example, many individuals are addicted to controlled substances and have not come into contact with the criminal justice system and are therefore difficult to track.



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Additionally, 18 U.S.C. § 922(4) prohibits the possession of a firearm or ammunition to those who have been adjudicated mentally ill or committed to a mental institution; it does not include those who are simply diagnosed and known to have a mental illness Federal law cannot require states to make information available that would identify people with these prohibitive criteria to the federal or state agencies that perform background checks (Giffords Law Center 2019). A final category of persons prohibited from owning firearms or ammunition are those with certain types of restraining orders or who have been convicted for misdemeanor domestic violence under 18 U.S.C. § 922(9). The reason misdemeanor is specifically stated is that 18 U.S.C. § 922(8) disqualifies all individuals who are indicted or convicted of a felony from possessing a firearm. According to Giffords Law Center (2019), the types of restraining orders that fall under this category include harassing, stalking, or threatening an intimate partner or their child or engaging in conduct that would place an intimate partner in reasonable fear of bodily injury to them or their child. It has been reported that one in nine background check failures are due to domestic violence, leading to more than 300,000 domestic abusers being denied when trying to purchase a firearm (Giffords Law Center 2019). However, because reporting by agencies into the National Incident Criminal Background Check System (NICS) is voluntary, many are able to still purchase because the necessary disqualifying records are missing from the system. Additionally, individuals with restraining orders and domestic abusers can turn to private sales that do not require a background check to be conducted prior to transfer.

Though the aforementioned laws discuss nine categories of prohibited people and other limitations, such as age, the language used in these codes obligates the seller to determine the legality of the buyer. Specifically, 18 U.S.C. § 922(1) states that it is unlawful for a person to sell or transfer any firearm or ammunition to a person if they are known to be or if there is a reasonable cause to believe that a person may be in one of the previously mentioned categories. To aid in regulating the sale of firearms to prohibited individuals, the U.S. government has passed a few acts. For example, two of the mandated acts that have provisions concerning firearm sales or tracking are the Gun Control Act of 1968 and the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act of 1993. The Gun Control Act of 1968 mandated the licensing of individuals and companies who sell firearms. The act further banned unlicensed individuals from acquiring handguns outside their state of residence (ATF 2005). Moreover, private sales between residents of two different states are prohibited unless the transfer goes through a licensed dealer. However, private sales from a personal collection between unlicensed individuals residing within the same state are permitted without a background check as long as other state and federal laws are not violated (ATF 2005). Additionally, the NICS was created by the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act of 1993 to prevent firearm sales to prohibited people (ATF 2005). The NICS is a background check used by licensed firearm dealers that verifies a prospective buyer is not a prohibited person. Melissa J. Tetzlaff-Bemiller and Candace Griffith See also: District of Columbia v. Heller; Felons and Gun Control; Immigrants and Guns

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Further Reading ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives). “Federal Firearms Regulations Reference Guide.” 2005. https://www .atf.gov/file/58686/download (accessed November 15, 2019). ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives). “National Firearm Act.” n.d. https://www.atf.gov/rules-and - r e g u l a t io n s / n a t io n a l -f i r e a r m s - a c t (accessed November 15, 2019). Bureau of Justice Statistics. “Prisoners in 2017.” 2019. https://www.bjs.gov/content /pub/pdf/p17.pdf (accessed November 15, 2019). France, Orin. “U.S. Supreme Court Rules in Favor of Illegal Immigrant in Possession of Firearm,” Jurist, October 10, 2019. https:// w w w. j u r i s t . o r g / n e w s / 2 019 / 0 6 / u s -supreme-court-rules-in-favor-of-illegal -immigrant-in-possession-of-f irearm / (accessed May 16, 2022). Giffords Law Center. “Mental Health Reporting.” 2019. https://lawcenter.giffords.org /gun-laws/policy-areas/background-checks /mental-health-reporting/#footnote_1_324 (accessed October 10, 2019). Hogden, Phil. “Why (Some) Expatriates Cannot Own Guns.” 2018. https://hodgen.com /why- expat r iates- ca n not- ow n-g u ns / (accessed May 16, 2022). Nichols, D. McNair. “Guns and Alienage: Correcting a Dangerous Contradiction.” Washington and Lee Law Review 73, no. 4 (Fall 2016): 2089–2133. Veterans Affairs. “Forms of Military Discharge.” n.d. https://va.org/forms-of-military -discharge/ (accessed October 12, 2019).

Cease Fire, Inc. Cease Fire, Inc., a national, not-for-profit organization, aimed to save lives by reducing the number of handgun-related deaths and injuries in the United States, especially

among children. The organization focused on the public health implications of handgun violence and endeavored to educate people about the dangers of keeping firearms in the home. Jann Wenner—founder, editor-in-chief, and publisher of Rolling Stone magazine—founded Cease Fire, Inc., in 1996. Funding was provided in part by singer Courtney Love, widow of rock star Kurt Cobain, who killed himself with a handgun. Its advisory board consisted of a broad array of public figures, including former President Jimmy Carter, Senators Bill Bradley and Dianne Feinstein, corporate leaders, and entertainment celebrities. Wenner had been a good friend of John Lennon. Lennon’s murder in 1980 impelled Wenner to become active in the gun control movement and to eventually found Cease Fire. Its stated mission was to “reshape the gun violence debate in America” with a specific goal to promote “handgun-free homes and families” through public education, using a public health model to disseminate public messages and research on death rates of children due to guns, especially guns in the home. In 1997, Cease Fire launched a national awareness campaign that included TV public service announcements (PSAs) and print ads in major newspapers and magazines. The PSAs and print ads noted that ten children were killed by a gun every day. Each ad or PSA presented the true story of a child who had been killed by a handgun in his or her home. The focus on the tragic death of one child made these ads and PSAs very powerful. The print ads showed a picture of a small child or children with captions such as, “John Higgins hid his handgun so well, it took his son three years to find it.” The ad then explained the circumstances in which the child found the gun and the ensuing tragedy. In the case of the John Higgins ad,

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Billy Higgins accidentally shot and killed his two-year-old sister. Cease Fire, Inc., advisory board member and actor Michael Douglas narrated the television PSAs. One ad showed a young boy who was perhaps five or six years old standing on a stack of boxes on a chair to reach a box that contained a gun. The child plays with the gun, the scene fades to black, and a shot is heard. Other PSAs were similar; some featured a group of children playing and then gaining access to a gun in the home. In all of the ads, the message is: “Think your kids don’t know where your gun is? Think again.” Cooperating with Cease Fire on the campaign were the American College of Emergency Physicians, the National Association of Children’s Hospitals and Related Institutions, the National Association of County and City Health Officials, the National Association of Secondary School Principals, and the National Education Association. Cease Fire also worked with leaders from a variety of other organizations and industries, including those in law, law enforcement, entertainment and media, and academia. Cease Fire launched the campaign in Boston, in conjunction with the unveiling of Stop Handgun Violence’s huge highway billboard drawing attention to handgunrelated deaths of children. The campaign then moved to Albuquerque, Austin, Cleveland, Miami, Portland, and Salt Lake City. Cease Fire also worked with parent-teacher associations to promote the campaign. After three years of national operations, the financial drain of the organization led Wenner to shut it down. When Cease Fire stopped operating in 1999, Wenner gave Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR) the rights to use the powerful Cease Fire ads and PSAs. PSR added its name to the

materials and continued to distribute them as part of its “Risk: Gun in the Home” public awareness campaign. The print ads could be downloaded from the PSR website and the PSAs still appeared on television. Although it had a short-lived existence, Cease Fire developed an influential model that continued after its demise to shape public efforts at gun control. Projects were developed in many communities across the nation modeled on Cease Fire, crediting it as influential in their development and success. A notable example is the Chicago Project for Violence Prevention, which reported that its Cease Fire Project in West Garfield Park reduced shootings by as much as 67 percent in one year (Skogan et al. 2008). Similar community projects in other areas, such as the U.S. Department of Justice’s Project Safe Neighborhoods, developed community-based programs using Cease Fire’s model of integrating law enforcement agents and community leaders in successful gun and violence reduction programs. Robin L. Roth See also: Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws; Project Safe Neighborhoods; Trigger Locks

Further Reading Ritter, Nancy. “CeaseFire: A Public Health Approach to Reduce Shootings and Killings.” National Institute of Justice, October 28, 2009. https://nij.ojp.gov/topics /articles/ceasefire-public-health-approach -reduce-shootings-and-killings (accessed May 16, 2022). Skogan, Wesley G., Susan M. Hartnett, Natalie Bump, and Jill Dubois. “Executive Summary Evaluation of CeaseFire-Chicago.” 2008. https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/nij /grants/227181.pdf (accessed December 23, 2021).

160 | Center for Gun Policy and Research U.S. Department of Justice. “Project Safe Neighborhoods: America’s Network against Gun Violence.” 2004. http://www.ncjrs.gov /pdffiles1/bja/205263.pdf (accessed December 23, 2021).

Center for Gun Policy and Research The Center for Gun Policy and Research (CGPR) aims to prevent gun-related injuries and deaths by applying a public health perspective to the issue of gun violence prevention. In pursuit of these goals, the CGPR carries out a broad range of activities, including “original scholarly research, policy analysis, and agenda-setting public discourse” (Center for Gun Policy and Research 2019). The CGPR carries out research on topics such as gun trafficking, domestic violence and guns, keeping guns from young people, and legal issues related to guns and gun violence. Its faculty and affiliated experts pursue strategies for reducing gun violence. The center is based at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, Maryland. In addition to being the oldest and largest school of public health in the country, the Bloomberg School is internationally acclaimed, with over 500 full-time faculty and more than 2,000 students from eightsix countries. Investigation into the cause and prevention of gun injuries and fatalities began at the Bloomberg School in 1995 as part of an overall injury prevention research effort. Center director Daniel Webster has worked on gun violence prevention research for the past two decades. In 1995, the center was formally established with funding from the Joyce Foundation. The center examines the public health effects of guns in society and serves as an objective resource for the media, policy

makers, advocacy groups, and attorneys. For the past two decades, it has helped shape the public agenda in the search for solutions to gun violence. Graduates of the school’s academic programs hold leadership positions in the field of gun violence prevention worldwide. The center carries out a broad range of activities, including scholarly research, policy analysis, and agenda-setting public discourse. It strives to bring public health expertise and perspectives to the complex policy issues related to gun violence prevention. The center’s priority areas of activity and research include the following: • Gun Trafficking: The center studies gun dealer regulation and oversight with the goal of reducing the transfer of firearms from legal to illegal markets. The center focuses on this area because the illegal transfer of guns by corrupt dealers is the single largest channel for guns into the illegal market. • Domestic Violence and Guns: Because guns are the most common weapons used in domestic violence, the center studies policies and behaviors related to gun violence by domestic violence offenders. • Keeping Guns from Youth: The center studies policies and behaviors related to gun access and carrying among youth. The center also designs and evaluates interventions and other policies designed to keep guns from criminals and other high-risk groups. Center researchers study the risk factors for youth violence and help to develop policies and programs to lessen that violence. • Legal Issues: The center monitors and evaluates the effectiveness of major gun laws, including laws banning Saturday night specials, concealed weapons laws, handgun registration laws, handgun licensing laws, and child firearm access

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prevention laws. The center holds to the position that litigation is an important tool for protecting the public’s health. Center faculty assist with litigation designed to change the way guns are designed, marketed, distributed, and sold. In addition to these major foci, the center has made numerous contributions in other areas related to gun violence, including the following: • Guns as Consumer Products: The center redefined the debate on gun violence prevention by proposing that the safe design of guns could be regulated in much the same way as the safety of cars, toys, and other consumer products. This new approach opened the way for legislation and litigation to protect consumers. The center’s research interests also include the marketing of guns and the regulation of gun sales. • Technology for “Safer” Guns: The center pioneered the concept of “personalized” guns that can be fired only by their intended owner. Such guns could potentially prevent childhood gun deaths, youth suicides, and homicides committed with stolen guns. The center promotes incorporating “safer gun” technology into the design and manufacture of all guns through litigation, legislation, regulation, and public education. • Model Legislation: In 1996, the center developed a model law that would require all new handguns to be personalized. This model law, revised in 1998, has been used by Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, and other states in their efforts to draft effective legislation. • Tracking Public Opinion on Gun Use and Prevention Strategies: Since 1996, the center has annually conducted a

national poll in conjunction with the National Opinion Research Center to assess public attitudes toward guns and prevention strategies. The findings provide an important basis for the development of new public policies. • Testimony and Expertise: Center faculty and affiliated experts are frequently invited to advise federal, state, and city legislators on gun laws and regulations, and to regularly testify at congressional and state hearings. • Public Education: A key center function is providing the public with accurate information about gun injuries and prevention strategies. Fact sheets as well as center publications, bibliographies, published articles, and information for the media and general public are available by contacting the center. Nancy Lord Lewin and Walter F. Carroll See also: Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; Medicine and Gun Violence; Motor Vehicle Laws as a Model for Gun Laws; Product Liability Lawsuits; Smart Guns; Trigger Locks; Violence Prevention Research Program (VPRP)

Further Reading Barry, Colleen L., Emma E. McGinty, Jon S. Vernick, and Daniel W. Webster. “After Newtown—Public Opinion on Gun Policy and Mental Illness.” The New England Journal of Medicine 368, no. 12 (March 2013): 1077–81. Barry, Colleen L., Daniel W. Webster, Elizabeth Stone, Cassandra K. Crisafi, Jon S. Vernick, and Emma E. McGinty. “Public Support for Gun Violence Prevention Policies Among Gun Owners and Non-Gun Owners in 2017.” American Journal of Public Health 108, no. 7 (July 2018): 878–81.

162 | Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence (CSPV) Castillo-Carniglia, Alvaro, Rose M. C. Kagawa, Daniel W. Webster, Jon S. Vernick, Magdelena Cerdá, and Garen J. Wintemute. “Comprehensive Background Check Policy and Firearm Background Checks in Three US States.” Injury Prevention 24, no. 6 (December 2018): 431–36. Center for Gun Policy and Research. “Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Prevention and Policy.” 2019. https://www.jhsph .edu/research/centers-and-institutes/johns -hopk i n s - ce nt e r-for-g u n-pol icy-a nd -research/index.html (accessed November 12, 2019).

Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence (CSPV) The Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence (CSPV) assists individuals and groups seeking to understand and prevent violence, especially adolescent violence. Acting as a bridge between researchers on one hand and practitioners and policy makers on the other, CSPV acts as an information clearinghouse, provides technical assistance, and carries out research on the causes and prevention of violence. Although the center does provide information on firearms and their role in violence, it does not emphasize gun and gun control-related issues. Founded in 1992 with a grant from the Carnegie Corporation, CSPV is a research center within the Institute of Behavioral Science at the University of Colorado at Boulder. University of Colorado Professor Beverly Kingston directs the center, which has a threefold mission. First, and most basic, the center provides a central location for collecting, evaluating, storing, and disseminating violence-related information.

Focusing primarily on youth violence, it acts as a clearinghouse providing bibliographic information to the public. It also provides fact sheets and position papers. For example, the “Top 10 Recommendations for School Safety” (CSPV 2018) provides basic information on how to promote safe schools using guidance from the U.S. Secret Service that may help to be better prepared for school-based shootings. They also provide resources, including school climate surveys, that can be used in conjunction with these recommendations for a more robust evaluation of needs and subsequent responses. The second part of the CSPV mission is providing technical assistance in evaluating and developing violence prevention programs. For example, in 2016, the CSPV received funding from the National Institute of Justice to implement and evaluate its Safe Communities-Safe Schools model in nearly fifty schools across the state of Colorado. More recently, between 2019 and 2023, the center was awarded two separate STOP School Violence Program grants through the Bureau of Justice Assistance to examine threat assessment and management protocols. The CSPV also provides technical assistance and training on their various programs. Other similar initiatives include the Youth Violence Prevention Center in Denver, the Gun Shop Project, and Blueprints for Healthy Youth Development. Third, CSPV team members carry out research and data analysis using a variety of different methodologies. Among their list of recent publications published on their website are evaluation studies of various frameworks to prevent school and youth violence (e.g., Dymnicki, Kingston, Arrendo Mattson, Spier, Maher, and Witt 2021), an analysis of risk and protective factors associated



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with youth firearm access (Mattson, Sigel, and Mercado 2020), and threat assessment outcomes (Goodrum et al. 2019). CSPV’s research also is regularly featured in both local and national news stories. Walter F. Carroll and Jaclyn Schildkraut See also: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC); Children’s Defense Fund (CDF); Columbine High School Shooting; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; National School Safety Center (NSSC); School Shootings; Student Pledge against Gun Violence; Youth and Guns; Youth Gun Control Legislation: The Juvenile Justice Bill of 1999

Further Reading CSPV (Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence). https://cspv.colorado.edu (accessed January 21, 2022). CSPV (Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence). “Top 10 Recommendations for School Safety.” June 2018. https://cspv .colorado.edu/wp-content/uploads/2019 /02/Top-10-Recommendations-for-School -Safety.pdf (accessed January 21, 2022). Dymnicki, Allison B., Beverly Kingston, Sabrina Arredondo Mattson, Elizabeth Spier, Susanne Maher, and Jody Witt. Assessing implementation, and effects associated with a comprehensive framework designed to reduce school violence: A randomized controlled trial. National Institute of Justice. 2021. https://www .ojp.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/300113.pdf. Goodrum, Sarah, Mary K. Evans, Andrew J. Thompson, and William Woodward. “Learning from a Failure in Threat Assessment: 11 Questions and Not Enough Answers.” Behavior Science Law 37 (2019): 353–71. https://doi.org/10.1002/bsl.2399. Mattson, Sabrina Arredondo, Eric J. Sigel, and Melissa C. Mercado. “Risk and Protective Factors Associated with Youth Firearm

Access, Possession or Carrying.” American Journal of Criminal Justice 45 (2020): 844–64. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12103-020 -09521-9.

Center to Prevent Handgun Violence. See Brady: United against Gun Violence Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) On July 1, 1946, the Communicable Disease Center began in Atlanta, Georgia with a staff of fewer than 400 and a budget of around $10 million. Its early mission was to combat malaria in the United States as part of the Public Health Service. The CDC pioneered surveillance of public health threats as foundational to ensuring the common welfare and is now known as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, having been renamed in 1970. The agency is presently housed in the Department of Health and Human Services and remains headquartered in Atlanta. The CDC is described as “the nation’s premier health promotion, prevention, and preparedness agency” (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 2018). Though the primary mission of the CDC is typically understood to pertain to infectious and other diseases, they are also concerned with other, non-pathological threats to public health, including traffic fatalities and pregnancy-related deaths. Similarly, the CDC has long been aware of firearms as a serious public health concern, and they note that firearms are among the top five leading causes of death for Americans until the age of sixty-five, especially for males and minorities (Centers for Disease Control and

164 | Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)

Prevention 2020). The CDC takes what is described as a “public health approach” to dealing with such threats, and their methods depend on four steps. The first step is to define problems by identifying how damaging a threat is and to whom it poses the greatest risks. The second step is to identify factors that elevate those risks as well as those that protect against them. The third is to create and test strategies for prevention, and the final step is to advocate for the broad implementation of effective strategies that they identify. The evidence-based approach of the CDC depends upon empirical research into the threats that they identify, and funding is necessary for such research to proceed. The controversial nature of gun violence in the United States and the use of federal dollars in researching it has created a history of politicization with respect to the CDC’s role in researching the issue. From 1985 to 1997, the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, housed within the CDC, utilized a proportion of their annual budget to study gun violence. In 1996, there was an effort by Congress to defund and functionally eliminate this part of the CDC, led by Representative Jay Dickey (R-Arkansas). He and his supporters accused researchers at the CDC of being biased against guns and gun owners after federally funded research linking firearms in homes to higher homicide risks came to public attention. The Dickey Amendment was the result, which prohibited federal funds from being used to advocate or promote gun control efforts (Kellermann and Rivara 2013). The Amendment also eliminated the exact amount ($2.6 million) that had been spent the previous year by the CDC on gun violence research from its budget, earmarking it instead for work on traumatic brain injury. This was underscored by

language that explicitly forbade the use of those monies in gun violence research. In 2011, similar restrictive provisions would be applied to funding for every agency within the Department of Health and Human Services (Rostron 2018). It has been argued that the language of the Dickey Amendment itself did not set any explicit restrictions on federal research on gun violence, but only on political advocacy. However, the practical effect was to severely curtail such work. There was, in other words, reluctance among researchers to test the limits of the restrictions and thereby imperil their careers (Rostron 2018). This remained the status quo for the following twenty years, during which time research into gun violence is estimated to have fallen by at least 64 percent (Schumaker 2019). The actual parameters of the Dickey Amendment’s restrictions would not be clarified until Congress responded to the Parkland, Florida, mass shooting event at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School that took place in February of 2018 (Laslo 2019). Public outcry led to Congress acknowledging in March 2018 that federal funding could support research into the causes of gun violence, though this clarification was not accompanied by any newly allocated funds to conduct such research (Schumaker 2019). In December 2019, the federal government broke from its reluctance to fund research into gun violence in the aftermath of mass shootings in Texas and Ohio earlier that year. Congress approved $25 million in research funds to be split evenly between the CDC and the National Institute of Health and required that the grants proceeding from those allocations be reviewed by Congress to ensure that the work being funded was not ideologically biased (Subbaraman 2019). This development was



hailed as the biggest ever investment by the federal government into research on gun violence and is seen as formalizing governmental approval of this work being continued by the CDC and other governmental agencies (Wetsman 2019). It also simultaneously ended a nearly twenty-five-year period during which no such research was funded within the agency. Marcus Tyler Carey See also: Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Lethality Effect of Guns; National Center for Injury Prevention and Control (NCIPC)

Further Reading Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “Firearm Violence Prevention.” May 22, 2020. https://www.cdc.gov/violencepre vention/firearms/fastfact.html (accessed May 16, 2022). Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “Our History.” December 4, 2018. https:// www.cdc.gov/about/history/index.html (accessed May 16, 2022). Kellermann, Arthur L., and Frederick P. Rivara. “Silencing the Science on Gun Research.” JAMA 309, no. 6 (2013): 549–50. Laslo, Matt. “The CDC Could Totally Study Gun Violence-It Just Needs Money.” Wired.com, August 7, 2019. https://www .w i r e d .c om / s t or y / c d c -g u n -v iole nc e -research-money/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Rostron, Allen. “The Dickey Amendment on Federal Funding for Research on Gun Violence: A Legal Dissection.” American Journal of Public Health 108, no. 7 (2018): 865–67. Schumaker, Erin. “Congress Agrees on Historic Deal to Fund $25 Million in Gun Violence Research.” ABC News, December 16, 2019. https://abcnews.go.com/Health /congress-approves-unprecedented-25 -million-gun-violence-research/story?id =67762555 (accessed May 16, 2022).

Charleston Church Shooting | 165 Subbaraman, Nidhi. “United States to Fund Gun-Violence Research after a 20-Year Freeze.” Nature.com, December 17, 2019. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586 -019-03882-w (accessed May 16, 2022). Wetsman, Nicole. “After a 20-Year Drought, U.S. Lawmakers Fund Gun Violence Research.” The Verge, December 19, 2019. https://www.theverge.com /2019/12/19 /21028779/gun-violence-research-funding -20-year-freeze-congress-bill-cdc-nih -dickey (accessed May 16, 2022).

Charleston Church Shooting Just after 9:00 p.m. on June 17, 2015, twentyone-year-old Dylann Roof was sitting in a Bible study at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church in Charleston, South Carolina. As the church’s parishioners bowed their heads in prayer, he stood up, retrieved the Glock 41 .45 caliber handgun he had brought with him, and opened fire. Within minutes, the perpetrator killed nine and wounded one more before fleeing the church. He was apprehended in Shelby, North Carolina, approximately 245 miles north of Charleston, the following day. The perpetrator, a white supremacist and supporter of apartheid, had specifically chosen Mother Emanuel, as the church was called, because it is one of the oldest Black churches in the nation. Having arrived almost an hour before the shooting, he was welcomed in by the twelve parishioners attending the Bible study, including the church’s senior pastor, Reverend Clementa Pinckney, who also was a state senator. During the next hour, he participated in the reading, initially listening, but eventually engaging in debate over the meaning of Scripture. When the perpetrator retrieved his gun during the prayer, he aimed it at Susie

166 | Charleston Church Shooting

A young boy looks at the items left behind by mourners and well wishers outside the Emanuel A.M.E. Church on Calhoun Street in Charleston, South Carolina. On June 17, 2015, nine Black parishioners were killed during Bible study at the church by a white supremacist who they had invited in to worship with them. (Jerry Coli/Dreamstime.com)

Jackson, an eighty-seven-year-old member of the church’s choir and regular attendee of the Wednesday evening Bible study. Another Bible study member, twenty-sixyear-old Tywanza Sanders, who also happened to be Jackson’s grandnephew, tried to deescalate the situation by asking the perpetrator why he wanted to harm them. The perpetrator respondent with racially motivated vitriol, claiming that they—referring to Blacks—were raping white women and taking over the country and, as such, he had to kill them all. At that moment, he pulled the trigger to shoot Jackson, but Sanders dove in front of her—he became the first

(and youngest) victim when the shooting began. The perpetrator then killed Jackson. Over the next six minutes, the perpetrator methodically went person by person, shooting them with hollow-point bullets as he spewed racial epithets. He also reloaded the gun five times; he had several other magazines that he did not use. In addition to Sanders and Jackson, six others were killed at the church: Reverend Pickney (age fortyone), Cynthia Hurd (age fifty-four), Ethel Lance (age seventy), Reverend Depayne Middleton-Doctor (age forty-nine), Reverend Sharonda Coleman-Singleton (age forty-five), and Myra Thompson (age fiftynine). The final victim, Reverend Daniel Simmons (age seventy-four), died a short time later after being transported to a local hospital. Others who were attending the Bible study survived by pretending they were dead. One woman, Polly Sheppard, was spared by the shooter when he said he wanted her to be able to tell other people what happened. After the shooting, the perpetrator fled to the neighboring state of North Carolina. At 10:44 a.m. on June 18, 2015, the perpetrator was taken into custody during a routine traffic stop after a woman who recognized him and his car called in a tip to the authorities. He was extradited back to Charleston that evening, where he told investigators that he intended to start a race war with the shooting. The following day, the perpetrator was charged with nine counts of murder and one count of possessing a firearm during the commission of a violent crime. On June 20, 2020, he was indicted on thirtythree federal charges, including nine counts of using a firearm to commit murder and twenty-four counts of hate crime-related charges; eighteen of the counts were eligible for capital punishment. On July 7, 2015, three counts of attempted murder also were



levied, and the perpetrator was indicted on all state-related charges. Both state and federal prosecutors stated they intended to seek the death penalty. On July 15, 2015, the perpetrator entered a plea of not guilty on the federal charges at the advice of his attorney. During the pretrial period, the perpetrator was granted the right to represent himself at trial, though he later requested that his lawyers be allowed back for the guilt phase. His federal trial began on December 7, 2016, after several pretrial delays. Eight days later, he was found guilty on all thirty-three counts. On January 4, 2017, the sentencing phase began, during which the perpetrator—who had dismissed his legal team—claimed that there was nothing wrong with him psychologically; the prosecution introduced evidence from an entry in his jailhouse journal written six weeks after the shooting in which he stated he had no regrets about what he had done. On January 10, 2017, he was sentenced to death in the federal case; three months later, he pleaded guilty to the nine counts of murder in the state case and was given nine consecutive life-withoutparole sentences. As of July 2020, he is currently incarcerated at a high-security federal penitentiary in Terra Haute, Indiana, awaiting execution.

The Charleston Loophole The Glock firearm used in the shooting was purchased by the perpetrator on April 16, 2015. The purchase was initiated five days earlier, on April 11, at a store in West Columbia, South Carolina, near where he lived. As it was the weekend, the processing of the transfer application and subsequent background check was not begun until the following Monday, April 13. An initial check of the perpetrator’s criminal history revealed that he was arrested on a felony

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drug charge on March 1, 2015, at which time he admitted to the Columbia police that he was in possession—the latter of which was a disqualifying purchase. Notably, the city of Columbia, where the perpetrator was arrested, actually spans two counties—Richland and Lexington. Although he was taken into custody by officers from the Columbia Police Department (CPD), which is based in Richland County, the arrest actually occurred in Lexington County. When the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) examiner reviewed the perpetrator’s criminal history, the arresting agency was listed as the Lexington County Sheriff’s Office (LCSO). When contacted, however, the LCSO advised that they were not in charge of the case and referred the examiner to the CPD. As the CPD was not on the county’s contact sheet, the examiner contacted the West Columbia Police Department, who also advised it was not their case. Because the CPD was located in Richland County, and the examiner was focused on Lexington County, she never contacted the agency. Further, at the time of the attempted purchase, the Lexington County court website showed the case was pending, meaning that the perpetrator was not technically a convicted felon for the purposes of the NICS check, even though his admitted possession to the CPD was enough to deny the purchase (Federal Bureau of Investigation 2015). On April 16, 2015, the status of the perpetrator’s NICS check was still pending. At that point, the firearms dealer completed the sale and transfer to the perpetrator in accordance with its lawful discretion. Between the date of purchase and the shooting, the FBI continued its investigation into whether the transaction should have been completed. Had the agency determined it should not

168 | Chicago, IL

have, the case would have been referred to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) for recovery; this, however, was not done prior to the shooting. Under what became known as the “Charleston Loophole,” the perpetrator of the AME shooting was able to legally purchase the firearm used in the attack when he should have otherwise been disqualified. Similar reporting loopholes were present in the 2007 Virginia Tech shooting, as well as the Sutherland Springs church shooting that occurred in 2017. On February 8, 2019, Representative Jim Clyburn (D-SC) introduced the Enhanced Background Checks Act of 2019 (H.R. 1112), aimed at closing the loophole. On February 28, 2019, the bill passed the House and was forwarded to the Senate, where it has yet to be addressed as of this writing. According to Skopos Labs, the bill has just a 2 percent chance of passing in the Senate as of July 2020 (GovTrack. us 2020). Jaclyn Schildkraut See also: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF); Hollow Point Bullet; National Instant Criminal Background Check System; Sutherland Springs Church Shooting; Virginia Tech Shooting

Further Reading Federal Bureau of Investigation. “Statement By FBI Director James Comey Regarding Dylann Roof Gun Purchase.” FBI.gov., 2015. https://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel /press-releases/statement-by-f bi-director -james-comey-regarding-dylann-roof-gun -purchase (accessed July 7, 2020). Frazier, Herb, Bernard Edward Powers Jr., and Marjory Wentworth. We Are Charleston: Tragedy and Triumph at Mother Emanuel. Nashville, TN: W Publishing Group, 2016.

GovTrack.us. “Enhanced Background Checks Act of 2019 (H.R. 1112).” 2020. https://www .govtrack.us/congress/bills/116/hr1112 (accessed July 7, 2020). Hawes, Jennifer Berry. Grace Will Lead Us Home: The Charleston Church Massacre and the Hard, Inspiring Journey to Forgiveness. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2019. Risher, Sharon. For a Time Such as This: Hope and Forgiveness after the Charleston Massacre. St. Louis, MO: Chalice Press, 2019. Shapiro, Emily. “Key Moments in Charleston Church Shooting Case as Dylann Roof Pleads Guilty to State Charges.” ABC News, April 10, 2017. https://abcnews.go .com/US/key-moments-charleston-church -shooting- case- dylan n-roof /stor y?id =46701033 (accessed July 7, 2020). Thompson, Anthony B. Called to Forgive: The Charleston Church Shooting, a Victim’s Husband, and the Path to Healing and Peace. Bloomington, MN: Bethany House Publishers, 2019.

Chicago, IL Chicago, Illinois, is the third largest city in the United States, with a city population of over 2.5 million people and a metropolitan population of over ten million (“QuickFacts: Chicago City, Illinois” 2019). Chicago is the largest city in the American Midwest and is located on the southwestern side of Lake Michigan, near the border of Illinois and Indiana. The city is thought to be split by the Chicago River into three distinct regions: the North, West, and South Sides. The population of Chicago is fairly evenly split into approximate thirds by race/ ethnicity: Black/African American, Hispanic/Latino, and white (“QuickFacts: Chicago City, Illinois” 2019). Chicago is politically more liberal, on average, than the rest of the United States; a Republican has not been elected as mayor of the city for



over ninety years (Flanagan 2005). As of 2021, Lori Lightfoot serves as the current Democratic mayor and is not only the first Black woman to assume the office but also the first openly LGBT person to hold the position. Chicago often finds itself in the middle of the debate on the merits of gun control and the effectiveness of gun laws. In early 2017, President Donald Trump threatened via tweet to send in a federal law enforcement agency to quell the number of homicides in the city (Gorner et al. 2020), and proponents of implementing more permissive gun laws in the United States use Chicago as an example of the danger of implementing restrictive gun laws (Lee 2017). At one point, Chicago did have the strictest gun laws in the country, although this has changed since 2010. Between 1982 and 2010, there was a ban on firearms in the city until the Supreme Court ruled this unconstitutional; two years later, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the state’s ban on concealed carry was unconstitutional, paving the way for the Illinois General Assembly to grant its citizens the right to concealed carry (Lee 2017). Currently, to own a firearm in the city, one must be at least twenty-one years old and be granted a firearm owner’s identification card. If they intend to carry the firearm outside their home, they must also complete a sixteenhour training course to obtain a concealed carry license. Both of these documents are granted by the Illinois State Police. Open carry of firearms is prohibited, and the state also does not recognize concealed carry permits from other states (Lee 2017). As a result of these laws, most firearms confiscated in Chicago are not bought in the city. According to a report released by the Office of the Mayor, 7,000 firearms were recovered by the Chicago Police Department

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between 2013 and 2016. Of those, only 40 percent were bought in the state of Illinois, the overwhelming majority of those being bought outside of the city (“Gun Trace Report” 2017). The other 60 percent of firearms were bought in places with more permissive gun laws, including Indiana (21%), which is geographically close Chicago, Mississippi (5.1%), Wisconsin (4.0%), Ohio (2.9%), Kentucky (2.5%), and others (“Gun Trace Report” 2017). Therefore, the gun laws in Chicago and the state of Illinois can only be so effective without more universal passing of restrictive gun laws across the country. By absolute numbers, Chicago often has the largest number of shootings and firearm-related homicides in the nation, depending on the year. Between 2010 and 2020, 2016 had the highest number of casualties by gun violence, with 4,369 individuals shot in Chicago; 2020 (the most recent year of available data at the time of this writing) saw similar numbers, with 4,133 victims of firearm violence (“Tracking Chicago Shooting Victims” 2021). Similarly, 2016 also had the highest number of homicides, of which most were firearm related, with 784 killed; 2020 ended with 769 murders. Chicago, however, is not the most dangerous city in the United States. In relative terms, Chicago is not even the top ten cities with the highest homicide rate, with a per capita rate of 20.7 (“2018 Crime in the United States” 2018). (Of note, Saint Louis, Baltimore, Detroit, New Orleans, and Memphis constitute the five cities with the highest per capita rate of homicide, respectively.) This rate is still, however, approximately twice the rate of the national average. Everyone in Chicago is not equally exposed to gun violence. The majority of shootings happen on the West or South Sides of Chicago, neighborhoods that are

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more likely to be majority Black or Hispanic/Latino, compared to the North Side, which is more likely to be majority white and wealthier (“Tracking Chicago Shooting Victims” 2020). The difference between the homicide rate between these areas can be more than seven times greater in the West and South Sides compared to the North Side (Papachristos, Wildeman, and Roberto 2015). Other demographics, such as age, sex, and race, also have a significant influence on an individual’s likelihood of being shot. For example, it is estimated that the nonfatal gun violence per capita rate is 1.62 per 100,000 for persons identifying as white, 28.72 for Hispanic/Latinos, and 112.83 for Blacks. The rate of being shot for all males is 44.68 per 100,000; Black males have a rate of 239.77 per 100,000, and Black males ages eighteen to thirty-four have a rate of 599.65 per 100,000 or a 1 in 200 chance of being shot per year (Papachristos, Wildeman, and Roberto 2015). The differences in the rate of gun violence by demographic are the result of decades of structural and systemic racist practices that have kept Blacks and Latinos in poverty in the city, whereas whites have been able to build wealth (Moore 2016). For example, the GI Bill, instituted to help veterans of World War II afford housing, led to a rush to the suburbs by whites to buy homes, many of them leaving the city due to the moving in of Black folk to their neighborhoods—otherwise known as white flight. Unfortunately, over one million Black and Latino veterans were excluded from such loans due to the racist act of redlining by the banking institutions of the time. Between the 1950s and 1970s, many neighborhoods of the South Side changed from being near universally white to nearly universally Black or Latino (Moore 2016). Without investment in their communities,

Blacks who did own property saw their property values plummet; and over time, poverty grew in these areas. Consequently, gang-related crime increased as individuals needed to find alternative ways to make money. According to a joint intelligence report by the City of Chicago Police Department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, much of the firearm-related crime can be traced to gang-related activity, spurred by an influx of illegal drugs trafficked by Mexican drug cartels (“Cartels and Gangs in Chicago” 2017). For example, the Sinaloa Cartel uses Chicago gangs as their primary street-level distributor; disputes related to the selling of drugs, including disagreements about territory in which one gang can sell compared to another, result in shootings and homicides. Indeed, the majority of individuals arrested for homicide in Chicago are found to be affiliated with a gang (“Cartels and Gangs in Chicago” 2017). Chicago has instituted many interventions in an effort to reduce gun violence in the city. One of the best known is Cure Violence; however, funding for the program has fluctuated over the years. For example, funding was cut in 2007, 2011, and 2015, which resulted in subsequent increases in shootings and homicides in the city (“Investing in Local Intervention Strategies in Illinois” 2020). Illinois’s 2020 budget has supplied relatively robust funding for gun violence prevention, including funds for the Cure Violence Program; community-based Violence Prevention Programs grants, which provide funds to programs and organizations that aim to reduce violence in atrisk youth through various methods, including violence mediation, mental health services, and mentoring; and programming for violence prevention and street intervention. In total, more than $26 million has



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been allocated to violence reduction strategies in 2020, nearly double the amount that was invested in 2019 (“Investing in Local Intervention Strategies in Illinois” 2020). Although it will take many years to see if this money and the subsequent programs are successful, it is a step in the right direction for reducing gun violence in Chicago. Paul Reeping

2017. https://www.chicagotribune.com/news / br e a k i ng / c t-met- ch icago -g u n-laws -explainer-20171006-story.html (accessed May 16, 2022). Moore, Natalie Y. The South Side: A Portrait of Chicago and American Segregation. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2016. Papachristos, Andrew V., Christopher Wildeman, and Elizabeth Roberto. “Tragic, but Not Random: The Social Contagion of Nonfatal Gunshot Injuries.” Social Science and Medicine 125 (2015): 139–50. https:// doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2014.01.056. “QuickFacts: Chicago City, Illinois.” United States Census Bureau, 2019. https://www .census.gov/quickfacts/chicagocityillinois (accessed May 16, 2022). “Tracking Chicago Homicide Victims.” Chicago Tribune, 2020. https://www.chicago tribune.com/news/breaking/ct-chicago -homicides-data-tracker-html (accessed May 16, 2022). “Tracking Chicago Shooting Victims.” Chicago Tribune, 2021. https://www.chicago tribune.com /data /ct-shooting-victims -map-charts-htmlstory.html (accessed May 16, 2022). “2018 Crime in the United States.” FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR), 2018. https:// ucr.f bi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2018/crime -in-the-u.s.-2018/topic-pages /murder (accessed May 16, 2022).

See also: African Americans and Gun Violence; Drive-By Shootings; Homicides, Gun; McDonald v. City of Chicago; Poverty and Gun Violence; Urbanism and Gun Violence

Further Reading “Cartels and Gangs in Chicago.” 2017. https:// www.dea.gov/sites/default/files/2018-07 / DI R- 013 -17 % 20 C a r t el% 20 a nd % 20 G a n g s % 2 0 i n % 2 0 C h ic a go % 2 0 - % 2 0 Unclassified.pdf (accessed May 16, 2022). Flanagan, Maureen A. “Politics.” Encyclopedia of Chicago, 2005. http://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/989.html (accessed May 16, 2022). Gorner, Jeremy, Stacy St. Claire, Gregory Pratt, and Lisa Donovan. “Calling Chicago ‘a Disaster,’ Trump Announces Surge of Federal Agents Will Be Sent to Deal with Violence Spike.” Chicago Tribune, 2020. https://www.chicagotribune.com/news /criminal-justice/ct-chicago-trump-federal -agents-20200722-ki3dqmj3szgwviclt noubvmmwu-story.html (accessed May 16, 2022). “Gun Trace Report.” 2017. https://www.chicago.gov/content/dam/city/depts/mayor /Press Room/Press Releases/2017/October /GTR2017.pdf (accessed May 16, 2022). “Investing in Local Intervention Strategies in Illinois.” Giffords Law Center, 2020. https://giffords.org/lawcenter/state-laws /investing-in-local-intervention-strategies -in-illinois/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Lee, William. “Are Chicago’s Gun Laws That Strict? An Explainer.” Chicago Tribune,

Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws Child Access Prevention (CAP) laws, also known as safe storage laws, attempt to minimize harm to young people by keeping firearms out of their hands. CAP laws do this by establishing criminal penalties for gun owners who do not store their firearms safely. As of 2020, twenty-nine states and the District of Columbia had established CAP laws (RAND Corporation 2020). In

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some states, violation of the CAP law is a felony. The potential importance of these laws is evident in data on shooting deaths among the young. In 2016, homicide was the third leading cause of death for those ten to nineteen years of age (and the leading cause for non-Hispanic Black youth) (Centers for Disease Control 2021), and 87 percent of them were killed with a firearm (Kegler, Dahlberg, and Mercy 2018). Recognition of the threats to young people from firearms led to the passage of CAP laws. In 1989, Florida became the first U.S. state to pass a child access prevention gun law. CAP laws, which require gun owners to store their firearms in a manner that would prevent children and teens from gaining unauthorized access, vary in how “safe storage” is defined but generally require firearms to be securely locked in a cabinet or gun safe, or, in some states, with a trigger lock. Some CAP laws hold gun owners criminally liable only if unsafe storage leads to an injury, whereas others are not dependent upon injurious outcomes. Another way state CAP laws vary is in the maximum penalty allowed for law violations, with a minority of states allowing for felony prosecutions in cases of CAP law violations. The first study of such laws used data through 1994 to estimate the effects of the first twelve state CAP laws that went into effect (see Cummings et al. 1997). The authors estimated that these laws were associated with a significant reduction (41%) in the rate of unintentional firearm deaths among youths up to age fourteen, but only in states with felony prosecution. Data from this study also indicated that there was a negative association between the adoption of these laws and teen firearm suicide rates that approached statistical significance. Webster and Starnes (2000) conducted a subsequent study with data through 1997

that assessed the effects of CAP laws on unintentional firearm deaths among youth under age fifteen in the first fifteen states to adopt these laws. They found that CAP law effects were not uniform across states. Florida’s CAP law was associated with a 51 percent drop in the rate of unintentional firearm deaths to youths, but there was no effect of the law in the other fourteen CAP law states. Lott and Whitley (2002) examined the effects of CAP laws on crime as well as on unintentional firearm deaths and suicides among youth. They hypothesized that CAP laws could increase criminal victimization within the home by making guns less accessible for home occupants to defend themselves against home intruders. Despite the relative rarity of unintentional firearm deaths to youths under age fifteen in most states in a given year, the authors estimated CAP laws’ effects within five-year age groups. They report no statistically significant CAP law effects on unintentional firearm deaths or suicides across all CAP law states, among those that allow felony prosecutions for CAP law violations, or in any single state that adopted a CAP law. The study also found that the introduction of CAP laws were associated with statistically significant increases in police-reported rapes (9%), robberies (8–10%), and burglaries (4–6%). Under various assumptions about prelaw trends, the authors report even greater law-associated increases in crime, including increases in aggravated assaults. It is difficult to discern exactly why Lott and Whitley do not find significant CAP law effects on unintentional firearm deaths when such effects were so striking in Webster and Starnes’s research. Breaking up the zero to fourteen age group into three fiveyear subsets weakens statistical power to detect statistically significant effects. Lott and Whitley also use a statistical model



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(Tobit) not typically used to study data with many zero values for specific states and years, because the model can be highly sensitive to model specification. Model specification is also at issue in the derivation of the laws’ effects on crime, as no specification tests are offered, and some of the findings are difficult to reconcile. For example, their models also reveal that laws prohibiting individuals from bulk handgun purchases increase crime both in the state that adopts the measure and in adjacent states. The findings on CAP laws’ effects on crime are also not consistent with other relevant research findings. Kellermann et al. (1995) found that citizens attempted to use a gun in defense in less than 2 percent of home invasion crimes. The 8–10 percent increase in total robberies associated with the adoption of CAP laws does not seem plausible given that only 11 percent of all robberies occur in residences (Federal Bureau of Investigation 1998), most of which will not have either children or guns. If such effects were true, CAP laws would have to double the number of robberies in residences. The reduction in burglaries also seems implausible. By definition, such crimes do not involve criminal contact with victims, and most criminals are unlikely to be aware of laws concerning firearm storage. A study by Grossman and his colleagues (2005) indicated that the practices associated with CAP laws do reduce youth suicide and unintentional injury in homes with children and teenagers. As of early 2022, this is the only study to assess such a relationship, though research by Monuteaux, Azrael, and Miller (2019) employed Grossman and colleagues’ findings in their estimation of the effects of safe storage by gun owners with children, finding that an additional 20 percent of firearms safely stored could save hundreds of children’s lives annually.

Researchers continue to be hindered in studying the effectiveness of CAP laws due to data availability and quality issues (RAND Corporation 2020). Daniel W. Webster and Walter F. Carroll See also: Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Gun Control; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Kellermann, Arthur L.; Lott, John R., Jr.; Motor Vehicle Laws as a Model for Gun Laws; Victimization from Gun Violence; Youth and Guns

Further Reading Centers for Disease Control. “Preventing Youth Violence.” 2021. https://www.cdc.gov /violenceprevention/pdf/yv/YV-factsheet .pdf (accessed December 23, 2021). Cummings, Peter, David C. Grossman, Frederick P. Rivara, and Thomas D. Koepsell. “State Gun Safe Storage Laws and Child Mortality due to Firearms.” Journal of the American Medical Association 278 (1997): 1084–86. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Crime in the United States, 1997: Uniform Crime Reports. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 1998. Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Child Access Prevention.” 2021. https://giffords.org/lawcenter/gun-laws /policy-areas/child-consumer-safety/child -access-prevention/ (accessed December 23, 2021). Grossman, David, Beth A Mueller, Christine Riedy, M Denise Dowd, Andres Villaveces, Janice Prodzinski, Jon Nakagawara, John Howard, Norman Thiersch, and Richard Harruff. “Gun Storage Practices and Risk of Youth Suicide and Unintentional Firearm Injuries.” Journal of the American Medical Association 293 (2005): 707–14. Kegler, Scott R., Linda L. Dahlberg, and James A. Mercy. “Firearm Homicides and Suicides in Major Metropolitan Areas—United

174 | Children’s Defense Fund (CDF) States, 2012–2013 and 2015–2016.” Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report 67, no. 44 (2018): 1233–37. https://www.cdc.gov /mmwr/volumes/67/wr/mm6744a3.htm (accessed May 16, 2022). Kellermann, Arthur L., Lori Westphal, Laurie Fischer, and Beverly Harvard. “Weapon Involvement in Home Invasion Crimes.” Journal of the American Medical Association 273 (1995): 1759–62. Lott, John R., Jr., and John E. Whitley. “Safe Storage Gun Laws: Accidental Deaths, Suicides, and Crime.” Journal of Law and Economics 44 (2002): 659–89. Monuteaux, Michael C., Deborah Azrael, and Matthew Miller. “Association of Increased Safe Household Firearm Storage with Firearm Suicide and Unintentional Death Among US Youths.” JAMA Pediatrics 173, no. 7 (2019): 657–62. https://doi.org/10 .1001/jamapediatrics.2019.1078. RAND Corporation. “The Effects of ChildAccess Prevention Laws.” 2020. https:// www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/analysis /child-access-prevention.html (accessed December 23, 2021). Webster, Daniel W., and Marc M. Starnes. “Reexamining the Association between Child Access Prevention Gun Laws and Unintentional Firearm Deaths among Children.” Pediatrics 106 (2000): 1466–69.

Childproof Guns. See Smart Guns

Children’s Defense Fund (CDF) A private, nonprofit child advocacy group, the Children’s Defense Fund has regularly advocated strict gun control measures in the United States. The organization was founded in 1973 by Marian Wright Edelman, an African American lawyer deeply involved in

civil rights activism in the South during the 1960s. Under Edelman’s leadership, the Washington, DC–based CDF has sought to inform the U.S. public on the state of children’s health, welfare, and education and to lobby government at all levels in favor of policy initiatives aimed, for example, at expanding access to early childhood education and health insurance. Its primary focus is on issues affecting poor children, minority children, and children with disabilities, with improvement in the health indexes of these groups being a central goal of the organization. Evidence indicating that Americans under the age of nineteen—especially male African Americans—are far more likely than children and youth in other industrialized nations to suffer firearm-related injury or death has led the CDF to argue that the prevention of gun violence is a vital issue of children’s health in the United States. For many years, the CDF campaigned vigorously for tighter restrictions on the ownership and availability of firearms, attributing high numbers of gun-related homicides, suicides, and accidental deaths among young people in the United States to a lack of such restrictions. The measures supported by the organization have included the registration of all firearms to facilitate police tracking of guns that end up in the hands of children as well as licensing requirements for potential gun owners to ensure firearms competency and knowledge of safe storage. As of 2010, however, legislative action addressing the issue of gun violence occupies a less prominent position among the CDF’s list of priorities, a development owing in part to recent U.S. Supreme Court rulings challenging the constitutionality of the sort of legal controls on firearms ownership and proliferation advocated by the organization (the landmark rulings were made in District of Columbia v. Heller and



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McDonald v. City of Chicago). The dramatic overall decline in gun deaths among U.S. children and youths since the mid-1990s, a trend evident in statistics published by the CDF, also appears to have diminished the urgency of the issue. Nonetheless, the frequency of such deaths remains sufficiently elevated, especially among African Americans, to keep the level of gun violence affecting U.S. children on the list of “unwanted distinctions” cited by the organization in its comparative assessments of U.S. conditions with those elsewhere. In addition to its national headquarters, the CDF maintains fourteen offices in eleven states and encourages a wide range of activism in support of its legislative and policy agenda. The organization’s “Protect Children, Not Guns” publication recommends a variety of approaches to reducing gun violence, ranging from public pressure in favor of “common-sense gun safety measures,” such as childproof features for firearms, to the active cultivation in homes, schools, and community institutions of nonviolent conflict resolution skills. Its bestknown contribution to policy debates is an annual report on the status of children and youth in the United States. This report provides a wide array of statistical and other information to policy makers and the public on a number of issues of concern to the organization, gun violence among them. Paul Lokken See also: District of Columbia v. Heller; McDonald v. City of Chicago; Youth and Guns

Further Reading Children’s Defense Fund. “About CDF.” n.d. https://www.childrensdefense.org/about -cdf/ (accessed December 23, 2021). Children’s Defense Fund. “Protect Children Not Guns 2010.” 2010. https://www.child

rensdefense.org/wp-content/uploads/2018 /08/protect-children-not-guns-2010-report .pdf (accessed December 23, 2021). Children’s Defense Fund. “The State of America’s Children Handbook 2012.” 2012. https:// www.childrensdefense.org/wp-content /uploads/2019/06/soac-2012-handbook.pdf (accessed December 23, 2021).

Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA) The Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms is a nonprofit, 501(c)4 organization that describes itself as “the commonsense gun lobby.” The CCRKBA serves mainly to promote political activities in support of gun rights, while its companion organization, the Second Amendment Foundation, focuses more on education, legal action, and publications. According to its IRS 990 filings, its revenues peaked at over $3 million in 2009, the first year of the Obama administration and after the District of Columbia v. Heller (554 U.S. 570) decision favoring gun rights. Revenues fell in subsequent years but has remained in the $1.5–$2 million per year range. The CCRKBA is part of a network of gun rights organizations overseen by Alan Gottlieb. Its stated mission is “to educate grass root activists, the public, legislators, and the media. Our programs are designed to help all Americans understand the importance of the Second Amendment and its role in keeping Americans free.” Gottlieb has served as chair of the CCRKBA, and Joe Waldron, a retired Marine Corps officer, has served as executive director. The CCRKBA accepts annual membership donations from $15 to $1,000. CCRKBA and the Second Amendment Foundation share offices in Bellevue,

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Washington. The two organizations cosponsor an annual Gun Rights Policy Conference. They also share ownership of several talk radio stations, and the CCRKBA purchased part of Oregon station KBNP in 2009. Marketing services had been contracted with Merril Associates. The CCRKBA lists about one-third of its expenses as being dedicated to lobbying activities, with the other two-thirds for educational activities. According to the Center for Responsive Politics (opensecrets.org), its lobbying activities ranked fifth among gun rights organizations by the late 2010s, well behind the National Sports Shooting Foundation, National Rifle Association, Gun Owners of America, and the National Association of Gun Rights. Nevertheless, it has had a consistent, national lobbying presence for decades. In 2011, the CCRKBA added to its advocacy efforts though a billboard truck that is used at events across the country to promote its “Guns Save Lives” campaign. The CCRKBA is a direct response to a billboard truck campaign sponsored by Mayors against Illegal Guns that includes a counter of the number of gun violence victims since the Representative Gabrielle Giffords shooting in Tucson, Arizona, in early 2011. Though the CCRKBA aggressively supports a gun rights agenda, it has been criticized by some activists for its occasional willingness to compromise with gun control supporters. Gottlieb and the CCRKBA supported a 1999 proposal in Washington State related to storage of unlocked guns. In 2011, the CCRKBA offered, via a press release, to meet with President Obama’s staff on gun control issues. At the same time, it reiterated support for gun rights and included criticism of a federal investigation that allowed drug dealers to purchase guns and transport them to Mexico in an attempt

to follow the weapons to cartel leaders. The organization appeared to be willing to support federal background check legislation in 2013. With these few exceptions, it otherwise has been in agreement with other gun rights organizations. Marcia L. Godwin See also: Gottlieb, Alan Merril; Gun Owners of America (GOA); Gun Rights Policy Conference (GRPC); Gun Shows; National Rifle Association (NRA); Second Amendment Foundation (SAF)

Further Reading Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms. https://www.ccrkba.org/ and https://www.facebook.com/CCRKBA/ (accessed August 29, 2020). Cook, Philip J., and Kristin A. Goss. The Gun Debate: What Everyone Needs to Know. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014. Utter, Glenn H. Encyclopedia of Gun Control and Gun Rights. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 2000.

City of Chicago v. Beretta. See Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers City of Cincinnati v. Beretta. See Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers City of Gary v. Smith & Wesson. See Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers City of New York v. A-1 Jewelry & Pawn. See Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005



City of New York v. Beretta. See Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005 City of St. Louis v. Cernieck. See Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers Civil War and Small Arms The American Civil War has been characterized as the first “modern” war. One of the most important changes was the shift from Napoleonic tactics in the field. The practice of massing infantry for frontal assaults (which often involved firing a volley at point-blank range and then resorting to the bayonet and/or using the musket as a club) proved disastrous in the face of new firearm technology and munitions that were brought to bear in this conflict. Specifically, the use of the “minie ball,” the replacement of the musket with the rifle, and the supplanting of the single-shot rifle with the breech action, rapidly firing carbine all led to the demise of the tactic of frontal assault. It took commanders on both sides a while to learn this lesson, however. Confederate general Robert E. Lee, looking for a decisive victory on northern soil and buoyed by the fighting spirit and mettle of his troops, made the same fundamental error at Gettysburg that Union general Ambrose Burnside had made against the Army of Northern Virginia in 1862, at Fredericksburg. Union general Ulysses S. Grant made the same mistake in 1864 at Cold Harbor, a catastrophe that cost the North 13,000 casualties to the South’s 2,500. The arms and munitions that spelled the end of the “age of frontal assault” were

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mass-produced in the North but hard to come by in the South. At the beginning of the war, both sides were using single-shot, muzzle-loading rifles that were very similar. Early in the war, the North used the Springfield .58-caliber musket, while the South relied on the .577-caliber British Enfield—among other arms secured in Europe. The efforts of Confederate agents such as Caleb Huse, a Massachusetts native, were crucial in this regard. Increasingly, a wide variety of weapons salvaged from the battlefield proved critical to southern armies as the northern blockade became more effective. The North, also initially short of arms, used numerous European suppliers as well. By the time production at northern armories reached capacity late in the war, Union forces were well armed. Northern armories produced three million firearms during the war, and Union agents purchased another million in Europe. Of the total of 500,000 guns in Confederate hands, well over twothirds had been purchased in Europe. The greater part of the remainder was provided by the battlefield or seized from Union facilities occupied by the Confederate government immediately following secession. Union forces also benefited from innovative rapid-fire firearms such as the .52-caliber Sharps and the .52 rimfire Spencer carbines, as well as the .44-caliber Henry rifle. Only the innate conservatism of their army ordnance office bound the Union troops to the less efficient Springfield until relatively late in the war. Colt’s revolvers found favor with both sides; the .36-caliber Navy model was especially popular in the South. Union forces favored the .44-caliber version, and it was later almost supplanted by the sturdier and less expensive Remington .44 Army. Revolvers quickly displaced sabers in the

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A row of stacked Union rifles sit at Petersburg, Virginia, on April 3, 1865. (Library of Congress)

cavalry; increased firepower was far more effective and less hazardous than slashing about with a sword in close quarters. Many infantrymen carried a variety of pocket pistols and other handguns foraged from the battlefield or brought from home—also useful in hand-to-hand fighting after exhausting the single shot from the rifle (bayonet charges were thankfully rare). Numerous revolvers made by other manufacturers, domestic and European, were obtained by both government and individuals throughout the war. Rudimentary but very functional machine guns, Gatling guns, and other precursors made their appearance in the war but played no major part. The importance of the Civil War for the history of firearms and the development of the gun culture in the United States is that after the Union’s huge advantage in industrial weapons production crushed the agrarian South, huge numbers of used and surplus weapons went home with both

victor and vanquished. A generation of combat-hardened young men had learned the relatively new lesson that firepower prevails. Disastrous and abortive Reconstruction-era violence followed, and much of the “wildness” in the West can be attributed to these young men and their arsenals. Furthermore, the gun manufacturers of the Connecticut Valley, who had profited mightily from federal contracts, sold the surplus inexpensively and began to advertise and dump their wares to those in the cities and on the frontiers. The government itself engaged in sales of large lots of this surplus in the postwar period. Some of the sales were at government facilities in the United States, and many of these arms and gun parts found their way to private owners and gunsmiths. (A surprising amount of U.S. surplus firearms was offered on the international market, being sold to the French and ending up as Prussian war booty following the Franco-Prussian War. The



Prussians sold much of it to Turkey.) Immigrants and those on the way west made heavy emotional investment in the incipient gun mythos. With highly accurate rifles like those developed during the war, professional hunters exterminated the buffalo, and the forces of the victorious Union, with massive firepower, including the Gatling gun, firmly put the remaining Native Americans in what the white man considered their place—the reservation. The aftermath of the war allowed the innovations in weaponry of the first modern war to be carried by all and sundry and may have been the critical period in the formation of an American gun culture. Francis Frederick Hawley See also: Colt, Samuel; Gun Culture; Remington, Eliphalet, II; Surplus Arms

Further Reading Coggins, Jack. Arms and Equipment of the Civil War. Wilmington, NC: Broadfoot, 1990. Edwards, William B. Civil War Guns. Harrisburg, PA: Stackpole Press, 1962. Nosworthy, Brent. The Bloody Crucible of Courage: Fighting Methods and the Combat Experience of the Civil War. New York: Carroll and Graf, 2003.

Civilian Marksmanship Program. See National Board for the Promotion of Rifle Practice (NBPRP) Clinton, William J.(1946–) In 1992, William Clinton became the first president of the United States to be elected with a public stance that was antithetical to the National Rifle Association (NRA).

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During his first term (1993–1997), significant gun control legislation was enacted, and after his party lost control of Congress in 1994, the president continued to propose additional legislation while also pursuing nonlegislative means. With Clinton’s support, the “Brady Bill” (named for James Brady, President Reagan’s press secretary, who was shot and seriously wounded along with Reagan and two law enforcement officers in 1981) was enacted by Congress after seven years of debate under previous administrations (including a veto by President George H. W. Bush) and signed into law by Clinton in November 1993 (PL 103-159). The law established a five-business-day waiting period for handgun sales through licensed dealers. The statute also required local law enforcement authorities to conduct background checks on handgun purchasers (this provision was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in Printz v. United States [95-1478], 521 U.S. 98 [1997]). In 1994, Congress enacted the administration’s crime bill (PL 103-322). The statute’s key gun control provision was a ban on the manufacture, sale, and importation of nineteen assault weapons (this provision of the statute had a “sunset clause,” and lapsed on September 13, 2004). Congress also passed the Gun-Free Schools Act of 1994 (PL 103382), which required schools receiving federal funds to expel for at least one year any student who brought a weapon to the school. After the Democratic Party lost control of Congress in the 1994 election (in his 2004 autobiography, Clinton acknowledged that his support of gun control measures hurt his party in the midterm elections), Clinton resorted to nonlegislative means to pursue his gun control policies. In 1997, Clinton and the nation’s eighth largest gun manufacturers agreed

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Bill Clinton served as the 42nd president of the United States. Elected in 1992 on a platform countering the National Rifle Association, Clinton helped enact significant gun control legislation, including the Brady Bill, the Assault Weapons Ban, and the Gun-Free Schools Act, during his first term. (The White House)

that they would include child safety locks with all new handguns. Clinton had previously issued an executive memorandum ordering federal law enforcement authorities to provide child safety locks for their officers’ firearms. In 1998, he issued an executive order banning the importation of fifty assault weapons. In March 2000, the Clinton administration announced that Smith & Wesson, the nation’s largest gun manufacturer, had agreed to reform the way it designed, distributed, and marketed the company’s products. The agreement settled a number of lawsuits brought by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and a number of local jurisdictions against

major U.S. gun manufacturers. The suits sought compensation for the damages that the guns produced by the manufacturers had inflicted upon the aggrieved communities. Smith & Wesson became the first defendant to settle. In April 2000, in the aftermath of a shooting at the National Zoo, where seven children were wounded, Clinton announced that HUD and the District of Columbia government would spend $350,000 to buy 7,000 guns as part of a local gun buyback program. The Washington program was the largest of HUD’s BuyBack America program, a $15 million initiative that more than 80 local jurisdictions had already joined. Clinton’s efforts to convince a Republican-controlled Congress to enact additional gun control legislation were unsuccessful. After the Columbine High School shooting in April 1999, the president proposed raising the legal age for owning a gun from eighteen to twenty-one and extending the Brady Law waiting period requirement to weapons sold at gun shows. These measures were rejected by Congress, with many of the opponents arguing that additional gun control legislation would not prevent incidents like that at Columbine and that more effective enforcement of existing gun laws could have a more significant impact. Jeffrey Kraus See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Background Checks; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Columbine High School Shooting; Democratic Party and Gun Control; Elections and Gun Control; Gun Shows; Gun-Free School Laws; Smith & Wesson Settlement Agreement

Further Reading Clinton, William Jefferson. My Life. New York: Knopf, 2004.

Clinton, William Jefferson. Proposed Legislation: “Saving Law Enforcement Officers’ Lives Act of 1995”: A Message from the President of the United States Transmitting a Draft of Proposed Legislation to Save the Lives of America’s Law Enforcement Officers. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1995. U.S. Congress. House of Representatives. Committee on the Judiciary. Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act: Report Together with Additional and Dissenting Views to Accompany H.R. 1025. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1993. U.S. Congress. House of Representatives. Federal Firearms Licensing: Hearing before the Subcommittee on Crime and Criminal Justice of the Committee on the Judiciary, House of Representatives. 103rd Cong., 1st sess., June 17, 1993. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1993. U.S. Congress. House of Representatives. Pending Firearms Legislation and the Administration’s Enforcement of Current Gun Laws: Hearing before the Subcommittee on Crime of the Committee on the Judiciary, House of Representatives. 106th Cong., 1st sess., May 27, 1999. Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, 2000. U.S. Congress. House of Representatives. Subcommittee on Crime. Implementation of the National Instant-Check System for Background Checks of Firearm Purchasers: Hearing before the Subcommittee on Crime of the Committee on the Judiciary, House of Representatives. 105th Cong., 2d sess., June 11, 1998. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 2000. U.S. Congress. House of Representatives. Subcommittee on Crime and Criminal Justice. Brady Handgun Violence Protection Act: Hearing before the Subcommittee on Crime and Criminal Justice of the Committee on the Judiciary, House of Representatives, 103rd Congress, 1st Session on H.R. 1025, September 30, 1993. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1994.

Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV) | 181 U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. Reducing Youth Gun Violence: An Overview of Programs and Initiatives: Program Report. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, 1996. U.S. General Accounting Office. Gun Control: Implementation of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act: Report to the Committee on the Judiciary, U. S. Senate, and the Committee on the Judiciary, House of Representatives. Gaithersburg, MD: U.S. General Accounting Office, 1996.

Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV) The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV) is a national, 501(c)(4) nonprofit gun control advocacy organization. CSGV’s sister organization, the Educational Fund to Stop Gun Violence, is a 501(c)(3) organization that focuses on public education. The coalition’s leadership includes Josh Horwitz, executive director, and Michael Beard, president emeritus. In 1974, the United Methodist General Board of Church and Society formed the National Coalition to Ban Handguns, a group of thirty religious, labor, and nonprofit organizations with the goal of addressing “the high rates of gun-related crime and death in American society” by licensing gun owners, registering firearms, and banning private ownership of handguns with “reasonable limited exceptions” for “police, military, licensed security guards, antique dealers who have guns in unfireable condition, and licensed pistol clubs where firearms are kept on the premises.” In 1989, the organization ceased advocating for a national

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ban on handguns and changed its name to the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence. CSGV currently has forty-eight national organizations as members, including faithbased groups, child welfare advocates, public health professionals, and social justice organizations. Its stated mission is “to secure freedom from gun violence through research, strategic engagement and effective policy advocacy.” In 2001, CSGV launched a campaign to close “illegal gun markets,” a paradigm that has now become the operating principle of the modern gun control movement. CSGV projects as of July 2020 include the following efforts: • Extreme Risk Laws: Extreme risk protection orders (ERPOs) enable family members and/or law enforcement to petition a court to temporarily remove firearms from an individual in crisis for whom violence, either personal, interpersonal, or stranger, might be imminent. CSGV took the lead in drafting and lobbying for the first ERPO legislation to be passed, which was enacted in California in 2014 following the mass shooting in Isla Vista. Since then, CSGV has provided assistance to advocacy groups and policy makers seeking to implement similar legislation, which is in effect in nineteen states as of July 2020; similar legislation has been introduced in twenty-six other states. • Disarming Domestic Abusers: CSGV continues to work on policies designed to limit domestic abusers’ access to firearms, which have been shown to increase the likelihood fivefold that an intimate partner will be killed by an abusive partner. In 2018, the organization partnered with the National Coalition against Domestic Violence and the Alliance for Gun Responsibility, launching a joint

effort called “Disarm Domestic Violence (http://disarmdv.org/). • Implement “Microstamping” Laws in States across the Country: Microstamping technology uses lasers to make microscopic engravings on the breech face and firing pin of a gun. As the gun is fired, a code identifying the weapon’s serial number is stamped onto the cartridge. CSGV implemented a multiyear public education campaign to promote micro-stamping technology in California. This effort bore fruit when Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed legislation in October 2007 mandating the microstamping of all new models of semiautomatic handguns in the state. In 2009, the District of Columbia enacted a microstamping law while revising its laws following the Heller decision. CSGV continues to advocate for microstamping technology in other states. • Universal Background Checks: CSGV continues to lobby at both the state and federal levels for background checks to be conducted on all firearms sales, including online and private transactions. The organization was instrumental in helping the House of Representatives pass the Bipartisan Background Checks Act of 2019, which would ensure people who are prohibited from purchasing or possessing a firearm would not be able to obtain them. Ladd Everitt See also: Beard, Michael K.; Black Market for Firearms; District of Columbia v. Heller; Gun Shows; Microstamping (Bullet Serial Numbers); Washington, DC

Further Reading Coalition to Stop Gun Violence. http://www .csgv.org/ (accessed July 8, 2020).

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Collectors Collecting firearms appears to be one of the more popular hobbies in the United States. Though it is difficult to produce a precise estimate of the number of gun collectors in the United States, the activity is sufficiently widespread to support a very large number of publications, websites, and chat rooms. These communications outlets are organized in almost every conceivable fashion. Whereas some publications, such as the National Rifle Association’s quarterly journal Men at Arms, are intended for general audiences, other magazines and websites cater to much narrower clienteles. Some publications target readers interested in particular time periods, such as those of the Old West, the American Civil War, or World War II; others focus attention on collectors of specific brands of firearms, such as Browning, Winchester, Colt, or Smith & Wesson. Still others are organized around a geographical unit, such as the Dallas Arms Collectors’ Association or the New Mexico Gun Collectors’ Association. Although it is difficult to generalize about such a diverse group of communications outlets, these magazines and websites tend to emphasize four different types of messages. First, these media constitute an important means of exchange. Information about gun sales, shows, and innovations are spread to interested readers through both substantive articles and paid advertisements. In addition to providing information about the purchases of guns and ammunition, these publications also provide access to further information. Some of these, such as Men at Arms or the more specialized Guns of the Old West, contain reviews of books on topics of interest to gun collectors.

Second, many of the articles in publications for gun collectors consist of descriptions of historical events in which firearms played important roles. These might include accounts of battles, military and scientific expeditions, or the depiction of firearms in the general media culture. The emphasis on history appears to fulfill an important rhetorical purpose, which involves pointing out the constructive use of guns in significant events in U.S. and world history. Third, many of the articles in gunoriented publications focus on the technical, performance-related characteristics of various weapons. Often, several different firearms of the same general type (such as revolvers, rifles, or shotguns of a particular caliber) are tested and compared to one another along different technical criteria. These might include accuracy, durability, aesthetics, and reliability. The theme of safety is often emphasized in articles of this type, since associations of gun owners and collectors are often eager to live down a perceived reputation for recklessness. Finally, some of these publications and sites carry explicit political messages. These are generally labeled clearly and set off from the rest of the publication in question. Explicitly political communications seem generally to fall into one of two distinct types. One set of messages emphasizes the legitimacy of gun ownership and the folly of gun control. These will often contain messages about the Constitution generally (or, more specifically, the Second Amendment) or about American history. The American Revolution is a popular theme in these communications, as the notion of a “citizen militia” is a very powerful rhetorical symbol to members of these groups. The connection between this type of political socialization and the historical articles described above is quite obvious, and there

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is considerable overlap between the two categories. Somewhat more rarely, other political messages will emphasize short-term tactics and will contain descriptions of candidate positions on firearm-related issues, information about pending legislation in Congress or in state legislatures, or analyses of recent court decisions. The popularity of gun collecting in the United States has contributed to the phenomenon of the “gun show,” in which gun enthusiasts can gather to exchange information and perspectives on aspects of gun ownership. Gun shows are often settings in which guns, ammunition, and accessories can be purchased with legal or practical exemptions from government regulations. The general point is that gun collecting is far from a private activity. Although individual collections may appear isolated from one another, gun collectors have created elaborate communications networks, which in turn promote shared cultural values and ideological perspectives. Ted G. Jelen See also: Gun Culture; Gun Ownership; Gun Shows; Recreational Uses of Guns; Target Shooting

Further Reading Horwitz, Joshua, and Casey Anderson. Guns, Democracy, and the Insurrectionist Idea. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2009. Shideler, Dan. 2012 Standard Catalog of Firearms: The Collector’s Price and Reference Guide. Iola, WI: Krause, updated annually.

Colleges and Gun Violence Rates of violent crime are far lower on college campuses than those in the general public. Rare as it may be though, violent

crime does still happen on college campuses, and gun violence is especially dangerous there given both the nature of the setting and firearms’ high rate of lethality when compared with other means of assault (Penn Medicine News 2014; Wolf et al. 2019). In fact, research has indicated that firearms are used in 9 percent of violent crimes against college students (Carr and Ward 2006), highlighting the risk that students face from firearms. Furthermore, even as violent crime has declined in the United States as a whole, and Clery Act statistics show that criminal offenses on campus have fallen sharply since the mid-2000s (U.S. Department of Education 2020), research indicates that gun violence there may be increasing. When comparing the time periods of 2001–2006 and 2011–2016, shooting incidents on or near college campuses have increased 153 percent, and total casualties have increased by 241 percent (Cannon 2016). When considering campus violence, many people think exclusively of mass shootings. However, research from the FBI indicates that there were just twelve active shooter incidents (defined as “an individual actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a confined and populated area”) on campuses between 2000 and 2013, resulting in sixty deaths (Blair and Schweit 2014). Using the broader scope of investigating all shootings that took place both on and near college campuses between 2001 and 2016, research by the Citizens Crime Commission of New York City shows that rampage shootings account for just 5 percent of incidents of gun violence, although they cause more deaths and injuries (130 out of the 437 total victims in the study) than any other category. The largest portion of gun violence incidents are precipitated by disputes (38%) or robberies (21%), while



smaller numbers of shootings involved drugs (12%), targeted employees or students (11%), or domestic violence (7%) (Cannon 2016).

The Nature of Gun Violence on Campuses In addition to being institutions of higher learning, colleges and universities are also workplaces and/or places of residence for a wide variety of people. Therefore, campuses sometimes end up being the sites of gun violence not because they are targeted, but instead because those acts are either perpetrated by, or directed toward, people who live and work there. One high-profile example of this took place in 2010 when a professor at the University of Alabama at Huntsville opened fire at a faculty meeting, killing three of her colleagues and wounding three others. The shooting was precipitated by the professor’s denial of tenure by the university, but after the incident, it became clear that she had a past history of violence and workplace problems. Therefore, despite the fact that it occurred on a college campus, this killing is more accurately described as a case of workplace violence rather than as what is traditionally thought of as a “school shooting.” Indeed, there are many gun crimes that occur on campus that appear unrelated to the location. These include cases of domestic violence, such as the murder of Lesli Kelly, a food service worker at the Penn State Beaver campus, who was killed there by her ex-husband in 2017 (Bradbury and Goldstein 2017), or that of a student at Central Michigan University who killed his parents in his dorm room in 2018 (Thomason 2018). As these crimes targeted intimate acquaintances, they could have happened almost anywhere that the

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perpetrator and the victims were in the same location and a firearm was accessible. Additionally, there are cases of gun violence that result from crimes—including gang-related crimes and drug dealing—that spill over from nearby areas or are simply crimes that started elsewhere but get detected on a campus. This may be especially likely to occur in urban centers, where crime rates are higher, and on campuses with buildings—such as medical centers (Korte 2018)—that serve the public.

Rampage Shootings on Campuses Much of the gun violence that occurs on college campuses can be considered routine given the high rates of gun ownership and gun crime in the United States. Such crimes are so commonplace that they often do not make national news and simply fade into the background of the larger patterns of gun violence. However, one type of gun violence—rampage shootings—tends to be very high profile and is often covered intensely by the media. Although there have been mass casualty incidents at educational institutions as far back as the 1800s, the first prominent rampage shooting in the modern era took place in 1966 at the University of Texas at Austin. There, a former marine took several firearms to the top of the campus’s clock tower and shot and killed fourteen people before he was killed by police. Since then, there have been a number of other rampage shootings on college campuses, including Virginia Tech (2007), Northern Illinois University (2008), Oikos University (2012), Santa Monica College (2013), University of California San Bernardino (2014), Umpqua Community College (2015), and the University of North Carolina Charlotte (2019).

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Prevention / Solutions The most common prevention strategies for campus gun violence include banning firearms from university property, the regular presence of police or campus safety officers, and the establishment of groups of university employees (often referred to as Behavioral Intervention Teams, or Campus Assessment, Response & Education [CARE] Teams) tasked with responding to information that suggests that students may be in distress. In addition to these approaches, however, one commonly proposed solution to prevent or mitigate rampage shootings is to allow students and faculty to carry firearms on campus. As of May 2020, six states plus Washington, DC, completely ban both open and concealed carry of firearms from college campuses, a legal position that was affirmed as presumptively constitutional in the 2008 District of Columbia v. Heller Supreme Court case. Seven additional states ban open and concealed carry on campus but have exceptions allowing firearms in vehicles. Four states restrict concealed carry but do not ban open carry, although they typically allow individual institutions to restrict open carry if they choose to do so, either for everyone or only for members of the campus community. A total of twenty-one states leave the decision about whether to allow firearms on campus up to individual institutions (with most opting for bans). And even in the twelve states where firearms are generally allowed on campus, there are often restrictions on things like the settings where weapons are permitted (e.g., in disciplinary hearings or at sporting events) (Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence n.d.). These laws are constantly in flux, with new legislation being proposed every year.

Firearms Ownership on Campus Recent survey data indicate that reported levels of gun ownership among college students are around 30 percent (Patten et al. 2013; Lewis and Huynh 2017; Verecchia and Hendrix 2018), though most students appear to leave their firearms at home. Only about 4 percent of students report having a working firearm with them at college (Miller, Hemenway, and Wechsler 2002), and typically less than 2 percent report that they carry concealed firearms on campus (Cavanaugh et al. 2012; Wells et al. 2012; Thompson et al. 2013), even in states where campus carry is legal (Reimal et al. 2019). Support for campus carry is highest among males, Republicans, and those who are gun owners (Schildkraut et al. 2018), and these results are similar for both students and faculty (Bennett et al. 2012; Nodeland and Saber 2019). However, the level of support for gun carrying varies based on a number of demographic factors, including the region of the country where the survey is carried out (Schildkraut et al. 2017). Support for firearms on campus is also affected by factors such as perceptions of campus safety, with lower perceived safety leading to lower support for allowing firearms on campus (De Angelis et al. 2017; Nodeland and Saber 2019). Impacts of Firearms Ownership on Campus There are two proposed mechanisms by which firearm carrying on campus is theorized to reduce crime: (1) potential criminals will choose not to commit crimes at all because the presence of firearms makes the crime less likely to be successful; or (2) if a crime is already being committed, the use of armed force by victims or passersby would prevent additional victimization either by killing the offender or by causing



them to break off the attack. However, data has not typically supported either element of this theory. Research on mass public shootings from 1966 to 2015 showed that 84 percent of all such incidents take place in areas where firearms are allowed, 5 percent take place in gun-restricting zones (where civilians may not be legally armed, but police or armed security are present), and just 12 percent take place in zones where no one is legally armed (Webster et al. 2016). The authors argue that this is because shootings are typically “directed at a specific person, group, or institution with whom the perpetrator has a grievance” (Webster et al. 2016, 11) rather than chosen because of the presence or absence of firearms. Separate research by Blair and Schweit (2014) and Klarevas (2016) also indicates that armed civilians rarely stop mass killings from taking place, and they may actually be more likely to be shot themselves than to successfully terminate a shooting in progress. Given the rarity of rampage shootings, especially the subset that occur on college campuses, it is perhaps unsurprising that the likelihood of one being stopped by an armed student is so low. Furthermore, even when campus carry laws are evaluated in terms of their broader effect on crime, evidence for positive impacts are lacking. A study by Gius (2019) used Clery Act data from 2005 to 2014, aggregated to the state level, to compare crime rates in states with and without laws allowing concealed carry on campus. The analysis revealed that laws regarding campus carry were not significantly associated with levels of either violent or property crime, although it did indicate that states with unpermitted concealed carry had lower property crime rates. That effect notwithstanding, Gius concluded from the data

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that “campus carry laws are not an effective tool in reducing campus crime” (Gius 2019, 8). Moreover, Biastro and colleagues (2017) compared rates of campus sexual assault in three states before and after the passage of laws allowing concealed carry on campus. Across the fifty-four colleges and universities that were part of the research, the authors found no evidence that sexual assault declined after the laws changed— and, in fact, found evidence of a significant increase in those crimes after the change.

Negative Consequences of Firearms on Campus Regardless of their effect on campus crime, increasing the number of firearms on campus is not without cost. Firearms intended for protective use can easily be used instead for self-harm, something which is very common on campuses. Suicide is the second most common cause of death among college students (David 2019), leading to over 1,000 deaths per year (Morris 2016); the majority of these are carried out using a firearm (Thompson et al. 2009). Other preliminary research indicates that suicide rates are as much as three times higher on campuses that allow concealed carry than on campuses where guns are banned (Sanfilippo 2017). These findings are in line with previous research indicating that “easy access influences the choice of [suicide] method” (Sarchiapone et al. 2011, 4550), and that restricting access to means of suicide, especially those that are highly lethal, can be an effective strategy to reduce suicide. This is especially important in a population that experiences high rates of stress, often lives unhealthy lifestyles—including high rates of alcohol consumption—and who may be experiencing issues with adjustment around being away from home (David 2019).

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Attitudes about Firearms on Campus For these reasons, as well as others, research has found that a majority of faculty, staff, and students oppose campus carry (Hassett et al. 2020), as do large majorities of university presidents (Price et al. 2014, 2016), though there is significant variability in support from campus to campus. This pattern appears to hold true on both two-year and four-year college campuses, with faculty reporting that they would feel the increased presence of firearms would alter the environment to one that feels threatening (Dahl et al. 2016). Among students, women and members of racial minorities reported that increased gun carrying on campus would make them more vulnerable to victimization and feel less commitment to the college environment (Soboroff et al. 2019), a finding that mirrors the higher level of support for campus carry among conservative white males (Verrecchia and Hendrix 2018). However, evidence suggests that support for campus carry is complex, and its relationship to variables like prior victimization and distrust of the police and government is not always straightforward (Kyle et al. 2017; De Angelis et al. 2017). Zachary Miner See also: Alcohol and Gun Violence; Campus Carry; District of Columbia v. Heller; Mass Murder (Shootings); Virginia Tech Shooting

Further Reading Baum, Katrina, and Patsy Klaus. Violent Victimization of College Students, 1995–2002. Washington, DC: Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2005. https://www.bjs.gov/content /pub/pdf/vvcs02.pdf (accessed April 29, 2020). Bennett, Katherine, John Kraft, and Deborah Grubb. “University Faculty Attitudes Toward Guns on Campus.” Journal of

Criminal Justice Education 23, no. 3 (2012): 336–55. Biastro, Leslie A., Karen H. Larwin, and Marla E. Carano. “Arming the Academy: How Carry-on-Campus Impact Incidence of Reported Sexual Assault Crimes.” Research in Higher Education Journal 32 (2017): 1–12. Blair, J. Pete and Katherine W. Schweit. A Study of Active Shooter Incidents in the United States between 2000 and 2013. Washington, DC: Texas State University and Federal Bureau of Investigation, 2014. Bradbury, Shelly, and Andrew Goldstein. “Two Dead in Apparent Murder-Suicide at Penn State Beaver; No Ongoing Threat.” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, December 13, 2017. https://www.post-gazette.com/local /nor th /2017/12/13/Penn-State-Beaver -shooting-campus-Monaca-Beaver-County /stories/201712130187 (accessed June 12, 2022). Cannon, Ashley. Aiming at Students: The College Gun Violence Epidemic. New York: Citizens Crime Commission of New York City, 2016. Carr, Joetta L., and Robert L. Ward. “American College Health Association Campus Violence White Paper.” NASPA Journal 43, no. 3 (2006): 380–409. Cavanaugh, Michael R., Jeffrey A. Bouffard, William Wells, and Matt R. Nobles. “Student Attitudes Toward Concealed Handguns on Campus at 2 Universities.” American Journal of Public Health 102, no. 12 (2012): 2245–47. Dahl, Patricia P., Jr., Gene Bonham, and Frances P. Reddington. “Community College Faculty: Attitudes Toward Guns on Campus.” Community College Journal of Research and Practice 40, no. 8 (2016): 706–17. David, Eden. “Rising Suicide Rates at College Campuses Prompt Concerns over Mental Health Care.” ABC News, October 9, 2019. https://abcnews.go.com/Health /rising-suicide-rates-college-campuses

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-prompt- concer ns-ment al /stor y?id = 66126446 (accessed June 12, 2022).

at College.” Journal of American College Health 51, no. 2 (2002): 57–65.

De Angelis, Joseph, Terressa A. Benz, and Patrick Gillham. “Collective Security, Fear of Crime, and Support for Concealed Firearms on a University Campus in the Western United States.” Criminal Justice Review (Sage Publications) 42, no. 1 (2017): 77–94.

Morris, Nathaniel P. “Stopping Suicides on Campus.” Scientific American, November 30, 2016. https://blogs.scientificamerican .com/mind-guest-blog/stopping-suicides -on-campus/ (accessed June 12, 2022).

Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Guns in Schools.” Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. n.d. https://lawcenter .g if ford s.org /g u n-laws /policy-a rea s /guns-in-public/guns-in-schools/ (accessed May 21, 2020). Gius, Mark. “Campus Crime and Concealed Carry Laws: Is Arming Students the Answer?” Social Science Journal 56, no. 1 (2019): 3–9. Hassett, Matthew R., Bitna Kim, and Chunghyeon Seo. “Attitudes toward Concealed Carry of Firearms on Campus: A Systematic Review of the Literature.” Journal of School Violence 19, no. 1 (2020): 48–61. Klarevas, Louis. Rampage Nation: Securing America from Mass Shootings. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2016. Korte, Lara. “Police Identify Man Killed at University of Kansas Hospital.” University Daily Kansan, December 4, 2018. http:// www.kansan.com/news/police-identify -man-killed-at-university-of-kansas-hospital /article_cf6a2396-f7f2-11e8-9efc-ab8adb032d0c.html (accessed April 28, 2020). Kyle, Michael J., Joseph A. Schafer, George W. Burruss, and Matthew J. Giblin. “Perceptions of Campus Safety Policies: Contrasting the Views of Students with Faculty and Staff.” American Journal of Criminal Justice 42, no. 3 (2017): 644–67. Lewis, Rhonda K., and Mai Huynh. “Mental Health Provision, Religion, Politics, and Guns: College Students Express Their Concerns.” Mental Health, Religion & Culture 20, no. 8 (2017): 756–65. Miller, Matthew, David Hemenway, and Henry Wechsler. “Guns and Gun Threats

Nodeland, Brooke, and Mark Saber. “Student and Faculty Attitudes toward Campus Carry After the Implementation of Sb11.” Applied Psychology in Criminal Justice 15, no. 2 (2019):157–70. Patten, Ryan, Matthew O. Thomas, and James C. Wada. “Packing Heat: Attitudes Regarding Concealed Weapons on College Campuses.” American Journal of Criminal Justice 38, no. 4 (2013): 551–69. Penn Medicine News. “Survival Rates Similar for Gunshot, Stabbing Victims Whether Brought to the Hospital by Police or EMS, Penn Medicine Study Finds—PR News.” 2014. https://www.pennmedicine.org/news /news-releases /2014/januar y/sur vival -rates-similar-for-gun (accessed April 28, 2020). Price, James H., Amy Thompson, Jagdish Khubchandani, Joseph Dake, Erica Payton, and Karen Teeple. “University Presidents’ Perceptions and Practice Regarding the Carrying of Concealed Handguns on College Campuses.” Journal of American College Health 62, no. 7 (2014): 461–69. Price, James H., Amy Thompson, Erica Payton, Juliane Johnson, and Olivia Brown. “Presidents of Historically Black Colleges and Universities Perceptions and Practices Regarding Carrying of Concealed Handguns on Their Campuses.” College Student Journal 50, no. 1 (2016): 135–44. Reimal, Emily, Sino Esthappan, Paige S. Thompson, and Jahnavi Jagannath. Guns on College Campuses. Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2019. https://www.urban .org/sites/default/files/publication/100963 /g u n s _ o n _ c ol lege _ c a m p u s e s _1.p d f (accessed April 29, 2020).

190 | Colt, Samuel Sanfilippo, Marjorie. “Concealed Carry on Campus—Research Can Inform the National Debate.” Campus Law Enforcement Journal 47, no. 3 (2017): 45–48. Sarchiapone, Marco, Laura Mandelli, Miriam Iosue, Costanza Andrisano, and Alec Roy. “Controlling Access to Suicide Means.” International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 8, no. 12 (2011): 4550–62. Schildkraut, Jaclyn, Collin M. Carr, and Victoria Terranova. “Armed and Academic: Perceptions of College Students on Concealed Carry on Campus Policies.” Journal of School Violence 17, no. 4 (2018): 487–99. Schildkraut, Jaclyn, Kevin Jennings, Collin M. Carr, and Victoria Terranova. “A Tale of Two Universities: A Comparison of College Students’ Attitudes about Concealed Carry on Campus.” Security Journal 31, no. 2 (2017): 591–617. Soboroff, Shane, William Lovekamp, and Robert Jenkot. “Social Status and the Effects of Legal Concealed Firearms on College Campuses.” Journal of Criminal Justice Education 30, no. 3 (2019): 376–88. Thomason, Andy. “Student Shot and Killed His Parents in Central Michigan U. Dorm, Police Say.” The Chronicle of Higher Education, March 2, 2018. https://www .chronicle.com/article/student-shot-and -killed-his-parents-in-central-michigan -u-dorm-police-say/ (accessed June 12, 2022). Thompson, Amy, James H. Price, Joseph A. Dake, Karen Teeple, Sara Bassler, Jagdish Khubchandani, Dianne Kerr, et al. “Student Perceptions and Practices Regarding Carrying Concealed Handguns on University Campuses.” Journal of American College Health 61, no. 5 (2013): 243–53. Thompson, Amy, James H. Price, Adam J. Mrdjenovich, and Jagdish Khubchandani. “Reducing Firearm-Related Violence on College Campuses--Police Chiefs’

Perceptions and Practices.” Journal of American College Health 58, no. 3 (2009): 247–54. Turner, James C., E. Victor Leno, and Adrienne Keller. “Causes of Mortality Among American College Students: A Pilot Study.” Journal of College Student Psychotherapy 27, no. 1 (2013): 31–42. U.S. Department of Education. “Campus Safety and Security.” 2020. https://ope.ed .gov / c a m p u s s a fe t y / Tr e n d / p u bl i c / # /answer/1/101/trend/-1/-1/-1/-1 (accessed April 28, 2020). Verrecchia, P. J., and Nicole Hendrix. “College Students Perceptions Toward Carrying Concealed Weapons on College Campuses.” Journal of Criminal Justice Education 29, no. 1 (2018): 62–78. Webster, Daniel, John Donohue, Louis Klarevas, Cassandra Crifasi, Jon Vernick, David Jernigan, Holly Wilcox, Sara Johnson, Sheldon Greenberg, and Emma McGinty. Firearms on College Campuses: Research Evidence and Policy Implications. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins, 2016. Wells, William, Michael Cavanaugh, Jeffrey Bouffard, and Matt Nobles. “NonResponse Bias with a Web-Based Survey of College Students: Differences from a Classroom Survey about Carrying Concealed Handguns.” Journal of Quantitative Criminology 28, no. 3 (2012): 455–76. Wolf, Ashley E., Michelle M. Garrison, Brianna Mills, Titus Chan, and Ali RowhaniRahbar. “Evaluation of Injury Severity and Resource Utilization in Pediatric Firearm and Sharp Force Injuries.” JAMA Network Open 2, no. 10 (2019): 1–10.

Colt, Samuel(1814–1862) For more than a century, beginning in 1855, Colt revolvers were manufactured in the brownstone armory that Samuel Colt built near the Connecticut River in Hartford. At the time, it was the largest private armory in



the world, crowned with a blue, onionshaped dome, still a Hartford landmark. Inventor, entrepreneur, and promoter Samuel Colt was born in Hartford in 1814. His passion for firearms and explosive devices as a youngster made him an indifferent student, to the chagrin of his father. Christopher Colt had difficulties with his son from the beginning. The senior Colt apprenticed Samuel to a farmer when the boy was eleven. He was an indifferent hand and spent more time reading up on gunpowder, galvanic experiments, and inventors than seemed proper. His reading program ultimately inspired an obsession for inventing what contemporaries called an “impossible gun”—one that would shoot five or maybe six times without reloading. Brought back to work in his father’s factory in 1829, Samuel quickly created a ruckus by using a galvanic cell (a battery) to explode an underwater charge of gunpowder. In 1832, Christopher Colt apprenticed his wayward son as a sailor on the brig Corvo, bound from Boston to Calcutta. While aboard, the sixteen-year-old youth conceived of the revolutionary idea of the revolver by watching the action of the ship’s wheel. This inspiration led him to carve a wooden model of would become a six-shooter. After Samuel returned from the sea, Christopher Colt, a successful entrepreneur, proved willing to finance the fabrication of two prototypes of Colt’s six-shooter. Both failed to give satisfactory performance. Undeterred, but penniless, Colt set out to earn the money needed to carry on his experiments by becoming an itinerant performer of spectacles. He billed himself as “the celebrated Dr. Coult of New York, London, and Calcutta.” With knowledge of the properties of the newly discovered nitrous oxide gas, he toured Canada and the East Coast for three years giving demonstrations of “laughing

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gas.” With his earnings, he engaged a competent mechanic, John Pearson, to fabricate improved models or his six-shooter. Then, borrowing $1,000 from his father, Colt set out in 1835 to secure patent protection for his idea in Europe. Still only twenty-one, he received patents in London (December 8, 1835) and France—and, the following February, U.S. Patent No. 138. On the strength of these, he raised $200,000 in capital from New York and New Jersey investors. Colt’s first attempt at manufacturing took place in Paterson, New Jersey, in a leased section of a silk mill. The company failed in 1842, despite the fact that one hundred of his revolvers had met with success against the Seminole Indians in Florida and in Texas, where the newly formed Texas Rangers used them in their fights against the fierce Comanche. Even with these successes, Colt faced a familiar problem among nineteenth-century manufacturers of novel and complex mechanical devices. Their inventions stretched the limits of contemporary technological capabilities for volume production. The capital and labor costs required for a precision product simply rendered volume sales impossible. Without the volume, the potential revenue could not repay the investment. In this period of the 1840s, even the national armories at Springfield and Harpers Ferry were just beginning to achieve their first truly effective interchangeability of parts for long arms—a much less demanding set of machining tasks than Colt faced with his handgun. The “filing and fitting” necessary for Colt’s guns made volume sales an elusive dream— even if he could find willing buyers. Five years later, at the outset of the Mexican War, the U.S. Army gave Colt an order for 1,000 revolvers. Even this relatively small run was beyond his capacity. Still “poor as a churchmouse,” as he said, and

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Samuel Colt perfected a revolving barrel firearm in the 1830s and made $15 million manufacturing his Colt revolver over the next 30 years. He lost Northern credibility during the Civil War after selling guns to the Confederacy. (Cirker, Hayward, ed., Dictionary of American Portraits, 1967)

clearly lacking production facilities, Colt turned to Eli Whitney Jr. in Whitneyville, Connecticut, to partner in the manufacture of the Colt-Whitney-Walker model. Everyone had known the guns were effective since the days of their use against the Seminoles and the Comanche. It was the Mexican War and the development of manufacturing capacity, however, that really launched Colt on his way to fame and fortune. Colt returned to Hartford to set himself up in a rented facility and set out to produce the Colt Dragoon model. By 1852, he was able to purchase 250 acres of floodprone land in the South Meadows and began work building a great armory and a selfsufficient community called Coltsville. Ignoring the skepticism and hostility of the

city fathers, he built a dike along his property for flood protection, laid out streets, erected houses for his employees, and even built a hall for their entertainment. Always on the lookout for more business, Colt saw an opportunity to furnish weapons to both sides in the Crimean War. The first American to manufacture abroad, he opened a factory in London in 1853 to make the Model 1849 Pocket and the Model 1851 Navy. Unfortunately, the plant was mismanaged and closed in 1857. The operating genius of the Colt Armory was Elisha K. Root, the most brilliant machinist of his era in New England. Adapting the system of interchangeable parts pioneered by Eli Whitney and the Springfield Armory, Root developed equipment and processes that made possible the mass production of firearms on machines, except for the finishing and final assembly. By 1857, the armory turned out 250 guns a day. It also became a training center for a succession of gifted mechanics, like Pratt and Whitney, who went on to apply Root’s methods in companies of their own. It is said that Root was the inspiration for the hero in Mark Twain’s novel A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court. Colt himself functioned as president and salesman extraordinaire through aggressive marketing and close relations with military officials, legislators, and foreign heads of state. Thousands of his revolvers were shipped to California during the Gold Rush. He traveled abroad, wangling introductions to government officials and making them gifts of beautifully engraved weapons. In less than a decade, Colt had become the United States’ first tycoon, a bibulous millionaire and cigar-puffing bachelor who had everything except a wife and home. Colt set out to acquire the wife and a mansion with his usual dispatch, showmanship,



and pomp. For his bride, he chose the gracious and gentle Elizabeth Jarvis, daughter of a Middletown minister. At age thirty, Elizabeth Jarvis was twelve years Colt’s junior. For Colt, it was the perfect match. The extravagance of their wedding in June 1856 shocked Hartford’s staid society. Likewise, Colt’s extravagant and palatial Armsmear on the western end of his domain caused a great deal of society chatter. As North and South raced toward the cataclysm of the Civil War, Colt busily harvested profits from both the U.S. Army and the southern states. A Democrat, he opposed the election of Lincoln out of fear the Union would be destroyed—and a lucrative market thereby lost. In his view, slavery was not a moral wrong, just an inefficient economic system. Anticipating the onset of conflict, he shrewdly prepared the armory for a fiveyear struggle and the arming of a million men. To that end, he erected a duplicate facility that mirrored his existing H-shaped factory. The demands of wartime production seemed to sap strength and wear down his seemingly inexhaustible energies. Plagued by frequent attacks of inflammatory rheumatism, he continued to drive himself as if he knew his days were numbered. At the age of forty-seven, he died on January 14, 1862, leaving his widow and son Caldwell an estate that was adjudged enormous at the time. Samuel Colt had adopted as his motto “Vincit qui patitur” (he conquers who suffers). But a more apt key to his character is the remark he once wrote to his half-brother William: “It is better to be at the head of a louse than at the tail of a lion. . . . If I can’t be first I won’t be second in anything.” A catastrophe almost put an end to the armory two years after his death, as 1,500 men worked two ten-hour shifts to keep

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Ulysses S. Grant’s Union troops supplied with muskets and revolvers. Fire destroyed the original factory and most of the machines. Undaunted, Elizabeth Colt ordered the building of a new armory. At the height of the Civil War, production had reached 100,000 revolvers and nearly 50,000 muskets annually. The coming of peace, however, brought an end to the military’s demand for arms. The company tried to keep its workforce busy making machine tools, steam engines, sewing machines, printing presses, and both the Gatling and Browning machine guns. In 1872, the company brought out the six-shot Colt .45, or “Peacemaker,” the gun that became a legend among cowboys and frontiersmen. It was said that whereas Lincoln made all men free, Colt made all men equal. In 1901, four years before her death, Mrs. Colt, the grande dame of Hartford society, sold the Colt Armory to Boston and New York financiers. The company earned huge profits until the end of World War I, paying its investors annual dividends averaging 22 percent. Making and selling arms and munitions was a business like any other, and the moral aspects of being “dealers in death” did not disturb the conscience of management. Certainly, Hartford did not regard gun making as a sin. Connecticut had been the arsenal of the nation since colonial times. During World War I, the Colt Armory achieved the highest production levels in its history. Before U.S. entry into the war, because of demand from Canada and Great Britain, the company’s order backlog extended to three years, employment rose to nearly 4,000, and its stock quintupled in value. By the end of the war in 1918, it had delivered 425,500 automatic pistols, 151,700 revolvers, 13,000 Maxim-Vickers machine

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guns, and 10,000 new Browning machine guns, all while smoothly handling the subcontracting of nearly 100,000 more. Employment peaked at 10,000. The three most responsible for this spectacular achievement were Colt president William C. Skinner; Fred Moore, head of production; and the inventor John Browning, whose .45 pistol was the army’s standard sidearm. Besides his .30-caliber machine gun, he also invented a lightweight automatic rifle. His son, Lt. Val A. Browning, was the first to fire both weapons in France. Peacetime called for a different strategy. Anticipating a severe drought in military sales, Skinner and his successor, Samuel Stone, set in motion a diversification program, as was done after the Civil War. They obtained contracts for adding machines and commercial dishwashers to be marketed under the name of someone other than Colt. Stone acquired a company engaged in molding hard plastics, which he renamed “Colt rock,” and another company that made electrical products. Colt weathered the Great Depression better than most other Hartford manufacturers, reducing the work week, cutting salaries, keeping more men on the payroll than were needed, and eating up surplus. On Pearl Harbor Day in 1941, the company was still the largest private armory in the United States and the only one turning out machine guns. As it had in two previous conflicts, Colt Armory stretched itself to the limit, winning the army-navy “E” for outstanding production in 1942. But a few months later, it was evident that the armory was in the incipient stage of its eventual downfall. It began losing money every month. The root of the trouble was partially its fatigued and strife-torn labor force, but more important was the obsolescence of both management and manufacturing techniques.

In September 1955, the directors voted to merge Colt Armory with an upstart conglomerate called Penn-Texas, which had acquired Pratt & Whitney Machine Tool the same year. Under the new ownership, the most significant achievement was the introduction of the M16 automatic rifle, which became the standard army and air force weapon. In the past two decades, Colt Armory suffered one blow after another: more mismanagement, heavy deficits, obsolete products, loss of markets and contracts, defense cutbacks, a four-year strike, another buyout, and bankruptcy. Yet it recovered from all of these reversals and now operates not in the old downtown armory, but in a modern plant in West Hartford. The departure from its original location in 1994 marked the end of 147 years of gun making in Hartford, during which not only Colt Armory but also Sharps, Pope Manufacturing, and Pratt & Whitney Machine Tool had led the state to an unprecedented era of power and prosperity. The armory is being renovated for small businesses, artists’ studios, and possibly a museum of industrial technology. Ellsworth S. Grant and David S. Lux See also: Browning, John Moses; Remington, Eliphalet, II; Ruger, William Batterman; Winchester, Oliver Fisher

Further Reading Barnard, Henry. Armsmear: The Home, the Arm, and the Armory of Samuel Colt: A Memorial. New York: Alvord, 1866. Edwards, William B. The Story of Colt’s Revolver. Harrisburg, PA: Stackpole, 1953. Flayderman, Norm. Flayderman’s Guide to Antique American Firearms. Iola, WI: F+W Media, Inc., 2007. Grant, Ellsworth S. The Colt Armory. Lincoln, RI: Andrew Mowbray, 1995.

Haven, Charles T., and Frank A. Belden. A History of the Colt Revolver. Special edition. Fairfax, VA: National Rifle Association (Odysseus Editions), 1997. Hosley, William. Colt: The Making of an American Legend. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1996. Lindsay, David. Madness in the Making: The Triumphant Rise and Untimely Fall of America’s Show Inventors. Lincoln, NE: iUniverse, Inc., 1997, 2005. Rasenberger, Jim. Revolver: Sam Colt and the Six-Shooter That Changed America. New York: Scribner’s, 2020. Rohan, Jack. Yankee Arms Maker: The Story of Sam Colt and His Six-Shot Peacemaker. Rev. ed. New York: Harper, 1948. Serven, James Edsall, and Carl Metzger. Paterson Pistols, First of the Famous Repeating Firearms Patented and Promoted by Sam’l Colt. n.p.: Foundation Press, 1946. Wilson, R. L. The Colt Heritage: The Official History of Colt Firearms, from 1836 to the Present. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1979.

Columbine High School Shooting On the morning of April 20, 1999, Columbine High School seniors Eric Harris (age eighteen) and Dylan Klebold (age seventeen) carried out what remains one of the most notorious mass shootings in U.S. history. The attack on the Littleton, Colorado, high school, which was the culmination of more than two years of planning and preparation, originally was designed to be a bombing. When the bombs failed to detonate, however, they adapted their plans and began firing on students. Over the next fifty minutes, twelve students and a teacher were killed, with twenty-four others injured; the pair then committed suicide

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as law enforcement made entry into the building. Prior to April 20, the perpetrators had conducted surveillance of the school’s cafeteria and determined that it was at its highest capacity—nearly 500 students—at 11:17 a.m. Subsequently, this was when they set the timers on two twenty-pound propane tank bombs they placed in the cafeteria on the day of the attack; two additional bombs, timed for the same moment, were placed in a field several miles from the school to create a diversion for law enforcement and draw them away from Columbine. Due to a design issue in the clocks used as the timing devices on the bombs in the school, however, they failed to detonate. When the perpetrators, who had taken up position in two separate areas of the school’s parking lots and were ready to shoot fleeing survivors, realized that their original plan was not going to work, they quickly changed course. They approached the school building, armed with four guns (two sawed-off shotguns, a Hi-Point 995 9-millimeter carbine semiautomatic rifle, and an IntraTec TEC-DC9 semiautomatic pistol), seven knives, hundreds of rounds of ammunition, and nearly 100 improvised explosive devices (IEDs; e.g., pipe bombs, Molotov cocktails). Both of their cars, which were left in the school’s parking lots, also had been rigged with explosives and contained napalm to enhance the explosion, designed to kill first responders. At 11:19 a.m., the perpetrators had made their way up toward the school building on its west side, climbing up the exterior steps toward an entrance on the upper level. Witnesses recall hearing them yell “Go! Go!” just before the shooting started. Using the two shotguns that had been concealed under black trench coats, the perpetrators opened fire on students who were eating lunch on

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the grassy area nearby. Rachel Scott was the first to be killed; Richard Castaldo, who was sitting with her, also was shot and permanently paralyzed. They continued shooting down toward the entrance to the cafeteria, wounding several additional students and killing Daniel Rohrbough as he tried to flee. The perpetrators also threw IEDs onto the school’s roof, into the parking lot, and onto where Rachel and Richard were previously sitting. As the shooting unfolded outside, students in the cafeteria had taken refuge under the tables once they realized it was not a senior prank. Approximately five minutes after the shooting began, teacher Dave Sanders was seen on surveillance camera footage rushing in and ordering the students to flee. Around that same time, school resource officer Neil Gardner, a Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office deputy, arrived back at the school from neighboring Clement Park and engaged the perpetrators. In doing so, he created a window of opportunity that allowed for teacher Patti Nielsen and student Brian Anderson, who had come to the school’s entryway to investigate the commotion, to escape back into the building after one of the perpetrators had attempted to shoot them through the glass. The perpetrators continued to exchange gunfire with Deputy Gardner and other officers responding to the scene before making their way into the school building. At the time of Columbine, the protocol for law enforcement responding to active shooter events was to create a perimeter and wait for the SWAT team to respond, which is what the responding officers did. (Importantly, Columbine led to changes in such protocols for law enforcement such that initial officers responding to the scene immediately work to neutralize the threat and minimize the loss of life.)

Once inside the building, where hundreds of students and educators had taken shelter, the perpetrators continued to randomly fire their weapons and detonate IEDs. As they made their way down the north hallway, a main corridor of the building, and then turned right down an adjacent hallway toward the library, the pair encountered Dave Sanders, who had made his way up from the lower level after alerting the students and staff in the cafeteria to flee. One of the perpetrators fired twice at Dave, hitting him in the back and neck, before both perpetrators made entry into the library. Dave pulled himself toward the science corridor, where a teacher pulled him into a classroom and students began to help administer first aid. In the library, fifty-six students and four educators had taken cover. Most of the students were huddled under tables in the library; Patti Nielsen hid in a cabinet and maintained an open line with 911, while the other staff members had sought shelter in adjacent rooms. The perpetrators demanded that all of the student athletes in the room stand up. When no one did, the pair began moving methodically through the library, taunting students before firing their guns at them underneath the tables. They also continued to detonate IEDs throughout the library. Over seven and a half minutes, ten additional students were killed in the library: Cassie Bernall, Steven Curnow, Corey DePooter, Kelly Fleming, Matthew Kechter, Daniel Mauser, Isaiah Shoels, John Tomlin, Lauren Townsend, and Kyle Velasquez. Twelve other students were wounded. The perpetrators left the library and continued to wander through the school, descending down to the cafeteria to try and detonate the propane tank bombs that had never exploded and also back to the entryway they had come through to exchange



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Family and friends gather at a remembrance service for victims of the Columbine High School shooting. Twelve students and a teacher were killed during the April 20, 1999, attack by two other students, who then died by suicide. (Reuters/Alamy Stock Photo)

gunfire with first responders. Around noon, they re-entered the library and continued to shoot at police officers and paramedics, who were trying to assist the wounded students outside, through several large glass windows that had been broken out. At 12:08 p.m., they retreated deeper into the library, detonated another Molotov cocktail, and committed suicide. The shooting had lasted an unprecedented forty-nine minutes. Just before the pair took their own lives, SWAT team officers had made entry into the building (12:06 p.m.) and begun their initial sweep, during which time they helped to evacuate the students and educators who were trapped in rooms throughout the school. At approximately 2:15 p.m., an officer positioned on the roof of a nearby residence spotted a sign that had been placed in one of the west-facing windows. It read “1

bleeding to death” and was in the room where Dave Sanders had been pulled into. Nearly thirty minutes later, SWAT officers finally reached the room and quickly took over first aid administration. By the time the first paramedic was able to reach the room, which was an additional thirty minutes later, Dave Sanders had died, the final casualty of the shooting that day.

The Aftermath Although Columbine was not the first school shooting, it was quickly transformed into a cultural and watershed moment in U.S. history, due in large part to the intensive media coverage it received. Unlike previous incidents, such as the 1997 shooting at Pearl High School in Pearl, Mississippi or the 1998 shooting at Westside Middle School in Jonesboro, Arkansas, Columbine

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was the first shooting to effectively be aired live in a way that has become common in the coverage of mass shootings. CNN, for instance, aired live, uninterrupted coverage of the scene for six hours after the story broke. A contributing factor to the intensive coverage was that many national media outlets were stationed in Boulder covering the Jon-Benet Ramsay murder trial and were able to make the quick forty-minute trip down to Littleton. The story also dominated nightly news coverage for weeks after the shooting. The public discourse quickly shifted from shock and sorrow to a search for answers. In what have become known as the “usual suspects” of mass shootings, people quickly sought to blame the availability of guns, mental health, and violent video games and media. The latter was particularly fervent after it was revealed that the perpetrators had named their act “NBK” for Natural Born Killers, a popular Oliver Stone film about a homicidal couple who terrorized the nation with their crosscountry murder spree. Their parents also were blamed as potential culprits. The Harris family was particularly uncooperative, even attempting to refuse entry into their home for police to search after the shooting; they never spoke publicly about the attack. The Klebolds were more cooperative with law enforcement but also declined initially to speak with the media, presumably out of fear of criminal or civil liability; by most accounts, they were very hands-on parents who provided a loving and stable home. Years later, Sue, the perpetrator’s mother, began speaking out about her son and his crimes and sought her own answers for how this could have happened. The National Rifle Association’s (NRA) annual meeting had been scheduled to be held in Denver at the end of April. Despite

public requests from the city’s mayor, Wellington Webb, and other local officials to cancel the event, the organization refused, though it did eliminate a gun exhibit and reduced the number of days of the event from three to one. Politicians who were slated to be speakers at the event also withdrew, and gun control advocates placed ads in the newspaper telling the NRA to stay away. On May 1, 1999, the NRA held its oneday meeting that was legally required for its members to attend. Earlier that same day, an anti-gun rally was held at the Denver capitol and featured an emotional and impassioned speech from Tom Mauser, whose son Daniel was killed in Columbine’s library. Mauser and nearly 8,000 other gun control advocates marched to the NRA meeting, outnumbering gun rights supporters nearly four to one. Inside at the NRA meeting, organization president Charlton Heston gave an equally impassioned speech, proclaiming, “We’re often cast as the villain. That’s not our role in American society and we will not be forced to play it. We cannot, we must not let tragedy lay waste to the most rare, hard-won right [the Second Amendment right to bear arms] in history.” The Columbine community soon would be rocked with additional tragedies. Six months after the shooting, Carla Hochhalter, whose daughter Anne Marie was shot and permanently paralyzed in the attack, went to a Denver-area pawnshop to look at guns. She told the clerk she was interested in purchasing a special revolver he had in the case and asked to examine and “dry fire” it (pull the trigger of the unloaded weapon to test the feeling of the firing mechanism). When he turned his attention to starting the background check paperwork, Carla loaded the gun with bullets she had brought with her and committed suicide.



Several months later, on February 14, 2000, two Columbine Students—Nick Kunselman and Stephanie Hart-Grizzell—were murdered at a local Subway sandwich shop. An employee of the store drove by several hours after closing and noticed the lights were still on; when they went to investigate, they found the pair shot to death. Nick and Stephanie’s murders remain unsolved, even to this day, though JCSO increased the reward for information to $100,000 in 2021. The following May, just over a year after the shooting, star basketball player Greg Barnes also committed suicide. Barnes was very close friends with Matthew Kechter, who had been killed in the shooting, and had witnessed Dave Sanders being shot twice through the window of his science classroom; he also was in the room with Dave as he bled to death. Despite a promising future, Greg had been unable to overcome the trauma associated with the shooting and ultimately hanged himself. In 2003, the shooting and those impacted were front and center in filmmaker Michael Moore’s documentary, Bowling for Columbine. (Notably, both perpetrators participated in a bowling league and were alleged to have gone bowling on the morning of the shooting.) In the film, Moore tackled the issue of gun violence both in Littleton and the nation. In one of the most pivotal scenes of the documentary, Moore visited the headquarters of K-Mart, then a powerhouse retailer, with survivors Richard Castaldo and Mark Taylor, who both had been injured in the shooting. They asked K-Mart executives for a refund on the bullets that were still lodged in their body from the attack, ultimately leading to the retailer changing their policies and ending the sale of handgun ammunition in their stores. Although criticized for having numerous errors and fabrications, the film went on to receive

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favorable reviews, break box office records worldwide, and win the 2003 Academy Award for Best Documentary. Since then, Columbine also has been memorialized in other forms of popular media, including television shows, song lyrics, and even computer games.

How They Got Their Guns At the time of the shooting, one of the perpetrators was seventeen years old, below the lawful age to purchase or possess any firearms. The other had turned eighteen just eleven days prior to the shooting. The investigation revealed, however, that their guns had been acquired roughly five months before the attack took place, leading to the question of how they were able to amass their arsenal. The investigation quickly turned to Robyn Anderson, an eighteen-year-old Columbine senior who was close friends with one of the perpetrators, even going to the prom with him the Saturday before the shooting. She had purchased three of the weapons—the two shotguns (a Savage 67-H pump-action shotgun and a Stevens 311-D side-by-side, double-barreled 12-gauge shotgun) and the carbine rifle—at the Tanner Gun Show held in Denver in November 1998. (The perpetrators subsequently sawed off the barrels of the shotguns to make them easier to conceal.) When initially interrogated by law enforcement, she acknowledged being at the gun show but denied purchasing any weapons, though police soon were able to connect her to the purchase of all three firearms. In all instances, Anderson denied having any knowledge of their plan to shoot anyone at the school. In testimony presented to the Colorado legislature in January 2000, Anderson reversed her story, openly admitting to purchasing the weapons. She also noted in her

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testimony that she had not wanted to give her name in connection with any of the purchases, which she had made clear to the two perpetrators. Accordingly, they had specifically sought out private sellers who did not run background checks to make the purchases. This “gun show loophole” was a gap in the Brady Act, passed in the wake of the attempted assassination of President Ronald Reagan in 1981 in which his press secretary, James Brady, had been shot. The loophole, which allowed private sellers to transfer firearms without background checks to anyone eighteen or older, had previously been identified both by one of the perpetrators in a class paper he had written in 1998 and victim Daniel Mauser, who identified the exception in preparation for a debate he was participating in. During her testimony before the legislature, Anderson suggested that there should be a law requiring background checks for all firearms purchased at gun shows. The fourth firearm used in the shooting, the IntraTec semiautomatic pistol, had been acquired through a friend. Phil Duran, who worked with the pair at a local pizza restaurant, introduced them to his friend, Mark Manes, the son of a gun control activist who also had committed several petty offenses. Manes, who sold the pistol to them for $500 and gave them two ammunition clips for it, also sold them one hundred rounds of ammunition the night before the attack; he also had gone target shooting with them several times, including the month prior, when they had filmed videos using the sawed-off shotguns to shoot bowling pins. Manes was convicted of selling a handgun to minors and possessing an illegally sawed-off shotgun and sentenced to concurrent six- and three-year terms for the offenses; he served just nineteen months of the sentence before being released to a halfway house and then a

release with monitoring in 2002. Duran plead guilty for his role and was sentenced to four and a half years in prison but was paroled after three and a half. The sentences served by Manes and Duran represent the only successful criminal charges brought forward in the case. In the year following Columbine, more than 800 bills were introduced at the state and federal levels to address issues related to firearms, including attempts to close the “gun show loophole.” Despite the visceral national reaction to the shooting and subsequent demand for action to prevent the next tragedy, few of these efforts were successful, with just about 10 percent of such bills being enacted into legislation. (Notably, the federal efforts to close the loophole were unsuccessful not only in the legislative session immediately following the shooting but also in the numerous attempts made for more than ten years after it.) In Colorado specifically, six pieces of firearms legislation were passed. One addressed the issues of “straw purchases,” or those gun purchases and transfers that were made on behalf of others who could not otherwise obtain the firearms themselves. This stemmed from Anderson’s purchases of the three guns used in the shooting; though she had not been held criminally responsible for the action, she was sued by nearly three dozen families of victims (injured and killed). The case reached a settlement involving a $300,000 payment from Anderson’s family insurance policy and her cooperation in providing a videotaped statement to be used in other lawsuits. (Manes and Duran also agreed to a combined settlement of $1 million for selling the perpetrators the fourth gun used in the shooting.) The other significant pieces of gun control legislation in Colorado were a restoration of the state’s background check system,



requiring checks on all sales, and submission of juvenile records into it. The latter was related to the Columbine perpetrators’ previous contacts with law enforcement. In January 1998, they broke into a locked van and stole computers and other electronic equipment. They were caught by police while fleeing the scene and later charged with criminal mischief, breaking and entering, theft, and trespassing. The juvenile officers assigned to their case allowed the perpetrators to enter a diversion program that involved community service, anger management, and mental health treatment, which they successfully completed ahead of schedule in February 1999. Due to the good impressions that they made on their probation officer, their criminal records were subsequently expunged. The month after they completed the diversion program, one of the perpetrators was reported to the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office (JCSO) by Randy Brown, the father of their classmate Brooks, who also was an on again–off again friend of the pair. Brown had come across the perpetrator’s website, which contained numerous pages of hatefilled writings, including a directed death threat against Brooks and multiple references to intentions to murder as many others as possible. All materials were turned over to the JCSO, which prepared an affidavit to search the perpetrator’s home; the application was further supported by evidence that he also was potentially engaging in manufacturing bombs and other improvised explosive devices. The department failed to file the affidavit with the courts, and no search was ever completed. By the time the shooting had occurred, there had been at least fifteen contacts with JCSO regarding the perpetrators. The remaining three pieces of legislation passed in Colorado enhanced or protected

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the rights of gun owners. The first offered protection for owners transporting their guns across state lines by car. The second protected the gun industry against negligence suits when their products were used in the commission of a crime or resulted in an accidental injury or death. The final piece concealed the names of individuals who were provided clearance by the government for concealed carry. In the more than twenty years since Columbine, regulations on guns have continued to lessen, representing a strengthening of the rights afforded to firearms owners and the success of the NRA’s lobbying efforts against introduced gun control legislation.

Columbine’s Legacy Although the shooting may not have had the expected impact on gun control legislation, it left an indelible mark on the country. It also became the measuring stick by which all other mass shootings are measured. Despite the fact that there have been considerably more lethal shootings since Columbine (such as the 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting that left forty-nine dead or the 2017 Las Vegas concert shooting where fifty-eight were killed), none has gained the attention or notoriety that Columbine did. The word “Columbine” has transcended April 20, 1999, and often is used in many ways. It serves as a noun used by shooters and the media to describe other similar plots (“planning a Columbine”). It is used as a verb to describe the actions of shooters (“they were going to Columbine”), and even an adjective (“pulling off a Columbine-style attack”). The shooting also has served as inspiration for people intent on committing similar acts of violence, leading them to plan—and sometimes execute—copycat attacks. One study by Mother Jones found that in the

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fifteen years following the shooting, there were seventy-four other copycat incidents that specifically referenced Columbine. Of these, 21 of the plots were carried out, taking the lives of 89 people and leaving 126 others injured. The other fifty-three cases involved plots or threats that were interrupted by law enforcement before they could be carried out. Perpetrators of other mass shootings, including Virginia Tech, specifically referenced Columbine, likening its perpetrators to martyrs and idols. Even more than twenty years after Columbine, its legacy is still pervasive. Each new mass shooting is often linked to the 1999 attack within and by the media. It continues to serve as inspiration for others, even those individuals who were not even born when Columbine happened. In April 2019, for instance, an eighteen-year-old girl infatuated with the perpetrators flew to Denver from Florida, purchased a firearm, and put the metropolitan area, particularly closest to the school, on lockdown in precautionary efforts to prevent further violence. She ultimately committed suicide at the base of the Rocky Mountains several days later. The school also continues to attract attention and visitors, with some making a pilgrimage to the building to pay their respects to the victims or, in some instances, the perpetrators. It is clear that no matter how much time goes by, America’s fascination with this tragedy remains. Jaclyn Schildkraut See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Bowling for Columbine; Gun Shows; Mass Murder (Shootings); Sawed-off Shotguns; School Shootings; Semiautomatic Weapons; Shooting Ranges; Violent Video Games and Gun Violence; Virginia Tech Shooting; Youth and Guns

Further Reading Cullen, Dave. Columbine. New York: Hachette Book Group, 2009. DeAngelis, Frank. They Call Me “Mr. De”: The Story of Columbine’s Heart, Resilience, and Recovery. San Diego, CA: Dave Burgess Consulting, Inc., 2019. Larkin, Ralph. Comprehending Columbine. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press, 2007. Schildkraut, Jaclyn, and Glenn W. Muschert. Columbine, 20 Years Later and Beyond: Lessons from Tragedy. Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger, 2019. Soraghan, Mike. “Colorado After Columbine: The Gun Debate.” State Legislatures 26, no. 6 (2000): 14–21.

Commonwealth v. Davis. See Massachusetts Gun Law

Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) Community policing suggests that police officers do better in keeping the peace when they work with community partners. Such partnerships include law enforcement agencies collaborating with other government agencies, selected individual community members, community groups, nonprofit organizations, service providers, private businesses, and the media. In an effort to better realize the ideals of community policing, Congress created the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) as part of the broader Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994. COPS creates linkages among local groups and individuals by providing information on crime control to all levels of law enforcement (including county sheriffs



and municipal police officers), government leaders, first responders, scholars, students, and the general public. Some of this information includes how to build partnerships and how to better use technology to combat crime. Over the years, COPS has focused on various issues such as terrorism, child abuse, bullying, violent crime, campus crime, gangs, and illegal drugs. Some of its key programs—including Accelerated Hiring, Education, and Deployment (AHEAD), Funding Accelerated for Smaller Towns (FAST), Making Officer Redeployment Effective (MORE), and the Universal Hiring Program (UHF)—have provided funding for the hiring of hundreds of thousands of officers throughout the country, as well as new technology and equipment for these officers. COPS also has funded training on immigration law enforcement, DNA, ethics, federal law enforcement, regional community policing, and tribal law enforcement. Community-oriented policing programs have been shown to be the effective in reducing gun crime. Building relationships with gangs—while sending the strong and repeated message that “if you use a gun, you’ll go to prison”—and cooperating with local nonprofit agencies and businesses to help get young people get off the streets and back into school (or gainful employment) represent two of the most important strategies that community-oriented policing programs use to reduce gun violence. Among the better known of these “carrotand-stick” programs are Project Safe Neighborhoods, Project Triggerlock, Project Exile, Operation Ceasefire, and the Boston Gun Project. Sean Maddan See also: Boston Gun Project (BGP); Project Exile; Project Safe Neighborhoods

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Further Reading Alpert, Geoffrey P., and Alex R. Piquero. Community Policing: Contemporary Readings. Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press, 2000. COPS (Community Oriented Policing Services). https://cops.usdoj.gov/ (accessed January 26, 2022).

Concealed Carry Magazine. See United States Concealed Carry Association (USCCA)

Concealed Weapons Laws Concealed weapons laws are one of the most common forms of gun control regulation throughout the states. Adopted by most states in the early twentieth century as alternatives to a total ban on weapons, these laws prohibited citizens from carrying concealed firearms. These laws were generally restrictive, though some states gave discretion to local police or judges to issue permits to those they felt were “trustworthy.” These laws were often backed by opponents of gun control such as the National Rifle Association (NRA). They reemerged as an important part of the gun control debate in the 1980s and 1990s as gun control opponents organized to modify most of the laws to end the discretion of local police chiefs and sheriffs to require mandatory issuance of permits to those who meet certain requirements. Before 1987, only Georgia, Indiana, Maine, New Hampshire, North Dakota, South Dakota, Vermont, and Washington had “shall issue” laws requiring law enforcement officials or courts to issue firearm-carrying permits to the average citizen. In 1987, Florida enacted a “shallissue” right-to-carry law that eventually served as the framework for other states.

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As of July 2021, thirty-one states allow concealed carry in public with a required state-issue permit. Of these, eight states and Washington, DC, have “may issue” laws, which provide broader discretion to deny permit applicants; eleven have “shall issue” laws that provide limited discretion to the issuing agency, and twelve “shall issue” states provide no discretion to such entities. The remaining nineteen states typically allow concealed carry in public without a license, though nearly all still issue such permits. In general, there is a brief spike in the number of individuals applying for a permit to carry a concealed weapon as soon as the more lenient laws are implemented, but this increase levels off after about a year. The number of permit holders in a state typically levels off after several years. The most common requirements are demonstration of a minimum level of proficiency with a firearm (usually through completion of a training course or passing a test) and a criminal background check that reveals no felony convictions. Some states also include any convictions for domestic abuse or sex offense in the category of disqualifying events. It is interesting that the opponents of gun control sparked the movement to change the laws they helped craft decades earlier. In some states, such as Virginia, they responded to sentiment that some of the judges were improperly exercising their discretion in denying permits to qualified citizens. In many cases, it was simply a preference to fight the legislative battles at the state level. State laws generally prohibit local jurisdictions from passing their own gun control measures (so-called preemption laws). This means that the interest groups involved in trying to influence policy can focus their attention on the state legislatures rather than

concerning themselves with a much larger number of city councils. The debate in “shall issue” states tends to take place over the issue of restrictions on where concealed firearms may be carried. Typically, permit holders are not allowed to carry into schools, government buildings, churches, or restaurants that serve alcohol. The NRA and other strong gun rights groups have lobbied diligently, with mixed success, in reducing the number of areas in which firearms may not be carried. The debate over these laws hinges largely on whether one believes that they increase the safety of the carrier by giving her or him the opportunity to fend off would-be assailants and deter potential criminals because they know their intended victim might be armed, or whether one believes that they lead to an increase in the crime rate because more people own and carry guns. This field has become one of the most hotly disputed in gun control research. Researchers such as Lott (2010) and Moody and Marvell (2009) claim that more lenient restrictions on carrying concealed firearms result in lower violent crime rates due to deterrence. Others, such as Ayres and Donohue (2009), argue that, at best, concealed carry has no impact on the violent crime rate, and, at worst, lenient laws might actually increase violent crime. In fact, in a more recent study, Donohue, Aneja, and Weber (2019) estimated that states with weaker concealed handgun laws have 13–15 percent higher violent crime rates than those states with stronger permitting systems in place. Though this debate may seem esoteric to those not enamored of disputes regarding the correct usage of quantitative studies and statistics beyond the understanding of most citizens who are not trained economists or statisticians, the debate has significant impact on those who make public policy.



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In 2004, the National Academy of Sciences issued a report stating that the evidence in the field was ambiguous and that further research was necessary (see Wellford, Pepper, and Petrie 2004). If the academy reconvened its panel today, it is unlikely they would reach a different conclusion as the body of research continues to lack clear and consistent findings. Harry L. Wilson See also: Cook, Philip J.; Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Gun Control; Hemenway, David A.; Kleck, Gary; Lott, John R., Jr.; More Guns, Less Crime Thesis; National Rifle Association (NRA); Preemption Laws; Right to SelfDefense, Philosophical Bases; Self-Defense, Legal Issues; Self-Defense, Reasons for Gun Use; Substitution Effects

Further Reading Ayres, Ian, and John J. Donohue III. “More Guns, Less Crime Fails Again: The Latest Evidence from 1977–2006.” Econ Journal Watch 6 (2009): 218–38. Donohue, John J., Abhay Aneja, and Kyle D. Weber. “Right-to-Carry Laws and Violent Crime: A Comprehensive Assessment Using Panel Data and a State-Level Synthetic Control Analysis.” Journal of Empirical Legal Studies 16, no. 2 (2019): 198–247. Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Concealed Carry.” n.d. https://giffords .org/lawcenter/gun-laws/policy-areas/guns -in-public/concealed-carry/ (last accessed July 5, 2021). Lott, John R., Jr. More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws. 3rd ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2010. Moody, Carlisle, and Thomas Marvell. “The Debate on Shall-Issue Laws.” Econ Journal Watch 5 (2008): 269–93. Wellford, Charles E., John V. Pepper, and Carol V. Petrie. Firearms and Violence: A

Critical Review. Washington, DC: National Research Council of the National Academies and National Academies Press, 2004. http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?isbn =0309091241 (accessed July 5, 2021).

Congressional Voting Patterns on Gun Control Members of the U.S. Congress demonstrate three predictable patterns of voting on gun control issues. First, regional voting differences are evident. Members of Congress from the South, the Plains, and the mountain states are notably inclined to vote against gun regulation, whereas members from the Northeast and far West largely favor regulation. Second, urban-rural differences are striking. Members of Congress representing rural constituents are much more likely to oppose gun control measures than are their colleagues who represent urban populations. Third, party cleavage is prominent. Gun control proposals traditionally find Republicans opposing regulation and Democrats in support. In time, these variables have become increasingly overlapping as many Republicans represent safe districts in the South and Mountain states that are also rural, while many Democrats represent safe districts in the Northeast or West that are often more urban. This means that there are fewer moderates elected to Congress and that many elections are about appealing to the party’s base with standard political positions.

Regional Differences Congressional decision-making on gun control bills aligns closely with regional origins. Southern members are notably inclined to oppose firearms regulation. This is not surprising, as private ownership of

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guns is highest in the South. Further, although Midwesterners and westerners have similar levels of gun ownership, the proportion of multiple gun owners is substantially higher in the West (except for the Pacific coast states). Reviewing the voting patterns for the Brady Act of 1993 and the Assault Weapons Ban of 1994 illustrates these regional differences. The Brady Act of 1993 required a background check and waiting period for gun purchasers, and the Assault Weapons Ban of 1994 prohibited the manufacture and importation of certain semiautomatic weapons. Southern members of Congress were relatively unreceptive to these gun control measures. About 42 percent of the southern representatives and 46 percent of the southern members of the Senate voted in favor of the Brady Bill. Southern congressional support of the Assault Weapons Ban of 1994 was even more anemic—with 34 percent of the southern representatives favoring the bill and 31 percent of southern senators voting for its passage. In sharp contrast to their southern colleagues, eastern members of Congress overwhelmingly supported these measures. A sizable 79 percent of eastern senators voted in favor of the Brady Bill, as did approximately 75 percent of eastern representatives. Support for the Assault Weapons Ban was similarly robust. Seventy-five percent of eastern senators approved the bill, and 70 percent of eastern representatives gave it the nod. Among western and Midwestern legislators, patterns of support for the Brady and assault weapons bills fell mostly between the solid backing from eastern members of Congress and the relatively weak support from southern congresspersons. Midwestern and western representatives were strikingly close in their voting preferences.

Fifty-six percent of both groups assented to the Brady Bill. Fifty-two percent of the western House members voted for the Assault Weapons Ban, and a nearly identical 51 percent of the Midwestern House members approved the measure. But midwestern and western senators were not so homogeneous in their voting—largely because of party differences. Midwestern senators staked their positions closer to their eastern comrades, whereas western senators aligned more closely to their southern colleagues. A hefty 87 percent of midwestern senators favored the Brady Bill, while only 46 percent from the West did so. And, in contrast to the 42 percent of western senators’ votes, 78 percent of Midwestern senators approved of the Assault Weapons Ban. In recent years, there have been fewer high-profile votes, but regional differences have held, or even widened, on many of them. An interesting complicating factor is when there is a prominent shooting. For example, following the February 14, 2018, attack at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, several Florida Republicans, at both the state and federal levels, became more supportive of some gun control measures. Whether these are short-term effects or long-term transformations will become clearer over time.

Urban-Rural Differences Regional voting differences partly reflect urban-rural cleavages. Irrespective of regional and party differences, urban legislators are much more likely to favor gun control measures than are their rural counterparts. This urban-rural difference reflects distinct patterns of gun ownership. Studies consistently report that the incidence of gun ownership is highest in rural areas and lowest in cities. Many more guns are used for



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hunting and sporting purposes in rural areas than in cities, so rural citizens, not surprisingly, are much less amenable to gun regulation than are urbanites. Moreover, because cities tend to have high rates of violent crime compared to the rural United States, urban legislators strongly support gun control bills to try to keep guns out of the hands of criminals. Examining the congressional votes on the Brady and Assault Weapons Ban bills reveals the urban-rural split over positions on gun control. Urban House members overwhelmingly supported both measures; rural representatives strongly opposed them. Nearly all urban House Democrats voted for the Brady Bill and the Assault Weapons Ban. And although urban House Republican support of the Brady and Assault Weapons Ban bills was far weaker (hovering just below 50 percent) than that of urban House Democrats, it was nearly double that of the rural House Republicans. The urban-rural voting differences on these bills also existed when controlling for regions of the country, although it was strongest in the South and West.

Party Differences Political party differences in gun control politics increased markedly from the 1960s to the 1990s. In 1968, both the Republican and Democratic Party platforms expressed some support for federal gun regulation. When the Gun Control Act of 1968 went to the floors of Congress for vote, overwhelming majorities of both parties in the House and Senate expressed their support for the bill. The little opposition to the bill that existed was similarly bipartisan, coming mainly from the South. By the 1990s, gun control had become a highly partisan and polarizing issue in Congress. The tone of rhetoric on both

sides became less compromising. Also, the powerful National Rifle Association (NRA) became more closely associated with Republicans, aiding many individual candidates and playing a role in Republicans achieving a House majority in 1994. Congressional voting patterns on the Brady Bill and Assault Weapons Ban reflected this divide. House Democratic support for the bills exceeded House Republican support by margins of 42 and 48 percentage points, respectively. These sizable party differences remained across all regions. Although support for gun control in the South was lower than in other regions, the difference between the party’s yes-vote percentages on these measures was still greater than 30 percentage points in both the House and Senate. Another major gun control measure came to a vote in Congress in 1999 in the aftermath of the Columbine High School shooting earlier that year. Voting in both chambers mostly followed party lines, with most Democrats in support and most Republicans opposed. Some of the bill debate also centered around cultural disputes as Republicans argued Hollywood and video games were glorifying gun violence, so they should face more age-based labeling and limits. In the 1990s voting, Republicans were almost completely unified, but Democrats saw more defections, often from members in the South. As the parties have further consolidated their holds on certain regions, the partisan divide has become almost absolute. For example, a 2017 vote to undo an Obama-era regulation that added some people with mental illnesses to the FBI’s background check database saw only six Democrats and two Republicans in the House and four Democrats and zero Republicans in the Senate vote opposite of their

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party majorities. For House elections from 2010 to 2018, the NRA gave 93 percent of Republicans a grade of at least an A-, whereas the percentage of Democrats receiving similar scores dropped from 29 percent in 2010 to 1.2 percent in 2018. A large majority of Democrats received F’s from the NRA; hence, few people from either party received scores other than A’s or F’s. These sharp divides are much larger than what polls show separates views of citizens, so even if some gun control measures gain popular support, they face further challenges in achieving Congressional majorities. Keith Rollin Eakins, Robert J. Spitzer, and John W. Dietrich See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Democratic Party and Gun Control; Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986; Gun Control; Gun Control Act of 1968; Gun Ownership; Republican Party and Gun Control

Further Reading Jelen, Ted G. “The Electoral Politics of Gun Ownership.” In The Changing Politics of Gun Control, edited by John M. Bruce and Clyde Wilcox, 224–46. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998. Kurtzleben, Danielle. “CHART: How Have Your Members of Congress Voted on Gun Bills?” NPR, February 19, 2018. https:// www.npr.org/2018/02/19/566731477/chart -how-have-your-members-of-congress -voted-on-gun-bills (accessed May 18, 2022). Langbein, Laura I. “PACs, Lobbies, and Political Conflict: The Case of Gun Control.” Public Choice 77 (1993): 551–72. Nass, Daniel, and John Cook. “NRA Goes on Downgrade Spree in the Wake of GOP Defections.” The Trace, October 18, 2018.

Patterson, Samuel C., and Keith R. Eakins. “Congress and Gun Control.” In The Changing Politics of Gun Control, edited by John M. Bruce and Clyde Wilcox, 45–73. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998. Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021.

Conservatism and Gun Control. See Ideologies—Conservative and Liberal

Consumer Product Safety Laws Consumer product safety policy aims to protect consumers from certain types of hazards. For firearms, product safety has been pursued by firearms industry standard setting; by tort lawsuit; by focused legislative statutes; and by administrative implementation of broad, general statutes. Two controversies predominate: whether particular requirements that claim to promote safety actually do so, and whether administrators should have the power to ban guns without legislative consent. At the federal level, the Consumer Product Safety Commission is forbidden to regulate guns, precisely because of fears of indirect gun prohibition. In Massachusetts, the attorney general, claiming authority from a consumer fraud statute, imposed a wide variety of gun restrictions. The original consumer safety regulations for American firearms were the standards set for the firearms industry by the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers Institute (SAAMI), an industry trade association. SAAMI was created in 1926, pursuant to a request from the federal government. SAAMI has created over 700



standards, which are updated every five years. SAAMI standards are examined and reviewed by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) and by the National Institute of Standards and Technology. Although SAAMI standards are not legally binding, manufacturers who wish to obtain government contracts must meet the standards, as the FBI, the U.S. military, and many state or local government agencies often require that procured firearms meet SAAMI specifications. In U.S. law, the most traditional form of consumer safety protection is the right of a consumer to bring a tort lawsuit against the manufacturer of a defective product. Consumer lawsuits against manufacturers of defective guns (e.g., the gun’s barrel explodes, or the gun discharges when accidentally dropped) have helped improve the quality of firearms sold and driven many substandard guns off the market. In contrast to lawsuits brought against makers of properly functioning guns (e.g., lawsuits filed in 1998–1999 by big-city mayors), consumer lawsuits against genuinely defective guns are uncontroversial. Legislatures may also choose to enact firearms laws designed to protect consumers (as opposed to firearm laws intended to prevent gun crime, the more common objective). For example, in 2000, Maryland enacted legislation requiring that all guns sold in the state beginning on January 1, 2003, be equipped with internal locking devices (Md. Ann. Code § 442c(d)). The Maryland law is an example of consumer legislation that is premised on the idea that many consumers are incapable of judging their own best interests. Currently, some guns have internal locks and some do not. The Maryland law assumes that consumers who choose guns without locks are making a mistake.

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Some states have enacted bans on socalled junk guns or Saturday night specials. The bans are often touted as protecting consumers from unreliable guns, although this claim is not entirely consistent with the fact that all the gun bans contain an exemption allowing police possession of the banned guns. If the banned guns really were unreliable and dangerous to the user, then it is difficult to see why anyone would want the police to have such guns. Another proposal, not currently enacted in any state, would require that all guns (or all handguns, or all self-loading handguns) have a “loaded indicator.” Lawsuits have been brought against manufacturers of guns without a loaded indicator, although none of the lawsuits as of 2011 have succeeded. As the name suggests, a “loaded indicator” shows that a firearm is loaded. Advocates of mandatory loaded indicators, such as Jon S. Vernick and Stephen P. Teret of Johns Hopkins University, argue that loaded indicators would reduce accidents involving the handling of a firearm that the user mistakenly thought was unloaded. The issue is particularly relevant for self-loading firearms that use detachable ammunition holders, or magazines. If the magazine is removed from the gun, the firearm can still hold one round of ammunition in the firing chamber—although the user might think that the gun was safe because the magazine was removed. Opponents of the Teret/Vernick proposal argue that mandatory loaded indicators would actually increase gun accidents. The critics argue that reliance on loaded indicators is contrary to the first rule of gun safety: “Treat every gun as if it’s loaded.” Relying on loaded indicators might also encourage people to violate the second and third rules: “Always point the gun in a safe direction”; and “Keep your finger off the

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trigger until you are ready to shoot.” If people believe that some mechanical device has rendered a gun harmless, they may be more careless about following the safety rules, and more accidents would result. Critics also point out that even if loaded indicators became mandatory immediately, most firearms in the existing American supply of approximately 274 million guns would not have them. A person who got used to relying on a loaded indicator on a new gun might presume that all guns have such devices, and then presume that an older gun was unloaded simply because there was no loaded indicator visible. Similar debates exist for almost all the “consumer safety” proposals offered by gun control advocates. The controversy over “smart gun” mandates involves a debate between those who believe that new technologies will reduce gun accidents and those who believe that the technologies will make guns less reliable for protection. Even more controversial than the substance of “consumer safety” controls is how they should be created. At the national level, Congress has granted the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) broad powers to impose standards, recall consumer products, or ban them. The three CPSC commissioners are appointed by the president and assisted by a professional staff. If the CPSC decides that there is no feasible standard by which a product can be made safe (meaning that in the CPSC’s view, the benefits of the product exceed the risks), then the CPSC may ban the product. For example, in 1990, the CPSC banned the sale of lawn darts. Rather than outlawing the sale of an entire category of product, the CPSC may instead choose to order the recall of certain versions of a product. Often, a manufacturer will voluntarily recall a product and

provide replacements rather than force the CPSC to issue a formal order. For example, in July 2000, the Master Lock company recalled 752,000 gun locks after the CPSC determined that the locks were too easy to defeat (no accidents had been reported involving the locks; see Consumer Product Safety Commission 2004). The CPSC’s jurisdiction covers “consumer products.” The statutory definition of consumer products specifically excludes a wide variety of items, including food, drugs, cosmetics, medical devices, tobacco products, motor vehicles, pesticides, aircraft, boats, and fixed-site amusement rides. Also excluded are firearms and ammunition (15 U.S.C. § 2052(a)(1)(E) and § 2080(d) and (e)). It is sometimes said that there are numerous consumer safety regulations for teddy bears and toy guns but no such regulations for real guns. Within the ambit of CPSC regulations, this is true, although it would be just as accurate to say that there are no consumer safety regulations for food or automobiles. But once one looks beyond CPSC regulations, one finds that food is extensively regulated by the Department of Agriculture, that automobiles are extensively regulated by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, and that firearms are extensively regulated by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF)—which has promulgated many pages of regulations and regulatory interpretations about firearms manufacture, sale, and possession. Putting aside administrative regulations, federal legislative statutes impose more restrictions on the sale of firearms than on any other common consumer product, except for prescription drugs. Manufacturing, wholesaling, or retailing of a firearm requires a federal license. For a retail sale to be



consummated, the retailer must obtain permission from the FBI or a state equivalent via the National Instant Check System. No other consumer product requires government approval for every single retail transaction. While the CPSC has the authority to ban the sale or manufacture of products, the ATF cannot ban the sale or manufacture of firearms (although the ATF can ban some kinds of imports and has the power in a few special categories to classify firearms or ammunition in ways that amount to de facto bans). Congress, of course, can and does ban guns, as with the 1994–2004 federal assault weapons prohibition. Some states have enacted their own assault weapons bans, and some have also banned small, inexpensive guns (i.e., Saturday night specials). A few cities, including Chicago and Washington, DC, banned handguns, until the bans were declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. But the nub of the controversy is that it is extremely difficult to pass gun bans, even in states that are generally favorable to gun control, such as New Jersey and Illinois. Thus, the Violence Policy Center (VPC) argues that the ATF should be given the authority to ban guns administratively whenever it decides that the guns are too dangerous for consumers to have. The VPC believes that the ATF ought to ban all handguns and most self-loading (i.e., semiautomatic) rifles and shotguns. Alternatively, Sen. Howard Metzenbaum (D-OH), the leading gun control advocate in Congress during the 1980s and early 1990s, proposed that the Consumer Product Safety Commission be given authority over firearms, thereby allowing the CPSC to ban whatever guns it chose. Besides making the usual arguments against gun control, opponents of administrative bans argue that prohibition of some or

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all guns is an important policy issue that ought to be decided by elected officials after full and open debate and public input— rather than decided by three unelected members of an administrative agency. Critics also argue that Article I of the U.S. Constitution states that “all legislative powers herein granted” are granted to the Congress, and therefore Congress cannot delegate lawmaking power to executive branch agencies such as the CPSC or ATF. Since the New Deal, however, courts have been very permissive in allowing Congress to delegate power. (For an argument that delegating too much lawmaking power to administrative agencies allows Congress to dodge tough decisions, see Schoenbrod [1993].) In 1997, the Massachusetts attorney general imposed sweeping gun controls based on a statute against “unfair or deceptive trade practice.” The attorney general claimed that it was unfair or deceptive to sell handguns that (1) did not have tamperresistant serial numbers, (2) did not meet standards that the attorney general created for durability and for being dropped on hard surfaces, (3) did not have the types of locks that the attorney general thought best, (4) did not have heavy trigger pulls that would make the guns impossible for an average five-year-old child to fire, and (5) had a barrel less than three inches long. For the last requirement, the manufacturer could sell short-barreled guns as long as certain disclosures about accuracy were made (see 940 Code Mass. Regs. §§ 16.00 et seq.). The American Shooting Sports Council (a trade association, which later merged with the National Shooting Sports Foundation) filed suit, claiming that the Massachusetts law against “unfair and deceptive trade practice” did not give the attorney general the authority to invent a detailed code of gun manufacture. The lawsuit also

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argued that particular details of the attorney general’s regulations were illogical, nearly impossible to meet, or counterproductive. The attorney general lost in the trial court but won in the Massachusetts Supreme Court (American Shooting Sports Council, Inc. v. Attorney General, 711 N.E.2d 899 [Mass. 1999]). The Massachusetts legislature mooted the issue by enacting a law granting the attorney general the power to create the regulations he had created. When the regulations initially went into effect in Massachusetts, the result was to bar the sale of all handguns except those made by Smith & Wesson, which is based in Springfield, Massachusetts. After the 2000 election of George W. Bush reduced the prospects for broad new federal gun controls, the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence (CPHV)—now known as Brady: United against Gun Violence— urged state attorneys general to follow the lead of the Massachusetts attorney general. The CPHV suggested that twenty states had consumer protection laws that could be used to impose gun controls. Another consumer-related issue bears not only on firearms themselves but on their advertising. In 1996, the CPHV filed a petition (consisting of a request letter and supporting documentation) with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) asking the FTC to ban gun advertising that encourages defensive gun ownership. A similar petition was filed by Professors Teret and Vernick in conjunction with Dr. Garen Wintemute of the University of California. The CPHV petition asked that defensive gun ads be banned as “deceptive,” because gun ownership does not increase safety in the home but in fact is very dangerous. Under current FTC policy, an advertisement is “unfair” if it causes “substantial injury to consumers which is not reasonably

avoidable by consumers themselves and not outweighed by countervailing benefits to consumers or to competition.” The CPHV argued that the defensive gun advertisements are unfair because they encourage people to own guns for protection. Gun ownership leads to injuries and deaths, the CPHV pointed out. There are no countervailing benefits, the organization argued, since defensive gun use is very rare. Opponents of the advertising ban argued that defensive gun ownership does increase safety among lawful gun owners; that harm from guns is “reasonably avoidable by consumers themselves” because consumers can obey gun safety rules and laws against committing gun crimes; and that the FTC should not censor speech on a controversial policy topic. The FTC rejected the request to restrict firearms advertising. David B. Kopel See also: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF); Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; Loaded-Chamber Indicator; Massachusetts Gun Law; National Instant Criminal Background Check System; Saturday Night Specials; Smart Guns; Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers’ Institute (SAAMI)

Further Reading Bejar, Benjamin. “Wielding the Consumer Protection Shield: Sensible Handgun Regulation in Massachusetts: A Paradigm for a National Model.” Boston University Public Interest Law Journal 7 (1998): 59–91. Dobray, Debra, and Arthur J. Waldrop. “Regulating Handgun Advertising Aimed at Women.” Whittier Law Review 12 (1991): 113–29. Kopel, David B. “Treating Guns like Consumer Products.” University of Pennsylvania Law Review 148 (2000): 1213–46.

Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers Institute. http://www.saami.org/ (accessed January 26, 2022). Vernick, Jon S., and Stephen P. Teret. “Public Health Approach to Regulating Firearms as Consumer Products.” University of Pennsylvania Law Review 148 (2000): 1193–212. Violence Policy Center. “The Firearms Safety and Consumer Protection Act: To Regulate the Manufacture and Safety of Firearms.” 1999. http://www.vpc.org/fact_sht/torkenfs .htm (accessed January 26, 2022).

Consumer Protection Regulations on Handgun Safety. See Massachusetts Gun Law

Cook, Philip J.(1946–) Philip J. Cook, one of the leading public policy researchers in the United States, has made major contributions to research on gun violence and policy. His research on policies to prevent gun violence and ways to estimate the costs of gun violence have been influential in public policy debates. In recognition of that research on gun policy and its effects, he, along with Franklin Zimring, was awarded the 2020 Stockholm Prize in Criminology. This prestigious award recognizes their “wide body of evidence that falsifies the claim that gun availability is irrelevant to the volume of gun injuries” and their long-term research on gun violence and its social effects. (Stockholm Criminology Symposium 2020). Cook has received numerous academic honors, fellowships, and grants, including grants to investigate major issues in firearm policy. Cook has spent his entire career at Duke University, where he is the ITT/Terry Sanford

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Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Public Policy Studies; Professor Emeritus of both Economics and Sociology, Affiliate of the Center for Child and Family Policy, and Faculty Research Scholar of DuPRI’s Population Research Center. He has held visiting positions at the Univeristy of Maryland; the Kennedy School of Government, at Harvard University; and at the University of North Caroline at Chapel Hill. Born in Buffalo, New York, Cook received his BA from the University of Michigan and his PhD in economics from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1973. Cook went to Duke as an assistant professor of economics in 1973. His research has focused on the regulation of unhealthy and unsafe behavior. In addition to his work on the costs and consequences of gun availability, he has carried out studies on numerous other policy issues, including alcohol-related problems, state lotteries, sources of inequality in earnings, and the costs of the death penalty. Cook’s research on guns and gun violence, often collaboratively with Jens Ludwig and others, has focused on some of the most important and controversial issues in the gun control debate. The research includes studies of the effects of gun availability on violence; instrumentality effects; gun markets; defensive uses of handguns against criminal attacks, or Defensive Gun Uses (DGUs); the tracing of guns used in crimes; and the real costs of gun violence. Early in his career, Cook (1979) studied the fifty largest cities in the United States to find out whether gun availability influences crime. He found that in cities with low-gun ownership rates, the percentage of homicides and suicides involving guns is low. In cities with many guns, robbers are more likely to use guns in their crimes, and the robberies are more likely to be lethal than in cities with fewer guns.

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In 1979–1980, the Center for the Study and Prevention of Handgun Violence funded his study of the causal linkages between gun control ordinances and crime. In 1993–1994, the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation supported his study of stolen-gun markets. In 1994, the National Institute of Justice provided a grant to the Police Foundation for a study of guns in the United States. The Foundation engaged Cook and Jens Ludwig (1997)to carry out the National Survey of Private Ownership of Firearms (NSPOF), the most comprehensive overview of gun inventory and gun ownership in the country. The survey generated numerous important findings related to the size, composition, and ownership of the nation’s gun inventory; the methods of and reasons for firearm acquisition; the storage and carrying of guns; and DGUs. In 1995, Cook chaired a symposium sponsored by the Guggenheim Foundation on youth violence. The symposium focused on the role of guns in homicides, especially among young inner-city men. The Duke University School of Law journal Law and Contemporary Problems published the conference papers in 1996 under the title Kids, Guns, and Public Policy. Cook edited the issue and emphasized that, although homicide rates in general had been falling, those for youths had greatly increased, and all of that increase had been due to guns. Cook has also made important contributions to the discussion of DGUs, taking issue with Kleck and Gertz’s estimate of 2.5 million DGUs annually (Kleck 1997; Kleck and Gertz 1995). Kleck and Gertz argue that there are more DGUs than crimes committed with handguns. If true, this might weaken arguments for gun control, although Cook points out that, aside from the dispute over the numbers, it is not clear that all these DGUs add to public safety. Cook and

his colleagues refer to the estimate of 2.5 million DGUs as “the gun debate’s new mythical number” (Cook, Ludwig, and Hemenway 1997). The National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) generates an estimate of about 100,000 DGUs a year. Cook and his colleagues suggest that the higher estimate is at least partly due to the likelihood of having many more “false positives”—those who did not use a gun for self-defense during the period studied but say that they did—than “false negatives”— those who did use a gun for self-defense but did not report it (Cook and Ludwig 2000; Cook, Ludwig, and Hemenway 1997). Cook and Ludwig’s own National Survey of Private Ownership of Firearms (NSPOF) generates an estimate of about 1.5 million DGUs. Cook and Ludwig suggest that this figure is an overestimate and that accurate estimates of DGUs are unlikely to emerge from such large sample surveys because of the likelihood of false positives outweighing false negatives. Pro-gun groups have gleefully seized on Cook and Ludwig’s suggestion that their own survey overestimated DGUs and argued that the results prove Kleck and Gertz’s estimate. In fact, Cook and Ludwig exercise sound methodological judgment in reaching their cautious conclusions. Cook’s research on the effects of gun availability on robberies and murders committed during robberies shed light on the “instrumentality effect,” the idea that the instrument used in a crime influences whether the crime is lethal. Cook’s research on robbery showed that robbers who chose to use firearms in committing their crime did so to ensure control and compliance on the part of their victims. When robbers used guns, there was less likely to be a physical attack; but if there was a physical attack, the victims were more likely to be killed. In

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fact, “the case-fatality rate for gun robbery is three times as high as for robberies with knives and ten times as high for robberies with other weapons” (Cook and Ludwig 2000, 35). In a major, controversial contribution to thinking about gun policy, Cook and Ludwig estimated the net costs of gun violence in the United States (Cook and Ludwig 2001). Rather than focusing only on the costs of handgun violence in terms of the medical costs and lost productivity associated with gun injuries and deaths, Cook and Ludwig develop an economic-cost framework to calculate the full or real costs of handgun violence. Their goal is “to document how gun violence reduces the quality of life for everyone in America” (Cook and Ludwig 2000, viii). They estimate that gun violence costs the nation about $100 billion annually. They derive most of this estimate, which is much higher than most such figures, from a “contingent-valuation” survey. The approach, originally developed to estimate how much people would be willing to pay for environmental improvements, is based on surveys. The National Opinion Research Center (NORC) of the University of Chicago asked the questions in its 1998 General Social Survey (GSS). The survey asked respondents what they would pay to reduce gun crime in their communities. Extrapolating from those figures, Cook and Ludwig reached an estimated cost of $80 billion a year. Drawing on workplace studied and jury awards for the “value of per statistical life and nonfatal injury, we estimate that the elimination of unintentional shootings and gun suicides in 1997 would be worth as much as $20 billion” (Cook and Ludwig 2000, 115), to which they add the $80 billion estimate to arrive at the $100 billion figure. This research broadens the debate over gun violence and gun control

by emphasizing that all Americans are potential victims of gun violence, which amounts to a tax on the quality of life for all Americans. Subsequently, Ludwig and Cook edited Evaluating Gun Policy: Effects on Crime and Violence (2003). This collection examines gun policy and research from a variety of perspectives and is useful for anyone who wishes to better understand gun policy. More recently, Cook coauthored The Gun Debate: What Everyone Needs to Know (2014) with Kristin A. Goss, herself the author of the invaluable Disarmed: The Missing Movement for Gun Control in America and coeditor of Gun Studies: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Politics, Policy, and Practice (Carlson, Goss, and Shapira 2018). With Harold A. Pollack, Cook edited and contributed an introduction to an issue of the Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences titled “The Underground Gun Market: Implications for Regulation and Enforcement” (Cook and Pollack 2017). Walter F. Carroll See also: Crime and Gun Use; Gun Control; Gun Ownership; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Kleck, Gary; Suicide, Guns and; Weapons Victimization for Gun Violence; Zimring, Franklin E.

Further Reading Bijlefeld, Marjolijn. “Philip J. Cook.” In People for and against Gun Control: A Biographical Reference, edited by Marjolijn Bijlefeld, 64–68. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1999. Carlson, Jennifer, Kristin A. Goss, and Harel Shapira, editors. Gun Studies: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Politics, Policy, and Practice. New York: Routledge, 2018. Cook, Philip J. “The Effect of Gun Availability on Robbery and Robbery Murder: A Cross-Section Study of Fifty Cities.”

216 | Copycat Shootings Policy Studies Review Annual 3 (1979): 743–81. Cook, Philip J. “Kids, Guns, and Public Policy.” Law and Contemporary Problems 59 (1996): 1–4. Cook, Philip J., and Kristin A. Goss. The Gun Debate: What Everyone Needs to Know. 2nd ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2020. Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. Gun Violence: The Real Costs. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. “Guns in America: National Survey on Private Ownership and Use of Firearms.” National Institute of Justice Research in Brief. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice, May 1997. http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles/165476.pdf (accessed March 7, 2011). Cook, Philip J., Jens Ludwig, and David Hemenway. “The Gun Debate’s New Mythical Number: How Many Defensive Gun Uses per Year?” Journal of Policy Analysis and Management 16 (1997): 463–69. http:// home.uchicago.edu / ~ludwig j /papers / JPAM_Cook_Ludwig_Hemenway_2007 .pdf (accessed March 7, 2011). Cook, Philip J., Mark H. Moore, and Anthony A. Braga. “Gun Control.” In Crime: Public Policies for Crime Control, edited by James Q. Wilson and Joan Petersilia, 2nd ed., 291–330. San Francisco: ICS Press, 2002. Cook, Philip J., and Harold A. Pollack, editors. “Issue: The Underground Gun Market: Implications for Regulation and Enforcement.” RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences 3 (October 2017). Goss, Kristin A. Disarmed: The Missing Movement for Gun Control in America. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006. Kleck, Gary. Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1997.

Kleck, Gary, and Marc Gertz. “Armed Resistance to Crime: The Prevalence and Nature of Self-Defense with a Gun.” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 86 (1995): 150–87. Ludwig, Jens, and Philip J. Cook, editors. Evaluating Gun Policy: Effects on Crime and Violence. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 2003. Stockholm Criminology Symposium. “2020 Winners of the Stockholm Prize in Criminology.” Stockholm University. 2020. http:// https://www.su.se/english/about/prizes -awards /the-stock holm-pr ize-in - c r i m i n olog y / 2 0 2 0 -w i n n e r s - of- t h e -stockholm-prize-in-criminology-1.460594 (accessed June 2, 2020).

Cooling-Off Periods. See Waiting Periods

Cop Killer Bullets. See ArmorPiercing Ammunition

Copycat Shootings The phenomenon of copycat shootings refers to the incidence of multiple attacks occurring in a short period of time. Also sometimes called a media contagion effect, this perspective suggests that the news coverage attributed to a particular case can lead to increases in copycat or imitative behavior, particularly in the short term. Though the media contagion effect stemming from coverage has been well-documented related to suicide (a phenomenon known as the “Werther effect”), it is only recently that similar scholarly attention has been devoted to consideration of such impacts relative to mass and school shootings.



Copycat or contagion behavior can increase when an event is covered, but also may be sensitive to other factors such as whether the perpetrator was portrayed as a celebrity, if detailed descriptions of the attack were included, or if the event was glamourized or sensationalized. The amount of prominent coverage, such as where stories are placed (e.g., leads on broadcasts or front pages of newspapers or news magazines) and how much time or space is devoted to the case, also can influence whether a contagion effect is found. When a case is highly covered, it incites other would-be perpetrators to engage in similar acts under the belief that they will receive the same amount of attention (or more). Several studies have found a contagion period following a school or mass shooting. Towers and colleagues (2015), for example, found that each mass shooting increases the likelihood of a similar attack within two weeks (thirteen days) after the incident. Similarly, school shootings also were found to be socially contagious, though over a slightly longer period (one month). During this contagion period, there may be other incidents that occur beyond imitative attacks. A report by the Educator’s School Safety Network, for example, found that in the three weeks following the 2018 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, there was a 300 percent increase in school-based violent incidents and threats over the 108 days before it (Klinger and Klinger 2018). Consistent with other studies, the majority of these events occurred in the first twelve days after the shooting, when the media coverage also was the highest. Though a contagion period typically is used to describe a shorter time interval where increases in imitative events are more likely, the term “copycat” is used to

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refer to events that are patterned over longer periods of time. This effect is particularly pronounced in relation to the 1999 shooting at Columbine High School in Jefferson County, Colorado. One study by news outlet Mother Jones found that in the fifteen years following the attack, it inspired at least seventy-four known copycat cases (Follman and Andrews 2015). Of these plots, twentyone were completed, leading to the deaths of 89 people and leaving 126 others injured. Other mass shooters to this day, including those who were not even born when the Columbine attack happened, still cite the two perpetrators as sources of inspiration. Part of the reason that Columbine continues to serve as a source of inspiration and imitation is the amount of media coverage the shooting received. Although it was not the first of its kind, instead coming at the end of a spate of school shootings that occurred through the latter half of the 1990s, it was the first time that such an incident was watched unfolding live on television. The shooting garnered more coverage in both print and television media than any other shooting to date, including those that were considerably more lethal, and effectively established the mold for how incidents of mass firearm violence are reported on. Much of this coverage focused on the shooting’s two perpetrators, cementing them as role models for other aggrieved individuals seeking retribution through violence. To counter the copycat and contagion effect, researchers and members of the public have called on the news media to engage in more responsible reporting that seeks to deny mass shooters the infamy they are seeking by carrying out such events. This includes limiting the use of the perpetrator’s name and image, avoiding prominent placement and reporting sensationalized details, and emphasizing the victims, survivors, and

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heroes. This movement began with the No Notoriety campaign established after the 2012 shooting at an Aurora, Colorado, movie theater by Tom and Caren Teves, whose son Alex was among the individuals killed in the attack. Although some media personalities and outlets have adopted this strategy, most have not, leading to a continued copycat effect with each new high-profile attack. Jaclyn Schildkraut See also: Columbine High School Shooting; Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting; Mass Murder (Shootings); Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting; School Shootings

Further Reading Follman, Mark, and Becca Andrews. “How Columbine Spawned Dozens of Copycats.” Mother Jones, October 5, 2015. https:// www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/10 /columbine-effect-mass-shootings-copycat -data/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Garcia-Bernardo, J., H. Qi, J. M. Shultz, A. M. Cohen, N. F. Johnson, and P. S. Dodds. “Social Media Affects the Timing, Location, and Severity of School Shootings.” ArXiv:1506.06305 [Physics], November 5, 2018. http://arxiv.org/abs/1506.06305. Kissner, Jason. “Are Active Shootings Temporally Contagious? An Empirical Assessment.” Journal of Police and Criminal Psychology 31, no. 1 (2016): 48–58. https:// doi.org/10.1007/s11896-015-9163-8. Klinger, Amy, and Amanda Klinger. 30 Days since Parkland: School-Based Violent Incidents and Threats from Feb 15th-Mar 16th. Washington, DC: Educator’s School Safety Network, 2018. https://cdn1.sph. harvard.edu /wp-content/uploads /sites /2466/2018/04/fact-sheet-30-days-of-data -since-parkland.Educators.School.Safety .Network.-www.eSchoolSafety.org_.pdf. Langman, Peter. “Different Types of Role Model Influence and Fame Seeking among Mass Killers and Copycat Offenders.”

American Behavioral Scientist 62, no. 2 (2018): 210–28. https://doi.org/10.1177 /0002764217739663. Lankford, Adam, and Sara Tomek. “Mass Killings in the United States from 2006 to 2013: Social Contagion or Random Clusters?” Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior 48, no. 4 (2018): 459–67. https:// doi.org/10.1111/sltb.12366. “No Notoriety.” https://nonotoriety.com/ (accessed October 2, 2021). O’Toole, Moderator: Mary Ellen, Participants: Eugene V. Beresin, Alan (Lanny) Berman, Steven M. Gorelick, Jacqueline B. Helfgott, and Chuck Tobin. “Celebrities Through Violence: The Copycat Effect and the Influence of Violence in Social Media on Mass Killers.” Violence and Gender 1, no. 3 (2014): 107–16. https://doi.org/10 .1089/vio.2014.1512. Schildkraut, Jaclyn. “A Call to the Media to Change Reporting Practices for the Coverage of Mass Shootings.” Washington University Journal of Law & Policy 60, no. 1 (2019): 273–92. https://openscholarship .wustl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article= 2113&context=law_ journal_law_policy (accessed May 18, 2022). Schildkraut, Jaclyn, H. Jaymi Elsass, and Kimberly Meredith. “Mass Shootings and the Media: Why All Events Are Not Created Equal.” Journal of Crime and Justice 41, no. 3 (2018): 223–43. https://doi.org/10| .1080/0735648X.2017.1284689. Towers, Sherry, Andres Gomez-Lievano, Maryam Khan, Anuj Mubayi, and Carlos Castillo-Chavez. “Contagion in Mass Killings and School Shootings.” PLoS ONE 10, no. 7 (2015): e0117259. https://doi.org/10 .1371/journal.pone.0117259.

CornerShot Guns The CornerShot is a gun frame with specific equipment that allows a firearm to shoot around corners with increased accuracy.

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This feature protects the shooter by keeping him or her hidden when firing. Israeli Lieutenant Colonel Amos Golan, a former special forces officer, invented the device in 2003 in collaboration with the United States for use by the country’s military for use by special operations and task forces work to address terrorist standoffs or other crises. By 2006, the device was made accessible internationally to various foreign military forces and quickly became popular in Great Britain, the United States, and Central and South America. Other countries with a version of the device include Iran, India, and South Korea. The CornerShot device includes a hightech camera that mounts on the gun barrel. The camera is connected to a liquid crystal display (LCD) monitor for seeing around a corner. Indeed, the sections of the CornerShot that are behind cover are the grip, the monitor, and the stock parts of the system. The barrel can swivel up to sixty degrees to the left or to the right. Its video system allows the shooter to see a red dot on the target before firing. It can also be fitted with infrared light to see in dim light situations. The CornerShot’s captured images may be transmitted, such as to operation headquarters. In the latest versions of the device, the transmitted images may even be sent encrypted. Further, the CornerShot can be used with different makes and models of handguns, such as the Glock 9, 17, 18, 19, 22, and 23; the Sig Sauer military grade pistols 226, 228, and 229; the Bull Grand Cherokee; and the FN Five-Seven pistol. Reportedly, specific types of recent CornerShots work with automatic assault weapons. The typical device weighs about eight pounds and allows the semiautomatic gun to fit into the front of the frame. Law enforcement special weapons and tactics (SWAT) teams utilize these devices for hostage and crisis situations to be able to gain a tactical advantage.

In addition to Israeli and American manufacturing by the Golan Group, CornerShots are also made in China. To date, CornerShot devices are only sold to the military and law enforcement. The concept of the CornerShot technology is not new. As far back as World War I, military personnel used devices to shoot around corners or over embankments. The first such device involved attaching a periscope, a type of gun frame that allowed the soldier’s rifle to be positioned above him for firing out of a war trench or from behind a barrier with the ability to see incoming enemies and fire upon them Later, the Krummlauf, a German curved barrel device that can be attached to a rifle to allow it to shoot around a corner, was used during World War II. Today, there is also the Pakistan Ordnance Factories (POF) eye device, a gun attachment that has been in use since 2008, with a camera that can be mounted on the gun to allow it to function like a CornerShot gun. Given the popularity of the CornerShot device, its capabilities will likely be enhanced in time. Camille Gibson See also: Assault Weapons; Semiautomatic Weapons

Further Reading Eshel, David. “Israeli Highlights LIC Capabilities.” Military Technology 28, no. 6 (June 2004): 143–44, 46, 48. Minter, Frank. “A Gun that Shoots around Corners.” Gear Up, June 30, 2015. https:// www.range365.com/gun-shoots-around -corners/ (accessed March 2, 2020).

Corporation for the Promotion of Rifle Practice and Firearms Safety. See National Board for the Promotion of Rifle Practice (NBPRP)

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Crime and Gun Availability. See Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime Crime and Gun Use Throughout its history, the United States has had a relatively high rate of violent crime compared with other developed nations. Initially, the inexpensiveness and widespread availability of guns were major contributing factors to crime. In addition, disadvantaged groups in society traditionally had limited access to firearms and were therefore more often the victims of violent crime and intimidation. Gun use as a factor in committing crimes peaked in the 1980s and steadily declined until the 2010s, when a growing number of mass shootings reignited debates over gun control. During the early era of colonization in North America, effective law enforcement was rare. Law enforcement was the responsibility of local sheriffs recruited from the community. If there were large groups of bandits, the militia would be called out. The result of all this was that law enforcement was reactive, and if criminals were caught, justice was often severe. This pattern of crime and gun use continued as the frontier moved westward. The massive influx of people into California in the wake of the discovery of gold in 1849 led to a dramatic rise in crime as people fought over claims to land. Strikingly, the homicide rate in the region tripled between 1849 and 1850. In the aftermath of the Civil War (1861–1865), there was a corresponding rise in crime and gun use in the West as renewed waves of settlers moved westward, many carrying the firearms that they had used during the war. The influx of well-armed people and little effective law enforcement in the West led to

increases in a variety of crimes and ushered in the era of the gunfight. Bands of wellorganized and armed bandits robbed trains and banks. Many of these groups, including the James Gang, were comprised of veterans of the Civil War who had served in irregular guerilla units such as Quantrill’s Raiders. Meanwhile, the gunfight became a relatively common means for men to settle disputes, though the practice was not as widespread as they were portrayed in popular fiction. The closing of the frontier in the 1890s and the subsequent increase in both the scale and scope of law enforcement brought a decline in gun-related crimes in the West. However, large-scale immigration in the East and the extreme poverty faced by many immigrants drove crime rates higher in the East, although gun use was not as widespread as it was in the West. In addition, the municipal police forces of the urban areas of the East were more efficient than their counterparts in the South and West. The onset of Prohibition in 1920 led to the outbreak of another era of serious gun crime. Organized crime gangs dominated the illegal procurement and sale of alcohol. The spread of speakeasies (illegal bars that served alcohol) brought enormous profits to organized crime. Mobsters such as Al Capone built immense empires (Capone’s organization brought in an estimated $60 million per year). The rise of the Mafia led to bitter and often bloody turf wars over control of territory and markets. During the 1920s, in Chicago alone, there were 500 Mafia-related murders. Crimes such as racketeering and extortion also rose. In the aftermath of World War I (1914–1918), many former servicemen had experience with automatic weapons. The introduction of such firearms as the Thompson submachine gun and automatic handguns, including the .45-caliber Colt Model 1911A, exacerbated the violence.



Other factors also influenced crime and gun use during the 1920s and 1930s, such as the proliferation of automobiles, which increased the mobility of criminals. The onset of the Great Depression in 1929 added vast numbers of Americans to the unemployment rolls, with three million Americans out of work by 1930. With bank and business failures, the number of homeless people increased dramatically. Petty theft, mainly of food and other sundries, grew more common, as did more serious crimes, especially bank robberies. The widespread poverty and despair provoked a backlash against disadvantaged groups in the United States, including recent immigrants and African Americans. Throughout the nation, hate groups such as the Ku Klux Klan grew dramatically during the late 1920s and the 1930s. In addition, the number of hate crimes, including lynchings, tripled. During the 1920s and 1930s, the nation’s homicide rate rose to a level that would not be seen again until the 1980s. The onset of World War II (1939–1945) led to a drop in violent crime, and the prosperity of the 1950s continued this trend. However, racial violence continued throughout the South as the civil rights movement gained momentum and white supremacists sought to intimidate the prointegrationists. Crime rates in the United States increased in the early 1960s, as despite the affluence of the period, a significant proportion of the population lived below the poverty line. The 1960 census showed that 25 percent of the nation, or about 40 million Americans, were poor. As the nation’s social fabric began to come apart in the 1960s, drug use increased, the counterculture grew, and crime rates rose dramatically. This last trend was exacerbated by the influx of relatively inexpensive handguns known as Saturday night specials. Violent race riots in major cities such as Detroit,

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Los Angeles, and Newark left scores dead and hundreds injured from gunshots. In the South, political violence related to the civil rights movement continued, and the assassinations of John F. Kennedy in 1963 and Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy, both in 1968, brought gun violence to the forefront of the public’s attention. Meanwhile, groups from both the political left and right began to engage in antigovernment activities, including bombings of public buildings and bank robberies. The rise in gun crime led Congress to enact the nation’s first federal firearm control law in over three decades, the Gun Control Act of 1968. Throughout the 1970s, crime continued to increase as drug use expanded, especially in urban areas. Furthermore, there were turf wars between organized crime organizations and a rise in gang-related violence. The introduction of a powerful new form of cocaine, known as crack, accelerated the violence as gangs fought each other for control of the market. Many police forces were unprepared to deal with the violence and increased gun use that was engendered by the spread of crack. Between 1985 and 1991, homicides among African American males under the age of twenty doubled, while overall homicide rates involving the use of a gun climbed by 71 percent. Between 1960 and 2000, one million Americans died from firearms (including in homicides, suicides, and accidental shootings). The rise in gun violence corresponded with the dramatic increase in guns in circulation: by 2000, Americans owned an estimated 200 million guns. This figure included an estimated forty million handguns that had been produced since 1973. The guns used in crimes came from a variety of sources, but the majority were purchased legally. According to a 1991 survey by the Justice Department, 10 percent of guns used in crimes were

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stolen, and 28 percent were bought or acquired illegally (the remainder were purchased through legitimate sources). The rates of gun use in nonfatal crimes, such as theft, sexual assault, and aggravated assault, also increased dramatically during the late 1980s. About one-third of these crimes were committed by perpetrators using firearms. In comparison, approximately 70 percent of homicides were committed with firearms. Handguns were the weapons of choice because they were easy to conceal and relatively inexpensive. Handguns accounted for 86 percent of all gun-related crimes (3% were perpetrated with rifles, 5% with shotguns, and 5% with undetermined types of firearms). In 1992, a record 931,000 crimes were committed with handguns. After the surge in gun violence during the late 1980s, gun crime began to decline significantly in the 1990s. Between 1993 and 2000, crimes perpetrated with firearms declined by almost 40 percent. This drop was the result of a variety of factors. First, tougher sentencing laws were enacted by a number of states and the federal government. These new measures expanded the length of prison time for those convicted of violent crimes. By 2000, the nation’s prison population had expanded to 1.3 million people, nearly six times the number of inmates in 1980. Second, new legislation made it more difficult to obtain guns. The Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, which went into effect in 1994, placed limitations on people’s access to guns. The law required background checks and waiting periods before handguns could be purchased. In addition, the 1994 Violent Crime Enforcement Act made the possession of semiautomatic assault weapons manufactured after the act illegal. Third, the maturation of the crack cocaine market and the growing popularity

of other illicit drugs caused a decrease in the gun violence related to the sale and importation of illicit drugs. Fourth, new methods of policing have improved the efficiency of law enforcement. Programs such as community policing have improved relations between law enforcement and the communities it serves, while buyback programs have had minor success in reducing the number of weapons available. Fifth, the economic expansion of the 1990s brought more people into the workforce and, like other periods of economic expansion, led to a general decrease in the crime rate. Though the 1990s witnessed a general decline in gun crime, this decline was not uniform. Specific segments of the nation continued to experience high rates of gun violence. This was especially true of African American and Hispanic males under the age of twenty. In the 2000s, gun crimes initially declined in overall terms, before stabilizing in 2004–2005. By 2009, the firearm crime rate had fallen to 1.4 victims per 1,000 people, down from 5.9 per 1,000 in 1993 and 2.4 per 1,000 in 2000. Meanwhile, that year, gun crimes fell to 8 percent of all violent crimes, down from 11 percent in 1993, but up from 7 percent in 2000. Guns were most often used in robberies. In 2004, the ban on assault weapons was allowed to expire. The number of guns held by private citizens increased during the 2000s, with a significant rise following the election of Barack Obama as president in 2008 (this rise was attributable to concerns that gun ownership would be restricted). By 2010, 39 percent of all U.S. homes had a firearm on the premises (and only 2 percent of respondents said they had a gun, but not kept at home), and there were more than 250 million privately owned guns (Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics 2011).



A number of mass shootings by lone gunmen in the 2000s refocused national attention on gun use during violent crimes. The deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history was in Las Vegas in 2017 in which 58 were killed (later revised to 59 after the death of one survivor two years later was believed to be the result of injuries sustained in the shooting) and another 422 injured from gunfire. Attacks in Orlando, Florida in 2016 killed forty-nine, and at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia, in 2007 killed thirtytwo. An attack at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newton, Connecticut in 2012 killed twenty-six students and teachers and led to new proposals to restrict semiautomatic rifles and handguns. By 2015, the firearm crime rate has risen to 9.5 victims per 1,000 people and reached a high of 12.9 per 1,000 people by 2018, rates much higher than what was seen in the 1990s. In 2017, six in ten gun deaths were caused by suicide rather than homicide, and 42 percent of Americans were living in homes that had a firearm on the premise. A 2018 Small Arms Survey found that national gun ownership in the United States had increased to about 120.5 firearms per 100 residents, and that there were approximately 393 million legal and illicit civilian firearms in the United States—more than any other country. Though the United States has experienced more lethal mass shootings in recent years, handguns remain the most frequently used weapon by such perpetrators, despite beliefs that assault-style rifles are more common (Schildkraut 2019). Tom Lansford and Kaytlin Dorris See also: African Americans and Gun Violence; Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime; Black Market for Firearms; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Concealed Weapons Laws;

Crime and Gun Use | 223 Drive-By Shootings; Federal Firearms Act of 1938 (Public Law No. 75-785); Felons and Gun Control; Frontier Violence; Gun Buyback Programs; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Ku Klux Klan (KKK); National Firearms Act of 1934; Vigilantism; Virginia Tech Shooting

Further Reading BBC. “America’s Gun Culture in Charts.” August 5, 2019. https://www.bbc.com/news /world-us-canada-41488081 (accessed April 11, 2020). Carter, Gregg Lee. The Gun Control Movement. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1997. Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. Gun Violence: The Real Costs. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. DeConde, Alexander. Gun Violence in America: The Struggle for Control. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2001. Gramlich, John. What the Data Says about Gun Deaths in the U.S. Pew Research Center. August 16, 2019. https://www.pewre search.org/fact-tank/2019/08/16/what-the -data-says-about-gun-deaths-in-the-u-s/ (accessed April 12, 2020). Gramlich, John, and Katherine Schaeffer. 7 facts about guns in the U.S. Pew Research Center, October 22, 2019. https://www .pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/10/22 /fa c t s - ab out-g u n s -i n -u n it e d - s t at e s / (accessed April 10, 2020). Karp, Aaron. Estimating Global CivilianHeld Firearms Numbers. Small Arms Survey, 2018. http://www.smallarmssurvey .org/fileadmin/docs/T-Briefing-Papers /SAS-BP-Civilian-Firearms-Numbers.pdf (accessed April 10, 2020). Kleck, Gary, and Don B. Kates. Armed: New Perspectives on Gun Control. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2001. Miller, Maryann. Drugs and Gun Violence. New York: Rosen Publishing Group, 1995. Schildkraut, Jaclyn. “Assault Weapons, Mass Shootings, and Options for Lawmakers.”

224 | Crime Prevention Research Center March 22, 2019. Albany, NY: Regional Gun Violence Research Consortium, Rockefeller Institute of Government. https://rockinst .org/issue-area /assault-weapons-mass -shootings-and-options-for-lawmakers / (accessed June 18, 2020). “Table 2.59.2010: Respondents Reporting Having a Gun in their Home or on Property (United States, Selected Years 1959–2010).” Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics, 2011. http://www.albany.edu/sourcebook/tost _2.html#2_ak (accessed June 25, 2011). U.S. Department of Justice. Criminal Victimization, 2018. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 2019. https://www . b j s .g ov / c o n t e n t / p u b / p d f / c v18 . p d f (accessed April 15, 2020).

Crime Prevention Research Center The Crime Prevention Research Center (CPRC) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit research and education organization founded in 2013. CPRC is dedicated to “conducting academic quality research on the relationship between laws regulating the ownership or use of guns, crime, and public safety; educating the public on the results of such research; and supporting other organizations, projects, and initiatives that are organized and operated for similar purposes” (CPRC 2019). According to their website, they do not accept donations from companies that make firearms or ammunition, and neither do they accept donations from organizations involved in either side of the gun control or illegal immigration debate. The organization’s goal is to provide an objective and accurate scientific evaluation of policing activities and the costs and benefits of gun ownership by improving awareness and knowledge of scientific understanding and public safety. To achieve these goals, CPRC engages in core activities that include conducting and publishing academic research

and supporting affiliated academics with similar research by providing direct financial support, sharing data, or providing technical assistance. They also focus on educating the public, journalists, and policy makers with the findings of their research through publications, lectures, and similar activities. The founder of CPRC and its current president as of 2019 is Dr. John R. Lott Jr., an economist who specializes in researching guns and crime. Lott received his PhD in economics from the University of California, Los Angeles, and has held research positions at various academic institutions. He also served as the chief economist at the United States Sentencing Commission from 1988 to 1989. Lott serves as a regular contributor for media outlets, including Fox News and The Hill. He also speaks at conferences and colleges and publishes books and journal articles relating to guns and crime, and his work is regularly cited by the press (Moskowitz 2018). Additionally, Lott has testified numerous times in front of Congress and state legislatures (DeFilippis and Hughes 2014). Though CPRC promotes its dedication to accurate and objective research regarding crime, firearms, and police, both the center and Lott are not free from controversy. CPRC is considered to be “right-biased” and strongly advocates for gun rights and a conservative agenda (Media Bias/Fact Check 2019). Though Lott has published numerous works on firearms, very few are in peerreviewed academic journals, and of those that are, none have been published since 2010 (Moskowitz 2018). Lott’s book, More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws, is one of his first and most controversial works on firearms. It asserts that more guns lead to safer areas and that passage of concealed carry laws reduces crime (Lott 2010). Many researchers, including those with the National Research



Council, have conducted their own analysis of crime and firearms, attempting to replicate Lott’s findings, and have rejected his claims (DeFilippis and Hughes 2014, 2016). Researchers say that their concerns about Lott’s work originate with the scientific method, pointing to issues with his methodology, including omitting important variables, the inclusion of confounding variables and explanations, and obscurity with his methodology (Moskowitz 2018). MacGuill (2018) even points out that Snopes, a factchecking service, eventually reprimanded Lott for using “inappropriate statistical methods” and creating a “false impression.” Lott also has been found to engage in ethical transgressions including creating online personas (Mary Roush) to defend his work and bash critics, revising his online commentary and data to deflect arguments, fabricating a survey on defensive gun use, presenting faulty findings, and repeatedly providing false claims and statistics (DeFilippis and Hughes 2014). Further, Lankford (2019) has discussed how Lott changed how he counted mass public shootings prior to posting a criticism of Lankford’s work. He further noted that Lott revealed his willingness to prioritize ideology over accuracy. Melissa J. Tetzlaff-Bemiller See also: Lott, John R., Jr.; More Guns, Less Crime Thesis; National Rifle Association (NRA)

Further Reading Crime Prevention Research Center. “About/ Board of Academic Advisors.” 2019. https:// crimeresearch.org/about-us/ (accessed February 15, 2020). DeFilippis, Evan, and Devin Hughes. “The GOP’s Favorite Gun ‘Academic’ Is a Fraud.” ThinkProgress, August 12, 2016. https:// thinkprogress.org/debunking-john-lott -5456e83cf326/ (accessed May 18, 2022).

Crime Prevention Research Center | 225 DeFilippis, Evan, and Devin Hughes. “Shooting Down the Gun Lobby’s Favorite “Academic”: A Lott of Lies.” Armed with Reason, December 1, 2014. https://www .armedwithreason.com/shooting-down-the -gun-lobbys-favorite-academic-a-lott-of -lies/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Exstrum, Olivia. “The Guy behind the Bogus Immigration Report has a Long History of Terrible and Misleading Research.” Mother Jones, February 7, 2018. http://motherjones .com/politics/2018/02/the-guy-behind-the -bogus-immigration-report-has-a-long -h istor y- of-t e r r ible -a nd-m isle a d i ng -research/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Lankford, Adam. “Confirmation That the United States Has Six Times Its Global Share of Public Mass Shooters, Courtesy of Lott and Moody’s Data.” Econ Journal Watch 16, no 1 (March 2019): 69–83. Lott, John R. More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws. 3rd ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2010. MacGuill, Dan. “Does the United States Have a Lower Death Rate From Mass Shootings Than European Countries? Snopes, March 9, 2018. https://www.snopes .com/fact-check/united-states-lower-death -shootings/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Media Bias/Fact Check. “Crime Prevention Research Center.” 2019. https://mediabias factcheck.com/crime-prevention-research -center/ (accessed February 15, 2020). Moskowitz, Peter. “Inside the Mind of America’s Favorite Gun Researcher.” Pacific Standard, September 28, 2018. https:// psmag.com/magazine /inside-the-mind -of-americas-favorite-gun-researcher (accessed May 18, 2022).

Cross-National Comparisons of Gun Violence. See Victimization from Gun Violence

D Dallas Police Officers Ambush(2016)

Centro College, engaging him in a shootout that expended over two hundred rounds of ammunition from both parties and a standoff that included two hours of negotiation. At that point, the shooter would only speak to Black officers, claiming he wanted to kill as many white officers as possible. Additionally, the gunman told negotiators that he was angry about the killings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile. During an ensuing investigation, it was discovered via the gunman’s social media accounts that he showed support for the New Black Panther Party, which had allegedly advocated for violence against whites and Jewish people. Despite this finding, it was concluded that the shooter did not have direct ties to any protest or political group, and neither had he adopted the ideology of any international terrorist organization. During the standoff, the shooter alleged that he had places explosives around the city of Dallas; however, an exhaustive sweep of the city found no bombs. After a two-hour negotiation, in which the gunman displayed delusional behavior as characterized by Police Chief David Brown, the command staff made the decision to arm a bomb disposal robot with one pound of C-4 explosive and detonate it against a wall adjacent to the gunman, killing him and ending the standoff at approximately 2:30 a.m. on July 8, 2016. Chief Brown reported that he made the decision to use the explosives to kill the gunman, a tactic which had not been employed by U.S. law enforcement agencies domestically prior to this event; however, it had been used

On July 7, 2016, in Dallas, Texas, the Next Generation Action Network planned a peaceful march to protest against police brutality directed toward minorities, specifically African Americans, after the killings of Alton Sterling (in Baton Rouge, Louisiana) and Philando Castile (in Falcon Heights, Minnesota) by police officers. According to the Dallas Police Department (DPD), one hundred sworn officers were assigned to the event to maintain order and protect the approximately eight hundred protestors who, at 7:00 p.m., began to peacefully march down Main Street. At 8:58 p.m., toward the end of the event, a gunman began shooting at police officers and into the crowd of protestors on Main Street, immediately killing three officers and injuring three others. A fourth officer was killed after engaging in a gunfight with the shooter, who shot him in the back at point-blank range with an assault rifle. The shooter then attempted to enter El Centro College, which is located on Main Street near the end of the protest route. As the shooter entered the college, he injured two campus police officers before proceeding to higher floors, shooting out of the windows down at police officers on the street below. At that point, the gunman shot and killed a fifth police officer, who was standing on the street in front of a convenience store. At 12:30 a.m. on July 8, 2016, Dallas police deployed their SWAT officers, who found the shooter near the library in El 227

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Large memorial photos of Dallas, Texas, police officers killed during a July 7, 2016, ambush are brought in during a candlelight vigil. The officers had been out patrolling in the city during a peaceful march against police brutality when they were killed. (Tribune Content Agency LLC/ Alamy Stock Photo)

overseas to neutralize targets with bombs during wartime. Investigation into the shooter indicated that his name was Micah Xavier Johnson, a twenty-five-year-old military veteran who had served as a carpentry and masonry specialist in Afghanistan as well as in the Army Reserves. He used an AR-15 assault weapon to carry out the attack and had acted alone, contrary to initial reports of multiple gunmen. Additionally, three people had been taken into custody during the standoff under suspicion of conspiring with Johnson but were subsequently released. Further investigation into the shooter revealed that he had extensively studied combat tactics, including shooting on the move, and investigators found bomb-making materials as

well as written manifestos pertaining to killing white police officers in the his home. This incident has been called the deadliest day for law enforcement since the September 11, 2001, attacks. Four Dallas police officers were killed, along with one Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART) officer. The Dallas police officers were Senior Corporal Lorne Ahrens, age forty-eight, who had served fourteen years with DPD; Officer Michael Krol, forty, who served eleven years with DPD; Sergeant Michael Smith, fifty-five, who served twenty-seven years with DPD; and Officer Patrick Zamarripa, thirty-two, who had served five years with DPD. The DART officer who was killed was Officer Brent Thompson, forty-three, who served seven years

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with DART and was the first DART officer killed in the line of duty. Nicole Leeper Piquero and Vrishali Kanvinde See also: Baton Rouge Police Officers Shooting (2016); Black Lives Matter; Police Shootings

Further Reading Achenbach, J., W. Wan, M. Berman, and M. Balingit. “Five Dallas Police Officers Were Killed by a Lone Attacker, Authorities Say.” Washington Post, July 8, 2016. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news /morning-mix/wp/2016/07/08/like-a-little -war-snipers-shoot-11-police-off icers -during-dallas-protest-march-killing-five (accessed May 18, 2022). Fernandez, M., R. Pérez-Peña, and J. E. Bromwich. “Five Dallas Officers Were Killed as Payback, Police Chief Says.” New York Times, July 8, 2016. https://www.nytimes .com/2016/07/09/us/dallas-police-shooting .html (accessed May 18, 2022). Hennessy-Fiske, M., D. Q. Wilber, and M. Pearce. “‘Loner’ Dallas Gunman Had Bomb Materials and Kept Journal of Combat Tactics.” Los Angeles Times, July 8, 2016. https:// www.latimes.com /nation /la-na-dallas -police-shooting-20160708-snap-story.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Kalthoff, K. “Dallas Police Ambush Shooting Investigation Finished.” NBCDFW, September 21, 2017. https://www.nbcdfw.com /news/local/Dallas-Police-Ambush-Shooting -Investigation-Finished-446601613.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Krause, K., and S. Ambrose. “Dallas Shooter Showed Signs of PTSD When He Returned from Afghanistan, VA Records Show.” Dallas Morning News, August 2016. https://www.dallasnews.com/news/dallas -a mbu sh / 2016 / 08 / 24 /d a l la s -shoot e r -showed-signs-ptsd-returned-afghanistan -va-records-show (accessed May 18, 2022). McGee, P., M. Fernandez, and J. E. Bromwich. “Snipers Kill 5 Dallas Officers at Protest

against Police Shootings.” New York Times, July 7, 2016. https://www.nytimes.com /2016/07/08/us/dallas-police-officers-killed .html (accessed May 18, 2022).

DC Project The DC Project is a female-led group advocating for the preservation of gun rights. Identifying as a nonpartisan organization of daughters, mothers, and sisters, the group’s mission hinges on three key goals. First, the DC Project emphasizes education related to both firearm safety and the prevention of violence, arguing that both are better achieved through developing knowledge rather than by way of legislation. Second, they call for the preservation of American gun culture, including how firearms are embedded in sports, hunting, and selfdefense. Third, the group promotes the role of ongoing advocacy, suggesting that “gun rights are women’s rights” and pointing to the increasing number of and diversity among female firearms owners. Some have likened the group to the Second Amendment version of Moms Demand Action, a grassroots gun control organization (Edwards 2022). The grassroots movement was founded by Dianna Miller in 2016. Miller, a retired law enforcement officer turned professional three-gun competitive shooter, sought to encourage other women to take up sport shooting. To this end, she traveled to Washington, DC, to meet with her legislator and invited others in the shooting community to join her with the goal of gaining participation from one representative from each state. This initial trip turned into an annual event that draws members from across the United States to the Capitol, where they meet with policy makers and senior staff

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members to discuss pressing issues related to the Second Amendment. Members also have testified before Congress and its subcommittees on various issues, including extreme risk protection orders. During these annual outings, the DC Project also hosts networking events for its members, a rally on the grounds of the U.S. Capitol building, and shooting range events where members of Congress can learn more about firearms and experience the culture of the shooting community for themselves. In July 2021, the DC Project joined with Operation Blazing Sword–Pink Pistols and Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership in filing an amici curiae brief in the case of New York State Rifle and Pistol Association Inc., et al. v. Bruen, et al., which is one of the first major Second Amendment cases heard by the U.S. Supreme Court since their 2008 and 2010 decisions in District of Columbia v. Heller and McDonald v. Chicago, respectively. Their brief specifically highlighted the importance of guns outside of the home for protection among women and marginalized groups, noting that these individuals often cannot rely on law enforcement for protection. In October 2021, five members of the DC Project’s delegation served as speakers at the Alternative Mass Media Conventions (AMM-CON), an educational workshop presented by the Second Amendment Foundation. The group’s state director for Arizona, Cheryl Todd, also served as coemcee for the AMM-CON event. Jaclyn Schildkraut

CNN, May 18, 2021. https://www.cnn .com/2021/05/18/business/gun-control -debate-women-minorities /index.html (accessed February 2, 2022). The DC Project Foundation, Operation Blazing Sword–Pink Pistols, and Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership. “In the Supreme Court of the United States: New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, et al. (Petitioners) v. Kevin P. Bruen, et al. (Respondents): Brief Amici Curiae of the DC Project Foundation, Operation Blazing Sword–Pink Pistols, and Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership in Support of Petitioners.” https://www.supremecourt .gov / D o cke t PDF / 20 / 20 - 8 43 /18 4308 /20210719173754323_41068%20pdf%20 Nightingale.pdf (accessed February 2, 2022). “DC Project—Women for Gun Rights.” https://www.dcproject.info (accessed February 2, 2022). Edwards, Cam. “Can the DC Project be the 2A Counter to Moms Demand Action?” Bearing Arms, January 19, 2022. https:// bearingarms.com/camedwards/2022/01 /19/can-the-dc-project-be-the-2a-counter - t o - m o m s - d e m a n d - a c t i o n - n 5 45 6 5 (accessed February 2, 2022). “Legislators Find Allies in the DC Project.” The Outdoor Wire, April 28, 2021. https:// www.theoutdoorwire.com/releases/eed8 dcc8 -a e77- 40 cf-bb18 -95f 249a6 478e (accessed February 2, 2022).

See also: Gottlieb, Alan Merril; Moms Demand Action; Second Amendment Foundation (SAF); Women and Guns

Defensive Gun Use (DGU)

Further Reading Alcorn, Chauncey. “The Fight against Gun Control Has Some Surprising New Allies.”

Defense of Habitation Law. See Castle Doctrine

Defensive gun use is the use of a firearm for defensive purposes against an immediate threat. The “use” may involve firing the gun, but more commonly it amounts to simply brandishing a gun. Scholarly research



suggests that the overwhelming majority of DGUs are “successful”—although whether such successes are morally legitimate is a subject of controversy. There is a heated dispute about how many DGUs take place in the United States annually; with estimates ranging from 60,000 to 2.5 million DGU incidents per year (Institute of Medicine and National Research Council 2013). Defensive gun use should be distinguished from the deterrent effects of firearm ownership. DGUs involve crimes in progress, whereas deterrence involves crimes that are never attempted because the criminal fears that the victim might be armed. Thus, Lott’s More Guns, Less Crime (2000), which finds that violent crime drops 5–8 percent and that mass murders in public places drop about 90 percent after the enactment of “shall-issue” handgun-carry licensing laws, is not really part of the DGU debate, as Lott’s research involves deterrence much more than the thwarting of attempted crimes. The National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) is conducted annually by the U.S. government to estimate the prevalence of crime and to study related matters. Examining survey results from 2007 to 2011, Hemenway and Solnick (2015) found that respondents who reported using a firearm to resist a violent crime were injured less often than were people who resisted by other means or who did not resist at all. The lowest crime completion rates were found when the victim used a firearm. For example, when robbery victims took no action, the robbery succeeded approximately 85 percent of the time, and the victim was injured 11 percent of the time. If the victim resisted with a gun, the robbery success rate fell to 39 percent, though the victim injury rate was virtually identical to when no action was taken. Other forms of resistance (e.g., shouting for help or using a

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weapon other than a firearm) had crime success rates somewhere in between the extremes of nonresistance and resistance using a firearm. All other forms of resistance had higher victim injury rates than did nonresistance or firearm resistance. Many gun control advocates argue that DGUs are harmful to society. For example, the United Methodist Church, which founded the National Coalition to Ban Handguns (now named the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence), declares that people should submit to rape and robbery rather than endanger the criminal’s life by shooting him (Polsby and Kates 1997). Opposing gun ownership by battered women, Betty Friedan argues that “lethal violence even in self-defense only engenders more violence” (Japenga 1994, 54). Under this view, violence is per se evil, and it is irrelevant whether that violence is used to perpetrate a crime or to prevent one. The only national study of how frequently firearms are used against burglars was conducted by Ikeda (Ikeda et al. 1997) and four other researchers for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). In 1994, random-digit-dialing phone calls were made throughout the United States, resulting in 5,238 interviews. The interviewees were asked about use of a firearm in a burglary situation during the last twelve months. The CDC researchers found that 6 percent of the sample population had used a firearm in a burglary situation during that twelve-month period. Extrapolating the polling sample to the national population, the researchers estimated that in the last twelve months, there were 1,896,842 incidents in which a householder retrieved a firearm but did not see an intruder. There were an estimated 503,481 incidents in which the armed householder did see the burglar, and 497,646 incidents in which the burglar was scared away by the firearm. As detailed by Kleck (1997), other

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research suggests that there are about two dozen cases annually in which an innocent person is fatally shot after having been mistaken for a burglar. Gun control advocates argue that all of the above surveys are wrong and that the only correct figure for DGUs comes from the NCVS. The NCVS data suggest an average of about 100,000 DGUs annually. Kleck and other critics respond that the NCVS never directly asks about DGUs (but instead asks an open-ended question about how the victim responded), and that because the NCVS is nonanonymous and is conducted by U.S. Department of Justice officials, respondents may be reluctant to disclose DGUs. Hemenway (1997) and Kleck have engaged in an extended debate about the validity of Kleck’s figures (and the other surveys) versus those of the NCVS. RAND Corporation (2018) concludes that the NCVS’s figures probably are too low (partly because it only asks about some crimes, not the full scope of crimes from which a DGU might ensue) and that the Kleck figure is too high. David B. Kopel See also: Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV); Cook, Philip J.; Kleck, Gary; Lott, John R., Jr.; More Guns, Less Crime Thesis; National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS); Right to Self-Defense, Philosophical Bases; Self-Defense, Legal Issues; SelfDefense, Reasons for Gun Use

Further Reading Hemenway, David. “Survey Research and Self-Defense Gun Use: An Explanation of Extreme Overestimates.” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 87 (1997): 1430–45. Hemenway, David, and Sara J. Solnick, “The Epidemiology of Self-Defense Gun Use:

Evidence from the National Crime Victimization Surveys 2007–2011.” Preventive Medicine 79 (2015): 22–27. Ikeda, Robert M., Linda L. Dahlberg, Jeffrey J. Sacks, James A. Mercy, and Kenneth E. Powell. “Estimating Intruder-Related Firearms Retrievals in U.S. Households, 1994.” Violence and Victims 12 (1997): 363–72. Institute of Medicine and National Research Council. Priorities for Research to Reduce the Threat of Firearm-Related Violence. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press, 2013. https://doi.org/10.17226/18319. Japenga, Ann. “Would I Be Safer with a Gun?” Health (March–April 1994): 54–65. Kleck, Gary. “Degrading Scientific Standards to Get the Defensive Gun Use Estimate Down.” Journal on Firearms and Public Policy 11 (1999): 77–137. http://www.saf.org/journal/11 /kleckfinal.htm (accessed January 14, 2011). Kleck, Gary. Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1997. Lott, John R., Jr. More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws. 2nd ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000. Polsby, Daniel D., and Don B. Kates Jr. “Of Holocausts and Gun Control.” Washington University Law Quarterly 75 (1997): 1237–75. RAND Corporation. The Challenges of Defining and Measuring Defensive Gun Use. 2018. https://www.rand.org/research/gun -policy/analysis/essays/defensive-gun-use .html (accessed January 20, 2022). Smith, Tom W. “A Call for a Truce in the DGU War.” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 87 (1997): 1462–69.

Democratic Party and Gun Control Beginning in the early 1970s, the Democratic Party at the national level committed



to supporting gun control, earning it the enmity of the National Rifle Association (NRA) and, until the Clinton administration (1993–2001), a perception among some voters as being “soft on crime.” However, after Vice President Al Gore’s narrow loss in the 2000 presidential election to George W. Bush (a defeat many attributed to the party’s strident support of gun control), the party distanced itself from the issue as part of an effort to improve the its standing in the Midwest and Far West. The Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting (December 14, 2012), during which twenty children between six and seven years old and six adults were killed, triggered a new national debate over gun control, with the Democrats again advocating for stricter gun laws. This stance has continued in the wake of a series of high-profile mass shootings that have occurred since Sandy Hook. The Democratic Party committed itself to gun control in its 1972 platform. Baer (2000) notes that Sen. George McGovern, with the assistance of the party’s left-wing faction, secured the party’s presidential nomination. This faction was able to force the regular Democratic Party and its white working-class supporters out of the convention (symbolic of this was the refusal to seat Chicago mayor Richard Daley’s Illinois delegation because of an insufficient number of African American and female delegates; in their place, a delegation headed by Jesse Jackson was seated). This faction forced the party to adopt a platform that reflected its viewpoint. On domestic issues, that platform “supported amnesty for draft evaders, gun control legislation, busing to achieve school integration, abolition of the electoral college, and ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA)” (Baer 2000, 24).

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In contrast, the Republican Party remained opposed to gun control (Congressional Quarterly 1994). The party’s opposition to gun control as well as its movement to the right on a number of other issues helped it make significant inroads in the Democratic Party’s white-ethnic working-class constituency. For twenty years, the Democratic Party found itself in the political wilderness. During that period (1972–1992), it elected one president (Jimmy Carter in the post-Watergate election of 1976), saw its electoral dominance of the old Confederacy evaporate, and found its white working-class constituency transformed into “Reagan Democrats” (Greenberg 1995). President Reagan recognized this phenomenon. During his 1984 reelection campaign, Reagan said, “To all the good Democrats who respect their tradition, I say: You are not alone and you are not without a home. . . . We’re putting out our hands and we’re asking you to come walk with us” (Noonan 1990, 127–28). In whiteethnic strongholds in Democratic bastions like Brooklyn, New York, where Adlai Stevenson received 80 percent of the vote in 1956 and Hubert Humphrey polled 75 percent in 1968, Reagan defeated Carter in 1980 (Rieder 1985). In February 1985, a new Democratic Party faction, the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC), emerged. The DLC’s membership included elected public officials, financial contributors, and political operatives who were hoping to move the party back to the ideological center. In establishing the DLC, these “New Democrats” were trying to counter Reagan by attempting to “change the party rather than changing parties” (Attlesey 1985, 52). Though the DLC challenged the liberals, who had come to dominate the party on a number of key issues, gun control was a point of agreement for the party’s two factions. At the DLC’s

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1991 convention, the group backed a sevenday waiting period for buying a gun and stronger mandatory sentences for those who committed crimes with guns (DLC 1991). The convention’s keynote speaker was Governor Bill Clinton of Arkansas. Eighteen months later, Clinton was elected president, becoming the first Democrat in almost a generation to be elected to the office. Under Clinton, the Democratic Party became even more closely identified with gun control. With Clinton’s backing, a Democratic Congress passed the Brady Bill, named for James Brady, President Reagan’s press secretary, who, after being shot and seriously wounded along with Reagan and two law enforcement officers in 1981, became active in the gun control movement. This bill had been debated for seven years during prior Republican administrations. Signed by Clinton in November 1993, Public Law 103159 mandated a five-business-day waiting period for handgun sales through licensed dealers and required local law enforcement authorities to conduct background checks on handgun buyers (this provision was declared unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in Printz v. United States (95-1478), 521 U.S. 98 (1997)). In 1994, the Democratic-majority Congress enacted the Clinton administration’s crime bill (PL 103322). The law’s major gun control provision was a ban on the manufacture, sale, or importation of nineteen assault weapons (the ban was allowed to “sunset” by President George W. Bush and a Republicancontrolled Congress in 2004). Later that year, Congress approved the Gun-Free Schools Act of 1994 (PL 103-382), which required schools receiving federal funds to expel for one year any student caught with a weapon in the school or on school grounds. In the 1994 midterm election, Republicans gained control of both houses of Congress,

picking up nine Senate seats and fifty-three seats in the House of Representatives. This overwhelming defeat represented a repudiation of Clinton and the Democratic Congress’s policies in the first two years of the administration, including the Democrats’ position on gun control. A 1992 Clinton voter, interviewed by Time magazine, offered some insight into the 1994 midterm defeat: “I voted for him, but he’s just got it all wrong about where we all stand on gays and guns and taxes” (Stacks 1994, 46). Clinton acknowledged the role that the party’s gun control position played in 1994. In his 1995 State of the Union Address, the president said, “The last Congress also passed the Brady Bill and, in the crime bill, the ban on 19 assault weapons. I don’t think it’s a secret to anybody in this room that several members of the last Congress who voted for that aren’t here tonight because they voted for it” (GPO 1995). Clinton was reelected in 1996. However, his party would remain the congressional minority. While Clinton pursued nonlegislative avenues to continue his gun control agenda, congressional Democrats found that they could push neither Clinton’s nor their own legislative proposals through a Republican-controlled Congress. In the 2000 presidential election, the party’s platform (2000) stated: “Democrats passed the Brady Law and the Assault Weapons Ban. We increased federal, state, and local gun crime prosecution by 22 percent since 1992. Now gun crime is down by 35 percent. Now we must do even more. We need mandatory child safety locks. We should require a photo license identification, a background check, and a gun safety test to buy a new handgun. We support more federal gun prosecutors and giving states and communities another ten thousand prosecutors to fight gun crime.” In



contrast, the only reference to gun control in the Republican platform was that the party asserted that “any juvenile who commits any crime while carrying a gun should automatically be detained.” Bush’s narrow election win was attributed by many to the Democratic Party’s support of gun control. President Clinton, in an election postmortem, stated that the NRA “probably had more to do than anyone else with the fact that we didn’t win the House this time, and they hurt Al Gore” (Dao 2001, 1). Max Sardin, a Democratic congressman from Texas, offered a similar assessment: “If the Democrats and the Gore campaign had not been so strident in opposition to gun rights . . . there’s absolutely no doubt that Vice President Gore would be president. . . . It cost him a tremendous amount of support across the South. It cost him support in his home state of Tennessee. It was a big issue in West Virginia, Arkansas . . . and hurt him in voter turnout throughout the country with the labor vote” (Moscoso 2001). Steve Cobble, director of the Campaign for a Progressive Future, a liberal political action committee, said “that gun control has become the shorthand for why Democrats don’t do well” (Dao 2001, 1). After Gore’s defeat, Ross Baker observed, “On the national level, the issue is considered toxic by Democrats. I think part of it has to do with [the Democrats’] remarkable success in capturing seats previously held by Republicans. Many of these new Democrats ran on platforms of not tampering with Second Amendment rights, and they don’t want to pull the rug out from under them” (O’Toole 2009). In the post-Clinton era, the Democrats distanced themselves from gun control. The party’s inability to attract votes from white male voters in the rural South and Midwest caused the party to step away. Electoral

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success in the Pro-gun regions by moderate Democrats opposed to gun control impacted the party’s position. Unlike 1993–1994, when a Democratic president and Congress enacted major gun control laws, President Barack Obama and a Democratic Congress did not take up the issue. Obama, in his acceptance speech at the 2008 Democratic Convention, said “The reality of gun ownership may be different for hunters in rural Ohio than for those plagued by gang violence in Cleveland, but don’t tell me we can’t uphold the Second Amendment while keeping AK-47s out of the hands of criminals” (O’Toole 2009). As president, Obama signed into law a number of gun rights laws enacted by a Democraticcontrolled Congress. In 2010, he signed legislation that permitted guns to be taken into national parks (PL 111-24) and an appropriations bill that contained an amendment allowing guns in checked baggage on Amtrak. In a 2011 op-ed piece, President Obama would write, “[M]y administration has not curtailed the rights of gun owners— it has expanded them, including allowing people to carry their guns in national parks and wildlife refuges” (Obama 2011). However, this changed after the Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting. In his address to the nation, the president said, “We’re going to have to come together and take meaningful action to prevent more tragedies like this, regardless of the politics” (White House Press Office 2012). In January 2013, Obama signed twenty-three executive actions relating to gun control, although none affected gun owners or people seeking to buy guns. However, the two major pieces of legislation that came in the wake of the shooting failed to gain approval. The Assault Weapons Ban of 2013 and the Manchin-Toomey amendment, which would have required universal background checks

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for firearm sales, both failed to pass the Democratic-controlled Senate. On June 22, 2016, Democratic House members, led by Congressman John Lewis of Georgia, staged a sit-in on the House floor in an attempt to force votes on gun control legislation. The bills would have barred those on a no-fly list from purchasing firearms, and the second bill required background checks for gun purchases at gun shows and online. The sit-in followed the Pulse nightclub shooting, which took place in Orlando, Florida, on June 12, 2016. The attack on the nightclub killed forty-nine and wounded fifty-three, making it (at that time) the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history. For more than twenty-six hours, Democratic House members made speeches demanding that the House take up the bills. Speaker Paul Ryan called the sit-in a “publicity stunt,” and in the early hours of June 23, the Republican majority approved a motion adjourning the House until July 5. None of the bills proposed by the Democrats were brought to a vote. However, Representative Lewis described the sit-in as “a struggle and we are going to win the struggle” (BarrónLópez and Bendery 2016). In her 2016 campaign, Hillary Clinton called for reinstatement of the Assault Weapons Ban that had lapsed in 2004, extending the window for background checks, and for stripping gun manufacturers of their immunity in liability cases. The National Rifle Association (NRA) endorsed Donald Trump, who ultimately won the election. In 2019, the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives passed legislation requiring universal background checks on prospective gun buyers. A companion bill extended the period for background checks from three to ten days; legislation that the

majority Republican Senate refused to consider. The Democrats’ return to gun control reform has come about in the wake of a number of mass shootings that have taken place since President Trump took office, and as the party’s electoral coalition has shifted away from heavily blue-collar and rural areas, where gun culture is strong, toward urban centers and white-collar suburbs that generally support limits on access to firearms. However, in 2020, the Democrats have emphasized, at the national level, making it more difficult for those with criminal records and mental health problems to obtain guns rather than attempting to outlaw weapons, which had been the party’s agenda in the 1990s. The party’s 2016 Platform stated, “We can respect the rights of responsible gun owners while keeping our communities safe” (Democratic Platform Committee 2016). Jeffrey Kraus See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Biden, Joseph, Jr.; Brady, James S.; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Clinton, William J.; Congressional Voting Patterns on Gun Control; Elections and Gun Control; Gun Lobby; McCarthy, Carolyn; Obama, Barack; Republican Party and Gun Control; Schumer, Charles E.

Further Reading Attlesey, Sam. “Both National Parties Focusing on Texas.” Dallas Morning News, June 30, 1985, A52. Baer, Kenneth S. Reinventing Democrats: The Politics of Liberalism from Reagan to Clinton. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2000. Barrón-López, Laura, and Jennifer Bendery. “House Democrats End Their Sit-In

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Protest Over Gun Reform.” HuffPost, June 24, 2016. https://www.huffpost.com/entry /house-democrats-end-their-sit-in-protest -over-gun-reform_n_576c1760e4b0aa4dc3 d4b28f?section= (accessed July 18, 2020). Congressional Quarterly. Guide to U.S. Elections. Washington, DC: Congressional Quarterly, 1994. Dao, James. “New Gun Control Politics: A Whimper, Not a Bang.” New York Times, March 11, 2001, sec. 4, 1. http://www .nytimes.com/learning/teachers/featured _articles/20010312monday.html (accessed June 16, 2011). Democratic National Committee. Party Platform. Washington, DC: Democratic National Committee, 2000. Democratic Platform Committee. 2016 Democratic Party Platform, as approved by the Democratic Platform Committee, July 8–9, 2016, Orlando, Florida. DLC (Democratic Leadership Council). The New American Choice: Opportunity, Responsibility, Community. Washington, DC: Democratic Leadership Council, 1991. Gottlieb, Alan, and Dave Workman. These Dogs Don’t Hunt: The Democrats’ War on Guns. Buffalo, NY: Merril Press, 2008. GPO (Government Publishing Office). Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents 31, no. 4 (Monday, January 30, 1995): 96–108. https://www.govinfo.gov/content /pkg / WCPD -1995- 01-30 / ht ml / WCPD -1995-01-30-Pg96.htm (accessed July 20, 2020). Greenberg, Stanley B. Middle Class Dreams: The Politics and Power of the New American Majority. New York: Times Books/ Random House, 1995. Moscoso, Eunice. “Some Democrats Advise Their Party to Drop Gun Control Efforts.” Cox Newspapers News Service, February 25, 2001. Noonan, Peggy. What I Saw at the Revolution: A Political Life in the Reagan Era. New York: Random House, 1990.

Obama, Barack. “President Obama: We Must Seek Agreement on Gun Reforms.” The Arizona Daily Star, March 13, 2011. O’Toole, James. “Gun Control Efforts Going Nowhere.” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, April 9, 2009. https://old.post-gazette.com/pg /09099/961708-53.stm (accessed July 20, 2020). Republican National Committee. Republican Platform 2000: Renewing America’s Purpose Together. Washington, DC: Republican National Committee, 2000. Rieder, Jonathan. Canarsie: The Jews and Italians of Canarsie against Liberalism. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985. Stacks, John F. “The Election Stampede!” Time 144 (1994): 46–52. White House Press Office. “President Obama Speaks on the Shooting in Connecticut.” 2012. https://obamawhitehouse.archives .gov/blog/2012/12/14/president-obama -speaks-shooting-connecticut (accessed July 16, 2020).

Demonization of Guns To demonize a person or thing is to describe them as evil or diabolic. Demonization of guns is the belief that guns have inherently evil moral characteristics. Closely related to the demonization of guns is the demonization of gun owners. Demonization may sometimes be related to a mental disorder known as “hoplophobia.” Guns—like knives, chainsaws, and automobiles—are manmade tools that can be used for good purposes or for bad ones, and they can be very dangerous when deliberately misused or used carelessly. As mere tools that can neither think nor act on their own, guns are obviously incapable of choosing to be evil. The advocacy of gun control should not be conflated with gun demonization. Many

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gun control advocates recognize that guns have no inherent moral character; the advocates simply favor various controls that they consider prudent in light of how dangerous guns can be when misused. Only a small number of gun control advocates are demonizers. For example, in 1989, a man who at the time was a Roman Catholic priest in Denver, Colorado, claimed that “Demons exist in the world today and guns are demons. . . . We look at different possibilities of casting out those demons” (as quoted in Kopel 1992, 404). Father Marshall Gourley was explaining why he was using his parish’s money to pay people to surrender their firearms. Though few people would go so far as to assert that guns are literally evil spirits, a more common belief is that guns can change the character of people around them. The belief is somewhat analogous to the claims made about “demon rum” by alcohol prohibitionists in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries—that is, the use or possession of the product will change a person’s character for the worse. Of course, an important difference between guns and rum is that rum is made for drinking, and when alcohol is taken into the human body, it does temporarily alter brain chemistry. The belief that the presence of a firearm can turn normal people into criminals is fairly widespread. The National Coalition to Ban Handguns (which is now called the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence), produced a pamphlet titled “A Shooting Gallery Called America.” The pamphlet claimed that every year, thousands of gun murders “are done by lawabiding citizens who might have stayed law-abiding if they had not possessed firearms . . . most murders are committed by previously law-abiding citizens.” In fact, most murderers have prior criminal records.

Washington Post columnist Mary McGrory expressed a similar notion. Worried about all-plastic firearms that could pass through a metal detector, she wrote, “Pretty soon, all airline passengers might in self-defense slip a plastic pistol into the hand-luggage, and any respectable businessman or housewife could become a potential terrorist” (McGrory 1987, C1). (There are not now, and never have been, any commercially sold plastic guns that could evade a metal detector.) More broadly, Ramsay Clark, who served as U.S. attorney general from 1967 to 1969, stated that guns “make lions out of lambs.” The implication is that people would be more lamblike if there were no guns. Unlike guns, human beings are capable of moral choices. Hence, the demonization of gun owners has at least a minimal degree of logic that the demonization of guns does not. Garry Wills, a professor at Northwestern University, called gun owners “a sordid race of gunsels,” “gun fetishists,” “anticitizens,” and “traitors, enemies of their own patriae” (Wills 1980, 1981, 8E). A “gunsel” is a young man kept for homosexual purposes, or the passive partner in male homosexual intercourse. In less dramatic terms, gun owners may be denounced as “rednecks,” “hicks,” “paranoids,” “bigots,” or inherently dangerous. The prejudiced remarks may sometimes serve as a shorthand for saying that gun owners cling to principles of selfreliance and individualism that are contrary to the more “civilized” model, exemplified by Western Europe or Japan, in which ordinary citizens are expected to defer to the wiser and more intelligent leadership of a benign government that will organize their lives better than they themselves can, and that will provide for almost all of their needs.



Like alcohol prohibition, gun control can in part be understood in part as a “status conflict.” Historian Joseph Gusfield (1986) called the alcohol prohibition movement a “symbolic crusade,” in which prohibitionists sought government validation of their lifestyle and condemnation of the perceived lifestyle of drinkers. An important (although not the only) base for alcohol prohibition was a Protestant, rural, nativist movement that felt threatened by the growing influence of large cities filled with Catholic or Jewish immigrants from southern and eastern Europe. The prohibition of alcohol was seen as a governmental affirmation of the superiority of the lifestyle of the older American stock. Accordingly, prohibitionists demonized both alcohol and alcohol consumers. Demonization of guns and gun owners can also be seen, in part, as an expression of status conflict. Demonization is also a modern expression of the persecution of scapegoat objects, a practice that was once a standard element of Anglo-American law. For example, if a boy used a chain to hang himself, the chain would be destroyed. Similarly, in ancient Greece, a sword used by a murderer would be banished beyond the city limits (Hyde 1916). In a minority of cases, demonization of guns may be a symptom of a mental illness known as “hoplophobia,” which is described in Dunlop and Ninan’s (2006) Contemporary Diagnosis and Management of Anxiety Disorders. The word’s root is “hoplon”— from an ancient Greek shield that could be used offensively or defensively. Of course, having a strong dislike or hatred of something is not in itself an indication of mental illness. Something becomes a specific phobia, clinically speaking, only when it significantly interferes with ordinary life activities. For example,

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few people enjoy being laughed at, but this normal fear would be a mental illness, “gelotophobia,” if a person avoided all social interactions for fear that someone might laugh at him or her. Imagining guns or gun owners to all have evil moral characteristics could readily lead to hoplophobia; indeed, the phobia would seem eminently rational from the phobic’s point of view. Demonization is most successful, politically speaking, when it induces in the general public a “moral panic”—defining of a group of people or a certain behavior as a threat to social values. In a moral panic, the media presents persons, objects, or activities in a stereotyped and hysterical fashion, urging that immediate action be taken, without time for reflection. A moral panic is often set off by an “atrocity tale,” which is an event (real or imaginary) that evokes moral outrage, implicitly justifies punitive actions against those considered responsible for the event, and mobilizes society to control the perpetrators (see Goode and Ben-Yehuda 2009). Since the late 1960s, some scholars have been searching for scientific proof for demonization, which they call “the weapons effect.” That a gun can change behavior is not seriously disputed; for example, if a scrawny fifteen-year-old is contemplating the robbery of a liquor store where two strong men stand behind the counter, the fifteen-year-old might attempt the robbery only if he had a handgun, since the firearm would enable him to genuinely threaten the clerks in a manner that would be impossible if he had to rely only on his bodily strength. The “weapons effect” theory, however, goes much further than pointing out that guns are tools that can be used to carry out a person’s objectives, for good or ill. Rather, the weapons effect asserts that the mere

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presence of a firearm makes a person more aggressive and antisocial. A few studies have claimed to have found a weapons effect, but other research has found the opposite—that firearms inhibit aggression. To the extent that any proaggression effect has been found, it appears confined to people who have no prior familiarity with guns. Most importantly, the few studies claiming to find harmful effects have little relation to the actual presence of guns. For example, one study found that people became angrier at dangerously aggressive drivers if the aggressive driver’s car had a “pro-gun” bumper sticker. At most, the study demonstrated greater social disapproval of an obviously dangerous person if the person were thought to own a gun. Another study tested how quickly university students reacted to particular words, depending on whether they had first been shown a drawing of a gun (Anderson, Benjamin, and Bartholow 1998). Kleck’s review of twenty-one weaponseffect studies found that “the more closely the experiments simulated real-world situations . . . the less likely they were to support the weapons hypothesis” (1991, 158–62). Another literature survey, by Gallant and Eisen (2002), examined the Anderson study and others and found the weapons-effect hypothesis to be poorly supported, but to have been used as a justification for many policies that caused real-world harms by depriving violent crime victims of defensive firearms. David B. Kopel See also: Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV)

Further Reading Anderson, Craig A., Arlin J. Benjamin Jr., and Bruce D. Bartholow. “Does the Gun Pull

the Trigger? Automatic Priming Effects of Weapon Pictures and Weapon Names.” Psychological Science 9 (1998): 308–14. Beckett, Lois. “The Uncomfortable Truth about Gun Rights Supporters—Sometimes They Are Right.” The Guardian (US), June 22, 2016. https://www.theguardian .com /us-news /2016/jun /22/gun-rights -supporters-national-rifle-association-nra (accessed January 26, 2022). Bhatia, Rukmani. “Guns, Lies, and Fear.” Center for American Progress, April 24, 2019. https://www.americanprogress.org /article/guns-lies-fear/ (accessed January 26, 2022). Dunlop, Boadie W., and Philip T. Ninan. Handbooks in Health Care. Newtown, PA: Handbooks in Health Care, 2006. Feldman, Richard. “Democrats Should Ditch the Anti-Gun Rhetoric if They Want to Survive 2022.” Politico, November 16, 2021. https://www.politico.com/news/magazine /2021/11/16/democrats-gun-owners-522562 (accessed January 26, 2022). Gallant, Paul, and Joanne D. Eisen. “Trigger Happy: Rethinking the ‘Weapons Effect.’” Journal on Firearms and Public Policy 14 (2002): 89–124. Goode, Erich, and Nachman Ben-Yehuda. Moral Panics: The Social Construction of Deviance. 2nd ed. Cambridge, MA: WileyBlackwell, 2009. Gusfield, Joseph. Symbolic Crusade: Status Politics in the Temperance Movement. 2nd ed. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1986. Hyde, W. W. “The Prosecution of Animals and Lifeless Things in the Middle Ages and Modern Times.” University of Pennsylvania Law Review 64 (1916): 696–730. Kleck, Gary. Point Blank: Guns and Violence in America. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1991. Kopel, David B. The Samurai, the Mountie, and the Cowboy: Should America Adopt the Gun Controls of Other Democracies? Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 1992.

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McGrory, Mary. “Plastic Guns: The NRA Gets the Drop.” Washington Post, October 25, 1987. Wills, Garry. “Gun Rules . . . Or Worldwide Gun Control?” Philadelphia Inquirer, May 17, 1981. Wills, Garry. “John Lennon’s War.” Chicago Sun-Times, December 12, 1980.

Department of the Treasury v. Galioto (1986). See Mental Disabilities and Gun Use and Acquisition

Derringers Derringers are very small, one- or two-shot pistols designed to be carried in the pocket and used for defense at very close quarters. The derringer originated from a one-shot, muzzle-loading pistol designed by Henry Deringer of Philadelphia in the 1850s. The design quickly became popular, and Deringer faced many competitors. Deringer’s gun was high in both quality and price, and many of his competitors put out cheaper models stamped with his name. He responded with trademark infringement suits; in an attempt to evade them, the competitors began to stamp their firearms “Derringer” (with two “r’s”), and this spelling became generally accepted as the name of the firearm type. Deringer’s original guns were of relatively large caliber, .33 to .52, whereas the modern derringer is most commonly chambered for .22 rimfire. Today, an authentic Henry Deringer pistol is a collector’s item commanding a high price. David T. Hardy See also: Handguns; Miniguns

Further Reading Eberhardt, L. D., and Robert L. Wilson. The Deringer in America. New York: Andrew Mowbray, 1985. Parsons, John E. Henry Deringer’s Pocket Pistol. New York: William Morrow, 1952.

DeVos, Betsy(1958–) Betsy DeVos was nominated by President Donald Trump and ultimately confirmed by the Senate as the eleventh U.S. secretary of education on February 7, 2017. Prior to serving in this position, DeVos devoted over thirty years her life to education policy serving as voice to parents and an advocate for children. She has been a proponent for the voucher programs, which allows parents whose children attend low-income schools to attend charter or private schools. Prior to serving as the U.S. secretary of education, DeVos was appointed as the board of trustees of the Kennedy Canter for Performing Arts in 2004. She served in this position until 2010. DeVos is a 1979 graduate of Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where she majored in business economics (Bauer 2020). As early as January 2017, during her Senate confirmation hearings to become the secretary of education of the United States, Betsy DeVos was criticized for saying that guns may be necessary in schools to protect students from wildlife such as grizzly bears. Despite public concern over the statements, DeVos became the secretary of education that year. Shortly thereafter, following the February 14, 2018, shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, she addressed whether states were permitted to utilize federal grant funds to purchase guns for schools as

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Betsy DeVos served as the secretary of education under President Donald Trump's administration. Among the firearms policies she openly supported was arming teachers, despite schools often being identified as gunfree zones. (U.S. Department of Education)

a part of their security measures. Additional questions were raised related to using federal funds to train school personnel on gun use. The matter became a public inquiry after an Oklahoma school district and the Texas Education Agency requested clarity on the point. The specific funds of interest are from the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, which was reauthorized in 2015 via the Every Student Succeeds Act Title IV-A Student Support and Academic Enrichment grants. These resources are used by schools for a broad range of expenditures to provide a “wellrounded” education to students in areas such as arts and science enhancement, mental health services, improving school

climate, safety, and bullying and drug abuse prevention. The funding also includes spending on the professional development of school personnel and to increase effective use of technology and to improve student outcomes. As such, opponents have been swift to point out that guns had not been a part of deliberations when the grants were being developed. Critics of federal funds being used to buy guns for teachers include gun control activists and many teachers who claim that the response to shootings should be fewer guns in circulation (Meckler and Balingit 2018). Moreover, they argue that funding firearms acquisition will reduce the money that goes to other programs, including mental health (Sadat and George 2019). However, many conservatives posit that arming teachers would deter attackers who now perceive schools to be easy or soft targets for mass shootings (Warnick and Kapa 2019). This, they say, is especially the case when schools are publicly designated as “gun-free zones.” Along this line of thinking, DeVos argued that arming school personnel would improve the learning environment and students’ performance through an enhanced sense of safety. She further supported the idea of removing the gun-free zones in schools and on military bases as a measure to create security and safe spaces for America’s children to learn. In 2018, Betsy DeVos led President Donald Trump’s Federal Commission on School Safety to offer policy recommendations that states should implement in order to provide safety in schools. The Commission concluded that no single approach would work for every community. Further, it stated that arming school personnel should only be an option for those who are comfortable with and capable of it. The report also noted that the extent to which arming and training school personnel may be necessary depends



on contextual factors, such as proximity and response time of local law enforcement to a school. Overall, DeVos’s position is that the local schools should make their own decision about guns in school, which she revealed in a letter dated August 31, 2018, addressed to Representative Bobby Scott (D-VA). Therein she reported that there are federal grants that provide the states with enough flexibility on how to use their funds. Later, in December 2018, she referenced Justice Assistance Grants as an example of federal money available to states to support school security. In an effective training programs report that was chaired by DeVos in 2018, she praised initiatives in Arkansas, South Dakota, and Texas to allow teachers to carry firearms and to be trained on use. This praise was without explicitly stating that this could be done with federal dollars (Przybyla, Strickler, and Khimm 2018). DeVos has maintained that anything more explicit on use regarding guns would need to come from Congress. She has, however, stated in Congressional testimony in 2018 that she would not take action against districts using Elementary and Secondary Education Act funds to arm teachers or to train staff on firearms (Foran 2019). Melanie Prudhomme See also: Armed Teacher Policies; Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting; Trump, Donald J.

Dingell, John D. | 243 to Security in our Public Schools.” Brigham Young University Education and Law Journal 1 (2019): 63–93. DeVos, B., K. M. Nielson, and A. M. Azar. “Final Report of the Federal Commision on School Safety.” U.S. Department of Education, 2018. https://www2.ed.gov /documents/school-safety/school-safety -report.pdf (accessed January 2020). Foran, C. “DeVos: I Won’t Take Action over Schools Buying Guns with Federal Funds.” CNN, August 31, 2019. https://www.cnn .com/2018/08/31/politics/betsy-devos-guns -schools-education-department-secretary /index.html (accessed January 2020). Meckler, L., and M. Ballingit. “Betsy DeVos Considers Allowing Schools to Use Federal Funds to Buy Guns.” Washington Post, August 23, 2018. https://www.washington post.com /news /g rade-point /w p /2018 /08/23/betsy-devos-considers-allowing -schools-to-use-federal-funds-to-buy-guns/ (accessed January 2020). Przybyla, H., L. Strickler, and S. Khimm. “DeVos Gives Quiet Nod to Arming Teachers, Despite Hearing from Many Who Disagree.” NBC News, December 19, 2018. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white -house /devos-gives-quiet-nod-ar ming -teachers-despite-hear ing-many-who -n950151 (accessed January 2020). Warnick, B., and R. Kapa. “Protecting Students from Gun Violence: Does ‘Target Hardening’ Do More Harm Than Good?” Education Next 19, no. 2 (2019): 22–30. Sadat, L. N., and M. George. “The U.S. Gun Violence Crisis: Human Rights Perspectives and Remedies.” Washington University in St. Louis Legal Studies Research Paper, 1–107, 2019.

Further Reading Bauer, P. “Betsy Devos: American Stateswoman.” Encyclopedia Britannica. 2020. https://www.britannica.com/biography /Betsy-DeVos (accessed July 2020). DeMitchell, T. A., and C. C. Rath. “Armed and Dangerous—Teachers? A Policy Response

Dingell, John D.(1926–2019) John Dingell (D-MI) was one of the staunchest opponents of gun control in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1955

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until 2015. A master tactician, Dingell frequently used procedural maneuvers and amendments to defeat or weaken gun control legislation. He served for many years on the National Rifle Association Board of Directors and once referred to Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) agents as “fascists.” Rep. Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY), a strong gun control advocate in the Congress, once called Dingell “Mr. NRA.” He routinely received an A+ rating from the NRA. The son of a congressman, Dingell received his law degree from Georgetown Law School in 1952. He served as assistant prosecuting attorney for Wayne County, Michigan, from 1954 to 1955, and then won a special election to Congress to succeed his father, who died in office in 1955. Dingell won reelection in each subsequent election since 1956. In 2002, the redistricting of Michigan to reflect population changes created a new 15th District that comprised parts of Dearborn and southwestern Wayne County, eastern Washtenaw County, and all of Monroe. As a result, Dingell was thrown into a scrutinized and cutthroat Democratic primary with another Democratic incumbent, Lynn Rivers. The latter had represented Ann Arbor, a university town, and another brand of the Democratic Party. The congresswoman was backed by pro-choice groups, in particular EMILY’s List, environmentalists, and gun control advocates such as the Brady Campaign. Dingell, on the other hand, was supported by the NRA and the United Auto Workers. Rivers attempted to galvanize electoral support around the issue of gun control, and the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence sent volunteers to the new district for six weeks and taped get-out-the-vote messages by actor Martin Sheen. Even founder Sarah Brady campaigned personally for Rivers in

the district. Despite Rivers’ and her endorsers’ efforts, Dingell won the primary by a margin of 59 percent to 41 percent. Dingell did not run for reelection in 2014 and thus left office in early January 2015. During his tenure, Dingell served as chair of the powerful House Committee on Energy and Commerce from the 97th through the 103rd Congresses, when Republicans gained control of the House. Political analysts consider Dingell to have built one of the most effective power centers in the modern Congress. A picture of the earth once hung in the committee office, representing the committee’s jurisdiction, which included energy, health care, and telecommunication. However, health care was the most important issue to Dingell, who helped to write the legislation that created Medicare in 1965. For decades, he was a staunch supporter of nationalized health care. Dingell lost his chairmanship of the committee to Henry Waxman (D-CA) in 2008. Dingell represented Detroit and thus was a staunch supporter of the auto industry. He consistently fought against stricter air pollution controls for cars and trucks, often clashing with members of his own committee. Dingell never shied away from political conflict, however, and earned a reputation as a master strategist. In one highly publicized incident, Dingell was told by a colleague on the Energy and Commerce Committee that he lacked the votes to win on an issue. Dingell retorted, “Yeah, but I’ve got the gavel,” and banged it down to adjourn the meeting. For many years, Dingell used his powerful position as chair of Energy and Commerce to bottle up gun control legislation in the House. In 1981, he was part of an effort to shut down the ATF, and was quoted in a 1981 NRA-produced documentary, It Can Happen Here, as referring to ATF agents as



“a jack-booted group of fascists who are . . . a shame and a disgrace to our country.” Dingell used his power in the House to effectively block gun control legislation during the 1980s and 1990s. When the Republicans took control of the chamber in 1995, Dingell took a low profile on gun control. But in 1999, he managed to insert an amendment in a House bill that would have weakened regulations on background checks of those who sought to buy guns at gun shows. The Dingell amendment would have given officials just twenty-four hours to conduct a background check and permitted the sale to be completed if officials had failed to finish their investigation. The amendment was a “killer amendment” because it sufficiently weakened the provisions of the overall bill that gun control advocates voted against final passage, and it permitted gun control opponents a “free vote” in favor of gun control. Despite Dingell’s earlier strong language about ATF agents, he resigned his seat on the NRA board after he voted for Clinton’s Omnibus Crime Bill in 1994, which the NRA had strongly opposed. Dingell’s resignation came at a time when former president George H. W. Bush resigned his membership and General H. Norman Schwarzkopf criticized the NRA publicly. Bush’s resignation came in response to a mailing that called ATF agents “jack booted thugs”—very similar to Dingell’s own words in 1981. But Dingell never backed away from his strong support for NRA policies, often leading him to conflict publicly with John Conyers, who once served as his aide. In the wake of the 2007 Virginia Tech shooting, in which a student gunman killed thirty-two individuals and wounded many more, Dingell played an instrumental role in securing the successful House passage of

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the first major gun legislation in more than a decade. Sponsored by Rep. Carolyn McCarthy and cosponsored by Dingell, among others, earlier iterations of the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) Improvement Act of 2007 mostly languished in the Congress. The Virginia Tech shooting, however, renewed congressional and public urgency on the issue. McCarthy enlisted the help of Dingell, who worked with the NRA to broker legislative language that would protect Second Amendment rights but would still be acceptable to gun control advocates. The eventual bill did receive the support of both the NRA and the Brady Campaign. The act authorized funding to states to transmit background check data to the federal government and keep the NICS database updated; it also created a mechanism for individuals wrongfully included in the database to petition for removal. The bill was signed into law in January 2008, and three years after its enactment, Dingell, among other authors of the original bill, requested that the Government Accountability Office conduct an audit of the NICS. Dingell was succeeded in office by his wife, Debbie, who disagreed with her husband on gun control issues. The second bill she introduced would bar convicted domestic abusers and stalkers from purchasing guns, and she promoted the bill with the help of Americans for Responsible Solutions, the gun control group associated with former Rep. Gabrielle Gifford. Even before her election, Debbie advocated for gun control, telling the Washington Post of a time that she tried to wrestle a gun from her mentally unstable father, who was trying to shoot her mother. Dingell suffered from heart problems after his retirement but became a prolific

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Twitter user, focusing on partisan politics. He died of prostate cancer in February 2019. Clyde Wilcox and Christine Kim See also: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF); McCarthy, Carolyn; National Rifle Association (NRA); NICS Improvement Act; Virginia Tech Shooting

Further Reading Anderson, Jack. Inside the NRA: Armed and Dangerous, an Exposé. Beverly Hills, CA: Dove Books, 1996. Fitzpatrick, Jack. “The Issue That Divides the Dingells.” The Atlantic, 2015. https://www .theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/07 /the-issue-that-divides-the-dingells/443385/ (accessed July 1, 2020). GovTrack. Congress: Voting Records. 2020. https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes (accessed July 1, 2020). Koszczuk, Jackie, and Martha Angle. “Dingell, John, D-Mich.” In Politics in America 2008: The 110th Congress. Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2007. Martinek, Wendy, Kenneth J. Meier, and Lael Keiser. “Jackboots or Lace Panties? The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms.” In The Changing Politics of Gun Control, edited by John M. Bruce and Clyde Wilcox, 17–44. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998. MacGillis, Alec. “Don’t Whitewash the Legacy of Rep. John Dingell, D-NRA.” The New Republic, February 24, 2014. https:// newrepublic.com /ar ticle /116738/joh n -dingells-nra-bond-must-be-part-his-legacy (accessed July 29, 2020). Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021.

District of Columbia v. Beretta U.S.A. Corp. See Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers

District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) The watershed District of Columbia v. Heller decision of June 26, 2008, marked the first time the U.S. Supreme Court enforced a claim of any description under the Second Amendment, and it was the first time the Court clearly acknowledged a Second Amendment right independent of service in the lawfully established militia and delinked from possession of weapons held for militia service. As proposed by Congress in 1789, and ratified by the requisite ninth state in 1791, the Second Amendment proclaims, “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.” Writing for a sharply divided 5–4 Court in Heller, Justice Antonin Scalia relied heavily on his signature jurisprudential theories of plain-meaning textualism and original public understanding to hold unconstitutional both the District of Columbia’s ban on handgun possession in the home and the requirement that permissible weapons kept in the home be disassembled or fitted with trigger locks. For Justice Scalia and the majority, the District’s strict gun control regime vitiated a right of personal selfdefense, and particularly a right to defend the home, that rests at the core of the Second Amendment. In separate dissents authored by Justices Breyer and Stevens, the court’s four dissenters maintained the amendment could not be fairly construed to say anything about weapons possession unrelated to militia service. For the dissenters, regulation of weapons possession unconnected to militia service is consistent with founding-era practice and should remain a matter of discretion for the politically accountable branches of local, state, and national government.



Precedent Prior to deciding Heller, the Supreme Court had addressed Second Amendment claims on only four prior occasions. The decisions, United States v. Cruikshank (1876), Presser v. Illinois (1886), Miller v. Texas (1894), and United States v. Miller (1939), were old—in three cases arguably obsolete and in the fourth allegedly ambiguous. The first three of these cases involved claims raised against state and local governmental actors and individuals alleged to be acting under color of state law in an era when Bill of Rights guarantees were not yet enforced against the states by the federal judiciary. The particular issue of enforcing the Second Amendment against the states was not implicated by Heller’s claim as it arose in the District of Columbia. Moreover, as the Supreme Court did not enforce noneconomic liberties guaranteed in the Bill of Rights against state actors through the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment until well into the twentieth century, the continuing precedential value of nineteenth-century decisions holding that the Second Amendment did not speak to state infringement of the right to arms was subject to question by the time Heller was argued. (Indeed, two years after Heller, in McDonald v. City of Chicago, the Supreme Court held that the Second Amendment right to arms was incorporated against the states through the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, even though the Court had held in Cruikshank, Presser, and Miller v. Texas that the Privileges or Immunities Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment did not require application of the right to arms against the states). The fourth preHeller case, United States v. Miller, was the most significant respecting the substantive scope of the constitutional right to arms.

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The case reversed a decision of the federal district court for the Western District of Arkansas quashing an indictment of two Depression-era gangsters for transporting a sawed-off shotgun across state lines in violation of the National Firearms Act of 1934. The federal district court had sustained a demurrer on the grounds that the conduct for which the defendants were indicted was protected by the Second Amendment. Writing for the court, Justice McReynolds stressed that “[c]ertainly it is not within judicial notice that this weapon is any part of the ordinary military equipment or that its use could contribute to the common defense.” Thus, the weapon at issue was not protected by the Second Amendment, and application of the National Firearms Act to punish its possession was not constitutionally infirm. Perhaps Justice McReynolds’s opinion did not set out with crystalline clarity a test for distinguishing weapons protected by the Second Amendment from those subject to governmental regulation and prohibition. In any case, the opinion has been subject to radically different readings by subsequent commentators, with one group wishing to exempt from Second Amendment protection all weapons not actually carried in service in the lawfully established militia, and another wanting to subject to Second Amendment protection any weapon that might be of a class that conceivably has some utility for military or paramilitary purposes. Federal courts of appeals uniformly read Miller as a severe limitation on the scope of the constitutional right to arms for many decades, but the Fifth Circuit’s decision in United States v. Emerson (2001) and the DC Circuit’s decision in Parker v. District of Columbia (2007; the case that became Heller upon appeal to the Supreme

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Court) recognized a Second Amendment right unrelated to militia service and created a split in the circuits, suggesting that the Second Amendment was ripe for reconsideration in the Supreme Court.

Lower-Court Litigation Dick Heller was one of six District of Columbia residents to challenge various aspects of the city’s strict gun control regime in Parker v. District of Columbia (decided 2004 in the federal district court, and in 2007 in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia). In his capacity as a special police officer, Heller was authorized under the DC law to carry a handgun while on duty at the Federal Judicial Center, but he was not permitted to register or obtain a license to keep a handgun at home. The Parker plaintiffs argued unsuccessfully in federal district court that the city’s bar on registration and licensure of handguns for home protection violated the Second Amendment. Heller was the only one of the Parker litigants who had actually applied for a registration certificate to keep a handgun; and as his claim focused on the concrete harm allegedly flowing from denial of that application, he alone could claim to have suffered adverse governmental action as a consequence of the District’s laws. According to Judge Silberman, writing for a split three-judge panel of the DC Circuit in 2007, Heller was therefore the only Parker plaintiff to satisfy standing requirements, and the only one allowed to challenge the unfavorable federal trial court decision in the court of appeals. Judge Silberman embraced an individualistic reading of the Second Amendment and held for Heller on the merits, ruling that the District’s prohibition on registering handguns for home protection was unconstitutional.

In justifying his decision, Judge Silberman relied principally on the Fifth Circuit’s Emerson opinion, which in turn drew heavily on the self-proclaimed “standard model” of the Second Amendment, a revisionist interpretation of the constitutional right to bear arms that won favor among gun rights advocates and law professors committed to libertarian principles in the last decades of the twentieth century. The “standard model,” which Justice Scalia went on to endorse in Heller, depends on textual exegesis and the weight of often isolated historical quotations to buttress a private-rights reading of the Second Amendment even as it rejects more contextualized accounts favored by academic historians. Thus, while most historians writing on the original meaning of the Second Amendment focus on the role of the militia in late-eighteenth-century AngloAmerican political discourse, standard modelers, Judge Silberman, and eventually Justice Scalia have zeroed in on the image of the individual rights bearer defending home and hearth against all enemies (including potentially governmental ones) as the archetypal embodiment of Second Amendment freedoms.

Justice Scalia’s Analysis The District of Columbia appealed the DC Circuit’s adverse decision to the Supreme Court in hopes of preserving what was effectively a total handgun ban. The District maintained that the Second Amendment did not concern weapons possession unrelated to service in the lawfully established militia, and, in the alternative, that even if the court chose to recognize a private right to self-defense disconnected from militia service, that right would not be violated by the District’s gun control laws. Justice Scalia rejected both arguments and endorsed a broader reading of



the Second Amendment that embraces at its core a purely private right to selfdefense, particularly of the home. That right, the majority reasoned, could not tolerate restrictions as severe as those imposed by the District. For the majority, the time required to assemble, unlock, and aim a more cumbersome weapon than a handgun imposed unacceptable burdens on Heller’s right to defend himself against intruders into his own home. Justice Scalia began his analysis by dividing the text of the amendment into a “prefatory clause” concerning the militia and an “operative clause” concerning the right to arms. This division of the text implies a hierarchical ordering that proved outcomedeterminative in the court’s analysis. For the majority, the purpose of preserving the militia announced in the so-called prefatory clause did not limit the meaning of the text labeled operational. Indeed, the court went so far as to assert that preservation of the militia was but one of many purposes behind the amendment, and likely not the most important. Both during oral argument and in the opinion of the court, the majority celebrated a private right to self-defense assumed to rest at the core of the amendment. The court played down evidence respecting original intent such as the fact that none of the reported commentary during the House of Representatives debates on the proposed amendment in 1789 touched on a private right to arms, while twelve members went on record to discuss a right related to militia service. (As the Senate debated behind closed doors until 1794, only House of Representatives debates were reported—and even these were only partially reported—during the First Congress). Rather, the court focused on original public understanding, that is, the alleged meaning attached to the text by the general public

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participating in the ratification process that gave life to the new constitutional text. The court stressed the amendment’s reference to a “right of the people,” which for the court implied individualist liberties analogous in application to rights belonging to “the people” described in the Fourth Amendment. Perhaps more controversially, the court proceeded to endorse a nonmilitary sense of “keep and bear Arms,” which it supported by citations to various dictionaries of the times, in the face of countervailing evidence respecting standard usage cited by the dissenters. The court acknowledged that bearing arms at least sometimes means rendering military service, but this usage according to the majority was “idiomatic” rather than “natural.” According to the court, the orthodox construction of the amendment’s operational language, and the one enshrined in the Constitution, guarantees not a narrow right to carry weapons in military or militia service but rather “the individual right to possess and carry weapons in case of confrontation.” Though five justices signed off on this meaning, oral argument also suggested differences among the majority respecting the scope of the constitutional right to arms, and these differences led to Justice Scalia crafting a narrower opinion than his own comments and questions indicated he might have wished to pursue. Alan Gura, counsel for Heller, urged an extremely potent version of the right to arms for purposes of self-defense, and Justice Scalia made clear during oral argument that he felt government action impacting an individual’s ability to engage in armed self-defense should be permitted only if it could withstand strict scrutiny; that is, only if the government measures served a compelling interest and employed means necessary to achieving that interest. Chief Justice Roberts, in

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contrast, expressed reticence about subjecting gun control legislation to a heightened form of judicial scrutiny, and in the end, the court left open the question of what standard lower courts should apply in reviewing gun laws in the future. Justice Kennedy, for his part, expressed great skepticism about United States v. Miller during argument in Heller and made it clear that he did not think gun possession unrelated to militia service was protected under the Miller interpretation of the Second Amendment. Kennedy was willing to overturn Miller, but the greater reluctance of other justices, including Chief Justice Roberts, to lay aside precedent pushed the majority toward a strained reading of Miller rather than forthright confrontation with that decision’s severely skeptical approach to private-rights claims under the Second Amendment. Meanwhile, the law-and-order sensibilities of the justices making up the Heller majority militated against the potentially boundless version of the right to self-defense urged by Gura and in some libertarianleaning amici curiae briefs. Thus, Justice Scalia readily conceded that some gun control measures might not run afoul of the amendment, writing that “nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools or government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.” In addition, Justice Scalia limited the right to “weapons in common use” thereby excluding “dangerous and unusual weapons.” The opinion strongly suggests, and oral argument made entirely clear, that Justice Scalia conceded the constitutionality of federal prohibitions on machine guns

precisely because they are “dangerous and unusual” and not “in common use” among the population. This allowance gives rise to a paradox, namely, that in the court’s reading of the Second Amendment, arms particularly suitable for militia service such as M16 rifles are not constitutionally protected, whereas weapons of very little military utility, such as target-shooting pistols, are constitutionally secured against government confiscation.

Dissents Justices Stevens and Breyer developed different lines of objection to the court’s opinion in their separate dissents, each of which was joined by all four dissenting justices. Both Stevens and Breyer took issue with Justice Scalia’s focus on original public understanding, in each instance both because they disagreed that Justice Scalia had accurately and faithfully rendered the original public understanding of the amendment, and also because they disagreed as a jurisprudential matter whether original public understanding should be the dominant consideration in constitutional questions. For Justice Stevens, the majority’s claim that the amendment was originally understood to focus on private self-defense unrelated to militia service was simply wrong as a matter of text and history. Stevens highlighted studies raised by amici demonstrating that contrary to the majority’s assertions, bearing arms had an overwhelmingly military meaning in the late eighteenth century. Stevens also considered broader questions of original intention, and these allowed him to focus on debates in Congress and scholarship on late-eighteenth-century American political ideology that undermined the majority’s reasoning. For his part, Justice Breyer expressed agreement that Justice Stevens had demonstrated



the absence of a private-rights dimension to the Second Amendment, but he accepted for the sake of argument the court’s determination that the amendment does include the right to self-defense. Even if the constitutional text did encompass the right to defend the home against intruders, Breyer then argued, the District’s measures were consistent with founding-era practice, including many municipal laws severely restricting the ability to use guns in urban settings in the late colonial and early national periods. Justice Breyer also strongly objected to the court’s decision on grounds of localism and democratic legitimacy. As in his view, the text of the Constitution provided no solid basis for judicial intervention, the people of the District of Columbia should be free to choose strict gun control even if their preferences do not harmonize with those in other regions of the country or of a bare Supreme Court majority.

Reaction Heller was hailed by gun rights enthusiasts as a major landmark in the Supreme Court’s checkered history of rights enforcement and as vindication of popular support for a robust, individualistic Second Amendment. Popular constitutionalists favoring traditional values associated with the founding era were not alone in singing Heller’s praises. Prominent constitutional scholars Randy Barnett and Eugene Volokh, who champion the theory that judicial reliance on original public meaning of constitutional text can minimize the dangers of judges’ personal political preferences infecting judicial review, celebrated Justice Scalia’s opinion as the high-water mark of originalist constitutional interpretation. But noted constitutional historians, including Jack Rakove and Saul Cornell, responded that

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Justice Scalia’s version of the historical understanding of the amendment was objectively untenable, and their suspicions of Heller’s jurisprudential bona fides were echoed by jurists with otherwise unimpeachable conservative credentials such as Richard Posner and Harvey Wilkinson, who labeled the decision activist and insufficiently supported by the Constitutional text.

Significance Heller left open for future consideration at least four broad questions about the right to armed self-defense. One of these questions— whether the constitutional right to arms would be applied against the states and municipalities—was answered affirmatively two years later in McDonald v. City of Chicago. A second question, whether there is a constitutional right to weapons possession for purposes other than self-defense or militia service, has not been addressed at all by the Supreme Court. Two other broad classes of questions adumbrated in Heller and McDonald remain, and burgeoning litigation in the lower courts will likely bring them before the Supreme Court in the coming years. These concern the standard of judicial review and permissible classes of gun regulation. In Heller, the court deliberately shied away from announcing that a particular level of scrutiny would automatically be triggered by Second Amendment claims, and given the chief justice’s skepticism respecting tiered scrutiny and the skepticism of four justices regarding a personal right to arms, it is likely that the current court will address Second Amendment claims on a case-by-case basis, carving out doctrinal niceties incrementally as the justices did in the Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Amendment arenas during the Warren, Burger, and Rehnquist years. The permissible reasonable limitations on

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the right to arms endorsed by the court in Heller were recited once more in McDonald, but because issues such as carrying guns in schools or prohibiting the mentally ill from acquiring arms were not litigated in either Heller or McDonald, it might be tempting for gun rights enthusiasts to argue that the court’s endorsement of restrictions amount to mere obiter dicta and are not part of the holdings of the cases that form binding precedent. For their part, government attorneys defending gun control regulations and statutes will almost certainly argue that the exceptions listed in Heller do not form a complete class, and that other analogous or conceptually related limitations on the right to arms should also be tolerated under the Second Amendment. The future, of course, remains unwritten, but gun rights litigation, for the first time in the nation’s history, has solid (if not impregnable) constitutional underpinnings. Civil litigation challenging licensing regimes has increased apace since Heller, although the Heller court took for granted that licensing was not in itself unreasonable. Perhaps more dramatically, Second Amendment claims are rapidly becoming part of the criminal defense attorney’s arsenal to be deployed alongside Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Eighth Amendment claims in gun cases. In the longer term, it is possible that Heller may be confined to its facts, standing for the important but limited principle that the government may not render impossible armed defense against home invaders. As of this writing, however, the scope of the right to armed self-defense of the home and the applicability of the right to armed defense to spaces outside the home remain very much in play, and criminal defense counsel, private litigants, lobbyists and action groups, and the judicial and legislative branches of local, state, and national

government are all poised to participate in determining the metes and bounds of these rights. William G. Merkel See also: Fourteenth Amendment; McDonald v. City of Chicago; Second Amendment

Further Reading Doherty, Brian. Gun Control on Trial: Inside the Supreme Court Battle over the Second Amendment. Washington, DC: Cato Institute, 2009. Korwin, Allan, and David B. Kopel. The Heller Case: Gun Rights Affirmed. Scottsdale, AZ: Bloomfield Press, 2008. Lund, Nelson. “The Second Amendment, Heller, and Originalist Jurisprudence.” UCLA Law Review 56 (2009): 1343–76. http://uclalawreview.org/?p=104 (accessed June 27, 2011). “Symposium: District of Columbia v. Heller.” Syracuse Law Review 59 (2008).

Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership (DRGO) Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership (DRGO) is a gun rights organization that opposes attempts by public health professionals and organizations to classify gun violence as a medical epidemic. Its mission statement indicates that it is an “advocacy and watchdog” network that supports responsible gun ownership and self-defense. The organization is now a project of the Second Amendment Foundation. Although originally based in California, it expanded to a national and international membership. DRGO was founded in 1993 by Dr. Timothy Wheeler and other doctors concerned about the increasing role of the medical community in firearms policy. By the early 1990s, medical journals were regularly publishing research on the causes of gun



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violence. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) established the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control in 1992, which has funded research on firearms use. Organizations such as the American Medical Association (AMA) and the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) also began advocating more directly for the adoption of gun control measures. For example, the AAP first adopted a policy statement in 1992, which recommends that doctors ask parents questions about gun storage and advise them to remove weapons from residences. These efforts became especially visible in California when the California Wellness Foundation sponsored a multimillion-dollar violence prevention initiative. Wheeler, a Fontana-based surgeon, facilitated DRGO’s development as a project of the nonprofit Claremont Institute for Statesmanship and Political Philosophy. With the Claremont Institute, it sponsored amicus briefs for legal cases, including a brief to the U.S. Supreme Court in 2008 for District of Columbia v. Heller (128 S. Ct. 2783), written by Don Kates and Marc Ayers. Dr. Wheeler himself testified before Congress, wrote opinion articles for major newspapers across the United States, and made numerous media appearances. DRGO became a project of the Second Amendment Foundation in 2012, although its mailing address remained in Southern California. Wheeler stepped down as director in 2016 but remained active in the organization. The organization has a robust leadership team along with numerous advisers and contributors to its education and advocacy efforts. It also maintains a referral service of medical providers that support its mission. Funding is provided through annual memberships that are considered charitable contributions. Marcia L. Godwin

See also: American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP); American Medical Association (AMA); District of Columbia v. Heller; Health Care Professionals and Gun Violence; Hemenway, David A.; Kates, Don B., Jr.; Medicine and Gun Violence; Second Amendment Foundation (SAF)

Further Reading American Academy of Pediatrics, Committee on Injury, Violence, and Poison Prevention. “Firearm-Related Injuries Affecting the Pediatric Population.” Pediatrics 105 (2012): e1416. Christoffel, Katherine Kaufer. “Firearm Injuries: Epidemic Then, Endemic Now.” American Journal of Public Health 97 (2007): 626–29. Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership. n.d. https://drgo.us (accessed August 23, 2020). Finch, Stacia, Victoria Weiley, Edward H. Ip, and Shari Barkin. “Impact of Pediatricians’ Perceived Self-Efficacy and Confidence on Violence Prevention Counseling: A National Study.” Maternal and Child Health Journal 12 (2008): 75–82. Godwin, Marcia L., and Jean Reith Schroedel. “Policy Diffusion and Strategies for Promoting Policy Change: Evidence from California Local Gun Control Ordinances.” Policy Studies Journal 28 (2000): 760–76. Goyal, Monika K., Gia M. Badolato, Shilpa J. Patel, Sabah F. Iqbal, Kavita Parikh, and Robert McCarter. “State Gun Laws and Pediatric Firearm-Related Mortality.” Pediatrics 144 (2019): e20183283. Kates, Don B., Jr., with John K. Lattimer and James Boen. “Sagecraft: Bias and Mendacity in the Public Health Literature on Gun Usage.” In The Great American Gun Debate: Essays on Firearms and Violence, edited by Don B. Kates Jr. and Gary Kleck, 123–47. San Francisco: Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy, 1997. Nathanson, Constance A. “Social Movements as Catalysts for Policy Change: The Case

254 | Drive-By Shootings of Smoking and Guns.” Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law 24 (1999): 421–88. Paola, Frederick A. “Firearm Counseling by Physicians: Coverage under Medical Liability Insurance Policies.” Southern Medical Journal 96 (2003): 647–51. Petty, John K., Marion C. W. Henry, Michael L. Nance, Henri R. Ford, and APSA Board of Governors. “Firearm Injuries and Children: Position Statement of the American Pediatric Surgical Association.” Pediatrics 144 (2019): e20183058. Wheeler, Timothy, and E. John Wipfler III. Keeping Your Family Safe: The Responsibilities of Firearm Ownership. Bellevue, WA: Merril Press, 2009. Wintemute, Garen J., Marian E. Betz, and Megan L. Ranney. “Yes, You Can: Physicians, Patients, and Firearms.” Annals of Internal Medicine 165 (2016): 205–13.

Domestic Violence and Guns. See Lautenberg, Frank R. Domestic Violence Offender Gun Ban. See Lautenberg, Frank R. Drive-By Shootings Drive-by shootings, or “drive-bys,” are defined as situations when a firearm is discharged from a vehicle at a person, another vehicle, a building, or other target. They can allow a shooter to approach a victim quickly and without being noticed, to get some protection from possible return fire, and to leave the area before either retaliation or police action can take place. They are often associated with gang violence but also stem from road rage, ordinary disputes between individuals, and random actions.

There are no fully reliable national statistics on drive-bys, but studies have been conducted at local levels and by using samples of national news. A 1994 article in the New England Journal of Medicine reviewed 1991 Los Angeles police files. In that year alone, over 2,000 people were victims; 670 adolescents and children were shot at, resulting in 393 wounded and 36 killed. The majority of the victims had gang affiliations, but other criminals and innocent bystanders were also shot. The Violence Policy Center (2010) has conducted two national surveys of drive-bys using data collected from news reports. They acknowledge that this method is not fully scientific or comprehensive. Their data shows that from July 1, 2008, to December 31, 2008, there were 733 drive-by incidents reported in the media. All but four states had an incident in this period, but California, Texas, and Florida led the nation. They found most of the incidents happen between 7:00 p.m. and 7:00 a.m. In nearly half of the incidents, the victims were at a residence, and in about one-sixth, they were in another car. Drive-by shootings have helped focus national attention on gun-related violence and have fueled the desires of gun control advocates for stricter gun control measures. Several famous people such as former Northwestern University coach Ricky Byrdsong and rap artist Tupac Shakur have been killed in drive-bys. Drive-by shootings have, however, been celebrated in certain music and popular video games despite their violence. G. Edward Richards and John W. Dietrich See also: Crime and Gun Use

Further Reading Dedel, Kelly. “Drive-By Shootings.” In Problem-Oriented Guides for Police, ProblemSpecific Guides Series (No. 47). Washington,

Dueling | 255 DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, 2007. Hutson, H. Range, Deirdre Anglin, and Michael J. Pratts Jr. “Adolescents and Children Injured or Killed in Drive-by Shootings in Los Angeles.” New England Journal of Medicine 330 (1994): 324–27. The Violence Policy Center. Drive-by America. 2nd ed. 2010. http://www.vpc.org /studies/driveby2010.pdf (accessed January 26, 2022).

Dueling During the early period of American history, dueling was relatively common in the country. Both swords and guns were used, but pistols emerged as the weapon of choice. By the 1800s, the rules and customs surrounding dueling had become codified, and the practice was deemed an acceptable means for gentlemen to settle their differences. Following the deaths of several prominent Americans, however, including Alexander Hamilton, public pressure began to mount to abolish the practice. But it was not until the Civil War that dueling came into disfavor in the South. Dueling had its roots in medieval European practices whereby noblemen would fight to avenge their honor or to prove their innocence. The concept behind such judicial combat centered around the belief that God would only allow the person who was in the right to win. This legitimized the violence and even gave it state sanction. Later attempts to ban dueling during the 1600s and 1700s met with little success, despite efforts by the church to suppress the practice. The first recorded duel in American history occurred in 1621 in Massachusetts. The combatants fought with swords, but

pistols quickly became the favorite weapons in the British North American colonies. By the time of the American Revolution (1775– 1783), dueling had become widespread, but it was particularly popular among the landed gentry of the South. In 1777, the “Code Duello” was published by a group of Irish dueling enthusiasts. The code contained specific rules of conduct for duels, including stipulating the number or severity of wounds or the number of shots that were necessary to satisfy the honor of the grieved party. In 1838, John Lyde Wilson, the governor of South Carolina, published an American version of the code. Dueling customs and the “Code Duello” mandated that once a grievance had been registered, all action was coordinated through seconds. The second was usually a close friend or relative. Ideally, the seconds were supposed to try to mediate the dispute before violence ensued. If reconciliation was not possible, the seconds arranged the meeting time, place, and other details. The party that was accused of the grievance chose the weapons used. The accused could apologize at any point prior to the duel and the matter would be dropped; but once the encounter began, it could only be stopped with the consent of the grieved party or when specific injury or death was inflicted on either party. The most common weapon used was a smoothbore flintlock pistol. Most wealthy American men owned a matched set of these guns. They were often given as presents, and many were exquisitely crafted. Nonetheless, these weapons were relatively inaccurate and unreliable. In addition, custom dictated that duelists had to fire their gun within three seconds. These factors were probably the key to the popularity of the flintlock pistols, since their drawbacks usually meant that few people were killed in duels. In fact, it was very

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Aaron Burr duels with Alexander Hamilton in Weehawken, New Jersey, on July 11, 1804. (Library of Congress)

uncommon for duelists to be seriously wounded. For instance, in a celebrated duel in North Carolina in 1797, the two duelists exchanged twelve rounds apiece without hitting each other. A variety of prominent Americans opposed dueling. Benjamin Franklin and George Washington, as well as a host of religious leaders, led the movement to ban dueling. Partially as a result of such leadership, many states outlawed dueling soon after the Revolutionary War. By 1800, dueling was illegal in most northern states. However, such bans were not uniform and were often ignored. For instance, though dueling was illegal in Washington, DC, it remained legal in Maryland. Consequently, men would cross the border into the neighboring state to duel. Likewise, although dueling became illegal in North Carolina and South Carolina soon after 1800, the gentry of these states would travel to isolated areas to fight. In South

Carolina, the duelists would leave areas such as Charleston and go to the state’s barrier islands for their combat. Tybee Island, off the coast of South Carolina, became noted as an area for duels. Society’s acceptance of dueling began to decline after a number of famous Americans were killed in altercations and following a number of grisly encounters that seemed to the public to be executions rather than legitimate efforts to settle disputes. The infamous 1804 duel between Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr, which resulted in the death of Hamilton, horrified many in the nation. Other prominent Americans of the period who were killed in duels included Button Gwinnett, who was one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, and Commodore Stephen Decatur. As late as 1859, dueling continued to take its toll on U.S. politics. That year, California Sen. David Broderick was killed in a duel.

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As more and more states outlawed dueling, its adherents found increasingly innovative methods to avoid prosecution. For example, in cases where two neighboring states both outlawed dueling, for a time the duelists would stand on opposite sides of the state border and fire. This made it very difficult to prosecute because of the different jurisdictions. In the aftermath of the Civil War, dueling dramatically declined. States developed an ingenious tactic to combat the practice when they began enacting legislation that prohibited convicted duelists from holding public office. California enacted such a law in 1849, but North Carolina did not follow suit until 1868. Through such measures, states undermined the appeal of dueling by striking at the livelihood of the southern gentry and thereby responding to the widespread public dissatisfaction with the practice. Dueling would continue to be practiced during the westward expansion in the form of gunfights, but it was not formalized in the manner of the ritualized duels of the South. Tom Lansford See also: Frontier Violence

Further Reading Melville, Lewis. Famous Duels and Assassinations. New York: J. H. Sears, 1974. Moore, John Hammond. Carnival of Blood: Dueling, Lynching, and Murder in South Carolina, 1880–1920. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2006. Quinn, Arthur. The Rivals: William Gwin, David Broderick, and the Birth of California. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1997.

Dum-Dum Bullet In the early twentieth century, “dum-dum” was employed as a slang term for all

expanding bullets. The original dum-dum was a British .303 rifle bullet with the hard metal jacket removed from the tip, thus exposing the soft lead core. Upon impact, the bullet tended to expand, imparting greater shock; it was adopted in the belief that the tribal enemies faced by the British were fanatics who could not be stopped by an ordinary rifle bullet. The design was created by Captain Bertie Clay and produced at the Dum-Dum Arsenal in India, hence its name. The original dum-dum bullet was dangerous to its user as well as to its target; with the lead core exposed both at the base and at the nose, the gas pressures of firing sometimes blew the lead core out and left the copper jacket lodged in the barrel, leading to catastrophic failure of the rifle when the next bullet fired hit the jacket remnants. It was subsequently replaced by a hollow-point design with the copper jacket enclosing the base. This was the ancestor of all modern hollow-point projectiles. The dum-dum and all similar designs were forbidden for wartime use by the Hague Declaration of 1899, which prohibited use of bullets designed to flatten or expand in the human body. David T. Hardy See also: Ammunition, Types of; Hollow Point Bullet

Further Reading Hogg, Ian. Jane’s Directory of Military Small Arms Ammunition. New York: Jane’s Publishing, 1985.

Duty-to-Retreat Doctrine and Gun Control Laws. See Castle Doctrine

E Eddie Eagle

According to the NRA, the program has been used in all fifty states and has reached more than twenty-one million children. The NRA says that Eddie Eagle offers no value judgments about whether guns are good or bad; it is designed to promote protection and safety. Critics of the program argue that it has less honorable purposes. In its report “Joe Camel with Feathers,” the Violence Policy Center (VPC), a pro-gun control research organization, argues that the program was developed as a lobbying tool to defeat child-focused gun safety legislation then being considered

The Eddie Eagle program was created by the National Rifle Association (NRA) in 1988 to teach children to avoid gun accidents. The core of the program, symbolized by the costumed cartoon character Eddie Eagle, consists of a four-line slogan designed to tell children from prekindergarten to sixth grade how to react if they encounter a gun: “Stop! Don’t touch. Leave the area. Tell an adult.” The NRA makes available various instructional materials, including workbooks, posters, and an animated video.

Eddie Eagle, a mascot for the National Rifle Association, helps promote gun safety for children at an event in Wilmington, North Carolina, in 2019. (Roberto Galan/Dreamstime.com) 259

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in Florida by offering the program as a voluntary, NRA-controlled substitute for government regulation. The VPC further criticizes the program for failing to include information about the dangers of guns, and charges that the program is really a backdoor method for introducing children to gun use. The VPC also says that there is no proof that the program has been effective in reducing gun-related harm to children (cf. Hemenway 2004, 84–86). The NRA says its program has been effective, however, and denies that it is designed to promote firearm use. Robert J. Spitzer See also: National Rifle Association (NRA); Safety Courses; Violence Policy Center (VPC)

Further Reading “Eddie Eagle.” National Rifle Association, n.d. http://www.nrahq.org/safety/eddie / (accessed January 17, 2011). Hemenway, David. Private Guns, Public Health. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2004. Sagi, Guy. 2019. “NRA’s Eddie Eagle Reaches 32 Million Children.” American Rifleman, September 3, 2019. https://www.american rifleman.org/articles/2019/9/3/nra-s-eddie -eagle-reaches-32-million-children/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Spitzer, Robert J. “The Gun Dispute.” American Educator 23 (Summer 1999): 10–15. Violence Policy Center. “Joe Camel with Feathers.” Washington, DC: Violence Policy Center, November 1997. http://www.vpc.org /studies/eddiecon.htm (accessed January 17, 2011).

Education Fund to Stop Handgun Violence. See Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV)

Elections and Gun Control The importance of gun control in elections varies from region to region and from election to election. It is difficult to dispute that the issue has been very important in many national, statewide, and congressional races, and that it has generally been the candidate on the side of gun rights that has benefited, although that trend may well be shifting. Citizens who support gun owner rights are often more motivated to vote and are more likely to be single-issue voters; that is, they will base their voting decision on that issue alone. The percentage of voters in this category is not large but can determine a close election. Interest groups who support gun rights— primarily the National Rifle Association (NRA)—are quite active in political campaigns. The NRA spends millions in issue advertising, contributes additional millions to individual candidates and political action committees, and, perhaps most importantly, works tirelessly to communicate with and motivate its members. For years, the NRA was mostly unchallenged, but that changed when billionaire Michael Bloomberg became active in the gun control movement and helped organize and fund Everytown for Gun Safety. At the presidential level, the issue of gun control is thought to have been significant in George W. Bush’s victory over Al Gore in 2000. Though the focus of that election was the disputed outcome in Florida, the fact remains that Gore was unable to carry his home state of Tennessee, former president Bill Clinton’s home state of Arkansas, or then-Democratic stalwart West Virginia. Any of those three states would have won the election for Gore. The NRA was active



in each state, and Gore was hurt by supporting various gun control proposals. In 2004, the issue again worked in favor of Bush, but it was not decisive in that election. Still, John Kerry was hurt by his attempts to court gun rights supporters, including a pheasant hunt/photo op in Iowa. Barack Obama chose not to go hunting in 2008, and he softened his stance on gun control. Gun control was clearly less important than economic issues and foreign conflicts in 2008. Gun control was not an important issue in the presidential election of 2012. President Obama incurred the wrath of gun rights advocates, but the issue never rose to the level of the economy or health care. Given his lack of open hostility toward gun rights in his first term, the worst offense that could be ascribed to Obama was his desire to restrict gun rights. Early in his term, Obama received a grade of “F” from the Brady Campaign for his lack of support for gun control. In early 2009, when Attorney General Eric Holder said the administration would support renewal of the Assault Weapons Ban, Chief of Staff Rahm Emmanuel, no ally of the NRA, reportedly told Holder not to speak on the gun issue. It was suggested the political cost was too high. Little changed even after the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in December 2012, in which twenty-six were killed, including twenty children. Obama pushed for stricter gun laws, but the Republicancontrolled House of Representatives was unwilling to pass any significant measures. Many thought that the gun control debate was essentially over if the Sandy Hook shooting could not move the needle. In 2016, the NRA threw its weight (and money) behind Donald Trump. The group

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spent $54 million in the election, with more than $30 million specifically in support of Trump. Many pundits thought that was foolish spending, but the NRA was stalwart in in its support of Trump, and they were successful in Senate and House races as well. Their spending dwarfed that of gun control groups. The electoral and legislative landscape for gun control shifted following the February 2018 shooting at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, in which a former student killed seventeen and wounded seventeen others. Many of the survivors became politically active, and the shooting had political implications far greater than Sandy Hook. There was some movement in public opinion, and the Democrats went “all in” for gun control at that point. The NRA spent less than $10 million in 2018 and was outspent by gun control groups, including the Bloomberg-backed Everytown for Gun Safety, which spent more than $30 million. In the 2019 legislative races in Virginia, the NRA’s home state, Everytown outspent the NRA, $2.5 million to $300,000. It was reported that Everytown planned to spend at least $60 million in 2020. Much of the advantage now enjoyed by Everytown is dependent upon the financial support of Bloomberg. Though gun control is thought to be a partisan issue, with Democrats supporting regulations and Republicans opposing them, it breaks down more by region and residency patterns. Citizens who live in the Northeast, the West Coast, and in urban areas tend to support stricter laws, whereas those who live in the South, Mountain West, and in rural areas support fewer restrictions on firearms. At present, Democrats are stronger in urban areas and the coasts, and Republicans are more powerful in the

262 | Enforcement of Gun Control Laws

South, West, and rural areas. Because the nation has become polarized on this issue, as well as many others, and by geography, gun control is now largely a partisan issue, pitting urban Democrats against rural Republicans, with the suburbs often deciding who wins elections and who legislates on this issue. Both parties have little to gain and much to lose by compromising on gun control. Interest group support and spending on this issue is now almost completely partisan as well. The NRA has claimed a high rate of success in influencing elections, at least up to 2018. That success rate is somewhat inflated because the organization does not endorse a candidate in every contest. A nonendorsement may reflect a judgment that both candidates are acceptable, that neither is acceptable, or that the preferred candidate is not capable of winning. Taking all of that into account, the NRA’s winning percentage remains high, and few elected officials in districts with significant numbers of NRA members would choose to run afoul of the NRA. The NRA enjoys strong loyalty in its membership. Votes are more valuable than money, and NRA members are motivated voters and often respond to the appeals from the leadership. Society has only recently become more aware of how important these communications can be for interest groups and how extensive they are. Everytown now boasts more than five million members, which is comparable to the size of the NRA. It is not clear, though, that Everytown members are as committed as those who support gun owner rights. Harry L. Wilson

Safety; National Rifle Association (NRA); Obama, Barack; Political Victory Fund (PVF); Republican Party and Gun Control; Trump, Donald

See also: Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence; Bush, George W.; Democratic Party and Gun Control; Everytown for Gun

The issue of enforcement of gun laws is both a legal and political issue. On the legal side, enforcement can lower future gun violations

Further Readings Beckett, Lois. “Gun Control Groups Outspent NRA in Midterm elections.” The Guardian, November 11, 2018. https://www.the guardian.com/us-news/2018/nov/11/gun -control-groups-nra-midterm-elections (accessed May 18, 2022). Gangitano, Alex. “Gun Control Groups Spend Big in 2020.” The Hill, January 29, 2020. https://thehill.com/business-a-lobbying /480404-gun-control-groups-spend-big -in-2020 (accessed May 18, 2022). Kirell, Andrew. “Norah O’Donnell Grills Rahm Emmanuel for Telling Obama to ‘Shut the F**k Up about Assault Weapons Ban.” Mediate, December 18, 2012. OpenSecrets.org. “The NRA Placed Big Bets on the 2016 Election, and Won Almost All of Them.” https://www.opensecrets.org/news /2016/11/the-nra-placed-big-bets-on-the -2016-election-and-won-almost-all-of -them/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021. Wilson, Harry L. Guns, Gun Control, and Elections: The Politics and Policy of Firearms. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007. Wilson, Harry L. The Triumph of the Gun Rights Argument: Why the Gun Control Debate Is Over. Santa Clara, CA: Praeger, 2015.

Enforcement of Gun Control Laws



either by removing criminals from society or by deterring the criminal or others from committing a crime because they fear the consequent punishment. On the political side, some argue that “we need to make more laws restricting guns,” while others argue “we don’t need new laws—we need enforcement of existing gun laws.” Further, there also can be societal trade-offs where more enforcement may be effective but will require major government resources or significant curtailment of individual rights. Examining enforcement is complicated by the fact that there are both state and federal laws as well as dozens of federal, state, and local enforcement agencies. Additionally, guns are frequently used by criminals in committing crimes and in protecting themselves, so many gun arrests come as an indirect result of arrests for other violations. Handguns are the most common weapon used in all violent crimes, so gun crimes and enforcement tend to follow trends in overall patterns of homicides and assaults. The rate of arrests per 1,000 people increased substantially from 1.0 in 1983 to about 1.3 in 1994 and decreased thereafter until 1998, when it was 1.1. It has remained in a small range since then. The number of arrests reported by the FBI ranged from about 150,000 to 200,000 per year (Statistical Abstract of the United States). There are at least two competing explanations for the later decline in the number of arrests. First, enforcement may have been first increased and then decreased. Second, because of increased enforcement earlier, the criminal activity that leads to arrests decreased since it no longer paid off for the offenders. However, beginning in 1994, approvals had to be given for transfers of handguns and could be refused where the recipient was a person forbidden from owning a

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handgun. This was a consequence of the Brady Act. The initial Brady period was from 1994 through 1998, during which about half the decline in arrests occurred. After the permanent Brady rules went into effect in 1999, the arrest rate first continued to fall and then stabilized at a lower level than had been seen since before 1983. Possibly, those who are not allowed to own handguns learned over the 1994–1998 period either not to violate the gun laws or to be more cautious in their violations. In recent years, about one-third of all annual gun deaths in the United States, or roughly 13,000 per year, are homicides. Most of these deaths and many other firearms crimes are perpetrated with handguns. Many of these crimes also are committed by repeat offenders. In 2018, of the just under 7,000 people convicted of federal gun violations, over 91 percent had a previous conviction, and over 41 percent had previous firearms convictions (United States Sentencing Commission 2018). A study that followed federal offenders after their release found the following: “Firearms offenders generally recidivated at a higher rate, recidivated more quickly following release into the community, and continued to recidivate later in life than non-firearms offenders” (United States Sentencing Commission 2019). More than two-thirds of people released after serving a sentence for firearms were rearrested within eight years. This raises major doubt about the strength of deterrent effects on recidivism, although it remains possible that others never commit crimes because they fear the chance of jail time. Most arrests for weapons-related crimes are made by local or state police. In 2004, federal arrests in this category numbered 9,936, while state and local arrests totaled 117,610 (Sourcebook of Criminal Justice

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Statistics 2004, various tables). Some of these case end in plea bargains. Some lead to probation. Of those sentenced to prison, the average sentence is forty-two months at the state level and eighty-four months at the federal level. The fraction of the sentence actually served is also shorter at the state level. The result is that a person convicted of a felony gun crime (when that crime is the most serious part of the conviction) can expect to serve an average of less than nine months in prison if in a state court or thirtythree months if in a federal court. The average across all such convictions is eleven months in prison. As only about 79 percent of those arrested are actually convicted, and, of course, only a small percentage of those who violate the gun laws are unlucky enough to be arrested and charged, the expected cost of violating the gun laws in terms of prison time is very small. An optimal amount of gun law enforcement would be at a level at which the marginal cost of reducing a crime by enforcement equaled the marginal social cost of the crime prevented by that enforcement. Generally, that means, in effect, deterring crime rather than actually stopping it. To know whether the level of enforcement is optimal, we need to know the costs of enforcement and the effect of enforcement on crime as well as the social cost of that crime. None of these issues are usually very well analyzed, however, because the production relations have not been agreed upon generally or estimated acceptably. We have some idea of the costs of police, courts, and corrections, but we do not know with any accuracy the degree to which crimes are deterred by these factors. This is unlike the private sector, where we can generally calculate how much it costs to produce an additional unit of a product, given

the labor, capital, materials, and so forth that go into that product. It is difficult to obtain a valid measure of the costs of a crime. There is the value placed on the goods stolen by a thief or robber, presuming we do not count the value to the criminal as a gain. But what about the psychic costs to the victim, or the reduced feeling of safety among other potential victims? In business, we have a good idea of the value of an additional unit of the product; it is the price at which it can be sold. Presumably, the purpose of the laws and their enforcement is to attempt to strike this balance between the marginal costs and the marginal benefits. There are at least three types of gun control laws in the United States. First, there are those laws that restrict the importation of guns and equipment. Second, there are laws that affect manufacturing or sales within U.S. borders. Third, there are laws on ownership and use by the individual (there are also laws regulating the armed services and police, but these are not generally of interest directly to the public). The first two types of laws may be thought to be relatively easy to enforce, but generally, their enforcement is more efficient at the federal level. There are relatively few importers or manufacturers compared to the number of consumers who own guns or might own them. That does not mean that there are no violators of the law, but the inspections needed to ensure compliance are fewer in number. The number of retail dealers is larger. They may be more tempted to violate the laws, especially if doing so is profitable. On the other hand, gun dealers are very highly regulated, with a good deal of paperwork involved in any transfer of a gun. Individual gun owners are much more numerous. The law that is most likely to be



violated is one that forbids a convicted felon from owning a gun. In many cases, convicted felons are career criminals who feel the need to have a gun in the performance of their profession. Their victims are more compliant and consequently more profitable to them. Further, criminals may well be potential victims of other criminals and consequently feel the need for self-defense. Until a person uses a gun in some fashion, how can we determine that the person has an illegal gun? The intrusiveness of the personal inspections needed to ensure that each person does not have an illegal gun is simply incompatible with a free society. Though inspecting people to ensure that they do not have illegal firearms is not feasible, increasing the sentences for illegal use of those firearms is. It should be possible, if desired by society, to substantially increase the penalties, especially at the state level. Further, enhancement of the sentences for other crimes when they are done with illegal guns should help reduce the incentive to use guns in committing such crimes. In deciding how many resources to devote to pursuing firearms offenders, it should be kept in mind that there are limited resources available to the criminal justice system. Resources must be allocated to countering other crimes, too. The optimal allocation will result in the marginal benefit of each criminal justice activity, relative to its cost, being equal across activities. Important questions to be asked include how much people fear other crimes relative to firearms crimes (which are usually possession), how effective additional enforcement will be in reducing the actual number of such crimes and the attendant fear of those crimes, and how effective firearms enforcement will be in actually reducing other crimes. Until these questions are

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answered, the question of whether additional enforcement is warranted remains unresolved. Lawrence Southwick Jr., and John W. Dietrich See also: Gun Control; Gun Courts

Further Reading Bureau of Justice Statistics. http://bjs.ojp.usdoj .gov/ (accessed May 31, 2011). Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Bureau of Justice Statistics, various years. Statistical Abstract of the United States Annual. Washington, DC: U.S. Bureau of the Census, various years. United States Sentencing Commission. The Criminal History of Federal Offenders. 2018. United States Sentencing Commission. Recidivism Among Federal Firearms Offenders. 2019.

Ergonomics and Firearms Design Ergonomic considerations in firearms design are aimed toward making guns more efficient, lighter, and easier to use, as well as toward reducing the likelihood of accidental discharges. Rifles manufactured before World War II tended to be heavy and have limited capacity—examples include Mauser 98s, Enfields, Springfields, and Mosin-Nagants. Military guns were optimized for long-range encounters with powerful ammunition and sized for the average Western European or American male. Operation was manual and relatively slow, though intensive training could achieve fast rates of fire. Desire for lightweight guns with greater rates of fire in World War II led to the

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production of lower-powered guns using less powerful rounds (including pistol rounds)—such as the American M1 carbine and M3 “Grease Gun” in 45 ACP; the British Sten and Sterling submachine guns in 9 mm; the German MP-38 and MP-40; and Russian PPSh-41. Even greater firing rates were quickly developed, including the German Sturmgewehr 44, the USSR AK-47, and the U.S. M16 family. More recent developments have emphasized less recoil and adjustable stock lengths, which are especially valuable to the smaller shooter. Similar trends can be seen in handgun development. Though the revolver was revolutionary when it was introduced in the middle of the nineteenth century, with its offering of multiple rounds, in the modern era, the semiautomatic handgun dominates the military, police, and self-defense markets. Soon after its introduction in the early 1980s, the Glock 17 set what would become the dominant paradigm: a light-polymer frame, with a high-capacity magazine. One advantage of polymers is that grip size can be made alterable to accommodate different hand sizes. Gun sights have seen many improvements over the past several decades. The most obvious are the increasingly powerful and more sophisticated telescopic sights. Other important developments include colored, fiberoptic sights and night sights that make targets glow. More passive sights using Gestalt perceptual principles to align front and rear have also been developed— though none of these has become popular. However, laser sights, such as those developed by Crimson Trace and Lasermax, have become increasingly popular. A bright red dot is projected on the target and aligned with the gun’s point of impact at a chosen distance. The advantages are that one can see the point of impact, the gun

does not have to be brought to eye level, and the dot can be intimidating. Developed in the late 1970s, they were popularized in the movie The Terminator. Problems include the shooter losing the dot in bright light and “chasing” it rather than focusing on the target. To improve daylight usage, green lasers have been developed to take advantage of the human’s greater sensitivity to that wavelength band, making the dot more visible. Dominating the rifle market are red dot or Reflex sights, such as the Aimpoint or Eotech offerings. Patented by John Arne Ingemund in 1973, they use reflexive optics to project a dot on a target seen through the sight without parallax error. They offer much faster target acquisition and much better performance in low light compared to old-fashioned iron sights. The armed forces are major users of this type of sights. The sights are relatively large for handgun usage and thus far are usually seen only at competitions. However, smaller ones are being developed. Visual performance is also enhanced by adding illumination devices to firearms. Most modern military rifles and other long arms can have a flashlight attached to them. The same is true of modern semiautomatic handguns. Numerous companies manufacture such devices. They serve to identify targets and also have an intimidation effect. The downside of such devices is that they necessitate pointing the gun at a target with the risk of an accidental or negligent discharge. One crucial aspect of firearms design is to avoid accidental or negligent discharges. A key problem is that even when a firearm is pointed at a wrong target (e.g., an innocent bystander in a police or military setting), there is a natural impulse to put one’s finger on the trigger. Modern training stresses keeping the finger off the trigger



and to the side of the firearm unless you are to shoot. A “startle response” can generate a fourteen-pound trigger pull. A squeezing reaction of the hand not holding the gun can cause a sympathetic squeeze in the gun hand, causing it to fire. And even simply swinging one’s hand with the finger on the trigger can set off the gun. Attempting to activate a gun-mounted flashlight in too close a proximity to the trigger has also been seen to lead to an accidental pulling of the trigger. In more extreme cases, officers have reached for a pistol-shaped taser, pulled their handgun instead, and have shot someone that they were trying to restrain. The firearms world sometimes attempts to deal with such problems with training mantras, the most famous of which is “all guns are always loaded.” Unfortunately, training may not overcome errors unless it is long and intense—much longer and much more intense than most gun users have experienced. For example, several studies show that even trained police officers put their fingers on the trigger in simulations when they swore they did not. To prevent the accidental trigger pulling that can ensue, one solution has been to increase the trigger pull pressure. However, intensive training seems the best solution. Other designs to prevent accidental discharges include (1) adjustable handgrip and stock sizes so that weapons can be personalized for users of different heights, arm lengths, and grip strengths; (2) magazine release designs that discourage the incorrect loading of guns; (3) loaded-chamber indicators to prevent accidents in which someone thinks a firearm is unloaded but a round is still in the chamber (with magazinefed weapons, it is common to assume that removing the magazine removes all ammunition—but this is not true and leads to tragic accidents); and (4) safeties that

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have designs guaranteeing that a firearm does not discharge if it is dropped. Glenn E. Meyer See also: AK-47; Loaded-Chamber Indicator; Smart Guns

Further Reading Christopher, John Chivers. The Gun. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2010. Connor, Matthew. “Firearms History and the Technology of Gun Violence.” University of California-Davis (UC-Davis) Online Exhibit. 2019. https://www.library.ucdavis .edu/exhibit/firearms-history-and-the-tech nology-of-gun-violence/ (accessed January 27, 2022). Green, Marc. “Human Error vs. Design Error.” Human Factors Blog, July 16, 2010. http://humanfactorsblog.org/2010/07/16 /the-human-factors-of-weapons/ (accessed January 27, 2022). Hendrick, Hal, Paul Paradis, and Richard J. Hornick. Human Factors Issues in Handgun Safety and Forensics. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, 2007. Norman, Donald A. The Psychology of Everyday Things. New York: Basic Books, 1988.

Everytown for Gun Safety Everytown for Gun Safety is a national nonprofit organization that advocates for gun violence prevention more broadly, as opposed to solely focusing on gun control. Their objective is to create safer communities by reducing the number of Americans who die or are injured by firearms. Within this broad prevention mandate, Everytown has identified several issues worthy of emphasis. These core issues include a better system of background checks, disarming domestic violence offenders, protecting children, combating everyday inner-city gun violence, and holding the gun

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industry accountable (Everytown for Gun Safety 2019). Everytown is largely the brainchild of its most visible and prolific patron, billionaire and former mayor of New York City, Michael Bloomberg. The seeds of Everytown began with Bloomberg’s creation of Mayors against Illegal Guns in 2006 (Neyfakh 2016). Mayors against Illegal Guns then joined forces with Moms Demand Action, an activist group established in the wake of the 2012 mass shooting in Newtown, Connecticut (Neyfakh 2016). In 2014, Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America united with Mayors against Illegal Guns, forming what is now known as Everytown for Gun Safety. Currently, Everytown is composed of several subsidiary and partially autonomous entities, or what they call the “voices of the movement” (Everytown for Gun Safety 2019). These voices consist of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, Students Demand Action, Mayors against Illegal Guns, and a gun violence survivor network. These various groups function primarily as the grassroots arm of the organization. However, the business of Everytown encompasses more than grassroots activism. It is also engaged in research, law, and lobbying. Through its activism, research, and law components, Everytown essentially employs a three-pronged strategy for combating gun violence. Overall, their strategy anticipates incremental change in public policy and public sentiment. This change is pursued through increasing public awareness and education, lobbying elected officials, funding gun sense candidates, and affecting legal reform at the state and local levels. This comprehensive and decentralized strategy is seen as more effective than the singular strategy of trying to move the hand of the U.S. Congress.

The grassroots activism component of Everytown consists of everyday Americans acting in various capacities. As of 2019, Everytown reports having roughly four million online supporters and six million who have joined their movement overall (Everytown for Gun Safety 2019). Everytown also reports having over 50,000 active volunteers and volunteer-led chapters of Moms Demand Action in each of the fifty states (Charity Navigator 2019). Individuals are encouraged to join or start a local chapter of Moms Demand Action or Students Demand Action. The activism of their supporters can take several forms. Wear Orange Day is the marquis event for gun safety supporters. This day of recognition occurs on the first Friday in June and is designated as National Gun Violence Awareness Day. Other calls to action include attending sponsored events or political rallies, organizing vigils, protesting companies, signing online petitions, voter mailings, or setting up information booths at various community events. Supporters can also participate in the gun sense action network, where they contact elected officials to spur them to action and register their support or opposition to certain legislation or policies. Everytown supporters are also encouraged to speak with their vote. A major ongoing effort in this regard is the “Throw Them Out” campaign which includes a supporters’ pledge to only vote for gun sense candidates. Everytown runs television and digital ads targeting officeholders who receive gun lobby contributions and fail to back gun regulations (Eichner 2018). They also maintain a database that informs voters about the gun safety positions of candidates who are currently running for office in their district or state. Everytown Research, the organization’s research component, seeks to increase



awareness and understanding of gun violence. Everytown examines the patterns, trends, causes and prevention of gun violence and disseminates this information in various forms (e.g., charts, tables, figures, infographics, fact sheets) on their website. The website also provides reports on a variety of gun-related topics. Since 2014, Everytown Research has produced twenty original reports on guns and domestic violence, strategies for decreasing gun violence, and illegal online gun sales (Charity Navigator 2019). To increase awareness and education, Everytown also records on a continuing basis the number of unintentional child shootings and school shootings throughout the country (Everytown Research 2019). Everytown claims to have the most rigorous and current information database on child and school shootings in the United States. This information has been especially useful in educating gun owners. The theme of this education platform is that gun ownership is not just about individual rights, it is also about individual responsibilities. The overriding responsibility is to promote gun safety through the proper storage of personal firearms. Gun owners are expected to take steps to ensure their firearms stay out of the hands of those who should not have them, such as children or youth, or anyone residing in the home that is cognitively impaired or seriously mentally ill. All in all, the message to gun owners is that they can prevent lethal or injurious accidents from happening by hindering inappropriate access to private weapons. In addition to conducting its own research, Everytown also supports external gun violence research through various partnerships. These partnerships are with highly respected academic and think tank institutions, such as Harvard University,

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Johns Hopkins University, and The Urban Institute (Charity Navigator 2019). The research conducted through these partnerships has furnished insight into underground gun markets and the impact of gun violence on the economic health of cities (Charity Navigator 2019). Everytown’s partnerships also aid the development of other nonprofits aimed at reducing gun violence. Through the provision of seed money, Everytown helped launch The Trace in 2015 (Charity Navigator 2019). This web-based news media outlet advances and amasses media and journalistic coverage of gun violence issues. A repository of unique information is also accessible through Everytown’s Gun Law Navigator tool. This interactive database is the largest of its kind in the United States and provides state-by-state information on gun laws and gun law trends dating back to 1991 (Everytown Research 2019). This tool also reveals various gaps in the existing gun laws of each state. This information works in close proximity to Everytown’s legal division, Everytown Law. Everytown Law takes the cause of gun violence prevention into the courts. Expert litigators from around the country produce legal scholarship that aids the representation of clients in various lawsuits. Their legal scholarship focuses on the intersection between gun laws, constitutional issues, and public safety (Everytown Research 2019). Their hands-on legal work includes the representation of persons, businesses, and governments in civil and criminal cases. Some of the persons represented by Everytown’s team of attorneys are those who have been wounded by gun violence or are survivors of gun violence. For example, they have represented the family of an exchange student killed in a school mass

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shooting. The plaintiffs are suing the parents of the shooter for the negligent storage of their firearms. Everytown has also filed an amicus brief in a Wisconsin Court of Appeals that urges the court to allow the petitioner, a gun violence survivor, to proceed with a lawsuit against an online classified ads site that promulgates the sale of guns. Everytown Law also represents local governments by offering legal counsel to cities seeking to enact, strengthen, or maintain local ordinances related to guns. For example, they have represented cities seeking to pass local ordinances requiring the safe storage of weapons and prohibiting the sale of assault weapons and large-capacity magazines (Everytown Research 2019). Everytown Law also challenges what are deemed to be dangerous gun laws and files amicus briefs defending state and federal gun safety laws against Second Amendment challenges. In 2019, on behalf of the West Virginia Domestic Violence Coalition, they challenged a law preventing state business owners from prohibiting guns on their property, including parking lots (Everytown Research 2019). In 2019, Everytown Law also sued an Ohio school district for allowing untrained school employees to carry arms on campus (Everytown Research 2019). Additionally, Everytown has fought to uphold laws that prohibit convicted felons from owning weapons (Everytown Research 2019). In their relatively short existence, Everytown has emerged as a strong countervailing force against a powerful gun industry. This previously unchallenged complex consists of manufacturers, retailers, and organized gun enthusiasts. With the advent of Everytown and similar advocacy groups, this complex is now encountering organized resistance in every state. This resistance is

no longer sporadic or confined to an individual mass or high-profile shooting; it is systematic, well funded, and ongoing. Karol Lucken See also: Bloomberg, Michael; Gun Control; Moms Demand Action; Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting

Further Reading Charity Navigator. “Everytown for Gun Safety Support Fund.” 2019. https://www.chari tynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay= search .summary&orgid=16646 (accessed October 12, 2019). Eichner, Billy. “Everytown Has a 5 Point Action Plan to Get Rid of Lawmakers Beholden to the Gun Lobby.” Vogue, February 16, 2018. Everytown for Gun Safety. 2019. https://every town.org/ (accessed October 11, 2019). Everytown Research. 2019. https://every townresearch.org/law/ (accessed October 12, 2019). Neyfakh, Leon. “Whatever Happened to Michael Bloomberg’s Anti-Gun Crusade? It Still Exists—And It’s Starting to Work.” Slate, July 5, 2016.

Extreme Risk Protection Orders In 1999, Connecticut enacted the nation’s first Extreme Risk Protection Order (ERPO) law. Such laws create opportunities for authorized individuals and entities to seek court orders that temporarily prevent firearms acquisition and possession by individuals shown to pose a danger to themselves or others (Sklar 2019). These orders apply for a temporary period of time, typically up to one year, but can be renewed if evidence is presented to justify extending the order. Prior to the February 2018 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School



in Parkland, Florida, only five states had ERPO laws. After the Parkland shooting and its attendant mobilization of gun control activity nationwide, additional state legislatures enacted ERPO laws. Most ERPO laws were enacted by state legislatures, but the voters of Washington created that state’s law through a ballot issue. By June 2019, fifteen states and the District of Columbia had ERPO laws, and Nevada’s version of the law awaited the governor’s signature after enactment by the legislature. In Congress, bipartisan interest in a possible federal ERPO law led to a 2019 hearing by the Senate Judiciary Committee to examine how such laws were working in the states. The Committee’s chairman, Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-SC), had cosponsored a federal ERPO proposal in 2018 with Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) during the previous session of Congress. However, that proposal was not enacted by Congress. ERPO laws are intended to reduce firearms deaths and injuries, with special emphasis on identifying individuals for whom there is evidence of suicide risk, intrafamily violence dangers, or a psychological state, whether due to a life crisis or other causes, that risks harm to the wider public. They are often referred to as “red flag laws” because ERPO laws authorize the removal of firearms from individuals who exhibit behavior that causes alarm about the potential for violence or self-harm. Concerns have been raised, however, that the “red flag” terminology serves to stereotype and stigmatize people with mental disabilities as “dangerous,” even if they are not individuals to whom the law will be applied (Coalition to Stop Gun Violence 2019). There are variations among states in the elements and procedures for their ERPO laws. The most notable differences concern the specification of who can present evidence

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to a judge in order to request an order to remove guns from individuals who pose dangers to themselves or others. Typically, ERPO laws authorize law enforcement officials to seek such orders, but most states also authorize family and household members to request removal of firearms upon the presentation of required evidence. A few states also permit mental health professionals and school officials to present petitions and evidence to seek such orders (Giffords Law Center 2019). Each jurisdiction defines for itself the level of evidence needed to establish the defined risk required for judges to issue such orders. Most states require “clear and convincing evidence” but vary in their terminology for whether that evidence needs to establish “a risk,” “significant danger,” “extreme risk,” or other formulation for potential danger (Sklar 2019). Each jurisdiction also establishes its own relinquishment process after judges issue orders to remove firearms and bar the acquisition and possession of additional guns. Typically, the laws require subject individuals to surrender their firearms with the use of search warrants to seize weapons if all firearms are not surrendered (Frizzell and Chien 2019). Gun rights advocates and their supporters within state legislatures often oppose ERPO laws. Many of the arguments against ERPO laws focus on the sufficiency and fairness of procedures that lead to court orders. States typically include within their laws opportunities for individuals to seek termination of court orders by presenting evidence to refute judges’ conclusions about risks and dangers. However, this mechanism to ensure fairness is not viewed as adequate by critics of ERPO laws. Those with a broad vision of gun ownership rights under the Second Amendment raise concerns about an individual’s loss of property and a

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specific constitutional right without ever being charged for or convicted of a serious crime. The “clear and convincing evidence” evidentiary standard for ERPO is much less demanding than the “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard used in criminal cases. Thus, critics fear that mere unsubstantiated claims by a police officer or family member can lead to removal orders by judges who are insufficiently protective of gun rights. Depending on the balance of political power in a state legislature, such concerns can prevent ERPO proposals from receiving consideration in legislative bodies dominated by legislators who are opposed to gun control laws. There are also concerns about the risks of harm to police officers and citizens when officers are called upon to remove weapons from individuals subject to ERPO orders who refuse to voluntarily relinquish their weapons. Critics point to an incident in Maryland in November 2018 when police officers shot and killed a man who would not put down his gun when officers came to seize the weapon under the ERPO law (“Maryland Officers Serving ‘Red Flag’ Gun Removal Order Fatally Shoot Armed Man” 2018). Any encounters between police officers and armed individuals pose dangers. ERPO enforcement contexts may heighten anger and emotions when officers arrive at individuals’ homes to seize property that those individuals may view as central to their constitutional rights and capacity to defend their homes from criminals. Political mobilization in support of gun control, including ERPO laws, is often spurred by highly publicized mass shootings. Prior to the mass shootings at the University of California-Santa Barbara in 2014 and Parkland, Florida, in 2018, law enforcement officials or family members had grave concerns about the dangers posed by the

pre-shooting behavior of the perpetrators of those crimes. In the California case, the shooter’s parents had called police to express concern about their son’s social media posts concerning murder and suicide. In the Parkland case, the shooter’s mother, the police, and school and mental health officials all had knowledge of his serious behavioral problems. These cases reinforced the arguments favoring a process for intervening to prevent gun possession by individuals whose behavior provides evidence of the potential to cause serious harm to themselves or others. California and Florida each enacted ERPO laws in the aftermath of the event that occurred within their borders. Yet, there are questions about the potential impact of ERPO laws to prevent mass shootings and other violent events. For example, in other multivictim shootings, such as the Virginia Beach, Virginia, city hall shooting on May 31, 2019, the perpetrator did not arouse any suspicions by law enforcement officials or family members. Although mass shootings create political momentum to enact gun control laws, the advocates of ERPO laws typically talk about reducing gun violence more broadly, especially in the context of suicide and intrafamily violence, rather than predicting any specific impact on mass shootings generally (Cunningham 2018). As most states’ ERPO laws began to be implemented in 2018 and 2019, there is little information to demonstrate the effectiveness of laws, other than documenting the number of ERPO proceedings in the states’ courts each year. As these laws are so recent that many people do not yet know that such orders are available, there are concerns that citizens’ lack of knowledge will hamper effectiveness as the laws will initially be underutilized by uninformed family members who have relevant evidence about a relative posing risks of harm.



Several studies have examined the impact of ERPO laws in the two states, Connecticut and Indiana, in which such laws have been in existence for the longest time period, since 1999 and 2005, respectively. These studies indicate that ERPO laws are most frequently applied to people experiencing a major life crisis rather than those with prior diagnoses of psychological problems and that ERPO-generated gun removals reduced the number of suicides that otherwise would have occurred (Frizzell and Chien 2019). A study published in 2018 that examined both Connecticut and Indiana found “firearm seizure legislation is associated with meaningful reductions in population-level firearm suicide rates” but left lingering questions about whether individuals in Connecticut may have sought alternative means to commit suicide (Kivisto and Phalen 2018, 861). The existence of research studies documenting post-ERPO reductions in gun suicides enables advocates to characterize ERPO laws as representing “evidence-based policy” that does not rest on mere speculation or beliefs about potential impacts (Roskam and Chaplin 2017, 22). Research evidence about suicide reduction is regarded by ERPO advocates as providing a basis to seek bipartisan support from gun-rightsoriented legislators who represent rural and small-town areas where gun suicides are prevalent. There is potential for bipartisan support of ERPO laws, which differentiates such laws from more polarizing gun control regulations. It can be very difficult, however, to reach agreement on procedures and standards of evidence that strike the appropriate balance between gun rights and public safety. Procedures must be developed to enable timely removal of weapons from gunowners experiencing a moment of personal crisis while providing sufficient

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protection against weakly-justified ERPO actions. Advocates and opponents of ERPO proposals regularly disagree about whether a specific law would strike the correct balance. In addition, many gun rights advocates focus on gun ownership as essential for selfprotection and crime control. Thus, research evidence about suicide reduction is not relevant, let alone persuasive, with respect to their beliefs about the role and importance of firearms ownership for Americans. The small flurry of ERPO law enactments in state legislatures in 2018 and 2019 reflects a push by gun control advocates across the nation to identify and put forward proposals to address specific aspects of gun violence problems. As a result, ERPO laws have been proposed in a number of other state legislatures, including those in which advocates have little immediate hope of gaining consideration of these proposals. In some states, actual legislative action on these proposals may not occur unless and until the political balance of power changes in state legislatures in the elections that will follow redistricting after the 2020 U.S. census. The political mobilization of gun control advocates that began after the 2012 school shootings in Newtown, Connecticut, and subsequently increased in the aftermath of the 2018 Parkland, Florida, shootings, appears to have created a social movement that can serve as a sustained, if not necessarily equal, counterpoint to the traditional pro-gun-rights political power of the National Rifle Association and the gun lobby (Goss 2018). As a result, ERPO laws are likely to be introduced in state legislatures and Congress year after year for the foreseeable future. It seems likely that at least some additional ERPO laws will be enacted, especially if there are new mass shooting events involving perpetrators whose behavior and mental state had previously aroused concerns from

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family members and law enforcement officials, thereby leaving people to wonder if ERPO might have prevented a particular shooting. Christopher E. Smith See also: Crime and Gun Use; Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting; NICS Improvement Act

Further Reading Coalition to Stop Gun Violence. “It’s Time to Retire the Term ‘Red Flag Laws.’” Medium (blog), March 26, 2019. https://medium. com/@_CSGV/its-time-to-retire-the-term -red-flag-law-89dbe2764d8 (accessed June 10, 2019). Cunningham, Amanda. “Coalition Is Focused on Bill That Would Take Guns Away from Dangerous Individuals.” The Legislative Gazette, February 12, 2018. http://legislativegazette.com/coalition-is-focused-on -bill-that-would-take-guns-away-from -dangerous-individuals/ (accessed June 11, 2019). Frizzell, William, and Joseph Chien. “Extreme Risk Protection Orders to Reduce Firearm Violence.” Psychiatric Services 70 (January 2019): 75–77. Giffords Law Center. “Extreme Risk Protection Orders.” 2019. https://lawcenter.giffords.org /gun-laws/policy-areas/who-can-have-a -gun/extreme-risk-protection-orders/#state (accessed June 11, 2019).

Goss, Kristin. “Whatever Happened to the ‘Missing Movement’? Gun Control Politics Over Two Decades of Change.” In Gun Studies: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Politics, Policy, and Practice, edited by Jennifer Carlson, Kristin Goss, and Harel Shapira, 136–50. New York: Routledge, 2018. Kivisto, Aaron J., and Peter Lee Phalen. “Effects of Risk-Based Firearm Seizure Laws in Connecticut and Indiana on Suicide Rates, 1981–2015.” Psychiatric Services 69 (2018): 855–62. “Maryland Officers Serving ‘Red Flag’ Gun Removal Order Fatally Shoot Armed Man.” CBS News, November 6, 2018. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/maryland -officers-serving-red-f lag-gun-removal -order-fatally-shoot-armed-man/ (accessed June 12, 2019). Roskam, Kelly, and Vicka Chaplin. “The Gun Violence Restraining Order: An Opportunity for Common Ground in the Gun Violence Debate.” Developments in Mental Health Law 36 (Summer 2017): 1–28. Segers, Grace, and Camilo Montoya-Galvez. “‘I Cannot Get Her Life Back’: Lawmakers Hold Rare Gun Control Hearing to Discuss ‘Red Flag’ State Laws.” CBS News, March 28, 2019. https://www.cbsnews.com/live -news/red-flag-gun-control-bill-house-judi ciary-hearing-watch-live-stream-today-2019 -03-26/ (accessed June 11, 2019). Sklar, Tara. “Elderly Gun Ownership and the Wave of State Red Flag Laws: An Unintended Consequence That Could Help Many.” Elder Law Journal 27 (2019): 35–50.

F Faiths United to Prevent Gun Violence. See National Council of Churches (NCC) and Gun Control

used in more than three-quarters of mass shootings (Schildkraut, Formica, and Malatras 2018). The political action committee intends to change the laws and the lawmakers by targeting federal races and focusing their efforts on supporting policymakers who have similar goals and opposing those who do not (Families vs. Assault Rifles n.d.). The organization is nonpartisan and does not support any specific candidates, rather it opposes NRA-funded candidates (Huriash 2018). As of September 2019, the organization’s President was Jeffrey A. Kasky, the father of two student survivors from the shooting. One of his sons, Cameron Kasky, was one of the cofounders of the March for Our Lives movement. Jeffrey Kasky started Families vs. Assault Rifles so that Stoneman Douglas parents could join the important effort implemented by his son. The committee represents concerned citizens, which include, but are not limited to: parents, veterans, law enforcement, teachers, survivors, and gun enthusiasts, with the purpose of keeping children safe and from becoming the “next national mass shooting headline” (Families vs. Assault Rifles n.d.). Families vs. Assault Rifles is not calling for an immediate ban on rifles with assaultstyle designs or accessories but wants restrictions on the sale of such weapons and for those who currently own them to be grandfathered in with registration and a fee (Sherfinski 2018). There is an option on the website to donate, with the suggested amounts being in increments of $17 in remembrance and

Families vs. Assault Rifles Following the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, on February 14, 2018, parents of the victims and survivors formed the Families vs. Assault Rifles Political Action Committee. In that shooting, the perpetrator used a semiautomatic assault-style rifle during the six-minute event, during which seventeen people were killed and seventeen others were injured. After the shooting occurred, it was revealed that the sheriff’s office and even the FBI had received tips regarding threats made ahead of the attack by the perpetrator to carry out a school shooting (Blinder and Mazzei 2018). Families vs. Assault Rifles was registered as a nonprofit on May 18, 2018. The organization’s mission is to “prevent the mass shootings made possible when civilians have easy access to military grade semi-automatic rifles, magazines, and bump stocks— guns that were meant for war, not schools” (Families vs. Assault Rifles n.d.). Research shows that nearly 80 percent of mass shootings involve any type of semiautomatic weapon. It is important to note that semiautomatic technology is not exclusive to rifles and can be on handguns. While it is a common public perception that mass shootings include use of assault rifles, handguns are 275

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recognition of the individuals who lost their lives in the Parkland shooting. The donations are intended for use “to try to oust political candidates who both oppose its efforts to amend the laws that permit semi-automatic rifles, or who receive campaign donations from the NRA—or both” (Huriash 2018, 2). Melissa J. Tetzlaff-Bemiller See also: Assault Weapons; March for Our Lives Movement; Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting; National Rifle Association; Semiautomatic Weapons

Further Reading Blinder, Alan, and Patricia Mazzei. “As Gunman Rampaged through Florida School, Armed Deputy ‘Never Went In.’” New York Times, February 22, 2018. https://www .nytimes.com/2018/02/22/us/nikolas-cruz -florida-shooting.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Families vs. Assault Rifles. “Families vs. Assault Rifles PAC.” n.d. https://www.face book.com/famsvarpac/ (accessed August 15, 2019). Huriash, Lisa J. “Parkland Parents Set up PAC to Take on NRA.” South Florida SunSentinel, May 31, 2018. https://www.sun -sentinel.com/local/broward/parkland/flor ida-school-shooting/fl-sb-douglas-parents -families-rif les-pac-20180529-story.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Schildkraut, Jaclyn, Margaret K. Formica, and Jim Malatras. “Can Mass Shootings be Stopped? To Address the Problem, We Must Better Understand the Phenomenon.” May 22, 2018. https://rockinst.org/issue-area /can-mass-shootings-be-stopped/ (accessed November 29, 2019). Sherfinski, David. “Parkland Parents Form PAC to Pressure Candidates to Crack Down on Assault Rifles.” Washington Times, August 9, 2018. https://www.washing tontimes.com/news/2018/aug/9/parkland -parents-form-pac-against-assault-rifles/ (accessed May 18, 2022).

Fatalities. See Victimization from Gun Violence Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) The Federal Bureau of Investigation, as the federal law enforcement agency in charge of the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), plays an important enforcement role in the regulation of guns in the United States. Federal law requires that any gun buyer be subjected to this instant background check prior to purchasing a firearm. The purpose of NICS is to determine whether a potential gun buyer is complying with the laws that limit which persons may or may not purchase firearms (e.g., persons with a felony record may not purchase firearms). In most states, however, transactions between private parties are not required to go through the NICS system. Eighteen states do require gun sales between private parties to be made with the assistance of a federally licensed firearms dealer—who can ensure that the backgrounds of the buyer and seller are run through NICS and thus meet federal requirements for the possession and purchase of a firearm. (Those states are Alabama, California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Rhode Island, and South Carolina.) Though the FBI is the primary federal law enforcement agency responsible for implementation and operation of NICS, it plays a secondary role in the investigation and enforcement of federal gun laws. That is, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) has primary jurisdiction



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in the investigation, prevention, and enforcement of federal laws involving firearms, ammunition, and explosives relating to interstate commerce. The jurisdictional primacy of ATF in this area has led to what has been often described as a “turf war” between ATF and FBI. According to a Washington Post article dated May 10, 2008, entitled “FBI, ATF Battle for Control of Cases: Cooperation Lags Despite Merger Five Years Ago,” the agencies have “fought each other for control, wasting time and money and causing duplication of effort.” Furthermore, according to the above article, “at crime scenes, FBI and ATF agents have threatened to arrest one another and battled over jurisdiction and evidence” (Markon 2008). As part of the Homeland Security legislation in 2002, the law enforcement aspects of ATF were transferred from the Department of the Treasury to the Department of Justice (DOJ). While ATF remained as a separate agency, the law enforcement aspects of its mission are now housed under the same parent department as the FBI, namely DOJ (the tax collection functions of ATF were left under the auspices of the Department of the Treasury). Part of the impetus for this transfer was to minimize jurisdictional conflicts between the ATF and FBI. Yet, as the FBI is the primary federal law enforcement agency in the investigation of terrorism related offenses, and ATF retains primary jurisdiction over incidents involving explosives, conflicts continue to arise between the agencies. The FBI also publishes the annual Crime in the United States, which is based on its Uniform Crime Reports (UCRs)— information provided voluntarily by police departments throughout the United States. The FBI provides standardized forms for recording the data. The UCRs are the only

source of information for deducing trends in crime in the United States as a whole and in localities within the country. They are the primary source of crime statistics for elected officials, criminal justice agencies, administrators, and other policy makers as well as the news media and the general public. The reports also analyze and inform policy makers on issues pertaining to crime and gun offenses, and they inform agents and officers in the field. Although the FBI has traditionally played an important role in the enforcement of existing firearm laws, the appointment of John Ashcroft as attorney general of the United States in 2001 altered the enthusiasm with which the Bureau has pursued those who are in possession of firearms illegally or who attempt to possess them illegally. Ashcroft, in a May 17, 2001, letter to the executive director of the National Rifle Association, made it clear that he interpreted the Second Amendment’s guarantee to a right to bear arms as one that applies to individual citizens rather than organized militias. Following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Ashcroft was reported in the New York Times to have barred the FBI from checking records to determine whether any of the people detained after the attacks had bought guns. In response to this letter, others pointed out that the federal courts had, in fact, consistently ruled that the Second Amendment applies to the right of individual states to have militias and not to the rights of individual citizens to keep and bear firearms for any other purpose. However, in the landmark cases of District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) and McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010), the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the individual-rights interpretation. More recent cases have solidified that stance; for example, in Caetano v. Massachusetts

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(2016), the court ruled that Massachusetts’s ban on stun guns was unconstitutional because the Second Amendment extends to all forms of bearable arms, even those not in existence at the time of writing of the amendment. In contrast to Ashcroft’s stance on guns, Eric Holder, the U.S. Attorney General between 2009 and 2015, led a DOJ that emphasized the reduction of gun-related crimes instead of the protection of individual gun rights. Elizabeth K. Englander and Patricia Snell See also: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF); District of Columbia v. Heller; McDonald v. City of Chicago; National Instant Criminal Background Check System; NICS Improvement Act; Second Amendment; Uniform Crime Reports (UCR).

Further Reading Ashcroft, John. “Letter to Mr. James Jay Baker, Executive Director of the National Rifle Association.” Sent May 17, 2001. http://www.nraila.org/images/Ashcroft.pdf (accessed April 12, 2011). Cole, George F., and Christopher E. Smith. The American System of Criminal Justice. 8th ed. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 2000. Federal Bureau of Investigation. http://www .fbi.gov (accessed June 11, 2020). Markon, Jerry. “FBI, ATF Battle for Control of Cases: Cooperation Lags Despite Merger Five Years Ago.” Washington Post, May 10, 2008. http://www.washingtonpost .com/wp-dyn/content/story/2008/05/09 /ST2008050903113.html (accessed July 11, 2011). Volokh, Eugene. “Unanimous Pro-SecondAmendment Stun Gun Decision from the Supreme Court.” Washington Post, March 22, 2016. https://www.washingtonpost.com /news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2016/03/21

/unanimous-pro-second-amendment-stun -gun-decision-from-the-supreme-court/ (accessed May 18, 2022).

Federal Firearms Act of 1938 (Public Law No. 75-785) The Federal Firearms Act of 1938 imposed the first federal limitations on the sale of ordinary firearms. It was aimed at those selling and shipping firearms through interstate or foreign commerce. The law required manufacturers, dealers, and importers of guns and handgun ammunition to obtain a federal firearms license (at an annual cost of one dollar) from the Internal Revenue Service. Dealers had to maintain records of the names and addresses of persons to whom firearms were sold. Gun sales to persons convicted of violent felonies were prohibited. The legislation was substantially weakened by the National Rifle Association, as it was able to convince Congress to strike a provision that would have empowered the Justice Department to prosecute gun shippers and manufacturers who put guns into the hands of criminals (Carter 1997, 68). They could only be prosecuted if they “knowingly” sold guns to criminals (Spitzer 2021). Jeffrey Kraus See also: Firearm Dealers; Gun Control; National Firearms Act of 1934

Further Reading Ascione, Alfred M. “The Federal Firearms Act.” St. John’s Law Review 13 (1939): 437–49. Barnes Company. Handgun Laws of the United States. Fairfield, CT: Barnes Company, 1974. Carter, Gregg Lee. The Gun Control Movement. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1997.

Foster, Michael A. Federal Firearms Laws: Overview and Selected Legal Issues. Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, 2019. https://crsreports.congress. gov/product/pdf/R/R45629 (accessed January 27, 2022). Leff, Carol Skalnik, and Mark H. Leff. “The Politics of Ineffectiveness: Federal Firearms Legislation, 1919–1938.” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Sciences 455 (1981): 48–62. Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021.

Federal Firearms Licensee (FFL). See Firearm Dealers Federal Gun Control Act of 1968. See Federalism and Gun Control; Gun Control Act of 1968 Federalism and Gun Control The U.S. Constitution established a system of governance, federalism, whereby governing powers are divided between the national or federal government on the one hand and state governments on the other. In the realm of gun control, laws regulating guns, gun use, and gun possession were the exclusive province of state and local governments from colonial times until the twentieth century. State and local laws regulating gun carrying, gun ownership, gun use, hunting practices, and laws requiring militia-eligible men to own guns were common among the colonies and, later, states. Even today, the vast majority of gun laws and regulations exist at the state and local levels. The first federal gun law imposed a federal excise tax on guns enacted as part of the War Revenue Act of 1919. In 1927, responding to rising gun use by criminals, Congress

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enacted a bill to bar the sale of handguns to private individuals through the mail. The first major national gun law, the National Firearms Act of 1934, imposed restrictions on so-called gangster weapons, including machine guns and sawed-off shotguns. Subsequently, periodic national gun laws were enacted as the result of societal violence and high-profile assassinations. The federal government’s involvement in gun regulations paralleled the dramatic expansion of federal power that occurred during the New Deal era in the 1930s. As with the national government’s greatly expanded influence in many areas, Congress’s power to regulate interstate commerce became a key means by which it sought to shape national gun policy. From the end of the 1930s until the 1990s, the federal courts consistently upheld the national government’s more expansive definition of the commerce power. In 1995, however, in the case of United States v. Lopez, the Supreme Court overturned a federal law that barred guns from public schools, the Gun Free School Zones Act of 1990, concluding that the government’s chief basis for the law—that the presence of guns in schools impeded the educational process, and that education was vital to the commerce of the nation—was an inadequate basis for use of the commerce power. Less noticed in the fracas over this court decision was the fact that all of the states already had legal proscriptions to gun carrying in schools. In 1996, Congress enacted a new version of the Gun Free School Zones Act, this time including wording stating that any firearm-based prosecution must be accompanied by evidence that the firearm in question must have “moved in or otherwise affects interstate commerce.” The Lopez decision was followed by others that imposed limits on Congress’s

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application of the commerce power. The Supreme Court’s decision in United States v. Morrison (2000), for example, struck down the civil remedy portions of the Violence against Women Act of 1994 as beyond Congress’s powers to regulate interstate commerce. In 2005, however, the high court upheld Congress’s use of the commerce power to regulate the local cultivation and use of marijuana in California in the case of Gonzales v. Raich, even though state law did not criminalize these activities. The Supreme Court also ruled that Congress may not require state officials to participate in federal gun control efforts. In Printz v. United States (1997), the court struck down a provision of the federal Brady gun control law that required local law enforcement officials to conduct background checks on gun purchasers. The court held that Tenth Amendment principles of state sovereignty protected the states from having their officials told what to do by the federal government. State gun laws came under uniform scrutiny because of a landmark ruling by the Supreme Court in 2010. In the case of McDonald v. City of Chicago, strict local handgun bans in Chicago and Oak Park, Illinois, were challenged as a violation of the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms. Though numerous such Second Amendmentbased challenges of state and local gun laws had been rejected in federal courts in the past, the door to this challenge was opened by the Supreme Court’s 2008 ruling in District of Columbia v. Heller, when a closely divided court ruled, for the first time in history, that the Second Amendment provided an individual right of citizens to possess handguns for the purpose of personal selfprotection in the home (setting aside the militia-based interpretation that had been

accepted by past courts). It also held that the due process clause in the Fifth Amendment limited federal authority to deprive American citizens of any constitutionally protected interest, including those contained in the Second Amendment. In McDonald, however, the court extended its ruling, thus applying or “incorporating” this amendment to the states. Although this ruling opened the door to hundreds of challenges to state and local gun laws around the nation, the court majority opinion, authored by Justice Samuel Alito, went to great pains to note that it considered most existing gun regulations to be legal within this newfound gun right. These constitutional considerations have remained front and center in proposed legislation to, as a 2019 Congressional Research Service report put it, “amend the existing federal statutory framework of firearms regulation. Among other things, such legislation has focused on issues arising from the dissemination of 3D-printed and untraceable firearms, gaps in the collection of records for background checks of prospective firearm purchasers, restrictions on certain types of firearms and accessories, possession of firearms by the mentally ill, interstate reciprocity for lawful concealed carry of firearms, and laws permitting courts to order that firearms be temporarily removed from persons deemed to be a risk to themselves or others” (Foster 2019). Glenn Harlan Reynolds and Robert J. Spitzer See also: Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); District of Columbia v. Heller; Gun Control; Gun Registration; GunFree School Laws; Licensing; McDonald v. City of Chicago; National Firearms Act of 1934; Printz v. United States; Second Amendment; Tenth Amendment



Further Reading Cornell, Saul. A Well-Regulated Militia. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006. Ducoff, John A. “Yesterday: Constitutional Interpretation, the Brady Act, and Printz v. United States.” Rutgers Law Journal 30 (1998): 209–45. Foster, Michael A. Federal Firearms Laws: Overview and Selected Legal Issues. Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, 2019. https://crsreports.congress .gov/product/pdf/R/R45629 (accessed January 27, 2022). “Reflections on United States v. Lopez: Symposium.” Michigan Law Review 94 (1995): 533–831.

Federation for NRA Federation for NRA is an ad hoc organization formed independently of the National Rifle Association (NRA) in 1977 by disgruntled NRA hard-line members who felt that the NRA’s old-guard leadership was insufficiently tough on gun and related political issues. Formed and headed by gun activist Neal Knox and including NRA dissidents Harlon Carter, Robert Kukla, David Caplan, and Joseph Tartaro, the federation became the umbrella group that laid plans to wrest control of the NRA from the oldguard leaders at the NRA’s 1977 annual convention in Cincinnati. In what was later dubbed the Cincinnati Revolt, federation members, identifiable by their orange caps, coordinated their activities at the convention using bullhorns and walkie-talkies. They used parliamentary procedures to alter the NRA’s bylaws to give the members attending the convention greater influence over organizational decisions. They then used these revised procedures to vote out of office the old-guard leaders and to vote in

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Carter to head the NRA. Federation members were elected or appointed to other NRA leadership posts. The federation was revived by Knox in 1982 after he was forced to resign as head of the Institute for Legislative Action (ILA) by Carter. By this time, a rift had developed between the two men. Knox believed that Carter had become soft and complacent, corrupted by the authority of his office; Carter believed Knox had become too extremist. Knox objected to Carter’s fiveyear term as president (NRA presidents before and since have served one-year terms) and charged that Carter had interfered with ILA activities. Knox and the federation proposed a return to one-year terms and other procedural changes. At the NRA’s 1983 convention, these efforts were easily defeated by Carter and his allies, who had led the NRA to a broader membership and financial base. In 1984, Knox became the first NRA Board of Directors member ever voted off that body. In 1991, Knox returned to the board and again gained power in the NRA, only to be thwarted in 1997 by Wayne LaPierre and his candidate for vice president (who became NRA president in 1998), actor Charlton Heston. Robert J. Spitzer See also: Heston, Charlton; Knox, Neal; National Rifle Association (NRA)

Further Reading Brown, Peter Harry, and Daniel G. Abel. Outgunned: Up against the NRA. New York: Free Press, 2003. Leddy, Edward F. Magnum Force Lobby. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1987. Tartaro, Joseph. Revolt at Cincinnati. Buffalo, NY: Hawkeye, 1981.

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Feinstein, Dianne(1933–) A forceful advocate who has made gun control one of her prime issues, Dianne Feinstein has been a Democratic senator from California for six terms since winning a special election to that post in 1992. Using her membership on the Senate’s Judiciary Committee as a platform, Feinstein has focused on efforts to strengthen the federal role in combating crime and on gun control. Early in her Senate career, Feinstein played a leadership role in the passage of two significant federal gun control measures: the Gun-Free Schools Act and the Assault Weapons Ban of 1994. Subsequently, she has been less successful in seeking a new Assault Weapons Ban, closing the gun show loophole, and passing new “extreme risk laws.” She is a frequent prominent commentator and major congressional force on most gun control measures, which has led to strong support from gun control supporters but sharp criticism and labels of “extremism” from gun rights advocates and the National Rifle Association (NRA). Feinstein’s strong support of gun control is rooted in her experiences in the San Francisco city government. In 1978, as president of the city’s board of supervisors, she was called upon to announce the gunshot murders of Mayor George Moscone and board member Harvey Milk. She made the announcement soon after personally discovering the two bodies in City Hall. Her experiences in the tragedy were recalled during a noteworthy exchange she had with a fellow senator during a gun control debate. Larry Craig (R-ID), a member of the NRA’s board, questioned her knowledge of guns. Feinstein replied that she certainly knew of the effects of guns after trying to find Milk’s pulse after he was fatally shot. She became mayor of San Francisco, where she won

approval of a municipal ordinance banning handgun ownership within the city, although it was later invalidated by the courts. Then, in a public ceremony, Feinstein surrendered the .38-caliber pistol she had carried in response to death threats, the shooting out of her windows, and an attempted bombing of her home. The gun and others were melted down and made into a cross that she later presented to Pope John Paul II. Passage of the handgun ordinance greatly angered gun control opponents, some of whom initiated an effort to recall the mayor. Feinstein won the subsequent election by an overwhelming majority, a victory that seemed to solidify her political base in preparation for subsequent statewide contests. In comments on gun issues, Feinstein often refers to her time as mayor as giving her insight into urban violence and a personal connection to gun issues. In the Senate, Feinstein continued her anti–violent crime and gun control efforts. The Gun-Free Schools Act of 1994, which she cosponsored with Byron Dorgan (D-ND), established uniform nationwide guidelines to make elementary and secondary schools gun-free “safe havens” to protect children and youth from gun-related violence. Feinstein noted that school gun prohibition standards varied enormously among the states; her goal was to ensure that all children would be assured legal protection from gun-related violence. In 1994, Feinstein also succeeded in winning passage of a ten-year ban on nineteen forms of combat-type assault weapons. Her proposal, inserted as an amendment to the 1994 crime bill, listed specific types of rapid-fire weapons, partly to separate them from arms commonly used for hunting or target shooting. The law only applied to guns manufactured after the law went into effect. Another key provision of this bill



banned the manufacture and sale of ammunition magazines carrying eleven or more rounds. Feinstein argues the limits reduced the level of weapons used in crime and lowered the number of mass shootings, but critics contended it is impossible to prove the ban lowered crime and that gun manufacturers easily circumvented the ban by making minor design modifications. In 2004, the Assault Weapons Ban was due to expire under a sunset clause unless it was renewed. President Bush indicated he would sign a renewal law if it reached his desk, but he would not push Congress on the issue. Feinstein introduced an amendment that would have extended the ban for another ten years to a bill that would have shielded the firearms industry from lawsuits. The amendment passed on a 52-47 vote, with most support coming from Democrats and northeastern Republicans. Lead sponsors of the liability bill opposed the renewal amendment and also a successful amendment to close the gun show loophole, so they called for defeat of their own bill. The bill died in a 90-8 vote. In subsequent years, Feinstein and others submitted bills to renew the ban every Congress. The wording of the bills has been adjusted over time to reflect new technical issues, but they have made little progress in Congress. She remains committed to renewing and even expanding the Assault Weapons Ban but is seeking the right political moment. In 2005, the liability bill was raised again. Feinstein sharply opposed the measure, calling it “highly offensive” and “a give-away” to the gun industry. The bill passed and became law (the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act). Feinstein also has been unsuccessful with legislation on gun shows. In 2008, she, Sen. Frank R. Lautenberg (D-NJ), and Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI) led nine other cosponsors in introducing legislation

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Dianne Feinstein, former mayor of San Francisco and U.S. senator from California, has been one of the nation’s most vocal gun control advocates. She played key roles in helping with the passage of the Gun-Free Schools Act and the Federal Assault Weapons Ban, as well as in the expansion of the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). (U.S. Senate)

to require background checks at gun shows. The group unveiled the effort at a press conference featuring victims and family members of the Virginia Tech shooting. The legislation never made it out of committee. She has continued to push for universal background checks citing polls that show majority voter support. After major events such as the Newtown shooting, she often tries to rally public, Congressional, and presidential support to new limits, but she has been unsuccessful. Feinstein was more successful in playing a role in expansion of the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (the

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NICS Improvement Amendments Act), which was signed into law by President Bush in 2007. The Judiciary Committee approved her amendment to require that anyone found to be not guilty by reason of insanity or incompetent to stand trial be reported to the database. In recent years, Feinstein has become a major advocate of extreme risk, or “red flag,” laws and introduced the Extreme Risk Protection Order Act of 2019. The bill would give grants to states that enact laws allowing police or family members to petition for court orders that temporarily remove firearms from individuals judged to be a danger to themselves or others. Several states have already passed laws, but the bill seeks to encourage more uniformity and toughness in the laws. She points to experiences in California and elsewhere that show petitions are granted in a high percentage of cases and many firearms have been removed. The issue has drawn support from several Republican Senators, but no bipartisan legislation has emerged. She also has sponsored the Senate version of the Violence against Women Act of 2019. The legislation attempts to limit possession of firearms by domestic abusers. Those under a domestic violence order, those convicted of domestic violence against someone they are dating, and those convicted of stalking could not possess a firearm. Robert Dewhirst and John W. Dietrich See also: Assault Weapons Ban, Renewal Attempts of; Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Gun Shows; Gun-Free School Laws; NICS Improvement Act

Further Reading Mehta, Seema. “Gun Violence Has Defined Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s Career. The Issue

Is More Important Than Ever for Her Now.” Los Angeles Times, March 28, 2018. https://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol -ca-feinstein-gun-control-20180328-story. html (accessed June 11, 2020). Murphy, Chris, and Dianne Feinstein, “Our Republican Colleagues in the Senate Must Act to Break the Cycle of Gun Deaths.” Time, June 14, 2019. Roberts, Jerry. Dianne Feinstein: Never Let Them See You Cry. New York: Harper Collins, 1994.

Felons and Gun Control Where, how, and why felons obtain, carry, and use guns have been central issues in the gun control debate for decades. One goal of many gun control advocates is to find some mechanism that disrupts the flow of firearms into criminal hands but does not infringe upon the legitimate gun ownership rights of law-abiding citizens. Many recent gun control measures have been enacted with this specific end in mind. Unfortunately, the criminal population has always found it relatively easy to circumvent gun control measures. The most comprehensive survey of felons and their firearms was undertaken by Wright and Rossi (2008) in the early 1980s and is still cited in the scholarly literature with regularity. Armed and Considered Dangerous was described in 2005 as “the only available survey of attitudes of (imprisoned) felons” concerning guns (Hahn et al. 2005), and it remains the only such survey as of January 2022. The study showed that relatively few felons (about one in six) attempted to obtain guns through customary retail channels; the illicit firearm market was dominated by informal purchases, swaps and trades with family members, friends, street sources, drug dealers, and



other hard-to-regulate sources. The study also showed that most crime guns (somewhere between one-half and three-quarters of them) entered the stream of illicit commerce through theft from legitimate gun owners. The Armed and Considered Dangerous survey findings have also been substantiated by surveys conducted by the U.S. Department of Justice (Bureau of Justice Statistics [BJS] 2019). In the 2016 survey of state inmates, among those who possessed a gun at the time of their arrest, 56 percent had either stolen their firearm, found it at the scene of the crime, or bought it on the street or through an illegal source (BJS 2019). These results give reason to doubt the efficacy of gun controls imposed at the point of retail sale (e.g., the prohibition in the Gun Control Act of 1968 against retail sale of firearms to persons with felony records, the five-day waiting period for new firearm purchases enacted as part of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act of 1993, or the instant criminal records check now required of new gun purchasers). The national five-day waiting period was implemented to give police departments ample time to undertake background checks on prospective gun buyers; the instant record check obviated the need for a waiting period. Whether or not a significant number of gun purchases by felons have been thwarted by these measures has been a matter of dispute. Proponents cite the number of purchases disallowed because of the background checks; opponents argue that the principal effects have been to divert an even higher proportion of felonious gun acquisitions into the secondary or informal market. Regardless, the most comprehensive evaluation of the effects of the five-day waiting period found no significant effects on rates of homicide and suicide (Ludwig and Cook 2000).

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The five-day waiting period expired in 1998 and was replaced by the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) managed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The heart of the NICS is a national database containing information on all felony convictions; in theory, it allows for instantaneous presale background checks of all prospective gun purchasers. If the background check is not completed within three business days, the transfer is allowed to proceed by default. According to the 2019 NICS Operations Report, approximately 92 percent of transactions created within the system were resolved within the three business days, with nearly 90 percent of checks completed immediately. Restrictions at the point of retail sale, even the NICS background checking restriction, are readily circumvented by criminals. Another General Accounting Office (GAO) report released in March 2001 revealed that GAO investigators using fake identification successfully purchased guns from licensed gun dealers in every state they tried. Another easy circumvention is the use of proxy purchasers, associates with “clean” records who purchase guns from retailers in quantity for distribution to their felonious friends. Despite these obvious strategies that allow felons to evade retail sales controls, the preponderance of evidence continues to show that most felons acquire guns through one-at-a-time and offthe-record transactions with friends, family, and other informal sources (Pierce et al. 2004). Consistent with this conclusion, the Bureau of Justice Statistics (2019) estimates that few possessors of crime guns (about 10%) purchased their firearms directly from federally licensed gun dealers. Given the above findings, it is anomalous that most guns used in crimes, confiscated by the police, and traced through the ATF

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paperwork system prove to be relatively new guns. The elapsed time between a gun’s first retail sale and its use in a crime is called “time-to-crime,” and numerous ATF reports and other studies have concluded that, on average, time-to-crime is relatively short. This implies a criminal preference for new guns and, perhaps, a larger role for organized gun trafficking in supplying the illicit firearm market than is suggested by the studies reviewed above, a conclusion endorsed by the ATF. Kleck (1997) resolves the anomaly by noting that criminals are, on average, relatively young and would therefore be expected to own relatively newer firearms. Consistent with this conclusion, one study (Kennedy, Piehl, and Braga 1996) found that the younger the criminal, the younger his gun. Among gun owners in general, the secondary or informal market (private purchases or swaps and trades that do not involve licensed gun retailers) accounts for about 42 percent of annual firearm sales according to the most recent estimates (Miller, Hepburn, and Azrael 2017). The preponderance of evidence is that among felons, that fraction is substantially higher. And while it is illegal under federal law to knowingly transfer a firearm to a felon even in a private transaction, this restriction is for all practical purposes unenforceable; as a result, the immense secondary market in firearms is essentially unregulated—a free-market free-for-all that felons can and do exploit to obtain guns of every description, in any desired quantity. A serious effort to prevent firearms from falling into felons’ hands will require some regulation of this secondary market, and so far, no one has come up with a workable strategy to accomplish this end. James D. Wright and Rachel L. Rayburn See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Background Checks; Black Market for

Firearms; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Crime and Gun Use; Enforcement of Gun Control Laws; Gun Control Act of 1968; Gun Shows; National Instant Criminal Background Check System; Youth Crime Gun Interdiction Initiative (YCGII)

Further Reading BJS (Bureau of Justice Statistics). Source and Use of Firearms Involved in Crimes: Survey of Prison Inmates, 2016. Washington, DC: Department of Justice, 2019. https:// bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/suficspi16 _sum.pdf (accessed January 20, 2022). Miller, Matthew, Lisa Hepburn, and Deborah Azrael. “Firearm Acquisitions without Background Checks.” Annals of Internal Medicine 166, no. 4 (2017): 233–39. https:// doi.org/10.7326/M16-1590. Federal Bureau of Investigation, Criminal Justice Information Services Division. National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) Section: 2019 Operations Report. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2020. https://www.fbi.gov /file-repository/2019-nics-operations-report .pdf/view (accessed May 18, 2022). General Accounting Office. Firearms: Purchased from Federal Firearm Licensees Using Bogus Identification. Washington, DC: General Accounting Office, 2001. Hahn, Robert A., Oleg Bilukha, Alex Crosby, Mindy T. Fullilove, Akiva Liberman, Eve Moscicki, Susan Snyder, Farris Tuma, Peter A. Briss, and Task Force on Community Preventive Services. “Firearms Laws and the Reduction of Violence: A Systematic Review.” American Journal of Preventative Medicine 28 (2005): 40–71. Kennedy, David M., Anne M. Piehl, and Anthony A. Braga. “Youth Violence in Boston: Gun Markets, Serious Youth Offenders, and a Use Reduction Strategy.” Law and Contemporary Problems 59 (1996): 147–96. Kleck, Gary. Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyer, 1997.

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Ludwig, Jens, and Philip J. Cook. “Homicide and Suicide Rates Associated with Implementation of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act.” Journal of the American Medical Association 284 (2000): 585–91. Pierce, Gary L., Anthony A. Braga, Raymond R. Hayatt Jr., and Christopher S. Koper. “Characteristics and Dynamics of Illegal Firearms Markets: Implications for a Supply-Side Enforcement Strategy.” Justice Quarterly 21 (2004): 391–422. Wright, James D., and Peter H. Rossi. Armed and Considered Dangerous. 2nd ed. Piscataway, NJ: Aldine Transaction, 2008.

Ferguson, Colin. See Long Island Railroad Shooting

of .50-caliber owners and manufacturers. Political advocacy is especially important to FCSA because of its belief that the interests of the .50-caliber shooting community are threatened by gun control advocates. Walter F. Carroll See also: Second Amendment

Further Reading Burtt, John. “Position Statement.” Fifty Caliber Shooters Association, n.d. http://www.fcsa .org/wwwroot/visitors/position_statement .php (accessed January 27, 2022). FCSA (Fifty Caliber Shooters Association). “Fact Sheet.” n.d. http://www.fcsa.org/www root/visitors/about.php (accessed January 27, 2022).

Fifty Caliber Shooters Association, Inc. (FCSA)

Firearm Dealers

The Fifty Caliber Shooters Association (FCSA) was founded in 1985 by a small group dedicated to advancing the sporting uses of the .50-caliber Browning Machine Gun (BMG) cartridge. FCSA, a nonprofit organization registered in Tennessee and Utah, publishes a quarterly magazine, Very High Power; maintains a website providing comprehensive information on .50-caliber shooting; and sanctions shooting competitions. The primary focus of the shooting competitions is on 1,000-yard competitions; the organization sponsors ten to fifteen of these each year in different locations in the United States. Although most of its 2,000 members are in the United States, FCSA has members in twelve countries. FCSA is a pro–Second Amendment, strongly gun rights–oriented organization. FCSA also includes the Fifty Caliber Institute. The institute focuses on education, represents the organization to the media, and advocates politically on behalf

Virtually all civilian sales of new firearms in the United States are made through federally licensed firearm dealers (FFLs), regulated under a scheme established by the federal Gun Control Act of 1968 (GCA). Retail dealers range from tiny enterprises, such as mom-and-pop sidelines in rural general stores, to vast specialized emporia with racks of guns and affiliated shooting ranges. Retailers get most of their guns from wholesale distributors, who are also federally licensed. Even so, an estimated 22 percent of firearms acquisitions annually occur outside of the purview of FFLs and their associated background checks, either through purchases occurring in the secondary market (e.g., private sales, gun shows) or through gifts (Miller, Hepburn, and Azrael 2017). Enacted in the wake of the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the GCA replaced the Federal Firearms Act of 1938 as the primary federal law regulating

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commerce in firearms. The 1968 law created a licensing system aimed primarily at regulating the interstate movement of firearms. By restricting interstate movement of firearms to transactions between FFLs, the law was intended to enhance the ability of the individual states to effectively enforce their own gun laws by barring “gun runners” from buying guns in states with lax laws and transporting them to states with more restrictive laws. The GCA also barred certain prohibited classes of persons, such as convicted felons, illegal aliens, and drug addicts from receiving or possessing firearms. Central to the federal regulatory scheme is the requirement that any person “engaged in the business” of manufacturing, importing, or dealing in firearms obtain a license from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF). The ATF issues eleven types of licenses, depending on the nature of the licensee’s activity. The most common license, Type 01, is issued to retail dealers (40%), but some other common licenses include Type 02 for pawnbrokers (5%), Type 06 for ammunition manufacturers (less than 2%), Type 07 for firearm manufacturers (11%), and Type 08 for importers (less than 1%; see Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives 2021). A dealer’s license grants the holder the privilege of purchasing and shipping guns in any quantity across state lines to and from other licensees, including retailers, wholesale distributors, and manufacturers. Licensees are required to maintain detailed records of firearm transactions and are subject to periodic inspection by the ATF. Although some states impose their own licensing requirements, most do not, limiting their regulation to collateral matters such as zoning restrictions and generic business licensing and tax collection.

The GCA’s original wording limited the ATF’s discretion in denying licenses. The law required ATF to issue a license within forty-five days of an application to anyone who was twenty-one years old, had business premises, and was not prohibited from possessing firearms. Although the law required anyone “engaged in the business of dealing in firearms” to have a license, it failed to define the term “engaged in the business.” As a consequence of these regulatory features, two issues quickly developed. First, the number of FFLs quickly ballooned. Persons who had no intention of engaging in a full-fledged retail business easily got licenses at an annual fee of only $10. With license in hand, these so-called kitchen-table dealers could buy guns out of state, sometimes at wholesale prices, for themselves, their friends, and others, often evading local zoning and tax laws in the process and without undergoing background checks or waiting periods imposed on individual retail customers. By 1992, there were 245,000 licensed gun dealers in the United States— more than the 210,000 gas stations in the country. The sheer number of dealers made meaningful regulation by the ATF virtually impossible. As a result, some licensees who appeared on the surface to be operating only as a convenience to friends were in fact selling firearms in volume without records. . By 1993, when the number of FFLs reached its peak of 286,000, the ATF estimated that 74 percent of FFLs were kitchen-table dealers, and 46 percent conducted no business at all. By 2010, the ATF reported that the number of licensed dealers and pawnbrokers had declined to 54,600—primarily due to federal gun legislation in 1993 and 1994 (see below). This number increased slightly to 59,909 by fiscal year 2020, representing just under 46 percent of all active FFLs in the United States at the time.



The second issue problem associated with the law resulted directly from the failure to clearly define “engaging in the business.” Unlicensed dealers sold from flea markets, gun shows, their homes, and their cars while claiming to be simply collectors. Efforts to police dealers and to prosecute unlicensed dealers generated substantial resistance within the firearms enthusiasts and advocacy groups who advanced legislation designed to restrict the authority of ATF to inspect dealers, narrow the definition of engaging in the business, and reduce record-keeping violations by dealers to misdemeanors (Vizzard 2000). This legislation passed Congress in 1986 as the Firearms Owners Protection Act (FOPA). As a result, the capacity of ATF to control unlicensed dealing and diversion of firearms by licensed dealers into the unlicensed market was greatly reduced (Vizzard 2000). Although the 1993 Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (the “Brady Bill”) primarily was aimed at requiring uniform criminal record checks of all persons purchasing guns from federally licensed dealers, it also increased the dealer licensing fee to $200 for the first three years and $90 for each additional three-year period. It also requires applicants to certify that they have notified the chief law enforcement officer in their area of their intent to apply for a license. The 1994 Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act (the “Assault Weapons Ban”) further required applicants to submit photographs and fingerprints, and to certify that their business complies with all state and local laws, including zoning regulations. Finally, ATF field offices initiated cooperative efforts with state and local authorities to ensure that applicants met all relevant state and local laws. As a result of these changes, the number of Type 01 FFLs dropped from 245,628 in

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January 1994 to 66,500 in February 2001, a decrease of 73 percent. It continued to drop through 2020, when there were 52,795 active Type 01 FFLs. Gun rights advocates have complained that the reforms infringed on their rights, and the industry complained that the dramatic decrease in dealers hurt sales. But regulators welcomed the drop, arguing that it was easier to supervise fewer dealers and that the drop in casual dealers discouraged criminal gun trafficking. Federal law does not require all gun sellers to obtain a license. On the contrary, the FOPA exempts a person who makes occasional sales, exchanges, or purchases of firearms for the enhancement of a personal collection or for a hobby, or who sells all or part of a personal firearms collection, and requires a showing that they are in business for livelihood and profit. Although such hobbyists and personal sellers do not enjoy the privilege of interstate sales, they have inspired commercial complaints and regulatory concerns, principally in the context of gun shows, venues at which firearms are often sold informally. Because federal gun control laws have focused primarily on screening gun buyers in an attempt to “keep guns out of the wrong hands,” licensed dealers are required to keep specific records on all guns they buy or sell and to initiate background checks on all potential purchasers. Hobbyists and personal sellers are free from these requirements. Licensed dealers complain that this disparity puts them at a competitive disadvantage, especially at gun shows, where the only difference between a licensed dealer and an unlicensed private seller is that a person buying from the latter is free of bothersome paperwork and background checks. Gun regulators argue that unlicensed sellers have become a major source of firearms for felons, juveniles, and others

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who have been effectively barred from getting guns by the background checks imposed by the Brady Bill. Closing this “gun show loophole” remains a contentious goal of the gun control movement. Thomas Diaz and William J. Vizzard See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF); Federal Firearms Act of 1938 (Public Law No. 75-785); Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986; Gun Control Act of 1968; Gun Shows

Further Reading Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives. Fact Sheet - Facts and Figures for Fiscal Year 2020. April 2021. https:// www.atf.gov/resource-center/fact-sheet /fact-sheet-facts-and-figures-fiscal-year -2020 (accessed January 29, 2022). Diaz, Tom. Making a Killing: The Business of Guns in America. New York: New Press, 1999. Miller, Matthew, Lisa Hepburn, and Deborah Azrael. “Firearm Acquisitions Without Background Checks.” Annals of Internal Medicine 166, no. 4 (2017): 233–39. Violence Policy Center. Firearms Production in America: 2000 Edition. Washington, DC: Violence Policy Center, 2000. http://www .vpc.org/graphics/prodcov.pdf (accessed January 29, 2022). Vizzard, William J. Shots in the Dark: The Policy, Politics, and Symbolism of Gun Control. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000.

Firearm Sentence Enhancement (FSE) Laws Firearm sentence enhancement laws are those criminal laws that impose upon criminal offenders increased penalties if the use

of a firearm was involved in the offender’s criminal offense. FSE laws, often also called “gun-use laws,” typically result in significantly longer terms of imprisonment for perpetrators of crimes committed with guns. By increasing the term of imprisonment, FSE laws were envisioned as a way to decrease violent crimes, including gun assaults and homicides, through deterrence. FSE laws have been assumed by legislators to have a derivative deterrent effect on violent gun assaults and homicides because the potential criminal offender would presumably leave the guns at home to avoid the imposition of greater punishments if apprehended. The arguable assumption behind FSE laws is that the existence of such laws might influence the decision-making process of the criminal offender on whether or not to carry a firearm or whether or not to use the firearm during the commission of a felony. In the gun control and firearm policy areas, few measures have received as much attention at both the state and federal levels as FSE laws. Multiple state statutes and the federal Gun Control Act of 1968 impose increased punishments in criminal cases through the use of FSE provisions. FSE laws have been viewed by state and federal legislators as an attractive means of gun control, as one of their most important expectations is that they will reduce gunrelated crime without imposing further constraints on the behavior of “law-abiding” citizens who wish to possess firearms. It is for this reason that interest groups such as the National Rifle Association frequently lend their support to the advancement of FSE laws. The federal FSE law is contained in section 924(c) of the Gun Control Act (GCA) of 1968. In its original form, the FSE law in the GCA provided a mandatory minimum



sentence of between one and ten years for criminals who used or carried a firearm unlawfully during the commission of any federal felony. As the federal FSE law’s original enactment, Congress has amended it many times, including by expanding the coverage to drug crimes, distinguishing among the types of firearms, and raising the penalty to up to thirty additional years if the firearm is a machine gun, an assault rifle, or equipped with a silencer. Congress has also clarified the meaning of “use” and “possession” of a firearm in the FSE provision in response to several Supreme Court cases restricting the interpretation of the FSE provision. The efficacy of these laws in improving public safety and reducing gun violence is a matter of continuing debate. A 2011 study conducted by the University of Pennsylvania found that FSE laws resulted in a modest decline in armed robberies, but other studies, such as a 2014 analysis from the National Research Council Committee on Law and Justice, found that FSE laws had no significant impact on gun crime—but did contribute to rising incarceration rates in U.S. corrections facilities (National Research Council 2014). James A. Beckman See also: Gun Control Act of 1968

Further Reading Hofer, Paul. “Federal Sentencing for Violent and Drug Trafficking Crimes Involving Firearms: Recent Changes and Prospects for Improvement.” American Criminal Law Review 37 (2000): 41–73. National Research Council. The Growth of Incarceration in the United States: Exploring Causes and Consequences. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press, 2014. https://doi.org/10.17226/18613.

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Firearms Industry The firearms industry in the United States is unique in several respects. Unlike many manufacturing industries, it has limited potential for export sales, as most nations more strictly control civilian firearms sales than does the United States. Even for classifications of small arms that are less restricted, such as traditional hunting rifles and shotguns, demand does not match that in the United States. In addition, firearms technology has changed very slowly, and firearms are very durable. Thus the two forces that drive demand for other products, obsolescence and consumption, provide very little impetus for firearms sales. Over the past half-century, the gun market in the United States has evolved from one dominated by sporting rifles and shotguns (“long guns”) to one dominated by firearms designed primarily for combat. Beginning in the early 1960s, gun sales increased rapidly as baby boomers came of age and consumer product sales generally increased. At the same time, the composition of the market began to change (Vizzard 2000, 24). Between 1960 and 2017, handgun sales increased far more rapidly than long gun sales; expanding from about a quarter to more than two-thirds of all new gun sales (ATF 2019). In addition, military (nonsporting style) firearms became a progressively larger portion of the rifle and shotgun market, and the handgun market shifted from domination by revolvers to domination by semiautomatic pistols. Actual volume of sales for new guns has fluctuated over the past fifty years, climbing from just over 2 million in 1960, to a high of 16.25 million in 2016. The election of 1992 and subsequent push by the Bill Clinton administration for a ban on certain semiautomatic, military-style rifles, commonly called

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“assault rifles,” ignited a fear of new gun control and spurred sales to over 7 million by 1994, which was followed by another decline (ATF 2019). The 2008, 2012, and 2016 elections generated significant increase in buying, which peaked in 2016 at over 16 million and then began to again decline (ATF 2019). The shift from a market dominated by sporting-style long guns to one dominated by handguns and combat-style long guns— combined with a pattern of sales that appears to respond primarily to perceived changes in the political climates—implies that the gun market has moved from one dominated by hunters and sport shooters to one more dominated by persons who perceive a need for personal defense. The number of hunting licenses issued in the United States peaked in the late 1970s at about 16.5 million. The number licensed hunters began to decline in the early 1980s and has stabilized at about 15.5 million or under 4.5 percent of the population. (U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service 2019). Over the past decade, the firearms industry has also witnessed a shift from domination by a small number of manufacturers with long histories—Colt, Smith & Wesson, Winchester, Remington, Mossberg, and Ruger—to include a diverse group of new manufacturers and foreign importers. The percentage of households reporting gun ownership in the General Social Survey (National Opinion Research Center 2019), 31 percent in 2016, represents a 17 percent decline from the late 1970s. Although legitimate scholars have questions regarding the calculation of the true rate of gun ownership by individual citizens (Ludwig, Cook, and Smith 1998), the data reflecting decline has remained consistent over several decades. Yet, the number of firearms in private hands in the United States, conservatively estimated at 220

million in 2000 (Vizzard 2000), has grown to over 400 million today. The rate of growth requires some estimation. Although data exists for total firearms manufactured, imported and legally exported, no exact figures exist for guns no longer serviceable, confiscated by police and illegally exported. Given this increase in the gun population, concurrent with a declining number of gun owners, one can only conclude that a limited number of gun owners continue to acquire firearms beyond the number needed to engage in sport or accomplish personal protection. Extrapolating from the pattern of behavior by purchasers of other products in the United States, impulse buying would seem to offer the most reasonable explanation for much of the market. In addition, the sudden spike in buying around elections implies an influence from hoarding due to fear of future restrictions. Based on data from federal excise taxes, firearms and ammunition accounted for about $6.4 billion in retail sales in 2018. This represented about 0.13 percent of the U.S. retail economy. The National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) estimates that the firearms and ammunition industry and its suppliers account for about 212 thousand jobs or 0.13 percent of the total U.S. employment. Of these, about 12,000 constitute manufacturing jobs. According to ATF, there were fewer than 55,000 licensed firearms dealers in the United States as of 2018. Although this represents a significant decline from the peak of 286,000 in 1993, many of these do not conduct regular, full-time retail or wholesale sales. William J. Vizzard See also: District of Columbia v. Heller; Ergonomics and Firearms Design; Firearm Dealers; Hunting; National Association of Firearms Retailers (NAFR); National Shooting Sports



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Foundation (NSSF); Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005; Second Amendment; Surplus Arms

Vizzard, William J. Shots in the Dark: The Policy, Politics, and Symbolism of Gun Control. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000.

Further Reading ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives). 2019. https://www.atf.gov /firearms/docs/report/2019-firearms-com merce-report/download (accessed January 12, 2020). Gregory, Sean. “Boom in Gun Sales Fueled by Politics and the Economy.” Time, April 8, 2009. http://www.time.com/time/print out/0,8816,1889886,00.html (accessed June 26, 2011). Ludwig, Jens, Philip J. Cook, and Tom W. Smith. “The Gender Gap in Reporting Household Gun Ownership.” American Journal of Public Health 88 (1998): 1715–18. National Opinion Research Center. General Social Survey, 2019. (“Do You Happen to Have in Your Home (or Garage) Any Guns or Revolvers?” If Yes, “Is It a Pistol, Shotgun, Rifle, or What?”). https://gssdataex plorer.norc.org/trends/Civil%20Liberties ?measure=owngun / (accessed January 19, 2020). SAAMI (Small Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers Institute). “Market Size and Economic Impact of the Sporting Firearms and Ammunition Industry in America.” 2004. https://www.nssf.org/government -relations/impact/ (accessed January 17, 2020). U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. 2019. https:// wsfrprograms.fws.gov/Subpages/Licen seInfo/LicenseIndex.htm (accessed January 19, 2020). U.S. Government Accountability Office. Firearms Trafficking: U.S. Efforts to Combat Arms Trafficking to Mexico Face Planning and Coordination Challenges. Washington, DC: United States Government Accountability Office, GAO-09-709, June 2009. http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d097 09.pdf (accessed May 27, 2011).

Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986 This federal law relaxed several gun restrictions that were first enacted in 1968. The move to relax federal gun regulations was a top agenda item of a new and more politically aggressive leadership faction that took control of the National Rifle Association in 1977. Congressional sponsors of the bill were Sen. James McClure (R-ID) and Rep. Harold Volkmer (D-MO). The bill that passed in 1986 (PL 99-308, 100 Stat. 449) came to be known as the McClure-Volkmer bill. As early as 1978, Rep. Volkmer proposed legislation at the behest of the NRA to repeal much of the Gun Control Act of 1968. Sen. McClure joined this effort in the early 1980s. This political drive picked up important momentum from the presidential election of gun control foe Ronald Reagan in 1980 and the more conservative mood of the country—and from the fact that the Republicans won control of the Senate after the 1980 elections. Earlier versions of the McClure-Volkmer bill had been approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee in 1982 and 1984, but full floor consideration was not obtained until 1985, when, at the urging of the bill’s sponsors, Senate Majority Leader Robert Dole (R-KS) authorized the unusual move of bypassing the Judiciary Committee and placing the bill directly on the Senate calendar. Once on the floor, the bill was subjected to a barrage of amendments designed to strengthen gun controls; none of these amendments was accepted, however, except

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for a restriction adopted by the Senate to ban the importation of gun parts for cheap handguns called Saturday night specials. Opponents of the bill, led by Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-MA) and Sen. Howard Metzenbaum (D-OH), threatened a filibuster in June if some of the bill’s provisions were not softened. Supporters yielded, and after intense negotiations the bill, S. 49 was passed on July 9, 1985. The final vote for passage of the bill was 79-15. The relatively speedy passage was attributed to the pressure of the NRA and its allies, and to the fact that the Republican-controlled Senate had a sympathetic Judiciary Committee chair, Strom Thurmond (R-SC), and majority leader. Deliberations in the Democratic-controlled House posed a far greater problem for McClure-Volkmer supporters. House Judiciary Committee chair Peter Rodino (D-NJ), a staunch gun control proponent, had announced early in 1985 that the bill arrived “D.O.A.—Dead on Arrival.” Bill opponents were still confident that Rodino would succeed as he had in the past in keeping the bill bottled up in committee. Yet Rodino was unable to fulfill his prediction. By the fall of 1985, bill supporters had begun a discharge petition that, if signed by a majority of the House membership (218 representatives), would force the bill out of committee and onto the floor. The drastic and unusual nature of the House discharge petition is revealed by the fact that from 1937 to 1986, discharge petitions had succeeded in only twenty instances. Of those, only two such bills were actually enacted into law. Despite the initial opposition of Rodino and Rep. William J. Hughes (D-NJ), the chair of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, they both realized that unless they formulated a substitute compromise bill, the full committee would be forced to report

McClure-Volkmer. The committee thus held a markup session on a compromise bill and reported it to the floor by unanimous vote. This remarkable turn of events occurred in March 1986 as the result of a successful discharge petition. By reporting the Rodino-Hughes bill to the floor first (on March 11), before the actual filing of the discharge petition on behalf of McClureVolkmer (on March 13), gun control supporters hoped to salvage some parliamentary flexibility that would allow priority consideration of the Rodino-Hughes bill. This maneuver failed, however, because Volkmer was able to offer his version of the bill as a substitute for that of the Judiciary Committee in a vote on the floor. On April 9, Representative Hughes offered a package of law enforcement amendments to McClure-Volkmer, including a ban on interstate sale and transport of handguns and stricter record-keeping regulations. The package was rejected by a wide margin (248-176). During the vote, police officers stood in full uniform at “parade rest” at the entrance to the House floor as a sign of their opposition to McClureVolkmer. After several other votes on motions to strengthen certain gun control provisions (all were defeated), the House adjourned and then reconvened the next day. On the third try, the House approved (by 233-184) a ban on interstate handgun sales after proponents stressed the difference between sale and transport. A final amendment to bar all future possession and sale of machine guns by private citizens also passed. The bill was approved by a 292-130 vote on April 10. President Reagan signed the measure into law on May 19, 1986. As passed into law, McClure-Volkmer amended the 1968 act by allowing for the legal interstate sale of rifles and shotguns as long as the sale was legal in the states of



both the buyer and seller. The act also eliminated record-keeping requirements for ammunition dealers, made it easier for individuals selling guns to do so without a license unless they did so “regularly,” allowed gun dealers to do business at gun shows, and prohibited the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) from issuing regulations requiring centralized records of gun dealers. The law also reduced the penalty for falsifying firearm records from a felony to a misdemeanor. In addition, the act limited to one per year the number of unannounced inspections of gun dealers by the ATF and prohibited the establishment of any system of comprehensive firearm registration. Finally, the act barred future possession or transfer of machine guns and retained existing restrictions (except for transport) on handguns. In a final move to tighten up elements of the bill, which was also a concession to law enforcement groups that had opposed McClure-Volkmer, the Senate passed a separate bill on May 6 that tightened licensing, record-keeping, and interstate transport requirements. That bill easily passed the House on June 24 and was signed into law on July 8, 1986. The passage of McClureVolkmer represented a high point in the NRA’s influence in Washington. In all, the NRA spent about $1.6 million in lobbying and advertising costs to win passage of the bill. At the same time, however, gun control supporters, led by Handgun Control Inc. (now called the Brady Campaign), also won some concessions in the bill, prompting them to claim victory as well. In addition, this bill marked a public and permanent split between police organizations and the NRA. Formerly, links between the two had been strong. After this, however, most police organizations would side with efforts to strengthen gun control, including the Brady

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Bill and the Assault Weapons Ban. Despite the NRA’s victory, leaders within the organization considered it inadequate, and several dozen NRA employees were fired after the bill’s enactment as a consequence. Robert J. Spitzer See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Brady: United against Gun Violence; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF); Gun Control Act of 1968; National Rifle Association (NRA)

Further Reading Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021. Vizzard, William J. Shots in the Dark: The Policy, Politics, and Symbolism of Gun Control. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000.

Firearms Shooting Accuracy Rates Estimates of the accuracy of firearm shooting depend heavily upon the definition used. Sometimes called the “hit rate,” firearm accuracy can be assessed at the incident and the bullet levels (among others). At the incident level, accuracy is based on whether the intended target is shot without considering the number of shooters or the number of shots fired. At the bullet level, accuracy is assessed by dividing the number of hits on the intended target by the total number of shots fired. The incident level accuracy rates are thus typically much higher than the bullet level. Nationwide reports of firearm shooting accuracy are scant, and scholarly research and media coverage often focus on

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assessments of law enforcement officers. Given that law enforcement officers undergo extensive initial training and then at least annual firearms recertification, it stands to reason that their accuracy rates should be both higher than a layperson’s and subject to public review. Due to high-profile instances of police use of force, officer involved shootings (OIS) incidents have been the target of intense media and political scrutiny. Currently, there are no national data collected regarding the accuracy rates of police officer shooting. In fact, much information regarding police use of force broadly, and OIS specifically, is often provided on a voluntary basis. With regards to OIS incidents in general, several major police departments report a decline in recent years. The Chicago Tribune reports that the number of OIS incidents in Chicago dropped from 107 in 2011 to 44 in 2015, while the New York City Police Department’s website reports the number of incidents went from 125 in 2005 to 35 in 2018 (Richards et al. 2016). Likewise, Philadelphia Police Department’s website reported a drop in OIS from sixty in 2009 to twelve in 2016, but these number do not include incidents where an officer shot at an animal. Whether these trends hold true for all or even most cities is unknown, and comparisons across jurisdictions are complicated by differing definitions of OIS (e.g., incident versus bullet) and which situations are counted (e.g., situations involving humans or animals). To provide a national picture, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) launched the National Use-of-Force Data Collection on January 1, 2019. The system collects information on police use-of-force incidents that resulted in death, serious bodily injury, or where an officer discharged their firearm. Currently, the program is voluntary, and

law enforcement agencies are merely encouraged to participate. Additionally, while information regarding discharge of a firearm is collected, total number of shots fired and shooting accuracy are not. Other federal datasets capture policeinvolved homicides, defined as a death caused by a law enforcement officer acting in the line of duty, an arrest-related death of a suspect, or a felon killed by police, depending upon the source. However, media and scholarly review of these datasets question their thoroughness. The Chicago Tribune, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, and the Guardian all maintain databases that track police-involved homicide incidents. In 2015, then-FBI Director James Comey publicly acknowledged that the Guardian and the Washington Post both had more accurate counts of police use of lethal violence than the FBI, with the agency’s records underreporting these homicides by more than half. A 2016 study by Barber and colleagues examined several federal death reporting systems and found that from 2005 to 2012 the National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS) correctly accounted for 92 percent of police homicides, with the Center for Disease Control’s Vital Statistics and the FBI’s Supplemental Homicide Report accounting for far less (58% and 48%, respectively). Similarly, a Bureau of Justice Statistics effort only accounted for 57 percent of law enforcement homicides listed in the NVDRS for 2005–2009 in eleven states. Further, none of these reporting systems capture the number of shots fired or the accuracy of each shot. Critics assert that given the voluntariness of reporting of police use of force (weapon discharge or otherwise) and the lack of accurate reporting of the most serious outcome of OIS situations (e.g., homicide), the scope of OIS is



not fully understood. At best, records are maintained by individual police departments regarding these incidents, and police reporting of crime incidents has been criticized in the past for vast underreporting of crime. Not all police departments maintain records on the accuracy of their officers who discharge firearms in the line of duty. Even fewer publish their data. Most academic papers assessing accuracy of police officer shooting use data from major metropolitan cities and these data suggest that police have difficulty accurately hitting their targets. For example, using OIS data from Dallas Police Department for a fifteenyear period, researchers reported 54 percent incident accuracy and 35 percent bullet accuracy (Donner and Popovich 2019). Data from Chicago, Illinois, revealed a similar pattern, with officers hitting at least one person involved in the incident 54 percent of the time (incident accuracy). At the incident level, between 1987 and 1992, police officers in Philadelphia shot with 49 percent accuracy. At the bullet level, data from major metropolitan areas (e.g., Chicago, New York, Metro-Dade) during the 1970s and 1980s typically showed accuracy around 20 percent. Data reported from Las Vegas shows slightly higher bullet accuracy than other cities, with 42 percent of all rounds fired striking intended targets in 2011 (Gillespie 2012). These global figures do not consider several factors that are known to contribute to officer’s shooting accuracy. For example, the seriousness of the incident has been shown to decrease shooting accuracy. The RAND Corporation’s examination of the New York Police Department’s OIS situations from 1998 to 2006 reported a 30 percent hit rate (bullet level) for officers firing at a suspect not returning fire, but only

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18 percent for return fire situations (Rostker et al. 2008). However, other studies have found that having a suspect show or use a weapon improves firearm accuracy or the fatality of the incident. Distance between the officer and the suspect also plays a significant role in police accuracy. NYPD officers hit their targets 73 percent of the time at distances of seven yards or less, whereas hit rates fell off sharply to 23 percent at longer ranges (Rostker et al. 2008). In Las Vegas, Nevada, the accuracy of shots fired by police officers from distances of twenty-one feet or less was 49 percent but dropped to 34 percent at over twenty-one feet away (and only 22% in 2010). In Philadelphia, officers were more likely to fire at and miss their intended targets if suspects were more than twenty feet away. Similar results are found when looking at police officers and/or recruits at a shooting range. In one study, police recruits who had completed firearms training shot with 87.68 percent accuracy at three to fifteen feet but only 14.06 percent accuracy at sixty to seventy-five feet from a stationary paper target (Lewinski 2015). Demographic characteristics have also been shown to influence shooting accuracy. Novice and rookie officers perform less accurately versus veteran and trained officers. This result has mainly been found in studies where officers were at a shooting range or when using scenarios rather than OIS reports. Studies differ in terms of whether race of the suspect influences officer accuracy. In Dallas, researchers found that OIS situations that involved a nonwhite suspect resulted in lower shot accuracy. However, other published studies have failed to find a significant difference. Though little research has examined the age of the suspect, one study found that situations involving a younger suspect resulted in less officer accuracy.

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Environmental factors also play a role in officer shooting accuracy. Several studies have found that OIS situations during daylight hours are more accurate than those in the dark. The Baltimore County Police Department reported an average hit rate of 64 percent in daylight OIS versus 45 percent in lowlight for the years 1989–2002. Studies conducted at a shooting range have found that officer’s or recruit’s shooting accuracy is better during the day (versus lowlight or nighttime) and when using night sights (versus not using in nighttime conditions). Further, a number of studies have examined the influence of anxiety on shooting accuracy. In several of these studies, research subjects (often police officers or recruits) were assigned to either a high- or low-pressure group (see for example, Landman, Nieuwenhuys, and Oudejans 2016). In the high-pressure group, officers were asked to shoot (with fake bullets or soap pellets) at “targets” placed on the clothing of a trained firearm instructor while the instructor periodically shot back. The low-pressure group shot at life-size cardboard or mannequin targets shaped like an adult man that had similarly placed targets. These studies typically found worse shooting accuracy in the high-pressure groups and attributed this inaccuracy to biological (e.g., higher heart rates, lower response times, more blinking) and psychological (e.g., higher reported state of anxiety) factors. Likewise, studies have found that officers have higher cortisol levels (a biological indicator of stress) and lower working memory scores after being in a high-pressure (versus low-pressure) shooting scenario. To address the anxiety associated with shooting situations, training on biofeedback (e.g., reducing muscle tension and heart rate) and meditation may improve officer shooting accuracy, though more research is needed.

Still other research has examined officers’ biological factors that may influence shooting accuracy. In one study, high accuracy shooters were found to have stronger hand grips, larger wrist and bicep circumference, and lower average heart rates than those shooters characterized as low accuracy (Kayihan et al. 2013). Others have argued that hand steadiness, which influences accuracy of shooting, may be hampered both by the ability to respond quickly and to control anxiety. Several studies and professional organizations suggest that specific types of training could improve police officer shooting accuracy. Police departments require initial firearms training (as much as two weeks and/or eighty hours) and then regular recertification and/or training. A widely mentioned criticism of this standard training is the lack of reality. During the police academy, recruits are trained on proper technique and stance but often under “unrealistic” circumstances, such as shooting at static paper targets. Police departments may require annual or semiannual recertification using the same assessment technique. Though the departments require high accuracy on these paper targets (often at or exceeding 78%), as seen above, this shooting range accuracy is not translated into actual OIS situations. Critics argue that officers need more initial and ongoing training in realistic situations like firearm training simulators or Hogan’s Alley scenarios. In a firearm training simulator, officers watch a life-size video simulation and use a modified service weapon to make and execute split-second decisions. These decisions are reviewed for shot accuracy and proper decision-making. Hogan’s Alley scenarios, developed by the FBI, create realistic street blocks or alleys where trainees must navigate different buildings and civilian traffic while interacting



with “criminals” and making decisions about firearm use. Though an emerging area of study, research has found that officers who are trained with more realistic, higherstress scenarios shoot more accurately under pressure and have less accuracy deterioration from low- to high-pressure situations compared to more traditionally trained officers. A limitation to these more realistic training situations, however, is cost. When creating Hogan’s Alley, the FBI consulted with Hollywood set designers to achieve a high degree of realism. Firearm training simulators require a dedicated space and tens of thousands of dollars to purchase. Many police departments do not have the budget to accommodate this. Jennifer Roberts, Curtis Wert, and Chelsea Clark See also: Ergonomics and Firearms Design; Police Shootings; Target Shooting

Further Reading Barber, Catherine, Deborah Azrael, Amy Cohen, Matthew Miller, Deonza Thymes, David Wang, and David Hemenway. “Homicides by Police: Comparing Counts from the National Violent Death Reporting System, Vital Statistics, and Supplementary Homicide Reports.” American Journal of Public Health 106 (2016): 922–27. Donner, Christopher and Nicole Popovich. “Hitting (or Missing) the Mark: An Examination of Police Shooting Accuracy in Officer-Involved Shooting Incidents.” Policing: An International Journal 43 (2019): 474–89. Federal Bureau of Investigation. “National Use of Force Data Collection.” n.d. https:// www.fbi.gov/services/cjis/ucr/use-of-force (accessed May 18, 2022). Gillespie, Douglas. “Deadly Force Statistical Analysis 2010–2011.” Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, July 1, 2012. https://

Florida Carry, Inc. | 299 cops.usdoj.gov/pdf/deadly-force-statistical -analysis.pdf (accessed May 18, 2022). Kayihan, Gurhan, Gulfem Ersoz, Ali Ozkan, and Mitat Koz. “Relationship Between Efficiency of Pistol Shooting and PhysicalPhysiological Parameters of Police.” Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies & Management 36 (2013): 819–32. Landman, Annemarie, Arne Nieuwenhuys, and Raoul Oudejans. “Decision-Related Action Orientation Predicts Police Officers’ Shooting Performance Under Pressure.” Anxiety, Stress, & Coping 29 (2016): 570–79. Lewinski, William, Ron Avery, Jennifer Dysterheft, Nathan Dicks, and Jacob Bushey. “The Real Risks During Deadly Police Shootouts: Accuracy of the Naïve Shooter.” International Journal of Police Science & Management 17 (2015): 117–27. Richards, Jennifer Smith, Angela Caputo, Todd Lighty, and Jason Meisner. “92 Deaths, 2,623 Bullets: Tracking Every Chicago Police Shooting Over 6 Years.” Chicago Tribune, August 26, 2016. Rostker, Bernard, Lawrence Hanser, William Hix, Carl Jensen, Andrew Morral, Greg Ridgeway, and Terry Schell. “Evaluation of the New York City Police Department Firearm Training and Firearm-Discharge Review Process.” The RAND Corporation, 2008. https://www.rand.org/content/dam /rand /pubs /monographs /2008/R AND _MG717.pdf (accessed May 18, 2022).

Florida Carry, Inc. Florida Carry Inc. is a nonprofit organization that promotes expanding gun rights in the state of Florida. Florida Carry was formed on January 6, 2011, in order to better organize gun lobbying efforts. Their website declares that “Florida Carry works tirelessly toward repealing and striking down ill-conceived gun control laws that have been proven to provide safe havens to

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criminals and be deadly to law abiding citizens” (Florida Carry 2019). Florida Carry has been actively involved in lobbying efforts since their formation. During the 2011 Florida Legislative Session, Florida Carry lobbied in favor of House Bill (HB) 517 and Senate Bill (SB) 234, bills originally intended to legalize open carry of a firearm by concealed weapons holders, legalize the ability to carry firearms and other defensive weapons on college campuses, legalize storage of firearms in private vehicles, secure the legal right to purchase a long gun from any state, and authorize the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services to issue concealed carry licenses to qualified applicants (Cunningham 2011). These bills were opposed by both the Florida Sheriff’s Association and the Florida Retail Federation. An amended version of these bills passed without the open carry and campus carry provisions. Despite being a water-downed version of the original bills, this was seen as a partial victory by Florida Carry, specifically the right to purchase long guns from out-of-state sources (Florida Carry 2019). Previously, Florida residents were limited to making out-of-state gun purchases from contiguous states only. Florida Carry has continued their efforts during each consecutive year. Their website lists every gun control bill to be debated for each legislative session, and their stance on each bill. They delineate a bill as follows: Support, Strongly Support, Oppose, Strongly Oppose, Neutral, or Still Being Evaluated. In 2012, which was the last year that they commented on whether a bill was a victory or failure, Florida Carry claimed two major victories in the Florida legislative session. During that session, Florida Carry lobbied in favor of HB 463 / SB 998. This bill authorized shall carry for current military

personnel and veterans. They also supported HB 5601, which reduced concealed carry fees. The passage of both of these bills was viewed as a victory for Florida Carry. In the 2019 session, Florida Carry began employing a thumbs up or thumbs down rating system for gun-related bills, listing the 2019 legislation session as “an all-out attack on the Right to Bear Arms” and rating the majority of the bills being considered as thumbs down (Florida Carry 2019). In addition to their lobbying efforts, Florida Carry has also actively pursued litigation against any party they deem as hindering gun rights. They have several active cases listed on their website. On September 8, 2015, Florida Carry filed a lawsuit against Florida State University (FSU) for prohibiting firearms in vehicles (Florida Carry 2019). Florida Carry argued that FSU’s ban on long guns in cars was illegal since state law does not require them to be concealed (Florida Carry 2019). They filed another lawsuit against FSU on August 27, 2018, for the same reason. They filed a similar lawsuit against the University of Florida on January 10, 2014 (Florida Carry 2019). On May 2, 2014, Florida Carry filed a lawsuit against the city of Tallahassee citing a constitutional challenge to the city’s ordinances that regulate firearm possession and use in public (Florida Carry 2019). This case is still in litigation at the time of this writing. A similar case was filed against the city of Leesburg on March 14, 2012. The ordinance in Leesburg was repealed following a victory at an appellate court (Florida Carry 2019). In 2012, Florida Carry suffered a loss at the Supreme Court with Norman v. Florida. This case involved an incident where an individual did not properly conceal a firearm and was charged with violating the ban on open carry. Most recently, Florida Carry lost a case



concerning the banning of bump stocks at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia (Hurley 2019). Florida Carry has also used loopholes in Florida law to promote activism. Florida law currently allows any individual who is fishing the right to legally carry a firearm unconcealed. Florida Carry has organized several fishing events exploiting this loophole to demonstrate that armed individuals are not a danger to the general public. On June 24, 2018, Florida Carry hosted a fishing event in Miami that resulted in six men being detained for two hours (Gurney 2018). Florida Carry threatened legal action following this incident (Gurney 2018). Most recently, Florida Carry had an open-carry fishing event scheduled for April 6, 2019 in Ocala, Florida. Although Florida Carry states that its mission is to expand gun rights to all lawabiding gun owners in the state, they have sometimes had a contentious history with the National Rifle Association (NRA). On December 7, 2017, the NRA’s chief lobbyist for Florida, Marion Hammer, wrote an open letter criticizing the actions of Florida Carry during a Senate Judiciary Hearing on two days earlier. Hammer titled this letter, “Florida Carry cuts off its nose to spite its face— again,” and said that their posturing during that hearing aided the anti-gun movement— not Florida gun owners (Hammer 2017). In this report, Hammer (2017) accused Florida Carry of “demonstrating a lack of concern for concealed weapons holders.” Benjamin Dowd-Arrow See also: Campus Carry; Concealed Weapons Laws; Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Open Carry Laws

Further Reading Cunningham. FL House of Representatives Staff Analysis. Bill Analysis, Tallahassee, FL: Florida Senate, 2011.

Fourteenth Amendment | 301 Florida Carry, Inc. Florida Carry. June 2019. https://www.floridacarry.org/ (accessed June 1, 2019). Gurney, Kyra. “Open-Carry Advocates Suing Miami Beach after They Were Detained while Fishing.” Miami Herald, July 26, 2018. Hammer, Marion. “Florida Action Report: Florida Carry Cuts Off Its Nose to Spit Its Face—Again.” National Rifle Association—Institute for Legislative Action, December 7, 2017. Hurley, Lawrence. “U.S. Chief Justice Rejects Bid to Block ‘Bump Stocks’ Gun Ban.” Reuters, March 26, 2019.

Force-on-Force Training. See Tactical Training Fourteenth Amendment The Fourteenth Amendment granted full citizenship to African Americans and was designed to guarantee the “equal protection” of the law to all citizens. It was one of three amendments passed in the wake of the Civil War that were designed to integrate African Americans into the broader spectrum of American politics and to provide full rights of citizenship. Since the 1897 Supreme Court case Chicago, Burlington, and Quincy Railroad v. Chicago, the Fourteenth Amendment has been used to incorporate the protections of the Bill of Rights at the state and local levels. Passed in 1868, the Fourteenth Amendment is the only component of the U.S. Constitution that specifically addresses the issue of equality by mandating “equal protection of the laws.” The due process clause of the amendment declares that states could not “deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.” It was used in successive court cases to extend basic civil rights

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and liberties to disadvantaged groups such as African Americans after the Supreme Court in the 1873 Slaughter-House Cases ruled that the privileges and immunities clause of the amendment applied only to the federal government and not the states. Following the Civil War, southern states passed a variety of restrictive gun laws that were designed to prevent African Americans from obtaining guns. Southern elites feared that if African Americans were armed, they would be less compliant, and laws such as the “Black Codes” were passed to deny rights to the community. A number of states, including Alabama, Louisiana, and Mississippi, enacted laws that expressly forbade African Americans from acquiring guns. The passage of the Fourteenth Amendment led to the repeal of race-based restrictions on gun ownership. However, these gun laws were often replaced with more restrictive legislation that was race-neutral in language, but its impact was to limit access to weapons. For instance, restrictions on gun ownership were often unequally enforced. While law enforcement vigorously enforced bans on certain weapons in the African American community, the white-dominated police forces ignored possession of guns in the white community. The disparity of gun ownership and the advent of racially motivated attacks in the South led Congress to debate legislation that would have outlawed southern militias and placed restrictions on the ability of all southerners to possess firearms. However, the majority of members of Congress from both parties ultimately agreed that efforts to ban or prohibit militias would be overturned by the Supreme Court. Since Congress could not limit the ability of whites to acquire weapons, the national legislature concentrated on measures to ensure equal

access to firearms. Support for arming African Americans also had an ideological component. Just as Americans had to resort to force to gain independence from Great Britain and now had to use force to free the slaves, many Radical Republicans envisioned a well-armed African American citizenry as the optimum means to ensure the equality granted under the Fourteenth Amendment and subsequent legislation. Through the Fourteenth Amendment, the Republican-controlled Congress endeavored to provide African Americans with the means to defend themselves from racist organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan (KKK). In response to racial violence, Congress passed the Anti-KKK Act in 1871. Weapons were also seen as a necessary tool to protect African American families from corrupt local law enforcement, and during Reconstruction, the federal government provided weapons to arm Black militias for purposes of self-defense. In spite of the intentions of the measure, the Fourteenth Amendment initially failed to provide the protections contained within it. A succession of Jim Crow laws were passed in the South that institutionalized segregation. Legal segregation was approved by Supreme Court cases in the 1880s and in the infamous Plessy v. Ferguson (which endorsed the concept of “separate but equal”) in 1896. Nonetheless, the amendment would also serve as the basis for later efforts to repeal segregation and ensure political equality. The Fourteenth Amendment continues to be a core element of the gun control debate in the United States. Contemporary gun rights advocates base their arguments against gun regulation on the equal protection clause of the amendment. According to this line of reasoning, all citizens have the



right to self-defense since the Fourteenth Amendment guarantees equal protection for all Americans. In 2008, in District of Columbia v. Heller, the Supreme Court ruled that the Second Amendment allowed individuals to own firearms for personal protection or self-defense. Two years later, the court used the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to apply the Second Amendment to states and localities in McDonald v. City of Chicago. The decision overturned broad prohibitions against firearms ownership by the states or local governments. It did permit the continuation of some restrictions, including laws against carrying weapons in public areas such as schools or prohibitions against felons owning firearms. Tom Lansford See also: District of Columbia v. Heller; Ku Klux Klan (KKK); McDonald v. City of Chicago; National Rifle Association (NRA); Right to Self-Defense, Philosophical Bases; Second Amendment;

Further Reading Bland, Randall, and Joseph V. Brogan. Constitutional Law in the United States: A Systematic Inquiry into the Change and Relevance of Supreme Court Decisions. San Francisco: Austin & Winfield, 1999. Cornell, Saul. “The Right to Regulate Arms in the Era of the Fourteenth Amendment: The Emergence of Good Cause Permit Schemes in Post-Civil War America.” UC Davis Law Review Online, September 2021. https://lawreview.law.ucdavis.edu/online /55/files/55-online-Cornell.pdf (accessed January 27, 2022). Curtis, Michael Kent. No State Shall Abridge: The Fourteenth Amendment and the Bill of Rights. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1987.

Fourth Amendment | 303 Epps, Garret. Democracy Reborn: The Fourteenth Amendment and the Fight for Equal Rights in Post–Civil War America. New York: Holt, 2007. George, Robert P., ed. Great Cases in Constitutional Law. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2001. Halbrook, Stephen P. Securing Civil Rights: Freedman, the Fourteenth Amendment, and the Right to Bear Arms. Washington, DC: Independent Institute, 2010. Harrison, Maureen, and Steve Gilbert, eds. Landmark Decisions of the United States Supreme Court. Beverly Hills, CA: Excellent Books, 1991.

Fourth Amendment The Fourth Amendment forbids unreasonable searches and seizures. The amendment was one of the ten original amendments to the Constitution (the Bill of Rights). The Fourth Amendment was designed to protect Americans from general or arbitrary searches by the police or government by requiring a specific warrant to be issued by a judge or magistrate before a search is undertaken. The rise in handgun violence during the 1960s and 1970s led to a gradual erosion of Fourth Amendment rights as the courts granted the police greater latitude in searches for weapons and firearms. The amendment has its roots in English common law. By the time of the American Revolution, it had become a legal precedent in Great Britain that the police or other forces of the Crown needed an official writ before entering a personal home. In fact, one of the factors that created tension between the colonies and Great Britain was the suspension of such protections. Throughout the colonies, royal magistrates and judges issued writs of assistance and

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general warrants that allowed British soldiers to search houses and seize property without cause or provocation. The lingering resentment against such actions prompted the adoption of the Fourth Amendment. The amendment forbade the government from conducting “unreasonable searches and seizures” and guaranteed the “right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects.” The amendment requires that the police obtain a warrant that specifically describes what place will be searched and what, if any, items are to be seized or people arrested. For the police to gain a search warrant, they have to swear under oath that there is “probable cause” for such a warrant. Since the ratification of the Bill of Rights in 1791, courts have allowed exemptions to the Fourth Amendment. For instance, police are permitted to arrest people who are in the midst of committing a crime or when they have probable cause to suspect someone is about to break the law. In 1912, the Supreme Court began using the exclusionary rule whereby evidence that was seized without a warrant or legally valid probable cause cannot be introduced in a criminal trial. The rule initially applied only to federal cases. It was not until 1961 and the Supreme Court case Mapp v. Ohio that the exclusionary rule was applied to state and local court cases. The Supreme Court has allowed some exceptions to the exclusionary rule. In Nix v. Williams in 1984, the court decided that the police and prosecutors could use evidence, even if it was seized illegally, if the discovery of that evidence led police to a discovery that they would have reached without the illegal evidence. That same year, the court in United States v. Leon further expanded the exemptions to the exclusionary rule by finding that evidence could be used for prosecution

if it was obtained when the police were acting in “good faith” even if they were mistaken about the scope or breadth of a search warrant. In Herring v. United States (2009), the court found that evidence could also be used even if there was unintentional police negligence in preparing a search warrant. Meanwhile, in Illinois v. Webster (2004), the high court ruled that police could use roadblocks in response to specific crimes or searches (but not general roadblocks). Roadblocks had become an increasingly common tactic of police. Critics of some specific gun control efforts claim that these programs violate the Fourth Amendment. For instance, the courts have granted the police wide latitude to search for and seize guns even without probable cause. One result of such latitude has been the police tactic of “profiling,” whereby police units stop motorists on the highways or people in certain neighborhoods if they fit a specific set of guidelines, which usually mirror the profiles of those engaged in criminal activity. The police defend these warrantless stops by claiming that they fall under the doctrine of probable cause. Furthermore, many localities have adopted programs that are designed to reduce violence and crime in certain neighborhoods. Central to these programs is the ability of the police to run “sweeps” or warrantless searches of public housing areas to confiscate guns or illicit drugs. For example, in 1988, Chicago began Operation Clean Sweep in which the police randomly “swept” through public housing buildings and seized illegal materials. After the American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit against the tactic, the scope of the sweeps was limited, but they have continued. Concern over crime and gun violence in certain urban areas has increased the popularity of these programs that erode an



individual’s Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable search and seizure. In May 2021 the U.S. Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision in the case of Caniglia v. Strom, in which officers acting without a warrant seized firearms in the home of a person they judged to be a potential danger. The Court held that the “community caretaking” exception to the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirements did not extend to personal residences. Allowing such warrantless searches, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in the majority opinion, flouted Fourteenth Amendment guarantees of “the right of a man to retreat into his own home and there be free from unreasonable governmental intrusion” (Sibilla 2021). Tom Lansford See also: American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)

Further Reading Bland, Randall, and Joseph V. Brogan. Constitutional Law in the United States: A Systematic Inquiry into the Change and Relevance of Supreme Court Decisions. San Francisco: Austin & Winfield, 1999. George, Robert P., ed. Great Cases in Constitutional Law. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2001. Harrison, Maureen, and Steve Gilbert, eds. Landmark Decisions of the United States Supreme Court. Beverly Hills, CA: Excellent Books, 1991. Hoffman, Ronald, and Peter J. Albert, eds. The Bill of Rights: Government Proscribed. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1997. Sibilla, Nick. “Supreme Court Closes Fourth Amendment Loophole That Let Cops Seize Guns without Warrants.” Forbes, May 17, 2021. https://www.forbes.com/sites/nick sibilla/2021/05/17/supreme-court-closes -fourth-amendment-loophole-that-let-cops -seize-guns-without-war rants /?sh = 9b 964105c1e3 (accessed January 27, 2022).

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Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) The Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) is the world’s largest organization of rank-and-file police officers. Founded in 1915 by police officers in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, as the Fort Pitt Lodge No. 1, the FOP soon spread to other states, and in 1955, it became a national organization. The FOP now has over 2,100 local and state chapters, or lodges, with over 356,000 members. The national organization, known as the Grand Lodge, has two main offices: the Steve Young Law Enforcement Legislative Advocacy Center in Washington, DC, and the Atnip-Orms Center in Nashville, Tennessee. The latter serves as the organization’s national headquarters and houses its administrative and labor services divisions. State and local lodges independently determine the services they provide to their members. Through its national offices, the FOP maintains an active legislative agenda, lobbying and testifying before Congress and regulatory agencies on legislation it favors or opposes. Local lodges provide members with legal defense and counsel, and also sponsor and provide practical and financial support to injured officers and their families. FOP offices provide labor representation to members, although its founders were reluctant to call the organization a union due to the virulent antiunion sentiment of their founding period. Through its history, however, the FOP has functioned much like a labor union in advocating for a broad range of labor benefits and protecting members from perceived unsatisfactory work conditions. The FOP has been an active legislative lobbying force on firearms-related issues. The FOP does not have an overall position on gun control; rather, it takes varying positions on gun control legislation based on its

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assessment of their implications for law enforcement officers and the law enforcement community. For many years, the FOP as well as other law enforcement associations maintained close ties to the National Rifle Association (NRA) because of the NRA’s role in sponsoring firearm safety classes and promoting the responsible use of firearms. However, the NRA’s increasing resistance to any kind of gun control gradually alienated the FOP and other police organizations. In 1994, the FOP broke from the NRA when it supported the Brady Bill’s establishment of federal background checks on firearms purchasers. The NRA opposed regulation of armorpiercing (so-called cop killer) bullets. Spitzer (2012) suggests the split became final when the NRA began to run advertisements attacking police chiefs who had opposed their policies. Carter (1997) notes that the passage of the McClure-Volkmer Act in 1986 also contributed to the disaffection of law enforcement organizations—including the FOP—from the NRA. The NRA strongly supported the McClure-Volkmer Act, which “removed record-keeping requirements for ammunitions dealers and allowed mail-order sales of rifles, shotguns, and ammunition to resume” (Carter 1997, 103). Estrangement from the NRA led the FOP and other police organizations to ally themselves with Handgun Control Inc. (HCI, now called the Brady: United against Gun Violence). In reaction to the split with the established law enforcement organizations, the NRA supported and subsidized the creation of the Law Enforcement Alliance of America (LEAA) as an alternative to the mainstream law enforcement organizations. LEAA is small, not very influential, and generally takes NRA positions on gun control issues and legislation.

The FOP—and a coalition of other police organizations—supported the Brady Act, allying itself with HCI. The FOP strongly opposed the 1996 Domestic Violence Offender Gun Ban, also known as the Lautenberg Amendment. This amendment to a federal spending bill prohibits anyone with a misdemeanor conviction for domestic violence against a spouse or child from purchasing or owning a handgun. According to the FOP, the amendment has cost some police officers their jobs for having committed one domestic violence infraction in the past. The FOP argues that it is unfair to apply the ban retroactively and supports amending the Lautenberg Amendment so that it would not apply retroactively. The FOP also supported passage of the Law Enforcement Safety Act, passed by Congress in 2004, that allows active-duty and off-duty law enforcement officers as well as retired officers to carry concealed weapons, even outside of their jurisdictions. The FOP and the bill’s sponsors argued that it would allow those trained in law enforcement to intervene in criminal situations and protect communities. FOP president Chuck Canterbury argued in the legislative hearings that this is not a firearms issue, but “an officer safety issue, a public safety issue, and a homeland security issue” (Canterbury 2004). Furthermore, he said the FOP supported a federal law to supplant the ineffective patchwork of states’ concealed carry laws. The National Legislative Office of the FOP also opposes a wide variety of other handgun control legislation, including legislation to require the licensing and registration of all handguns with the federal government, legislation to require anyone owning a handgun or ammunition to have a license from their state, legislation to prohibit individuals from purchasing more than one handgun in a thirty-day period,



and legislation to ban the manufacture of guns that cannot be personalized. The FOP also supports legislative actions that are not directly related to violence, gun control and other police-related legislation. Most notably, these have included several bills and acts regulating Social Security, such as the Social Security Fairness Act, and President Bush’s Commission to Strengthen Social Security’s recommendation to privatize Social Security. The FOP also has supported the “Thin Blue Line Act,” introduced to expand the list of aggravating factors in capital murder cases to include the targeting or killing of a law enforcement or other first responder, and the “Abby Honold Act,” which would promote the use of traumainformed techniques by law enforcement responding to sexual assault crimes. Robin L. Roth See also: Ammunition, Regulations of; Armor-Piercing Ammunition; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Brady: United against Gun Violence; Concealed Weapons Laws; Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986; Lautenberg, Frank R.; National Rifle Association (NRA)

Further Reading Canterbury, Chuck. Testimony of Chuck Canterbury, National President, Grand Lodge, Fraternal Order of Police, on H.R. 218, the Law Enforcement Officers Safety Act of 2003, before the House Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security Committee on the Judiciary, June 15, 2004. http://commdocs.house.gov/committees /judiciary/hju94197.000/hju94197_0.HTM (accessed July 5, 2021). Carter, Gregg Lee. The Gun Control Movement. New York: Twayne, 1997. Fraternal Order of Police. https://fop.net/ (accessed July 5, 2021). Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021.

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Fresno Rifle and Pistol Club, Inc. v. Van de Kamp. See Halbrook, Stephen P. Frontier Violence Many different forms of violence took place on the American frontier. The violence played an important role in creating and shaping the American gun culture. Even today, the effects of the frontier are powerful. The most common form of frontier violence was hunting. In the British Isles, France, and other parts of Western Europe—the sources of almost all of the white population of the British colonies and then the United States before the late nineteenth century—hunting was strictly controlled for the benefit of the aristocracy. A farmer might even be forbidden to kill deer or rabbits that were eating his crops. In theory, all game belonged to the king. But in the wilds of the United States, hunting was wide open. Anyone could hunt, and for people living on the frontier— whether in western Massachusetts in the 1670s or Idaho in the 1870s—hunting often made a difference in whether the family would go hungry or not. Even today, there are many poor people in rural parts of the United States for whom the results of the fall hunting season determine how much meat the family will be eating over the winter. The ready availability of hunting gave ordinary people an important reason for owning firearms, and the practical requirements of hunting—such as shooting a squirrel out of a tree dozens of yards away—promoted the development of shooting skills. Most of the American Revolution and the Civil War did not take place on the frontier, but some important engagements occurred there. The Indian wars took place almost

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The Battle of New Orleans took place on January 8, 2015, and was considered a major victory for America during the War of 1812. Despite such depictions, however, frontier violence most commonly took the form of hunting. (Library of Congress)

exclusively on the frontier. But perhaps the most important military violence involving the American frontier was the Battle of New Orleans on January 8, 1815. (New Orleans itself was not on the frontier, but the port was the key to the economy of much of the frontier, and frontiersmen played a major role in the battle.) The Treaty of Ghent, signed on December 24, 1814, had officially ended the War of 1812, but news of the treaty had not reached North America. Had the British captured New Orleans—the port through which almost all trade from the United States’ recently acquired Louisiana Territory flowed—it is doubtful that the British would have relinquished it, despite what the Treaty of Ghent required. Indeed, the British had violated the Treaty of Paris, which ended the American Revolution, by refusing to evacuate their forts east of the Mississippi.

The British army was fresh from its triumph over Napoleon, and the forces invading New Orleans were the best in the world—the victors of the Peninsular Campaign in Spain. Against the best-trained, best-equipped army in the world, the Americans did not have enough weapons for their forces. Historian Robert Remini’s The Battle of New Orleans quotes a contemporary observer: “From all the parishes the inhabitants could be seen coming with their hunting guns” because “there were not enough guns in the magazines of the United States to arm the citizens” (Remini 1999, 45). The Tennessee militia hardly looked like a professional army, with their rough clothes, unshaven faces, and raccoon caps. The Kentucky militia was even worse, arriving in rags and disappointed to find out that there were no blankets in the city for them. The redcoats called them “dirty



shirts.” Yet, as Remini explains, “most of these men could bring down a squirrel from the highest tree with a single rifle shot. Their many years living in the Tennessee wilderness had made them expert marksmen” (1999, 71). The Americans who fought at New Orleans were a diverse combination of professional soldiers, militiamen, irregulars, lawyers, privateers, farmers, and shopkeepers. They included free Blacks, Creoles, Cajuns, Spaniards, Frenchmen, Portuguese, Germans, Italians, Indians, and Anglos. When objections were raised to arming the free Blacks of Louisiana, General Andrew Jackson replied, “Place confidence in them, and . . . engage them by every dear and honorable tie to the interest of the country who extends to them equal rights and privileges with white men.” As the British maneuvered outside the city, nightly raids by the dirty shirts killed British sentries, took their equipment, and kept the whole army off balance. During an engagement by the Cypress Swamp on December 28 (eleven days before the main battle), the Tennesseans waded through the muck and leapt from log to log like cats, driving off the British beefeaters. In one encounter on the day of the main battle, a dirty shirt took aim at a wounded British officer who was walking back to his camp. “Halt Mr. Red Coat,” yelled the American. “One more step and I’ll drill a hole through your leather.” The officer complied, sighing, “What a disgrace for a British officer to have to surrender to a chimney-sweep.” Although the British greatly outnumbered the Americans, the day of January 8, 1815, turned into one of the worst days in British military history. Over 2,000 British soldiers were killed, captured, or wounded.

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The Americans lost only seven killed and six wounded, although their total casualties from skirmishes on other days amounted to 333. As news of the victory spread throughout the United States, the Americans’ sense of inferiority to the British began to recede. The Americans had smashed the best that Britain could throw at them. Newspapers quoted Shakespeare’s Henry VI: “Advance our waving colors to the wall, rescued is Orleans from the English wolves.” Jackson’s upset victory was as important for the United States’ future as Joan of Arc’s was for France. Until the Civil War, the Battle of New Orleans was celebrated nearly on a par with the Fourth of July. It became a tremendous source of American pride, helping to shape the national identity. The victory also helped propel Jackson to election as president in 1828. The popular song, “The Hunters of Kentucky,” celebrated the accomplishments of American frontiersmen and their rifles. One version of the song concluded: But Jackson he was wide awake, And was not scared of trifles, For well he knew Kentucky’s boys, With their death-dealing rifles. He led them down to Cypress Swamp, The ground was low and mucky, There stood John Bull in martial pomp, And here stood old Kentucky. But steady stood our little force, None wished it to be greater, For every man was half a horse, And half an alligator. (chorus) Oh, Kentucky, hunters of Kentucky! Oh, Kentucky, hunters of Kentucky! And when so near we saw them wink, We thought it good to stop them, It would have done you good, I think, To see Kentuckians drop them. And so if danger e’er

310 | Frontier Violence

annoys, Remember what our trade is, Just send for us Kentucky boys, And we’ll protect you ladies. Many of the American rifles at New Orleans were of a superbly crafted and effective type originally made by the Pennsylvania Dutch. Thanks in part to the song, though, the Pennsylvania rifles became known as “Kentucky rifles.” The Kentucky rifles were well suited for both hunting and self-defense. In contrast, British guns were more specialized, reflecting who would be using them. Muskets were mass-produced for infantry soldiers, who were not even trained to aim at an individual enemy; but in tightly controlled linear formations, the redcoats could produce massive, devastating firepower. In contrast, British aristocrats hunted on their estates with exquisite shotguns and other firearms tailored for them personally. The way guns were made in the United States—massproduced for a mass market and intended for multiple uses—reflected frontier conditions, as “civil and military uses of firearms dovetailed as they had not generally done in Europe” (Kennett and Anderson 1975, 41). The second great frontier-related military experience that shaped American attitudes toward firearms was the Texas Revolution. As the military dictatorship of General Santa Anna began systematically denying Texans their right to self-government (which the Mexican government had guaranteed to Texan settlers) and other rights guaranteed to all Mexicans by the 1824 Mexican Constitution, Texans began to contemplate a war for independence. At Gonzales, the Mexicans tried to seize a small cannon that the settlers had used to scare away Indians. The Texans were armed only with bowie knives, a few pistols, and flintlock rifles, many of which dated back to

the American Revolution. The Texans raised a flag, which dared, “Come and Take It.” The Mexicans tried unsuccessfully and then retreated. At the Alamo, a fort in San Antonio, 136 Texans withstood a siege by the main Mexican standing army from February 23 to March 6, 1836, before finally being destroyed, having refused all demands to surrender. The defenders of the Alamo had bought Sam Houston crucial time to rally the Texan people. On April 21, 1836, the Texans met the Mexican army at San Jacinto. Although outnumbered two to one, the Texans launched a surprise attack. “Remember the Alamo,” they yelled, rushing into battle with their rifles and bowie knives, as a single fife and a single drum played the love song, “Will You Come to the Bower?” In the first hour of battle, the Texans killed 600 Mexicans and captured 200 more. Within a day, the rest of the Mexican army, including Santa Anna himself, had been captured. Texan casualties were six dead and thirty wounded. The Mexican standing army was crushed, and although Mexico refused formally to recognize Texan independence, the dictatorship gave up trying to conquer Texas. The “Texan War Cry”—sung to the same tune as the “Star Spangled Banner”— celebrated the victory of a self-armed people over the professional army of a tyrant: Oh Texans rouse hill and dale with your cry, No longer delay, for the bold foe advances. The banners of Mexico tauntingly fly, And the valleys are lit with the gleam of their lances. With justice our shield, rush forth to the field, And stand with your posts, till our foes fly or yield. For the bright star of Texas shall never grow dim, While her soil boasts a son to raise

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rifle or limb. Rush forth to the lines, these hirelings to meet, Our lives and our homes, we will yield unto no man. But death on our free soil we’ll willingly meet, Ere our free temple soiled by the feet of the foe man. Grasp rifle and blade with hearts undismayed, And swear by the temple brave Houston has made. That the bright star of Texas shall never be dim, While her soil boasts a son to raise rifle or limb. The frontier attitudes expressed in the “Texan War Cry” and “The Hunters of Kentucky” deeply shaped American culture. Even in the early twenty-first century, these ideas are at the core of the American gun culture: A true man will use a firearm to protect women from predators (the British soldiers had been promised a rape-andpillage spree—“beauty and booty”—if they captured New Orleans); the free people of a nation must defend it personally with their own arms; professional soldiers (“hirelings”) in the pay of unfree governments are—despite the soldiers’ intimidating “martial pomp”—morally and militarily inferior to American soldiers; dying in defense of freedom is better than living under tyranny; and the quintessence of freedom—the precise reason why the stars of liberty shine—is the patriot’s rifle. These attitudes did not start with the frontier, of course. The American Revolution is the most important part of their foundation. And the attitudes were reinforced, with modification, by American participation in World War II. Yet it would be a serious mistake to underestimate the influence of Alamo imagery on almost every generation of American youth until almost the end of the twentieth century. The Battle of New Orleans and the Texan War of Independence helped ensure that the firearms-related “moral lessons” of the American Revolution

were not seen as one-time events but recurring facts of the eternal struggle between freedom and tyranny. In September 2000, Michael Bellesiles’s book Arming America: The Origins of a National Gun Culture was published with great critical acclaim. Bellesiles, with an obvious eye on the contemporary gun control debate, argued that before the Civil War, few Americans owned guns, even on the frontier; that hunting was mostly confined to professionals; and that guns were unimportant in the United States until the federal government promoted mass armament as a result of the Civil War. However, historians who investigated Bellesiles’s claims have found them to be contrary to the facts—and indeed contrary to the very sources that Bellesiles cited (e.g., Cramer 2006; Lindgren and Heather 2001). The Bellesiles book was exposed as a fraud, and withdrawn by the publisher. Bellesiles was forced to resign his professorship at the History Department at Emory University. If some Americans today wish to imagine a “gun-free” America in colonial days and during the early republic, Americans of the late nineteenth century had different wishes. For many people in the United States and around the world, knowledge of the American “Wild West” reflects that of the city audiences who attended the enormously popular “Buffalo Bill Wild West Show.” The show opened in 1883 and featured a stagecoach robbery, shooting contests, numerous gunfights, and terrifying Indians. In his book The Mythic West, Robert Athearn explains how the Wild West, exemplified (or invented) by the Buffalo Bill show, became a symbol of the purest, most rugged form of Americanism. The western frontier, a reasonably calm place in real life, was revered as bloody and heroic.

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Though the Buffalo Bill show and movie “Westerns” are responsible for popular understanding of the western frontier in the late nineteenth century, the reality was not so violent. The most thorough investigation of gun ownership and gun violence in the American western frontier is Roger McGrath’s Gunfighters, Highwaymen, and Vigilantes, an examination of the nineteenthcentury Sierra Nevada mining towns of Aurora and Bodie. Aurora and Bodie certainly had as much potential for violence as any place in the West. Their populations were mainly young, transient males subject to few social controls. There was one saloon for every twenty-five men; brothels and gambling houses were also common. Governmental law enforcement was ineffectual, and sometimes the sheriff was himself the head of a criminal gang. Nearly everyone carried a gun. Aurorans usually toted a Colt Navy .36 six-shot revolver, while Bodieites sported the Colt double-action model known as the “Lightning,” a double-action version of the famous “Peacemaker,” or “Frontier,” revolver. The homicide rate in those towns was extremely high, as the “bad men” who hung out in saloons shot each other at a fearsome rate: 64 per 100,000 annually in Aurora and 116 in Bodie. These rates are comparable to the highest homicide rates in the worst parts of U.S. cities during the late twentieth century. The presence of guns turned many petty drunken quarrels into fatal encounters— as they sometimes do today. But in Aurora and Bodie, other crime was virtually nonexistent. McGrath, writing in 1984, compared the Aurora and Bodie crime rates to the 1980 crime rates in the United States. The per capita annual robbery rate in Aurora and Bodie was only 7 percent of modern New York City’s rate. The burglary rate was a mere 1 percent of

New York’s. Rape was unknown in Aurora and Bodie. Bodie had a robbery rate of 84 per 100,000 persons per year. The rate in 1980 New York City was 1,140; in San Francisco–Oakland, it was 521; and in the United States as a whole, it was 243. The Bodie burglary rate was 6.4 per 100,000 people per year. The 1980 New York City rate was 2,661; the San Francisco–Oakland rate was 2,267; and the overall rate for the United States was 1,668. “The old, the weak, the female, the innocent, and those unwilling to fight were rarely the targets of attacks,” McGrath found. One resident of Bodie did “not recall ever hearing of a respectable woman or girl in any manner insulted or even accosted by the hundreds of dissolute characters that were everywhere. In part this was due to the respect depravity pays to decency; in part to the knowledge that sudden death would follow any other course.” Everyone carried a gun, and except for young men who liked to drink and fight with each other, everyone was secure from crime. The experiences of Aurora and Bodie were repeated throughout the West. One study of five major cattle towns with a reputation for violence—Abilene, Ellsworth, Wichita, Dodge City, and Caldwell—found that altogether, the towns had fewer than two criminal homicides per year (Dykstra 1983). During the 1870s, Lincoln County, New Mexico, was in a state of anarchy and civil war. The homicide rate was astronomical, but (as in Bodie and Aurora) it was confined almost exclusively to drunken males upholding their “honor.” Modern big-city crimes such as rape, burglary, and mugging were virtually unknown (Utley 1990). A study of the Texas frontier from 1875 to 1890 found that burglaries and robberies (except for bank, train, and stagecoach

Frontier Violence | 313



robberies) were essentially nonexistent. People did not bother with locking doors, and murder was rare, except for young men shooting each other in “fair fights” they engaged in voluntarily (Holden 1940). John Umbeck’s (1981) investigation of the High Sierra goldfields in the midnineteenth century yielded similar results. After the Gold Rush brought on by Sutter’s Mill in 1848, thousands of prospectors rushed to gold fields in the California mountains. There was no police force. Indeed, there was no law at all regarding property rights, as the military governor of California had just proclaimed the Mexican land law invalid (without offering a replacement). There was intense competitive pressure and greed for gold, and nearly everyone carried firearms. Yet there was hardly any violence. Similarly, when much of the Indian territory of Oklahoma was opened all at once for white settlement, heavily armed settlers rushed in immediately to stake their claims, and the settlers with their guns arrived long before effective law enforcement did. Yet there was almost no violence (Day 1989). In sum, historian W. Eugene Hollon (1974) observes that “the Western frontier was a far more civilized, more peaceful, and safer place than American society is today.” Americans living in the “Wild West,” with its many guns, were far safer than Americans living in many modern cities. In addition, it is clear that on the American frontier throughout the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries, firearms were not only a very important survival tool but also a preeminent symbol of personal and national independence and self-sufficiency. David B. Kopel See also: American Revolution; Civil War and Small Arms; Long Rifle (Pennsylvania/

Kentucky); Native Americans and Gun Violence; Urbanism and Gun Violence; Vigilantism

Further Reading Athearn, Robert G. The Mythic West. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1986. Bellesiles, Michael. Arming America: The Origins of a National Gun Culture. New York: Knopf, 2000. Cramer, Clayton. Armed America: The Remarkable Story of How and Why Guns Became as American as Apple Pie. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2006. Day, Robert. “‘Sooners’ or ‘Goners,’ They Were Hell Bent on Grabbing Free Land.” Smithsonian 20 (1989): 192–203. Dykstra, Robert R. The Cattle Towns: A Social History of the Kansas Cattle Trading Centers. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1983. Frantz, Joe B. “The Frontier Tradition.” In Violence in America: Historical and Comparative Perspectives, edited by Hugh Davis Graham and Ted Robert Gurr, 127–53. New York: Bantam Books, 1969. Holden, William C. “Law and Lawlessness on the Texas Frontier, 1875–1890.” Southwestern History Quarterly 44 (1940): 188–203. Hollon, W. Eugene. Frontier Violence: Another Look. New York: Oxford University Press, 1974. Jancer, Matt. “Gun Control Is as Old as the Old West.” Smithsonian Magazine, February 5, 2018. https://www.smithsonianmag .com/history/gun-control-old-west-18096 8013/ (accessed January 27, 2022). Kennett, Lee, and James LaVerne Anderson. The Gun in America: The Origins of a National Dilemma. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1975. Lindgren, James, and Justin Lee Heather. “Counting Guns in Early America.” William and Mary Law Review 43 (2001): 1777–842. McGrath, Roger D. Gunfighters, Highwaymen, and Vigilantes: Violence on the Frontier.

314 | Frontier Violence Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984. Remini, Robert. The Battle of New Orleans. New York: Viking Press, 1999. Umbeck, John. A Theory of Property Rights: With Application to the California Gold Rush. Ames: Iowa State University Press, 1981.

Utley, Robert M. High Noon in Lincoln: Violence on the Western Frontier. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1990. Wilson, Harry L. Gun Politics in America: Historical and Modern Documents in Context. 2 vols. Santa Barbara, CA: ABCCLIO, 2016.

Guns in American Society

Guns in American Society AN ENCYCLOPEDIA OF HISTORY, POLITICS, CULTURE, AND THE LAW Third Edition Volume 2: G–Q

Jaclyn Schildkraut and Gregg Lee Carter, Editors

Copyright © 2023 by ABC-CLIO, LLC All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Carter, Gregg Lee, 1951- editor. | Schildkraut, Jaclyn, editor. Title: Guns in American society : an encyclopedia of history, politics, culture, and the law / Jaclyn Schildkraut and Gregg Lee Carter, editors. Description: Third edition. | Santa Barbara, California : ABC-CLIO, [2023] | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2022012539 | ISBN 9781440867736 (hardcover ; 3 vol. set) | ISBN 9781440867743 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Gun control—United States—Encyclopedias. | Firearms—Law and legislation—United States—Encyclopedias. | Firearms—Social aspects—United States—Encyclopedias. | Violent crimes—United States—Encyclopedias. | Social movements—United States—Encyclopedias. Classification: LCC HV7436 .G8783 2022 | DDC 363.330973—dc23/eng/20220603 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022012539 ISBN: 978-1-4408-6773-6 (set) 978-1-4408-6775-0 (vol. 1) 978-1-4408-6776-7 (vol. 2) 978-1-4408-6777-4 (vol. 3) 978-1-4408-6774-3 (ebook) 27 26 25 24 23  1 2 3 4 5 This book is also available as an eBook. ABC-CLIO An Imprint of ABC-CLIO, LLC ABC-CLIO, LLC 147 Castilian Drive Santa Barbara, California 93117 www.abc-clio.com This book is printed on acid-free paper Manufactured in the United States of America

Contents

List of Entries, vii Preface, xiii Introduction, xv Chronology, xxi A–Z Entries, 1 Appendix 1: Key Federal Gun Laws, 967 Appendix 2: Key State Gun Laws, 977 Appendix 3: List of Judicial Developments, 993 Appendix 4: Organizations Concerned with the Role of Guns in Contemporary American Society, 1015 About the Editors and Contributors, 1033 Index, 1051

v

List of Entries

Accidents Acoustic Gunshot Detection Technologies Acquisition of Guns African Americans and Gun Violence AK-47 Alcohol and Gun Violence American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) American Bar Association (ABA) American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) American Jewish Congress (AJC) American Medical Association (AMA) American Revolution Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) Ammunition, Regulation of Ammunition, Types of Amnesty Programs Armed Teacher Policies Armor-Piercing Ammunition Arms Trade Treaty Articles of Confederation and Gun Control Assault Weapons Assault Weapons Ban, Renewal Attempts of Assault Weapons Ban of 1994 Association of Firearm and Tool Mark Examiners (AFTE) Aurora Theater Shooting Automatic Weapons Laws Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime Average-Joe Thesis Background Checks Ballistic Identification System

Bartley-Fox Carrying Law Baton Rouge Police Officers Shooting Beard, Michael K. Biden, Joseph, Jr. Black Codes Black Lives Matter Black Market for Firearms Bloomberg, Michael Body Armor Boston Gun Project (BGP) Bowling for Columbine Boxer, Barbara Brady, James S. Brady, Sarah Kemp Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill) Brady Legal Brady: United against Gun Violence Branch Davidians Brown, Michael, Shooting of Brown Bess Browning, John Moses Bullet Button Bulletproof Consumer Products Bump Stocks Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) Bush, George H. W. Bush, George W. Campus Carry Cartridges vii

viii | List of Entries

Castle Doctrine Categories of People Prohibited from Owning Firearms Cease Fire, Inc. Center for Gun Policy and Research Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence (CSPV) Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Charleston Church Shooting Chicago, IL Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws Children’s Defense Fund (CDF) Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA) Civil War and Small Arms Clinton, William J. Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV) Collectors Colleges and Gun Violence Colt, Samuel Columbine High School Shooting Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) Concealed Weapons Laws Congressional Voting Patterns on Gun Control Consumer Product Safety Laws Cook, Philip J. Copycat Shootings CornerShot Guns Crime and Gun Use Crime Prevention Research Center Dallas Police Officers Ambush DC Project Defensive Gun Use (DGU) Democratic Party and Gun Control Demonization of Guns Derringers DeVos, Betsy Dingell, John D. District of Columbia v. Heller Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership (DRGO)

Drive-By Shootings Dueling Dum-Dum Bullet Eddie Eagle Elections and Gun Control Enforcement of Gun Control Laws Ergonomics and Firearms Design Everytown for Gun Safety Extreme Risk Protection Orders Families vs. Assault Rifles Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Federal Firearms Act of 1938 (Public Law No. 75-785) Federalism and Gun Control Federation for NRA Feinstein, Dianne Felons and Gun Control Fifty Caliber Shooters Association, Inc. (FCSA) Firearm Dealers Firearm Sentence Enhancement (FSE) Laws Firearms Industry Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986 Firearms Shooting Accuracy Rates Florida Carry, Inc. Fourteenth Amendment Fourth Amendment Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) Frontier Violence Giffords, Gabrielle Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence Gottlieb, Alan Merril Gun Buyback Programs Gun Clubs Gun Control Gun Control Act of 1968 Gun Control, Attitudes toward Gun Courts Gun Culture Gun Lobby Gun Owners’ Action League (GOAL) Gun Owners of America (GOA)



Gun Owners of California (GOC) Gun Ownership Gun Registration Gun Rights Policy Conference (GRPC) Gun Sales Records Gun Shows Gun Violence Archive (GVA) Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem Gun-Free Business Practices Gun-Free School Laws Gunpowder Guns in the Home Gunshot Detection Technologies (GDTs) Gunshot Wounds (Wound Ballistics) Halbrook, Stephen P. Hammer, Marion P. Handguns Health Care Professionals and Gun Violence Hellfire Trigger Helmke, Paul Hemenway, David A. Henigan, Dennis A. Heston, Charlton High-Capacity Magazine Ban High-Capacity Magazines Hinckley, John Warnock, Jr. Hirsch, Margot Hollow Point Bullet Holocaust Imagery and Gun Control Homicides, Gun The Huey P. Newton Gun Club Hunting Hupp, Suzanna Gratia Hurricane Katrina and Gun Control Ideologies—Conservative and Liberal Immigrants and Guns Independent Firearm Owners Association, Inc. (IFOA) Institute for Legislative Action (ILA) Intelligent Gun Safety Systems International Firearms Laws Iron Pipeline Izaak Walton League of America (IWLA)

List of Entries | ix

Johnson, Lyndon B. Juvenile Gun Courts Kates, Don B., Jr. Kellermann, Arthur L. Kennesaw, Georgia Killeen, Texas, Shooting Kleck, Gary Knox, Neal Kopel, David B. Ku Klux Klan (KKK) LaPierre, Wayne R., Jr. Las Vegas Shooting Lautenberg, Frank R. Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers League of Women Voters and Gun Control Legal Implications of Firearms Characteristics Lethality Effect of Guns Libertarianism and Gun Control Licensing Loaded-Chamber Indicator Loesch, Dana Long Gun Long Island Railroad Shooting Long Rifle (Pennsylvania/Kentucky) Lost and Stolen Firearms Reporting Lott, John R., Jr. Mailing of Firearms Act of 1927 Mail-Order Guns March for Our Lives Movement Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting Martin, Trayvon, Shooting of Mass Murder (Shootings) Massachusetts Gun Law McCarthy, Carolyn McDonald v. City of Chicago McNamara, Robert G. Medicine and Gun Violence Mental Disabilities and Gun Use and Acquisition Metal Detectors Methodologies for Studying Gun Violence Microstamping (Bullet Serial Numbers)

| List of Entries x Miller v. Texas Million Mom March Miniguns Minimum Ages to Purchase and Possess Firearms Modular Weapons System Moms Demand Action More Guns, Less Crime Thesis Motor Vehicle Laws as a Model for Gun Laws NAACP and Gun Control National Association of Firearms Retailers (NAFR) National Board for the Promotion of Rifle Practice (NBPRP) National Center for Injury Prevention and Control (NCIPC) National Council of Churches (NCC) and Gun Control National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) National Firearms Act of 1934 National Instant Criminal Background Check System National Institute of Justice (NIJ) National Rifle Association (NRA) National School Safety Center (NSSC) National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) National Student Safety and Security Conference (NSSSC) National Tracing Center (NTC) National Violent Death Reporting System Native Americans and Gun Violence Needle-in-the-Haystack Problem News Media and Gun Control NICS Improvement Act Obama, Barack Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act One-Gun-per-Month Laws Open Carry Laws Periodicals, Guns Pittsburgh Synagogue Shooting

Plastic Guns Police Shootings Political Victory Fund (PVF) Poverty and Gun Violence Pratt, Larry Preemption Laws Product Liability Lawsuits Project Exile Project Safe Neighborhoods Project Triggerlock Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005 Pulse Nightclub Shooting Racism and Gun Control Reagan, Ronald Wilson Recreational Uses of Guns Regional Gun Violence Research Consortium Remington, Eliphalet, II Republican Party and Gun Control RFID Guns Right to Self-Defense, Philosophical Bases Roberti-Roos Assault Weapons Control Act of 1989 Ruby Ridge Ruger, William Batterman SAFE Act of 2013 Safety Courses San Bernardino Shooting Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting Sandy Hook Promise Saturday Night Specials Sawed-off Shotguns School Marshal and Guardian Programs School Shootings Schumer, Charles E. Second Amendment Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) Self-Defense, Legal Issues Self-Defense, Reasons for Gun Use Semiautomatic Weapons Shooting Ranges SHUSH Act Silencers



Slippery Slope Argument Smart Guns Smith & Wesson (S&W) Smith & Wesson Settlement Agreement Soto et al. v. Bushmaster Firearms International, LLC et al. South (U.S.) and Gun Violence Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers’ Institute (SAAMI) Sporting Purposes Test (SPT) States United to Prevent Gun Violence Stop Handgun Violence (SHV) Student Pledge against Gun Violence Students for Concealed Carry on Campus Substitution Effects Suicide, Guns and Suicide, International Comparisons Sullivan Law Surplus Arms Sutherland Springs Church Shooting Tactical Training Target Shooting Tartaro, Joseph P. Techno-Polymers Tenth Amendment Terrorist Screening Database and Firearms 3D Gun Printing Tommy Gun Toy Guns Trigger Locks Trump, Donald J. Tucson, Arizona, Shooting Uniform Crime Reports (UCR)

List of Entries | xi

United Nations (UN) United States Concealed Carry Association (USCCA) United States Conference of Mayors United States Constitution and Gun Rights Universal Background Checks Urbanism and Gun Violence Victimization from Gun Violence Vigilantism Violence Policy Center (VPC) Violence Prevention Research Program (VPRP) Violent Crime Rate Violent Video Games and Gun Violence Virginia Tech Shooting Waiting Periods Washington, DC Washington, DC, Sniper Attacks Washington Navy Yard Shooting Weapons Instrumentality Effect Winchester, Oliver Fisher Women Against Gun Control (WAGC) Women Against Gun Violence (WAGV) Women and Guns Workplace Shootings Wright, James D. Youth and Guns Youth Crime Gun Interdiction Initiative (YCGII) Youth Gun Control Legislation: The Juvenile Justice Bill of 1999 Zimring, Franklin E. Zip Guns

G Giffords, Gabrielle(1980–)

as an Arizona State Senator. Giffords won reelection in 2004. In December 2005, Giffords resigned from the Arizona Senate in to pursue her next political goal: a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. She won this election with 54 percent of the vote in November 2006, becoming U.S. Representative of Arizona’s Eighth District. Giffords married navy combat veteran, test pilot, and astronaut Mark Kelly in 2007. Giffords won reelection to her congressional seat in the 2008 and 2010 elections, garnering 54 percent and 48.8 percent of the vote, respectively. During her tenure in Congress, Giffords sat on the Armed Services, Foreign Affairs, and Science and Technology committees. Within these committee assignments, Giffords served as a member of the Subcommittees for Tactical Air and Land Forces, Readiness, and Technology and Innovation, and was designated Chair of the Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics. Giffords politically advocated for enhancements in border security, immigration reform, and for the expanded use of renewable energy sources, including solar energy. On January 8, 2011, Giffords was meeting with constituents at a “Congress on Your Corner” event, held at a Tucson grocery store, when she was shot in the head at close range. Six people were killed in the attack, including U.S. District Judge John Roll; Giffords and twelve others were severely injured by gunfire. The assailant, Jared Lee Loughner, fired thirty-three bullets from a loaded Glock 9-mm handgun

Gabrielle “Gabby” Giffords is an American gun control advocate and former congresswoman. Giffords represented Arizona’s Eighth Congressional District (covering the towns of Peoria, Surprise, and suburbs northwest of Phoenix) in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2007 to 2012, when she resigned from U.S. Congress following an assassination attempt. Giffords was born on June 8, 1980, raised in Tucson, Arizona, and attended Scripps College in Claremont, California. At Scripps, she graduated with a B.A. in sociology and Latin American history in 1993. Following graduation, Giffords studied in Chihuahua, Mexico, for the next year before she returned to school at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, earning a master’s degree in regional planning. In 1997, she returned home to Tucson to serve as president and chief executive officer of her family’s tire business, El Campo Tire Warehouses, until 2000, when the company was sold to Goodyear Tire. Although Giffords had previously been registered as a Republican voter, she changed her affiliation to identify as a centrist Democrat prior to starting her career in politics. In 2000, Giffords entered her first political race for a seat in the Arizona House of Representatives. Winning this election, she spent a single term serving in the Arizona State House before running for the state’s Senate in 2002. Giffords won the senate election with 74 percent of the vote to become the youngest woman ever elected 315

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Former Representative Gabrielle Giffords attends a news conference on the Bipartisan Background Checks Act of 2019 on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, on February 26, 2019. Giffords, who was wounded during a mass shooting in Arizona in 2011, has become a leading voice for gun violence prevention efforts. (UPI/Alamy Stock Photo)

before bystanders wrestled him to the ground and restrained him until police arrived. The perpetrator had previously encountered Giffords at a 2007 “Congress on Your Corner” event and had become obsessed with the congresswoman, specifically targeting her in his attack. He was later indicted on forty-nine federal charges for the attack. Following a guilty plea in November 2012, he is currently serving seven life terms plus 140 years in prison, without the possibility of parole. Following the attack, Giffords was in critical condition and was rushed to emergency surgery. Despite the location and severity of her injuries, Giffords made a remarkable recovery over the next several months, regaining her abilities to walk, talk, and participate in day-to-day activities.

Giffords returned to Washington, DC, in August 2011 to vote for a bill to increase the debt ceiling. In November 2011, Giffords and Kelly published the memoir Gabby: A Story of Courage and Hope. Gabrielle Giffords resigned from the 112th Congress on January 25, 2012, citing a need to focus on her ongoing recovery. She was succeeded in the U.S. House of Representatives by her district director, Ron Barber, who had also been injured by gunfire in the 2011 Tucson shooting. On February 10, 2012, President Barack Obama signed Giffords’s final piece of legislation into law, the Ultralight Aircraft Smuggling Prevention Act of 2012. On the second anniversary of the Tucson shooting, shortly following the December 2012 mass shooting at Sandy Hook

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Elementary School, Giffords and husband Mark Kelly cofounded the political action committee and nonprofit organization Americans for Responsible Solutions (ARS). ARS was founded with the goal of reducing gun-related violence in the United States by promoting responsible firearms ownership and advocating for stringent gun control legislation. Since its inception, ARS has been politically involved in researching, writing, and proposing policies for comprehensive background checks on firearms sales and safer gun laws. Through advocacy and lobbying, ARS has endorsed and financially supported state and federal candidates and elected officials promoting enhanced gun control legislation while challenging politicians and lawmakers supported by the gun lobby. ARS merged with the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence in 2016 to form a joint political action committee (PAC) known as Giffords. Current policy measures supported by the Giffords PAC include universal background checks, allocation of federal funding for gun violence research, enhanced regulation of semiautomatic assault weapons, greater restrictions on carrying concealed firearms, implementation of gun violence intervention programs in underserved communities of color, federal child access prevention laws promoting “safe storage” of firearms, legislation prohibiting domestic abusers and stalkers from obtaining firearms, and the continuation of gunfree school zones. In May 2017, Gabrielle Giffords and Mark Kelly published Enough: Our Fight to Keep America Safe from Gun Violence, a book detailing aspects of her path to recovery and her continued advocacy for gun control alongside her husband. In 2017, the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence was established as the 501(c)(3) nonprofit arm of the Giffords

organization. The Giffords Law Center works to provide community education and technical assistance to empower citizens and organizations who seek to make their communities safer from gun violence. This work includes educating communities and government officials on effective and defensible gun control policy and producing research on gun-related legal issues in the interests of enhancing public safety. In 2020, Mark Kelly won an Arizona U.S. Senate seat as a Democrat, narrowly defeating the Republican incumbent, Martha McSally. Beck M. Strah See also: Background Checks; Congressional Voting Patterns on Gun Control; Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence; Tucson, Arizona, Shooting

Further Reading Astor, Maggie. “Why Gabby Giffords Is Starting a Gun Control Group for Gun Owners.” New York Times, April 19, 2019. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/19/us /politics/gabby-giffords-minnesota-guns .html (accessed May 18, 2022). Andrews, Wilson, Bonnie Berkowitz, Alberto Cuadra, Nathaniel Kelso, Laura Stanton, Pamela Tobey, and Karen Yourish. “Giffords Shooting: The Attack and Aftermath. Washington Post, January 20, 2011. http://www .washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/poli tics/giffords-shooting-timeline/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Giffords, Gabrielle, and Mark Kelly. Gabby: A Story of Courage and Hope. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2012. Giffords, Gabrielle, Mark Kelly, and Harry Jaffe. Enough: Our Fight to Keep America Safe from Gun Violence. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2014. James, Frank. “Gabrielle Giffords’ Resignation Message a Reminder of Gains, Losses.” National Public Radio, January 20, 2012.

318 | Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence https://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics /2012/01/22/145608588/gabrielle-giffords -resignation-message-reminds-of-gains -losses (accessed May 18, 2022). Klawonn, A. “What Motivated Giffords Shooter?” Time Magazine, January 9, 2011. http://content.time.com/time/nation/article /0,8599,2041427,00.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Quinn, Ben, and Paul Gallagher. “U.S. Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords Shot as Six Die in Arizona Massacre.” The Guardian, January 8, 2011. https://www.theguardian .com/world/2011/jan/08/gabrielle-giffords -shot-tucson-arizona (accessed May 18, 2022).

Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence The Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence (GLC) is a nonprofit educational organization dedicated to informing communities across the United States about the prevention of gun violence through statistics, reports, and numerous other forms of research and analysis. The GLC tracks all legislation surrounding the Second Amendment at the local, state, and national levels. Numerous lawyers, activists, and researchers work with the center and provide pro bono support for gun control laws and policies. According to the GLC, the center’s mission is to provide accessible and accurate information; produce research, reports, and analyses that educates the public, lawmakers, and the media; present workshops and training; and build coalitions with gun control allies to create model laws that regulate guns.

Background The GLC was originally founded in 1993 after the tragic shooting at the Pettit and

Martin Law Office in downtown San Francisco on July 1 of that same year. The shooter used a semiautomatic weapon to murder eight people and wound six others before turning the gun on himself. After the shocking event, a group of local Bay Area lawyers founded the Legal Community Against Violence (LCAV). Within its first year, the LCAV was able to work with its supporters to successfully advocate on behalf of the 1994 Federal Assault Weapons Ban, which Congress ultimately enacted. Even more important for the LCAV was educating the public regarding California’s higher than national average rates of gun violence. LCAV recognized that issues surrounding gun control during this time period were unfamiliar to citizens, and they therefore designed and spread 2,500 manuals called “Addressing Gun Violence through Local Ordinances,” as a means to challenging gun laws in twenty-eight cities across California (Linden 1997). The interaction with local entities helped the lawyers to provide free legal assistance and launch community gun control campaigns. Local ordinances adopted by city governments through these campaigns barred gun sales in certain areas and neighborhoods and helped LCAV embrace vertical incrementalism as its signature strategy (Goss 2006). By 1999, the impact of the LCAV’s early work in California developed their nationwide approach of extending their work to activists, politicians, and anyone else in need of their assistance. The LCAV launched websites to educate the public on the processes of challenging local and state gun ordinances, continued to offer legal assistance, and published reports concerning gun control. In 2016, LCAV merged with an organization led by former Congresswoman Gabrielle



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Giffords and her husband Mark Kelly, a former navy veteran and retired astronaut, called the Americans for Responsible Solutions (ARS). Former Congresswoman Giffords survived a 2011 assassination attempt and mass shooting in Tucson, Arizona, that killed six people and wounded thirteen constituents. In the wake of the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, less than two years later, Giffords formed ARS as a nonprofit organization and a super PAC. The goal of ARS was to match the gun lobby’s influence and resources by supporting laws that include mandatory background checks for all gun purchases, the regulation of silencer, and the prevention of guns in specific sites. Both the LCAV and ARS then merged to become the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence as one powerful nonprofit organization committed to the reduction of gun violence in the United States.

Missions and Goals The GLC focuses on initiatives that combat gun violence through partnerships with legal professionals, public health officials, law enforcement, politicians, and citizens. There are several approaches that the GLC utilizes to further their goals of reforming gun control. The first centers on educating communities on the nuances that encompass the Second Amendment and gun control. GLC for instance, advocates for a commonsense public safety agenda that includes universal background checks for those purchasing guns. The center also emphasizes the need to close online and interstate loopholes that enable illegal buyers and gun traffickers to purchase firearms. The center is at the forefront of addressing the issue of mass shootings in America through its assistance and support for victims of gun violence and their families. To

this aim, the GLC offers experts to speak at conferences, seminars, workshops, and in political/community events on their gun policy perspectives. Part of their education campaign includes the support for laws that improve mental health reporting, the designated categories on who can own a gun, the conditions for gun sales, owner responsibilities, consumer/child safety, stricter rules on carrying guns in public, and additional regulation of certain gun hardware and types of ammunition. At the forefront of educating the public is the GLC’s media outreach. The GLC website includes thousands of press releases and offers a long list of available experts, attorneys, activists, and organizers ready to engage with the media. In an effort to educate the public, the center tracks laws at different levels of government and provides an extensive summary of firearm laws and policies along with the cost of gun violence for each state. The movement toward gun control reform is backed by the GLC’s findings using various statistics, factsheets, and forms of research. The GLC publishes research and reports on numerous issues regarding gun violence, annual gun law scorecards for every state, annual trend watch reports, toolkits, and brochures. The reports cover numerous topics, including (but not limited to) excessive use of police force, school shootings, illegal gun sales, and suicides using firearms. The information published by GLC also provides both the public and policymakers with information about the disparities between states’ gun laws and their rates of violence, injuries, suicides, and deaths. The GLC also actively works to influence current gun legislation and policies. Experts, activists, and attorneys who partner with the center assist cities and states in challenging weak gun control laws as an

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extension of their broader goal of preventing firearm-related violence. The pro bono partner program involves law firms who volunteer their services, such as assisting with filing amicus briefs in cases across the nation that challenge certain pro-gun interpretations of the Second Amendment. One such example is an amicus brief filed in January 2020 supporting the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Act in Florida after the Parkland shooting. When the act prohibiting anyone under the age of twenty-one from purchasing a firearm was signed into law, the NRA filed a suit claiming that it violated the Second Amendment. Through evidence that combined legal arguments with social, neurological, and biological sciences, the amicus brief demonstrated how the act was in fact protecting public safety rather than violating young citizens’ constitutional right to bear arms. Finally, the GLC collaborates with other gun control organizations to counter the pro-gun lobby. In December 2016, for example, the GLC, Brennan Center for Justice, and the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence joined together to launch the Firearms Accountability Counsel Task Force (FACT), a coalition of organizations to reduce gun violence. FACT is working with pro bono law firms to find ways to hold the gun industry accountable for statements and advertisements that the gun industry uses to mislead the public while proposing potential measures that would prevent and decrease gun violence. FACT, for example, is pursuing litigation that challenges local and state laws that permit firearms in schools, libraries, and shopping centers with arguments that such laws infringe on property owners’ rights and compromise their safety. Through collaboration with other organizations, the contesting of laws and policies

through researchers and lawyers, and numerous educational programs, the GLC is trying to achieve all their stated missions and goals by expanding their struggles against the gun lobby beyond the preceding failures in the congressional realm. These approaches by the GLC are focused on addressing the shortcomings in current gun laws to reduce the impact of gun violence while balancing such efforts with the constitutional rights specified in the Second Amendment. The Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence originated in two horrific events: the mass shootings that wounded six and killed eight members of a San Francisco law firm in 1993 and that of Tucson, which killed six people and wounded thirteen in 2011. Congresswoman Giffords’s survival in the latter was an example of how people can transform a tragic event and work toward activism and social change. In recent years, the center has been successful in its work as the majority of states pass variations of gun safety laws and elected candidates continue to challenge the gun lobby. The GLC is an organization that believes that continuous education on guns and safety will guide Americans toward impartial grounds in the conversation on the Second Amendment that can save lives and prevent further pain, anguish, and despair within communities that continue to suffer from gun violence in the United States. Nabil Ouassini and Haley Doyle See also: Giffords, Gabrielle; Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting; Tucson, Arizona, Shooting

Further Reading Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Amicus Briefs.” n.d. https://lawcenter.gif fords.org/gun-laws/the-second-amendment /amicus-briefs/ (accessed February 28, 2020).

Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Browse Gun Laws.” n.d. https:// lawcenter.giffords.org/browse-gun-laws/ (accessed February 28, 2020). Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “History.” n.d. https://lawcenter.gif fords.org/about/history/ (accessed February 28, 2020). Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Our Mission.” n.d. https://lawcenter.giffords .org/about/mission/ (accessed February 28, 2020). Goss, Kristin A. Disarmed: The Missing Movement for Gun Control in America. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006. Linden, Laura. “Disarming Tactics.” Mother Jones, March 3, 1997. https://www.mother jones.com/politics/1997/03/disarming-tac tics/ (accessed May 18, 2022).

Glock Pistols. See Plastic Guns Gonzalez, X. See March for Our Lives Movement Gottlieb, Alan Merril(1947–) Alan Merril Gottlieb is a prominent gun rights advocate who oversees a substantial network of gun rights organizations, conservative lobbying organizations, publications, and radio stations. Gottlieb himself also makes regular media appearances and has authored numerous books promoting gun rights and a conservative political agenda. Gottlieb’s various enterprises are headquartered in Bellevue, Washington, a somewhat conservative suburb east of Seattle that is also home to Microsoft’s headquarters. Gottlieb’s wife, Julianne Versnel, was the publisher of Women & Guns magazine (which ceased print publication in 2019) and has had key roles with other Gottlieb organizations.

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According to Gottlieb’s own biography, found on numerous websites related to organizations he leads, he was born in Los Angeles in 1947, spent a portion of his childhood in New York City, and lived in Knoxville, Tennessee, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in nuclear engineering from the University of Tennessee. He served in the Army National Guard during the Vietnam War. He also was on the staff of a member of Congress, served as a leader of the Young Americans for Freedom, and was national director of Youth against McGovern in 1972. Gottlieb was an invited, in-person guest at President Trump’s acceptance speech on the south lawn of the White House that was part of the 2020 Republican National Convention. He also supported the Trump reelection campaign as an adviser for Gun Owners for Trump. Gottlieb founded both the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms and the Second Amendment Foundation in the 1970s. He also founded and still leads the Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise, which promotes “wise-use” environmental positions, and the American Political Action Committee (AmeriPAC), which supports politically conservative candidates. Many of these organizations paid Gottlieb a stipend or salary and had substantial contracts with Merril Associates for direct mail and marketing services. Gottlieb and his organizations have owned or co-owned several radio stations in the Pacific Northwest, including KSBN (Spokane, Washington), KITZ (Port Orchard, Washington), KGTK (Port Orchard, Washington), and KBNP (Portland, Oregon, https://kbnp.com/). All are AM stations with a money talk format. According to IRS Form 990s, Gottlieb sold his share of the ownership of KBNP to the Second Amendment Foundation and the Committee for the Right

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to Keep and Bear Arms in 2009. The parent company, KBNP Radio Inc., owns all four stations. Although the stations’ websites used to include advertisements for Gottliebaffiliated organizations, that is no longer the case. Gottlieb served a several-month prison sentence in the mid-1980s for a felony federal income tax evasion conviction; however, he successfully applied to regain his ability to purchase firearms. His acceptance of an all-expenses-paid trip to a 1983 conference in Jamaica sponsored by a conservative organization with ties to the Rev. Sun Myung Moon and the Unification Church was also controversial. In the late 1990s, Gottlieb was criticized by some gun rights supporters for supporting a compromise on child safety locks in an editorial written for Women & Guns; this turned out to the only exception to his anti-regulation political views. In the 2000s, Gottlieb was interviewed regularly on conservative television programs, but he also occasionally appeared on more neutral or liberal news television programs. Gottlieb has authored and coauthored books on gun rights, the environment, and other issues. His books are largely published through his Merril Press but distributed nationwide via Amazon.com and other booksellers. A sample of titles authored or coauthored by Gottlieb include America Fights Back: Armed Self-Defense in a Violent Age (2007); Assault on Weapons: The Campaign to Eliminate Your Guns (2009); Black and Blue: How Obama and the Democrats are Beating Up the Constitution (2010); Good Guys with Guns (2019); Politically Correct Guns (2010); Right to Carry: I Carry a Gun, A Cop Is Too Heavy (2016); She Took a Village: The Unauthorized Biography of Hillary Rodham Clinton (2010), Shooting Blanks: Facts Don’t Matter to the

Gun Ban Crowd (2011), These Dogs Don’t Hunt: The Democrats’ War on Guns (2008); Trashing the Economy: How Runaway Environmentalism Is Wrecking America (2nd ed., 2010); and Alan Gottlieb’s Celebrity Address Book (2001). Merril Press has also published books by several other wellknown gun rights proponents, including David B. Kopel and John Lott. Marcia L. Godwin See also: Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA); Gun Rights Policy Conference (GRPC); Second Amendment Foundation (SAF); Trigger Locks

Further Reading American Political Action Committee. https:// www.ameripac.org/ and https://www.face book.com/AmericanPAC/ (accessed August 29, 2020). Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise. https://www.facebook.com /Center-for -the-Defense-of-Free-Enterprise-42613609 596/ (accessed August 29, 2020). Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms. http://www.ccrkba.org/ (accessed August 29, 2020). Halpin, Jim, and Paul de Armond. “The Merchant of Fear.” Eastside Week, 1994. http:// www.sweetliberty.org/mof.htm (accessed August 29, 2020). Keep and Bear Arms RKBA Webring. “Keep and Bear Arms: Gun Owners Home Page.” http://www.keepandbeararms.com/ (accessed August 29, 2020). Lacitis, Erik. “Bellevue Gun Rights Advocate Becomes Key Player in National Debate.” Seattle Times, November 17, 2013. https:// www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/bellevue -gun-rights-advocate-becomes-key-player-in -national-debate/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Merril Press. https://www.ipgbook.com/merril -press-publisher-MP0075.php (accessed August 29, 2020).

Second Amendment Foundation. https:// www.saf.org/ (accessed August 29, 2020). Utter, Glenn H. Encyclopedia of Gun Control and Gun Rights. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 2000.

Gritz, James “Bo.” See Ruby Ridge Gun Buyback Programs Gun buyback programs—in which local governments encourage residents to turn in firearms using cash payments, gift certificates, or merchandise as incentives— became part of law enforcement efforts in the 1990s to reduce gun violence by removing weapons from circulation. However, although the programs have been politically popular, empirical evidence has failed to demonstrate their effectiveness. The first such program was begun in Baltimore in 1977. During a three-month period, 13,000 guns were collected (Callahan, Rivara, and Koepsell 1994). The programs became widespread in the early 1990s, as local law enforcement agencies began to employ them as part of their strategy to reduce gun violence that was reaching “epidemic” proportions in many urban areas. In a research brief prepared for Congress, Krouse (2000, 15) observed that “gun buy-back programs remove lethal firearms from homes and, therefore, prevent gun violence by removing the possibility that a firearm may fall into the hands of a child (or adult) who may accidentally or intentionally shoot themselves or others. . . . Such programs lend a sense of empowerment to communities seeking to end gun violence.” In 1999, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) established

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a $15 million gun buyback program. The program provided grants to local housing authorities and local police agencies to launch community buyback programs. In announcing the program, President Bill Clinton stated that “every gun turned in through a buyback program means potentially one less tragedy.” In July 2001, President George W. Bush ended the program, declaring them “limited in their effectiveness as a strategy to combat violent and gun-related crimes.” Krouse (2000, 15) also observed that although the programs “usually receive wide acclaim and favorable media coverage, there is little empirical research demonstrating the effectiveness of these programs.” Drawing the same conclusion, Sherman (2000, 3) noted that the program “that is best known to be ineffective is gun buybacks. In three separate, moderately strong scientific evaluations, there was [found to be] no reduction in gun violence following the purchase of large quantities of guns.” Krouse (2000, 15) contended that it is obvious that “persons who are intent on using firearms are unlikely to exchange firearms. If they do exchange a firearm, they may use the money to buy another more lethal firearm.” Callahan, Rivara, and Koepsell (1994, 474), in their evaluation of Seattle’s program, found that 64 percent of sellers had another gun that they did not surrender, and that 3 percent of the sellers reported they would use the money to purchase another gun. Others have suggested that gun buybacks improve public safety if they get guns away from hardened criminals, but that most guns are not turned in by criminals. Kuhn et al. (2002), in their study of Milwaukee’s gun buyback program, found that handguns recovered in buyback programs

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A Los Angeles Police Gun Unit officer drops off rifles traded in by people during an anonymous gun-buyback event in Los Angeles, California, on March 20, 2021. These events allow citizens to turn over firearms to law enforcement without question in exchange for cash or other incentives. (Ringo Chiu/Shutterstock.com)

are not the types most commonly linked to firearm homicides and suicides. Levitt (2004, 174) asserted, “Gun buy-back programs are another form of public policy instituted in the 1990s that is largely ineffective in reducing crime.” Notwithstanding the lack of empirical support for such programs, they continue in many communities throughout the United States. Jeffrey Kraus See also: Amnesty Programs; Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime; Crime and Gun Use; Guns in the Home; More Guns, Less Crime Thesis

Further Reading Callahan, Charles M., Frederick P. Rivara, and Thomas D. Koepsell. “Money for

Guns: Evaluation of the Seattle Gun BuyBack Program.” Public Health Reports 109 (1994): 470–77. Krouse, William (Congressional Research Service). “Gun Control.” Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, Library of Congress, 2000. Kuhn, Evelyn M., C. L. Nie, M. E. O’Brien, R. L. Withers, G. J. Wintemute, and S. W. Hargarten. “Missing the Target: A Comparison of Buyback and Fatality Related Guns.” Injury Prevention 8 (2002): 143–46. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles / PMC1730 8 4 6 / p d f / v 0 0 8p 0 0143.p d f (accessed January 27, 2022). Levitt, Steven D. “Understanding Why Crime Fell in the 1990s: Four Factors That Explain the Decline and Six That Do Not.” Journal of Economic Perspectives 18 (2004): 163–90.

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Plotkin, Martha R., ed. Under Fire: Gun BuyBacks, Exchanges and Amnesty Programs. Washington, DC: Police Executive Research Forum, 1996. Sherman, Lawrence. “Reducing Gun Violence: What Works, What Doesn’t, What’s Promising.” National Institute of Justice Research in Brief. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice, July 1998. http://www.ncjrs .gov/pdffiles/171676.PDF (accessed January 27, 2022). Van Horn, Dwight. “What’s Wrong with Gun Amnesty Programs.” Law Enforcement Alliance of America Newsletter 12 (1992): 2.

Gun Clubs Gun clubs, or organizations of shooters, have probably existed since firearms evolved from hand cannons to more manageable and accurate weapons. The nineteenth century saw the formation of national gun clubs, which were sometimes quasigovernmental entities. The primary force behind this development was the perception that long-range marksmanship had become essential to national defense. The replacement of the smoothbore musket with the rifle as the primary infantry arm made marksmanship important, and since a practical machine gun had yet to be invented, laying down long-range fire required large numbers of men capable of hitting their mark at great ranges. The National Rifle Association of Great Britain was founded in 1860 and given a royal charter in 1890; the National Rifle Association of America was founded in 1871 by retired Union generals. In addition to national organizations, there are numerous state and local gun clubs devoted to shooting or collecting firearms. As of 2019, the National Rifle Association of America had more than 15,000 affiliated

gun clubs and associations. Among the largest of these are the California State Rifle and Pistol Association, the Texas State Rifle Association, Calguns, and the Ohio Gun Collectors’ Association. David T. Hardy See also: Collectors; Gun Culture; Gun Ownership; National Rifle Association (NRA); Shooting Ranges

Further Reading Collier, Kayla. “Gun Clubs, Dealers Sue State Over New Laws.” News & Citizen. April 26, 2018. https://www.stowetoday.com/news _and_citizen/news/local_news/gun-clubs-dea lers-sue-state-over-new-laws/article_99f01 774-4970-11e8-9334-27a78fff87e0.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Flora, Earl. History of the Ohio Gun Collectors Association. Columbus: Ohio Gun Collectors Association, 1987. NRA Explore. “Affiliated Clubs, Ranges and Businesses.” https://explore.nra.org/programs /clubs/ (accessed November 17, 2019).

Gun Control In recent years, gun rights supporters have worked hard, not only to ward off attempts by gun control groups to initiate additional restrictions on firearms but also to eliminate existing legal limitations on the right to possess and carry firearms and to expand the scope of gun rights. Favorable legislative actions and judicial rulings have contributed to significant victories for gun rights advocates over those who support various gun control measures. The National Rifle Association (NRA) and other gun rights organizations have worked to eliminate restrictions on where guns can be carried, such as allowing teachers and administrators to carry firearms in school and permitting church members to carry handguns during services.

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Meanwhile, gun control supporters have tended to argue for more moderate proposals to increase the effectiveness of existing laws and curb illegal gun sales. For instance, they have urged requiring background checks for all gun sales at gun shows and mandating the safe storage of firearms in the home. However, with the troubling frequency of mass shootings, some gun control advocates have supported more extensive policies to limit gun violence, such as confiscating the guns of those judged to be a threat to themselves or others (so-called red flag laws or extreme risk protection orders). In its broadest sense, the term “gun control” refers to any government policies that influence the availability and use of firearms among the general public or distinct subsets of the population—such as minors, convicted felons, and the mentally ill. Such policies can affect behavior involving the manufacture of firearms as well as their sale, ownership, importation, and use. Firearm policies more generally may be intended either to encourage or discourage the ownership and use of firearms and can influence attitudes toward guns in the general population by granting a certain legitimacy to them or by labeling them as suspect products. As Carl Bogus (1998) notes, in the southern colonies prior to the American Revolution (1775–1783), the possession of firearms and the maintenance of militias were considered crucial to internal security and keeping slave populations under control. Although militia members were required to possess firearms, such legal requirements were often unenforced. Many could not afford to buy firearms, and at times, colonial governments attempted to subsidize the purchase of weapons. However, gunsmiths were in short supply, and the era of interchangeable parts and mass production techniques had not yet

begun, so sufficient numbers of firearms were often unavailable. One common perception historians have of firearms at the time of the Revolution is that Americans were superior marksmen, although this claim has been challenged. Christopher Ward (1952) states that colonial Americans had little practice in the use of arms due to infrequent training and difficulty obtaining scarce—and therefore relatively expensive—gunpowder. Contrary to this view of early American gun use, Alexander Rose (2010) claims that militiamen during the Revolution were efficient in the use of technologically unsophisticated but well-kept and effective firearms. Nearly every person who participated in the battles of Lexington/Concord and Bunker Hill, Rose asserts, brought their own weapon with them and demonstrated far greater accuracy than their British opponents. Following the Civil War (1861–1865), with former Union soldiers keeping their firearms and with prices declining due to fewer government contracts, gun ownership in the civilian population became far more widespread. Two Union veterans, William Conant Church and George Wood Wingate, established the NRA as a means of encouraging more systematic training in marksmanship. From the start, the NRA gained government support for its efforts. In 1871, New York State granted a charter to the organization and provided funds so that land on Long Island could be purchased for rifle practice. From the early twentieth century, government officials served on the NRA’s board of directors, and the organization benefited from discount sales of surplus military firearms and ammunition to gun clubs.

Gun Control in the Twentieth Century During the twentieth century, national and state governments attempted to deal with



what were considered the negative consequences of widespread firearm ownership. In 1911, responding to popular reaction against gun violence in New York City, the New York state legislature passed the Sullivan Dangerous Weapons Law, named for Timothy D. “Big Tim” Sullivan, a New York City machine politician who championed the legislation. The law required a license to possess or carry a concealable weapon. In 1934, following an attempted assassination of President-elect Franklin Roosevelt in 1933, and in reaction to the use of certain firearms by notorious criminals, Congress passed the National Firearms Act, the first major piece of firearm-related legislation of the twentieth century. This legislation established a tax on the manufacture, sale, and transfer of sawed-off shotguns and sawed-off rifles, machine guns, and silencers. Those purchasing such weapons were required to submit to a background check conducted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and to acquire approval of such purchases from local law enforcement officers. The weapon then had to be registered. Four years later, in an effort to bolster the 1934 act, Congress approved the Federal Firearms Act, which required that firearm manufacturers, dealers, and importers be licensed and forbade the sale of firearms to known criminals. Congress passed a third piece of major gun control legislation thirty years after the Federal Firearms Act, following the assassinations of President John Kennedy in 1963 and Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968. The Gun Control Act (GCA) of 1968, which President Lyndon Johnson strongly supported, prohibited the purchase and ownership of firearms by certain groups of people, including convicted felons, fugitives, drug addicts, minors, and the mentally ill. The legislation

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banned mail-order sales of guns and ammunition and required serial numbers on all newly manufactured firearms. Another provision banned the importation of so-called Saturday night specials, cheaply made handguns claimed to be the weapons of choice in criminal activity. The law also required federally licensed firearm dealers to keep sales logs, and federal agents were authorized to inspect dealers’ records and inventory of firearms. A fourth piece of gun control legislation, the 1986 Firearms Owners’ Protection Act, was intended to weaken many of the provisions of the Gun Control Act. The chief sponsors of the legislation, Sen. James A. McClure (R-ID) and Rep. Harold L. Volkmer (D-MO), argued that the 1968 act unfairly penalized law-abiding citizens. Among its provisions, the new legislation permitted the resumption of ammunition sales through the mail, eased the recordkeeping regulations for ammunition dealers, and prohibited the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF), the enforcement arm for firearm legislation, from centralizing the records of firearm dealers or establishing a firearm registration system. Despite weakening provisions of the GCA, the legislation also increased restrictions on firearms by prohibiting the future manufacture of machine guns for private sale, banning the importation of barrels for Saturday night specials, and mandating additional penalties for those engaged in drug trafficking who carry firearms. Just as the Gun Control Act led to a reaction from gun rights advocates, resulting in legislation that weakened several of its provisions, the Firearms Owners’ Protection Act spurred attempts to increase restrictions on firearms, particularly the handgun, which many considered the weapon most problematic in the fight against violent

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crime. An assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan in 1981 presented the gun control movement with two valuable new allies. The president’s press secretary, James Brady, who was severely wounded during the assassination attempt, and his wife, Sarah, joined the effort to gain passage of legislation to control the sale and ownership of handguns. Sarah Brady became chairperson of Handgun Control Inc. (HCI) and of HCI’s sister organization, the Center for the Prevention of Handgun Violence (in 2001, the two organizations merged to become the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence). The organizations were leading proponents of what came to be called the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act. After several years of struggle, Congress finally approved the act in November 1993, making it the fifth piece of major gun control legislation of the century. The main provisions of the legislation required a fiveday waiting period, during which gun dealers in states that had not already instituted such checks were required to provide local chief law enforcement officers with the names of people wishing to purchase handguns and mandated that these officers conduct background checks to determine the eligibility of the purchaser to own a handgun. Although the U.S. Supreme Court in Printz v. United States (1997) struck down the mandate that law enforcement officers must run background checks, the five-day waiting period was a temporary measure that came to an end in November 1998 when a computerized National Instant Check System (NICS) went into effect, covering rifle and shotgun, as well as handgun, sales. Both sides of the gun control issue expressed dissatisfaction with the instant check system. Those supporting stronger controls noted that certain crucial records,

such as histories of mental illness, were often not available, whereas gun rights supporters, such as the NRA, feared that the ATF would use the computerized system to develop a comprehensive list of firearm owners that would constitute gun registration. In response to this concern, each fiscal year beginning in 2004, Congress has approved the Tiahrt Amendment (named for Congressman Todd Tiahrt [R-KS], who introduced the rider) to Justice Department appropriations that formalized the George W. Bush administration’s policy of deleting approved NICS background check records within twenty-four hours. Although the NRA has defended this policy, claiming that such records are of no practical use in fighting crime, critics argue that the short retention span makes it more difficult for law enforcement officers to identify falsified NICS applications. In 2007, a student at Virginia Tech, who had been able to purchase firearms legally even though he had been determined to be mentally ill and an imminent danger to himself and others, killed thirty-two students and faculty before committing suicide. Due in part to that incident, Congress approved the NICS Improvement Amendments Act, which included several measures intended to enhance the transmission of federal and state records to the system and to provide funding to states to assist in the automation and sharing of records with the NICS. The legislation also contained provisions for privacy protection and a process for individuals who have been treated for mental illness to regain the right to purchase a firearm. A sixth case of major gun control legislation, the 1994 Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, more commonly known as the Federal Assault Weapons Ban, banned the manufacture, sale, and



possession of nineteen types of semiautomatic assault weapons and other similar firearms. The legislation outlawed the sale of magazines holding more than ten rounds of ammunition, prohibited juveniles from possessing a handgun or handgun ammunition, increased the requirements for firearm dealer licenses, and prohibited those people who were under a restraining order involving threats of domestic violence from possessing firearms. Gun rights groups argued that the legislation arbitrarily banned certain weapons and that its restrictions could be circumvented by modifying particular features of firearms. In 2004, with President George W. Bush offering tepid support for renewal, Congress failed to take action, and the Assault Weapons Ban expired. In 1996, Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) succeeded in attaching an amendment, called the Domestic Violence Offender Gun Ban (also known as the Lautenberg Amendment), to the fiscal 1997 Omnibus Appropriations bill. This amendment was a significant addition to the Brady Law restriction, prohibiting anyone convicted of an act of domestic violence against a spouse or child, whether a felony or a misdemeanor, or anyone currently under a restraining order involving a domestic partner or a child, from purchasing or owning a firearm. The measure proved controversial because critics claimed that many police officers and military personnel could be adversely affected due to misdemeanor convictions that may have occurred years earlier. In addition, a spouse could be prohibited from purchasing a firearm to protect themselves from a violent partner. Some critics also maintained that the legislation amounted to an ex post facto law that increased the penalties for individuals who committed crimes before the law was passed, an argument that the courts rejected.

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Gun Control at the State and Local Levels Governments at the state and local levels instituted various gun control measures. In 1981, the village of Morton Grove, Illinois, gained nationwide attention when local authorities approved an ordinance instituting a general ban on the ownership of firearms. The ordinance was upheld in court at the time (prior to U.S. Supreme Court rulings finding that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to keep and bear arms) and prompted the NRA and other gun rights organizations to lobby state legislatures to pass firearm preemption laws that forbid local governments from enacting more stringent measures than those existing at the state level. The NRA argued that uniform laws within a state would protect gun owners from the uncertainty of many differing local ordinances. More than forty states enacted firearm preemption laws that strictly limited local governments’ authority to regulate firearms. Gun rights interests lobbied state legislatures to pass liberalized carrying concealed weapons (CCW) laws (also referred to as right-to-carry [RTC] laws, a broader term that includes issuing a permit to carry a firearm openly). Such provisions allow individuals to carry loaded, concealed weapons on their person. Spurred on in part by John Lott’s research conclusion (1998; 3rd ed. 2010) that liberalized CCW laws lead to less crime, states with “may-issue” provisions that allow local law enforcement agencies to approve at their discretion applications for CCW licenses were lobbied to pass “shallissue” laws that require officials to issue a license to anyone who applies, provided the person is not disqualified for a specific reason, such as a felony conviction. By the second decade of the twenty-first century, thirty-five states had adopted shall-issue

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CCW laws. Six states—Alaska, Arizona, Kansas, Maine, Vermont, and Wyoming— do not require a permit to carry a concealed weapon, which some gun rights advocates consider models that other states should follow. Nine states—California, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, and Rhode Island—maintain “may issue” concealed carry policies. The enthusiastic push toward more liberal CCW laws notwithstanding, several researchers, including Ian Ayres and John Donohue (2009), have concluded from analyses of available data that CCW laws actually increase rates of aggravated assault. In contrast to concealed carry, forty-five states allow the open carrying of firearms, with varying restrictions, including where and when a firearm can be carried openly. Fifteen states require a permit to carry a weapon openly. Just five states—California, Florida, Illinois, New York, and South Carolina—prohibit open carry. Various retail stores (including Walmart and Starbucks) have wrestled with establishing a policy that either allows or discourages open carry in their stores. Citing Article 4, Section 1, of the U.S. Constitution, which declares that “full faith and credit shall be given in each state to the public acts, records, and judicial proceedings of every other state,” gun rights advocates encourage the establishment of reciprocity agreements among the states, whereby each state will recognize the concealed carry permits of every other state. Several states have passed reciprocity legislation. Texas recognizes the CCW laws of forty-four other states, and Pennsylvania recognizes the provisions of twenty-nine states. New York and California, both of which have “may issue” CCW provisions, do not recognize the CCW statutes of any

other state. In 2009, Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL) and Rep. Rick Boucher (D-VA) introduced a bill, titled the National Rightto-Carry Reciprocity Act, which, if it had been approved, would have required each state to recognize the concealed carry permits of every other state. Opponents of the bill emphasized that states should maintain the right to determine for themselves who is allowed to carry a weapon, openly or concealed, in their jurisdiction. Several municipal governments, including New Orleans, Chicago, Boston, and San Francisco, filed lawsuits against firearm manufacturers and gun dealers to recover medical and legal costs of violent crimes committed with guns. One basis for such suits was the claim that gun manufacturers and dealers oversupplied certain markets where firearm restrictions are minimal, knowing that guns would be purchased and transported to areas having much stricter regulations. Generally, the courts were not sympathetic to the liability claims that municipalities made, and gun manufacturers and gun rights groups countered the lawsuit strategy by lobbying state legislatures and Congress to limit the authority of cities to file such suits. In 2005, Congress passed and President George W. Bush signed the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, which prohibits lawsuits against firearm manufacturers and dealers based on the criminal use of their products. Individuals still may pursue legal action against companies for defective firearms.

Proposals for Additional Gun Control Gun control organizations, such as the Violence Policy Center (VPC) and the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, have backed several proposals to further restrict the ownership and use of firearms. The VPC has supported passage of a Firearms



Safety and Consumer Protection Act that would end the exemption of firearms from federal health and safety regulations. Under such legislation, the treasury secretary would be given the authority to regulate the design, manufacture, and distribution of firearms and ammunition. Manufacturers would be required to test firearms and firearm products to assure that they meet standards set by the Treasury Department. The VPC endorsed an Internet gun trafficking bill that Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY) introduced during the 106th session of Congress (1999–2000). If it had passed, the legislation would have required all gun sales initiated over the Internet to comply with federal and state firearm laws and mandate that the ATF be informed of any website that sells firearms. The organization also supported a complete ban on the manufacture of Saturday night specials, or “junk guns,” and called for additional limitations on the manufacture and purchase of assault weapons. Another VPC-backed measure would allow more efficient monitoring of gun shows by ATF agents, and another would prohibit those younger than eighteen years old from possessing rifles and shotguns in addition to handguns. To keep firearms out of the hands of children and juveniles, gun control advocates in some states have successfully instituted measures making it a crime for an adult to allow youth access to firearms. The Brady Campaign backed legislation that would require locking devices and other technologies to improve gun safety; an increase in the minimum age from eighteen to twenty-one for handgun possession; an expansion of the Brady Act to prevent juveniles convicted of violent crimes from possessing firearms even after they become adults; and a ban on the importation of highcapacity ammunition clips. The so-called gun show loophole became a major issue for

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the Brady Campaign and other gun control organizations, such as Mayors against Illegal Guns (which, in 2013, became Everytown for Gun Safety). They argued that those not licensed as federal firearms dealers should be prohibited from selling firearms at gun shows because such sales do not require a criminal background check. Garen Wintemute (2009), reporting the results of a study of gun shows, points to difficulties with the proposal to prohibit such unlicensed gun show sales. First, regulating sales by unlicensed persons will not solve the problem of undocumented sales because most of those transactions are not made at gun shows, and second, most firearms sold at gun shows that ultimately are used in crimes are sold by licensed dealers. Wintemute suggests that it would be better to prohibit all private sales, an objective that may help to explain why gun rights advocates have been resistant to calls for closing the gun show loophole. Other gun control proposals include a measure that would limit individuals to purchasing one handgun per month to discourage those who are legally qualified to purchase firearms from acquiring a large number of handguns that might be sold to others who are legally prohibited from making such a purchase. These so-called straw purchases were a major focus of Mayors against Illegal Guns, which commissioned an investigation of the illegal gun trade and the role that straw purchases have played in the illegal transfer of firearms. The National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), in cooperation with the ATF, developed a training program for licensed firearm dealers, “Don’t Lie for the Other Guy,” which provides dealers with information and training to prevent illegal sales of firearms. In District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) and McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010),

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the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that laws prohibiting the ownership of firearms (particularly handguns) for self-defense are a violation of an individual’s Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. In Heller, contrary to the position taken by gun control groups that the Second Amendment refers to a collective right of state militias to keep and bear arms, the Court ruled that the Second Amendment protects an individual’s right to own firearms. In the McDonald decision, the court applied, via the Fourteenth Amendment, the Second Amendment protection to state and local governments. However, the court indicated that, similar to the First Amendment protection of free speech, the right to possess firearms is not absolute and therefore may be subject to certain limitations. Following the Heller decision, Paul Helmke, then president of the Brady Campaign, stated that now that the Supreme Court had ruled in favor of an individual right to possess firearms, gun control could cease to be a severely divisive, wedge issue, and gun rights advocates no longer needed to view moderate gun control proposals meant to maintain the public safety as steps on a slippery slope toward more extreme firearm restrictions. However, Helmke’s expectation proved overly optimistic. Gun rights advocates continued to warn their constituencies that any efforts to control the role that firearms play in violent conflict amount to attempts to ban individual gun ownership. Gun rights interests also expressed concern that efforts by the United Nations and several nongovernmental organizations to reach agreements to regulate the international trade in small arms and light weapons amounted to threats to the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. Richard Feldman (2008), a former lobbyist for the now-defunct American

Shooting Sports Council, former regional director for the NRA, and founder and president of the Independent Firearm Owners Association, has commented that such warnings contribute to a major goal of the NRA, which is to raise funds from supporters to maintain the organization’s financial strength. One of the more emotional arguments for greater control of firearms is the number of gun-related accidental deaths that occur each year, especially among children. However, the absolute number of accidental deaths over time has decreased. Due to a corresponding decrease in the violent crime rate since the mid-1990s, legislators may have found proposals for further legislation less compelling than they did in the past. However, a renewed increase in the violent crime rate could result in more intense pressure for additional legislative restrictions on firearms. A long-term trend that may affect the future of gun control policy is the proportion of Americans owning firearms. Although there is disagreement over when a gun culture arose in the United States (Haag 2016), there is little doubt that by the early twentieth century, there was a segment of the American population, including a core of hunters and other sporting enthusiasts, who were committed to firearm ownership and opposed to limitations on what they considered a basic right. However, General Social Survey data indicate that from the early 1970s to 2010, the proportion of households with firearms declined from 49 percent to 32 percent (Smith, Laken, and Son 2015). In 2012, General Social Survey data revealed that among the Baby Boomer generation (those born from 1946 to 1969), 40.2 percent owned firearms, but among those born after 1969, just 22.6 percent owned firearms (reported in Jelen 2016),



thus providing evidence for a decline of the gun culture and possibly a weakening of resistance to additional gun restrictions.

State Legislative Action on Gun Control Although Congress failed to consider additional firearm legislation, especially following mass shootings, such as at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, where a gunman killed seventeen students and staff members in February 2018, state legislatures, especially those with Democratic majorities, began to pass gun control measures, including such provisions as limiting handgun sales to one per month, mandating background checks on all sales and transfers, banning assault weapons, and limiting the size of ammunition magazines. In 2018, more than half of the state legislatures approved a total of sixty-nine gun control provisions. Gun control organizations, including the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence and Everytown for Gun Safety, along with its affiliate Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, lobbied for bills in state legislatures and opposed legislative initiatives to expand gun rights that were backed by the NRA. The direction in which a particular state moves appears to depend on two major factors: the rate of gun violence (especially high-visibility mass shootings) and which political party, Democratic or Republican, has a majority in the state legislature. When a shooting in which several people are killed and wounded—events that, in 2019, occurred on average at least twice per month—those favoring additional gun control measures demand quick action, whereas gun rights advocates caution that the highly emotional climate immediately following the event should not lead to limiting the

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rights of law-abiding citizens, restrictions they claim have no effect on the criminal use of firearms. As far as gun control advocates are concerned, gun rights supporters never seem to conclude that the time is right to consider firearm regulations that show promise of reducing gun-related violence, accidents, and suicides. Although the general trend has been to liberalize restrictions on firearms (for instance, by instituting “shall issue” rather than “may issue” concealed carry statutes or eliminating altogether the requirement to acquire a concealed carry permit, and allowing the open carrying of firearms), some states, including New York, California, and Virginia, have heightened their restrictions on firearms. Following the December 14, 2012, mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, in which a gunman killed twenty elementary school children and six teachers and staff, as well as an incident in Webster, New York, in which a shooter killed two firemen, the New York state legislature, at the urging of Governor Andrew Cuomo, passed the New York Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement (SAFE) Act. The legislation further restricted the sale of so-called assault weapons by defining such weapons as semiautomatic rifles, pistols, and shotguns that possess one or more features of military weapons, such as a bayonet mount, a flash suppressor, or a telescoping stock (previous law specified two such characteristics in defining an assault weapon). Although those who already owned such weapons could keep them, the owners were required to register the guns with the New York State Police. One of the more controversial provisions in the law restricted ammunition magazines to seven rounds, although no such magazines were available. The courts found

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that provision unconstitutional and therefore the limit ultimately became ten rounds in a ten-round magazine. The SAFE Act required health professionals to report to authorities the names of any individuals deemed a danger to themselves and others. Any persons that are reported could have their handgun license rescinded and their firearms seized by law enforcement officers. Some psychiatrists and others involved in the mental health community publicly expressed their apprehension that the reporting mandate could deter potentially dangerous individuals from entering treatment because they might anticipate that their firearms would be confiscated. The U.S. Veterans Health Administration announced that it would not abide by the mandate, citing federal confidentiality requirements. The SAFE Act also established a universal background check system that requires not only federally licensed firearm dealers, but everyone who sells or transfers firearms, to conduct a background check through NICS. Transfers between family members are exempt from the NICS as long as the family member transferring the weapon knows that the recipient is not prohibited from owning a firearm. The act classifies straw purchasing—buying a firearm for someone who would not pass a background check—a felony, which previously was classified as a misdemeanor. The act also mandates a minimum sentence for those using or carrying a firearm in drug trafficking or in the commission of a violent felony. Although a majority of New York residents statewide approved the SAFE Act, support varied according to region, highlighting a cultural divide in the state. Residents in New York City and its surrounding areas strongly supported the new legislation,

but more rural sections of the state raised objections. Various local governments in upstate New York passed resolutions denouncing the law, and state legislators, primarily Republicans, have attempted to repeal the act. In 2019, the California state legislature, with the ardent support of Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom, further restricted firearm ownership in the state. Lawmakers mentioned the 2018 mass shooting in Parkland as a justification for passing the new legislation. Other mass shootings undoubtedly contributed to the California legislature’s passing more restrictive gun control legislation, including those occurring on November 7, 2018, at the Borderline Bar in Thousand Oaks, California, in which twelve people were killed, not including the gunman, and at least ten others were wounded before the gunman killed himself; on July 28, 2019, at the Gilroy Garlic Festival in Gilroy, California, where a gunman killed three people and wounded seventeen others before committing suicide; on August 3, 2019, in which a gunman killed twentythree people and wounded twenty-three others at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas; and on August 4, 2019, in which nine people were killed and seventeen others wounded at a nightclub in Dayton, Ohio. Among the new provisions the California legislature approved is an expansion of the state’s “red flag” law, which permits individuals (including family members as well as an employer, coworker, teacher, or law enforcement officer) to request that the courts impound the guns of persons believed to be a threat to themselves or others. The new measure extends the length of time a gun violence restraining order may remain in effect from one to five years. Those subject to a red flag ruling may file an appeal with a district appellate court



once a year to have the restraining order removed. Another provision decreases the number of guns a person not a licensed firearm dealer may sell each year and how frequently they may engage in a sale. A seller is limited to five sales of a maximum of fifty firearms annually. Other measures include a mandate that firearm packaging include a statement to the purchaser about suicide prevention. Beginning in 2024, the sale of parts used to manufacture a firearm must be conducted through a licensed firearm dealer. The legislature the prohibition on purchasing more than one handgun extended to semiautomatic rifles per month and also prohibited those under twenty-one years of age from purchasing a firearm. Another provision imposes a lifetime gun ownership ban on those who have been patients in a mental health facility more than once in a given year because they were determined to be a danger to themselves or to others. Those subject to the ban may petition for a judicial hearing to demonstrate that they could safely possess a gun. In such hearings, the district attorney would be required to show that there were strong grounds for concluding that those prohibited from owning a gun would use a firearm to harm themselves or others. In March 2020, the Virginia state legislature, with a newly elected Democratic majority in both chambers, approved seven gun control bills. In response to the proposed legislation, in January of that year, an estimated 22,000 people engaged in a protest in the state capital of Richmond against the pending legislation and in support of what they considered the rights of gun owners. Also in response to the legislation, more than one hundred Virginia municipalities declared themselves Second Amendment “sanctuaries.” Lawmakers and sheriffs

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declared that they would not enforce new gun control laws in their jurisdictions. President Donald Trump, in a Twitter message, supported the protestors, stating that the Second Amendment was under attack in Virginia and claiming that Democrats would take away guns. The large demonstration notwithstanding, Virginia legislators proceeded with the proposals. Among the bills that Virginia Democratic Governor Ralph Northam strongly supported and the legislature approved is a universal background check requirement that includes private sales, although personal transfers of firearms, including gifts, are not covered in the provision. Another measure limits individuals to one handgun purchase per month, but that does not apply to those who possess a concealed carry permit. The state legislature also approved a “red flag” law similar to the California measure that calls for an individual’s gun to be seized if that person is judged to pose a danger to themselves or to others. The measure requires the Virginia state police to establish and maintain a computerized Substantial Risk Order Registry to monitor those who are subjects of red flag orders. The state legislature also gave authority to local elected officials to decide whether to prohibit firearms in government buildings and other public places such as parks. Prior to the new legislation, local officials were prohibited from instituting such bans. One gun control bill that would have banned military-style assault weapons failed to receive sufficient support in the Virginia state senate. The measure would have allowed current owners to keep their military-style weapons, but would have prohibited new sales and transfers. This bill was the most controversial proposal in part because lawmakers could not agree on a

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clear definition of an assault weapon. Opponents of the proposed assault weapons ban, employing a version of the “slippery slope” argument, claimed that a ban on a particular class of firearms would lead ultimately to broad confiscation of weapons. The senate judiciary committee decided to table the assault weapons measure until the following year, and Governor Northam announced that the assault weapons ban would be reintroduced in the next legislative session. In addition to lobbying for gun control measures in state legislatures, another tactic that activists have employed is the ballot initiative. In the November 2018 election, Washington State voters approved a measure that included such provisions as expanding background checks, raising the minimum age for purchasing semiautomatic rifles, establishing a waiting period for purchasing a gun, and requiring the safe storage of firearms.

The Future of Gun Control Little action on gun control had occurred at the national level during the first decade and a half of the twenty-first century. In the 2008 and 2012 presidential campaigns, Barack Obama, although supportive of additional gun control measures, did not focus exceptional attention on the issue. During his presidency, usually following a mass shooting, President Obama advocated gun control measures, but each time to no effect, blaming the NRA’s inordinate influence in Congress for the failed attempts. In 2016, neither Hillary Clinton nor Bernie Sanders focused on the issue during the Democratic presidential primary contest, although Clinton did criticize Sanders’s past congressional voting record on gun control. However, gun control became a key issue in the 2020 Democratic Party presidential nomination process. As the nomination contest began in

earnest, several of the early entrants publicly expressed their support for various gun control measures. Following a mass shooting on May 31, 2019, at the Virginia Beach, Virginia, municipal building in which a gunman killed twelve people and wounded four others, several Democratic presidential candidates demanded that Congress enact new gun control legislation. Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey took what many considered a more extreme position on gun control, proposing a national gun license program. Booker’s plan included establishing minimum standards for firearm ownership, fingerprinting gun owners, and requiring an interview with a federal agent before a license would be granted. Rep. Eric Swalwell of California, in his brief run for the Democratic presidential nomination, advocated a mandatory gun buyback program for military-style assault weapons. John Feinblatt, president of Everytown for Gun Safety, refused to support Booker’s proposal, commenting that Everytown recommends only those suggested policies that have been evaluated and found to be effective, and which the general public supports. Matt Bennett, cofounder of the Democratic group Third Way, in concert with Feinblatt’s evaluation, stated that the Booker and Swalwell proposals represented a needless political risk to Democratic electoral prospects. Michael Bloomberg, who had long backed gun control proposals, contributed $30 million to candidates in the 2018 midterm election who endorsed additional restrictions on firearms. In 2019, the Bloomberg-supported groups, Everytown for Gun Safety and Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, planned to send a questionnaire to candidates, asking them about their support for such measures as instituting universal



background checks, regulating assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines, and repealing the 2005 Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act. During his brief run for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, Bloomberg purchased a one-minute ad during the Super Bowl that featured a woman telling about her son who had been shot and killed, and then praising Bloomberg for his strong support of gun control. The ad reportedly cost Bloomberg’s campaign $11 million. Sen. Bernie Sanders, seeking once more the Democratic presidential nomination, came under criticism from other presidential nomination candidates due to his support for the 2005 Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act and his opposition to a bill that would have established a fiveday waiting period for purchasing a handgun. Former vice president Joseph Biden in February 2020 criticized Sanders for voting against the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act in 1993. Biden stated that, as president, he would work to have the 2005 gun manufacturers immunity law repealed. Nonetheless, Sanders announced his support for more extensive background checks and a ban on the sale of military-style assault weapons. He had cosponsored legislation in 2016 and 2017 to repeal the 2005 immunity law. His NRA rating had radically declined in more recent years, and in 2018, he finally received an “F” from the gun rights organization. Any attempt to predict the future of gun control depends on consideration of several factors. Gun rights interests will continue to challenge local, state, and federal firearms legislation based on the Supreme Court– sanctioned interpretation that the Second Amendment protects an individual’s right to keep and bear arms. Though the Second Amendment provides the most emotionally

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based argument against gun regulation, those opposed to restrictions, such as Kates (2005), also argue that law-abiding citizens should not be restricted in their ability to defend themselves against those who use firearms in criminal activity. Gun rights groups claim to be nonpartisan, but Republicans generally are considered more dependable legislative allies than are Democrats, and the Republican Party’s overall agenda undoubtedly coincides more closely with the conservative positions of many gun owners on other issues. Therefore, partisan control of Congress, the presidency, and state legislatures will undoubtedly continue to affect the success of lobbying groups on both sides of the issue. In 2019, the NRA experienced a major setback due to internal strife that threatened the leadership of executive vice president Wayne LaPierre. In April, Oliver North, who had been the organization’s president since September 2018, was forced to resign, and Christopher W. Cox, chief lobbyist for the organization’s Institute for Legislative Action since 2002, departed in June. The NRA’s financial situation became a subject of controversy, and the attorneys general of New York and Washington, DC, called for an investigation of the organization. The NRA became embroiled in a legal battle with Ackerman McQueen, an advertising firm long associated with the organization and which the NRA accused of fraudulent billing. Such difficulties notwithstanding, the NRA remains an extremely influential lobbying group with extensive financial resources and more than five million members, many of whom are likely to maintain uncompromising opposition to gun control proposals.

Intervention Effects The future of gun control may also rest on the results of research that assesses the

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impact—called intervention effects—of government policy. The types of intervention include right-to-carry (RTC) laws, stand-your-ground (SYG) provisions, universal (comprehensive) background checks, permit-to-purchase (PTP) laws, and domestic violence restraining order (DVRO) policies that could be found to either decrease, increase, or have no effect on the level of violent crime. Determining a causal link between a gun policy and an outcome can be extremely challenging. Although researchers are unable to employ rigorous experimental research designs, which would allow for the exclusion of intervening variables other than a gun policy that may affect the level of firearm-related violence, suicide, and accidents, they have used various quasiexperimental methods that involve the statistical control of factors such as growth or decline of the illegal drug trade, general economic conditions, and cultural characteristics, including attitudes toward gun ownership and use. Researchers may either observe conditions in a population before and after policy implementation (called a longitudinal research design) or compare the results of a policy in one population with another population that has not been subject to the policy (a cross-sectional study). Lott’s controversial research concluding that the adoption of less restrictive state concealed carry laws resulted in lower crime rates employed a combination of longitudinal and cross-sectional analysis. Researchers who have analyzed two laws at the national level (the 1994–2004 Assault Weapons Ban and the Brady Act) have concluded that each statute had limited effect on the overall gun-related crime rate (Cook and Ludwig 2013; Koper 2013) and suggest that such factors as incomplete and missing background check records, deficient compliance

and enforcement, and narrowly framed gun laws resulting from political compromise may help to explain limited outcomes. Regarding the Brady Act, researchers also suggest that although the law has prevented thousands of ineligible persons from buying a firearm, people who were eligible at the time of purchase may subsequently have committed a gun-related crime. Institutions such as the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence at the University of Colorado at Boulder, and the Violence Prevention Research Program at the University of California at Davis have engaged in studies to determine the effects of gun laws on violence crime. However, each year since 1996 Congress has included the NRA-supported Dickie Amendment (named for Rep. Jay Dickie [R-AR]) as a rider to appropriations bills that prohibits funding for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that could be used to “advocate or promote gun control.” As a result, the CDC has avoided funding any research having to do with gun violence. In 2018, Congress stated that the amendment does not prevent the CDC from conducting gun violence-related research as long as the Center does not employ appropriated funds to advocate gun control. Nonetheless, any research that might conclude that gun policy measures are effective in reducing gun-related violence may be construed as advocating gun control. If those individuals (for instance, Levitan 2017; Otto 2016) are correct who claim there is a “war on science” involving ideological disagreements on such issues as climate change as well as a more general distrust of scientific findings, valid scientific research results may not lead to policy change on gun control. Glenn H. Utter

See also: Acquisition of Guns; Ammunition, Regulations of; Amnesty Programs; Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Bartley-Fox Carrying Law; Black Codes; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Brady Legal; Brady: United against Gun Violence; Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws; Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV); Concealed Weapons Laws; Congressional Voting Patterns on Gun Control; Consumer Product Safety Laws; Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Democratic Party and Gun Control; District of Columbia v. Heller; Enforcement of Gun Control Laws; Extreme Risk Protection Orders; Federal Firearms Act of 1938 (Public Law No. 75-785); Firearm Sentence Enhancement (FSE) Laws; Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986; Gun Buyback Programs; Gun Control Act of 1968; Gun Control, Attitudes toward; Gun Shows; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Institute for Legislative Action (ILA); International Firearms Laws; Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; Mailing of Firearms Act of 1927; McDonald v. City of Chicago; NAACP and Gun Control; National Firearms Act of 1934; National Instant Criminal Background Check System; National Rifle Association (NRA); NICS Improvement Act; Political Victory Fund (PVF); Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005; Racism and Gun Control; Republican Party and Gun Control; Second Amendment; Smith & Wesson Settlement Agreement; Sullivan Law; United States Constitution and Gun Rights; Universal Background Checks; Waiting Periods; Youth Gun Control Legislation: The Juvenile Justice Bill of 1999

Further Reading Albiges, Marie. “Virginia Lawmakers Passed Most of Northam’s Gun Control Bills. Now What?” Virginia-Pilot, March 8, 2020. https://www.pilotonline.com/government /virginia/vp-nw-gun-bills-pass-virginia-20

Gun Control | 339 200308-zhi65gtd5f hppadnxu2x2rd6ma -story.html (accessed March 15, 2020). Astor, Maggie, and Karl Russell. “After Parkland, a New Surge in State Gun Control Laws.” New York Times, December 14, 2018. https://nytimes.com/interactive/2018/12 /14/us /politics /gun-control-laws.html (accessed March 10, 2020). Ayoob, Massad. The Gun Digest Book of Concealed Carry. Iola, WI: Krause, 2008. Ayres, Ian, and John J. Donohue III. “More Guns, Less Crime Fails Again: The Latest Evidence from 1977–2006.” Econ Journal Watch 6 (2009): 218–38. https://econwatch .org/File+download/248/2009-05-ayresdo nohue.com.pdf?mimetype=pdf (accessed April 10, 2020). Bogus, Carl T. “The Hidden History of the Second Amendment.” University of CaliforniaDavis Law Review 31 (1998): 311–408. Burns, Alexander. “Bloomberg Proposes Sweeping Gun Agenda, Including Federal Licensing.” New York Times, December 5, 2019. http://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/05 /us/politics/michael-bloomberg-gun-control .html (accessed March 12, 2020). Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. “The Limited Impact of the Brady Act: Evaluation and Implications.” In Reducing Gun Violence in America: Informing Policy with Evidence and Analysis, edited by Daniel Webster and Jon S. Vernick, pp. 21–32. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2013. Doherty, Brian. Gun Control on Trial: Inside the Supreme Court Battle over the Second Amendment. Washington, DC: Cato Institute, 2008. Epstein, Reid J. “Issue of Gun Control, Long Hedged, Becomes Platform for Democrats.” New York Times, June 1, 2019, A13. Epstein, Reid J., Maggie Astor, and Danny Hakim. “How Gun Control Groups Are Catching Up to the N.R.A.” New York Times, August 4, 2019. https://www.nytimes .com/2019/08/04/us/politics/gun-control -laws-mass-shootings.html (accessed March 4, 2020).

340 | Gun Control Feldman, Richard. Ricochet: Confessions of a Gun Lobbyist. New York: Wiley, 2008. Haag, Pamela. The Gunning of America: Business and the Making of the American Gun Culture. New York: Basic Books, 2016. Hakim, Danny. “Inside Wayne LaPierre’s Battle for the N.R.A.” New York Times Magazine, December 18, 2019. https:// www.nytimes.com/2019/12/18/magazine /wayne-lapierre-nra-guns.html (accessed February 2, 2020). Henigan, Dennis A. Lethal Logic: Exploding the Myths That Paralyze American Gun Policy. Dulles, VA: Potomac Books, 2009. Jelen, Ted G. “Gun Ownership: Who Owns Guns and Who Does Not?” In Guns and Contemporary Society: The Past, Present, and Future of Firearms and Firearm Policy, edited by Glenn H. Utter, vol. 2, 75–90. Amenia, NY: Grey House, 2016. Johnson, Nicholas J., David B. Kopel, George A. Mocsary, and Michael P. O’Shea. Firearms Law and the Second Amendment. 2nd ed. Alphen aan de Rijn, The Netherlands: Wolters Kluwer, 2017. Kates, Don B. “The Hopelessness of Trying to Disarm the Kinds of People Who Murder.” Bridges 12 (2005): 312–30. Koper, Christopher S. “America’s Experience with the Federal Assault Weapons Ban, 1994–2004: Key Findings and Implications.” In Reducing Gun Violence in America: Informing Policy with Evidence and Analysis, edited by Daniel W. Webster and Jon S. Vernick, 157–71. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2013. Korwin, Alan. Gun Laws of America: Every Federal Gun Law on the Books. 6th ed. Phoenix, AZ: Bloomfield Press, 2009. LaPierre, Wayne. The Global War on Your Guns: Inside the UN Plan to Destroy the Bill of Rights. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2006. Levitan, Dave. Not a Scientist: How Politicians Mistake, Misrepresent, and Utterly Mangle Science. New York: W. W. Norton, 2017.

Lott, John R., Jr. More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws. 3rd ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2010. Mayors against Illegal Guns. “Inside Straw Purchasing: How Criminals Get Guns Illegally.” https://everytownresearch/2015/12 /inside-straw-purchasing-criminals-get -guns-illegally.pdf (accessed April 6, 2020). McGreery, Patrick. “After Mass Shootings, California Sets New Limits on Gun Buyers and Expands Firearm Seizure.” Los Angeles Times, October 11, 2019. https://www .latimes.com/california/story/2019-10-11 /california-approves-gun-control-red-flag -laws (accessed March 26, 2020). Otto, Shawn. The War on Science: Who’s Waging It, Why It Matters, What We Can Do about It. Minneapolis, MN: Milkweed Editions, 2016. Rose, Alexander. “Marksmanship in 1775: Myth or Reality?” American Rifleman (June 2010): 45–47, 70. https://www.americanrifle man.org/articles/2010/6/15/marksmanship -in-1775-myth-or-reality (accessed March 26, 2020). Smith, Tom W., Faith Laken, and Jaesok Son. Gun Ownership in the United States: Measurement Issues and Trends. National Opinion Research Center, University of Chicago, October 2015. https://gss.norc .org/Documents/reports/methodological -reports/MR123%20Gun%20Ownership .pdf (accessed April 2, 2020). Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021. Utter, Glenn H., ed. Guns and Contemporary Society: The Past, Present, and Future of Firearms and Firearm Policy. 3 vols. Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger, 2016. Utter, Glenn H., and Robert J. Spitzer. The Gun Debate: An Encyclopedia of Gun Rights and Gun Control in the United States. 3rd ed. Amenia, NY: Grey House, 2016. Ward, Christopher. The War of the Revolution. New York: Macmillan, 1952.

Wintemute, Garen. “Inside Gun Shows: What Goes on When Everybody Thinks Nobody’s Watching.” Sacramento, CA: Violence Prevention Research Program, 2009. https:// health.ucdavis.edu/vprp/pdf/IGS/IGSexec summweb.pdf (accessed April 12, 2020).

Gun Control Act of 1968 The Gun Control Act (GCA) of 1968 is the foundation for federal gun control laws. Enacted in response to the racial and other unrest of the 1960s, the GCA was the first comprehensive federal gun law. Its most important provisions were sharp restrictions on sales of guns and ammunition across state lines; restrictions on the import of firearms; the “prohibited persons” list of classes of people who are barred from possessing guns; and a point-of-sale system of gun owner registration. Concerns about abusive enforcement of the GCA eventually led Congress to pass, and President Reagan to sign, the Firearms Owners’ Protection Act (FOPA) of 1986, which curtailed some provisions of the GCA while leaving its basic structure intact. Although the GCA was politically important, research does not suggest that it has had a statistically significant impact on U.S. crime rates. In August 1963, Connecticut Democratic senator Thomas Dodd introduced the first version of what would eventually become the Gun Control Act. Connecticut was then the most important state for American gun manufacturing, and American manufacturers had assisted with the drafting of the early versions of the Dodd bill, as they shared Dodd’s objective of excluding lowcost imported guns from the U.S. market. Interest in gun control as a method of crime control rather than a form of

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protectionism surged in 1966, a year of unrest that frightened much of the American public. For six days in May, Vietnam War protests, sometimes violent, rocked college campuses. On June 7, civil rights leader James Meredith was shot and wounded while leading a march for voter registration. In July and August, city after city suffered race riots, as the contagion of rioting that appeared in the 1965 Watts riot in Los Angeles spread nationwide. “Black Power” leaders such as Stokely Carmichael and members of the Black Panthers terrified mainstream America with high-powered rhetoric about violent revolution, as they encouraged Blacks to arm themselves against “Whitey.” Then, on August 1, 1966, a former marine named Charles Whitman, who was then an agricultural student, climbed to the top of a tower at the University of Texas in Austin. Using a high-powered hunting rifle, he murdered fifteen people and wounded thirtyone before being killed by the police. In October, the Senate Judiciary Committee convened gun control hearings. Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-MA), serving his first term, called for a ban on mail-order sales of rifles made to military specifications. Gun control advocates were particularly disturbed by the sale of low-priced foreign rifles; as European governments had been replacing their World War II battle rifles, these outdated rifles were being shipped to the thriving U.S. firearms market. The rifles, mostly bolt-actions, were available at low prices and were said to be the weapon of choice for urban rioters. Whereas Senator Kennedy called for giving the secretary of the treasury the discretion to ban the import of firearms not “recognized as particularly suitable” for sporting purposes, Sen. Roman Hruska (R-NE) rejected this idea. Hruska railed against “the unlikely assumption without

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evidence that substantial markets for imported products are composed of irresponsible or criminal citizens.” Hruska said there was “no justifiable criteria” on which to discriminate among various categories of imported firearms and warned that giving the Treasury Department broad discretion would subject gun owners to the vicissitudes of “domestic politics.” The witnesses who appeared before Congress in 1966 included U.S. attorney general Nicholas Katzenbach, the attorney general of New Jersey, the chief of police of St. Louis, the chief of police of Atlanta, and representatives of the New York City police bureaucracy, the American Bar Association, and the International Association of Chiefs of Police. Senator Kennedy predicted that adoption of his gun control plan would substantially alleviate the problem of juveniles acquiring guns. But no federal gun controls were enacted in 1966, and the next year, the chaos increased. There were more than one hundred riots in the summer of 1967, erupting in cities such as Boston, Chicago, Cincinnati, Hartford, Minneapolis, New Haven, New York, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Tampa, and Washington. The worst riots took place in Detroit and Newark and resulted in seventy-two deaths. Following the Newark riots, the National Guard conducted houseto-house searches for guns in Black neighborhoods there. Sen. Dodd had less time to spend on gun control in the summer of 1967, however, as he unsuccessfully attempted to fight off the Senate’s move to censure him (by a vote of 92–5) for using tax-exempt campaign funds for personal purposes. Long before the “long hot summer” of 1968 began, riots erupted again. Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated by a sniper using a rifle on April 4, and for the

next three days, riots raged in over one hundred cities. Race riots had not been unknown in the United States in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, but the 1965–1968 riots were unprecedented. Never before 1966 had there been so many riots within a few weeks of each other, and never before 1968 had so many riots erupted all at once. The impact of the riots was magnified by television, which brought the riots into every American living room with an immediacy that made events in one city terrifying to the whole nation. Gun sales soared as homeowners and store owners prepared to protect themselves in the event of civil disorder. Violent crime rates had been at historical lows when the 1960s began, but they began to surge in mid-decade, and every year they got worse and worse. On June 5, 1968, a young Palestinian male named Sirhan used a cheap imported handgun to murder presidential candidate and New York senator Robert F. Kennedy. Sirhan was angry with Kennedy’s strong support for Israel. Kennedy had just won the California Democratic primary. Although Vice President Hubert Humphrey (who had not entered a single primary) had an insurmountable lead in delegates for the Democratic nomination, Kennedy’s idealistic supporters had not been deterred. But now another of their heroes had been killed by gunfire. Senator Kennedy’s assassination galvanized anti-gun activists more intensely than any event since the assassination of President McKinley in 1901. Immediately after Kennedy’s assassination, the Emergency Committee for Effective Gun Control was formed, with former astronaut and future senator John Glenn as chairman. Members included the AFL-CIO, the National Council of Churches, New York mayor John



Lindsay, Johnny Carson, Mississippi newspaper editor (and future White House staffer) Hodding Carter III, Joe DiMaggio, Ann Landers, Green Bay Packers coach Vince Lombardi, and Frank Sinatra. Another member was Paxton Quigley, a young woman who eventually changed her mind on the gun issue and wrote two books urging women to arm themselves for self-protection: Armed and Female and Not an Easy Target: Paxton Quigley’s Self-Protection for Women. The committee demanded national gun registration, national gun licensing, a ban on interstate gun sales, and a ban on mailorder sales of long guns. (Handguns had been banned from the U.S. mail since the 1920s but could still be delivered by other carriers, such as UPS.) Many other gun control advocates urged a ban on all small, inexpensive handguns, so-called Saturday night specials (a reference to handgun violence common in poor Black neighborhoods on Saturday nights). On June 24, President Johnson addressed the nation and called for national gun registration. He promised that registration would involve no more inconvenience than dog tags or automobile license plates. “In other countries which have sensible laws, the hunter and the sportsman thrive,” he said, urging hunters and target shooters not to oppose the new restrictions. On June 16, several of the major American long gun manufacturers announced their own gun control plan. A joint statement from Remington, Savage, Olin, Winchester, Mossberg, and Ithaca called for a national ban on mail-order gun sales. (Leading U.S. gun manufacturers had been calling for a mail-order ban since 1958 to restrict competition.) Further, the manufacturers suggested that states that wanted additional controls should enact gun owner

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licensing, like the system that Illinois had created in 1966. Three weeks later, in testimony before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, the gun manufacturers demanded that every state adopt the manufacturers’ Model Firearms Owner’s License Bill. States that did not, the manufacturers said, should be forced to do so by Congress. The National Rifle Association (NRA), however, continued to oppose any new federal gun controls and said that if gun owner licensing were to be done at all, it should be undertaken by the states, not the federal government. On August 20, the Soviet Union invaded Czechoslovakia, crushing the “Prague Spring” of liberalization that had been progressing under Czech president Alexander Dubcek. Czech students protested and even rioted, but their efforts were futile against Warsaw Pact tanks and soldiers. Some Second Amendment advocates argued that Czechoslovakia demonstrated the dangers of disarmament. Yet, although it was not uncommon for gun control to be described as “a Communist plot,” gun control opponents were much more reticent in the 1960s than they became later about defending firearm ownership on grounds of personal safety; in 1968, gun advocates tended to focus on the merits of the sporting uses of guns. Riots broke out in Chicago the next week when the Democratic convention assembled to nominate Hubert Humphrey. Plans for peaceful protests against the Vietnam War were hijacked by the successful efforts of Yippies and the “Chicago Seven” to promote a riot. The Chicago police, under the command of Mayor Richard Daley, responded with what the National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence later called “a police riot,” breaking heads and engaging in indiscriminate

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violence against rioters, innocent bystanders, and even the media. In Washington, negotiations continued on the gun control bills. Finally, Sen. Dodd and other congressional backers of President Johnson’s plan arrived at a compromise with the NRA, leading to the Gun Control Act of 1968. The NRA had fought the GCA at every step of the way, but before the final vote, a compromise was reached. The NRA, while not supporting final passage of the GCA, would not score it as an anti-gun vote. There would be no federal licensing of gun owners. Gun and ammunition sales would be registered, but only by the dealer, not the government. (Registration is done via the 4473 form that the purchaser fills out in gun stores.) Mail-order and interstate gun and ammunition sales were outlawed, except that states could enact laws allowing their citizens to buy long guns in adjacent states. Ever since the Federal Firearms Act (FFA) of 1938, persons in the business of selling firearms had been required to possess a federal firearms license, or FFL (Federal Firearms Act, Public Law no. 75–785, 52 Stat. 1250, 1938). The GCA broadened the scope of sellers needing an FFL and imposed various restrictions on FFLs. The FFA had prohibited interstate gun sales to persons with certain types of convictions, but had not applied to in-state sales or to gun possession. A “prohibited persons” list was established, banning gun possession by anyone with any type of felony conviction (except for a few business regulation crimes), no matter how distant or nonviolent, alcoholics, drug users, “mental defectives,” fugitives, persons dishonorably discharged from the military, and persons who renounced their citizenship. In the 1990s, the list was expanded to include people with

any domestic violence misdemeanor conviction and persons subject to domestic violence restraining orders. The ban on sales, but not possession, was also applied to persons under indictment. In contrast to the laws of many states, the federal prohibited persons list is permanent and retroactive. Interstate pistol sales were banned. Interstate long gun sales were also banned, except when contiguous states enacted laws authorizing such sales. Mail-order gun sales were shut down, too, as were interstate ammunition sales. People possessing FFLs (including gun manufacturers and wholesalers) were still allowed to sell across state lines to each other and to use the mails. A new class of FFL was created for gun collectors, allowing them to engage in interstate and mail-order transactions for “curios and relics,” but requiring them to submit to various registration and paperwork requirements. FFL sales of handguns were banned to persons under twenty-one, as were long gun sales to persons under eighteen. In addition, the secretary of the treasury was given the authority to ban the import of any gun not “particularly suitable for or readily adaptable to” sporting purposes. Imports of foreign military surplus were prohibited. This last measure was pleasing to American gun manufacturers, who were tired of losing sales to foreign imports sold at bargain-basement prices. (The surplus ban was later modified to allow curios and relics.) The controls aimed at inexpensive guns led liberal writer Robert Sherrill (1973) to describe the GCA as race control masquerading as gun control. Most of the Gun Control Act is found at 18 U.S. Code in sections 921–929, and it remains the main federal gun law. New federal gun laws (e.g., the Brady Act) are usually codified as amendments to the GCA statutes.



The GCA also amended a separate federal law, the National Firearms Act (NFA) of 1934. The NFA (U.S. Code, volume 26, section 5801 et seq.) had imposed a taxation and registration system on machine guns, short shotguns, short rifles, and silencers. The GCA amended the NFA by creating a new category of highly restricted weapons called “destructive devices” (e.g., mortars and grenades). Earlier in 1968, in Haynes v. United States (390 U.S. 85 [1968]), the Supreme Court had ruled part of the National Firearms Act unconstitutional because a particular registration requirement (applying to persons who had acquired the gun illegally, without paying the necessary federal tax) could force a person to incriminate himself in violation of the Fifth Amendment. Congress revised the NFA to make technical changes to the registration mandate, thus complying with the court’s decision. President Johnson picked up conservative votes for the GCA by agreeing to legislation authorizing federal wiretapping, which he had previously opposed. The GCA was signed into law by Johnson on October 22. (The statutes that are now called the Gun Control Act were actually combined from two different bills. One bill was called the Gun Control Act and the other was called the Omnibus Safe Streets and Crime Control Act, which also had wiretap provisions. Title II of the bill called the Gun Control Act was actually the new version of the National Firearms Act.) Among the Texas delegation, the only “yes” vote came from a young representative named George Herbert Walker Bush III, who said the GCA was good but that much more needed to be done. In the 1970 Texas Senate race, Democratic candidate Lloyd Bentsen used Bush’s vote against him and won the election. In Maryland,

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Democratic senator Millard Tydings made a campaign issue out of his strong support for gun control and wiretapping. He lost the election and thereby frightened many congressmen away from gun control for years to come. Likewise, Connecticut senator Thomas Dodd, chief sponsor of the GCA, was defeated by Republican Lowell Weicker, who ran on a pro-gun platform. The GCA led to the creation of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF)— upgraded from its previous status as a division—within the Department of the Treasury. The Treasury Department rather than the Justice Department had always had primary authority for enforcement of federal gun laws since the 1934 and 1938 federal laws were enacted under Congress’s taxation power. The idea that Congress could use its power “to regulate commerce . . . among the several states” to create laws regarding the possession or sale of guns within a single state would have been considered ludicrous before the 1960s. (In 2002, the ATF was renamed the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, and was moved to the Department of Justice.) As with previous federal gun laws, the GCA was part of a self-reinforcing cycle of the expansion of federal power. The National Firearms Act of 1934 (which used the tax power to control machine guns) was patterned after the Narcotic Drug Act of 1914 (which used the tax power to control opiates), and the NFA in turn set the stage for the Marihuana Tax Act (which used the tax power to control marijuana). The GCA of 1968 (which used the interstate commerce power to control noninterstate firearm sales and possession) would not have been possible without the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (which used the interstate commerce power to control in-state racial

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discrimination). The GCA, in turn, set the stage for vastly expanded federal drug laws and other criminal laws over the following decades. Many years after resigning the presidency, Richard Nixon revealed that he considered guns an “abomination.” The Nixon administration was the first to implement the GCA, and enforcement often appeared consistent with Nixon’s view of guns. Firearm dealers and owners complained that ATF enforcement of the GCA was often lawless and abusive. They alleged that sometimes when gun dealers called ATF for advice about how to comply with the new federal laws, ATF agents would get the caller’s name, give him misleading advice, and then arrest him for breaking the law. Allegations of illegal forfeitures, harassment, entrapment, due-process violations, and search-and-seizure abuse were common. With the NRA and other gun rights organizations demanding reform, Congress began to hold hearings. In a 1982 report, the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on the Constitution unanimously concluded that the 1968 Gun Control Act facilitated ATF “conduct which borders on the criminal. . . . Enforcement tactics made possible by current firearm laws are constitutionally, legally and practically reprehensible. . . . Approximately seventy-five percent of BATF gun prosecutions were aimed at ordinary citizens who had neither criminal intent nor knowledge, but were enticed by agents into unknowing technical violations” (U.S. Congress 1982, 20–23). The first version of what would become the Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986 was introduced in Congress in 1979 under the title the Federal Firearms Reform Act of 1979. As a candidate for president, Ronald Reagan endorsed the proposal. But when Reagan took office, his advisers told

the NRA that the economy was the top priority and that gun law reform would have to wait. Although candidate Reagan had endorsed the FOPA without reservation, the Reagan Treasury Department, strongly influenced by career ATF employees, began to insist on major revisions. The NRA leadership was divided about what to do. Eventually, NRA Institute for Legislative Action head Neal Knox was ousted because of Knox’s continued objections to compromising with the White House. In Congress, the FOPA—also known as “McClure-Volkmer” for its chief sponsors, Sen. James McClure (R-ID) and Rep. Harold Volkmer (D-MO)—was building momentum. Senate Majority Leader Howard Baker (R-TN) had refused to bring the FOPA to the floor, but in the 1985 Congress, Robert Dole (R-KS) became majority leader, and the FOPA was brought to a vote. A modified version of the FOPA that was acceptable to the White House passed the Senate 79–15 in 1985. The bill then went to the House of Representatives, where House Judiciary chairman Peter Rodino (D-NJ), a strong gun control advocate, pronounced it “dead on arrival” and refused to schedule hearings. Rep. Harold Volkmer began to circulate a “discharge petition” to bring the bill directly to the floor of the House. When it became clear that Volkmer would obtain the necessary 218 signatures (out of 435 representatives), floor debate was scheduled. As in the Senate, the NRA prevailed in the House on most recorded votes on amendments. But Rep. William Hughes (D-NJ) offered an amendment to ban the sale of any machine gun manufactured after the FOPA’s enactment to any person who was not a government employee. The presiding officer called for a voice vote, pronounced that the “ayes” had it, and refused



requests to allow a recorded vote, although opponents insisted that there had been more “no” votes. The NRA decided to accept the FOPA, even with the machine gun amendment, rather than send the bill to a conference committee where House leadership would likely kill it. The FOPA was signed into law by President Reagan on May 19, 1986. The first provision in the FOPA declared Congress’s belief that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual the right to arms. The bulk of the act made technical changes to the GCA. The FOPA prohibited forfeitures on charges for which a defendant had been acquitted; prohibited punishment of unintentional violations of the GCA (by requiring that the government prove that the violation was willful or knowing); clarified what was meant by the GCA requirement that FFLs were necessary for persons “engaged in the business”; allowed people with FFLs to sell guns away from their principal place of business as long as they complied with all relevant laws (thus allowing FFL holders to sell guns at gun shows); reclassified certain paperwork violations as misdemeanors; limited ATF inspections of gun dealers to one per dealer per year (while still allowing unlimited inspections in the case of a criminal investigation); required the ATF to process FFL applications in a timely manner and not to deny the application without good cause; imposed controls on ATF license revocations; provided for the award of attorney’s fees against the ATF if the court found that the case was abusive; prohibited the ATF from creating a national gun registry; removed federal restrictions on interstate ammunition sales; relegalized interstate long gun sales (if the seller was an FFL holder and the sale was legal in both states); and broadened the scope of firearms that could be imported (Firearms Owners’

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Protection Act, Public Law no. 99–308, 100 Stat. 449, 1986). Because of problems experienced by travelers moving through jurisdictions with highly restrictive gun laws (e.g., hunters driving to upper New England via Massachusetts or New York City), the FOPA exempted interstate travelers from local gun law enforcement if the travel was for sporting gun use and the gun was unloaded and locked in a trunk or similar compartment. The FOPA also modified the National Firearms Act to bring some machine gun parts within the definition of a machine gun. The GCA had created a mandatory sentence for use of a gun in a federal crime of violence. The FOPA extended this to include drug trafficking crimes and added a thirtyyear sentence for use of a machine gun or silencer. As the “war on drugs” developed, these mandatory sentences were used for a far broader range of cases than had been anticipated, including that of the Branch Davidians (one such example was Muscarello v. United States). The FOPA did not end the debate about proper federal implementation of the GCA. The ATF’s regulation writing under the GCA and FOPA, as well as enforcement of the two acts, remain objects of great controversy, with allegations that the ATF is implementing the statute too stringently or too loosely. The NRA has continued to push for further changes in the GCA to prevent what it sees as continuing ATF abuses. The GCA and FOPA have been politically important, and of course they have been momentous to some persons directly affected by the acts. But their effect on U.S. crime rates is not clear. During the Carter administration, Professors James D. Wright, Peter Rossi, and Kathleen Daly (1983) were commissioned to produce a comprehensive report on all prior gun control research.

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Their report was unable to find any statistically significant impact of the GCA on crime, even on interstate criminal acquisition of guns, which had been a major target of the GCA. Subsequent research has not seriously challenged this conclusion. Today, gun control advocates denounce the GCA as insufficiently strict, whereas gun rights advocates argue that the GCA proves that gun control does not work. Not many people claim that the GCA was a success—other than at laying the foundation for future gun control laws. David B. Kopel

Waxman, Olivia B. “How the Gun Control Act of 1968 Changed America’s Approach to Firearms—And What People Get Wrong about That History.” Time.com, October 30, 2018. https://time.com/5429002/gun -control-act-history-1968/ (accessed January 27, 2022). Winkler, Adam. Gunfight: The Battle Over the Right to Bear Arms in America. New York: W. W. Norton, 2011. Wright, James D., Peter Rossi, and Kathleen Daly. Under the Gun: Weapons, Crime, and Violence in America. New York: Aldine, 1983.

See also: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF); Federal Firearms Act of 1938 (Public Law No. 75-785); Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986; Gun Control; National Firearms Act of 1934; Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act; Saturday Night Specials

Gun Control, Attitudes toward

Further Reading Batey, Robert. “Techniques of Strict Construction: The Supreme Court and the Gun Control Act of 1968.” Boston University Law Review 13 (1986): 123–56. Halbrook, Stephen P. Firearms Law Deskbook. [Annual]. Minneapolis, MN: Thomson West, 2021–22. Hardy, David T. “The Firearms Owners’ Protection Act: A Historical and Legal Perspective.” Cumberland Law Review 17 (1986): 585–682. Sherrill, Robert. The Saturday Night Special. New York: Charterhouse, 1973. U.S. Congress. Senate. Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee on the Constitution. The Right to Keep and Bear Arms. Senate Document 2807. 97th Cong., 2nd sess. February 1982. Vizzard, William J. “The Gun Control Act of 1968.” St. Louis University Public Law Review 18 (1999): 79–97.

Public opinion is a summary measure or description of the political attitudes of a group of people on some public issue. The ability to understand or even describe public opinion on an issue is closely tied to how one defines the issue and measures the individual opinions surrounding it. It is true that many specific control proposals (e.g., universal background checks, assault weapons ban, red flag laws) are supported by a clear majority of Americans. However, the issue of gun control is much broader than any of these specific measures, covering everything from universal bans on all civilian ownership of firearms (which is strongly opposed by a large majority of Americans) to background checks before purchase (which is strongly supported). Broader questions such as, “Is it more important to protect the right of Americans to own guns, or to control gun ownership?” reveal an almost even split in public preferences. Added to this are complications arising from the intensity with which individuals hold an opinion and the salience of the issue in question. One person, when asked, might evince support for criminal background



checks but may not feel especially strong about it. Another might feel an almost religious fervor on the topic. For some, the issue of gun control hardly registers, while for others it is a topic worthy of daily thought, discussion, and action. Intensity and salience are also related to the stability of individual opinion, which in turn shapes the stability of public opinion. Most research has indicated that, for the majority of Americans, opinions on guns and gun control are not very intensely held, nor is the issue itself usually salient. Opinion also tends to be relatively stable over time. This means that compelling events of the day, especially such high-profile national events as attempts at assassinating public officials or mass shootings, often produce only temporary shifts in public opinion. In recent years, those events, such as the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in 2012 and the Las Vegas shooting in 2017, resulted in short-term increases in support for stricter laws, but few serious attempts to strengthen gun laws. The Parkland, Florida, school shooting in 2018 may have been a turning point for both opinion and lawmaking, as public support for stricter laws increased but states moved in different directions, with some making laws more restrictive and others loosening restrictions. Elected officials, especially members of the legislature, are an important audience for public opinion and are keenly aware of its ebbs and flows and the many nuances with which it is expressed. For a legislator, ever attuned to how an action will affect chances for success in an upcoming election, the question is not just how many people support a given policy but also how likely a person is to base actions (votes, campaign contributions, etc.) upon that issue. Opinions that lack intensity, that are related to less salient issues, or that are

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likely to change in the near term are given less weight. To put it another way, an intense, well-organized minority will often overcome a marginally interested, easily distracted majority. Whether that represents “correct” policy making is debatable. Both opinion and policy have become more partisan in recent years as the nation has become much more polarized on a variety of political issues. The previous tendencies of Democrats, both rank-and-file and elites, to favor stricter gun laws while Republicans favored gun rights are now litmus tests for both parties. It is difficult to summarize the existing public opinion data on gun control without overgeneralizing. However, some general patterns and statements are appropriate. First, there is widespread support for many specific proposals to regulate access to firearms, and majorities of Americans have expressed that support for several decades. In question after question involving specific policies ranging from registration and permits, to waiting periods, to limits on the number of guns that might be purchased, support levels usually hover near 75 percent and sometimes higher. Outright bans on guns of various types are among the least favored types of control measures. However, even gun bans, if they are targeted at very specific types of firearms, may be supported by a majority. The type of firearm bans that are most often proposed target so-called assault weapons. Difficult to define, the term assault weapon itself has a negative connotation. Bans of other firearms are much less popular. Among the most palatable forms of controls are background checks, waiting periods, and restrictions on classes of persons (such as convicted criminals and those with mental health issues) who may not purchase firearms. Support for measures of these

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types often approaches or may even exceed 90 percent. For many years, the Gallup Poll has traced significant trends favoring gun rights. In response to the generic question, “In general, do you feel that the laws covering the sale of firearms should be made more strict, less strict, or kept as they are now?,” Gallup has found that those favoring more strict laws has declined from 78 percent in 1990 to 43 percent in 2011, but then rose again to 64 percent in 2019. Conversely, Gallup and others have found that the public is more likely to blame mental health issues than lax gun laws for mass shootings. Despite majorities that support various restrictions on guns, the efficacy of such laws is questioned by many who support them. Several surveys have found that that less than a majority of respondents think that stricter gun control measures would reduce violent crime, accidental shootings, or suicides. As mentioned above, gun control has become a more partisan issue in the twentyfirst century. The primary fault line in public opinion on guns has been urban/rural, but that distinction has also come to largely define the two major political parties. Opinion also features regional differences, a gender gap, and a smaller race gap. The largest differences, however, are seen when comparing the attitudes of those who own guns (or were raised in a gun-owning household) with those who do not. In the case of guns, the saying “familiarity breeds contempt” is turned on its head. Familiarity breeds acceptance. Overall, the evidence of opinion of gun control is largely split. While majorities favor many specific gun control proposals, majorities also think those measures will not be effective in reducing violent crime,

accidents, or suicides. Meanwhile, support for the general concept of stricter gun laws is not as strong, although some polls have found recent increases in support. David Russell Harding and Harry L. Wilson See also: Congressional Voting Patterns on Gun Control; Gun Control; Ideologies— Conservative and Liberal; Las Vegas Shooting; Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting; Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting; Virginia Tech Shooting

Further Reading Cohn, Nate, and Margot Sanger-Katz. “On Guns, Public Opinion and Public Policy Often Diverge.” New York Times, August 10, 2019. Gallup. “Guns.” https://news.gallup.com/ poll/1645/Guns.aspx (accessed May 13, 2020). Montanaro, Domenico. “Poll: A Year after Parkland, Urgency for New Gun Restrictions Declines.” NPR, February 14, 2019. https://www.npr.org/2019/02/14/694223 232/poll-a-year-after-parkland-urgency -for-new-gun-restrictions-declines (accessed May 13, 2020). Schaeffer, Katherine. “Share of Americans Who Favor Stricter Gun Laws Has Increased since 2017.” Pew Research Center, October 16, 2019. https://www.pewre search.org/fact-tank/2019/10/16/share -of-americans-who-favor-stricter-gun-laws -has-increased-since-2017/ (accessed May 13, 2020). Wilson, Harry L. “Review of Roanoke College Poll Results Related to Gun Control.” Roanoke College, July 9, 2019. https://www .roanoke.edu /about/news /rc_poll_gun _control_review (accessed May 13, 2020). Wilson, Harry L. The Triumph of the Gun Rights Argument: Why the Gun Control Debate Is Over. Santa Clara, CA: Praeger, 2015.

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Gun Courts The gun court began to appear in the early 1990s as an offshoot of the Project Triggerlock program administered by the U.S. Department of Justice to combat rising gun violence-related offenses. Adult-oriented gun courts are aimed at reducing the number of firearm offenses by removing violent offenders from society through the deterrent effect of speeding up case disposition and the imposition of severe mandatory sentences. By diverting gun-related offenses to a specialized court, these cases are less likely to be plea-bargained down into lesser offenses by overburdened judges who wish to avoid a time-consuming jury trial. The first of these courts appeared in 1994 in Providence, Rhode Island, and other communities followed suit when it was shown that the case disposition times fell dramatically and the conviction rates soared. There are now gun courts in Birmingham, Detroit, Indianapolis, Minneapolis, New York City, Philadelphia, Seattle, and Washington, D.C. (Carter 2017). Conversely, juvenile gun court programs are one variety of problem-solving courts focusing on education and supervision for youths who have committed nonviolent gun offenses that did not result in physical injury. The rationale behind these courts is early intervention to deter future conduct involving weapons. Similar in structure to the youth drug court program, the juvenile gun court relies on several methods: early intervention; a short-term intensive program; an educational component; and the cooperative involvement of court personnel, law enforcement, and community partners. These courts do not operate as a separate system, but are usually incorporated into the existing juvenile justice system. However, the difference

is that the judges stay involved with the case even through the post-adjudication process (Carter 2017; OJJDP Model Programs Guide 2011). One highly successful juvenile offender program in Jefferson County, Alabama, is a good example of the problem-solving approach taken by gun courts. First-time gun offenders are eligible for the program, while those with multiple or more serious offenses are referred to adult courts or the normal juvenile justice system. Gun court participants must complete a twenty-eight-day boot camp, a substance abuse program, and community service. It further includes a parent education program and intensive post-adjudication supervision of the offender. The Justice Department notes that although there are few studies analyzing the effectiveness of the juvenile gun court programs, one study conducted by the University of Alabama at Birmingham found that the Jefferson County Drug Court program had a significantly lower rate of recidivism—17 percent—than the other two comparison groups of youthful gun offenders—37 and 40 percent (OJJDP Model Programs Guide 2011). Robert H. Wood See also: Project Triggerlock

Further Reading Carter, Gregg Lee. Gun Control in the United States: A Reference Handbook. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2017. Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. OJJDP Model Programs Guide, Gun Courts. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2011. Yablon, Alex. “The Case for Gun Courts.” The Trace, September 24, 2015. https:// www.thetrace.org/2015/09/gun-courts -drug-courts-rochester-shooting/ (accessed May 18, 2022).

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Gun Culture The American gun culture is a seemingly unified aggregation of individuals—mainly white, small-town males—who evidence a long-standing personal attachment to guns, gun ownership, and gun habits, including the use of firearms for hunting and sporting purposes. The culture has existed since colonial times. There is considerable and growing diversity among firearms owners and numerous subcultures within the greater gun culture, but is it frequently asserted that hard-core gun culture adherents are often oriented to single-issue thinking about guns and gun ownership issues. The gun has played an important role in U.S. history and continues to play a defining role in shaping the nation’s values and politics. Yet the gun culture is not defined by the mere fact of firearm ownership per se but rather by participation in or identification with a number of distinct gun subcultures. Guns have been part of the American mythos from the very start. Many historical accounts stress the primacy of guns in defending colonial homes from Native Americans, wild animals, and foreign armies. The notion of the militia, the citizensoldier, successfully and repeatedly rising to the occasion to defend hearth and home from “the other,” although sometimes challenged, is a deeply cherished and highly emotionalized aspect of the American historical imagination. As in the 1800s, in the present highly politicized self-appointed “militias” have come into being on both sides of the political spectrum. Their degrees of commitment and organization are, however, questionable. However, recent scholarship questions the efficacy of American militias, in particular their preparedness and the quality and quantity of their arsenals. Local militias

were poorly disciplined and insufficiently armed to be of much use. George Washington’s jaundiced view of militias is obvious: “To place any dependence upon Militia is assuredly resting upon a broken staff. . . . [They] come in, you cannot tell how; [they] go, you cannot tell when; and [they] act, you cannot tell where” (Spitzer 1999, 30). But the myth born at the battles of Lexington and Concord (they were actually defeats, though the British withdrawal to Boston turned into a rout) is indeed potent and pervasive. Reinforced by World War II movies that emphasized the diversity and commonality of foot soldiers—all pulling together to defeat the fascist foe—the idea of the American fighting man as springing spontaneously from the people became an image as solid as the Marine Corps monument commemorating the Battle of Iwo Jima. The myth of the militia and the American fighting man is predicated on the assumption that, at least in the past, all or most American men owned or had access to firearms and were proficient in their use (the image endures of “ole Betsy” hanging over the mantel). But it is likely that most Americans, even on the frontier, did not own guns and were not familiar with their use and handling. Cinematic drama and its predecessor, the dime novel of the 1800s, has enhanced the romance of the gun culture. Boys and men encountered the exploits of Buffalo Bill, Kit Carson, and other worthies, both actual and imagined, in Police Gazette and other cheap publications in barbershops, saloons, pool halls, and other bastions of bachelor culture well into the 1960s. Cinematic Westerns and television heroes in that decade focused on gunplay and derringdo from their square-jawed idols. The iconic weapon of these cinematic efforts was the Colt .45, but Winchester lever-action rifles were also very much in evidence.



As Westerns became more critical, cynical, and socially aware in the late 1960s (for example, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly), other gun-oriented themes and dramas came into play. Chief among these were antihero police or citizen-oriented efforts such as Dirty Harry (complete with his huge .44 Magnum revolver) and other Clint Eastwood rogue cop epics. Death Wish, starring Charles Bronson, featured a mildmannered citizen turned urban vigilante with a classic Colt .45, like a hero of the Wild West. Both Eastwood and Bronson’s films gave rise to profitable series. Television fare such as Police Story, Hill Street Blues, and most notably SWAT into the 1990s featured exotic hardware as well as mundane police armaments. Television police shows into the 2000s focused less on ordnance and more on human interest and character development. As surprising as it may seem, with the attention given to ever-present sidearms in the West and violent showdowns in the past and present, even the denizens of the “Wild West” may not have been particularly well armed. Even the fast-draw-style gunfight, or “walk down,” is largely a creation of the nineteenth-century dime novel and the twentieth-century cinema (Brown 1994, 419). The “gunfight at OK Corral,” itself the stuff of epic legend making (and recent demythologizing), was far from a heroic battle of equal forces or one of unmitigated good against the forces of discord and disorder. In reality, it took place in extremely close quarters, was over in a matter of seconds, and was little more than an unexceptional urban shootout between two groups of urban toughs in a boomtown setting. Yet how much myth has Hollywood created out of this shootout? The problem with guns in early America and today only erupted with a boom

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economy, the absence of the influence of respectable women and clerics, the pervasive use of disinhibiting drugs (e.g., alcohol, crack), and the presence of undersupervised, underregulated, armed young men. Almost every “crime wave” in U.S. history, from the goldfields of California through the “Roaring 20s” to the urban ills spawned by the crack explosion of the 1980s, involves these elements. A “frontier mentality” prevails, and violence may occur until the town or area is “civilized”—that is, respectable women arrive in numbers and exert their influence, the men are disarmed, or diverse economic opportunity builds. It should be emphasized that this is present in today’s urban crime hot spots as well. Although violent crime in general has decreased, in some urban areas, strategies such as police militarization, strict “broken windows” law enforcement, and increased patrol have not had any appreciable impact. The revisionist argument theorizes that in the post–Civil War period, gun manufacturers and well-heeled hunters and target enthusiasts were essential to the formation of a myth of universal firearm ownership in the United States. Firearm advertisements from this period to the present often present a climate of danger and menace and demonstrate the unique “leveling” effect of the firearm. Such ads have sometimes also focused on the aesthetic aspects of the firearms—their fine craftsmanship and materials—but the primary appeal appears to be instrumental rather than expressive. It should be pointed out, however, that a small cohort of gun owners are aesthetes and focus on artistic qualities of cult firearms. In rural America, at least, a culture of gun ownership was ensconced by the 1920s. This condition, coupled with fundamental improvements that had taken place in gun manufacture and in the quality and capacity

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of firearms themselves in the previous forty years, led more people to own advanced weaponry than in years past. Crime waves and accompanying media hysteria in both the 1920s and 1960s increased interest in firearms and gun ownership. Hollywood featured firearms more prominently in its products. Guns came to be viewed as essential to the plots of many television shows and movies—for example, “The Rifleman’s” rifle, Paladin’s derringer, 007’s Walther, and “Dirty Harry’s” .44 magnum. A cursory glance at the ads in the movie section in any U.S. newspaper will reveal frequent use of the firearm as a cinematic icon. The gun is almost always presented larger than scale, superimposed on the hero’s romantic image, often thrust upward in an Freudian manner. And, of course, advertisements and movies have had some effect on popularizing gun ownership. Ironically, some believe that the growth of popular gun ownership and the gun culture owes much as to the climate of menace evoked by media and accompanying cries for gun control as it does to its own advertising-laden press. In other words, the very dialogue over gun ownership issues has stimulated gun sales. Anticipating additional pro-control legislation, those who were undecided make the move to get some firearms while they are still available. In fact, the viral pandemic, coupled with civil disorder and the possibility of a Democratic sweep in the 2020 elections (and accompanying passage of more gun control laws), has greatly increased gun sales in recent years. In fact, June 2020 recorded the highest monthly gun sales in U.S. history. Gun inventories were depleted in warehouses and stores. Also, many firearms instructors have had to add more sections of concealed carry classes (CCW) to meet demand.

Nonetheless, within the context of popular firearm acquisition and interest, a more specialized hard core of gun ownership and idiosyncratic firearms specific cults have flourished.

Features of the Gun Culture Because gun ownership is so widespread in the United States, generalizations about a monolithic gun culture are risky. Indeed, there are multiple specialized and distinct gun cultures. Examples include the urban minority street culture, Civil War reenactors, rural white male deer hunters, skeet shooters, trap shooters, sporting clay enthusiasts, collectors, and survivalists. Moreover, individuals own guns for a number of reasons— not just for self-defense but also for hunting, collecting, or out of a sense of being linked through the firearm to one’s past. There are also subcultures where gun ownership is explained by interests in target shooting or military-type recreation, or a singular devotion to the Second Amendment. Much of the ideology of these groups overlaps. Committed gun owners, along with other groups recently stigmatized by media and academe, have value systems similar to other “pariah groups.” A pariah group is a one whose belief system was formerly dominant or at least respectable but is now considered marginal, somewhat disreputable, and, most significantly, anachronistic. Like other pariah groups, such as cockfighters and Neoconfederates, hard-core gun owners are paternalistic and anachronistic. In general, they long for the “good old days” and ritualistically decry the “mess in Washington,” with some calling for a draining of “the Swamp.” They revere the past, often taking refuge in mythopoeic imagery and notions. For example, posters bearing the likeness of John Wayne or Clint Eastwood in attire appropriate to their



iconic roles are always on sale at gun shows. The man of action is universally acclaimed, and the military and its service is likewise celebrated. Accordingly, the role of women and minorities in gun culture has been insignificant until very recently. Since the 1960s, firearm manufacturers have focused their advertisements on these groups (and have been criticized for doing so by gun control advocates), and national groups such as the National Rifle Association have belatedly attempted to broaden their membership base. Yet, many local organizations of gun owners and shooters remain white male preserves. It is ironic that although individual gun owners criticize (sometimes quite viciously) the national government, most profess to be extremely patriotic and authoritarian. The nation that they embrace (however mythical it may be) is that of the period immediately after World War II. Subsequent developments, particularly in the 1960s, are seen as causes of decline in U.S. arms and society. Events such as Waco and Ruby Ridge and FBI blunders—even “Monicagate”— have furthered their estrangement from the national government. The election of President Obama, though he had made no threats to gun ownership during his campaign and subsequent years in office, seemed to energize and politicize many gun owners to take a more militant stance on the issue, a position that was reinforced with the election of his vice president, Joe Biden, as president in 2020. Many of the politically committed have aligned their interests with that of the Tea Party schismatics. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, the entity charged with enforcement of laws pertaining to firearm ownership and commerce, has drawn their special ire for generating “unnecessary paperwork” and supposedly harassing inoffensive gun owners and dealers.

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They venerate, more or less uncritically, elders of the past, including shooters, writers, and other “great Americans,” some of whom have achieved legendary status through their prowess with weapons on the range or “somewhere on the border,” serving as lawmen. One consequence of this fixation on the past for some is a derogation of new ideas, innovations, and technology. In general, gun culture adherents are more likely to be politically conservative and to vote for Republican candidates in national elections; they are frequently “single issue” voters. They are likely to live in the South, West, or Midwest rather than the East (especially the Northeast). Gun owners are likely to say that they are hunters and to live in rural areas and small towns and cities. Typical of “bedrock America,” they are generally uncritical consumers of American national mythology. For them, guns represent both a concrete and a spiritual-emotional link to the heroic past. In this regard, the gun culture, like other anachronistic cultures, may be seen as highly totemistic. Weapons that have been used in combat or that have personal connections to famous figures are especially valued. This is particularly evident in the South, where family heirlooms from the Civil War are venerated and given pride of place in many living rooms. Civil War reenacting, which is especially strong in the South, is also a way of linking to the past, and many reenactors are seriously committed to gun ownership ideology as well. Little has been written about the aesthetic appeal of guns—the appreciation that many gun collectors feel toward fine craftsmanship and guns as a form of art. One can see the acme of the gunsmith’s art in the Musée de la Chasse (Hunting Museum) in Paris and the Imperial War Museum in London, or in the less exotic but more straightforward

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Sanders-Metzger Collection at Texas A&M University in College Station, Texas. Many gun collectors and recreational shooters focus on a certain type of firearm. For example, a veritable cult of the 1911A Colt .45 automatic, a notoriously powerful but temperamental pistol, has been around for some time. For admirers of this weapon, its replacement in the United States Armed Forces with the finely crafted and reliable high-capacity Italian-designed Beretta 9 mm was a blow indeed. The 2017 announcement of replacement of the Beretta by a SIG Sauer 320 9mm will surely not placate them. But the Colt .45 lives on, touted by enthusiasts in the gun media and aided by its own legend as a “man stopper.” Similarly, the “broomstick” Mauser C96 handgun, in its various configurations, attained cult status decades ago and is thus obtainable today only at high prices. Cults focused on new firearms include the AR-15 and its many imitators and variants. That this gun lends itself to modification and accessorizing has led some to call it a “male Barbie.” The firearm has also been frequently used as a decidedly negative icon in media and popular culture. A simpleminded plot was repeated throughout the police dramas of the 1970s in which an errant firearm (one seemingly with a will of its own) wreaked havoc among those unfortunate enough to happen upon it. In such narratives, the gun itself was an immanently evil entity, and human agency and free will played little part in these melodramas. In other words, the gun drove the drama. Similarly, news media typically use an iconic pistol, often a smoking one, as a backdrop for any violent story, whether the action involves a gun or not. Finally, some have attempted to link gun enthusiasts to sexual inadequacy, implying that the bigger the gun (or the more guns the owner has), the more

inadequate (or the more latently homosexual) the owner. The firearm, in this context, is a way for the impotent, self-doubting individual to reaffirm his masculinity. This notion, called the priapic theory, is nowhere supported by research, but it is omnipresent in cinema and television entertainment and has become part of popular psychology as well. That notwithstanding, gun magazines “stage” new products in articles and ads in the most flattering of angles, replete with airbrushing and attractive backgrounds. One would be tempted to label such presentation “gun porn” if it would not feed the popular cliché. One of the most critical factors behind the survival of the gun culture is recruitment and proselytizing. Outdoor and hunting magazines are constantly spreading the gospel of the value of taking a kid hunting or shooting. Whereas in the past, these pleas took the form of “take a boy hunting,” increasingly one notes in the outdoor press the notion that girls might enjoy the shooting and hunting as well. Daughters, girlfriends, and wives are frequently shown in photos standing over their fallen quarry, grinning proudly at the camera. One critical recruitment venue for gun enthusiasts is reunions or gun shows. These events, where guns, ammo, literature, technical information, and ideas are exchanged, are critical to the survival of the culture in its present form. Besides being a recruitment site, they are a rare social and expressive opportunity for this ruggedly individualistic group. Crime control–inspired efforts at ending gun shows through banning them in certain locales or banning specific commercial activities, which are central to the purpose of the show, have the potential to seriously damage the gun culture. Gun advocates have criticized such bans as attacks on the First and Second Amendments and as



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A father teaches his son how to aim and fire a gun. (David H. Lewis/iStockphoto.com)

direct attacks on the Constitution and the culture. Internet sites abound that serve the gun culture review and critique firearms, both old and new. Some are quite utilitarian while retaining a distinctly conservative point of view. Others are framed around having a good time shooting various targets or animals with exotic and mundane firearms while avoiding controversy. Sites are also presented giving specific information about gun laws in various states, specifically those that refer to the status of concealed weapons carriage and how states “rate” in terms of “gun friendliness.” Generally, California and states in New England rate among the least friendly. Some internet sites are gun-specific for gun cultists, whereas others are oriented to helping cinema fans identify hardware seen in movies and television shows. One can order

firearms online, but they must be sent to a federal firearms licensee in the state where the customer resides for final sale as requisite paperwork must be filled out and filed according to the laws of that jurisdiction. Several cable networks are partially oriented to hunting or firearms and their development. Other historically labeled networks feature programs and series devoted to iconic firearms and other weaponry. Perhaps the most important contemporary factor in the maintenance and, indeed, expansion of gun ownership and the gun culture is the concealed carry movement (CCW). Gun magazines, mentioned earlier, eagerly advocated more reasonable gun carriage laws in the 1980s, and today they tout and advertise the new products created by this new market. For example, this revolution in firearms carriage has encouraged gun magazine reader to buy not just new

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“wondernines,” or “miniguns” (light and concealable 9mm handguns, often partially made with synthetic frames) but to also acquire a whole raft of related products to full a “CCW wardrobe.” This includes clothing and purses to disguise gun carriage and more concealable and smoothly functioning holsters. Young men who enter the gun culture typically come from patriarchal families. Traditionally, the young man gets a BB gun as a child, and then sometime later receives a .22 rifle. Through proper instruction and use of these weapons, he learns about safety, ballistics, and wind drift, not to mention killing small animals and birds. As he becomes an adolescent, he moves on to shotguns, duck and upland game hunting, and deer rifles, and he joins the male world of hunting. But this progression is no longer inevitable; many young men and women never move beyond the video game stage of shooting or never get practical and ethical instruction in the use of guns and the possible tragedies that careless use can cause. There are fewer places where the young can shoot at beer cans than in the past—a rapidly urbanizing society has placed shooting increasingly out of bounds, legally and morally. Moreover, even rural residents object to shooting ranges being built in their locale, chiefly due to noise and safety issues. The rural gentile coming of age that the progression of firearm ownership represents evokes the earlier medieval progression from squire to knighthood. But it is at war with the spirit of the age. Efforts to disarm young men are met with bemusement or anger, although rural folk are increasingly resigned to them. In the past, such efforts would have been seen as bizarre and presumptuous—trusting young men with increasing levels of adult responsibility was the whole point of this progression. To

disarm them, effectively destroying this rite of passage into adulthood and offering nothing in its place but video games, the internet, and pop culture, seems excessive and antirural to many in “bedrock” America.

Survival of the Gun Culture The survival of the gun culture and most forms of gun ownership is less uncertain than it was at the turn into the twenty-first century. The pandemic and social disorder have given it new life, though that may be only temporary. CCW laws have given the group much more vitality and viability. Though viewed by policymakers and media as antithetical to progress and unfairly linked to crime and militia extremists, the gun culture is alive and well. Urban, cosmopolitan America still regards gun ownership and the gun culture as highly problematic and believes that firearm ownership should be relegated to the margins and legislated into oblivion. On the other side, bedrock Americans see the Second Amendment as a grant from the deity, a right and an obligation, and perhaps a divine exhortation to self-defense. The growth of conservative media, including internet sites and interest groups, coupled with the success of the CCW movement, has given the gun culture new life. However, as the United States continues its rush toward urbanization, the gun culture will continue find its positions eroded, and its adherents will continue to be stigmatized and marginalized. Pandemic-related stress and civic disorders have temporarily increased gun ownership, but in the absence of gun shows due to quarantine, it is unclear how much increased, sustained viability will ensue. Electoral politics in the 2020 election further created uncertainty around this issue. Francis Frederick Hawley

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See also: Black Codes; Civil War and Small Arms; Concealed Weapons Laws; Firearms Industry; Frontier Violence; Gun Clubs; Gun Ownership; Handguns; Hunting; Ideologies— Conservative and Liberal; Long Gun; Miniguns; Native Americans and Gun Violence; News Media and Gun Control; Periodicals, Guns; Safety Courses; Sporting Purposes Test (SPT); Vigilantism; Women and Guns; Youth and Guns

Further Reading Ayoob, Massad. The Gun Digest Book of Concealed Carry. Iola, WI: Gun Digest Books, 2008. Brown, Richard Maxwell. “Violence.” In The Oxford History of the American West, edited by Clyde A. Milner, Carol A. O’Connor, and Martha A. Sandweiss, 394–430. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994. Bruce-Briggs, Barry. “The Great American Gun War.” Public Interest 45 (1976): 37–62. Carter, Gregg Lee. “Guns.” In Boyhood in America: An Encyclopedia, vol. 1, edited by Priscilla Ferguson Clement and Jacqueline S. Reinier, 330–35. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2001. Courtwright, David T. Violent Land: Single Men and Social Disorder from the Frontier to the Inner City. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1998. Diaz, Tom. Making a Killing: the Business of Guns in America. New York: New Press, 1999. Gibson, James William. Warrior Dreams: Violence and Manhood in Post-Vietnam America. New York: Hill and Wang, 1994. Hawley, Frederick. “Culture Conflict and the Ideology of Pariah Groups: The Weltanschauung of Gun Owners, Southerners, and Cockfighters.” In The Gun Culture and Its Enemies, edited by William R. Tonso, 109–26. Bellevue, WA: Merril Press, 1990. Hawley, Frederick. “Guns.” In The Encyclopedia of Southern Culture, edited by Charles Reagan Wilson and William Ferris, 1480–82. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1989.

Kalesan, Bindu, Marcos D. Villareal, Katherine M. Keyes, and Sandro Galea. “Gun Ownership and Social Gun Culture.” Injury Prevention 22, no. 3 (2016): 216–20. Kleck, Gary. Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1997. Spitzer, Robert J. “The Gun Dispute.” American Educator 23 (1999): 10–15. Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021. Yamane, David. “The Sociology of U.S. Gun Culture.” Sociology Compass 11, no. 7 (2017): e12497. https://doi.org/10.1111 /soc4.12497.

Gun Industry. See Firearms Industry Gun Industry Watch. See Brady: United against Gun Violence Gun Lobby “Gun lobby” is a vague term referring to interests and interest groups working on behalf of gun rights. Often used to refer only to the National Rifle Association (NRA) in a pejorative fashion, the term may also include other interest groups and even firearm manufacturers. The NRA has historically been the largest and most powerful group lobbying for or against gun rights. Much of the organization’s power is ascribed to the money spent during election campaigns. In total, the NRA spends approximately $250 million per year either on promoting gun rights or opposing gun control. A fraction of this money—between $2 million and $3 million per election cycle—is spent on contributions to candidates and political action committees, though the organization’s contributions reached their highest

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annual amounts (over $5 million per year) in 2017 and 2018. Considerably more of the organization’s finances are spent on issuerelated advertising. For instance, in just the first six months of 2019, the NRA spent $1.6 million lobbying against universal background checks (Schwartz 2019), despite the fact that the policy is supported by more than half of its membership (depending on the survey, estimates of NRA member support for universal background checks ranges from 54 percent to 72 percent). Still, the money only accounts for part— some would argue a small part—of the NRA’s success. Its estimated 5.5 million members (as of 2018; see Gutowski 2019) are truly a political force to be reckoned with. They tend to be passionate, attentive, and loyal to the organization. They are more likely to base their votes on a candidate’s position on guns than are those who support gun control. To be sure, the NRA is not omnipotent, but it is very powerful in more rural areas where the percentage of the population that are members tends to be greater. Elected officials who represent large numbers of NRA members are aware of that fact and often vote accordingly. Other groups include Gun Owners of America (GOA), Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA), and Second Amendment Foundation (SAF). There are also numerous other groups that function at the state level. While frequently, and often correctly, portrayed as unwilling to compromise, the NRA is more mainstream than many of the other groups. The gun lobby is active in a variety of arenas at all levels of government. Pressure may be exerted through campaign contributions, independent expenditures during campaigns, and voter mobilization. The NRA communicates with its members

through email, direct mail, and group activities. It produces legislator “report cards” that rate elected officials on their votes of importance to gun owners, and the group frequently endorses and/or opposes candidates in elections. The NRA is also involved in lobbying the executive branch when the president is sympathetic to their views. Equally important, the gun lobby is active in the judicial process. Although the NRA was active in the McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010) case, it was the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) and Libertarian-leaning independent attorneys who successfully argued the District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) case at the U.S. Supreme Court. SAF was also involved in the McDonald case and is often involved with firearms litigation. The groups who lobby for gun rights are, generally speaking, larger, better funded, and more active than their counterparts who argue for gun control. For all of those reasons, they tend to be more effective, although there are limits to their effectiveness. Although they litigate cases, they clearly cannot lobby judges; and though they lobby legislators, they do not win every legislative battle. Much of the important and influential work of those who lobby for gun rights takes place at the state level of government. State governmental action is often as crucial as, if not more so than, that of the federal government, but it generally receives much less media attention unless it is a particularly controversial issue. It is within the states that those who work for gun rights frequently have an advantage. While the NRA is quite active within the states, other smaller, and often statebased, groups are important as well. Concealed carry laws, many restrictions on firearms purchases, safe storage laws, and many others are most often found at the state and even local levels of government.



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Although the gun lobby is powerful, it is not impervious. Since 2018, following the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, public opinion polls have found declining support for the NRA (see, for example, Frankovic 2018). In 2019, the organization found itself embroiled in legal battles with New York and Washington, DC, over fraud, financial misconduct, and misuse of charitable funds, with attorney generals in each locality filing civil suits against the NRA on August 6, 2020. In 2021, the organization filed for bankruptcy, though the petition was soon dismissed as being filed in bad faith. Still, even in the midst of the organization’s woes, it has remained one of the most influential special interest groups in the United States (Russonello 2021). Harry L. Wilson

Gutowski, Stephen. “NRA Membership Dues, Contributions Rebounded in 2018.” The Washington Free Beacon, May 30, 2019. https://freebeacon.com/issues/nra -membership-dues-contributions-reboun ded-in-2018/ (accessed January 29, 2022). Hardy, David T. “Evolution of the National Rifle Association and Other Gun Rights Organizations.” In Guns and Contemporary Society: The Past, Present, and Future of Firearms and Firearm Policy, edited by Glenn H. Utter, 139–64. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2016. OpenSecrets.org. “National Rifle Assn.” http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/summary .php?id=D000000082 (accessed January 29, 2022). Patrick, Brian Anse. The National Rifle Association and the Media: The Motivating Force of Negative Publicity. New York: Peter Lang, 2002.

See also: Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA); Democratic Party and Gun Control; District of Columbia v. Heller; Elections and Gun Control; Gun Owners of America (GOA); Libertarianism and Gun Control; McDonald v. City of Chicago; National Rifle Association (NRA); Republican Party and Gun Control; Second Amendment Foundation (SAF)

Russonello, Giovanni. “How Much Sway Does the N.R.A. Still Have?” New York Times, May 3, 2021. https://www.nytimes .com/2021/04/19/us/politics/nra-gun-control .html (accessed January 29, 2022).

Further Reading Carter, Gregg Lee. The Gun Control Movement. New York: Twayne, 1997. Frankovic, Kathy. “Public Sentiment Turns against the NRA.” YouGov America, February 28, 2018. https://today.yougov.com /topics/politics/articles-reports/2018/02/28 /public-turns-negative-towards-nra (accessed January 29, 2022). Goss, Kristin A. Disarmed: The Missing Movement for Gun Control in America. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006.

Reich, Gary, and Jay Barth. “Planting in Fertile Soil: The National Rifle Association and State Firearms Legislation.” Social Science Quarterly 98, no. 2 (2017): 485–99.

Schwartz, Brian. “NRA Spent $1.6 Million Lobbying against Background Check Expansion Laws in Months Leading Up to Latest Mass Shootings.” CNBC, August 5, 2019. https://www.cnbc.com/2019/08/05/nra -spent-1point6-million-lobbying-against -expanded-background-check-laws.html (accessed January 29, 2022). Second Amendment Foundation Online. http:// www.saf.org/ (accessed January 29, 2022). Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021. Vizzard, William J. Shots in the Dark: The Policy, Politics, and Symbolism of Gun Control. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000.

362 | Gun Owners’ Action League (GOAL) Wilson, Harry L. Guns, Gun Control, and Elections: The Politics and Policy of Firearms. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007.

Gun Owners’ Action League (GOAL) The Gun Owners’ Action League (GOAL) promotes public discussion of firearms issues in the state of Massachusetts and also takes part in the national gun control debate. Its aims are lobbying and education. GOAL actively promotes grassroots political activism in favor of the Second Amendment, interpreting the amendment to protect the individual right to keep and bear arms. The organization engages in voter registration, offers evaluations of political candidates regarding their firearm policies, and annually educates state legislators on firearm safety issues. The organization has its own professional lobbyist. Its message is further strengthened through an active grassroots network. The organization promotes safety and training education for children and youth through the NRA’s Eddie Eagle gun safety programs as well as local training courses and visits to schools. Shooting sport enthusiasts and junior Olympic candidates can receive training through the organization. Adults can turn to the organization for extensive information about Massachusetts and U.S. firearm laws. GOAL publishes a monthly newspaper, The Outdoor Message, through which members can receive up-todate information about developments in legislation. In 2016, the organization also introduced a podcast titled The Primer, where contemporary issues related to the Second Amendment are discussed. Tiia Rajala

See also: Eddie Eagle; Massachusetts Gun Law

Further Reading Gun Owners’ Action League (GOAL). http:// www.goal.org (accessed November 17, 2019). The Primer. https://goalpodcast.libsyn.com/ (accessed November 17, 2019).

Gun Owners of America (GOA) Gun Owners of America (GOA) is a generally conservative organization of firearm owners. GOA was founded in October 1975 in California by state senator Bill Richardson. Its official publication is The Gun Owners, a monthly member newsletter focusing on firearm legislation and national politics. GOA pioneered the use of member fax and email alerts as a means of targeting specific legislation and quickly generating grassroots opposition. Parallel organizations include the GOA Political Victory Fund, a political campaign fund that aims to provide heavy support of a relatively few select candidates, and the Gun Owners’ Foundation, a tax-exempt organization that supports litigation and educational efforts. GOA stresses that its objective is the elimination rather than merely the restriction of gun control legislation. It takes a relatively optimistic view of what can be achieved by grassroots opposition and pressure; this has historically resulted in a more uncompromising position than that held by other firearm groups, including the National Rifle Association. David T. Hardy See also: Gun Control; Gun Shows; National Rifle Association (NRA); Pratt, Larry

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Further Reading Gun Owners of America. http://www.gunown ers.org (accessed January 27, 2022).

Gun Owners of California (GOC) Advertised as “attack oriented” and “the toughest, most hard hitting pro-gun organization in the state of California,” Gun Owners of California (GOC) has fought against California’s gun control measures since the early 1970s. The organization was founded by H. L. (Bill) Richardson, who served in California’s state senate for twenty-two years and also founded Gun Owners of America. Senator Richardson dedicated his political career to pro-gun issues, and upon leaving the California Senate, he dedicated his time to pro-gun activism. GOC follows the policy of accepting no compromises and fighting against all gun control measures, whether new or already passed. GOC focuses its work entirely in California. It does not attempt to expand beyond the state or gain a more national influence (aspirations that can be fulfilled through other gun rights organizations such as Gun Owners of America and the NRA). GOC’s action plan focuses on finding the optimal focus for the organization’s efforts. The organization’s structure is kept compact, its board of directors has five members, support staff work part time, and there are no headquarters or regional/field representatives. Donations collected through the GOC’s political action committee are directed toward lobbying, while contributions to GOC Inc., provide funding for other efforts. Gun rights candidates are supported not only in senate races but also in local ones; however, the organization has a policy of not financially supporting incumbents unless they are running for a higher office

and have proved loyal to the gun rights agenda. The gun promotion efforts of GOC are similar to those of other groups and include mail, fax, and email alerts; newsletters; education; recruitment; and contributions to gun rights candidates. Tiia Rajala See also: Gun Owners of America (GOA); National Rifle Association (NRA)

Further Reading Gun Owners of California. http://www .gunownersca.com (accessed January 27, 2022).

Gun Ownership The most reliable international estimates of total gun ownership are those provided by the Small Arms Survey. These figures are based on a complex series of approximations involving such sources as surveys of firearms ownership, experts’ estimates, and comparisons across analogous countries, and factoring in attrition that occurs when guns are destroyed intentionally by governments or unintentionally through breakage. These figures suggest that there are now over one billion firearms in the world, approximately 85 percent (857 million) of which are thought to be in civilian hands. This represents a large increase over a relatively short period of time, with civilians holding just 650 million firearms as recently as 2006. Beyond those held by private citizens, an additional 13 percent (133 million) are held by militaries and 2 percent (22.7 million) by police agencies (Karp 2018). The United States has the highest rate of civilian firearm holdings, with 120.5 guns per 100 persons. This rate is more than twice as high as the next-closest nation

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(Yemen, with 52.8 per 100 persons) and more than three times higher than the third highest (Montenegro and Serbia, each with 39.1 per 100 persons). This is due primarily to the massive number of civilian-held firearms (393.3 million), a figure that exceeds all other nations and dwarfs even those of nations with vastly larger populations— India has 71.1 million firearms (5.3 per 100 persons), and China has 49.7 million (3.58 per 100 persons) (Karp 2018). Despite topping the list of private gun ownership, the exact number of firearms in civilian hands in the United States remains unknown. One major reason for this is that there is no national-level database that tracks private ownership of firearms. This is due to the Firearms Owners Protection Act of 1986, which made a variety of changes to federal law, including banning the federal government from creating a registry that identifies individuals as owning specific firearms, except in the case of automatic weapons. So, although individual states may continue to require gun owners to register their firearms, the U.S. government does not maintain a definitive count either of the total number of guns in the United States or of the total number of gun owners. Therefore, calculating estimates of those numbers requires the use of survey data. A number of different ongoing surveys have tracked Americans’ responses about gun ownership, together providing a somewhat inconclusive picture of trends over time. For example, the General Social Survey indicates that household gun ownership peaked in 1977 at 54 percent, declined slowly through 2000 (34%), and has remained relatively steady (between 32% and 37%) ever since (General Social Survey 2020). Gallup polling, on the other hand, reports that gun ownership did not peak

until 1993 (at 51%), fell to its lowest point in 1999 (34%), and has fluctuated since (ranging from a high of 45% in 2011 to a low of 37% in 2013 and 2019) (Gallup 2020). The inconsistency of these numbers almost certainly does not reflect actual changes in gun ownership levels; instead, it stems from a difficulty with firearms surveys: the issue of stigma. As the Small Arms Survey notes, “even in regions where armed violence is rare, asking about access to firearms is not a neutral act” (Small Arms Survey 2007, 54). For this reason, it is not difficult to imagine that respondents might choose to underreport—or entirely conceal—their firearms ownership. This concern has increasingly become an issue, with research indicating that willingness to respond to gun ownership survey questions has declined, and that this trend is more common among those identifying as Republicans (Urbatsch 2019). Other undercounting concerns have also arisen—especially about data gathered at the household level— over the extent to which wives may be unaware of (or unwilling to discuss) their husbands’ gun ownership (Kleck 1997, 100), a finding that occurs with samples of teenage girls when asked about parents’ ownership as well (Cook and Sorensen 2006). These effects are in addition to a generalized tendency for all types of respondents to be less willing to disclose gun ownership information when they are unfamiliar with the person asking the question and uncertain about how that person will react (Wallace 2017), likely leading to overall undercounts of gun ownership in surveys. Given all of these caveats, and using the likely conservative figures gathered from survey-based methods, a minimum of 32 percent of American households likely contain a firearm. Using the U.S. Census



Bureau’s 2019 estimate of approximately 128.5 million households, this means that around 41.1 million households in the United States contain one or more firearms (U.S. Census Bureau 2020). A variety of studies of national samples of firearms owners has attempted to chart the demographics of gun ownership in the United States. While some data are inconclusive—such as the effects of age and education—other factors remain strongly linked with gun ownership. For instance, gun ownership is most common among men, whites, Republicans, and those living in rural areas. These factors tend to have interaction effects, with white men reporting the highest rates of ownership and nonwhite women reporting the lowest (Jones 2013; Pew Research 2017). The region where gun ownership is the least common is the Northeast, where 27 percent of households contain a firearm, with the other regions reporting higher rates (44–46%). One key factor driving gun ownership is growing up in a household with firearms; people who grew up with firearms are more likely to own guns themselves, and they are more likely to become gun owners at a younger age, than those who did not (Pew Research 2017). Some of the factors that have been associated with gun ownership include previous violent victimization (Warner and Thrash 2020), lacking confidence in the federal government (Jiobu and Curry 2001), racial bias (Gearhart et al. 2019), and anti-immigrant sentiment (Flores 2015). Fear of crime is also associated with gun ownership, though often in indirect or complex ways (Gearhart et al. 2019; Pew Research 2017; Warner and Thrash 2020). Mencken and Frose (2019) have shown that a series of variables—such as religiosity, political attitudes, and age—have significant effects on gun owners’ attitudes

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about controversial firearms topics, such as gun bans, arming teachers, and policies surrounding use of force. Nevertheless, several trends do emerge from the literature that point to some important commonalities. When gun owners are surveyed about their reasons for their gun ownership, for instance, the most common answer is protection (60–67%), followed by hunting (36– 38%), and sport shooting (21–30%) (Swift 2013; Pew Research 2017). Most of these answers are roughly similar across all regions, with the exception of hunting, which is more common among rural residents than those living in urban or suburban areas (Pew Research 2017). For many gun owners, though, firearms have strong symbolic meanings in addition to any practical reasons for which they own them. Kohn (2000), for example, found that respondents saw gun ownership as having a meaningful connection not only to the United States’ frontier past but also even further back to the founding values of Colonial America. Specifically, they felt that they had a kind of “civic duty and responsibility” that tended to manifest itself in the imperative to keep and bear arms to protect themselves, and the nation, in service of what they see as the public good (Kohn 2000, 386). Another study also found common values among gun owners and that owning firearms allowed respondents to “embod[y] martial prowess, masculinity, and independence” (Albers 2003, 151). Similarly, a 2008 study found that guns are “rich with symbolic values” and that value that gun owners place on their firearms is “far more emotional in nature than monetary” (Taylor 2008, ii). These findings are supported by a 2010 study reporting that their respondents’ identities revolved around themes of “cowboy bravery and toughness, expert knowledge of

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firearms, and skillful ability to handle lethal weapons” (Anderson and Taylor 2010, 54). Among certain groups—particularly white men facing economic hardship—guns have also been shown to “reestablish a sense of individual power and moral certitude” (Mencken and Frose 2019), with some suggesting that the increasing emphasis on protective ownership constitutes a fundamental shift to a new form of U.S. gun culture more focused on using guns to address “social insecurities created by postindustrial economic decline and neoliberal policy ascendance” (Yamane 2017, 6). Not everyone views guns positively, however. Many gun owners report being aware of the stigma of association with crime and violence, which they deal with in a variety of ways. Some attempt to pass as nonowners (Taylor 2008) or use “selective disclosure” (Albers 2003) to avoid wider knowledge, whereas others are more proactive, offering “dignifying accounts” (Kohn 2000, 45) meant to differentiate positive, legal gun ownership from criminal, illegal gun ownership. Zachary Miner See also: Acquisition of Guns; Democratic Party and Gun Control; Ideologies— Conservative and Liberal; International Firearms Laws; Republican Party and Gun Control; Urbanism and Gun Violence; Women and Guns

Further Reading Albers, Benjamin Daniel. “On Being a Gun Owner: Firearms and the Cultivation of Identity.” Ph.D. Dissertation, Duke University, North Carolina, 2003. Anderson, Leon, and Jimmy D. Taylor. “Standing Out while Fitting In: Serious Leisure Identities and Aligning Actions among Skydivers and Gun Collectors.”

Journal of Contemporary Ethnography 39, no. 1 (2010): 34–59. Cook, Philip, and Susan Sorenson. “The Gender Gap among Teen Survey Respondents: Why Are Boys More Likely to Report a Gun in the Home than Girls?” Journal of Quantitative Criminology 22, no. 1 (2006): 61–76. Flores, René D. “Taking the Law into Their Own Hands: Do Local Anti-Immigrant Ordinances Increase Gun Sales?” Social Problems 62, no. 3 (2015): 363–90. Gallup Inc. “Guns.” Gallup.com, 2020. https:// news.gallup.com /poll/1645/Guns.aspx (accessed April 30, 2020). Gearhart, Michael C., Kristen A. Berg, Courtney Jones, and Sharon D. Johnson. “Fear of Crime, Racial Bias, and Gun Ownership.” Health & Social Work 44, no. 4 (2019): 241–48. General Social Survey. “GSS Data Explorer | NORC at the University of Chicago.” 2020. https://gssdataexplorer.norc.org/trends /Civil%20Liberties?measure = owngun (accessed April 30, 2020). Jiobu, Robert M., and Timothy J. Curry. “Lack of Confidence in the Federal Government and the Ownership of Firearms.” Social Science Quarterly (Wiley-Blackwell) 82, no. 1 (2001): 77. Jones, Jeffrey. “Men, Married, Southerners Most Likely to Be Gun Owners.” Gallup. com, 2013. https://news.gallup.com/poll /160223/men-married-southerners-likely -gun-owners.aspx (accessed May 1, 2020). Karp, Aaron. “Estimating Global CivilianHeld Firearms Numbers.” 2018. http://www .smallarmssurvey.org/fileadmin/docs/T -Briefing-Papers/SAS-BP-Civilian-Firearms -Numbers.pdf (accessed May 18, 2020). Kleck, Gary. Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control. New York: Aldine de Gruyter, 1997. Kohn, Abigail Alma. . “Shooters: The Moral World of Gun Enthusiasts.” Ph.D. Dissertation, University of California, San Francisco, with the University of California, Berkeley, California, 2000.

Mencken, F. Carson, and Paul Froese. “Gun Culture in Action.” Social Problems 66, no. 1 (2019): 3–27. Pew Research. “Americans’ Views on Guns and Gun Ownership: 8 Key Findings.” Pew Research Center, 2017. https://www .pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/06/22/key -takeaways-on-americans-views-of-guns -and-gun-ownership/ (accessed April 30, 2020). Small Arms Survey. “Small Arms Survey 2007: Guns and the City.” 2007. http:// www.smallarmssurvey.org/publications /by-type/yearbook/small-arms-survey-2007 .html (accessed May 20, 2016). Swift, Art. “Personal Safety Top Reason Americans Own Guns Today.” Gallup. Com, 2013. https://news.gallup.com/poll /165605/personal-safety-top-reason-ameri cans-own-guns-today.aspx (accessed May 1, 2020). Taylor, Jimmy D. “Gun Shows, Gun Collectors and the Story of the Gun: An Ethnographic Approach to U.S. Gun Culture.” Ph.D. Dissertation, The Ohio State University, Ohio, 2008. Urbatsch, R. “Gun-Shy: Refusal to Answer Questions about Firearm Ownership.” Social Science Journal 56, no. 2 (2019): 189–95. U.S. Census Bureau. “Historical Households Tables.” The United States Census Bureau, 2020. https://www.census.gov/data/tables /time-series/demo/families/households.html (accessed April 30, 2020). Wallace, Lacey N. “Concealed Ownership: Americans’ Perceived Comfort Sharing Gun Ownership Status with Others.” Sociological Spectrum 37, no. 5 (2017): 267–81. Warner, Tara D., and Courtney R. Thrash. “A Matter of Degree? Fear, Anxiety, and Protective Gun Ownership in the United States.” Social Science Quarterly (WileyBlackwell) 101, no. 1 (2020): 285–308. Yamane, David. “The Sociology of U.S. Gun Culture.” Sociology Compass 11, no. 7 (2017): 1–10.

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Gun Registration Registration laws can include requirements to register with a governmental authority (1) the possession of a firearm (“possession registration”); (2) transfer of a firearm, such as a gift or loan from a private person (“transfer registration”); (3) purchase from a licensed dealer (“purchase registration”); and (4) importation or transportation into a jurisdiction (“importation registration”). Federal law requires that a purchaser of an ordinary rifle, shotgun, or handgun from a dealer (a federal firearms license holder, or FFL) fill out a federal Firearms Transfer Record (Form 4473) that records, among other things, the purchaser’s name, race, and address, as well as the model and serial number of the firearm (“purchase registration”; 18 U.S.C. § 923(g)). The dealer must keep the forms available for inspection by federal agents for at least twenty years. When the dealer goes out of business, he must deliver all of his records for the previous twenty years to the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF). The federal system is the result of a compromise in the Gun Control Act of 1968. At the time, gun control advocates wanted a national, centralized system of gun registration. Gun rights advocates were fearful of central registration. Among other reasons, they knew that Nazis, Communists, and other dictators had used gun registries for firearms confiscation. The Gun Control Act compromise created sales records that can be reviewed by law enforcement when conducting criminal investigations, but keeps those records decentralized. However, a considerable amount of centralization occurs anyway. Some of the centralization comes from consolidation of the

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records of retiring FFLs. ATF scans these records and puts them in a database, although ATF says that database rules prevent customer name searches. Additionally, many active FFLs participate in a voluntary ATF program that allows the Bureau to conduct electronic searches of the dealer’s sales records. The Firearms Owner’s Protection Act of 1986 specifically forbids the creation of a federal registry of guns or gun owners (18 U.S.C. § 926(2)(a)). Similarly, when Congress created the National Instant Check System for retail firearms sales in 1993, it forbade the use of the checks to create a registry of lawful guns or gun owners (18 U.S.C. § 922(t)(C)(2)). Accordingly, the Department of Justice has promulgated a regulation requiring that federal instant check records of lawful sales be destroyed within twenty-four hours (28 Code of Federal Regulations § 25.9). In 2011, Congress buttressed the existing prohibition on a federal registry with a permanent appropriations limitation: “That no funds appropriated herein or hereafter shall be available for salaries or administrative expenses in connection with consolidating or centralizing, within the Department of Justice, the records, or any portion thereof, of acquisition and disposition of firearms maintained by Federal firearms licensees” (PL 112-55, 125 Stat. 552, 609–610 [2011]). The 2011 law also made permanent an appropriations rider than had been enacted on an annual basis since 1996: That “no funds under this Act may be used to electronically retrieve information gathered pursuant to 18 U.S.C. 923(g)(4) by name or personal identification code” (PL 104-208, 110 Stat. 3009, 3009–319 (1996)). However, federal law does require the reporting by licensed dealers of the sale of two or more handguns to the same person

within five business days. (18 U.S.C. § 923(g)(3)(A); ATF Form 3310.4). Moreover, in 2011, ATF began requiring FFLs in California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas to report sales of two or more semiautomatic center-fire rifles (Houser 2011). A 2016 investigation by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found that ATF had not been complying fully with provisions against creation of centralized databases on firearms owners. For example, ATF did not always obey its own policy of destroying multiple sales records after two years if a given record had not resulted in a trace during that period. ATF promised to fix its procedures (GAO 2016). As for items covered by the National Firearms Act of 1934 (short rifles, short shotguns, suppressors, machine guns, and some other special categories), the law requires the payment of a federal excise tax to receive the item, and further requires registration of the item, putatively as the means to enforce the tax. Thus, all such items are supposed to be registered in the ATF’s National Firearms Registration and Transfer Record (NFRTR) database. However, the NFRTR is notoriously incomplete and inaccurate (Hardy 2017). Although there is no federal registration for ordinary firearms, some states have their own registration systems. California and Hawaii register almost all firearms, while some states register only handguns. Some of the states that do not register long guns in general do register so-called assault weapons (see Appendix 2). Likewise some municipalities have their own registration system. For example, Illinois does not have gun registration, but Chicago requires annual reregistration of all firearms. The District of Columbia and New York City also have comprehensive gun registration.



Potential Social Utility of Firearms Registration Laws Laws requiring registration of firearms are based, in part, on the hypothesis that such laws will reduce violent crime. For example, as initially proposed, the 1934 National Firearms Act would have imposed taxation and registration of any transfer or interstate transportation of pistols, revolvers, shortbarreled shotguns, and machine guns. In support of the bill, President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s attorney general, Homer Cummings, testified before Congress. He asserted that registration would facilitate the arrest and conviction of gangsters and other career criminals because “the criminal elements are not going to obtain permits” (Cummings 1934, 10). His theory was that although prosecutors could not get quick and easy convictions of criminals for committing violent crimes, they could nonetheless get quick and easy convictions for violations of firearms registration laws. A second utility of firearms registration is using the registration records to solve crimes. But as Cummings (1934) pointed out, criminals typically do not register their firearms. Tracing of crime guns through the use of registration lists usually leads law enforcement back to the last law-abiding person in the chain of possession. After the gun was stolen from the lawful possessor and introduced into the black market, registration records are of no further use. A cross-sectional study of all 170 U.S. cities with a population of 100,000 or greater found that registration had no statistically significant effect on crime rates, except that gun and non-gun homicides both increased (Kleck and Patterson 1993). If some registration requirements caused social harm by discouraging lawful gun ownership, the magnitude of the effect would presumably depend on the practical

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onerousness of registration. At one extreme would be the DC system, which, in its early years after the Supreme Court’s Heller decision, required multiple trips to police headquarters to register a firearm. In contrast, a requirement that dealers simply send the authorities sales records every week might have a much smaller effect. A lesser effect might also be expected from the federal system because filling out the federal Form 4473, which has thirty-six separate items plus additional sub-questions, takes less than half an hour. (Since the 4473 is a national requirement, the 170-city study did not consider it as a variable.)

Background Federal bans on firearms registration reflect a continuing congressional belief that centralized firearms registration is unconstitutional and dangerous. In 1978, the Jimmy Carter administration proposed that dealer records be used to create a limited federal gun registration database. The administration said that no additional funds would be needed since the ATF could implement the $5 million project from existing appropriations. The House of Representatives voted 314–80 to prohibit the expenditure of any federal funds on gun registration. For good measure, the House also cut the ATF’s appropriation by $5 million. In 1941, Congress looked with horror at what gun confiscation had led to in Nazioccupied Europe and in the Soviet Union (Halbrook 2006, 2013, 2018). When Congress passed the Property Requisition Act of 1941 to allow the federal government to take property needed for national defense, it forbade the federal government “to authorize the requisitioning or require the registration of any firearms possessed by any individual for his personal protection or sport (and the possession of which is not

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prohibited or the registration of which is not required by existing law),” or “to impair or infringe in any manner the right of any individual to keep and bear arms” (Halbrook 1995). At the time of the adoption of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights in 1787 and 1791, respectively, no jurisdiction required the registration of firearms. Many jurisdictions did require that men subject to militia service prove that they had a firearm suitable for such service; proof was typically made by showing up at militia meeting with a suitable gun. Militia records sometimes listed which individuals had or had not “passed muster” (the formal term for proving that one had the necessary militia equipment). Even for militiamen, there was no requirement to disclose the possession of additional firearms. The American militia system in the eighteenth century was very different from England’s, where U.S. (though not all) arms for the militia were owned by the government and stored in a central location, such as the local government-run church, when not in use. The Federalist Papers expounded on a fundamental purpose of private armskeeping—namely, to deter tyranny and, if necessary, to remove it and restore the Constitution. According to Alexander Hamilton in Federalist no. 28, either a state or the federal government could become tyrannical; the necessary response of the people would be “the exertion of that original right of self-defense which is paramount to all positive forms of government.” In case of federal tyranny, the federal standing army would not be able to subdue the vast resistance led by so many state governments, Hamilton predicted. James Madison, in Federalist no. 46, endorsed a similar view. While emphasizing that the risks of federal tyranny were small, he reassured the public that the

armed American populace, organized into militias and led by the state governments, would speedily thwart any attempt to use the federal standing army to impose a dictatorship. Madison explained that because of “the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation,” any federal “schemes of usurpation will be easily defeated by the State governments, who will be supported by the people.” Madison contrasted the American situation with Europe; one reason that kings rather the people ruled Europe was that the European people were disarmed: “notwithstanding the military establishments in the several kingdoms of Europe . . . the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms” (Kopel 2010). Like the Federalists, who advocated ratification of the Constitution, the AntiFederalists, who opposed it, knew and extolled the Magna Carta, which had been promulgated in 1215. The first version of Magna Carta, but not later republications, codified “the right to control the sovereign by force”—a right that “was merely an application of the general right of revolution under any government” (Adams 1912, 174). According to Magna Carta article 61, if the king violated Magna Carta, a committee of twenty-five barons would ask the king to redress their grievances. If the king refused, then the barons could decide to summon forth the entire armed nation. Led by the barons, all free persons, bearing their personal weapons, would seize and hold the king’s castles, without harming the king or his family. During the latter part of the seventeenth century, the English governments of Kings Charles II and James II attempted to register all firearms and confiscate most of them. They were sufficiently successful in their program that armed domestic resistance to



them was unsuccessful and perhaps hopeless. James II was overthrown in the 1688 Glorious Revolution not by a domestic uprising, but by a Dutch invasion that was supported by most of England’s standing army, led by General John Churchill (ancestor of Winston). The American constitutional system, as described by Hamilton and Madison, thus followed the broad outline of Magna Carta from half a millennium before: resistance to central executive should be led by intermediate levels of government (e.g., barons, states), relying on the armed populace. The gun registration experience of the seventeenth century England had not made registration popular in America.

First Amendment Analogies Following the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2008 decision in District of Columbia v. Heller, many courts have looked to the First Amendment, for which legal doctrines are well developed, to find analogies for nascent Second Amendment doctrine (Kopel 2014). Regarding registration for First Amendment activities, in Lamont v. Postmaster General (1965) the Supreme Court ruled that a federal statute requiring registration of recipients of “Communist political propaganda” mailed from the Soviet Union was unconstitutional, because the registration requirement would inhibit the right to receive such propaganda. The registration process at issue in the case was not onerous; the registrant simply had to sign a form at a post office. Just as many people do not want to have the government keep a list of their First Amendment possessions or actions, some people would strongly object to the government keeping registries of all users of birth control, or all persons who had an abortion. However, courts have not been hostile to gun registration per se. The leading modern cases on gun registration are the D.C.

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Circuit Court of Appeals decisions on the District of Columbia’s post-Heller gun registration system (Heller II, Heller III). The court upheld basic gun registration because it was only a de minimis burden on gun ownership. The court did find unconstitutional some parts of the registration scheme, which the court found to be pointlessly burdensome—for example, the requirement that a gun be brought to DC police headquarters for registration and the requirement that guns be reregistered every three years. Registration systems in other jurisdictions may pose greater impediments to the exercise of Second Amendment rights. California’s handgun registry was created in 1990 and its long gun registry in 2014. Californians who had acquired firearms before the relevant dates were not required to register them. Nevertheless, under California’s 2019 background check law for ammunition purchases, Californians who are not listed in the state’s registry are not allowed to purchase ammunition (Rhode v. Becerra).

Confiscation The DC Circuit’s analysis of registration addressed the present operation of the District’s registration system and did not discuss the issue of confiscation. New York City has had handgun registration since 1911 and long gun registration since 1967; starting in the late 1980s and continuing to the present, the City has used its registration lists for confiscation of an expanding set of what it calls “assault weapons”— which now includes any long gun with an ammunition capacity over five rounds. Some American gun control advocates have touted gun “buy backs” (compensated confiscation of firearms) in Australia and the United Kingdom, both of which used registries to implement confiscation. Whatever the hypothetical possibilities of federal tyranny in the future, state tyranny

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has been a part of historical experience in the United States. For example, in the South during the Civil Rights era, local law enforcement often tacitly or overtly tolerated the activities of the Ku Klux Klan and similar terrorist organizations. Former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who calls herself “a Second Amendment absolutist” (CNN 2005), grew up in Birmingham, Alabama, where her father, a Presbyterian minister, was a strong advocate of civil rights. The Montgomery Advertiser reported how the turmoil of the time shaped her views: “During the bombings of the summer of 1963, her father and other neighborhood men guarded the streets at night to keep white vigilantes at bay. Rice said her staunch defense of gun rights comes from those days. She has argued that if the guns her father and neighbors carried had been registered, they could have been confiscated by the authorities, leaving the black community defenseless” (Radelat 2004, 1). David B. Kopel and David I. Caplan See also: District of Columbia v. Heller; Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986; Gun Control Act of 1968; Holocaust Imagery and Gun Control; McDonald v. City of Chicago; National Firearms Act of 1934; National Instant Criminal Background Check System; Second Amendment; Washington, DC

Further Reading Adams, George B. The Origin of the English Constitution. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1912. CNN. “Interview with Condoleeza Rice.” Larry King Live, May 11, 2005. http:// transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0505 /11/lkl.01.html (accessed May 6, 2020). Cummings, Homer S. “Congressional Testimony.” In National Firearms Act; Hearings before the Committee on Ways and

Means, House of Representatives, Seventythird Congress, Second Session, on H.R. 9066, 1–31. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1934. Federalist Papers, nos. 28, 46. The Avalon Project, Yale Law School, https://avalon .law.yale.edu /18th_century/fed28.asp; https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century /fed46.asp (accessed May 8, 2020). Government Accountability Office (GAO), Firearms Data: ATF Did Not Always Comply with the Appropriations Act Restriction and Should Better Adhere to Its Policies. GAO-16-552. June 2016. Grosjean v. American Press Co. 297 U.S. 233 (1938). Halbrook, Stephen P. “Congress Interprets the Second Amendment: Declarations by a Co-Equal Branch on the Individual Right to Keep and Bear Arms.” Tennessee Law Review 62 (1995): 597–641. Halbrook, Stephen P. Gun Control in Nazi Occupied-France: Tyranny and Resistance. Oakland, CA: Independent Institute, 2018. Halbrook, Stephen P. Gun Control in the Third Reich: Disarming the Jews and “Enemies of the State.” Oakland, CA: Independent Institute, 2013. Halbrook, Stephen P. “Nazism, the Second Amendment, and the NRA: A Reply to Professor Harcourt.” Texas Review of Law and Politics 113 (2006): 113–31. Harcourt, Bernard E. “On Gun Registration, the NRA, Adolf Hitler, and Nazi Gun Laws: Exploding the Gun Culture Wars (A Call to Historians).” Fordham Law Review 73 (2004): 653–80. Hardy, David. “NFA Database Seriously Flawed.” Of Arms & the Law, June 7, 2017. https://armsandthelaw.com/archives/2017 /06/nfa_database.php (accessed April 27, 2020). Heller v. District of Columbia (Heller II), 670 F.3d 1244 (D.C. Cir. 2011). Heller v. District of Columbia (Heller III), 801 F.3d 264 (D.C. Cir. 2015).

Houser, Charles, Chief, Nat’l Tracing Ctr., letter to Fed. Firearms Licensees 1. July 12, 2011. http://www.scribd.com/doc/61159256 /ATF-Multiple-Rifle-Sale-Reporting-Require ment-Letter (accessed April 27, 2020). Kleck, Gary, and E. Britt Patterson. “The Impact of Gun Control and Gun Ownership Levels on Violence Rates.” Journal of Quantitative Criminology 9 (1993): 249–87. Kopel, David B. “The First Amendment Guide to the Second Amendment.” Tennessee Law Review 81 (2014): 417–78. Kopel, David B., “Federalist No. 46—The Influence of the State and Federal Governments Compared, From the New York Packet (Madison).” Constituting America, June 30, 2010. https://constitutingamerica.org/june-30 -2010-%e2%80%93-federalist-no-46-%e 2%80%93-the-influence-of-the-state-and -federal-governments-compared-from-the -new-york-packet-madison-%e2%80%93 -guest-blogger-david-b-kopel-research-di/ (accessed May 8, 2020). Lamont v. Postmaster General. 381 U.S. 301 (1965). Magna Carta (1215). https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/education/resources/magna -carta/british-library-magna-carta-1215-runny mede/ (accessed April 27, 2020). Radelat, Ana. “State Strife Turned Rice into Leader.” Montgomery Advertiser, November 17, 2004, 1. Rhode v. Becerra. 18-CV-802-BEN (S.D. Cal. Apr. 23, 2020). https://michellawyers.com /wp-content/uploads/2020/04/2020-04-23 -Order-Granting-MPI.pdf (accessed May 8, 2020).

Gun Rights Policy Conference (GRPC) The Gun Rights Policy Conference (GRPC) is an annual three-day meeting held in the fall, usually the last weekend in September, by the Second Amendment Foundation

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(SAF) and the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA). The GRPC is an important tool for educating and training grassroots Second Amendment activists and for networking within the Second Amendment movement. Every year, the GRPC site changes, typically alternating between locations in the East and the West. A particular city is often selected because holding the conference there will facilitate the progress of gun rights groups that are already active in the area. For example, Seattle (in 1998) and St. Louis (in 1999) were host cities shortly after their states held ballot votes on gun laws. San Francisco (2010) and Chicago (2011) were selected to assist activists in areas where gun control support has heretofore been strong. Speakers at the conferences include U.S. senators and representatives, other elected officials, media personalities, officials from the NRA, leaders of local gun rights groups, and leaders of the firearms industry. They also include attorneys, scholars, activists, representatives of other civil liberties organizations that seek to work with gun owners (sometimes the American Civil Liberties Union or the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers), and, of course, staff from SAF and CCRKBA. Usually several hundred people attend, some of whom travel cross-country for every annual meeting. Attendees must pay for their own travel and lodging, but the conference itself is free, and the attendees receive large packets of books and other materials. The formal program of speakers aims to improve both the policy knowledge and the political/communication skills of the audience. In addition, a great deal of networking and exchanging of ideas takes place at receptions and in the hallways. The GRPC was first held in Seattle in 1985. Firearm manufacturers and other

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companies in the firearms business provide financial support for the event, as do national, state, and local gun rights organizations. The GRPC is much smaller than the annual convention of the National Rifle Association and the annual Shooting, Hunting, and Outdoor Trades Show (SHOT Show) presented by the National Shooting Sports Foundation, both of which draw tens of thousands of people. But at the NRA conventions and the SHOT Show, political and policy forums are relatively small parts of much bigger events. In contrast, the GRPC is tightly focused, and the only people who attend are persons with a high level of interest in Second Amendment activism. Thus, the GRPC is the largest policy-only meeting for gun rights activists. Over the years, the GRPC has developed into an important tool for promoting the success of activists. David B. Kopel See also: Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA); National Rifle Association (NRA); National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF); Second Amendment Foundation (SAF)

Further Reading National Shooting Sports Foundation. “NSSF SHOT Show 2020.” 2019. http://www.shot show.org/ (accessed November 17, 2019). Second Amendment Foundation. “Gun Rights Policy Conference.” n.d.-a. https://www.saf .org/grpc/ (accessed November 17, 2019). Second Amendment Foundation. “The Second Amendment Foundation.” n.d.-b. http:// www.saf.org (accessed November 17, 2019).

Gun Sales Records Today, due to a lack of records on private gun sales and other forms of transfer, it is nearly impossible for law enforcement

agencies to identify how dangerous individuals come to possess guns that are used in one or more violent crimes.

Current U.S. Federal and State Regulations The Legal Information Institute (LII) at Cornell Law School provides an electronic version of the code of federal regulations. Title 27, Chapter II, Subchapter B, Part 478, Subpart H of this code pertains to records for the commerce in firearms and ammunition. For each gun sold by a licensed dealer to a U.S. resident, section 478.124 requires the completion of a firearms transaction record, or ATF Form 4473. This form records information on the buyer such as their name, address, date of birth, sex, and race, and information on the gun being sold, including its type, serial number, caliber or gauge, and manufacturer and importer (ATF n.d.). For all gun sales, a licensed dealer must keep this completed form and any supporting documents for at least twenty years, after which the dealer can submit the form(s) to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) for continued storage (ATF, n.d.). If the dealer is going out of business, they must submit these forms to the ATF within thirty days of the business closing. Dealers may destroy all firearms transaction records for sales that occurred prior to December 16, 1968. There are other federal regulations for the collection and retention of firearm sale records by licensed dealers, including for multiple handgun sales, semiautomatic assault weapons, and more. Notably absent from the list of regulations is one pertaining to the collection and retention of gun sale records for guns sold by private residents. In the United States, there is no federal law requiring unlicensed residents to complete



background checks or documentation for guns sold or otherwise transferred to another resident (Cook, Molliconi, and Cole 1995; Cook and Gross 2014). Here, the term “transferred” refers to multiple channels of transfer, including the gifting, loss, theft, and passing down of a firearm. Only a few states and the District of Columbia have made steps to fill these gaps in federal law by requiring record keeping for gun transfers that occur between residents (Giffords Law Center n.d.). There exists a public perception that anyone can go to a gun show and buy a firearm without a background check or documentation of the sale. This is only somewhat true. Federal regulation section 478.100 defines the dealing of firearms at gun shows or other events dedicated to firearms. This regulation mandates that licensed dealers maintain firearms records for sales made at these events in the same way as guns sold at their licensed retail locations. The problematic aspect of gun shows, in terms of preventing gun trafficking and gun violence, is that unlicensed private residents may also sell guns at these events and these individuals are not liable to federal regulations for the documentation and retention of gun sale records.

The Importance of Gun Sale Records Many police agencies try to combat gun violence and trafficking in their jurisdictions by submitting information from recovered guns to the ATF for tracing. The Gun Control Act of 1968 provided for the establishment of the National Tracing Center, which was to be operated by ATF and would be responsible for tracing guns submitted by law enforcement agencies (ATF 2000, 2010). The act also required that all U.S. firearms be identified by a unique serial number, and that records be kept by

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manufacturers, importers, distributors, and any other federal firearm licensee for each gun transaction (Cook and Braga 2001). The resulting trace reports, submitted back to the agency by ATF, can provide information on the gun’s manufacturer, importer, dealer, first legal purchaser, the date that the gun was purchased, and more. One thing it cannot do, however, is describe what happened to the gun after it was sold by a licensed gun dealer, which is what the police care most about when attempting to uncover how criminals in their jurisdictions are obtaining and using guns to commit violent crimes. As shown above, federal law and state law in most states do not regulate private gun sales. The limited value of trace information becomes apparent when one considers that the average length of time between the gun being purchased from a licensed dealer and recovered by law enforcement is around eleven years (MAIG 2010). Consequently, many trace requests are unsuccessful due to the gun being purchased from a licensed dealer so long before it was recovered by law enforcement. For example, Collins and colleagues (2017) reported that trace requests were successful in only around 65 percent of cases, and that two of the top reasons for this finding included the dealer being out of business or having died and the gun being sold before record-keeping requirements. Arguably, these traces would have been successful, thereby providing law enforcement with valuable information about guns used in crimes, if more persons in between the gun’s first retail purchaser and the person who possessed the firearm when it was recovered by law enforcement were required to keep records of their gun transfers. Moreover, only about 20 percent of the individuals police recover guns from are the same individuals who purchased the

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firearm from a licensed dealer initially (Collins et al. 2017). It is likely that this figure would be even lower if recovered guns were restricted to only those used in a violent crime. Clearly, having information about the original retail purchaser is of limited value to gun trafficking and crime investigations. The point, then, is that the police can do very little with the resources currently available to them to effectively respond to the criminal acquisition of guns and the resulting gun violence that plagues many urban areas. Outside of tracing a gun to identify which state it came from and how old it is and trying to impel suspects to honestly describe how they gained possession of the firearm, investigators have few options. In addition, even if the resulting information is of some use to investigators, because there is no centralized repository of U.S. gun sale records that the ATF can search, the trace process often is a long and burdensome process, which can hinder criminal investigations (Giffords Law Center n.d.). Of course, maintaining records of gun sales is important for reasons outside of preventing criminals from obtaining and using guns to commit violent crime. Enacting state and federal laws that mandate gun sale record keeping for all gun sales would allow law enforcement to identify gun distributors who comply with these laws, and to charge gun traffickers who do not. It would also hold U.S. residents more responsible for who they sell their gun(s) to. These laws would provide the police with information on any guns purchased from a nonretailer by felons prior to their conviction so that the police could remove the gun(s) from their possession. Local and federal law enforcement agencies would also gain the ability to examine gun purchasing patterns among

domestic terrorists, mass murderers, and other dangerous persons, which could aid in the formation of policies that make it more difficult for these individuals to purchase guns. Importantly, it will require more than expanding federal and state laws on the collection and retention of gun sale records to reduce gun violence and trafficking in the United States. Thomas L. Scott See also: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF); Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence; Gun Control Act of 1968

Further Reading ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives). Commerce in Firearms in the United States. Washington, DC: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, 2000. ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives). eTrace Comprehensive User Manual. Washington, DC: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, 2010. ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives). “Firearms Transaction Record.” n.d. https://www.atf.gov/file/61446 /download (accessed May 28, 2019). Collins, Megan E., Susan T. Parker, Thomas L. Scott, and Charles F. Wellford. “A Comparative Analysis of Crime Guns.” RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences 3, no. 5 (2017): 96–127. Cook, Phillip J., and Anthony A. Braga. “Comprehensive Firearms Tracing: Strategic and Investigative Uses of New Data on Firearms Markets.” Arizona Law Review 43, no. 2 (2001): 277–309. Cook, Phillip J., and Kristin A. Goss. The Gun Debate: What Everyone Needs to Know. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014. Cook, Phillip J., Stephanie Molliconi, and Thomas B. Cole. “Regulating Gun Markets.”

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 86, no. 1 (1995): 59–92. Giffords Law Center. “Maintaining Records of Gun Sales.” n.d. https://lawcenter.giffords .org/gun-laws/policy-areas/gun-sales/main taining-records-of-gun-sales/ (accessed May 28, 2019). MAIG (Mayors against Illegal Guns). Trace the Guns: The Link between Gun Laws and Interstate Gun Trafficking. New York: Mayors Against Illegal Guns, 2010.

Gun Show Loophole. See Gun Shows Gun Shows Gun shows are routinely promoted by individuals or organizations who rent venues and charge for admission and display tables or booths. The venues are typically at county fairgrounds or other large public facilities, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF 2007) estimates that there are 2,500–5,200 held annually (see also Matthay et al. 2017). These events resemble antique shows and flea markets far more than dog or horse shows, in that most of the displays are for the sale of firearms or firearms-related items such as scopes, holsters, books, and ammunition components. Thus, the events are dominated by dealers rather than collectors for rare items. The vast majority of firearms that are displayed for sale are modern and generally are not sporting arms. Federal law and regulations allow licensed firearms dealers (FFLs) to sell at gun shows provided they display their license and comply with all ATF recordkeeping requirements and regulations, including recording the place of sale (ATF 2010). Furthermore, dealers at gun shows

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who are licensed in the state where the show takes place may dispose of handguns to residents of the state where the gun show is as long as the purchaser is over twenty-one years old and all provisions of the Brady Law are met; dispose of long guns to residents of any state, provided the purchaser is at least eighteen years old and the laws of both states are complied with and all provisions of the Brady Law are met; dispose of guns to any FFL; acquire firearms from any FFL licensed in the state and from any nonlicensed individual; and take orders of any firearm from a nonlicensee and ship the order to a licensee in the purchaser’s state of residence, where the purchaser may take possession of the firearm, provided the provisions of the Brady Law are followed. Dealers not licensed in the state may do all the above, except they may not dispose of handguns or long guns. They may also ship curio or relic firearms from the show to any other FFL (ATF 2010). In addition to having regulations for dealers at guns shows, there are restrictions on residents from in state or out of state regulating their activities at these gun shows. According to the ATF (2010), nonlicensed residents of the state where the gun show is being held may acquire handguns or long guns from FFLs licensed in the state, provided that all provisions of the Brady Law are met; may dispose of personal firearms to any FFL; and may acquire from and dispose of personal firearms to nonlicensed residents of the state, but nonlicensed individuals may not be in the business of dealing firearms without an FFL. In addition, nonlicensed residents of the state in which the gun show is held may not acquire or dispose of firearms from/to nonlicensed residents of another state and cannot ship in interstate commerce any lawfully acquired firearm. Nonlicensed residents from another

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state may dispose of firearms to any FFL; acquire long guns from FFLs licensed in the state as long as both states’ laws are followed and the Brady Law; and may order firearms from any FFL and have them shipped from the show to an FFL in their state, but cannot acquire handguns or either acquire from or dispose of firearms to nonlicensed individuals (ATF 2010). State law does not regulate gun show activity in most states; however, in states with licensing and waiting periods, pointof-sale delivery is either restricted or prohibited (Wintemute et al. 2010). One example is California, which requires reporting and a waiting period for virtually all gun sales. Other than California, few states have any laws regulating gun shows. The three leading sources of guns used in crime in 2020 were Florida, Georgia, and Texas (ATF 2021), none of which regulate gun shows or private-party gun sales (Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence n.d.). In addition to licensed dealers, casual sellers, collectors, and unlicensed dealers display at these shows. Approximately 50–75 percent of vendors at gun shows are FFLs (U.S. Department of the Treasury and U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacsco, Firearms and Explosives 1999). A study by Wintemute (2007) asserted that only 30 percent of gun vendors are licensed retailers, contrary to the ATF’s claims, and further estimated 25–50 percent of all vendors at all guns shows are unlicensed. However, because of the nature of the shows, the first two groups are not well represented among those displaying at tables, and Wintemute (2013) later suggested that his 30 percent estimate was “almost certainly low” (p. 23). A casual seller with only one or two firearms to sell must pay for a table to display those

firearms, thus increasing the cost of transaction. A casual seller is more likely to carry a firearm around the show in hopes of selling it to a dealer or another attendee without a table. Collectors do attend specific shows that attract other serious collectors but represent only a small minority at the typical fairgrounds show. Serious collectors tend to specialize in specific genre and require focused events that attract others of like interest. Most gun shows depend upon attracting a large number of attendees to survive. Thus, they draw both casual and serious gun enthusiasts in much larger numbers than serious, specialized collectors. Although an estimated 80 percent of firearms used in crimes are acquired through unlicensed sellers (Vittes, Vernick, and Webster 2013), research has found mixed results as to whether the occurrence of gun shows is correlated with increases in gun deaths or injuries. For instance, Matthay and colleagues found that gun shows in California did not increase firearm injuries locally, but when guns were purchased at shows in neighboring Nevada, short-term increases were found. The authors subsequently attributed their findings to the stringent regulations of California as a potential deterrent for illicit gun use. A study by Duggan, Hjalmarsson, and Jacob (2011) found that gun shows in neither California nor Texas increased gun homicides or suicides, arguing that the effects of California’s tighter regulations may have been overstated. Wintemute and colleagues (2010) countered Duggan and colleagues’ earlier unpublished version of these findings, citing significant methodological flaws in the study. Both gun shows and efforts to regulate gun shows have generated controversy. The ATF has no specific program directed at regulating gun shows but does investigate

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gun shows. Seventy-seven percent of ATF investigative operations at gun shows from FY 2004 through FY 2006 were in pursuit of a specific target. The ATF asserts that “as a rule . . . no enforcement action, such as arrests or firearms seizures, [take place] during the gun shows” (ATF 2007). A review of illegal gun-trafficking cases revealed approximately 30 percent of the guns involved could be linked to gun shows. Although some cases involve guns being purchased by prohibited persons at gun shows and subsequently used in crimes, more often the firearms are purchased by intermediaries for resale (Wintemute et al. 2010). For instance, a firearm used to murder a Seattle police officer was traced back to an unlicensed dealer selling at gun shows. An investigation initiated by the city of New York using undercover buyers revealed that the majority of sellers were willing to sell even when the buyer indicated that they were likely not legally allowed to purchase the gun (Gun Show Undercover: Report on Illegal Sales at Gun Shows 2009). Enforcement efforts directed at gun shows by ATF and local authorities have resulted in intense political reaction from gun rights groups (U.S. Government Accountability Office 2009; Vizzard 2000). The resulting political pressure, combined with the existing definition of engaging in the firearms business, facilitate unregulated dealing at gun shows (Gun Show Undercover: Report on Illegal Sales at Gun Shows 2009; Vizzard 2015). The ATF has historically limited enforcement activity at gun shows to avoid congressional hostility, and current law requires proof of pursuit of livelihood and profit to charge a seller as an unlicensed dealer (Vizzard 2015). The nature of gun shows provides the unlicensed dealer with significant advantages over the reputable and law-abiding licensed dealer, who must

check for criminal record, demand identification, record the purchaser’s identification, and pay sales tax. William J. Vizzard See also: Black Market for Firearms; Collectors; Gun Control; National Association of Firearms Retailers (NAFR); National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF)

Further Reading ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives). “The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives’ Investigative Operations at Gun Shows.” June 2007. http://www.justice.gov/oig/reports /ATF/e0707/final.pdf (accessed January 29, 2022). ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives). Categories Associated with Firearms Recovered and Traced in the United States and Territories. December 8, 2021. https://www.atf.gov/resource -center/docs/report/2020-firearms-trace -data-categor ies-associated-f irear ms -recovered-and/download (accessed January 29, 2022). ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives). “Gun Show Guidelines.” 2010. https://www.atf.gov/file/56651/down load (accessed June 13, 2022). Duggan, Mark, Randi Hjalmarsson, and Brian A. Jacob. “The Short-Term and Localized Effect of Gun Shows: Evidence from California and Texas.” Review of Economics and Statistics 93, no. 3 (2011): 786–99. Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. Gun Shows. https://giffords.org/law center/gun-laws/policy-areas/gun-sales /gun-shows/#footnote_0_5635 (accessed January 29, 2022). Gun Show Undercover: Report on Illegal Sales at Gun Shows. 2009. http://www.nyc .gov/html/om/pdf/2009/pr442-09_report .pdf (accessed January 29, 2022).

380 | Gun Violence Archive (GVA) Matthay, Ellicott C., Jessica Galin, Kara E. Rudolph, Kriszta Farkas, Garen J. Wintemute, and Jennifer Ahern. “In-State and Interstate Associations Between Gun Shows and Firearm Deaths and Injuries: A Quasi-experimental Study.” Annals of Internal Medicine 167, no. 12 (2017): 837–44. U.S. Department of the Treasury, and U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacsco, Firearms and Explosives. “Gun Shows: Brady Checks and the Crime Gun Traces.” January 1999. https://www.atf.gov /resource-center/docs/guide/gun-shows -brady-checks-and-crime-gun-traces-199 /download (accessed June 13, 2022). U.S. Government Accountability Office. Firearms Trafficking: U.S. Efforts to Combat Arms Trafficking to Mexico Face Planning and Coordination Challenges. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Accountability Office, GAO-09-709, June 2009. http:// w w w.gao.gov/new.items /d09709.pd f (accessed January 29, 2022). Vittes, Katherine A., Jon S. Vernick, and Daniel W. Webster. “Legal Status and Source of Offenders’ Firearms in States with the Least Stringent Criteria for Gun Ownership.” Injury Prevention 19, no. 1 (2013): 26–31. Vizzard, William J. “The Current and Future State of Gun Policy in the United States.” Journal of Criminal Law & Criminology 104, no. 4 (2015): 879–904. Vizzard, William J. Shots in the Dark: Policy Politics and Symbolism of Gun Control. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000. Wintemute, Garen J. “Background Checks for Firearm Transfers.” Violence Policy Research Program, 2013. https://m.ucdmc. ucdavis.edu /vpr p /CBC%20White%20 Paper%20Final%20Report%20022013.pdf (accessed January 29, 2022). Wintemute, Garen J. “Gun Shows across a Multistate American Gun Market: Observational Evidence of the Effects of Regulatory Policies.” Injury Prevention 13 (2007): 150–85. http://injuryprevention.bmj

.com/content/13/3/150.full.pdf (accessed January 29, 2022). Wintemute, Garen J., David Hemenway, Daniel Webster, Glenn Pierce, and Anthony A. Braga. “Gun Shows and Gun Violence: Fatally Flawed Study Yields Misleading Results.” Health Policy and Ethics 100 (2010): 1856–60.

Gun Violence Archive (GVA) In recent years, gun violence has emerged as one of the United States’ primary social concerns. Many attribute this new political momentum to the wave of organized activism that followed the shooting at Marjory Stoneman High School in Parkland, Florida, in February 2018 that left seventeen dead and seventeen others seriously injured. That same month, the Chicago Police Department reported over 250 shootings in their city in the first two months of 2018. Around the country, thousands “marched for their lives,” demanding that both federal and state legislators do something about the perceived increase in gun violence. Yet, the lack of comprehensive official data related to gun violence has made the creation of evidence-based policy efforts virtually impossible. Currently, the only source of official data that captures shootings known to police at the incident level is the National IncidentBased Reporting System (NIBRS), a part of the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting Program. Although NIBRS has many strengths over other official data sources, it also has its shortcomings. For instance, there is a significant time lag between when the data is collected and when it is released. Indeed, the 2015 NIBRS data was not released until September of 2017—a full twenty-one-month lag. In addition, participation in NIBRS is not mandatory, and only approximately

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37 percent of all U.S. law enforcement agencies participate. In fact, the four most populated states in the country—California, Texas, Florida, and New York—currently do not report data on gun violence to NIBRS. In response to these issues, several nongovernmental organizations and media outlets have made attempts to record the true extent of gun violence in the United States. The most successful is the Gun Violence Archive (GVA). The GVA was originally established in the Fall of 2012 as an independent research organization dedicated to creating a centralized database on gun violence-related deaths. The goals of the GVA have since expanded to provide comprehensive information about gun violence more broadly. Specifically, in late 2013, the GVA expanded its definition of gun violence to include: all incidents of death or injury or threat with firearms without pejorative judgment within the definition. Violence is defined without intent or consequence as a consideration. To that end a shooting of a victim by a subject/suspect is considered gun violence as is a defensive use or an officer involved shooting. The act itself, no matter the reason is violent in nature. (Gun Violence Archive 2019) The GVA updates publicly available data on their website in near real time using their own sophisticated method of locating and cataloging incidents. The information included in the database is collected from over 2,500 law enforcement, media, government, and commercial sources daily by a team of researchers. This is done using automated and manual searches through local and state police records, media outlets, other data aggregates, and government reports. Once located, incidents are filtered

through two validation processes. Next, they are coded for the presence of 120 incident characteristics before being added to the database along with a brief description of the event and a link to a media outlet covering the incident. Once coded, the incident is then added to the daily summary ledger—a count of the most requested data, including the total number of incidents, deaths/injuries, children and teen deaths/injuries, mass shootings, officer-involved incidents, home invasions, defensive uses, and unintentional shootings for the year. Since 2014, the GVA has successfully identified and recorded over 275,000 incidents of gun violence. The GVA successfully evades two of the main shortcomings of official data sources. By relying on nonofficial sources of information, such as media reports, they have avoided the issue of agency nonparticipation and have eliminated the time lag by conducting daily updates. The descriptions of the incidents usually include valuable information, including incident location, date, and characteristics of both the suspects and victims (e.g., age, sex, injury/ death/arrest status). When possible, other incident characteristics, such as the believed motive and features of the guns involved, are also coded. As the GVA keeps track of such details, they are able to create various reports, such as police-involved shootings, accidental shootings, and shootings involving children that are of special interest to the public, media, and policy makers alike. The GVA also provides crime statistics by congressional district and state legislator district, along with the contact information for each jurisdiction’s respective politicians. Despite these efforts, no data are perfect, and it is still possible that the GVA may underestimate the true nature and extent of

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gun violence in the United States. For example, although the GVA uses a team of researchers to locate incidents, it is still possible that some are overlooked. Indeed, two deadly mass shooting incidents—the 2014 execution-style shooting of the Sun family of four in Harris County, Texas, and the 2016 quadruple murder of Michael Adams, Jennifer Leasure, Michael Royal, and Lachelle Powell in Rochester, New York—were notably absent from the GVA at the time that this article was written. Furthermore, the GVA does not collect information on race, religion, mental health status, nationality, or political affiliations for victims or subjects/perpetrators. Even with these shortcomings, the GVA is undoubtedly the most comprehensive publicly available database on gun violence in the United States dating back to 2014. The data has been featured in major news outlets, including the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, CNN, FOX, and the BBC. It has also been referenced in studies published in respected academic journals, including the American Journal of Public Health, Translational Behavioral Medicine, and Drug and Alcohol Dependence. Although not without flaws, the data being collected by the GVA are the best option for studying gun violence in real time and making informed opinions and decisions. Kristen J. Neville See also: Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting; Mass Murder (Shootings); School Shootings; Workplace Shootings

Further Reading Behrman, Pamela, Colleen A. Redding, Sheela Raja, Tamara Newton, Nisha Beharie, and Destiny Printz. “Society of Behavioral Medicine (SBM) Position Statement: Restore

CDC Funding for Firearms and Gun Violence Prevention Research.” Translational Behavioral Medicine 8, no. 6 (2018): 958–61. Conner, Andrew, Deborah Azrael, Vivian H. Lyons, Catherine Barber, and Matthew Miller. “Validating the National Violent Death Reporting System as a Source of Data on Fatal Shootings of Civilians by Law Enforcement Officers.” American Journal of Public Health 109, no. 4 (2019): 578–84. Gun Violence Archive. “Methodology.” 2019. https://www.gunviolencearchive.org/metho dology (accessed June 1, 2019). Stein, Michael D., Shannon R. Kenney, Bradley J. Anderson, and Genie L. Bailey. “Loaded: Gun Involvement among Opioid Users.” Drug and Alcohol Dependence 187 (April 2018): 205–11.

Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem Firearm injuries are a major public health problem in the United States. On an average day between 2000 and 2018, firearms were used to kill ninety-four people (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC] 2020). This number has increased from 78 people killed per day with firearms in 2000, to 108 people killed per day with firearms in 2018. Each day, guns were also used in the commission of about 1,000 crimes. On average, it is estimated that in recent years, over 200 people each day were treated in U.S. emergency departments with nonfatal firearm injuries, over one-third of which resulted in hospitalization. Compared to rates in other high-income countries, U.S. rates of property crime and violent crime are unremarkable. What distinguishes the United States is its high rate



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of lethal violence, most of which involves guns. In 2015, the U.S. homicide rate was 7.5 times higher than that of other high-income nations, driven by a firearm homicide rate that was 24.9 times higher. For example, among fifteen- to twenty-four-year-olds, the U.S. gun homicide rate was 31.1 times higher (the non-gun homicide rate was 2.6 times higher), and the U.S. gun suicide rate was 10.6 times higher. The total gun-death rate in this age group was 23.3 times higher. Gunshot wounds can lead to permanent disability. For example, spinal cord injuries from firearms tend to be more serious than those caused by other traumatic injuries, resulting in more morbidity, disability, and higher financial cost. Gunshot wounds are more likely to lead to paraplegia and complete spinal cord injury than traumatic spinal cord injuries caused by falls or motor vehicle collisions. The medical costs of gunshot wounds from hospital admissions are estimated to be between $600 and $900 million annually. The mean cost of an inpatient hospitalization for a gunshot injury is about $22,000. Over one-third of the initial costs of hospitalization are covered by Medicaid. The disability, pain, grief, and fear caused by gun violence in the United States are likely incalculable. The best decades-old estimate, derived from asking people how much they would pay to reduce gun violence, is that the cost of gun violence in the United States is about $100 billion per year (Cook and Ludwig 2000). The psychological costs of firearm trauma can be long lasting. For example, among traumatic injuries, interpersonal gunshot injuries were more likely than unintentional injuries to lead to the development of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Among firearm-related injury

readmissions, 6.7 percent were due to acute stress disorder or post-traumatic stress disorder. Firearm injury to children has been linked to high rates of PTSD. Chronic posttraumatic stress disorder following firearm injury is common: in one study, over half of those who survived a firearm injury screened positive for PTSD six to twelve months after injury. Compared with those who survived motor vehicle crashes, those who survived a firearm injury had more than three times the odds of screening positive for PTSD. Even witnessing firearm violence can have serious psychological consequences. A recent review of the literature found that exposure to mass shootings was associated with an increase in PTSD symptoms, anxiety, and depression (Shultz et al. 2014). The severity and proximity of exposure to the mass shooting was strongly associated with mental health issues. Through most of the twentieth century, gun assaults were seen almost exclusively as a criminal justice problem, gun suicides as a mental health problem, and unintentional gunshot wounds as a safety issue. Since the mid-1980s, it has become increasingly recognized that gun injuries are also a serious public health problem, though gun violence research is still underfunded and understudied. Public health involvement in gun issues has many beneficial consequences. First, it broadens the issue from one that is exclusively focused on crime to one that is concerned with all firearm injuries—unintentional as well as intentional, self-inflicted as well as other-inflicted. After all, from the surgeon’s perspective, treating a bullet in the head is the same whether the wound occurred during a robbery, a suicide attempt, or adolescent horseplay.

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Second, public health adds new data sources (e.g., the National Center for Health Statistics, the National Health Interview survey, the National Violent Death Reporting System), new analytic tools (e.g., an emphasis on surveillance data, epidemiological analysis of risk factors, cohort and case-control analyses), and new research professionals from the public health and medical communities. Much of the current scientific knowledge about guns and gun injuries has come from their research. Third, public health attracts new practitioners and organizations into the arena. Physicians, for example, have firsthand experience concerning the human and medical implications of gunshot wounds and the long-term consequences of injury, and their testimony carries much weight. Public health offers a broader lens to supplement physicians’ individual patient focus on treatment with a focus on population-level prevention. Public health is not merely an academic specialty, but a government responsibility, as well. Agencies such as the CDC, the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and the U.S. Public Health Service, along with state and local health departments have the potential to reduce gun violence. The government can also reduce firearm violence by creating good data systems and providing funding for researchers who are actively working to prevent firearm violence through increased understanding of this issue. Finally, the public health approach emphasizes that there are many reasonable and beneficial interventions that can reduce gun violence. Public health professionals believe that their can-do attitude, as demonstrated by their past successes, inspires hope for fundamentally reducing our firearm injury problem. David Hemenway and Erin Grinshteyn

See also: Accidents; Center for Gun Policy and Research; Guns in the Home; Suicide, Guns and; Suicide, International Comparisons; Victimization from Gun Violence; Violence Prevention Research Program (VPRP); Youth and Guns

Further Reading Bonnie, Richard J., Carolyn E. Fulco, and Catharyn T. Liverman, eds. Reducing The Burden of Injury: Advancing Prevention and Treatment. Washington, DC: National Academies Press, 1999. CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention). “WISQARS: Fatal Injury Reports, National, Regional and State, 1981–2020” [Database]. 2020. https://wisqars.cdc.gov /fatal-reports (accessed June 13, 2022). Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. Gun Violence: The Real Costs. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. Grinshteyn, Erin, and David Hemenway. “Violent Death Rates in the U.S. Compared to Those of the Other High-Income Countries, 2015.” Preventive Medicine 123 (2019): 20–26. Hemenway, David. Private Guns, Public Health. University of Michigan Press, 2017. Hemenway, David, and Matthew Miller. “Counterpoint: Reducing Firearm Violence—Why a Public Health Approach Is Helpful.” Journal of Policy Analysis and Management 38, no. 3 (2019): 795–801. Hemenway, David, and Eliot Nelson. “The Scope of the Problem: Gun Violence in the USA.” Current Trauma Reports 6, no. 1 (2020): 29–35. Shultz, James M., Siri Thoresen, Brian W. Flynn, Glenn W. Muschert, Jon A. Shaw, Zelde Espinel, Frank G. Walter, et al. “Multiple Vantage Points on the Mental Health Effects of Mass Shootings.” Current Psychiatry Reports 16 (2014): 469. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11920-014-0469-5 (accessed June 13, 2022).



Gun World. See Periodicals, Guns Gunfighters. See Frontier Violence Gun-Free Business Practices Gun-free business practices are policies put into place by private establishments that dictate that no firearms may be carried within their space by either employees or patrons. They are a version of “zero tolerance” policies (Burleson 2018), which aim, in this case, to remove and/or prevent threatening or disruptive behavior in commercial settings, especially violence. Unlike most zero tolerance efforts, however, the sanctions imposed for violations of gunfree business practices are often minimal or nonexistent (Khoury 2017). Further, policies excluding weapons from business settings are the subject of controversy within policymaking, academic, and business circles (Chiappetta 2019; Schur 2015). Though the safety goals of such policies are consistently lauded (Morral et al. 2018), there are substantial disputes about their legality, effectiveness, ethics, and fairness. Legally, every state allows for the concealed carry of firearms, though the specific parameters of licensing and restrictions vary from state to state. Some states, including Georgia, Missouri, Oklahoma, and Tennessee, have “guns everywhere” policies that do as the name suggests and permit citizens to be armed at almost any location, including schools, bars, and government buildings. Contrast this with Michigan, for example, where weapons are permitted in general but forbidden in sporting arenas, schools, hospitals, and bars (Bartkowiak 2020).

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Federal law is clear that a property owner maintains the right to enact prohibitions on the carrying of firearms on their property by either customers or employees (Quinn 2017). This is due, in part, to the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals’ decision in GeorgiaCarry.Org, Inc. v. Georgia (2010), which held that the right of an owner to exert control over their property was “sacred and inviolable.” As such, property rights trumped the Second Amendment rights of citizens to carry firearms, as well as state laws granting broad leeway to carry weapons in diverse settings (Smith 2011). In short, a business owner retains the right to set gun policy within their business. Though the right of business owners to implement them is clear, for gun-free business practices to be effective, there needs to be an enforcement mechanism in place, which is often lacking or inconsistent (Smith 2019). For any policy to carry weight, there needs to be some sanction attached in case of policy violations, and states vary widely in how the criminal law is applied relative to the enforcement of gun-free business practices. For example, in Kansas, the business owner/proprietor must verbally request that a gun-carrying patron leave the premises before the policy violator will be subject to trespassing sanctions (Quinn 2017). Texas, on the other hand, requires signage that carries the weight of the law on its own. There, no verbal warnings are necessary to place violators in jeopardy of criminal trespassing charges, which are considered misdemeanors and are punishable by fines of up to $2,000 (Browning 2016; Texas Parks & Wildlife n.d.; Quinn 2017). Such inconsistencies across state lines are especially relevant to retail chains and other large businesses because the discrepancies make

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A sign reading “Guns Not Allowed On Premises” is displayed prominently on the window of a retail store in New York City. Gun-free business policies allow private establishments to prohibit employees and customers from carrying firearms on the premises. (photo_chaz/ iStockphoto.com)

crafting gun-free policies that apply nationwide effectively impossible (Martin 2018). Legal inconsistencies regarding sanctions are only one potential hindrance to the effectiveness of gun-free business practices. As with most gun control policies, cultural concerns exist for the business owner considering banning weapons in his or her establishment (Schur 2015). Among these is whether the clientele of the business favors or opposes such a measure, as well as the viewpoints of employees. Employee willingness to enforce bans is also relevant. Ethically, proponents of gun-free business practices often base their support on the idea that such policies protect employees, customers, and ultimately businesses themselves, and that safety is of the highest ethical importance (Morral et al. 2018). However, critics argue that the right to selfdefense is inalienable and is not surrendered while engaged in commerce (Hsiao 2017).

According to this criticism, if people have any right to bear arms for purposes of selfdefense, that right should always exist unless the agents responsible for denying it provide equivalent protection in its stead (Hsiao 2017). Since there is no plausible means by which business owners could or would offer their patrons such protection, the ethics of gun-free business policies are suspect, according to this view. Relatedly, opponents of gun-free business practices worry that their implementation can result in the creation of “soft targets,” meaning that gun-free environments become known as relatively defenseless places and therefore suitable for attack (Kirby, Anklam, and Dietz 2016). In other words, the concern over “gun-free zones” is that the perceived defenselessness of the people within them will attract shooters (Lott 2014), such that a gun-free business (especially one with signage indicating it



to be so) is a more attractive target for violence. Empirical research generally does not support the soft-target argument, particularly as lethality increases. Research shows that approximately 90 percent of mass shootings that resulted in the deaths of at least six people have been outside of gun-free zones or have taken place in the presence of law enforcement (Webster et al. 2016). Further, Fox and Fridel (2016) report that mass shooters rarely target gun-free zones. Although such findings indicate that the “soft target” concern may be overstated, they do little to diminish the intuitive appeal of the idea. Many people believe that being unarmed is a vulnerability, and so gun-free business practices continue to be scrutinized on those grounds. Finally, some worry over the fairness of zero tolerance policy implementation, including as embodied by gun-free business practices. Specifically, concern exists that gun-free business practices might effectively target minority populations, particularly African Americans. There is evidence within academic research to suggest that zero tolerance policies are generally enforced against minorities disproportionately (Burleson 2018). This fear is also reasonable considering persistent evidence that minorities are often perceived as dangerous, especially with respect to firearms (Gardner 2007). Gun-free business practices are intended to protect employees, customers, and business concerns, all of which are widely accepted as ethical and just purposes. However, there is tremendous disagreement about the effectiveness of such measures, and laws governing their implementation are inconsistent and sometimes contradictory. Ethics and perceptions of fairness are also serious issues that will vary by

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community, demography, and political alignment. Business owners need to consider the legal landscape at the state and federal level, but also the cultural leanings of their customers and employees when they consider whether to enact gun-free policies. Marcus Tyler Carey See also: Concealed Weapons Laws; Open Carry Laws; Racism and Gun Control

Further Reading Bartkowiak, Dave. “Understanding Michigan’s Gun Laws—Not as Straightforward as You Might Think.” Clickondetroit.com, February 14, 2020. https://www.clickondetroit.com /news/2019/08/05/understanding-michigans -gun-laws-not-as-straightforward-as-you -might-think/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Browning, John G. “What Texas Companies Need to Know about Open-Carry.” D Magazine, April 25, 2016. https://www.dmagazine .com/publications/d-ceo/2016/may/open -carry-gun-law-texas-business/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Burleson, Lamarra. “Zero Tolerance Policy Analysis.” PhD dissertation, California State University, Northridge, 2018. Chiappetta, Clare. “Firearms at Work: Good Precaution or Bad Policy?” Human Resources Certification Institute, October 4, 2019. https://www.hrci.org/community /blogs-and-announcements/hr-leads-busi ness-blog/hr-leads-business/2019/10/04 /how-should-employers-treat-guns-at-the -workplace (accessed May 18, 2022). Fox, James Alan, and Emma E. Fridel. “The Tenuous Connections Involving Mass Shootings, Mental Illness, and Gun Laws.” Violence and Gender 3, no. 1 (2016): 14–19. Gardner, Bonita R. “Separate and Unequal: Federal Tough-On-Guns Program Targets Minority Communities for Selective Enforcement.” Michigan Journal of Race and Law 12, no. 2 (2007): 305–49.

388 | Gun-Free School Laws Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Location Restrictions.” 2018. https:// lawcenter.giffords.org/gun-laws/policy -areas/guns-in-public/location-restrictions/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Hsiao, Timothy. “The Ethics of ‘Gun-Free Zones.’” Philosophia 45, no. 2 (2017): 659–76. Khoury, George. “Can a Business Prohibit Guns?” FindLaw, January 4, 2017. https:// blogs.findlaw.com/free_enterprise/2017 /01/can-a-business-prohibit-guns.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Kirby, Adam, Charles E. Anklam, and J. Eric Dietz. “Active Shooter Mitigation for GunFree Zones.” In 2016 IEEE Symposium on Technologies for Homeland Security (HST), 1–6. IEEE, 2016. Lott, John R. “The Cruelty of Gun-Free Zones.” National Review, January 31, 2014. https://www.nationalreview.com/2014/01 /cruelty-gun-free-zones-john-r-lott-jr/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Martin, Craig. “What Is Starbucks’ Gun Policy?” Concealedcarry.com, March 8, 2018. https://www.concealedcarry.com/firearms -ownership/what-is-starbucks-gun-policy/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Morral, Andrew R., Terry L. Schell, and Margaret Tankard. The Magnitude and Sources of Disagreement among Gun Policy Experts. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2018. Quinn, Christine M. “Reforming State Laws on How Businesses Can Ban Guns ‘No Guns’ Signs, Property Rights, and the First Amendment.” University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform 50, no. 4 (2017): 955–87. Schur, Matt. “Workplace Gun Policies: What Your Small Business Should Know.” National Federation of Independent Businesses, June 8, 2015. https://www.nfib.com /content/resources/legal/workplace-gun -policies-what-your-small-business-should -know-bizhelp-69667/ (accessed May 18, 2022).

Smith, Maya. “No Guns Allowed: A Look at Local Gun Policies.” Memphis Flyer, October 25, 2019. https://www.memphisflyer .com/NewsBlog/archives/2019/10/25/no -guns-allowed-a-look-at-local-gun-policies (accessed May 18, 2022). Smith, Robert. “Georgiacarry.org, Inc. v. Georgia.” The Urban Lawyer 43, no. 3 (2011): 911–12. Texas Parks & Wildlife. n.d. https://tpwd .texas.gov/publications/nonpwdpubs/water _issues/rivers/navigation/riddell/trespass .phtml (accessed May 18, 2022). Webster, Daniel W., John J. Donohue III, Louis Klarevas, Cassandra K. Crifasi, Jon S. Vernick, David Jernigan, Holly C. Wilcox, Sara B. Johnson, Sheldon Greenberg, and Emma E. McGinty. Firearms on College Campuses: Research Evidence and Policy Implications. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, 2016. https://www.jhsph.edu/research/centers -and-institutes/johns-hopkins-center-for -g u n-violence-prevention-and-policy /_archive-2019/_pdfs/GunsOnCampus.pdf (accessed June 13, 2022).

Gun-Free School Laws With the increase in school shootings and mounting public concern with the perceived unsafe conditions at American schools, the federal government and various states have enacted laws, frequently called gun-free school laws or weapon-free school laws, designed to remove crime and violence from educational institutions by attempting to eliminate the possession of guns and other weapons on or near school property. Federal laws establish certain common standards, but the requirements vary greatly from state to state. Federal laws mandate the criminal prosecution of any individual who brings a firearm within a certain distance of school property if the



firearm has traveled in interstate commerce, as well as the suspension of students who possess weapons on school grounds. As of 2020, over forty states have enacted laws banning or criminalizing the possession of all firearms on or in close proximity to school property. In some states, this ban applies to students, while in others, it applies to any individual carrying a firearm or weapon within a certain distance of school property. A few states go even further and specify that the parents of a minor who brings a weapon to school are liable for their child’s actions. In recent years, gun rights advocates have sharply criticized these laws and there have been some moves to slow expansion, or even roll back, state laws. The most expansive attempt by Congress to legislate in this area came with the GunFree School Zones Act of 1990, which attempted to prohibit the possession of any firearm within 1,000 feet of any school in the country. The legislation passed Congress almost unanimously. However, in 1995, this legislation was held to be unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in United States v. Lopez; the court ruled that the law exceeded the scope of Congress’s constitutional powers under the commerce clause. In the aftermath of Lopez, Congress amended the Gun-Free School Zones Act. As amended, the Gun-Free School Zones Act prohibits the knowing possession or discharge of a firearm within 1,000 feet of a school if the firearm has traveled in interstate commerce. In addition to the interstate requirement, the law has limits as it does not apply to people licensed by a state or locality to possess a gun or cover when the firearm is unloaded or in a locked container. Overall, the law has not been aggressively enforced.

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Under its spending clause powers, Congress enacted the Gun-Free School Act of 1994, which requires each state receiving federal funds under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act to enact laws requiring the expulsion of any student who brings a gun to school. The law was revised in 2002 but continues to encourage state legislators to enact gun-free school laws penalizing students who are caught with any kind of weapon on school grounds. As the punishment for violating these laws is immediate expulsion, they have also been labeled “zero tolerance laws.” Forty-seven states and the District of Columbia have state laws to prohibit carrying or possessing a firearm on K–12 school property, within safe school or gun-free school zones, on school-provided transportation, or at school-sponsored events. Only Hawaii, New Hampshire, and Wyoming do not generally prohibit people from bringing guns onto the property of K–12 schools. New Mexico and South Dakota’s provisions do not apply to private schools. There are five additional states (Delaware, Kansas, Michigan, Oregon, and Utah) that do allow concealed weapons permit holders to carry guns at K–12 schools. The motivation for gun-free school laws is the hope that school shootings can be significantly reduced and a safer learning environment can be created for our schools. Critics have argued that the administration of schools has traditionally been a state and local function, and that local law enforcement communities know best what is needed in their areas. There have also been increased arguments that gun-free laws are actually counterproductive. For example, during his presidential campaign, Donald Trump drew attention for saying that these laws prevent teachers and others from arming themselves so that they

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Schools display gun-free signs, like the one seen here at an Atlantic City, New Jersey, school, to indicate that firearms cannot be brought on site. Most states designate schools as “gun-free zones,” making it criminal to have firearms on or near school grounds. (Christian Ouellet/ Shutterstock.com)

can stop an active shooter, and by leaving schools vulnerable, they increase the chance of attacks. A 2020 RAND Corporation review of the literature confirms that, to date, no systematic studies have been published that show conclusive evidence of the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of gun-free school laws. James A. Beckman and John W. Dietrich See also: School Shootings; Youth and Guns

Further Reading Chamberlin, Carl. “Johnny Can’t Read ’Cause Jane’s Got a Gun: The Effects of Guns in Schools, and Options after Lopez.”

Cornell Journal of Law and Public Policy 8 (1999): 281–346. Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Guns in Schools.” https://giffords.org /lawcenter/gun-laws/policy-areas/guns-in -public/guns-in-schools/ (accessed January 18, 2022). RAND Corporation. “The Effects of GunFree Zones.” https://www.rand.org/research /gun-policy/analysis/gun-free-zones.html (accessed July 10, 2020). Shaw, Kerry. “What Is a ‘Gun-Free Zone,’ and What’s Behind the Movement to Get Rid of Them?” The Trace, March 16, 2017. https://www.thetrace.org/2017/03/gun -free-zone-facts/ (accessed May 18, 2022).

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Gunpowder Gunpowder historically falls into two main categories: black powder and smokeless powder. Black powder is a composition of potassium nitrate (saltpeter), charcoal, and sulfur. Smokeless powder is composed of nitrocellulose and various additives. Black powder was used in China for fireworks over a millennium ago; its use in firearms appears to be a European invention. It is known to have been employed in firearms sometime in the early fourteenth century. It was initially used in dust form, in which it burned rather slowly when packed into a gun. In artillery, a tight-fitting wooden disk had to be driven atop the powder below the cannonball before the cannonball was loaded to permit the powder to burn and gas pressure to build before it began moving the projectile. In the fifteenth century, it was discovered that black powder would burn much more rapidly if the dust powder was moistened, compressed, and driven through screens that formed it into distinct grains. Black powder had many disadvantages. Each shot was marked by a burst of white smoke, giving away the shooter’s position. Also, due to incomplete combustion, tarlike black-powder residues built up in the gun’s barrel, which slowed loading. And the pressure, and thus the power it could develop, were limited. In 1832, nitrocellulose, which was produced by treating cellulose with nitric acid, was discovered. The result was a potent explosive and (when treated with solvents) the first plastic, known as celluloid. In 1884, Paul Vieille, a French ordinance expert, discovered how to tame nitrocellulose’s burning rate sufficiently to make a usable powder for firearms, and how to form it into flakes (later it was also produced as tubular

and spherical grains). With smokeless powders, the power of firearms, particularly rifles, could be increased. The power was further augmented when it was discovered that the grains could be designed to provide a progressive burning rate—that is to say, the rate of combustion would increase as the grains were consumed, enabling the powder to burn relatively slowly while the bullet was initially being accelerated and increase in burning speed as the bullet accelerated. The result was a revolution in small-arms design, as armies switched from .44- and .45-caliber black-powder cartridges to high-velocity rifle cartridges of about .30 caliber. Today numerous types of smokeless powder with different burning rates are available, so that a cartridge manufacturer or a private individual “handloader” can match the powder to the cartridge and the projectile. A smokeless powder composed solely of nitrocellulose is commonly identified as a single-based powder; one that also contains small amounts of nitroglycerin is identified as a double-based powder. Use of double-based powders is largely confined to pistols, where a very fast burning rate is needed due to the short barrel. David T. Hardy See also: Ammunition, Types of

Further Reading Andrade, Tonio. The Gunpowder Age: China, Military Innovation, and the Rise of the West in World History. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2016. Davis, Tenney L. Chemistry of Powder and Explosives. Hollywood, CA: Angriff Press, 1943. Delbruck, Hans. History of the Art of War. Vol. 4. Translated by Walter Renfroe. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1985.

392 | Guns in the Home Hogg, Ian. Jane’s Directory of Military Small Arms Ammunition. New York: Jane’s Publishing, 1985. Kelly, Jack. Gunpowder: Alchemy, Bombards, and Pyrotechnics: The History of the Explosive That Changed the World. New York: Basic Books, 2004.

unintentional injury. When thirty-four injury prevention experts were asked to prioritize home injury hazards for young children—based on frequency, severity, and preventability of the injury—the experts rated access to firearms in the home as the most significant hazard (Katcher et al. 2006).

Guns & Ammo. See Periodicals, Guns

Suicide There is compelling evidence that a gun in the home increases the likelihood that someone in the home will die from suicide. A meta-analysis of the research concluded that people who had accessible firearms had more than three times the odds of suicide (Anglemyer, Horvath, and Rutherford 2014). The increased risk of suicide includes everyone in the home—the gun owner, their spouse, and their children. Individuals are at particular risk if they live in homes with loaded and/or unlocked guns. The evidence also indicates that gun owners are no more likely to be depressed, think about suicide, or attempt suicide than non-gun owners. People often attempt suicide with what is available, and for gun owners it is too often a firearm—which is the deadliest method of suicide. Studies conclude that U.S. regions, states, cities, and counties with higher levels of firearm ownership have significantly higher rates of firearm suicide, and they typically also find that these areas have significantly higher rates of overall suicide—driven by higher rates of firearm suicide. There is no relationship between household gun ownership levels and nonfirearm suicide. The American Association of Suicidology’s policy statement concludes “The American Association of Suicidology recognizes that firearm access and storing firearms unlocked and loaded are risk factors for death by suicide.”

Guns in the Home Estimates of U.S. household gun ownership levels vary widely; a careful 2020 RAND analysis puts the figure at about one-third. The large majority of these gun owners believe that having a gun makes their home safer. The scientific evidence suggests otherwise—that on average, guns make it much more likely that someone in the home will die a violent death. Guns provide both risks and potential health benefits. The main health risks of a gun in the home are from: (1) firearm accidents; (2) suicides; (3) assaults and homicides; and (4) intimidation.

Risks Unintentional Gun Injuries Data from the National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS), a system of comprehensive information on each shooting death, indicate that almost three-quarters of unintentional firearm deaths occurred at someone’s home (including driveways, porches, and yards), typically with a gun kept in the home. There are more gun accidents in homes with guns and in states with higher levels of gun ownership. The differences are substantial. Overall, the evidence indicates that a gun in the home is a risk factor for serious

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Table 1: Violent death victimization rates per 100,000 among U.S. population in high-, medium-, and low-gun states, 2015

Homicides Firearm homicides Non-firearm homicides Total Suicides Firearm Suicides Non-firearm Suicides Total Unintentional firearm deaths

High-Gun States

MediumGun States

LowGun States

High Gun: Low Gun

6.0 1.8 7.8

4.0 1.5 5.5

2.2 1.2 3.3

2.7 1.5 2.4

10.3 6.4 16.6 0.3

7.1 7.0 14.1 0.2

2.1 6.9 9.0 0.0

4.9 0.9 1.8 –

Table Note: Data come from the CDC’s WISQARS and WONDER databases. The states with the highest average levels of household gun ownership were Alaska, Georgia, Idaho, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Montana, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and West Virginia. The states with the lowest average gun levels were Connecticut, Hawaii, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and New York. All other states and Washington, D.C., were in the medium-gun category.

Homicide Though most men are murdered away from home, most children, older adults, and women are murdered at home. A gun in the home may be a risk factor for homicide victimization for everyone in the family (a meta-analysis concluded that a gun accessibility doubled the risk of someone in the home becoming a homicide victim), but the evidence is particularly strong for women (Anglemyer, Horvath, and Rutherford 2014). Women in the United States are at far greater risk of femicide than women in other developed countries, and the great danger for women in homicides at home comes from intimate partners with guns. Case-control studies show that a gun in the home is a major risk factor for femicide. A review of intimate partner homicides in Chicago over a twenty-nine-year period concluded that “an effective prevention strategy for intimate homicide of women . . . would be to reduce the availability of firearms in the home” (Block and Christakos

1995, 522). One study found that for each 10 percent increase in state firearm ownership, there was a corresponding 10.2 percent increase in female firearm homicide rates (Siegel and Rothman 2016).

Intimidation A gun in the home is often used for intimidation, particularly against women, though sometimes threats are also made against children. A study of battered women in emergency shelters in California (a state where more than 600,000 women each year experience intimate partner violence) found that nearly two-thirds of their partners who owned guns had used the gun to scare, threaten, or harm the women (Sorenson and Wiebe 2004). By contrast, fewer than 7 percent of the women had used a gun in selfdefense and only when batterers had used a gun against them. Another study found that having a firearm in the home was more often used to intimidate than in self-defense (Azrael and Hemenway 2000).

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Mental Health Recent research has begun to explore the association between access to firearms at home and mental health outcomes. One study among adolescents found that access to firearms in the home was significantly associated with increased symptoms of depression with the largest increases in depression among female adolescents (Kim 2018). Benefits A main reason cited for having a handgun in the home is protection, typically for protection against strangers. But the home is a relatively safe place, especially from strangers. Only 5 percent of all the crimes of violence perpetrated by strangers in the United States occur in a home. Less than 10 percent of violent victimizations that occur in one’s home are perpetrated by strangers. For example, fewer than 30 percent of burglaries during 2003–2007 occurred when someone was at home, and in the 7 percent of burglaries when violence did occur, the burglar was more likely to be an intimate (current or former), and more likely to be a relative or known acquaintance, than a stranger (Catalano 2010). The main health benefits of firearms in the home are that they may be used to deter crime and thwart crimes in progress. Deterrence There is little evidence that a gun in the home deters crime. It was claimed that guns deter burglars, especially “hot” burglaries (when someone is at home) (Kopel 1992, 418; Lott 1998, 5). But counties and states with higher levels of household gun ownership actually have more burglaries and more “hot” burglaries. Like cash and jewelry, guns are attractive loot for burglars.

Thwarting Crimes There is little data on armed self-defense gun use, perhaps because whether one is a defender or perpetrator depends on perspective. One national study found that a firearm was used in self-defense in just 0.9 percent of all crimes where there was contact between the offender and victim, and using a firearm in self-defense was not associated with a reduction in injury to the victim during the crime (Hemenway and Solnick 2015). A study of police reports on home invasions in Atlanta found that in 3 percent of the 198 cases, the invader obtained the victim’s gun, and in only 1.5 percent of the cases was a victim able to use a firearm in self-defense (Kellermann et al. 1995). Evidence from private national surveys indicates that (1) there are many more illegal gun uses against people than selfreported self-defense uses by them; (2) most reported self-defense gun uses do not occur at home, and relatively few protect children; and (3) most of the self-reported self-defense uses are either ambiguous or socially undesirable. Indeed, most of the self-defense gun use reported on private surveys may be illegal—the result of arguments that escalated into gun use. Data from the National Crime Victimization Surveys indicate that genuine selfdefense gun use is rare, that there are many ways that people defend themselves without a gun, and that many of these other methods may be as effective as self-defense gun use in preventing injury. In potential self-defense situations, confusion, stress, and fear can become overwhelming. A pounding heart, muscle tension, and trembling can degrade the gun owner’s ability to use a gun wisely or effectively. Many gun experts believe that a

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handgun is not a good tool for home selfdefense for most people.

Shootings in the Home Studies that examine who gets shot by a household gun reach consistent findings: they are rarely strangers, burglars, or robbers. For example, a study of all home gunshot injuries in Galveston, Texas, over a three-year period found only two that were related to residential burglary or robbery (Lee et al. 1991). In one, the homeowner was shot by the burglar; in the other, the homeowner shot the burglar. During the same interval, guns in the home were involved in the death and injury of more than one hundred residents, family members, friends, or acquaintances. Conclusion Scientific studies indicate that, on average, the health risk of a gun in the home is greater than the benefit. The evidence is overwhelming that a gun in the home is a risk factor for completed suicide and that gun accidents are most likely to occur in homes with guns. There is compelling evidence that a gun in the home is a risk factor for intimidation and for killing women in their homes, and it appears that a gun in the home may more likely be used to threaten intimates than to protect against intruders. On the potential benefit side, there is no good evidence of a deterrent effect of firearms or that a gun in the home reduces the likelihood or severity of injury during an altercation or break-in. After reviewing the evidence, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that pediatricians counsel parents about the risks of firearm access to children and adolescents. They recommend that pediatricians ask patients about guns in the home and urge parents who possess guns to

prevent children gaining access to them. The AAP “affirms that the most effective measure to prevent suicide, homicide, and unintentional firearm-related injuries to children and adolescents is the absence of guns from homes and communities.” David Hemenway and Erin Grinshteyn See also: Accidents; American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP); American Medical Association (AMA); Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Kellermann, Arthur L.; Medicine and Gun Violence; More Guns, Less Crime Thesis; National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS); Victimization from Gun Violence

Further Reading Anglemyer, Andrew, Tara Horvath, and George Rutherford. “The Accessibility of Firearms and Risk for Suicide and Homicide Victimization among Household Members: A Systematic Review and MetaAnalysis.” Annals of Internal Medicine 160, no. 2 (2014): 101–10. Azrael, Deborah, and David Hemenway. “‘In the Safety of Your Own Home’: Results from A National Survey on Gun Use at Home.” Social Science & Medicine 50, no. 2 (2000): 285–91. Block, Carolyn Rebecca, and Antigone Christakos. “Intimate Partner Homicide in Chicago over 29 Years.” Crime & Delinquency 41, no. 4 (1995): 496–526. Catalano, Shannan. Victimization during Household Burglary. Washington, DC: Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2010. https:// bjs.ojp.gov/content /pub /pdf/vdhb.pdf (accessed June 13, 2022). Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. “Guns and Burglary.” In Evaluating Gun Policy: Effects on Crime and Violence, 74–118. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2003. Dahlberg, Linda L., Robin M. Ikeda, and Marcie-Jo Kresnow. “Guns in the Home

396 | Gunshot Detection Technologies (GDTs) and Risk of a Violent Death in the Home: Findings from a National Study.” American Journal of Epidemiology 160, no. 10 (2004): 929–36. Hemenway, David. Private Guns, Public Health. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2017. Hemenway, David. “Risks and Benefits of a Gun in the Home.” American Journal of Lifestyle Medicine 5, no. 6 (2011): 502–11. Hemenway, David, and Deborah Azrael. “The Relative Frequency of Offensive and Defensive Gun Uses: Results from A National Survey.” Violence and Victims 15, no. 3 (2000): 257–72. Hemenway, David, and Sara J. Solnick. “The Epidemiology of Self-Defense Gun Use: Evidence from the National Crime Victimization Surveys 2007–2011.” Preventive Medicine 79 (2015): 22–27. Katcher, M. L., A. N. Meister, C. A. Sorkness, A. G. Staresinic, S. E. Pierce, B. M. Goodman, N. M. Peterson, P. M. Hatfield, and J. A. Schirmer. “Use of The Modified Delphi Technique to Identify and Rate Home Injury Hazard Risks and Prevention Methods for Young Children.” Injury Prevention 12, no. 3 (2006): 189–94. Kellermann, Arthur L., Lori Westphal, Laurie Fischer, and Beverly Harvard. “Weapon Involvement in Home Invasion Crimes.” JAMA 273, no. 22 (1995): 1759–62. Kim, Jinho. “Beyond the Trigger: The Mental Health Consequences of In-Home Firearm Access Among Children of Gun Owners.” Social Science & Medicine 203 (2018): 51–59. Kopel, David. The Samurai, the Mountie, and the Cowboy: Should America Adopt the Gun Controls of Other Democracies? Amherst, NY: Prometheus Press, 1992. Lee, Roberta K., Richard J. Waxweiler, James G. Dobbins, and Terri Paschetag. “Incidence Rates of Firearm Injuries in Galveston, Texas, 1979–1981.” American Journal of Epidemiology 134 (1991): 511–21. Lott, John R., Jr. More Guns Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control

Laws. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998. Morrall, Andrew. “The Science of Gun Policy: A Critical Synthesis of Research Evidence on the Effects of Gun Policies in the United States.” RAND Health Quarterly 8, no. 1 (2018). https://www.rand.org/pubs /research_reports/RR2088.html (accessed June 30, 2022). National Research Council. Firearms and Violence: A Critical Review. Washington, DC: National Academies Press, 2005. Siegel, Michael, Yamrot Negussie, Sarah Vanture, Jane Pleskunas, Craig S. Ross, and Charles King III. “The Relationship between Gun Ownership and Stranger and Nonstranger Firearm Homicide Rates in The United States, 1981–2010.” American Journal of Public Health 104, no. 10 (2014): 1912–19. Siegel, Michael, and Emily F. Rothman. “Firearm Ownership and Suicide Rates Among US Men and Women, 1981–2013.” American Journal of Public Health 106, no. 7 (2016): 1316–22. Sorenson, Susan B., and Douglas J. Wiebe. “Weapons in the Lives of Battered Women.” American Journal of Public Health 94, no. 8 (2004): 1412–17.

Guns Magazine. See Periodicals, Guns Gunshot Detection Technologies (GDTs) The detection of weapons is a key technique in curbing their illicit use. Systems for this purpose have been developed for use by law enforcement agencies and the military. The most prominent weapon detection techniques are directed toward identifying a concealed weapon on an individual, with the major emphasis on guns and knives. But beginning in the 1990s, gunshot detection



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A display of the NYPD ShotSpotter system is seen in New York City on March 16, 2015. Systems like these help law enforcement with detecting the sound of gunfire and identifying the location where it occurred to expedite their response. (Reuters/Alamy Stock Photo)

technologies (GDTs) have focused on detecting weapons use by locating the sound made by discharged firearms. Systems have been used in more than 100 cities across the United States and abroad. Supporters argue the systems provide more reliable information than depending on citizen reporting, so can be used in establishing crime patterns and investigating individual cases. Critics suggest the systems are not accurate enough and are too costly to justify the limited gains they bring. Gunshot detection technologies, also known as gunshot detection systems, are designed to detect the sound of a muzzle blast from a gun within seconds of the shot being fired, identify the location from which the shot was fired, and alert the police about the shot. The systems used by police cover a specified target area through a series of

sensor modules. Sensors can be either optical, acoustic, or both. Optical sensors are enhanced cameras that seek to detect the blast from the muzzle as the bullet exits the firearm, but they are more expensive and less commonly used than acoustic sensors. Acoustic sensors include microphones, acoustic sensing elements, and gunshot identification electronics. Originally, the sensors transmitted information about the gunshot location to a personal computer located in the police department’s dispatch center. Increasingly, the information is now transmitted to centralized acoustic experts that work for the private companies that sell the technology. For example, ShotSpotter now covers areas in close to one hundred cities from its base in California. The information is transmitted in under two seconds from when the shot is fired and

398 | Gunshot Detection Technologies (GDTs)

the information about the gunfire is displayed on a computerized map, enabling dispatchers to relay the information to officers on the street if and when they choose. GDT “triangulates” gunfire alerts such that information from responding acoustic sensors is used to pinpoint the precise location from which the shot was fired. Triangulation procedures can pinpoint 99 percent of shots within a sixty-five-foot radius of the event; 88 percent of shots within thirty feet; 63 percent of shots within twenty feet; and 35 percent of shots within ten feet (Mazerolle et al. 1999). There remain several important technical challenges. Once the sensors detect a sound and transmit the information to the central computer, the software must discriminate against most other community sounds (such as car backfires, jackhammers, thunder, and barking dogs). This can be especially difficult around times such as the Fourth of July with fireworks. Generally, there is less ambient noise at night, so system accuracy can vary by time of day. It is more difficult to identify shots fired when the path of the muzzle blast is blocked by walls or other physical impediments. Hence, shots that are fired indoors or in alleyways are typically not as well detected. Also, shotgun blasts are more easily detected by GDTs than assault rifle or pistol rounds, which raises issues for the police in determining how useful GDT would be in most high-guncrime urban areas. Finally, because the systems rely on recordings from permanent sensors, there are some civil liberties issues about what is recorded and how it is shared.

Implementation of GDT Alerts Police departments have heavily relied on citizen reporting of a shot, but that is typically dependent on (1) the citizen hearing the shot; (2) the citizen being able to discern

the noise as gunfire; (3) the citizen making the decision to call the police within a reasonable time frame of the shot being fired; and (4) the citizen being able to reliably tell the police exactly where the shot was fired from. Citizen reports therefore miss many shootings and can provide limited useful information. Gunshot detection technology removes the citizen contingencies that influenced random gunfire reporting. Gunshot detection systems present the police with four possible outcomes: (1) when the device is neutral, no warning is produced (true negative) and no actions by the police need be taken; (2) when shots are fired, one expects the device to activate an alarm (true positive) and some type of corrective police action will be taken (whether as an immediate, delayed, or problem-solving response); (3) when the device fails to activate when gunfire is present (false negative), evasive actions cannot be considered, leaving open the possibility of an escalating problem; and (4) the device reacts without the presence of gunfire (false positive), if police action is needlessly undertaken, this is a waste of scarce police resources. Gunshot detection systems thus provide police departments with greater potential to discern the extent, nature, and specific locations of outdoor gunfire problems, but the technology also poses challenges to police departments to determine how, when, and under what circumstances they want to mobilize police resources in response to gunfire alerts. It is difficult to judge the precise effectiveness of GDT because there is no pure dataset of known shots to compare against. Comparisons are often to statistics generated by using the citizen response data. One evaluation of GDT found that the technology will identify three times as many gunshot incidents as are typically reported to the police by citizens (Mazerolle et al.



1999). Other studies have shown similar increases, but this is in part because of false positives. In San Antonio between May 2016 and May 2017, ShotSpotter identified 785 incidents and in 55 percent of those there was no 911 call received (Davila 2017). On the other hand, in 14 percent of total cases, there was a call, but no ShotSpotter alert. Crucially, police could find no evidence of a shooting at the scene 80 percent of the time. San Antonio chose not to continue their program.

Positive and Negative Considerations of GDT Supporters of GDT use argue it brings several both broad and specific benefits. GDT and enforcement can signal to citizens that the police are serious about investigating, and hopefully reducing, gunfire in their neighborhoods. It is possible that criminals might feel some deterrent effect, but this is likely to be small and hard to statistically prove. Data can be collected over time to identify common high shooting times and locations to allow some efforts at targeted preventions. The system provides police with a specific location to investigate within minutes of a shot. This can aid police investigations as they look for witnesses still in the area. They can also look for shell casings or evidence. The response time is rarely fast enough to catch someone with a gun still in their hands, but in more prolonged events police may occasionally be able to intervene. Critics suggest that GDT systems lead to few actual arrests. They can provide evidence of shot location and time, but that does not fully replace the information police can sometimes gain from witnesses. The increase in suspected shots to be investigated takes police manpower. This can take time away from other duties or require large amounts of

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overtime payments since many incidents occur at night. The combination of the contract cost for the equipment and the increased personnel costs can lead to high costs, especially relative to the number of arrests generated. Several cities have therefore chosen to drop their contracts after initial periods. Police departments need to think very carefully about the policy implications of using gunshot detection systems. On the positive side, the technology can help identify random gunfire hot spots and shape police problem-solving responses to these locations. On the negative side, gunshot detection systems are unlikely to result in arrests of shooters; they can significantly increase police workloads and potentially reduce the amount of time patrol officers have available to deal with citizen complaints about random gunfire events. Lorraine Mazerolle, Sean Maddan, and John W. Dietrich See also: Crime and Gun Use

Further Reading Davila, Vianna. “San Antonio Police Cut Pricey Gunshot Detection System.” San Antonio Express-News, August 16, 2017. Irvin-Ericksona, Yasemin, Nancy La Vignea, Ned Levineb, Emily Tirya, and Samuel Bielerc. “What Does Gunshot Detection Technology Tell Us about Gun Violence?” Applied Geography 86 (2017): 262–27. Mazerolle, Lorraine Green, Cory Watkins, Dennis Rogan, and James Frank. “Random Gunfire Problems and Gunshot Detection Systems.” National Institute of Justice Research in Brief. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice, December 1999. http:// wwwp381.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/179274 .pdf (accessed July 23, 2011). Mazerolle, Lorraine Green, Cory Watkins, Dennis Rogan, and James Frank. “Using Gunshot

400 | Gunshot Wounds (Wound Ballistics) Detection Systems in Police Departments: The Impact on Police Response Times and Officer Workloads.” Police Quarterly 1 (1998): 21–49. Sanburn, Josh. “Shots Fired.” Time Magazine 190 (2017): 48–51.

Gunshot Wounds (Wound Ballistics) Ballistics is the study of the motion of projectiles, specifically bullets, after leaving the gun muzzle. This includes both the path of the bullet in the air and the results of a bullet’s impact on its targets. Bullet trajectory is affected by bullet design and by the gun that launches it. In the air, a bullet accumulates kinetic energy, which is an important concept as it is the transfer of kinetic energy to the target that causes damage on impact. A bullet’s size and speed determine its kinetic energy. The proportion of this energy that is transferred from the bullet to the target tissue depends on characteristics such as the bullet’s shape and fragmentation, the firing distance of the gun, and the properties of the target itself. Wound ballistics studies the patterns of damage inflicted on a target once a bullet hits it. Modifications can be made to bullets to increase their target damage based on such principles of ballistics. Knowledge about ballistics permits a gun user to tailor his gun and ammunition to specific purposes. It also has relevance in the vast field of medical forensics, where the path is traced backward from the wound to describe the bullet.

Bullet Ballistics As suggested, the damage that a particular bullet can inflict is related to the amount of kinetic energy it obtains. A bullet’s kinetic

energy is described in physics as E = 1/2 mv2, where E is kinetic energy, m is bullet mass, and v is bullet velocity. Therefore, heavier bullets accumulate more kinetic energy in flight. Likewise, the speed of a bullet has a squared effect on the amount of energy it carries, with faster bullets building exponentially greater damaging potential. Kinetic energy alone does not determine target damage. Rather, other factors such as shape and fragmentation dictate the proportion of this kinetic energy that is actually transferred as damage to the target.

Size A bullet’s size is described by its caliber and weight. Caliber refers to a bullet’s circumference. It is measured in either inches or millimeters. Bullets are commonly referred to by their caliber—for instance, the familiar 16 mm or .45 (forty-five hundredths of an inch). Bullet weight is described in grains per pound (gr/lb), a unit that is internationally standardized. The greater the caliber or weight of a bullet, the greater its mass, and the greater the kinetic energy it possesses. Velocity A bullet’s velocity refers to the speed it is capable of gathering within the gun muzzle. Velocity is measured in terms of feet per second (ft/sec) or meters per second (m/ sec). Low-velocity bullets move at less than 600 m/sec, or approximately 1,900 ft/sec. Higher-velocity bullets exceed a critical velocity of greater than 600 m/sec, or 1,900 ft/sec. Handguns fire bullets of lower velocity, while rifle ammunition is usually of high velocity. Modifications can be made to increase a bullet’s velocity. A full metal jacket is a lining of copper around a lead bullet, the stronger copper protecting the bullet from heat and allowing it to travel



Gunshot Wounds (Wound Ballistics) | 401

faster. Magnum bullets have more gunpowder, which launches a bullet at higher velocities. The higher the velocity, the greater the kinetic energy a bullet gathers.

reaching its target can reduce a bullet’s accuracy. On impact, though, yaw and tumble may result in greater tissue damage, as they multiply the area of contact and injury.

Shape and Configuration The most common bullet has a round-shaped nose with a solid core of lead or steel. Bullets can undergo profile modification that alters this basic shape, affecting their ballistics. For instance, a hollow-point bullet has a cavity carved into the nose tip of its presenting surface. This hole becomes a heat-trapping cavity. As the bullet accelerates, hot gas accumulates in the hollow point, causing the bullet to flatten and mushroom, giving it a larger area of impact. By increasing the bullet’s forward area of contact, there is increased energy transfer and greater damage.

Wound Ballistics Wound ballistics involves the damage inflicted on a target once a bullet hits it.

Fragmentation Bullets can be made to fragment by packaging them into shot. Shot consists of numerous small lead or steel pellets packed together in a plastic casing. The casing then fragments after being fired, scattering the tiny bullets and increasing the area impacting a target. Bird shot often has many small, light pellets, permitting a wider area of impact but with each small projectile still potent enough for the target. Buckshot is used for hunting larger animals and contains less numerous but heavier shot. Yaw and Tumble A bullet does not always travel in a straight line. Its path can be altered by air, tissue, or other objects. Yaw is a term used to describe the natural dipping and rising of the nose of any projectile, altering its perfectly linear or curvilinear path. Tumble describes when a bullet begins to cartwheel down its forward path. Both of these are natural phenomena. The yaw and tumble of a bullet before

Crush and Cavitary Injury A bullet damages its target by transferring its kinetic energy into crush and deforming forces. When a bullet hits, it causes direct tissue damage at points of contact. It also creates a ring of cavitary injury surrounding its direct path. Greater kinetic energy increases the depth of this ring. Once entering tissue, the bullet’s path is distorted and subject to yaw and tumble. Such nonlinear pathways in addition to bullet fragmentation and mushrooming can multiply the degree of cavitary injury. Firing Distance The proximity of the gun to its target can sometimes be determined by examining markings at a bullet’s entrance site into a target. When a gun is in direct contact with its target, the heat from the gunpowder can cause an actual flame, burning the entrance wound and leaving a sear mark. Contact wounds are also close enough that the stillexpanding gas from gunpowder detonation distorts the tissue at the entrance-wound edges, causing a muzzle contusion and a stellate-shaped wound. The exception is tight contact wounds that retain a more circular contour. Guns that are fired in contact can also force clothing and other material into the wound, another identifying clue. At close but not contact firing ranges of six to twelve inches, there is a soot pattern left on the wound edges by discharge of the gun. The distribution and concentration of

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these soot marks leave footprints. Guns fired at an intermediate range of one to two feet are too distant to leave soot deposition. Instead, they leave characteristic wound tattoos. These are indelible marks caused by micro-impregnation of the nearby skin by pellets of unburned gunpowder. Guns fired at distant ranges of greater than ten feet leave no soot residue or tattooing around the bullet entrance, as these are too distant for gunpowder to reach the wound. These instead have abrasion collars—bruises from the force of bullet impact in contrast to close-range markings that are burns from the heat of combustion.

Entrance and Exit Wounds An exit wound often has everted, irregular edges and should have no soot markings or gunpowder tattooing. Entrance and exit wounds, however, are not always clearly distinguishable. Not all entrance wounds are smaller than their exit wounds. For instance, a contact entrance wound may have the large stellate pattern from the nearby gunfire but retain a small exit wound if the bullet maintains a straight path. The damage inflicted by a bullet is not necessarily proportional to its visible entrance and exit wounds. Wounds from bullets that fragment or that have a high degree of yaw and tumble can have deceptively greater internal tissue damage, despite seemingly small external wounds. Target Properties Properties of the target tissue affect the amount of damage that a bullet can cause. The elasticity of the tissue can affect entrance and exit wounds; for instance,

bullets entering the elastic palm surface may appear slitlike, as the tissue contracts the wound. Elastic tissues are also more resilient to cavitary injury, given their greater capacity to stretch and contract and retain less permanent damage. Target tissues that are denser (for instance, bone) suffer greater damage when hit by a bullet. This is because in a given surface area, there are more particles to accept the transfer of kinetic energy. Winny W. Hung See also: Accidents; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem

Further Reading Bartlett, Craig S., David L. Helfet, Michael R. Hausman, and Elton Strauss. “Ballistics and Gunshot Wounds: Effects on Musculoskeletal Tissues.” Journal of the American Academy of Orthopedic Surgery 8 (2000): 21–36. DiMaio, Vincent J. M. Gunshot Wounds: Practical Aspects of Firearms, Ballistics, and Forensic Techniques. 3rd ed. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, 2015. Naudé, Gideon, Demetrios Demetriades, and Fred Bongard. Trauma Secrets. Philadelphia: Hanley and Belfus, 1999. Sellier, Karl G., and Beat P. Kneubuehl. Wound Ballistics and the Scientific Background. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1994. Walls, Ron, Robert Hockberger, and Marianne Gausche-Hill, eds. Rosen’s Emergency Medicine: Concepts and Clinical Practice. Vol. 1, 9th ed. Philadelphia, PA: Elsevier, 2018. Yee, Doreen A., and J. Hugh Devitt. “Mechanisms of Injury: Causes of Trauma.” Anesthesiology Clinics of North America 17 (1999): 11–14.

H Halbrook, Stephen P.(1947–)

While teaching philosophy, Halbrook earned his JD from the Georgetown University Law Center in 1978. By the early 1980s, he had emerged as a leading attorney and scholar on Second Amendment issues. As an attorney, Halbrook has participated in dozens of important federal and state cases involving constitutional law and firearm statutes or regulations. He has taken four cases to the U.S. Supreme Court and won them all. Halbrook’s first Supreme Court case was United States v. Thompson/Center Arms Co. (504 U.S. 505 [1992]). The issue was the interpretation of a complex federal statute involving a kit that was intended for the home assembly of a rifle that could be lawfully converted into a handgun, but that also could be used to unlawfully assemble a handgun with an illegal rifle shoulder stock. If the gun were assembled illegally, it would be the type of gun that is subject to a special federal tax and regulatory system (National Firearms Act, 26 U.S.C. § 5801, et seq.). The court agreed 5-4 with Halbrook that the tax was not applicable to the manufacturer, who sold the kit for lawful purposes. The second case became a leading decision in federalism doctrine. In Printz v. United States, a sharply divided Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that Congress did not have the authority to compel local law enforcement agencies to conduct the federal background check on retail handgun purchasers (521 U.S. 898 [1997]). The mandatory federal check, which had been created by the 1993 Brady Act, was set to expire in 1998

Since the early 1980s, Stephen Halbrook has been one of the most important attorneys and legal scholars on the Second Amendment and firearm law. Winner of four Supreme Court cases, Halbrook is a prolific scholar of legal history. He has written extensively about the original meanings of the Second Amendment and the Fourteenth Amendment (the latter as applied to Second Amendment rights). He has also become an expert on the effects of firearm laws during World War II—in particular, the effect of the universal militia system in Switzerland on keeping that nation free and the effect of German firearm laws in facilitating the oppression and murder of Jews. After earning a PhD in philosophy in 1972 from Florida State University, Halbrook taught philosophy for the next nine years at the Tuskegee Institute, Howard University, and George Mason University. Tuskegee and Howard are both historically Black universities, and in times when many universities would not admit Blacks, Tuskegee and Howard were among the most important educational institutions for American Blacks. Later, when Halbrook began to write on firearms issues, civil rights would be one of his major topics. Halbrook’s work continues to reflect his background in philosophy: his writing eschews quantitative material (e.g., how often guns are used for self-defense or committing crimes) and instead focuses on pure law and history.

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anyway, so the case did not have a drastic impact on firearm policy. Printz’s long-term impact, however, was enormous. First of all, the case foreclosed the proposed “Brady II” congressional gun control legislation, which would have ordered state governments to set up handgun licensing and registration systems according to a federal scheme. Even more significant, Printz was one of a series of cases, beginning with New York v. United States in 1991, in which the Supreme Court began paying renewed attention to federalism and states’ rights and enforcing constitutional limits on congressional power. (Another case in this series was United States v. Lopez [514 U.S. 549 (1995)], in which the court held 5-4 that Congress lacked authority to create “gun-free school zones.”) Halbrook’s third Supreme Court case, Castillo v. United States, grew out of the invasion by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, on February 28, 1993. A gun battle had erupted between the Branch Davidians and the ATF. When several Branch Davidians were put on trial later, they were acquitted of all charges of murder, aiding and abetting murder, and conspiracy to commit murder. For those charges, the judge had told the jury that it could consider whether the Branch Davidians had been acting in self-defense. But the judge did not allow the jury to consider selfdefense for the lesser charge of aiding and abetting voluntary manslaughter (defined as a homicide resulting from “adequate” provocation). Several Branch Davidians were convicted of this charge; although the jury expected that the Branch Davidians would be sentenced only to time served, the federal statute provides a penalty of up to ten years in prison.

Federal law provides an additional penalty of up to five extra years when a gun is used in a federal violent crime, and up to 30 additional years when the gun is a machine gun (18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)). Although the indictment had never charged the Branch Davidians with using machine guns, and although the jury had never been asked to make any findings about whether any of the Branch Davidians had used machine guns, federal district judge Walter Smith sentenced several Branch Davidians to the maximum term of forty years: ten for manslaughter, plus thirty for using a machine gun. Unlike in the Thompson and Printz cases, Halbrook had not participated in the Branch Davidian cases from the beginning. Rather, he volunteered to serve pro bono as an appellate attorney for Jamie Castillo, one of the convicted Davidians. Federal circuit courts of appeal were split on whether the issue of machine-gun use in a federal crime was to be determined unanimously by the jury, based on a finding Stephen P. Halbrook arguing before the Supreme Court beyond a reasonable doubt, or decided by a judge based only on the preponderance of the evidence. Unanimously, the Supreme Court ruled that the jury must make the finding about the machine gun (Castillo v. United States, 530 U.S. 120 [2000]). The case was one of several in the late 1990s in which the court resolved ambiguous statutes in favor of the constitutional presumption that a person should only be sentenced to time in prison based on what a jury had determined that the person actually did. Halbrook also helped write the brief for petitioner in Small v. United States (544 U.S. 385 [2005]). By the 5-3 majority, the court agreed with Halbrook that the 1968 Gun Control Act’s ban on gun possession



by persons with felony convictions did not apply to convictions in foreign nations. In the Heller case, Halbrook wrote an amicus curiae brief, arguing for the individual Second Amendment right, on behalf of 250 representatives, 55 senators, and the president of the Senate (Vice President Richard Cheney). Shortly after Heller was decided, Halbrook filed suits on behalf of the NRA against Chicago and several Chicago suburbs, which were the only municipal governments in the United States with handgun bans. Most of the defendants voluntarily repealed their laws, but Chicago and Oak Park fought all the way to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court made the NRA and Oak Park into parties in the related case of McDonald v. City of Chicago. Halbrook asked that the NRA be given ten minutes of oral argument, which the court granted. Four of the five justices who ruled against the Chicago and Oak Park handgun bans relied on the argument that Halbrook had emphasized in his briefing, based on the “due process of law” clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The plurality opinion by Justice Alito and the concurring opinion by Justice Thomas repeatedly cited Halbrook’s scholarship, as had Justice Scalia’s majority opinion in Heller. Halbrook has also been on the losing side of a variety of cases, including Fresno Rifle and Pistol Club, Inc. v. Van de Kamp (746 F.Supp. 1415, E.D. Cal. [1990]; affirmed 965 F.2d 723 [9th Cir. 1992]), which was an unsuccessful challenge to California’s assault weapon law; and Quilici v. Village of Morton Grove (695 F.2d 261 [7th Cir. 1982]), certiorari denied 464 U.S. 863 (1983), in which Halbrook filed an amicus brief unsuccessfully arguing against the city’s handgun ban. Halbrook’s clients include the National

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Rifle Association, firearms businesses, and individuals. Based on his extensive litigation experience, Halbrook was asked to write the Firearms Law Deskbook, published annually by West Group. The book is the leading guide for attorneys in firearm litigation. Halbrook’s greatest influence, however, has been as a scholar. Had Halbrook lived in the nineteenth century, his research would have appeared as merely a restatement of the obvious. All legal scholars of the nineteenth century, and every judge (with a single exception) who wrote about the Second Amendment during the nineteenth century, regarded it as an individual right (Kopel 1998). But by 1975, the once-obvious Second Amendment had become obscure, at least to the legal community. While polls showed that the American public continued to regard the Second Amendment as protecting an individual’s right to keep and bear arms, legal scholars paid virtually no attention to the amendment, and there was almost no awareness of its original meaning. Halbrook first appeared on the Second Amendment scene with a 1981 article in the George Mason University Law Review, arguing that the Second Amendment guaranteed an individual right to arms and that the Fourteenth Amendment was intended to make that Second Amendment guarantee enforceable against the states. Halbrook elaborated on this thesis in a 1982 report for the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on the Constitution. The subcommittee unanimously adopted a report (“The Right to Keep and Bear Arms,” reprinted in Cottrol 1993) agreeing with both of Halbrook’s claims. Halbrook’s most important scholarly contribution, however, was the book That Every Man Be Armed, originally published in 1986. The book was the most thorough

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analysis of the legal history and original intent of the Second Amendment. Since then, virtually every subject addressed by Halbrook (e.g., the American Revolution and British efforts to disarm the colonists, proposals for a Bill of Rights, nineteenthcentury legal history, Reconstruction and its aftermath, twentieth-century cases) has been analyzed in much greater detail, sometimes by Halbrook himself. Even so, the book remains a starting point for many readers investigating the Second Amendment. The book is characteristic of Halbrook’s general scholarly style, in that the research is meticulous, and careful review of Halbrook’s sources virtually never reveals a conflict between the claim in Halbrook’s text and the cited source. But, as noted in Malcolm’s (1986) review of the book, Halbrook treats sources that do not fully support his thesis too gingerly rather than confronting them head-on. Other scholarship by Halbrook has studied the origins and legal history of the right to arms in many of the eastern seaboard states and in Texas and West Virginia. His book Freedmen, the Fourteenth Amendment, and the Right to Bear Arms, 1866– 1876, is the most detailed examination of congressional Reconstruction, the Civil Rights Act, and the passage of the Fourteenth Amendment as they relate to Second Amendment rights. Through quote after quote, Halbrook shows that the Congress that carried out Reconstruction and sent the Fourteenth Amendment to states for ratification understood the Second Amendment as an individual right to firearms for personal protection and voted for the Fourteenth Amendment in part to keep southern states and local governments from infringing upon that right. In 2010, the book was republished in a paperback format with a new title, Securing

Civil Rights: Freedmen, the Fourteenth Amendment, and the Right to Bear Arms. In 2007, Halbrook penned The Founder’s Second Amendment, a detailed examination of the right to arms in the United States from the period leading to the American Revolution, through the creation and early implementation of the Second Amendment. In an article on the 1886 U.S. Supreme Court case Presser v. Illinois, which upheld a ban on armed public parades, Halbrook shows that the origin of the antiparade law was a determination by Illinois’s governing class to suppress demonstrations by working people. Beginning in the 1990s, Halbrook turned some of his research attention to European history. In Target Switzerland, which has been translated into French, Italian, Polish, and German, Halbrook examines the impact of the Swiss militia system on World War II. He shows how the universal armament policy of the Swiss deterred (if only barely) a German invasion at various stages during the war. He also points out that because control of the Swiss army was widely distributed (in the sense that all able-bodied adult males were active members of the militia), Switzerland was not vulnerable to the problems of France or other European nations that had centralized standing armies, and whose national elites quickly surrendered the army to advancing Nazi forces. A follow-up book, The Swiss and the Nazis, examined the Swiss people’s moral and military preparations to resist the Nazis. The book was translated into German. In his most recent books, Gun Control in the Third Reich: Disarming Jews and “Enemies of the State” and Gun Control in NaziOccupied France: Tyranny and Resistance, Halbrook researched German and Nazi firearm laws and how they were implemented to disarm Jews and other opponents of



Hitler. This research reflects Halbrook’s longest-running theme: gun control is used by dominant groups to suppress their victims. These victims range from colonial patriots to ex-slaves to workingmen to Jews, depending on the time and place. Both in print and in oral argument, Halbrook’s style is methodical and straightforward rather than flashy or brilliantly creative. His contribution has been not to create new Second Amendment theory, but rather to return scholarly attention to matters that had been familiar in their own time but have since been neglected. Halbrook has twice won first place in revolver shooting in the National NorthSouth Skirmish Association, a competitive shooting association that uses Civil War– era firearms. He also shoots in the Swiss Federal Schuetzenfest, the largest rifle match in the world, on the team of the Swiss Rifles of Washington, DC. His law practice is located in Fairfax, Virginia. David B. Kopel See also: District of Columbia v. Heller; Fourteenth Amendment; McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010); Second Amendment

Further Readings Cottrol, Robert J., ed. Gun Control and the Constitution: Sources and Explorations on the Second Amendment. New York: Garland, 1993. Halbrook, Stephen P. Firearms Law Deskbook, 2010–2011 Edition. 2 vols. Eagan, MN: West (updated annually), 2010. Halbrook, Stephen P. Gun Control in NaziOccupied France: Tyranny and Resistance. Oakland, CA: Independent Institute, 2018. Halbrook, Stephen P. Gun Control in the Third Reich: Disarming Jews and “Enemies of the State.” Oakland, CA: Independent Institute, 2014.

Hammer, Marion P. | 407 Halbrook, Stephen P. Securing Civil Rights: Freedmen, the Fourteenth Amendment, and the Right to Bear Arms. Oakland, CA: Independent Institute, 2010. Halbrook, Stephen P. Swiss and the Nazis: How the Alpine Republic Survived in the Shadow of the Third Reich. Philadelphia: Casemate, 2006. Halbrook, Stephen P. Target Switzerland: Swiss Armed Neutrality in World War II. Rockville Centre, NY: Sarpedon, 2000. Halbrook, Stephen P. That Every Man Be Armed. Oakland, CA: Independent Institute, 2000. Halbrook, Stephen P. The Founders’ Second Amendment: Origins of the Second Amendment. Lanham, MD: Ivan R. Dee, 2008. Halbrook, Stephen P. http://www.stephenhal brook.com/ (accessed November 17, 2019). Kopel, David B. “The Second Amendment in the Nineteenth Century.” Brigham Young University Law Review 1998, no. 4 (1998): 1359–554. Malcolm, Joyce. “Review of That Every Man Be Armed.” George Washington University Law Review 54 (1986): 582.

Hamilton v. Accu-Tek. See Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers Hamilton v. Beretta U.S.A. Corp. See Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers Hammer, Marion P.(1939–) Marion Hammer is executive director of Unified Sportsmen of Florida, a position she has held since 1978. She is past president of the National Rifle Association of America (NRA), the first woman in the NRA’s history to hold that office.

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She learned to shoot and hunt at age five, taught by her grandfather, who helped raise her after her father was killed in action at Okinawa during World War II. She was elected to the NRA’s Board of Directors in 1982, to its vice presidency in 1992, and to its presidency in 1996 and 1997. She currently serves on its board and its Executive Committee and was elected for life to its Executive Council. The NRA Foundation honored her by naming its award for distinguished philanthropy by a woman the Marion P. Hammer Award. At the NRA, she emphasized the education of youth in firearm safety and use, and during her presidency, she broke ground for construction of the NRA National Firearms Museum. In 1993, the National Safety Council presented Hammer with its Outstanding Community Service Award for creating the NRA Eddie Eagle gun safety program. In 1997, she received the Outstanding Woman Achievement Award from the Florida secretary of state, and in 1985, she became the only woman to win the Roy Rogers Man of the Year award. In 1996, the American Legion presented to Hammer its National Education Award for the Eddie Eagle program. In 2005, she was inducted into the Florida Women’s Hall of Fame. In Florida, Hammer was the force behind passage of Florida’s landmark right-to-carry law, which provided for liberal issuance of concealed-firearm-carry permits to lawabiding citizens, and which became a model for legislation in dozens of other states. A public speaker and media spokesperson for the NRA, Hammer has been featured in many profiles in newspapers and national magazines, including People and George. On television, she has been prominently featured on A&E’s Biography, CBS’s 60 Minutes, ABC’s Nightline, NBC’s Today Show, the Oprah Winfrey Show, and CNN.

In 2019, Hammer came under intense scrutiny for taking out loans from a NRA affiliate for personal use. Although nonprofits are not prohibited from making loans to board members, the numerous transactions Hammer made potentially violated the Internal Revenue Service’s guidelines. Hammer contends that the loans were taken from her retirement account, but investigation revealed that the interest she paid against the loans was to Unified Sportsmen of Florida. David T. Hardy See also: Concealed Weapons Laws; Eddie Eagle; National Rifle Association (NRA)

Further Readings Kovaleski, Serge F. “New NRA Chief Aims at Future.” Washington Post, April 23, 1996, A1. http://www.washingtonpost.com /wp-srv/politics/daily/june98/nra042396 .htm (accessed February 15, 2011). NRA Winning Team. “Marion P. Hammer.” 2001. http://www.nrawinningteam.com/ham mer.html (accessed February 15, 2011). Reinhard, Beth, and Tom Hamburger. 2019. “NRA Board Member and Former President Marion Hammer Obtained Low-Interest Loan from Affiliate She Leads.” Washington Post, September 6, 2019. https://www .washingtonpost.com/investigations/nra -board-member-and-former-president-mar ion-hammer-obtained-low-interest-loan -from-affiliate-she-leads/2019/09/06/dff03 3f0-cc26-11e9-8067-196d9f17af68_story .html (accessed May 16, 2022).

Handgun Control, Inc. See Brady: United against Gun Violence Handguns A handgun is a short firearm that can be held and fired with one hand. The two main types are revolvers and semiautomatic

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pistols. According to the most recent comprehensive national survey on the topic, about one in four U.S. households has at least one handgun on the premises (National Opinion Research Center 2019). Most owners cited self-defense as their primary reason for owning a handgun. Other reasons for handgun ownership include target shooting and job-related needs. A relatively small number of people also collect handguns or hunt with them (Cook and Ludwig 1996; Smith 2001). The distinctive feature of handguns is their small size, which makes them handy, concealable, and portable. Compared to rifles, handguns gain the advantages associated with small size at the expense of range, accuracy, and lethality. Although many rifles are accurate to ranges of 300 yards or more, it is difficult to hit targets with even the most accurate handguns beyond about 50 yards. Also, although all handgun cartridges have the potential to cause lethal injury, handgun rounds have less wounding potential than most rifle rounds. The same features that make handguns useful for self-defense also make them useful in criminal acts. In 2008, approximately 67 percent of murders were committed with firearms, and of firearm murders for which the firearm type was known, approximately 89 percent were committed with handguns (Federal Bureau of Investigation 2009). The main parts of a handgun are the frame, to which the other parts are attached and which may be made of polymer, steel, or other metal; the barrel, which is made of steel; the grip, where the gun is held and which is usually made of polymer, plastic, or wood; the sights, used to point the weapon at the target; and the action, which causes the weapon to fire when the trigger is pulled and which includes the slide on semiautomatic pistols and the cylinder on

revolvers. In modern handguns, as well as rifles and shotguns, a cartridge (which consists of a bullet mounted in a case—usually brass—with gunpowder and a primer) is inserted in the firing chamber at the breech, or rear end of the barrel. When the trigger is pulled, the firing pin is allowed to strike the primer, igniting the powder, which propels the bullet down the barrel. In almost all modern small arms except shotguns, the barrel is rifled with spiral grooves running its entire length to make the bullet spin. This prevents the bullet from tumbling in flight, increasing accuracy over longer distances.

Handgun Types The three main varieties of modern handguns are single-shot pistols, revolvers, and semiautomatic pistols. (Semiautomatics are sometimes called automatics, but this usage describes automatic chambering of a round, not automatic fire like in a machine gun.) Single-shot pistols find specialized use in target shooting, in hunting, and as very small self-defense weapons, and they are much less common than revolvers or semiautomatics. Revolvers hold several rounds—usually six—in chambers bored in a rotating cylinder located at the breech of the barrel. Before each shot is fired, the cylinder is rotated to bring the next chamber in line with the barrel for firing. Cylinder rotation is accomplished by cocking the hammer. This can be done manually or, in doubleaction revolvers (see below), merely by pulling the trigger. Semiautomatic pistols hold rounds in a magazine inside the butt, or handle. Magazine capacities vary, but most hold between seven and seventeen rounds. When the pistol’s slide is pulled back and allowed to move forward under spring pressure, the

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Handguns, like the .45 caliber “686” automatic pistol and Beretta 9mm 92SB automatic pistol pictured here, are the most commonly owned type of firearms in the United States. Their popularity stems from their small size, allowing them to be easily concealed and also held or fired with one hand. (Corel)

action advances a round from the magazine into the firing chamber, and the pistol is ready to fire. When a round is fired, energy from the shot pushes the slide back, ejecting the empty cartridge that was just fired; the spring then pushes the slide forward again and loads the next cartridge. Revolver butts are smaller than pistol butts because they do not contain a magazine. This smaller size can make them more comfortable for shooters with small hands to grasp. Revolvers have an edge in reliability and may be easier for beginners to use because of their simplicity. Semiautomatics have greater magazine capacity, are easier for most shooters to reload quickly, can be fired a little bit faster than revolvers, and,

depending on configuration, may have a lighter trigger. Shooters who wish to maximize simplicity and reliability may opt for a revolver; those who wish to maximize the number of rounds available to fire usually will choose a semiautomatic.

Triggers Handguns are available with three main types of triggers: single action (SA), double action (DA), and double action only (DAO). An SA trigger does one thing: it releases the hammer, causing the bullet in the firing chamber to fire. However, for the hammer to be in position to strike, it must first be cocked. On a single-action revolver, the hammer must be cocked by hand before

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firing each round. On a single-action semiautomatic pistol, the gun must be cocked by hand before the first round is fired (which can be accomplished by working the slide to chamber the first round). When the gun is fired, the semiautomatic action will load the next round and cock the weapon. Doubleaction triggers perform two functions: they cock the gun and release the hammer to fire it. On a DA revolver, the trigger cocks the hammer, rotates the cylinder, and releases the hammer. On a DA semiautomatic pistol, when a round is fired, the mechanism automatically loads the next round and cocks the hammer, so after the first round, the trigger functions as single action. This is significant because the single-action trigger pull is lighter than the double-action trigger, so DA pistols have relatively heavy trigger pulls on the first shot and lighter pulls on subsequent shots. For example, while a double-action trigger might require six to twelve pounds of pressure to fire, a singleaction trigger might require only three to five pounds of pressure. Some shooters who prefer a consistent trigger pull for all shots opt for a DAO trigger, which provides the convenience of double action along with the consistency of uniform trigger weight. A lighter trigger makes it easier to shoot accurately because light pressure on the trigger makes it less likely that the gun will be pulled off aim while firing, so single action is preferred for target pistols. However, lighter triggers may also increase the chance of an accidental discharge, and single action is sometimes more cumbersome to operate, so double action is often preferred for defensive weapons.

Ammunition Ammunition is described in terms of its caliber, which is approximately equal to the diameter of the bullet and of the inside of

the barrel from which the bullet is intended to be fired. The 9-mm, the .38 Special, the .357 Magnum, and the .380 ACP all fire bullets approximately 9 mm (or 0.355 inches) in diameter from barrels of approximately the same diameter. Ten-millimeter ammunition is about 10 mm in diameter, .22 caliber ammunition is about 0.22 inches in diameter, and so forth. Whether caliber is expressed in British or metric units merely reflects the decisions of the designers. One of the most common types of ammunition is the .22 Long Rifle (which, despite its name and its use in long guns, is a lowpower handgun-class cartridge). The .22 is well suited for target shooting because it is inexpensive and accurate (when used in an accurate firearm), and it generates very little recoil. It is generally considered a poor choice for defensive use because of its small size. Among the most popular cartridges for defensive use are the 9-mm Parabellum (also known as the 9 × 19-mm and 9-mm Luger, or simply the 9-mm), the .38 Special, the .357 Magnum, the .40 Smith & Wesson, and the .45 ACP. All of these cartridges have adequate penetration and bullet diameter to provide a reasonable chance of promptly incapacitating an attacker. Other common cartridges include the .25 ACP, the .32 ACP, and the .380 ACP, which, along with the .22, are frequently used in Saturday night specials and other relatively compact handguns but are less effective for self-defense use than the larger calibers.

Lethality When a weapon is used in self-defense, the shooter’s appropriate goal is to promptly incapacitate an assailant. Contrary to images of handgun use sometimes shown in entertainment media, handgun bullets generally do not cause incapacitation by knocking people down and killing them instantly.

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Incapacitation occurs as a result of blood loss, central nervous system damage (when bullets hit the brain or spinal cord), and psychological factors, and the first and last of these may take considerable time. Bullets also do not knock people backward to any great degree. They could not be expected to, as they deliver approximately the same amount of momentum to the target as the shooter experiences as recoil. (The momentum of a 9-mm bullet is roughly equal to the momentum of a ten-pound weight dropped from a height of three-quarters of an inch— hardly enough to knock people down regularly.) Although all handgun rounds have the potential to cause lethal injury, a majority of people who are shot with handguns survive. Matthew DeBell See also: Homicides, Gun; Long Gun; Miniguns; Saturday Night Specials

Further Readings Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. Guns in America: Results of a Comprehensive National Survey on Firearms Ownership and Use. Washington, DC: Police Foundation, 1996. Ezell, Edward C. Handguns of the World. Harrisburg, PA: Stackpole Books, 1981. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Crime in the United States, 2008. Washington, DC: Federal Bureau of Investigation, 2009. http://www2.f bi.gov/ucr/cius2008/index .html (accessed June 20, 2011). National Opinion Research Center. “General Social Survey, 2018.” (“Pistol—Pistol or revolver in home?”). 2019. https://gss.norc. org/get-the-data/spss (accessed November 17, 2019). Smith, Tom W. 2001 National Gun Policy Survey of the National Opinion Research Center: Research Findings. Chicago: National Opinion Research Center, 2001.

Handguns Magazine. See Periodicals, Guns Health Care Professionals and Gun Violence Health care professionals (HCPs) include physicians, dentists, nurses, scientists, technicians, mental health professionals, medical social workers, public health officers, biomedical researchers, and others. The professional orientations, demographic characteristics, and socioeconomic status vary considerably within and among different health care professions. Therefore, health care employees are likely to have varying opinions on important topical issues, including firearms. Although many of the professional organizations to which HCPs belong have adopted a public health or epidemiological approach to firearms violence, the levels of agreement between the members and the organizations are not fully known. Most studies have focused on physicians and have found variations in opinion based on their personal experiences with firearms. Several studies have indicated that the public health approach is generally favored by physicians, but with lower levels of support among those who own guns. For example, Cassel et al. (1998) interviewed 915 members of the American College of Physicians (ACP) and the American College of Surgeons (ACS). Support for the public health approach was greatest among respondents who had little exposure to guns and who belonged to gun control organizations. The supporters tended to be female, younger, and currently practicing in large cities. Those accepting the public health approach tended to believe that it is appropriate to offer counseling on firearm safety,



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to believe the medical literature on guns, to think that physicians should be involved in firearm injury prevention, and to think that violence prevention should be a priority for physicians. This concern was not reflected in actual practice, as few included firearm safety counseling in their clinical practice. Not surprisingly, most thought that gun control legislation can reduce the risks of injury and death from firearms. Restricting access to high-capacity, rapid-fire weapons, dangerous new forms of firearms and handguns, and registration of handguns were favored. Other studies have confirmed that relatively few physicians provide counseling on firearms storage and use. Beecher, Cassel, and Nelson (2000) found, ironically, that those who own guns were more likely to counsel patients about firearms, but that counseling rates remained relatively low. Frank et al. (2006) surveyed over 2,000 medical students in 16 medical schools in 2003 and also found a correlation between firearm counseling and gun ownership, with overall counseling levels remaining low. An Ohio study confirmed these findings for social workers but found higher levels of counseling by social workers who had firearm safety training. Therefore, in the absence of additional training programs or requirements, the prospects for firearms counseling to become widespread practice appear low. A Florida state law passed in 2011 restricted physician counseling on firearms, specifically restricting medical professionals from asking patients about gun ownership, including such information in patient records, and discussing safe storage. The law was subsequently declared unconstitutional by a U.S. District Court in 2012, with the judge noting that it “unduly burdened physicians’ right to free speech” and therefore violated the First Amendment; this

decision was reaffirmed by the federal appellate court in 2017. Interestingly, a study by Betz and colleagues (2016) found that 66 percent of participants surveyed as part of a national study believed that it was appropriate for physicians to discuss firearms with their patients at least some of the time, with nearly one in every four, on average, believing that such conversations were appropriate at any time. Several studies have reported gun ownership levels among physicians as being near national averages. However, declining firearm ownership by younger, urban adults and the rising number of women in medical schools means that the proportion of physicians owning firearms is likely to decline. Guglielmo (2000) published a survey of gun ownership among physicians, reporting that 32 percent of the respondents owned a gun, very close to that for the general population as reported in public opinion surveys at that time (34.3%; see General Social Survey, National Opinion Research Center [2008]). On the other hand, the level of ownership was higher among males and married physicians than among females and single physicians; it also increased with age. Medical specialty was also associated with gun ownership: it was highest among orthopedic surgeons and lowest among pediatricians. The Frank et al. study found lower-than-average gun ownership rates among medical students. Several other studies have examined the prevalence of gun ownership among physicians along with other health care workers. They report levels of ownership that are quite high, but there is a lack of recent data. Fargason and Johnston (1995) found that 50 percent of surveyed pediatricians reported owning a gun, and that 34 percent had a handgun in their household. They also surveyed trauma center workers (Fargason and

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Johnston 1994) and found that 65 percent owned a gun and 56 percent owned a handgun. Goldberg, Whitlock, and Greenlick (1996) surveyed 6,436 nonphysician employees of a large health maintenance organization and asked two questions about firearm ownership and storage practices. Forty-two percent of those surveyed reported keeping a firearm in their home. Price and Oden (1999) surveyed health directors in cities with populations greater than 60,000 and were surprised to find that 34.8 percent owned firearms. Overall, it appears a solid majority of health care professionals agree in principle with a public health approach to firearms violence. There appear, though, to be variations in the extent to which health care professionals consider preventing firearm violence and providing firearms counseling to be an integral part of their responsibilities. There also has been only limited research about health care professionals’ attitudes, knowledge, experience, and training regarding firearm use and safety issues. David Cowan and Marcia L. Godwin See also: American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP); American Medical Association (AMA); Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC); Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Hemenway, David A.; Kellermann, Arthur L.; Medicine and Gun Violence; Motor Vehicle Laws as a Model for Gun Laws; Victimization from Gun Violence

Further Reading Becher, Elise C., Christine K. Cassel, and Elizabeth A. Nelson. “Physician Firearm Ownership as a Predictor of Firearm Injury Prevention Practice.” American Journal of Public Health 90 (2000): 1626–28. Betz, Marian E., Deborah Azrael, Catherine Barber, and Matthew Miller. “Public Opinion

Regarding Whether Speaking with Patients about Firearms Is Appropriate.” Annals of Internal Medicine 165 (2016): 543–50. Betz, Marian E., Megan L. Ranney, and Garen J. Wintemute. “Physicians, Patients, and Firearms: The Courts Say ‘Yes.’” Annals of Internal Medicine 166 (2017): 745–46. Cassel, Christine K., Elizabeth A. Nelson, Tom W. Smith, C. William Schwab, Barbara Barlow, and Nancy E. Gary. “Internists’ and Surgeons’ Attitudes toward Guns and Firearm Injury Prevention.” Annals of Internal Medicine 128 (1998): 224–30. Coyne-Beasley, Tamera, and Adrea Theodore. “Future Physicians and Firearms: The Need for Additional Training in Firearm Injury Prevention Counseling.” Southern Medical Journal 99 (2006): 198–99. Fargason, Crayton A., Jr., and Carden Johnston. “Gun Ownership and Counseling of Alabama Pediatricians.” Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine 149 (1995): 442–46. Fargason, Crayton A., Jr., and Carden Johnston. “Gun Safety Practices of Trauma Center Workers in a Southern City.” Southern Medical Journal 87 (1994): 965–70. Frank, Erica, Jennifer S. Carrera, Jason Prystowsky, and Arthur Kellermann. “FirearmRelated Personal and Clinical Characteristics of US Medical Students.” Southern Medical Journal 99 (2006): 216–25. Goldberg, Bruce W., Evelyn Whitlock, and Merwyn Greenlick. “Firearm Ownership and Health Care Workers.” Public Health Report 111 (1996): 256–59. Guglielmo, Wayne J. “How Many Doctors Own Guns?” Medical Economics 19 (2000): 151–52. National Opinion Research Center. “General Social Survey, 2008.” (“Own Gun, Have Gun in Home: Do You Happen to Have in Your Home (or Garage) Any Guns or Revolvers?”) http://www3.norc.org/GSS+Website/ (accessed December 30, 2011). Price, James H., Andrea Kinnison, Joseph A. Dake, Amy J. Thompson, and Joy A. Price.

“Psychiatrists’ Practices and Perceptions Regarding Anticipatory Guidance on Firearms.” American Journal of Preventive Medicine 33 (2007): 370–73. Slovak, Karen, and Thomas W. Brewer. “Suicide and Firearm Means Restriction: Can Training Make a Difference?” Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior 40 (2010): 63–73. Slovak, Karen, and Karen Carlson. “Client Firearm Assessment and Safety Counseling: The Role of Social Workers.” Social Work 53 (2008): 358–66. Solomon, Barry S., Anne K. Duggan, Daniel Webster, and Janet R. Serwint. “Pediatric Residents’ Attitudes and Behaviors Related to Counseling Adolescents and Their Parents about Firearm Safety.” Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine 156 (2002): 769–75. http://archpedi.ama-assn .org/cgi/reprint/156/8/769 (accessed July 9, 2011).

Hellfire Trigger A Hellfire trigger is small metal device that attaches to a semiautomatic gun, allowing it to fire at a rate that approaches a fully automatic firearm. The device attaches by clamping to the guard directly behind the trigger of the gun. This allows a piece from the Hellfire trigger to press against the back of the firing mechanism, increasing the force that returns the trigger to its forward positions (Hell Fire Trigger System 2001). When the trigger is pulled, the device disengages the return spring. This allows for less finger movement to engage the trigger, thereby allowing for a higher rate of fire. The Hellfire system permits one to fire their gun at “full-auto” rates, even though the trigger is being pulled each time a round is discharged. The original Hellfire trigger system, which is no longer in production, came with a copy of a letter from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives stating

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that it was legal, just in case complications with legality arose (Hell Fire Trigger System 2001). The device works on the following devices: MAK-90s and other AK-47 derivatives, Mini-14s and Mini-30s, AR-15s and clones, SKS’s, M-11s, and similar guns, as well as for pistols with the addition of a barrel shroud or fake suppressor (Hell Fire Trigger System 2001). Although this device allows for rapid firing, it has been argued that it is technically not altering the firearm, as only one round is fired with every trigger pull. The Bump Stock Ban of 2019 clarifies the definition of “machine gun” in the National Firearms Act (NFA) from 1934 and the Gun Control Act (GCA) from 1968 to include devices that allow a semiautomatic firearm to shoot more than one round with a single pull of the trigger (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives 2019). As the Hellfire device only allows one round per trigger pull, it is not prohibited under this law. The Hellfire trigger gained notoriety with its use in a mass shooting that occurred on January 1, 1993, in San Francisco, California, at the law firm of Pettit and Martin. During this event, eight individuals were killed and six were injured (Dwyer and Hochmuth 2013). In addition to the fourteen victims, the perpetrator also took his own life. He reportedly used two TEC-9s outfitted with the device and a .45 semiautomatic pistol (Associated Press 1995). Following the shooting, relatives of the victims sued the companies that made the weapons and attachments used by the perpetrator. The named parties in the lawsuit included Navegar, maker of the TEC-DC-9; Hell-Fire Systems of Olathe, Colorado, maker of the Hellfire trigger used; USA Magazines, maker of the 32-round magazine standard in the TEC-DC-9; and Superpawn, the Nevada

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pawnshop where the perpetrator purchased the weapons (Associated Press 1995). According to Chiang (2003), this mass shooting had the most profound impact on California’s gun legislation. Victims’ relatives rallied together and gained the support of Senator Dianne Feinstein to further raise gun control issues (Dwyer and Hochmuth 2013). Some of the legislation that was implemented after the mass shooting included, but was not limited to the Assault Weapons Ban (1994) (restricting the manufacturing and sale of semiautomatic style assault weapons with one or more military characteristics), Gun Safety Standards (1999) (requiring safety standards for sales by gun dealers), and Immunity Repeal (2002) (repealing special immunity protecting gun makers from lawsuits) (Chiang 2003). The original maker of the Hellfire trigger, Hell-Fire Systems of Olathe, Colorado, filed for bankruptcy and went out of business in 1995 as a result of the aforementioned lawsuit (Kopel and Gardiner 1995). Even though the original company that made this device has gone out of business, newer generations have been created and are currently available for purchase. Melissa J. Tetzlaff-Bemiller See also: Assault Weapons; Bump Stocks; Semiautomatic Weapons

Further Reading Associated Press. “Suit Can Proceed against Maker of Guns Used in 1993 Killings.” New York Times, April 12, 1995. https://www .nytimes.com/1995/04/12/us/suit-can-proceed -against-maker-of-guns-used-in-1993-kill ings.html (accessed May 16, 2022). Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. “Rules and Regulations: Bump Stock.” 2019. https://www.atf.gov/rules-and -regulations/bump-stocks (accessed February 21, 2019).

Chiang, Harriet. “10 Years After / 101 California Massacre Victims Helped Toughen Gun Laws.” SF Gate, July 1, 2003. https:// www.sfgate.com/news/article/10-YEARSA FTER-101- Califor nia-massacre-vic tims-2567142.php (accessed May 16, 2022). Dwyer, Diane, and Amanda Hochmuth. “101 California Shooting: 20 Years Later.” NBC Bay Area, June 29, 2013. https://www .nbcbayarea.com/news/local/101-California -Shooting-20-Years-Later-213705691.html (accessed May 16, 2022). “Hell Fire Trigger System.” AK-47.net, January 4, 2003. https://web.archive.org/web /20080323112707/http://www.ak-47.net /products/hellfire.html (accessed May 16, 2022). Kopel, David B., and Richard E. Gardiner. “The Sullivan Principles: Protecting the Second Amendment from Civil Abuse.” Seton Hall Legislative Journal 737 (1995). http://davekopel.org/2A/LawRev/Protecti ng _ t he _ Se cond _ A me nd me nt _ f rom _Civil_Abuse.htm#fnb107 (accessed May 16, 2022).

Helmke, Paul(1948–) Paul Helmke served as president of the Brady Campaign/Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence—the nation’s largest national, nonpartisan, grassroots organization promoting stronger gun control laws—between July 2006 and July 2011. Prior to this, he was a lawyer in Fort Wayne, Indiana, where he served as a three-term mayor from 1988 to 2000 and served as president of the United States Conference of Mayors during his final mayoral term. In 2007, after the mass shooting at Virginia Tech, Helmke helped to pass federal legislation providing incentives to states to submit records of prohibited gun purchasers to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). He hired



Virginia Tech survivor Colin Goddard to work at the Brady Campaign, building on the organization’s history of leadership from victims, including founder Mark Borinsky, Pete Shields, Sarah and Jim Brady, and many others. Following the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark Second Amendment case, District of Columbia v. Heller, Helmke stressed that the opinion still allowed reasonable restrictions on guns. While the court’s 5-4 decision held that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess handguns specifically for use in self-defense in a person’s home, Justice Antonin Scalia, writing for the majority, stressed that the right “is not unlimited” and that many laws were “presumptively lawful.” Helmke framed the decision as a new opportunity to push for stronger national gun laws, including requiring background checks for all gun sales, restricting access to certain weapons, and limiting the carrying of guns in public. Helmke also led the Brady Campaign’s response to the January 2011 mass shooting in Tucson, Arizona. In just fifteen seconds, a shooter was able to fire more than thirty rounds, hitting nineteen people, including Representative Gabrielle Giffords, and killing six. The shooting prompted calls for a ban on assault clips holding more than ten rounds and for improvements to the background check system. The thirtieth anniversary of Jim Brady’s shooting on March 30, 2011, led to a trip to the White House by Helmke and the Bradys to meet President Barack Obama, helping focus attention on these issues. After stepping down from Brady, Helmke took a position in the School of Public and Environmental Affairs at Indiana University, where he earned his undergraduate degree in 1970. He also serves as the director of the Civic Leaders Living-Learning

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Center, which he founded in 2013, the same year he joined the faculty. He continues to provide interviews on gun control to news media. Rebecca Knox See also: Background Checks; Brady, James S.; Brady, Sarah Kemp; Brady: United against Gun Violence; District of Columbia v. Heller; NICS Improvement Act; Obama, Barack; Open Carry Laws; Tucson, Arizona, Shooting; United States Conference of Mayors; Virginia Tech Shooting

Further Reading “Paul Helmke.” Indiana University. 2021. https://oneill.indiana.edu/faculty-research /directory/profiles/faculty/full-time/hel mke-paul.html (accessed July 5, 2021).

Hemenway, David A.(1945–) David Hemenway is a professor of health policy at Harvard’s School of Public Health and serves as director of the Harvard Injury Control Research Center. He was also formerly Visiting James Marsh Professor-atLarge at the University of Vermont. A major exponent of the public health approach to reducing injury, he helped lead the efforts to create a National Violent Death Reporting System for the United States, a system that provides consistent, comparable, and detailed information about suicides, homicides, and unintentional gun deaths. Hemenway received his PhD in economics at Harvard in 1974 and has since written five books and more than 150 peer-reviewed journal articles. His injury research includes work on falls and fractures, fires, drownings, motor vehicle crashes, child abuse, suicides, and homicides. His career in the injury field began in the 1960s, when he

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worked for Ralph Nader and Consumers Union. In the early 1980s, he created a class at Harvard on injury prevention. Hemenway has won ten school-wide teaching awards at the Harvard School of Public Health. Hemenway is currently director of both the Harvard Injury Control Research Center and the Harvard Youth Violence Prevention Center. He has been head of the Injury Council of the National Association of Public Health Policy and is past president of the National Association of Injury Control Research Centers. He was a Pew Fellow on Injury Control and a Soros Senior Justice Fellow, and he received a Robert Wood Johnson Investigator Award to study firearm violence. In 2007, he won the Excellence in Science Award, given to one scholar each year by the Injury and Emergency Services section of the American Public Health Association. Hemenway’s research on fatalities shows that the developed countries with higher levels of firearm ownership have higher rates of homicide for both men and women due to higher rates of firearm homicide. His U.S. studies show that states with higher rates of household gun ownership have higher levels of suicides and homicides, due to higher rates of firearm mortality. These findings also apply separately for females, children, the middle-aged, and older adults. Some of Hemenway’s research findings come from surveys of students, criminals, and the general U.S. population. From national surveys, he discovered that many gun owners report storing their firearms loaded and unlocked, and that firearm training is associated with an increased likelihood of such storage practices. He found that the vast majority of Americans, including the majority of gun owners and National Rifle Association members, favor many reasonable gun policies that have yet to be

enacted. He found that respondents to national surveys report feeling less safe as other people obtain or carry firearms, and that less than 10 percent of the population want regular citizens to be able to carry guns into bars, restaurants, sports stadiums, hospitals, or government buildings. Some of his best-known and most controversial findings deal with self-defense gun use. He has shown that criminal gun use is far more common than self-defense gun use, and that self-reported self-defense gun use is often aggressive gun use in an escalating argument. Self-reported self-defense gun uses have been assessed by criminologists and criminal court judges as usually being illegal acts that harm the social welfare. Hemenway has argued that the methodology used to claim that more than a million Americans use guns each year in actual self-defense is plagued by the falsepositive problem for rare events, and could also be used to claim that almost a million Americans have personally been in contact with aliens from other planets. In 2012, Hemenway was recognized by the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention as one of the “twenty most influential injury and violence professionals over the past twenty years.” Roseanna Ander See also: Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Kellermann, Arthur L.; Kleck, Gary; Medicine and Gun Violence; Motor Vehicle Laws as a Model for Gun Laws; National Violent Death Reporting System; Victimization from Gun Violence

Further Reading Dodson, Nancy, and David Hemenway. “Toward a Deeper Understanding of Gun Violence.” Pediatrics 146, no. 1 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2019-3333

Hemenway, David. Private Guns, Public Health. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2004. Updated edition, 2017. Hemenway, David. “The Public Health Approach to Motor Vehicles, Tobacco and Alcohol, with Applications to Firearm Policy.” Journal of Public Health Policy 22 (2002): 381–402. Hemenway, David. “Survey Research and SelfDefense Gun Use: An Explanation of Extreme Overestimates.” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 87 (1997): 1430–45. Hemenway, David, and Deborah Azrael. “Gun Use in the United States: Results from Two National Surveys.” Injury Prevention 6 (2000): 263–67. Hemenway, David, Deborah Azrael, and Matthew Miller. “U.S. National Attitudes Concerning Gun Carrying in the United States.” Injury Prevention 7 (2001): 282–85. Hemenway, David, Catherine W. Barber, Susan S. Gallagher, and Deborah R. Azrael. “Creating a National Violent Death Reporting System: A Successful Beginning.” American Journal of Preventive Medicine 37 (2009): 68–71. Hemenway, David, and Matthew Miller. “Firearm Availability and Homicide Rates across 26 High-Income Countries.” Journal of Trauma 49 (2000): 985–88. Hemenway, David, Deborah Prothrow-Stith, Jack M. Bergstein, Roseanna Ander, and Bruce P. Kennedy. “Gun Carrying among Adolescents.” Law and Contemporary Problems 59 (1996): 39–53. Hemenway, David, Sara J. Solnick, and Deborah Azrael. “Firearm Training and Storage.” Journal of the American Medical Association 273 (1995): 46–50. Miller, Matthew, Deborah Azrael, and David Hemenway. “Firearm Availability and Unintentional Firearm Deaths, Suicide and Homicide among Women.” Journal of Urban Health 79 (2002): 26–38. Miller, Matthew, Deborah Azrael, and David Hemenway. “State-level Homicide Victimization Rates in the US in Relation to

Henigan, Dennis A. | 419 Survey Measures of Household Firearm Ownership, 2001–2003.” Social Science and Medicine 64 (2007): 656–64.

Henigan, Dennis A.(1951–) Dennis A. Henigan, formerly vice president for Law and Policy at the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, has long been a prominent advocate of stronger gun laws and the legal accountability of the gun industry. As founder and former Director of the Brady Center’s Legal Action Project, Henigan represented individuals and communities in lawsuits in federal and state courts seeking to reform the gun industry and bring about safer practices by gun manufacturers, dealers, and owners. In the case Merrill v. Navegar Inc. (2001), Henigan won the first appellate court ruling that a gun manufacturer could be liable in damages for the criminal use of a gun. Henigan also was active in filing numerous briefs amicus curiae defending gun laws against legal attack by the National Rifle Association and the gun industry. His work as a public interest lawyer has been profiled in the New Yorker and he was named one of the top ten “Lawyers of the Year” by Lawyers Weekly magazine. In two books, Lethal Logic (2009) and “Guns Don’t Kill People. People Kill People” and Other Myths about Guns and Gun Control (2016), Henigan critically examined the pro-gun slogans that have long dominated the gun control debate in the United States. His articles on constitutional and liability issues involving gun laws and gun violence have appeared in academic law reviews, as well as in periodicals and online publications, including Politico Magazine, The Daily Beast, Slate, The New Republic, and The American Prospect. He

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also has made numerous appearances on television and radio, including 60 Minutes, Dateline NBC, The Today Show, and Good Morning America. Gregg Lee Carter and Walter F. Carroll See also: Brady Legal; Brady: United against Gun Violence; Second Amendment

Further Reading Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence. ht t ps : //w w w.br a dy u n it e d .org /ab out (accessed January 28, 2020). Carter, Gregg Lee. Gun Control in the United States: A Reference Handbook. 2nd ed. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2017. Henigan, Dennis A. “Guns Don’t Kill People. People Kill People” and Other Myths about Guns and Gun Control. Boston: Beacon Press, 2016. Henigan, Dennis A. Lethal Logic: Exploding the Myths that Paralyze American Gun Policy. Washington, DC: Potomac Books, 2009. Henigan, Dennis A., Bruce Nicholson, and David Hemenway. Guns and the Constitution: The Myth of Second Amendment Protection for Firearms in America. Northampton, MA: Aletheia Press, 1995.

Heston, Charlton(1923–2008) Academy Award–winning actor, star of over one hundred films and theatrical productions, former president of the Screen Actors Guild, and civil rights activist, Charlton Heston served as president of the National Rifle Association (NRA) from 1998 to 2003. He became the NRA’s public face, championing the right to keep and bear arms and presenting the NRA as a mainstream, all-American organization. Heston was born John Charlton Carter on October 4, 1923, in Evanston, Illinois, but

he spent his formative years in Michigan after his mother divorced Heston’s father and married Chester Heston, a timber mill owner. Heston attended Northwestern University in Evanston on an acting scholarship and majored in speech and drama. At Northwestern he met Lydia Clarke, whom he married in 1944. He served in the Army Air Corps during World War II. Heston then went to Hollywood, where he enjoyed immense success as an actor. Among Heston’s most notable films were Ben-Hur, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor in 1959, and The Ten Commandments, in which he portrayed Moses. Like fellow actor Ronald Reagan, Heston began as a Democrat. He strongly supported the civil rights movement and participated in Dr. Martin Luther King’s 1963 March on Washington. Perhaps more surprisingly, Heston once publicly supported federal gun control legislation. In 1968, when President Lyndon Johnson was trying to push gun control legislation through Congress (a compromise version of which became the Gun Control Act of 1968), the White House enlisted the support of various “cowboy” actors to endorse gun control. Among the actors who endorsed the White House gun control proposal was Charlton Heston. Years later, when asked about his support for gun control, Heston said that he had changed his mind about gun control after he became a supporter of Barry Goldwater’s presidential campaign. Goldwater, however, was the Republican presidential nominee in 1964, four years before Heston endorsed the White House gun control plan. Already an honorary life member of the NRA, Heston became an NRA officer against the backdrop of a political struggle within the group. The NRA’s chief operating officer, Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre, was being challenged by Neal



Knox, who was then serving as the NRA’s second vice president. As second vice president, Knox was in line to become first vice president and eventually president of the NRA. (The first and second vice presidents and the president are unpaid positions. The executive vice president is a full-time, salaried staff position.) In an early 1997 NRA board meeting, LaPierre’s group narrowly turned back a challenge from Knox supporters. The Knox group had argued that LaPierre’s financial management of the group was deficient and that LaPierre was sometimes too willing to compromise on gun rights issues. At the 1997 NRA convention, Heston was a candidate for the seventy-sixth director position and won the race overwhelmingly. (Under the NRA’s bylaws, one member of the seventy-six-member board of directors is elected by all members who attend its annual convention.) Shortly thereafter, the board of directors met and elected Heston first vice president over Neal Knox. In 1998, Heston was elected president of the NRA, and he was reelected in 2000. In 2001, the organization modified its bylaws to allow Heston to exceed the ordinary term limits. He was elected to a third term in 2002. Heston used his presidential authority, such as the power to appoint committee members, to remove Knox supporters from positions of power. Within the NRA, Heston played an important role in solidifying LaPierre’s day-to-day control of the organization. As the NRA’s most visible spokesman, Heston played a major role in LaPierre’s campaign to present the NRA as a mainstream organization. Heston campaigned tirelessly for NRA-supported candidates, usually attracting large crowds. In addition, he spoke frequently on college campuses, urging students to stand up for their

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Charlton Heston, an Oscar-winning actor, served five terms as president of the National Rifle Association. He also became one of the organization’s most visible spokespeople, popularizing the phrase “From my cold, dead hands!” in support of Second Amendment rights. (Laurence Agron/Dreamstime.com)

free-speech rights and not to be afraid to speak their minds. His campus speeches were sometimes met with efforts by school administrators or campus groups to prevent the speech from taking place, such as at Brandeis University, where the administration imposed requirements on Heston that had not been required for other controversial speakers. Heston’s celebrity status allowed him to raise issues to a much higher degree of visibility than the NRA could ordinarily achieve. For example, when Heston challenged gun control advocate Barbra Streisand to a debate on the Second Amendment, the challenge was reported in newspapers

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nationwide (Streisand declined the invitation). On another occasion, early in 2000, the NRA ran a series of paid advertisements featuring Heston accusing then-president Clinton of lying when he accused the NRA of being unconcerned with public safety. A common theme in Heston’s writings and speeches was that gun ownership by law-abiding citizens helps reduce crime. Instead of enacting more gun control laws that do not work, Heston argued, we should seek solutions to broken families and a flawed criminal justice system. Heston’s critics fell into two major camps. Within the gun rights movement, some activists criticized Heston for not being fully informed on issues—especially in appearances on Sunday morning television interview programs and the like—and for making misstatements as a result. Most of these critics, however, conceded that when delivering a speech, Heston was unsurpassed as a defender of Second Amendment rights. Gun control advocates, well aware of Heston’s role in presenting the NRA as a core element of the American mainstream, conducted a campaign to portray Heston as an extremist. Actor Spike Lee said that Heston should be shot, and Democratic political operative Bob Beckel called Heston “the devil incarnate.” Criticism of Heston made little impact. He helped to grow the NRA’s membership to a new high of over four million members. He also played a major role in the NRA’s successful political efforts in the 2000, 2002, and 2004 elections. Al Gore named Heston personally responsible for Gore’s narrow defeat in 2000. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, it could be said that Sarah Brady was indispensable to the gun control cause, as she led her organization, the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence (formerly known as Handgun

Control Inc.), to new levels of political achievement and public support. The Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act of 1993 (originally named for Sarah Brady, then later named for her husband, Jim Brady) was well titled, for without Sarah Brady as the public face of the gun control movement, the movement would not have achieved nearly as many victories as it did. Charlton Heston has performed a similar role for the NRA and the gun rights movement. As the Associated Press noted, to the public at large, Heston and the NRA became synonymous. Heston authored an autobiography, In the Arena, and an essay collection, The Courage to Be Free, on, among other things, the Second Amendment and the virtues of an armed populace. In August 2002, he announced that he was in the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease; he wanted to make the announcement while still mentally clear. He resigned as NRA president in 2003. He died on April 5, 2008, extolled in an NRA tribute video as “freedom’s leading man.” Brannon P. Denning and David B. Kopel See also: Knox, Neal; LaPierre, Wayne R., Jr.; National Rifle Association (NRA)

Further Reading Heston, Charlton. The Courage to Be Free. Kansas City, KS: Saudade Press, 2000. Heston, Charlton. In the Arena: An Autobiography. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1995. Heston, Charlton. “Our First Freedom.” Saturday Evening Post 272, no. 1 (January– February 2000): 42–44. “NRA Tribute to Charlton Heston” [NRA Annual Meeting, Phoenix, AZ]. YouTube video, 9:24, posted by “NRAVideos,” May 23, 2008. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v =0297_ha8zXE (accessed January 27, 2022).

Raymond, Emilie. From My Cold, Dead Hands: Charlton Heston and American Politics. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2006.

High-Capacity Magazine Ban The Public Safety and Recreational Firearms Use Protection Act prohibited the manufacture, transfer, and possession of all high-capacity magazines (also called largecapacity magazines) capable of holding more than ten rounds of ammunition. President Bill Clinton signed the act into law on September 13, 1994, under the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act. Commonly known as the Federal Assault Weapons Ban (FAWB) of 1994, in addition to banning high-capacity magazines, this law prohibited the manufacture, transfer, and possession of nineteen specific models of assault weapons and any firearms with military-style features such as flash suppressors, bayonet mounts, folding stocks. Senator Howard Metzenbaum (D-OH) first introduced legislation prohibiting assault rifles and high-capacity magazines in 1989, following an attack on a Stockton, California, schoolyard. Using a semiautomatic rifle with a high-capacity magazine, the shooter killed five children and injured twenty-nine others in the attack. While national polls showed over 70 percent of the American public supported more restrictive gun laws, the Assault Weapon Control Act of 1989 failed to pass a Senate vote. In 1993, the call for an assault weapons ban regained momentum following two mass shootings— one on a Long Island Railroad train, resulting in five casualties and nineteen serious injuries, and the other at a San Francisco law firm, leaving eight dead and six wounded. Following the San Francisco shooting, Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) encouraged

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policy makers to construct a legislative framework to reduce the frequency and lethality of mass shootings. This legislation became law one year later as the Public Safety and Recreational Firearms Use Protection Act. The 1994 ban of high-capacity magazines was included within the Public Safety and Recreational Firearms Use Protection Act for the purpose of controlling and preventing mass shootings in the United States. A 2009–2017 review of mass shootings in the United States by lobby group Everytown for Gun Safety (2018) indicates that mass shootings involving high-capacity magazines resulted in twice as many fatalities compared to others where magazines under ten rounds were used as the primary weapon. Magazines capable of holding ten or more bullets can be used in both rifles and handguns that accept detachable magazines. From an impact study for the Public Safety and Recreational Firearms Use Protection Act, lawmakers determined that magazines containing ten or more rounds of ammunition exceeded what were considered to be “reasonable expectations” required by hunters and competitive shooters (Roth and Koper 1999). Because the ability to fire greater numbers of consecutive rounds carries the potential for additional harm in an attack, high-capacity magazines were specifically targeted for prohibition. Magazines holding greater amounts of ammunition facilitate the ability to rapidly fire shots in a short period of time, thereby increasing the potential for injury and death among the intended targets. Further, the time used by shooters to reload their firearms may be an especially critical window, allowing for victims to escape and law enforcement to carry out safer interventions. The FAWB carried a sunset provision of ten years and subsequently lapsed on

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September 13, 2004. Currently, nine states and Washington, DC, have laws in place banning high-capacity magazines. Statutory definitions of “high-capacity magazines” differ between states, typically restricting magazines with the capacity to hold between ten and twenty rounds of ammunition. However, these policies are undermined by the lack of a federal ban, allowing for individuals to purchase highcapacity magazines for use in neighboring states. Although FAWB restricted the sale of high-capacity magazines, all magazines manufactured or possessed prior to the ban’s effect were allowed by a “grandfather” provision written into the law. Exploiting this loophole, gun manufacturers increased production of the banned weapons in the months prior to the ban. Prices on the banned firearms and high-capacity magazines rose significantly during this time due to the advance speculation that these items would become collector’s items after the ban took effect. These efforts resulted in an increased supply of highcapacity magazines, thus allowing for sale and transfer even after the ban was put into effect, outside of areas where sales were prohibited by state law. Following the ban’s enactment, prices on high-capacity magazines fell significantly due to their continued availability enabled by the loopholes in the legislature. Notwithstanding these limitations, research addressing the 1994 ban has often demonstrated support for the ban’s effects. A contemporary study suggests that the frequency and deadliness of mass shootings decreased significantly during the ban’s tenure, then rose steeply when it expired in 2004 (Klarevas, Conner, and Hemenway, 2019). Recovery rates of crime-related guns equipped with high-capacity magazines

also increased to a significant degree following the FAWB lapse, at estimated rates of 49–112 percent in major U.S. cities and 33 percent nationwide (Koper et al. 2018). A study conducted by the Washington Post found clear reductions in the number of high-capacity magazines recovered from crimes by Virginia State Police during the federal ban. Analyses from this study show that approximately 10 percent of the firearms recovered in 2004 were equipped with high-capacity magazines; in the years after, this number has steadily crept upward, to 22 percent observed in 2010 (Fallis 2013). The Los Angeles Police Department has also recorded significantly higher quantities of crime guns recovered with high-capacity magazines since repeal of the federal ban. Numbers indicate that LAPD recovered only thirty-eight high-capacity magazines in 2003, while the ban was still in effect. Following the ban’s lapse, the LAPD reported the recovery of 151 to 940 highcapacity magazines recovered from 2006 to 2010 (Citizens Crime Commission of NYC 2011). Mass shooting homicides have increased in the period following the federal ban on assault rifles and high-capacity magazines. As of 2018, eight of the largest public health organizations in the United States and the American Bar Association have called for restricting the manufacture, sales, and transfer of assault weapons and high-capacity magazines for consumer use. Recent polling numbers have consistently shown that a majority of American voters support a highcapacity magazine ban, at rates of approximately 70 percent (Parker et al. 2017). Current research observes that firearms equipped with high-capacity magazines currently account for almost 40 percent of the guns used in serious violent crimes (Koper et al. 2018). Furthermore, a recent



study finds that states with high-capacity magazine bans experience significantly fewer incidents of mass murder, and far fewer casualties in mass shootings (Klarevas, Conner, and Hemenway 2019). Since the expiration of the federal ban, high-capacity magazines have been used by assailants in several of the deadliest mass shootings in U.S. history. These mass shootings include incidents in Aurora, Colorado (2012; twelve fatalities, fifty-eight injured), Newtown, Connecticut (2012; twenty-six fatalities, two injured), Orlando, Florida (2016; forty-nine fatalities, fifty-three injured), Las Vegas, Nevada (2017; 58 fatalities, 422 injured), Sutherland Springs, Texas (2017; twenty-six fatalities, twenty injured), Parkland, Florida (2018; seventeen fatalities, seventeen injured), and El Paso, Texas (2019; twenty-two fatalities, twentyfour injured). Despite several legislators’ attempts to revive the bill in 2003 through 2008, 2013, and 2019, the federal ban on high-capacity magazines has not been renewed. As of November 2019, there are no federal restrictions on the manufacture, sale, and possession of high-capacity magazines. The most recent legislative efforts to ban high-capacity magazines have been incorporated into the Keep Americans Safe Act (H.R. 1186), which was introduced in October 2017, following the mass shooting in Las Vegas. The Keep Americans Safe Act would provide a renewed federal ban on the transfer, sale, manufacture, transfer, and possession of high-capacity magazines capable of holding more than ten rounds of ammunition. Following the structure of the 1994– 2004 ban, the bill would not apply to any magazines or devices legally owned at the time it is enacted and carries no application to law enforcement and military officers using high-capacity magazines in an

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official capacity. The bill was reintroduced to the U.S. House of Representatives in February 2019 by Congressman Bob Menendez (D-NJ) and passed in the House Judiciary Committee in September 2019, by a vote of 23-16. Despite strong support from Democrats in the House and Senate, the Keep Americans Safe Act has not yet been subject to further votes by either legislative body. Beck M. Strah

Further Reading Citizens Crime Commission of NYC. “NYC & LA City Councils Introduce REZO for Federal Ban on Large Capacity Ammunition Magazines.” 2011. http://www.nycri mecommission.org/pdfs/CrimeCmsnNY CLACouncils.pdf (accessed July 2, 2022). DiMaggio, Charles, Jacob Avraham, Cherisse Berry, Marko Bukur, Justin Feldman, Michael Klein, Noor Shah, Manish Tandon, and Spiros Frangos. “Changes in US Mass Shooting Deaths Associated with the 1994–2004 Federal Assault Weapons Ban: Analysis of Open-Source Data.” Journal of Trauma and Acute Care Surgery 86, no. 1 (January 2019): 11–19. Donahue, John, and Theodora Boulouta. “That Assault Weapon Ban? It Really Did Work.” New York Times, September 4, 2019. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/04 /opinion/assault-weapon-ban.html (accessed May 16, 2022). Everytown for Gun Safety. “Assault Weapons and High-Capacity Magazines.” https:// everytownresearch.org/assault-weapons -high-capacity-magazines/ (accessed November 25, 2019). Fallis, David S. “Data Indicate Drop in HighCapacity Magazines during Federal Gun Ban.” Washington Post, January 10, 2013. https://www.washingtonpost.com/investiga tions/data-point-to-drop-in-high-capacity -magazines-during-federal-gun-ban/2013 /01/10/d56d3bb6-4b91-11e2-a6a6-aabac85 e8036_story.html (accessed June 12, 2022).

426 | High-Capacity Magazines Giffords Law Center. “Large Capacity Magazines.” n.d. https://lawcenter.giffords.org /gun-laws/policy-areas/hardware-ammuni tion/large-capacity-magazines/ (accessed November 25, 2019). Ingraham, Christopher. “The Real Reason Congress Banned Assault Weapons in 1994—And Why It Worked.” Washington Post, February 22, 2018. https://www.wa shingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2018/02 /22/the-real-reason-congress-ban ned -assault-weapons-in-1994-and-why-it -worked/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Kopel, David B. “The History of Firearm Magazines and Magazine Prohibitions.” Albany Law Review 78, no. 2 (December 2014): 849–84. Koper, Christopher S., William D. Johnson, Jordan L. Nichols, Ambrozine Ayers, and Natalie Mullins. “Criminal Use of Assault Weapons and High-Capacity Semiautomatic Firearms: An Updated Examination of Local and National Sources” Journal of Urban Health 95, no. 3 (2018): 313–21. Klarevas, Louis, Andrew Conner, and David Hemenway. “The Effect of Large-Capacity Magazine Bans on High-Fatality Mass Shootings, 1990–2017.” American Journal of Public Health 109, no. 12 (2019): 1754–61. Parker, Kim, Juliana M. Horowitz, Ruth Igielnik, J. Baxter Oliphant, and Anna Brown. America’s Complex Relationship with Guns. Pew Research Center, June 22, 2017. ht t ps://w w w.pew resea rch.org /social -trends /2017/06/22/americas-complex -relationship-with-guns/ (accessed June 12, 2022). Plumer, Brad. “Everything You Need to Know about the Assault Weapons Ban, in One Post.” Washington Post, December 17, 2012. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news /wonk/wp/2012/12/17/everything-you-need -to-know-about-banning-assault-weapons -in-one-post/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Rand Corporation. The Effects of Bans on the Sale of Assault Weapons and High-Capacity Magazines. Santa Monica, CA: Author, 2018. https://www.rand.org/research/gun

-policy/analysis/ban-assault-weapons.html (accessed May 16, 2022). Roth, Jeffrey A., and Christopher S. Koper. Impacts of the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban, 1994–96. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, National Institute of Justice, 1999. https:// w w w.ncjrs.gov/pdff iles1/173405.pdf (accessed May 16, 2022).

High-Capacity Magazines High-capacity (or large-capacity) magazines, sometimes also known as “extended ammunition clips,” are ammunition storage and feeding devices for firearms. These magazines are placed into the magazine well of the weapon, although larger-capacity magazines may extend beyond the well. Magazines can be removable or detachable, meaning they would be removed from the firearm to be loaded. Some magazines, however, remain integral to the firearm in that they are either located within or are fixed to the firearm. Some firearms hold more than one high-capacity magazine. Magazines hold ammunition until bullets are moved one by one into the chamber to be ejected by the firearm. Large-capacity magazines are generally available for any semiautomatic weapon with a removable magazine. What makes these high-capacity magazines different from standard-issue ones provided by the gun manufacturer is their capability to hold more bullets, or rounds. In some cases, this means that they contain more rounds than are legally allowed. The legal number of bullets depends on the jurisdiction and the type of firearm. In some jurisdictions, magazines holding more than five rounds are considered “high-capacity,” as some handguns only hold five bullets



with the standard magazine. Generally, magazines with a capacity of more than ten rounds of ammunition are considered largecapacity magazines. The manufacturer’s standard magazine capacity for a semiautomatic pistol is between fifteen and eighteen rounds, and all AR-15 style rifles come with magazines holding twenty to thirty rounds. Some magazines can hold much more ammunition, such as drum magazines, which typically hold between fifty and one hundred rounds. These circular magazines store rounds in a spiral around the center, facing the same way as the barrel so they can be loaded and fired in rapid succession. These increase the weight of a firearm by up to twenty pounds. By comparison, standard-capacity magazines with more than five rounds typically use rectangular, box-like holders. The loaded bullets form two staggered columns, or stacks, before narrowing to one at the top of the magazine and being fed into the firearm chamber. Since the 1980s, the thirtyround rifle magazine has been thought of as the “standard high-capacity magazine,” but today, magazines with forty, sixty, and one hundred rounds are more common than ever before (Stephens 2019). High-capacity magazines are desirable because operators do not have to reload their weapon(s) as often. At the same time, these magazines are sometimes unreliable and lack the mechanical design and research and development testing resources of a more reputable firearm manufacturer. Additionally, more bullets mean there is a greater chance that they will become misaligned before or during firing, which could increase the risk of a misfire. A jam like this would render the firearm useless until time-consuming corrective action is taken to clear it. The first magazine holding more than ten rounds was invented in the late sixteenth

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century. By the time the Second Amendment was ratified in 1791, many highcapacity magazines existed, the most innovative of which was the twenty- or twentytwo round magazine on the Girandoni air rifle. This weapon was superior by comparison to the powder guns of the time and was created for marksmen in the Austrian army; it was also used by Lewis and Clark on their famous expedition (Kopel 2014). During the Civil War (1861–1865), a sixteen-shot Henry Rifle created by Daniel Wesson and Oliver Winchester was used; it was later refined to become the Winchester Model 1866, a huge commercial success. By 1868, rifles holding more than ten rounds were common in the United States. The first pistol to incorporate a high-capacity magazine was the Browning Hi-Power, released in 1935, which held thirteen rounds (Kopel 2014). A 2012 survey for CNN showed that 62 percent of respondents supported laws banning the sale and possession of large-capacity magazines (ORC 2012). States with laws restricting large-capacity magazine had a 63 percent lower rate of mass shootings than those states without such laws (Siegel 2017). Across mass shooting cases between 1982 and 2012, more than half of the perpetrators possessed high-capacity magazines, assault weapons, or both. Forty-two of the weapons used (out of 143 across all cases) were outfitted with high-capacity magazines (Follman, Lee, and Aronsen 2013). Given that there have been a number of high-profile mass shootings in the United States in which the shooter has used a highcapacity magazine, the arguments surrounding their legality are contentious ones. Infamous mass shootings such as the ones that took place at Columbine High School in 1999; a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado, in 2012; a Las Vegas concert in 2017;

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High-capacity magazines, like the 30-round extended magazine pictured here, can hold more bullets than the standard magazines provided by gun manufacturers. (Matthew Valentine/ Dreamstime.com)

and the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in 2018 were all perpetrated with the use of high-capacity magazines. In these shootings, the number of individuals shot ranged between 17 and 422, and fatalities ranged from 12 to 58. In Dayton, Ohio, in 2019, a shooter was able to expend forty-one rounds in thirty-two seconds from a double-drum, one-hundredround magazine, killing nine people and injuring seventeen. High-capacity magazines were also used in a shooting that resulted in the death of sixty-seven people attending a summer camp in Norway, and the shooter stated in his written manifesto that the thirty-round ammunition magazines had been purchased via mail order from a dealer in the United States (Condon 2011). The 2019 mosque attacks in New Zealand, which resulted in fifty-one deaths

and forty-nine injuries, were also perpetrated with high-capacity magazines. In 1994, the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act went into effect, which banned assault-style weapons, of which large-capacity magazines are a feature. Therefore, the act also made it illegal to transfer, manufacture, or possess highcapacity magazines not lawfully possessed on or before the law’s enactment. This piece of legislation was not renewed and expired in 2004, but there were questions as to its effectiveness, given that it only applied to high-capacity magazines manufactured or possessed on or before its enactment. Since the expiration of that legislation, it is legal to purchase and own high-capacity magazines unless they are banned by state or local law. In March 2019, a federal judge in San Diego, California, ruled that a sales ban



on high-capacity magazines violated the Second Amendment and struck it down— after one week, the ban was reinstated and stayed pending an appeal in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. In the wake of that one-week lift of the ban, it is estimated that more than a million high-capacity magazines were purchased by gun owners in California (Gafni 2019). Although information on the number of high-capacity magazines in America is scarce, it is estimated that “tens of millions” of Americans have owned and used high-capacity magazines since 1866 (Kopel 2014). The NRA estimates that as of 2019, more than 250 million magazines with a capacity of eleven rounds or greater are in circulation; of those, 100 million have a capacity of at least thirty rounds. Jessica Trapassi Migliaccio See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Columbine High School Shooting; High-Capacity Magazine Ban; Semiautomatic Weapons

Further Reading Condon, Stephanie. “Norway Massacre Spurs Calls for New U.S. Gun Laws.” CBS News, July 28, 2011. https://www.cbsnews.com/news /norway-massacre-spurs-calls-for-new-us -gun-laws/ (accessed August 14, 2019). Follman, Mark, Jaeah Lee, and Gavin Aronsen. “More Than Half of Mass Shooters Used Assault Weapons and High-Capacity Magazines.” Mother Jones, February 27, 2013. https://www.motherjones.com/politics /2013/02/assault-weapons-high-capacity -magazines-mass-shootings-feinstein / (accessed August 14, 2019). Gafni, Matthias. “For One Week, HighCapacity Ammunition Magazines Were Legal in California. Hundreds of Thousands May Have Been Sold.” San Francisco Chronicle, April 11, 2019. https:// www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/For

Hinckley, John Warnock, Jr. | 429 -one-week-high-capacity-gun-magazines -were-13757973.php?psid=luZqL (accessed August 14, 2019). Kopel, David. “The History of Magazines Holding 11 or More Rounds: Amicus Brief in 9th Circuit.” Washington Post, May 29, 2014. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news /volokh-conspiracy/wp/2014/05/29/the -histor y-of-magazines-holding-11-or -more-rounds-amicus-brief-in-9th-circuit/ (accessed August 14, 2019). ORC International. “CNN | ORC Poll December 17–18, 2012.” CNN, December 19, 2012. http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2012 /images/12/19/cnnpoll.december19.4p.pdf (accessed August 14, 2019). Siegel, Michael, as printed in Sam Petulla. “Here Is 1 Correlation between State Gun Laws and Mass Shootings.” CNN, October 5, 2017. https://www.cnn.com/2017/10/05 /politics/gun-laws-magazines-las-vegas /index.html (accessed May 16, 2022). Stephens, Alain. “The Gun Industry Is Betting on Bigger High-Capacity Magazines.” The Trace, June 12, 2019. https://www .thetrace.org/2019/06/gun-industry-high -capacity-magazine-size/ (accessed August 14, 2019).

High Schools and Gun Violence. See School Shootings Hinckley, John Warnock, Jr. (1955–) On March 30, 1981, John Warnock Hinckley Jr. attempted to assassinate President Ronald Reagan as Reagan left the District of Columbia Hilton Hotel after speaking to the AFL-CIO. Hinckley opened fire with a .22-caliber RG-14 pistol and fired six shots in 1.7 seconds. One of the bullets ricocheted off the presidential limousine and wounded Reagan, entering under his arm and penetrating to his lung. Also wounded were presidential press secretary James Brady,

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DC police officer Thomas Delahanty, and Secret Service agent Timothy J. McCarthy. Hinckley was born on May 29, 1955. He was twenty-five years old at the time of the assassination attempt. He had developed an obsession with actress Jodie Foster— having viewed Martin Scorsese’s 1976 movie Taxi Driver about a would-be presidential assassin over a dozen times, obsessively listened to the soundtrack of the film, and immersed himself in The Fan, the book on which the film was based. Hinckley had repeatedly telephoned and written to Foster at Yale University, and had visited Yale while armed, preparing to kill Foster and then himself. He imagined that he would prove his love for her through some kind of “historic act.” He described himself as a white supremacist and “all-out anti-Semite.” Hinckley was prosecuted on thirteen charges and, after an eight-week jury trial, was found not guilty by reason of insanity on June 21, 1982. He was committed to Saint Elizabeth’s Hospital in Washington, DC. Over the following three years, Congress and about half the states narrowed the insanity defense— either by changing the scope of the legal defense, placing burden of proof of insanity on the defendant, or giving jurors the option of an additional verdict: “guilty but mentally ill.” Four states (Idaho, Kansas, Montana, and Utah) have abolished the insanity defense. Hinckley’s attempted murders resulted in major changes in presidential security, substantially reducing citizen access to the president in public places. At St. Elizabeth’s, Hinckley compared himself to the imprisoned Soviet dissident Andrei Sakharov, secretly collected photos of Jodie Foster, attempted to procure a pistol so he could escape and kill her, and corresponded sympathetically with imprisoned serial killer Ted Bundy.

In the early 1990s, Hinckley unsuccessfully urged, via the media, that he be released so, he said, he could advocate for gun control. His family had never had guns while he was growing up. After the December 1980 assassination of his hero John Lennon, Hinckley had written a poem blaming the assassination on the company that made the gun used in that crime, on the NRA, and on Ronald Reagan. Ironically, Hinckley had recently been preparing to assassinate President Carter, and was in December 1980 was preparing his 1981 plans for an assassination of Foster or the president. When lobbying for the Brady Bill— enacted in 1993 as the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act and originally named for Mrs. Sarah Brady (but later identified with her husband, Jim Brady)—Mrs. Brady stated, “Had a waiting period been in effect seven years ago, John Hinckley would not have had the opportunity to buy the gun he used” (Meddis 1988, A6). Though Hinckley had been seeing a psychiatrist when he sporadically lived with his parents in Evergreen, Colorado, he had no public record of mental illness, and thus there was no record that could be discovered by a mental records check. As for criminal records, a police background check was run on Hinckley a few days before he bought a pair of guns in Texas, and nothing turned up. Hinckley, who fantasized about hijacking a plane and then using the hijacking to install himself and Jodie Foster as residents of the White House, had been caught trying to smuggle guns aboard a plane on October 9, 1980, in Nashville. His name was run through the National Crime Information Center, which reported, correctly, that he had no felony convictions in any jurisdiction. He was promptly released after paying a fine of



$62.50 and pleading guilty to a misdemeanor. At the time, the authorities were not aware that Hinckley had just been stalking President Jimmy Carter on the campaign trail in Dayton, Ohio, and in Nashville, Tennessee. In Dayton, he got within six feet of the president but had not brought a gun that day. After the gun confiscation in Nashville, Hinckley purchased the Reagan assassination gun, a .22-caliber Rohm RG-14 revolver, for $45, as well as another gun. Regarding gun types, as with clothing, he emulated the Travis Bickle assassin character from Taxi Driver. Because Hinckley bought two handguns within a five-day period, the retailer, pursuant to the federal Gun Control Act of 1968, reported the sales to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. The assassination attempt provided gun prohibition advocates with strong momentum for their top priority, Senator Edward Kennedy’s bill to ban small, inexpensive firearms, such as the one that Hinckley had used. At a June 18, 1981, press conference, President Reagan was asked about the Kennedy bill. He replied, “[M]y concern about gun control is that it’s taking our eyes off what might be the real answers to crime; it’s diverting our attention. There are, today, more than 20,000 gun-control laws in effect—federal, state and local—in the United States. Indeed, some of the stiffest gun-control laws in the nation are right here in the district and they didn’t seem to prevent a fellow, a few weeks ago, from carrying one down by the Hilton Hotel.” For all practical purposes, Reagan’s answer ended the possibility of passing Kennedy’s bill. James Brady, Officer Delahanty, and Agent McCarthy eventually sued Hinckley (who had no assets) and the manufacturer of the handgun that Hinckley had used. The plaintiffs argued that the manufacturer

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should be held strictly liable, regardless of fault, for any injuries caused by the gun, because the gun was an inexpensive “Saturday night special.” The federal district court rejected the claim, in part because “this Court wonders whether the theory discriminates against those law-abiding citizens, who purchase a handgun for self-defense, but who cannot afford a $200 or $300 weapon and who must resort to the purchase of a cheap handgun.” Rejecting the label that inexpensive guns are “ghetto” guns, the court wrote that “while blighted areas may be some of the breeding places of crime, not all residents of are so engaged, and indeed, most persons who live there are law abiding but have no other choice of location. . . . It is highly unlikely that they would have the resources or worth to buy an expensive handgun for self-defense. To remove cheap weapons from the community may very well remove a form of protection assuming that all citizens are entitled to possess guns for defense” (Delahanty v. Hinckley, 686 F.Supp. 920 (D.D.C. 1986), affirmed 900 F.2d 368 [D.C. Cir. 1990]). In 1995, the plaintiffs entered into a settlement with Hinckley, entitling them to 80 percent of the first $3.6 million, which he might ever receive from selling his story. On March 28, 1991, former president Reagan marked the tenth anniversary of the crime by speaking at a George Washington University event in honor of the staff who had saved his life. There, he strongly endorsed the Brady Bill, a subject on which he had remained neutral when the bill came up for a vote in 1988, during the final year of his presidency. Although the bill did not become law in 1991, his endorsement may have helped it eventually win passage in 1993. Hinckley’s parents Jack and Joann paid for his very expensive legal defense and

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eventually moved to Virginia so they could visit him in the hospital and participate in family therapy with him. They dedicated themselves to raising public awareness of mental health problems and raising funds for mental health research and treatment. In 2009, U.S. district judge Paul L. Friedman ordered that Hinckley be allowed to obtain a driver’s license. He was also allowed extended unsupervised visits with his mother, who now lives in Williamsburg, Virginia. (His father died in 2008.) Hinckley’s lawyers and the hospital contend that he has long been in remission from the narcissistic personality disorder and the psychosis that led to his crime. In 2014, James Brady died; his death was ruled a homicide as it stemmed from complications from the 1981 assassination attempt. As Hinckley already had been tried for the crime, however, he was not charged, as doing so would have violated the Fifth Amendment protection against double jeopardy. On September 10, 2016, Hinckley was released from St. Elizabeth’s Hospital to live with his mother, no longer being considered a danger to himself or others. His release included a range of conditions, including a limitation on how far he could drive, both alone and with supervision; a prohibition against possessing firearms or ammunition; a prohibition on alcohol consumption; and the requirement that he worked at least three days per week and see a psychiatrist twice per month. He also was prohibited from having any contact with any members of the Reagan family, and his internet usage was subjected to strict scrutiny. Just over two years later, on November 16, 2018, Judge Friedman ruled that Hinckley could move out and live on his own, pending approval from his doctors. At the time of this writing, he remains a resident of

Virginia, though has petitioned the court to allow him to move to California to pursue a career in the music industry. David B. Kopel and Carol Oyster See also: Brady, James S.; Brady, Sarah Kemp; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; Reagan, Ronald Wilson; Saturday Night Specials

Further Reading Associated Press. 2018. “Judge Rules WouldBe Reagan Assassin John Hinckley Can Move Out of His Mother’s House.” NBC News, November 16, 2018. https://www . nb c n ews.c o m / n ews / u s - n ews /ju d ge -rules-would-be-reagan-assassin-john -hinckley-can-move-n937471 (accessed May 16, 2022). Bonnie, Richard C., John C. Jeffries Jr., and Peter W. Low. A Case Study in the Insanity Defense: The Trial of John W. Hinckley, Jr. 3rd ed. Minneapolis, MN: Foundation Press, 2008. Carter, Gregg Lee. The Gun Control Movement. New York: Twayne, 1997. Hinckley, Jack, and Jo Ann Hinckley, with Elizabeth Sherrill. Breaking Points. New York: Berkley, 1986. Hsu, Spencer S., and Ann E. Marimow. “Would-be Reagan Assassin John Hinckley Jr. to be Freed after 35 Years.” Washington Post, July 27, 2016. https://www .washingtonpost.com/local/public-safety /would-be-reagan-assassin-john-w-hinck ley-jr-to-be-freed-after-35-years/2016/07/27 /04142084-5015-11e6-a422-83ab49ed5 e6a_story.html (accessed May 16, 2022). Meddis, Sam. “Petitioners Taking Aim at Gun Laws.” USA Today, July 20, 1988. United States v. Hinckley. Series of cases involving Hinckley’s petitions for less restrictive confinement, or for limited release. All in the federal district court for Washington, DC: 721 F.Supp. 323 (1989),

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725 F.Supp. 616 (1989), 967 F.Supp. 557 (1997), 407 F.Supp. 2d 248 (2005), 2007 WL 1589467 (2007), 625 F.Supp. 2d 3 (2009). Wilber, Del Quentin. Rawhide Down: The Near Assassination of Ronald Reagan. New York: Holt, 2011.

Hirsch, Margot(1960–) Margot Hirsch is an advocate for gun safety by using smart technology with guns. She is the president of Smart Tech Challenges Foundation, a nonprofit organization in Silicon Valley, San Francisco, that emphasizes the development of this technology to prevent approximately 20,000 to 33,000 deaths and injuries from firearms. The foundation’s strategy involves personalizing guns so that unauthorized users will not be able to utilize them. Her foundation has given millions of dollars in awards to support various inventors engaged in smart gun development. Hirsch has argued to the federal government and to anti–gun violence advocates that smart gun development and use is a necessary future path. Her motto is “Smart guns are smart business.” Apparently dismayed at the disinterest of the United States’ largest gun manufacturers in gun safety technology, Hirsch became impassioned to take up this pursuit. In a March 2019 blog in The Hill, Hirsch referenced an urgency for smart gun development, given vulnerabilities related to estimates that over four million children in the United States are in homes with guns improperly stored, half a million guns are stolen annually, and 21,000 suicides occur each year with firearms. To indicate public sentiment on smart guns, she also referenced a 2018 survey of gun owners that indicated a majority of them were interested in utilizing gun safety technology.

Hirsch attended the University of Colorado Boulder with the intention of pursuing medicine; however, an engaging course in Greek mythology altered that trajectory. She fell in love with the classics, did a semester abroad, and graduated in 1982 with a bachelor’s degree in classical antiquities. Thereafter, she worked in sales at American Express, Altos Computer Systems, and Meditech. These led to senior positions such as a vice president of international sales for Blackboard, vice president of sales for eProsper, senior director at Strategic Alliances and Channel Solutions at SmartForce, director of business development at Angel Investors, and vice president of distribution sales at Global Village Communications. After twenty-six years in business development and sales, Hirsch joined Smart Tech at its genesis in 2013. In addition to speaking engagements in which she advocates for smart gun technology, Hirsch has delighted in sharing her business acumen in public schools as a BizWorld volunteer, instructing elementary and middle school students on the basics of starting a business. An otherwise private person, she is close to her kin, Betsy Hirsch Matteson. Camille Gibson See also: Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws; Guns in the Home; Intelligent Gun Safety Systems; RFID Guns; Smart Guns

Further Reading Hirsch, Margot. “Smart Guns Are Smart Business.” The Hill, March 18, 2019. https://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/ politics/434561-smart-guns-are-smartbusiness (accessed March 1, 2020). Hirsch, Margot. “These Are the Weapons That Could Prevent Gun Violence.” Washington Post, December 11, 2015. https:// www.washingtonpost.com/news/in-theory

434 | Hollow Point Bullet /wp/2015/12/11/these-are-the-guns-that -could-prevent-gun-violence/ (accessed March 1, 2020).

Hogg, David. See March for Our Lives Movement Hollow Point Bullet A key issue associated with firearms is stopping power. It addresses the issue of whether a particular firearm can stop a target from presenting a threat or can stop a creature being hunted. Stopping power increases as the caliber of a firearm increases. And given a particular caliber, stopping power can be increased by manipulating the conical shape of the bullet. One of the most popular manipulations is hollowing out the tip of the bullet. The hollow point bullet (HP) has a concave nose designed to expand on impact

with a target. Because the nose of the bullet expands, it usually does much more damage to a target. The bullet “mushrooms” and thus creates a larger wound. The stopping power of a HP bullet comes from the shock produced when it hits the body and mushrooms through it. The HP concept traces its roots to the late 1800s. The motivation was to reduce the bullet’s weight, which would increase its velocity. While originally designed for rifles, the innovation was eventually brought to handguns. The first two HP bullets cast explicitly for handguns were the Keith HP designs for the .38 and .357 Magnum. The binary lead/tin alloy made the rounds softer, more malleable, and not prone to fragmentation. Because of its destructive power, the HP bullet was banned for military use by the Hague Convention (Declaration III). Today, HP ammunition is mostly used with handguns, and it is popular with law enforcement due to the reduced risk of hitting bystanders from ricochets or overpenetration (and thus a miss by the shooter will likely not go through a house or building and create collateral damage). However, opponents of HP ammunition, including some in the emergency medicine community, dislike it because of the greater tissue damage and wider wounds that result when an offender is shot. These wounds are, of course, more likely to kill or debilitate. Sean Maddan See also: Handguns

Hollow point bullets, like the 45 ACP ammunition pictured here, are designed to expand on impact and can cause more damage to the target they hit than standard bullets. (Guy Sagi/Dreamstime.com)

Further Reading Gaylord, Chic. Handgunner’s Guide. New York: Bramhall House, 1970. Projectiles: External Ballistics. Memphis, TN: Books LLC, 2010.



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similarities are emphasized and critical differences ignored, we have reason to suspect the comparison is, in Maier’s words, “actually misleading and tendentious”—that is, motivated by “a partisan intent.” Maier’s test for tendentiousness may be applied to the Holocaust arguments of Poe, Zelman and Stevens, Halbrook, and their confreres to assess two important issues: the truthfulness of the claims staked and the motives underlying them.

The use of Holocaust imagery in the U.S. gun control debate has centered on a series of propositions alleging that restrictive firearms policies in the Weimar Republic and later in Nazi Germany rendered the German Jews defenseless against genocide. These propositions include the following: • There is a connection between a government’s restrictive gun laws and its tendency to commit genocide on its citizenry (Polsby and Kates 1997; Zelman and Stevens 2001). • Though an armed citizenry does not preclude the possibility that genocide will occur, it will tend to deter attacks on the part of genocide-prone governments by raising the cost of mass murder for the perpetrators (Poe 2001). • Weimar-era gun control laws enabled Adolf Hitler to seize power, consolidate his dictatorship, and disarm his future victims, especially German Jews (Halbrook 2000). • Hitler disarmed German Jews for the purpose of making them easier to attack (LaPierre 1994). The basic argument is that regulation of gun ownership will lead society down an infernal path toward genocide, much as it did in Nazi Germany. Indispensable to such an argument is historical comparison. “All history,” the historian Charles Maier has written, “is condemned to comparison” (Maier 1988, 99). While comparison is inevitable in historical analysis, it has to be undertaken with caution. Legitimate comparison accounts for both similarities and differences between the things being compared (Bloch 1963, 16–40). When surface

Weimar-Era Gun Laws and Hitler’s 1938 Gun Law Proponents of the Holocaust argument maintain that the Reichstag’s 1928 gun law enhanced regulation of gun ownership, thereby furnishing Hitler with a handy instrument for disarming his opponents in 1938, especially the Jews (Halbrook 2000). The scurrilous imputation is that modern gun control advocates in the United States “support Nazi-style public policies” or are themselves “elitist Fascists” (e.g., see references in Harcourt 2004, 655–56). In fact, the Reichstag’s 1928 and the Nazis’ 1938 gun laws liberalized firearms rights in Germany. Due to severe restrictions on weapons access under the 1919 Versailles Treaty, the postwar German government banned gun ownership in January 1919—a policy of interdiction that continued until passage of the 1928 gun law. Although the 1928 revision required a permit to own, sell, carry, or manufacture firearms, the statute allowed gun ownership; hence, it should be considered an expansion of gun rights as compared with its predecessor. Nor can Hitler’s 1938 gun law be regarded as an erosion of gun rights for German citizens. Where the 1928 law demanded a permit for all firearms, the Nazi law exempted rifles and shotguns from the permit requirement (only handgun owners needed one). Moreover,

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the Nazi law enlarged the circle of persons exempt from the permit requirement and reduced the minimum age for acquiring firearms (Harcourt 2004, 659–60, 669–74). Halbrook (2000) rightly points out that the Nazis disarmed the Jews after the Kristallnacht pogrom in November 1938. Nonetheless, as Bernard Harcourt has cautioned, this aspect of the Nazi gun law does not mean that it retrenched gun rights. In fact, so-called trustworthy Germans—that is, persons not considered “enemies of the state” like Jews, Gypsies, and communists—saw their firearms rights enhanced, not contracted. Harcourt offers an incisive appraisal of the Nazi analogy as applied to gun rights: “It is absurd to even try to characterize this [i.e., Nazi gun policies] as either pro- or anti-gun control.” Harcourt’s criticism is echoed in Robert Spitzer’s critique of Halbrook, which takes him to task for inadequate historical research (Spitzer 2004, 727–28).

Jewish Self-Defense: The Examples of the “Kristallnacht” Pogrom and the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising Two events from the Nazi experience have been cited by gun rights advocates to buttress their assertion of a linkage between restrictive gun laws and genocide: the “Kristallnacht” pogrom of November 1938 and the Warsaw Ghetto uprising of April 1943. According to Poe (quoting Innis), the “first thing” the Nazi government did in its program to “disenfranchise” the German Jews was to “disarm them.” He then affirms that the Nazis exploited Kristallnacht to ban Jewish gun ownership. “Without weapons,” he concludes, “the Jews were easily herded into concentration camps”—the implication being that an armed Jewish population could have repelled such an assault (Poe 2001). Poe’s fragmentary discussion of Kristallnacht is faulty in several respects. First, his

assertion that the “first thing” the Germans did in disenfranchising the Jews was to “disarm them” is false. The November 1938 pogrom was the culmination of a long train of civil disabilities inflicted on German Jews, beginning with Hitler’s accession to power in 1933. Well before the Jews were disarmed in November 1938, the Nazis, true to their original party program of 1920, stripped them of their civil rights. The Nazis passed laws to restrict (and eventually eliminate altogether) Jews in the civil service, law, medicine, the universities, and the arts. The infamous “Nuremberg Laws” (1935) forbade Jewish intermarriage with “Aryan” Germans and deprived them of full citizenship. In addition to these official policies, Nazi enthusiasts held public burnings of books by Jewish writers (Crowe 2008, 113–19). Months before the Jews were denied the right to own firearms, Nazi Party radicals had vandalized Jewish synagogues and cemeteries (the first synagogue demolished by the Nazis was Munich’s main synagogue, razed on June 9, 1938). Clearly, disarming the Jews was not the “first thing” the Nazis did in furtherance of Jewish disenfranchisement. Second, the statement that German Jews could have taken up arms to defend themselves against genocide by the Nazi state is untenable. The arrests of 30,000 male Jews after Kristallnacht indeed led to internment in concentration camps, but most of the prisoners were released after a brief time. The actual reason for the arrests was to force Jewish emigration from Germany— not to disarm the Jews in preparation for their physical extermination (Kershaw 2000, 141; Paxton 2004, 159). In fact, although the November pogrom was a decisive turning point in the Germans’ Jewish policy, little or no evidence exists of a Nazi plan to commit genocide on the Jews until 1941 (Browning 2004; Hilberg 2003;



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Mommsen 1986). Had the German Jews defended themselves with lethal force in November 1938, the result would have been to hasten the Jews’ demise, not avert it. As Hitler’s leading Anglophone biographer, Ian Kershaw, has noted, Hitler was obsessed with the idea of a “Jewish world conspiracy” devoted to Germany’s ruin. This notwithstanding, the German people reacted with consternation to the November 1938 pogrom; reports from the underground Social Democratic leadership (Sopade) indicate that most Germans rejected its extreme violence (Kershaw 2000, 142–50). Armed Jewish resistance—particularly in the form of an organized Jewish militia, the only force that might have had some limited success repelling the attacks—may well have only confirmed Hitler’s most fervid paranoid fantasies of Jewish treachery, and at the same time reduced Germans’ aversion to pogrom violence. In short, far from preserving Jewish lives, armed confrontation might have triggered the onset of a Jewish Holocaust in November 1938. Like Kristallnacht, the Warsaw ghetto uprising has been cited by gun rights advocates in support of their position. They claim that with “only a few dozen pistols and hand grenades,” a handful of halfstarved civilians was able to fend off German armored units for twenty-eight days (Kozinski 2003, 569–70; Poe 2001, 23–24). Adherents of this argument equivocate on its meaning: they variously conclude that the uprising shows how an armed civilian population can defend itself against genocidal attack (Kozinski 2003, 569–70); alternatively, they concede the “suicidal” nature of such self-defense but recommend it as a gesture of defiance (e.g., see Poe 2001, 114– 15). Other gun rights proponents support unabridged access to weapons as a means of “raising the cost” of genocide for governments entertaining it. This theory likens

governments to conventional criminals who can be deterred from committing crimes by dangling before them the prospect of armed retaliation (Polsby and Kates 1997). This interpretation, as it applies to the Warsaw ghetto uprising, is flawed on several counts. Most conspicuously, it commits a breach of logical reasoning by equating government action with individual behavior. In addition, proponents of this view are sometimes wrong on the facts. For example, they cite a figure of 12,000 German combatants in the Warsaw ghetto, while Gutman (1990, 1629) notes that the actual figure was 2,054 German soldiers and thirty-six officers. This kind of factual error can mar gun rights advocates’ writing about the Holocaust. In one article, a single paragraph about Kristallnacht misdated the event by one year and referred to Hermann Göring as the “chief of the German national police” at the time the pogrom erupted; Heinrich Himmler was the actual head of German police (Polsby and Kates 1997). Finally, there is little evidence that Hitler would have been “deterred” from genocide by potential, or even actual, losses to his troops. The cult of death and sacrifice permeated the Nazi movement from its infancy to its fiery end in the ruins of Berlin (Fest 1974, 534ff., 760ff.). Hitler was indifferent to “costs,” as his reckless, go-for-broke military campaigns during the war—exemplified in his order to his beleaguered troops at Stalingrad to fight to the last man rather than withdraw—amply demonstrate (Weinberg 1994, 453–54). The “Final Solution” was arguably Hitler’s top military priority: from the moment of its launching, he was committed inexorably to its realization. So dogged was Hitler’s attachment to Jewish destruction that he ended his final testament in April 1945 with the adjuration that Germany continue its “struggle” against the Jews after his death.

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A racist fanatic like Hitler would not have been deterred by Jewish armed resistance that increased “the expected cost of genocide” (Polsby and Kates 1997).

Browning, Christopher. The Origins of the Final Solution: The Evolution of Nazi Jewish Policy, September 1939–March 1942. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2004.

Conclusion In exaggerating similarities and ignoring differences in their comparisons, gun rights advocates violate Charles Maier’s test for tendentiousness. Their use of history has selected factual inaccuracies, and their methodology can be questioned. More generally, rather than examine evidence scrupulously, some adherents of the Nazi analogy cherry-pick it by decontextualizing their data and disregarding evidence at odds with their thesis. Regrettably, manipulation of Holocaust imagery is common in discourse about Nazism. Totalitarian theory after 1945 conflated Nazism with communism, an interpretation that demonized the USSR as an expansionist doppelgänger of Nazism that had to be contained. Theorists of the Comintern, by contrast, portrayed Nazism as the product of capitalism in crisis. This view was later employed to discredit the Eastern bloc’s rivals during the Cold War. Since the 1980s, the Nazi analogy has been adduced on behalf of diverse agendas: among them, endeavors to revive a pre-1933 German nationalism untainted by Nazi crimes and invocations of the Munich agreement of 1938 to justify the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq. Gun rights advocates’ use of the Holocaust can be seen as another example of how history is molded to fit a political cause. Michael S. Bryant

Crowe, David M. The Holocaust: Roots, History, and Aftermath. Philadelphia: Westview Press, 2008.

See also: Homicides, Gun; Self-Defense, Reasons for Gun Use

Further Reading Bloch, Marc. “Pour une Histoire Comparée des Sociétés Européenes.” In Melanges Historiques. Paris: S.E.V.P.E.N., 1963.

Fest, Joachim C. Hitler. New York: HarcourtBrace-Jovanovich, 1974. Friedberg, Edna. “Why Holocaust Analogies Are Dangerous.” United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, December 12, 2018. ht t ps://w w w.ush m m.org /infor mation /press/press-releases/why-holocaust-analo gies-are-dangerous (accessed January 28, 2022). Gutman, Israel. “Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.” In Encyclopedia of the Holocaust, edited by Israel Gutman, 1625–32. New York: Macmillan, 1990. Halbrook, Stephen P. “Nazi Firearms Law and the Disarming of the German Jews.” Arizona Journal of International and Comparative Law 17 (2000): 483–535. Harcourt, Bernard E. “On Gun Registration, the NRA, Adolf Hitler, and Nazi Gun Laws: Exploding the Gun Culture Wars (A Call to Historians).” Fordham Law Review 73 (2004): 653–80. Hilberg, Raul. The Destruction of the European Jews. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2003. Kershaw, Ian. Hitler: 1936–1945—Nemesis. New York: W. W. Norton, 2000. Kozinski, Alex. “Dissenting Opinion in Silveira v. Lockyer, 328 F.3d 567 (9th Cir. 2003).” 2003. https://casetext.com/case/sil veira-v-lockyer-3 (accessed June 12, 2022). LaPierre, Wayne R. Guns, Crime, and Freedom. Washington, DC: Regnery, 1994. Maier, Charles S. The Unmasterable Past: History, Holocaust, and German National Identity. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1988. Mommsen, Hans. “The Realization of the Unthinkable: The ‘Final Solution of the

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Jewish Question’ in the Third Reich.” In The Policies of Genocide: Jews and Soviet Prisoners of War in Nazi Germany, edited by Gerhard Hirschfeld, 27–38. Boston: Unwin Hyman, 1986. Paxton, Robert. The Anatomy of Fascism. New York: Knopf, 2004. Poe, Richard. The Seven Myths of Gun Control: Reclaiming the Truth about Guns, Crime, and the Second Amendment. Roseville, CA: Forum, 2001. Polsby, Daniel D., and Don B. Kates Jr. “Of Holocausts and Gun Control.” Washington University Law Quarterly 75 (1997): 90–120. Putterman, Samantha. “No, Gun Control Legislation in Germany Did Not Help Advance the Holocaust.” PolitiFact, April 8, 2019. https://www.politifact.com/fact checks/2019/apr/08/viral-image/no-gun -control-regulation-nazi-germany-did-not -hel/ (accessed January 28, 2022). Spitzer, Robert J. “Don’t Know Much about History, Politics, or Theory: A Comment.” Fordham Law Review 73 (2004): 721–30. Weinberg, Gerhard L. A World at Arms: A Global History of World War II. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994. Zelman, Aaron, and Richard Stevens. “Gun Control”: Gateway to Tyranny. Hartford, WI: JPFO Publishing, 2001.

Homicides, Gun When people commit murder in the United States, the weapon of choice is usually a gun. The use of such weapons first increased and then declined slightly between 1976 and 1999, reaching peak popularity between 1989 and 1994. This pattern has remained constant today (Statista 2019). There is a unique history between people and firearms in the United States. Part of this history involves a long romance with guns in the country, as well as the gradual development of easy-to-use firearms. The American attitude toward firearms is rooted

in Colonial America, where all freemen were required to carry arms for protection against Native Americans, the French, and others viewed as threats to the British colonies. The Colonial era’s long guns and dueling pistols were expensive and difficult to handle so guns were redesigned in order to defend oneself or one’s family. The more efficient, cheaper, and easily concealed Colt revolvers were introduced in 1840, and with them came an increase in homicide rates. Americans’ love of a certain image of the Old West, replete with white cowboys, influences the love of guns today (Satia 2019). Today, there are more guns than people in the United States—393 million civilianowned firearms are registered in the United States (Zimmerman 2018). A 2018 Gallup poll found that approximately 50 million (43%) of American households reported owning guns. On average, each gun-owning house has approximately eight firearms. Gun ownership varies around the globe with the global firearm ownership heavily concentrated in the United States. For instance, in 2017, Americans made up 4 percent of the world’s population but owned 46 percent of the 857 million global civilian firearms. These figures do not include guns owned by law enforcement (Morris 2016). Comparisons to other countries shed light on this contention. The gun homicide rate in the United States is twenty-five times higher than other high-income countries (Vargas 2019). Handguns are the most common weapons used in homicides in the United States with 64 percent of murders involving guns. Rifles are utilized in 4 percent of the homicides and shotguns in 2 percent (Statista 2019). Based on research by Aaron J. Kivito, Lauren A. Magee, Peter L. Phalen and Bradley R. Ray (2019), more than 25 percent of all gun homicides are domestic

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related (intimate partner or other family member). Every month, an average of fiftytwo women—half of all female homicide victims—are killed by a current or former intimate partner with a gun. In fact, women in the United States are twenty-one times more likely to die by firearm homicide than women in peer nations and much of this is driven by domestic violence. Public health researchers have established that in relationships where violence is present, abusers’ access to a gun significantly increases the risk of death for women. Access to a gun makes it five times more likely that the abusive partner will kill his female victim (Everytown for Gun Safety 2019). Gun violence varies by race as well. The homicide rate for Black Americans in all fifty states is, on average, eight times higher than that of whites. Black people specifically are 500 times more likely to die this way. Importantly, most urban areas, especially those that experience the most gun violence, are characterized by poverty, inequality, and racial segregation (Mitchell and Bromfeld 2019). There are more gun violence and deaths in the United States as a result of gun availability; consequently, there have been more civilian gun deaths since Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated in 1968 than the number of Americans soldiers killed during war (Hemenway 2017). The United States has more guns than people and states with more guns have more gun deaths. States with strict guns laws have lower gun-related deaths (Lopez 2019). In 2019, there were 15,292 fatal shootings, excluding suicides, in the United States. According to the Gun Violence Archive, in January 2020 alone, there were 3,273 gun-related deaths, 1,227 of which were homicides. Two million guns were sold in March 2020, the most guns sold in one month since January 2013. Sales skyrocketed as an assumption to the

coronavirus pandemic leading to civil unrest (Collins and Yaffe-Bellany 2020). There is a great debate about whether or not stricter gun laws should be implemented. Gun violence is an issue that touches many U.S. citizens in some way. The Pew Research Center found that approximately 44 percent of Americans, for instance, say they know someone who has been shot (Vargas 2019). A September 2019 ABC News/Washington Post poll concluded that six in ten Americans believe a mass shooting will occur in their communities. After the mass shooting in Parkland, Florida, Congress failed to pass legislation related to firearms, although states responded by passing sixty-nine gun controls measures in 2018 alone. This is more than three times the number passed in 2017, with more than half the states passed at least one measure. In 2018, legislators rejected about 90 percent of state-level bills backed by the National Rifle Association (Everytown for Gun Safety 2018). The loudest voices are often heard after a mass shooting, but the demand for stricter gun laws fade as time goes by. Most Americans oppose a ban on handguns, but there are many concerns over other types of guns being available, such as assault weapons. Firearm violence has become a public health issue, responsible for over 30,000 American deaths each year and an estimated $48 billion in health care costs and lost wages (Resnick et al. 2017). In general, U.S. residents are 128 times more likely to be killed by everyday gun violence than by international terrorism. Kim A. MacInnis See also: Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime; Concealed Weapons Laws; Crime and Gun Use; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Guns in the Home; More

Guns, Less Crime Thesis; Victimization from Gun Violence

Further Reading Aizenmen, Nurith, and Marc Silver. “How the U.S. Compares with Other Countries in Deaths from Gun Violence.” National Public Radio, 2019. https://www.npr.org / se c t ion s /goat s a nd so d a / 2019 / 08 / 05 /743579605/how-the-u-s-compares-to -other-cou nt r ies-in-deaths-f rom-g u n -violence (accessed April 30, 2020). Brenan, Megan. “Snapshot: Americans Dissatisfied with U.S. Gun Laws.” Politics: Gallup, 2019. https://news.gallup.com/poll /226871/snapshot-americans-dissatisfied -gun-laws.aspx (accessed April 30, 2020). Collins, Keith, and David Yaffe-Bellany. “About 2 Million Guns Were Sold in the U.S. as Virus Fears Spread.” New York Times, April 1, 2020. https://www.nytimes .com /interactive /2020/04/01/business /coronavirus-gun-sales.html (accessed June 9, 2020). Everytown for Gun Safety. 2018. https:// everytownresearch.org (accessed April 30, 2020). Everytown for Gun Safety. 2019. https:// everytown.org (accessed June 9, 2020). Federal Bureau of Investigation. “Uniform Crime Reports.” 2019. http://www.fbi.gov /about-us/cjis/ucr/ucr (accessed April 30, 2020). Giffords Law Center. “States with Assault Weapons Restrictions.” 2020. https://lawcenters.giffords.org (accessed April 30, 2020). Gun Violence Archive. 2020. https://gunviolencearchive.org (accessed April 30, 2020). Hemenway, David. “Why Has It Been so Difficult to Change U.S. Gun Policy?” 2017. https://blogs.bmj.com /bmj/2017/10/05 /david-hemenway-why-has-it-been-so-dif ficult-to-change-us-gun-policy/ (accessed April 30, 2020). Ingraham, Christopher. “There Are More Guns Than People in the United States According to a New Study of Global Firearm Ownership.”

Homicides, Gun | 441 The Washington Post, June 19, 2018. https:// www.washingtonpost.com /news/wonk /wp/2018/06/19/there-are-more-guns-than -people-in-the-united-states-according-to-a -new-study-of-global-firearm-ownership / (accessed April 30, 2020). Kivito, Aaron J., Lauren A. Magee, Peter L. Phalen, and Bradley R. Ray. “Firearm Ownership and Domestic Versus Nondomestic Homicide in the U.S.” American Journal of Preventive Medicine 57, no. 3 (2019): 311–20. Lopez, German. “America’s Unique Gun Control Problem, Explained in 16 Maps and Charts.” Vox.com, April 16, 2021. https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics /2017/10 /2/16399418/us-gun-violence -statistics-maps-charts (accessed June 9, 2020). Mitchell, Yolanda T., and Tiffany L. Bromfield. “Gun Violence and the Minority Experience.” 2019. https://www.ncfr.org/ncfr-report /winter-2018/gun-violence-and-minority -experience (accessed April 30, 2020). Morris, Hugh. “Gun Ownership by Country.” Gun Ownership by Country 2020, October 22, 2016. https://worldpopulationreview.com /countries/gun-ownership-by-country/. Resnick, Shelby, Randi N. Smith, Jessica H. Beard, Daniel Holena, Patrick M. Reilly, C. William Schwab, and Mark J. Seamon. “Firearm Deaths in America: Can We Learn From 462,000 Lives Lost?” Annals of Surgery 266, no. 3 (2017): 432–40. Satia, Priya. 2019. Empire of Guns: The Violent Making of the Industrial Revolution. Redwood City, CA: Stanford University Press. Statista. “Number of Murder Victims in the U.S. in 2018, by Weapon.” 2019. https://uushenandoah.org (accessed April 30, 2020). Vargas, Eugenio Weigend. “Gun Violence in America: A State-by-State Analysis.” Center for American Progress, November 20, 2019. https://www.americanprogress.org/issues /guns-crime/news/2019/11/20/477218/gun -violence-america-state-state-analysis / (accessed April 30, 2020).

442 | The Huey P. Newton Gun Club Zimmerman, Dan. “America Now Has More Guns Than People.” 2018. https://concealed nation.org /2018 / 06/amer ica-now-has -more-guns-than-people/ (accessed April 30, 2020).

Horwitz, Josh. See Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV) The Huey P. Newton Gun Club The Huey P. Newton Gun Club is a coalition of members from various groups and organizations that aspires to educate and arm Black people in the United States and abroad. Named after Black Panther Party founder Huey P. Newton (1942–1989), the organization’s mission is to teach individuals the importance of self (self-preservation, self-defense, and self-sufficiency) through militant culture. The organization was founded on three basic principles: advocating for (1) an immediate end to police brutality and the murder of Black and brown people; (2) the cessation of Blackon-Black violence and self-hatred; and (3) arming every Black man and woman throughout the United States, which the club argues has been the greatest fear of “the establishment” (Huey P. Newton Gun Club 2019). Yafeuh Balogun (given name Charles Goodson), Rakem Balogun (given name Christopher Daniels), and Babu Omowale (given name Darrin Reed, aka Darrin X), founded the Huey P. Newton Gun Club in 2014 in Dallas, Texas, as a response to police shootings of unarmed, defenseless Black, brown, and poor people. Balogun hopes the gun club will eventually become a mainstream gun-rights organization, the “black alternative to the NRA (National Rifle Association)” (Smith 2015).

Activities The gun club holds open-carry rallies in response to police brutality. The organization held its first armed protest on August 20, 2014, in Dixon Circle, a predominately African American neighborhood in Dallas, where police killed a young, unarmed Black man named James Harper in 2012. About two weeks before the rally, a white police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, killed Michael Brown, an unarmed Black teenager. A month prior to the protest, another white officer choked Eric Garner, a Staten Island father, to death over the alleged sale of untaxed cigarettes. Armed with assault rifles, many of the three dozen protesters chanted, “Justice for Michael Brown! Justice for Eric Garner!” In 2016, the gun club protested opposite the Bureau of American Islamic Relations (BAIR), a white anti-Muslim hate group known for conducting armed protests at places of worship all over Texas without opposition. On April 2, 2016, members of the Huey P. Newton Gun Club outnumbered protestors from BAIR to defend the Nation of Islam’s Muhammad Mosque No. 48 in South Dallas from harassment. Although both sides were armed, the showdown ended without violence. In addition to its armed protests, the Huey P. Newton Gun Club also hosts fitness and self-defense classes, weekly meetings, public forums, rallies, programs, and town hall meetings. The organization communicates with its audience via electronic and print media. Controversy Huey P. Newton Gun Club cofounder Rakem Balogun became the first individual prosecuted under the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s “Black identity extremist” policy. The FBI said in a 2018 report that

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“Black identity extremists” posed a growing threat to national security, and that “perceptions of police brutality against African-Americans spurred an increase in premeditated, retaliatory lethal violence against law enforcement and will very likely serve as justification for such violence” (Simek 2018). Some view the Black identity extremist movement as fictional, claiming that the only thing connecting targets is their race (Speri 2019). The FBI arrested Balogun on December 12, 2017, and charged him with illegal possession of a firearm. The agents confiscated a Taurus Protector Poly .38 special, a Norinco AK-style assault rifle, and bags of ammunition from his apartment. They also took notebooks in which Balogun scribbled doodles of AK-47s and copied out quotes from African American writers like Robert F. Williams, the author of Negroes with Guns (Simek 2018). Although authorities arrested Balogun on a firearms charge, he was held because of inflammatory comments he made on Facebook in support of Micah Xavier Johnson. On July 7, 2016, during a rally and march in downtown Dallas, Johnson shot and killed five police officers. Media outlets reported that Johnson was a member of the Huey P. Newton Gun Club, but Balogun denied these claims. Still, hours after the shooting, Balogun called Johnson a “hero” on Facebook, expressing his “solidarity” with the shooter and saying that the police officers “deserve what they got” (Simek 2018). Though the indictment was eventually dismissed, Balogun was incarcerated for six months before being released on May 1, 2018. Whytnee M. Foriest See also: African Americans and Gun Violence; Dallas Police Officers Ambush (2016); Gun Clubs; National Rifle Association (NRA)

Further Reading Huey P. Newton Gun Club Alpha Company. “Mission Statement.” Huey P. Newton Gun Club Alpha Company, 2019. https:// hueypnewtongunclub.org/about (accessed December 18, 2019). Silva, Christina. “Racial Showdown in Dallas: Black Panther Muslims and White Anti-Mosque Activists Face Off with Guns in Texas.” International Business Times, 2016. https://www.ibtimes.com/racial-show down-dallas-black-panther-muslims-white -anti-mosque-activists-face-guns-2347917 (accessed May 16, 2022). Simek, Peter. “The Right to Bear Arms (And Say Shocking Stuff on Facebook).” D Magazine, 2018. https://www.dmagazine .com/publications/d-magazine/2018/october /the-right-to-bear-arms-and-say-shocking -stuff-on-facebook/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Smith, Aaron Lake. “Huey P. Newton Gun Club in Dallas Are Responding to Police Brutality with Armed Community Patrols.” Vice, January 5, 2015. https://www.vice .com/en_us/article/5gk85a/huey-does-dallas -0000552-v22n1 (accessed May 16, 2022). Speri, Alice. “Fear of a Black Homeland.” The Intercept, March 23, 2019. https://theinter cept.com/2019/03/23/black-identity-extre mist-fbi-domestic-terrorism/ (accessed May 16, 2022).

Hunting Historically, for many American men, hunting has been an affirmation of masculine identity. This has often brought derision from anti-hunters, who depict hunters as developmentally arrested males, perpetually adolescent misogynists who must project phallic extensions of their psyches—namely, guns—to capture their lost manhood. In their own terms, men who hunt have defined their ideal of manhood by the local standards of hunting prowess, sportsmanship,

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and reputation. In certain subcultures, the single most important coming-of-age rite was young men killing their first deer, duck, grouse, rabbit, or other prey. Many American men dated their manhood from such events. In some rural regions, schools still virtually shut down in hunting season to permit adolescents to hunt and then reopen to find “blooded” young men returning triumphant. Of course, the fact that some women have hunted enthusiastically (as Mary Zeiss Stange details in Woman the Hunter [1998]) blurs this category of masculine affirmation, but hunters have generally overlooked the female “intrusion” and preserved hunting as a male bastion. Many hunters have argued that hunting was one of the first cooperative ventures that protohistoric societies accomplished, that it is timeless, traditional, and atavistic. To anti-hunters who charge that hunting is a barbaric holdover from pagan centuries, hunters cheerfully respond that it is just that anachronistic quality of hunting that validates the sport as a necessary connection with nature. Paul Shepard, in his The Tender Carnivore and the Sacred Game (1973) and other writings, and José Ortega y Gasset, in his Meditations on Hunting (1972), made the strongest cases for the persistence of hunting in human cultural patterns. Recently, some anthropologists and feminist scholars have challenged these assertions, positing instead that female-oriented gatherings are more important than hunting, but the verdict is far from clear. Hunters have maintained that hunting is an effective form of environmental perception and immersion in ecological processes. To many hunters, anti-hunters seem wellmeaning but essentially voyeurs of nature, refraining from participating honestly in the cycles of death and regeneration that inform natural processes.

Hunters have also asserted that they have been very important influences in American conservation and environmental movements. As predators, hunters have claimed that they control overpopulated herds and flocks whose irruptions threatened those species with mass starvation. As purchasers of hunting licenses and contributors to game preservation organizations, such as Ducks Unlimited, hunters have argued that they have been the primary economic backers of game and nongame conservation efforts. As John Reiger conclusively showed in American Sportsmen and the Origins of Conservation (2001), American hunters and fishers led the crusade for conservation starting in the 1860s, antedating the nongame wildlife enthusiasts and anti-hunters by two or three decades. Indeed, two figures who were hunters—one part time, Henry David Thoreau, and the other full time, Aldo Leopold—provided much of the germinal thought for twentieth-century environmentalism. In American folklore and literature, hunting has held an important status. Frontier legend is full of stories of Daniel Boone, Davy Crockett, Jim Bridger, Jedediah Smith, and other buckskin hunters who trod the woods or prairies. The fact that the sagas and tales embellished or falsified their exploits did not lessen their hold on the American imagination. Americans looked to the mythic hunter for national self-identification and proof of American exceptionalism, as a long line of scholars, more recently Daniel Herman in Hunting and the American Imagination (2001), have illustrated. Folktales about hunting relayed information about geography, nature lore, and danger, and served as vehicles for class or group reaffirmation or resentment. They also attempted to resolve the tension between angel and animal in the human personality.

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American writers have always been quick to seize upon the literary potential of the hunter and the hunt. From James Fenimore Cooper to modern novelists such as Norman Mailer, American literature abounds with hunting stories. Washington Irving, the “southwestern” humorists such as Thomas Bangs Thorpe and Mark Twain, as well as Henry David Thoreau, Herman Melville, Jack London, Stephen Crane, Ernest Hemingway, William Faulkner, Frank Waters, and Jean Stafford are some of the many writers who have employed hunting as a metaphor for environmental perception, social differentiation, and nature. Although hunters have used weapons other than guns to kill or capture their quarries, hunting and firearms are inextricably associated. For decades, the term “gunning” was a synonym for hunting. From colonial muskets to muzzleloaders and Pennsylvania long rifles, to Henry and Sharps buffalo guns, to twentieth century .22s and 30.06s, .410s and 12 gauges, American hunters went to the woods and prairies well armed, at least according to tradition. In hunting art and photography, the gun is an omnipresent fixture, an icon nonchalantly propped at the shooter’s side or fixed in his grip. Prize guns, such as Purdys and Parkers, have long been family treasures. In hunting humor, husbands routinely complain that their wives will not let them upgrade or add to the gun closet. In recent decades, hunting has declined in scale and overall importance in American society. There is a smaller percentage of hunters today than even forty years ago. The General Social Survey found a drop of households in which there was at least one adult hunter from 28.3 percent in 1980 to 17.0 percent in 2018 (National Opinion Research Center 2019). This still means, however, that there are millions of Americans who hunt.

A duck hunter sits in a blind. (Library of Congress)

There are many reasons the number of hunters has declined. Other sports and forms of recreation compete with hunting for limited expenditures and leisure time. Landowners who are anti-hunters or nonhunters have closed off land to hunters. Suburban sprawl has taken its toll on wildlife habitat, although it has ironically created some thriving edge communities for such opportunistic species as white-tailed deer and raccoons. Many hunters find that the best available hunting is on private club land or in commercial hunting preserves that rig the hunt for the shooters. The millions of immigrants to the United States in the past four decades are from regions of the world where recreational hunting and firearms are generally not common (Africa, Asia, and Latin America). Vivid anti-hunting programs such as the CBS show The Guns of Autumn, which depicted hunters as heartless butchers and

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bullies, alienated many nonhunters. Countering such criticism of hunting, hunters in a few states have pushed for “right to hunt” constitutional amendments and the enactment of hunter harassment laws to prevent obstruction of hunting. The sporting press sounds off glumly about the end of hunting in the United States. Americans will probably continue to hunt, in whatever numbers, for many of the reasons explored above, but today’s hunters feel more endangered than at any time in the nation’s history. Thomas Altherr See also: Gun Culture; Long Rifle (Pennsylvania/Kentucky); Recreational Uses of Guns

Further Reading Altherr, Thomas L. “‘The Best of All Breathing’: Hunting as a Mode of Environmental Perception in American Thought and Literature from James Fenimore Cooper to Norman Mailer.” PhD diss., Ohio State University, 1976. Herman, Daniel J. Hunting and the American Imagination. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 2001. Marks, Stuart A. Southern Hunting in Black and White: Nature, History, and Ritual in a Carolina Community. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1991. Miller, John M. Deer Camp: Last Light in the Northeast Kingdom. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1992. Mitchell, John G. The Hunt. New York: Penguin Books, 1981. National Opinion Research Center. “Cumulative General Social Survey, 1972–2018,” 2019. https://gss.norc.org/ (accessed June 27, 2020). Ortega y Gasset, José. Meditations on Hunting. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1972. Petersen, David, ed. A Hunter’s Heart: Honest Essays on Blood Sport. New York: Henry Holt, 1996.

“A Potshot Angers Its Quarry.” Sports Illustrated (September 22, 1975): 20–27. Proper, Datus C. Pheasants of the Mind: A Hunter’s Search for a Mythic Bird. New York: Prentice-Hall, 1990. Reiger, John F. American Sportsmen and the Origins of Conservation. 3rd ed. Corvallis: Oregon State University Press, 2001. Shepard, Paul. The Tender Carnivore and the Sacred Game. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1973. Stange, Mary Zeiss. Woman the Hunter. Boston: Beacon Press, 1998. Swan, James A. In Defense of Hunting. New York: HarperCollins, 1995.

Hupp, Suzanna Gratia(1959–) Suzanna Gratia Hupp became active in the concealed carry movement as a result of the death of her parents and her presence at the shooting in Luby’s Cafeteria in Killeen, Texas, on October 16, 1991. Hupp was having lunch with her parents at the cafeteria when George Hennard drove his truck into the cafeteria and began shooting the patrons. Hupp, who carried a handgun with her for protection, had left the gun in her car in compliance with Texas law, which prohibited concealed carrying of firearms. Hupp’s father was shot as he rushed the gunman, and her mother was killed when she went to her husband’s side. Hupp escaped through a broken window. Twenty-one other people were killed in the incident, and another twenty were wounded. Hennard ultimately killed himself at the cafeteria. Prior to the Virginia Tech shooting, it was the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history. Hupp claimed that she could and would have stopped the assailant if she had access to her gun. She said that she instinctively reached for the firearm only to realize that



she had left it in her car. Prior to that, Hupp was not a gun rights activist. A victim of a pellet-gun accident as a child, Hupp, who is a chiropractor, was convinced by an assistant district attorney patient to carry a gun for personal protection when she moved to Houston. The shooting propelled her to become a spokesperson for the concealed carry movement and to successfully run for the Texas legislature, where she served from 1996 until 2006. She has been active in the concealed carry movement since the shooting, speaking in favor of “shall-issue” laws across the country as well as allowing those with permits to carry their firearms in restaurants. Although the legislative trend among the states prior to Luby’s shooting was in the direction of more lenient concealed carry laws, this shooting and Hupp’s

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activism have been credited with continuing the momentum. Luby’s cafeteria has become a rallying cry for gun rights proponents. It is relatively uncommon for either side in the gun control debate to have an event that so clearly supports their argument and a spokesperson who can clearly and persuasively articulate their position in personal terms. Hupp is the gun rights antithesis of Rep. Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY, Fourth District), who became involved in politics and a strong gun control supporter following the death of her husband and wounding of their son by a gunman at a train station in New York. Although she left the Texas legislature in 2006, Hupp has remained active in the gun rights movement. She has been quoted in major news media throughout the country, and she has testified against various gun

Suzanna Hupp, who survived a mass shooting in which both her parents were killed, testifies during a Senate Judiciary subcommittee hearing on “Proposals to Reduce Gun Violence” on February 12, 2013. (ZUMA Press, Inc./Alamy Stock Photo)

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control laws before Congress and in numerous states over many years. Hupp joined the Liberty Legal Institute in filling an amicus curiae brief in District of Columbia v. Heller. She is a recipient of the National Rifle Association’s Sybil Ludington Women’s Freedom Award. Harry L. Wilson See also: Concealed Weapons Laws; District of Columbia v. Heller; Killeen, Texas, Shooting; McCarthy, Carolyn; Virginia Tech Shooting

Further Reading Cobbler, Paul. “Texas Mass Shooting Survivor Lobbies Congress for Less Gun Control.” Dallas Morning News, September 18, 2019. Hupp, Suzanna Gratia. From Luby’s to the Legislature: One Woman’s Fight against Gun Control. San Antonio, TX: Privateer Publications, 2009.

Hurricane Katrina and Gun Control Hurricane Katrina and the government failures associated with the hurricane led to significant changes in American firearms law, and in public attitudes toward firearms. Whereas the Columbine High School murders were the most significant firearmsrelated event in the United States in the last decade of the twentieth century, Katrina turned out to be the most significant in the first decade of the twenty-first. Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast of the United States in late August 2005, making landfall in southeastern Louisiana on Monday, August 29. Mississippi suffered the most direct damage from the storm, while New Orleans was not directly hit. However, after the storm, the city’s poorly

maintained levees broke, flooding the city, which is mostly below sea level. With some justification, the public perceived the federal, state, and local management of the disaster response to be monumentally incompetent. For example, although the New Orleans city government had hundreds of school buses available, not one of them was used to evacuate any of the thousands of New Orleans residents who did not own automobiles and who wanted to flee the city as the storm approached. Many New Orleans Police Department officers simply abandoned their posts. In the immediate aftermath of the storm, whatever remained of the police department was often invisible or ineffective. Despite a mandatory evacuation order, many residents had stayed in the city. Some could not leave. Others had stockpiled food and water and chose to remain in their homes. The floodwaters generally did not harm most of the homes in the historic Garden District, near Bourbon Street, since that district is at a higher elevation. New Orleans quickly degenerated into chaos. Civil government collapsed, and gangs of murderers and looters roamed wild. Some police officers joined the looting spree. For several days, the police who had stayed on the job did not act to stop the looting that was going on right in front of them. In response, some citizens shared their guns with neighbors to protect their families, especially at night. Some blocks or neighborhoods created informal neighborhood patrols to man barricades preventing criminals from entering their block. Similar actions took place nearby. For example, New Orleans lies on the northern bank of the Mississippi River, and the city of Algiers lies on the south. According to reporting by the New Orleans TimesPicayune, dozens of neighbors in one part



of Algiers formed a militia. After a carjacking and an attack on a home by looters, the neighborhood provided for the common defense. Neighbors shared firearms, took turns on patrol, and guarded the elderly. Although the initial looting had resulted in a gun battle, once the patrols began, the militia never had to fire a shot. Louisiana case law, based in part on the state constitution’s right to arms, authorized the use of deadly force, if necessary, to effectuate a citizen’s arrest of a looter (McKellar v. Mason, 159 So. 2d 700 [1964]), and of course, the laws of all states allow the use of deadly force when necessary to defend against a violent felony attacker. It was later alleged that some of the citizens who were purportedly armed for selfdefense committed violent crimes against others, although these accusations have not been proven. Several police officers were later convicted of perpetrating and covering up violent crimes against civilians during the post-Katrina period. Almost as soon as the storm had passed and people could go outside, the New Orleans police began confiscating lawfully owned firearms. On September 8, 2005, the New Orleans government publicly announced that all firearms in the city would be confiscated: “No one will be able to be armed. Guns will be taken. Only law enforcement will be allowed to have guns. No one is allowed to be armed. We’re going to take all the guns.” The statement is generally attributed to police superintendent P. Edwin Compass III, although a few news reports cited his second-in-command, Warren Riley. Compass and Riley sent the New Orleans police to enter houses, motor vehicles, boats, and business—knocking down doors, pointing guns at people, confiscating guns, and evicting people from their homes. The

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gun confiscation was assisted by other law enforcement agencies that had arrived to help out, including the U.S. National Guard, the Oklahoma National Guard, the U.S. Marshals Service, and the California Highway Patrol. A widely circulated national television clip of a Louisiana state trooper invading the home of a fifty-eight-year-old woman, Patricia Konie, slamming her to the ground, fracturing her shoulder, arresting her, and confiscating her old revolver (see the YouTube video “The Untold Story of Gun Confiscation after Katrina,” which features interviews of persons from whom guns were confiscated). Similarly, in nearby St. Tammany Parish, the sheriff had ordered gun confiscation, which was accomplished by seizing firearms from people who were attempting to evacuate. The police did not interfere with businesses that had hired private armed security guards, and they did not molest one wealthy neighborhood that had hired the Blackwater security corporation to provide armed protection. Louisiana had an emergency powers statute that gave chief law enforcement officers the power of “prohibiting and controlling” some things, such as alcohol sales or price gouging, and also granted the power of “regulating and controlling” certain other things, including firearms (Louisiana Revised Statutes § 14:329.6). However, neither the New Orleans nor the St. Tammany law enforcement officials made any effort to comply with the procedures of the emergency power law. Moreover, according to the statute, emergency powers expire after five days, but law enforcement confiscations continued for weeks, and confiscated guns were kept for years. According to a New Orleans police officer, low-value guns were then thrown in the river or the canals, whereas officers kept the nicer guns for themselves.

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The National Rifle Association (NRA) and the Second Amendment Foundation jointly filed suit in federal district court for the Eastern District of Louisiana on September 22, 2005. Judge Jay C. Zaney issued a preliminary injunction order which New Orleans and St. Tammany Parish signed. The order forbade gun confiscation, and required the return of the guns that had been taken. On September 27, 2005, Compass resigned, and was succeeded by Warren Riley. Although the initial ruling in the gunconfiscation cases had come swiftly, the case dragged on for years. St. Tammany Parish promptly returned the confiscated firearms. But New Orleans denied that there had ever been a gun-confiscation order, denied it had any guns, announced that it had kept no records when the guns were being confiscated, announced that many of the guns had been lost or damaged beyond repair, and declared that guns would be returned only to people who could prove they owned them with a sales receipt or serial number. Very few gun owners memorize or keep records of the serial numbers of their guns. Sales receipts may be available for a gun that was recently purchased at retail, but for firearms as with most other consumer products, people rarely retain receipts for years and years. Superintendent Riley, meanwhile, announced that if there were another hurricane or flood, he would confiscate guns all over again. Judge Carl J. Barbier, who had taken over the case, held New Orleans mayor Ray Nagin and Warren Riley in contempt of court. The contempt finding was based on “failure to provide initial disclosures and to compel answers to discovery.” A final court order in October 2008 directed New Orleans on how to return the guns, and prohibited the requirement that the owner provide a serial number or receipt.

Katrina instantly put gun confiscation at the top of the national gun control debate. Under pressure from the NRA and Congress, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) rescinded its rule against gun possession by disaster victims who were living in temporary FEMA housing. Partly as a result of the September 11 terrorist attacks, there were thirty-three states with some kind of emergency powers laws. Usually these laws did not specifically authorize restrictions on firearms, but many of them had very broad language that could perhaps be applied to firearms. By early 2010, twenty-nine states, including Louisiana, passed laws to specifically outlaw the confiscation of firearms during emergencies or other natural disasters. Congress did the same. By a vote of 32299, the U.S. House of Representatives in 2006 passed the “Disaster Recovery Personal Protection Act of 2006, sponsored by Louisiana representative and future governor Bobby Jindal. The U.S. Senate voted 84-16 for an appropriations rider sponsored by Louisiana senator David Vitter (R). The rider simply stated “None of the funds appropriated by this Act shall be used for the seizure of a firearm based on the existence of a declaration or state of emergency.” Among the votes for the Vitter amendment was U.S. Senator Barack Obama. What eventually was enacted by Congress was a new statute, 42 U.S.C. Section 5207 (as part of the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act). The law applies to federal law enforcement, plus any state or local agency that receives federal funds or is engaged in assisting federal law enforcement. In a disaster, this means almost everyone. The law bans emergency-based gun confiscation, gun registration, and restrictions on where a firearm may be possessed. Confiscation, registration, and restrictions



pursuant to existing laws are still allowed. People who are assisting federal disaster relief, and who are allowed to carry firearms under existing law, may not be forbidden to do so. The federal law further provides that when mass transit, such as buses, is being used for an evacuation, passengers can be required to surrender their firearms for the duration of the trip, and may then reclaim their firearms when the trip is over. A person victimized by a violation of this law can sue in federal district court; a prevailing plaintiff will be awarded attorney fees. The 2006 federal statute had an ancestor in the 1941 Property Requisition Act. That act, passed on the eve of U.S. entry into World War II, had allowed the federal government to seize property necessary for the national defense, provided that just compensation was paid. The act specifically forbade the seizure of firearms (55 Stat. 742 [1941]). The most important after-effect of Katrina was not the legal changes. Perhaps more than any other single event in modern times, Katrina convinced people who did not own guns to reconsider. Katrina vividly demonstrated the real possibility that in a natural or manmade disaster, citizens really could be left undefended by the government. While large-scale terrorist attacks in the United States are, fortunately, very rare, natural disasters are not uncommon occurrences. Tornadoes hit the Midwest every year, as do hurricanes on the Gulf and South Atlantic coasts, and sometimes the Pacific Coast. Snowstorms can sometimes paralyze

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government for several days in many parts of the northern two-thirds of the United States. In addition to directly increasing the ranks of gun owners, Katrina also played a decisive role in the softening of beliefs of many other Americans, who for the first time in their lives saw what they considered to be a good reason for people to own firearms. David B. Kopel See also: Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Right to Self-Defense, Philosophical Bases; SelfDefense, Legal Issues; Self-Defense, Reasons for Gun Use

Further Reading Halbrook, Stephen P. “‘Only Law Enforcement Will Be Allowed to Have Guns’: Hurricane Katrina and the New Orleans Firearm Confiscations.” George Mason University Civil Rights Law Journal 18 (2008): 339–58. Hutchinson, Gordon, and Todd Masson. The Great New Orleans Gun Grab. Boutte, LA: Louisiana Publishing, 2007. Paticia L. Konie v. State of Louisiana et al. Civil Action No. 05-6310, U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Louisiana. “The Untold Story of Gun Confiscation after Katrina.” YouTube video, 7:49, posted by “NRAVideos,” March 7, 2007. http://www .yout ube.com /watch?v = -taU9d 26wT4 (accessed January 27, 2022).

Hurst v. Glock. See Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers

I Identilock. See Smart Guns

itself has two strands. Classic liberalism, which can be traced to the ideas of John Locke (whose ideas strongly influenced the debate among the authors of the U.S. Constitution) emphasizes personal liberty and freedom from government intervention, especially in economic policy. Positive liberalism, which developed during the nineteenth century in response to the excesses of the Industrial Revolution, casts government and freedom in a much different light. The power of government, in this view, is to be used in a positive or constructive fashion to provide a socioeconomic environment that allows each person to develop to his or her potential. The paramount value of each is also different. Classical liberals tend to emphasize freedom, while positive liberals tend to emphasize equality. The difference between the two strands of liberalism is often cast as the difference between “freedom to” (work, worship, own a gun) and “freedom from” (poverty, hunger, discrimination). Furthermore, positive liberals, in their emphasis on the development of human potential, tend to be opposed to government interference in matters of personal choice outside of economics (i.e., morality issues such as abortion and civil liberties, especially of minority groups). Today, adherents of classic liberalism have come to be known as conservatives. This brings us to the second confusing aspect of modern political discourse concerning ideologies: there is a distinct ideological system of social conservatism whose adherents find themselves both at odds with and in sympathy with classic liberals.

Ideologies—Conservative and Liberal A political ideology is a system of beliefs about the political world. Fundamental to all ideologies are questions of power, freedom, and the role of individuals and collectives (especially governments) in a society. Public policies and public debate about the place of guns and gun control in American society are intimately bound up with these questions. Because it is a system, we expect the individual components of any ideology to somehow relate to each other or to be organized around one or more unifying dimensions. Components of ideologies include beliefs about what politics is (the substance of politics), how politics is organized and carried out (the procedures of politics), and, perhaps most important, which functions should be performed by government and how they should be done. This prescriptive aspect of the system is most often the focus of discussions about political ideologies. The particular mix of beliefs, attitudes, and emotional responses to political matters produces a wide range of ideologies, from totalitarianism to anarchism. In the United States, ideology is almost exclusively perceived in terms of liberalism and conservatism. Moreover, the two are often treated as the defining poles of a single dimension. This view is somewhat misleading, however, for two related reasons. First, liberalism 453

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Whereas a classic liberal holds government in low esteem, conservatives tend to have a negative view of human nature and of individuals. The social conservative emphasizes morality and social control. Rather than wishing to free the individual to do or to be something, conservatives hope to use the coercive power of government to restrain the individual for the benefit of society as a whole. This is not to say that conservatism espouses a pervasive or invasive government; indeed, quite the opposite is true. Governments themselves, because they are the creations of fallible humans, should also exercise restraint, working to preserve traditional institutions and values and avoiding grand schemes and revolutionary departures from the status quo. Because the classic liberal tends to give less emphasis to social and moral issues, and the social conservative is not primarily concerned with economic issues, a coalition of the two is possible. In the United States today, this is manifested primarily in the split in the Republican Party between the economic conservatives, who often exhibit a libertarian bent and prefer a smaller role for government in all spheres of life, and the social conservatives, who are willing to use government for what they perceive as the moral good. The fundamental value conflicts that shape the battle lines on gun control policy tend to cut across these ideological groups. One of the primary arguments cited by gun control advocates is based on the widely held but often criticized notion that the purpose of the Second Amendment’s “right to keep and bear arms” was to enable a free citizenry to protect itself from its own government. Such a notion certainly fits with the overall belief system of those in the conservative coalition who subscribe to the tenets of classic liberalism. It requires some effort, however, to place it inside a conservative system of beliefs, which is usually

profoundly antirevolutionary and founded on government control of individuals for the greater good. The reconciliation is accomplished on two fronts. First, the focus is placed on the problem of crime, criminals, and gun violence, de-emphasizing the role of guns and of ordinary law-abiding gun owners. Gun violence is a moral issue and an area in which conservatives are anxious to impose governmental controls. Conservative gun rights groups therefore advocate “people” control rather than gun control, calling for harsher penalties and stricter enforcement of existing laws. Most conservatives, and liberals as well, support the general concepts of self-defense and defense of others as legitimate uses of force. This still leaves the problem of the purported revolutionary origins and purpose of the Second Amendment, which, as the literal battle cry of the gun rights movement, cannot simply be ignored. The resolution of the dilemma is found in the social conservative’s distaste for revolution in any form. By portraying the government, especially federal law enforcement agencies such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives as agents of a conspiracy to overthrow existing institutional arrangements and traditional rights and values, conservatives can find a way to make progun sentiments fit into an anti-revolution worldview. That these strategies do not completely heal the rift in the traditional conservative coalition can be seen, for example, in the occasional split between gun rights organizations such as the National Rifle Association and police and law enforcement organizations. The high ground on the anticrime theme is hard to hold, and groups on the left have attempted to exploit the split among conservatives. On some issues, victim-rights



organizations on the “liberal” side have been able to commandeer the themes of crime and violence. Perhaps the best examples of this are the Brady Bill of 1993 and the Assault Weapons Ban of 1994. The background checks required by Brady have become firmly entrenched, while the Assault Weapons Ban expired in 2004 with relatively little fanfare. The cause of victims is a good fit with the positive liberal ideology in that it calls for government intervention to produce an environment in which individuals are safe to live up to their potential. Public opinion polls can confirm the relatively weak fit of the gun control issue with traditional ideological positions. Importantly, however, it does depend on the specific type of policy. A March 2021 Morning Consult and Politico poll found that 92 percent of liberals, 86 percent of moderates, and 79 percent of conservatives supported universal background checks on all purchases. When asked about closing the “Charleston loophole,” a proposal that would allow gun dealers to finalize sales after three days even if the Federal Bureau of Investigation had not yet completed the background check process, support levels varied greater across ideology. Specifically, 65 percent of liberals supported closing the loophole, while only 36 and 48 percent of conservatives and moderates, respectively, did. David Russell Harding and Harry L. Wilson See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Congressional Voting Patterns on Gun Control; Gun Control, Attitudes toward

Further Reading Converse, Philip E. “The Nature of Belief Systems in Mass Publics.” In Ideology and Discontent, edited by David E. Apter, 202– 61. New York: Free Press, 1964.

Immigrants and Guns | 455 Freeden, Michael. Ideologies and Political Theory. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996. Jacoby, William G. “The Structure of Ideological Thinking in the American Electorate.” American Journal of Political Science 39 (1995): 314–35. Morning Consult and Politico. National Tracking Poll # 210332, March 06-08, 2021: Crosstabulation Results. https://assets .morningconsult.com/wp-uploads/2021 /03/10070433/210332_crosstabs_POLI TICO_RVs_v1.pdf (accessed January 21, 2022).

iGun Technology Corp. See Intelligent Gun Safety Systems Ileto v. Glock, Inc. See Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005 Immigrants and Guns Fear of immigrants has been widespread in U.S. history (Dinnerstein 2009). Often tied to fears about immigrants and crime, those fears were stoked during the 2016 presidential election. The confluence of illegal status and political maneuverings via legislative actions—such as Arizona’s Senate Bill 1070—to criminalize what was once an administrative immigration violation creates anxiety about criminality at U.S. borders. Immigrants are perceived and portrayed as causing disruption and corruption. Increasing reports of violence along the southwestern border combined with misperceptions about undocumented immigrants create an image of immigration being linked to weapons, violence, and crime. These fears were used to justify President Trump’s efforts to build a border wall between the United States and Mexico. He also stoked fears about immigration from Middle Eastern countries.

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But Donald Trump was not the first politician, or even the first president, to play on those fears. In 2006, President George W. Bush stated that increasing numbers of undocumented immigrants strains public resources and increases crime. Although his statement was inaccurate, it reflected common ideas about controversial issues, such as the relationships between immigration and crime generally and fears about undocumented immigrants and crime more specifically. Linked to those fears were concerns about immigrants and guns. In a New York Times article (Gladstone 2016), Walter A. Ewing, an anthropologist and researcher at the American Immigration Council, noted that “it’s always easy to blame the other group for all of society’s problems.” Such fears about immigrants and crime and, by extension, immigrants’ access to and ownership of guns continue despite extensive research indicating that immigrants, both legal and undocumented, commit fewer crimes than native-born Americans. Studies conducted since the turn of the century make it clear that immigrants commit less crime than those who are native born or local to the area. Media coverage of immigrants’ involvement in crime continues to escalate, exacerbating public fear, while the rate of illegal or legal immigrants committing crimes with guns has remained lower than national averages. The research on this is consistent. Some older sociological theories suggest that immigration can lead to disruption in social environments such that neighborhoods with an influx of immigrants will have heightened levels of crime. The data relating to immigration specifically indicate otherwise. In an overview of “lasting trends and new understandings” of immigration and crime rates, Stowell and Gostjiev (2019, 81) acknowledge the complexity of this

research but note that “broadly speaking, the empirical evidence indicates that immigration is not associated with higher levels of crime.” Ousey and Kubrin’s (2009) study of immigration and violence crime rates conducted in California reveal that the placement of immigrant groups within a community does not have any significant impact on the total homicide rate. The study concluded that when there is a large concentration of Hispanic immigrants in a San Diego neighborhood, the rate of homicide typically drops. Other careful reviews support these findings (Ousey and Kubrin 2018), and Robert Sampson (2008), a leading sociologist/criminologist, has argued for them. However, as the title of an interview with criminologist Charis Kubrin makes clear, “Immigration isn’t linked to higher crime rates—but not everyone can believe it” (Wessel 2018). Unlike the situation with the abundant research on immigration on crime, there is limited information on how many immigrants, legal or undocumented, obtain and use guns in the United States. There is apparently no scholarly research on this. The General Social Survey (GSS), a nationally representative survey administered by the National Opinion Research Center (NORC) at the University of Chicago, can provide some insights on immigrants and guns. The GSS examines and presents data on a wide variety of opinions, attitudes, and behaviors and has been carried out since 1972. The 2018 GSS is the latest available iteration as of the time of this writing. Comparing native-born respondents to those who were born in in other countries, we see that 39.7 percent of those who were born in the United States have a gun in their home compared to 7.2 percent of those born in other countries who then emigrated to the United States. Looking at support for gun



control policies is also useful but not as clear-cut because most native-born Americans also support certain gun control policies. A high percentage of those born in this country (69.8%) are in favor of requiring gun permits, but an even higher percentage of those born outside of the country support the same measure (83.8%). It seems safe to draw from these results that immigrants are less likely than native-born Americans to own guns and more likely to support policies requiring gun permits. Despite the shortage of actual data on immigrants and guns, there are reports revealing the movement of guns from the United States to Mexico. According to data released by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) under the Department of Justice, nearly 8,000 guns recovered in Mexico in 2008 were originally purchased in the United States. In 2007, the bureau reported just over 3,000 American guns recovered in Mexico, a 50 percent increase from the previous year. Officials on both sides of the border estimate that Mexican drug-trafficking organizations obtain 95 percent of their gun arsenals from the United States. In May 2010, Mexican president Felipe Calderon made a statement to the U.S. Congress that tens of thousands of assault weapons seized by law enforcement officers in Mexico originated in the United States. Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren of California testified to Congress that there are more gun shops along the American side of the U.S.-Mexico border than there are residents in that region. Although there are border security issues, most media depictions and popular impressions indicate that the gun violence on the border moves from the southern direction northward. The reality indicates that much of the border violence stems from the north and moves into Mexico.

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There are approximately 6,600 U.S. gun shops within 100 miles of the Mexican border. In addition, it is estimated that more than 90 percent of all weapons in Mexico originated in the United States. The failure of the Unites States to recognize its role in fueling border violence through lax gun laws that permit widespread sales of weapons allows border violence to flourish. Under federal statute 18 U.S.C. Section 922, it is unlawful for any licensed firearms dealer to sell guns, rifles, or ammunition to those who, “being an alien (A) is illegally or unlawfully in the United States; or (B) except as provided in subsection (y)(2), has been admitted to the United States under a nonimmigrant visa (as that term is defined in section 101(a)(26) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. § 1101(a) (26)).” This is the same provision of law that prohibits gun sales to those who have renounced U.S. citizenship, members of the military who have been discharged dishonorably, and those who are fugitives from justice. Until additional research is available, we will not have clear data on immigrants and guns, but the research on immigrants and crime unequivocally demonstrates that immigrants are not the major threat for violent crime in the United States compared to native-born Americans. Neither undocumented nor documented immigrants are responsible for increases in crime or violence in the United States, where immigrants tend to congregate. If immigrants were responsible for spikes in crimes, there would be an increase in reported violent crimes such as armed robbery, homicide, aggravated assault, and rape, but those crimes have steadily declined, whereas rates of immigration have increased or remained the same. In fact, when immigrants move into neighborhoods, the crime

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rates tend to decline. Regarding gun ownership and support for gun control among immigrants, the limited data indicate the immigrants are less likely to own guns and more likely to support gun control, at least in terms of requiring gun permits. Karen K. Clark and Walter F. Carroll See also: Gun Control Act of 1968; Violent Crime Rate

Further Reading ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives). “Firearms” (various forms). 2011. http://www.atf.gov/forms /firearms/ (accessed June 21, 2011). Bush, George W. “The Immigration Debate: A Nation of Laws and of Immigrants.” New York Times, May 16, 2006. http://query .nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9505 E5DB153EF935A25756C0A9609C8B63 (accessed June 9, 2011). Dinnerstein, Leonard. Ethnic Americans: A History of Immigration. New York: Columbia University Press, 2009. Gladstone, Rick, “Research Doesn’t Back a Link between Migrants and Crime in U.S.” New York Times, January 13, 2016, https:// www.nytimes.com/2016/01/14/world/europe /research-doesnt-back-a-link-between -migrants-and-crime-in-us.html (accessed June 12, 2022). National Opinion Research Center. General Social Survey 2018. NORC at the University of Chicago. https://gss.norc.org/ (accessed July 5, 2020). Ousey, Graham C., and Charis E. Kubrin. “Exploring the Connection between Immigration and Violent Crime Rates in U.S. Cities.” Social Problems 56, no. 3 (2009): 447–73. Ousey, Graham C., and Charis E. Kubrin. “Immigration and Crime: Assessing a Contentious Issue.” Annual Review of Criminology 1 (2018): 63–84.

Sampson, Robert J. “Rethinking Crime and Immigration.” Contexts 7 (2008): 28–33. Stowell, Jacob I., and Feodor A. Gosjiev. “Immigration and Crime Rates: Lasting Trends and New Understandings.” In Routledge Handbook of Immigration and Crime, edited by Holly V. Miller and Anthony Peguero, chapter 6. Abingdon, UK: Routledge Press, 2019. Wessel, Lindzi. “Immigration Isn’t Linked to Higher Crime Rates—But Not Everyone Can believe It.” Knowable Magazine, August 1, 2018. https://www.knowablemaga zine.org/article/society/2018/immigration -isnt-linked-higher-crime-rates-not-every one-can-believe-it (accessed June 8, 2020).

Independent Firearm Owners Association, Inc. (IFOA) The Independent Firearm Owners Association, Inc. (IFOA) was established in February 2010 and formally launched one year later. The mission of the group is to participate in the public discourse on criminal justice issues, with a particular focus on firearm-related policies. The orientation is “pro–Second Amendment, pro law enforcement”—and its function is to serve as a rational voice on issues related to gun rights and gun control. The group feels that discourse in the debate on guns has been poisoned by both sides and that the key players play up fears in the public to maximize fundraising opportunities. IFOA supports diligent enforcement of the laws that protect Americans from violent criminals and also supports medical treatment for mentally disturbed individuals. The group opposes laws that infringe upon the right of Americans to possess and use firearms for lawful purposes (defense, sport, hunting, or collecting). IFOA seeks to engage the public, the media, and policy makers with “our



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independent, challenging perspective on a broad range of criminal justice, community empowerment, conservation, protection of the environment, wildlife and of course, Second Amendment issues.” Its board of directors in 2011 included one former U.S. congressman, a former New York state assemblyman, two police chiefs, several business professionals, a former university professor, and several attorneys. Richard J. Feldman

Federal Firearms Act of 1938, but unlike its political posture in later decades, the NRA was willing to accept some gun controls, including waiting periods and taxes on firearms. For the most part, however, the NRA’s main focus was on sporting, marksmanship, and hunting activities. This began to change in the 1960s, when national outrage over rising violence and the assassination of political leaders sparked calls for stronger gun laws. This, in turn, roused opposition from the NRA, which opposed enactment of the Gun Control Act of 1968. Even at this point, however, NRA opposition was not as unyielding as it would become later. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the NRA focused political efforts for the first time on specific legislative races, claiming credit for defeating two gun-control proponents in the Senate, Joseph Clark (D-PA) in 1968 and Joseph Tydings (D-MD) in 1970. Buoyed by these victories and persuaded to make politics a higher priority, the NRA reconstituted and concentrated its lobbying activities in 1975 with the creation of its ILA. Focusing primarily on legislative efforts in the states and in the nation’s capital, the ILA has become the primary power center in the NRA. The elevation of political activities was pushed further by the NRA’s new president, Harlon Carter, who led the hard-line faction that overthrew the NRA’s old-guard leadership in 1977. The hard-line faction believed that the old guard did not place a high enough priority on political action and was too willing to compromise. In recent years, the ILA has consumed 25 percent or more of the NRA’s total budget. In 1988, the ILA spent $20.2 million on political activities. By 1992, its spending had risen to $28.9 million. In 1994, ILA spending was $28.3 million, which, in combination with previous ILA spending, accounted for about 70 percent of

See also: Second Amendment

Further Readings Axelrod, Jim. “‘I Absolutely Reject Everything the NRA Is Putting Out,’ Ex-Member Says.” CBS News, February 20, 2018. https:// www.cbsnews.com/news/ex-nra-member -joe-plenzler-i-absolutely-reject-everything -the-nra-is-putting-out/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Independent Firearm Owners Association. “Website.” n.d. http://ifoausa.org/ (accessed November 17, 2019).

Injuries, Gun. See Accidents Institute for Legislative Action (ILA) The political arm of the National Rifle Association (NRA), the Institute for Legislative Action (ILA), spearheads the organization’s political activities. Since the 1970s, the ILA has been the largest division in the NRA and its center of power. The NRA’s explicit involvement in politics dates back to the 1930s, when the predecessor of the ILA, the NRA’s Legislative Division, was formed in 1934. The NRA exercised great influence over the two primary gun control laws enacted in the 1930s, the National Firearms Act of 1934 and the

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the NRA’s fiscal deficit. In the 2000 election, the ILA raised an estimated $30 million. In 2008, it spent about $40 million, and in the 2010 midterm elections, the organization spent about $10 million. The NRA, through its ILA, is widely known for its unyielding, uncompromising insistence on 100 percent support among its friends and its willingness to oppose those who fail to meet this standard. In 1994, for example, the ILA turned its political resources against one of its longest and strongest supporters in Congress, Rep. Jack Brooks (D-TX). Brooks vigorously opposed the Assault Weapons Ban that eventually passed that year, but the NRA turned on him in the belief that he did not do enough to try to defeat the bill. This, plus other factors, contributed to Brooks’s defeat. In 2000, the ILA turned its resources against another longtime ally, Rep. Bart Stupak (D-MI). Stupak was a consistent NRA ally and previous recipient of NRA contributions. But in 1999, Stupak supported some limited gun control measures in the House of Representatives, which prompted the NRA to launch a campaign to defeat him. Despite that, Stupak was reelected. Beyond its lobbying activities, the ILA has become the primary means through which the NRA mobilizes political support among NRA membership and sympathizers. In 1991, for example, the NRA spent about $10 million on “legislative alerts,” fund-raising, and mass mailings. The alarmist tone of the politically charged mailings has been labeled by journalist Osha Gray Davidson the “Armageddon Appeal.” As a former NRA head said, “You keep any special interest group alive by nurturing the crisis atmosphere. ‘Keep sending those cards and letters in. Keep sending money.’” Even though the NRA’s ILA is by no means the largest lobbying group in the

country, its belief in membership mobilization for political purposes is most clearly reflected in its spending on internal communications designed not only to buttress support for the NRA agenda, but to rally support for political candidates sympathetic to the NRA perspective. In most years since the end of the 1970s, the NRA has spent more money on internal communications than any other comparable group. During the 1991–1992 election cycles, for example, the NRA spent $8.4 million on political mail and other related internal political costs aimed at members and others. This level of spending represented a 90 percent increase over its spending for the same purpose four years earlier. Unlike donations to candidates’ fundraising committees, there are no federal spending limits on such internal communications. The NRA ILA has expanded its political efforts to the international stage. It joined with gun manufacturers and gun groups from eleven countries in 1997 to fight international efforts at gun control, including enactment of tougher gun laws in such countries as Great Britain, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand. The NRA also obtained “advocacy” (comparable to lobbyist) status at the United Nations (UN) in 1997. The following year, it unsuccessfully fought a UN resolution to curb illicit international firearm trading. Despite the vast resources funneled to its political efforts, and the zeal with which it promotes its anti–gun control cause, the ILA’s successes are often less than its feared reputation would suggest. In the 2000 elections, for example, it launched an all-out effort to swing key states to Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush. Despite the fact that Bush won the election, battleground states with large gun-owning populations—like Pennsylvania, Michigan,



and Iowa—all went to gun control supporter and Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore. In 2008, the NRA spent $40 million on political activities, yet it failed to dent Barack Obama’s political victory and that of Democrats in Congress. On the other hand, Obama and many Democrats backed away from support for new gun laws, seeking to avoid NRA ire. At the congressional level, the NRA’s ability to sway election outcomes has also been limited, given that most such elections are not determined by a single issue; that gun control is not a top issue concern of most voters; and that NRA political activities are, to some degree, counterbalanced by other groups seeking to influence the same pool of voters. Despite the fact that the NRA threw its weight behind Republican senator John McCain’s unsuccessful presidential campaign in 2008, the organization logged notable policy achievements during the Obama presidency, including elimination of a federal ban on carrying concealed weapons in national parks, retaining the destruction of gun purchase background check records, and blocking efforts to prevent people included on the government’s terrorist watch list from buying guns. In 2002, Chris W. Cox became the ILA’s executive director. Robert J. Spitzer See also: Eddie Eagle; Federation for NRA; National Rifle Association (NRA); Political Victory Fund (PVF)

Further Reading Bruce, John M., and Clyde Wilcox, eds. The Changing Politics of Gun Control. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998. National Rifle Association. n.d. “Institute for Legislative Action.” http://www.nraila .org/ (accessed November 17, 2019). Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021.

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Instrumentality Effect. See Weapons Instrumentality Effect Integrated Ballistics Identification System (IBIS). See Ballistic Identification System Intelligent Gun Safety Systems Intelligent gun safety systems are technologies fitted into firearms to prevent them from abuse by unauthorized persons. These safety systems play a vital role in averting harms and deaths, more so those originating from gun thefts, accidental shootings, and suicides. According to the National Institute of Justice (NIJ), these set of firearms are equipped with sophisticated biometric technologies, such as the fingerprint scanners or Radio Frequency Identification Devices (RFID), that are built-in the new generation guns being manufactured or retrofitted into the firearms in circulation (Greene 2013, 14). Several companies across the world, including (but not limited to) Armatix GmbH, Kodiak Industries, and iGun Technology Corporation, are working on incorporating intelligent safety systems into guns. In the past, gun safety has been reliant on mechanical systems whereby locks and external safes are used to prevent unauthorized access. Gobinet notes that the urge to have intelligent gun safety can be traced to the mid-1990s to early 2000s, when several manufacturing companies received funding from the government aimed at researching the most suitable intelligent gun safety systems (Small Arms Survey 2013). Despite extensive research aimed at shifting to smart guns, a greater portion of clients and law enforcement agencies still consider gun safety to be a mechanical issue. However, cases of police officers

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being shot using their own firearms or of children getting access to their parents’ firearms have revived the conversation about the feasibility of intelligent guns that employ RFID technology, magnetic rings, or fingerprint recognition systems in order to decrease accidents or access by unauthorized persons. Germany’s Armatix Company has been on the forefront when it comes to technological innovations and rolling out various intelligent gun safety systems. Most notably, the firm developed an intelligent system made up of two critical parts: the iW1 and iP1. The iP1 is a .22 caliber pistol that is triggered by the iW1, which is a device worn like a wristwatch. This system so far has been sold extensively across Asia and Europe. Similarly, Kodiak Industries came developed with Intelligun, a fingerprint operated locking system fitted into a .45 caliber pistol to unlock it for certified

individuals within seconds. Lastly, iGun Technology Corporation, based in Florida, created a more personalized firearm called the M-2000, on which the operator puts on the ring and embeds the RFID tag, which transmits when triggered by the reader on the gun (Gobinet 2013). According to data by the National Center for Injury Control and Prevention , 52,447 cases of deliberate and 23,237 accidental gun shooting cases occurred in the United States in the year 2000 (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 2006). A greater percentage of these incidents involve handguns in homes and institutions as witnessed in the rising cases of mass shootings, whereby most of the perpetrators are not licensed gun holders. Moreover, the need to embrace intelligent gun safety systems has been brought about by the statistics shared by the U.S. Department of Justice. According to the information, an

An Armatix smart gun is pictured at the company’s Munich headquarters in 2014. Smart guns use an electronic chip that communicates with a watch worn by the shooter through radio signals. If the two devices are separated by more than 10 inches, the gun will not fire. (Reuters/ Alamy Stock Photo)



average of 232,400 guns are stolen from private citizens each year (Langton 2012, 14). If smart safety measures are employed, such as fingerprint detection, the stolen firearms would be rendered useless immediately. According to the prevailing national opinion surveys in the United States, a bigger percentage of the population desire that the rampant cases of gun accidents and deaths are curtailed (Smith 2001, 5). Conversely, the same population is reluctant to campaign against access to guns. As such, the demands of U.S. citizens can only be addressed through either technology or legislation. A majority of the citizens in the United States want stronger gun control in order to minimize mass shootings. Rakeem (Rocky) Means See also: RFID Guns; Smart Guns; Trigger Locks

Further Reading Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “WISQARS Nonfatal Injury Reports.” National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, 2006. http://www.cdc.gov/injury /wisqars (accessed July 1, 2019). Greene, Mark. A Review of Gun Safety Technologies. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, National Institute of Justice, 2013. Langton, Lynn. Firearms Stolen during Household Burglaries and Other Property Crimes, 2005–2010. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2012. Small Arms Survey. “Personalized Firearms and Electronic Safety Devices.” In Smart Technology in SALW Control: Civilian Protection, the UN-POA, and Transfer Control (SmartCon), Berlin, Germany, June 17–18, 2013. https://pdfslide.net/documents/person alized-firearms-and-electronic-safety-fire arms-and-electronic-safety-devices.html (accessed July 3, 2022).

International Firearms Laws | 463 Smith, Tom William. 2001 National Gun Policy Survey of the National Opinion Research Center: Research findings. Chicago: National Opinion Research Center, University of Chicago, 2001.

Intelligun. See Smart Guns International Comparisons of Gun Violence. See Victimization from Gun Violence International Firearms Laws The question of how to control guns is crucial everywhere, but how gun control proceeds in Australia, Canada, France, Japan, Mexico, and the United Kingdom is especially relevant because these countries border the United States or resemble it governmentally. By and large, these are wealthy nations, but beyond that, there are substantial cultural and historical differences between them. Legally, however, there are similarities in how each approaches gun control, and common approaches include background checks, bans on specific firearms, and penalties associated with violations. Further, each nation has had their legislation shaped by unique historical forces, but most have had to respond to mass casualty events related to firearms.

Australia The gun control laws of Australia are among the strictest in the world, such that Australia is often hailed as an example that the United States might plausibly draw from in crafting reforms in its own efforts to reduce gun violence. To understand why Australia has such a strong reputation for gun control, it is necessary to examine the Australian context before and immediately

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after what has become known as the Port Arthur Shooting. In late April of 1996, an aggrieved alcoholic opened fire on the site of a former prison colony and tourist attraction with an AR-10 semiautomatic weapon, killing thirty-five visitors (Beck 2017). This event took place during a time in which mass shooting events had taken some forty Australian lives in the preceding eight years, and the Port Arthur shooting drew a swift and sweeping governmental response (Alpers 2013). Many noteworthy changes to Australian gun laws were enacted within twelve days of Port Arthur, including mandatory twenty-eight-day waiting periods for gun purchases as well as outright bans on semiautomatic weapons and shotguns (neighboring New Zealand also passed an assault weapons ban following a similarly lethal mass shooting in Christchurch on March 15, 2019). Further, thorough background checks were required for all legal firearm purchases, as well as mandatory justifications filed by purchasers that detailed their rationale for wanting to own a gun. Importantly, a desire for “self-defense” was not viewed as a legitimate rationale for gun purchases in Australia (Beck 2017). Rationales for gun ownership that are legally acceptable typically have to do with the type of firearm and the use to which it would be put, such as collecting, hunting, and other sporting activities (Time 2016). In addition to strengthening gun control legislation, Australia also instituted “buyback” programs after Port Arthur and intermittently in the years since. These have helped to diminish the outlawed firearms’ prevalence in Australian society, with some estimates suggesting that approximately one-third of all Australian guns have been surrendered as part of such initiatives (Beck 2017). So-called amnesty periods have also

periodically gone into effect, during which Australians can surrender illegal weapons without fear of legal consequences, and one such period in 2017 resulted in approximately 57,000 guns being turned in to authorities (Ingber 2019). There is also evidence that as many as one-fourth of guns surrendered by Australians were not part of buyback programs, indicating that a cultural shift may have been impactful in reducing the number of guns in circulation (Alpers 2013). There is substantial evidence that the measures taken in Australia have been effective in curbing gun violence. For example, the likelihood of an Australian dying from firearms is estimated to have been reduced by half, and suicides have also diminished since the reforms of 1996 (Alpers 2013). The prevalence of gun ownership has also gone down, decreasing from 17.5 guns per 100 residents in 1996 to 13.7 guns per 100 residents by 2016 (Beck 2017). Perhaps most importantly, mass shooting events have also been curtailed since that time. Using the year 1996 as a reference point, six mass shootings took place in the eight years prior to Port Arthur, and zero such events happened in the eight years after. Only three mass shooting events have occurred in Australia between 1996 and 2019 (Nunn 2019). Finally, research has shown that Australia has prevented twentythree deaths and saved approximately half a billion dollars per year because of increases in public safety from gun violence (Alpers 2013). While these figures are promising, not everyone credits gun control legislation with those gains. For example, the Sporting Shooters Association of Australia (SSAA) contends that the downward trends in violence and gun ownership were underway by the time of Port Arthur, and that the continuation



of those trends cannot be explained by the legislation enacted in its aftermath (Beck 2017). Like the NRA in the United States, the SSAA is a powerful lobbying group, and their membership has steadily increased since 1996, making their claims influential in Australia. Relatedly, there is some evidence that the benefits of the Australian gun law reforms have been undermined in the years since, particularly in the form of “replacement buys.” A replacement buy refers to a gun purchase that is made to replace a weapon that had been surrendered to the government. Also, while firearm production in Australia has been effectively eliminated, the result has been that guns in Australia have become largely American-made rather than disappearing entirely (Alpers 2013). Whether Australia’s gun law reforms are directly responsible for increases in public safety remains contentious within the country. However, what is not disputed is that Australian gun control laws are among the strongest in the world and that since the reforms of 1996, Australian citizens have become safer from gun violence.

Canada Like Australia, the gun laws of Canada are quite restrictive when compared to those in the United States. However, unlike Australia, whose contemporary gun legislation sprang largely from a single incident, the gun laws of Canada have progressed in steps over the course of several decades and in accordance with numerous bills. The Canadian gun control landscape has been shaped largely by four pieces of legislation: Bill C-51 in 1977, Bill C-17 in 1991, and Bill C-68 in 1995, and Bill C-71 in 2020 (Royal Canadian Mounted Police 2020). Bill C-51, passed in 1977 and whose provisions went into effect in the years

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immediately following, took the major step of designating all automatic weapons as “prohibited” in accordance with Canadian law. A firearm is deemed to be prohibited in Canada if it may not be bought, sold, or imported legally after the date upon which it is so designated, though firearms registered before that date may be kept by their owners. Bill C-51 also expanded police powers of search and seizure and implemented mandatory minimum sentences for perpetrators who use weapons during the commission of a crime (Library of Congress 2015). Bill C-17 followed in 1991 and further expanded the gun control requirements of Canadian law. Among its most noteworthy contributions were amendments to the Firearm Acquisition Certificate, which at the time was necessary for Canadians to legally obtain firearms. C-17 mandated that two character references be included in the Certificate and that a twentyeight-day waiting period be required for all firearm purchases. Criminal penalties for gun crimes also were included in the Bill, and mandatory safety training was enacted (Royal Canadian Mounted Police 2020). In 1995, Bill C-68 was passed, which is potentially the most important gun control legislation in modern Canadian history since it included The Firearms Act, which is considered the governing piece of Canadian gun legislation to this day. C-68 and The Firearms Act within it expanded gun-crime penalties further, replaced the previously binding Firearm Acquisition Certificate with a more robust licensing system, and required that all firearms be registered with the Canadian government via the Canadian Firearms Registry, which is overseen by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (2020). Canadian registration requirements outstrip those in the United States. All firearm purchases must be registered with the

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Canadian government via the Canadian Firearms Registry and in accordance with the Canadian Firearms Program (Matthews 2014). This means that Canada has a comparatively good idea of how many legal firearms are at large in the country relative to the United States, where no similarly comprehensive registry is required or even legally permitted to exist at the federal level. Additionally, firearms in Canada are categorized into three tiers. The first, designated “prohibited,” has already been described. The other two are “nonrestricted” and “restricted.” Nonrestricted guns in Canada are those “ordinary” rifles and shotguns that are mostly used in hunting and sporting activities, whereas restricted guns include most handguns and modified rifles (Gismondi 2020). The history of Canadian gun laws includes numerous shifts in categorization for specific makes and models of guns, with the general trend being to place them into categories of greater control. In terms of licensing, Canada has much more diverse and comprehensive requirements than the United States. Presently, all legal gun owners in Canada must be licensed, which includes passing the Canadian Firearms Safety Course (CFSA). The CFSA includes two components—the theoretical and practical segments—that deal, respectively, with aspects of social responsibility and the actual use of firearms (Gismondi 2020). For Canadians who wish to purchase restricted guns, passing a more intensive course in addition to the CFSA, called the Canadian Restricted Firearms Safety Course, is necessary. Licenses for prohibited firearms are available to some businesses, but individuals usually can only get them in cases in which the guns in question were owned prior to being designated as prohibited.

While the Canadian gun control landscape has developed over time, it has also been responsive to national tragedies, as was the case in 2020 when Bill C-71 was passed in the wake of a deadly mass shooting event in Nova Scotia (Ling 2020). The event that spurred C-71 involved a man without a license using numerous firearms to kill twenty-two people at different locations across the province over a period of two days using five firearms: two semiautomatic rifles and three semiautomatic handguns. While the circumstances of the shooting are still under investigation as of July 2020, there is evidence that the perpetrator obtained his weapons through a recently deceased associate’s estate (Tutton 2020). The Nova Scotia event spurred public calls to bolster Canada’s gun control apparatus, which were quickly heeded by the government. C-71 was the government’s response and it included placing numerous weapons, including the AK47, AR-10, AR-15, M16, and M14, on the prohibited list from the restricted list, as well as placing bans on guns that can fire projectiles at greater than 7,376-foot pounds of force per second (Royal Canadian Mounted Police 2020). The combined effectiveness of the bills outlined here has been, unsurprisingly, the topic of debate within Canada. Gun control is seldom without controversy, and in Canada, the most powerful groups that oppose gun control policies include the Canadian Coalition for Firearm Rights (CCFR) and the National Firearms Association (NFA). The groups can be considered roughly analogous to the NRA in the United States, and they claim that Canadian gun control laws are “byzantine” and that they place too great an onus on Canadian citizens to prove their worthiness to own weapons (Gismondi 2020). Members of these groups also argue



that guns used illegally are most often obtained illegally, thereby questioning the effectiveness of gun control laws. They point to the Nova Scotia shooter as further evidence of this claim. Nevertheless, the long history of Canada passing increasingly strict gun control measures shows that the country’s citizens are also supportive of gun control measures and proponents point to many benefits that they attribute to gun control effectiveness. Most notably, suicides in Canada have dropped following passage of gun control legislation, and homicide rates have been declining since the 1980s (Library of Congress 2015). Though there remains debate as to how responsible for these gains gun control legislation has been, once again there is little question that the gains exist, and that gun control legislation has progressed alongside them.

France In recent years, France has been compared both positively and negatively to the United States with respect to the utility of its gun control laws, and arguments that France’s strict control of firearms are ineffective stem largely from a series of deadly attacks that took place in 2015. To start that year, on January 7, the headquarters of a French publication called Charlie Hebdo was attacked by men wielding illegally obtained AK-47 rifles. Twelve people were killed in the Hebdo attack (Lu 2015). Later that year, on November 13, a more devastating and coordinated attack unfolded in Paris, centering on the Bataclan theater and including surrounding areas, that ultimately killed at least 130 people and injured hundreds of others (Andelman 2018). In the Bataclan attack, AK-47 rifles were again used, as were bombs, and at one point approximately one hundred hostages were taken. Together,

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these attacks raised major questions regarding the effectiveness of French gun control laws, which had long been thought to be among the strongest in Europe. French gun control had a strong reputation prior to the attacks of 2015 and continues to be regarded as robust. There are many reasons for this, including the rigorous licensing that is required for French citizens to own or carry a firearm. Further, France utilizes a system of categorization that resembles the Canadian system, which places different weapons under different levels of control. Licensing and registration requirements coupled with a tiered control scheme qualify the French gun control environment as quite restrictive (Frenchly 2018). The French government categorizes all weapons as belonging to categories designated as A through D. Category A guns are described as “weapons of war,” and include fully automatic weapons, such as the AK47s used in the Hebdo and Bataclan attacks. Category A weapons are not legal for any French citizen to own outside of military service (Nallet and Hank-Gomez 2018). Category B firearms are not fully illegal but are subject to high levels of control, and ownership must be authorized by the government. Firearms with a barrel shorter than 18.5 inches (e.g., handguns) qualify as Category B, as do those with a removable magazine that holds more than three rounds (Andelman 2018). To own a Category B gun, a sports shooting license is required. This in turn requires an applicant to have active membership in a shooting club, verification of practice at a shooting range at least three times a year, and certification by a physician as being both physically and mentally fit to own a gun. If an applicant has nothing on their criminal record, they can then file a petition to carry the gun. Category C are the most popular legally held

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firearms and include hunting weapons with a capacity of three rounds or fewer. Each Category C gun must be registered, and owners need to take one day’s worth of theory and practice training. This training includes learning about firearm safety as well as instruction regarding dog breeds and protected species (Andelman 2018). Finally, Category D items include pellet guns, pepper spray, and guns for display. These require no licenses, though minors are more restricted in possessing them than are adults. In sum, there are many weapons that are completely illegal for French citizens to purchase or own, and to possess any gun requires a series of licenses and verifications. It is very difficult to legally carry a gun in France because evidence of a threat is required for approval in addition to the normal ownership licensing mandates (Nallet and Hank-Gomez 2018). The office of the Minister of the Interior must approve carry licenses, and few are granted outside of the police force. French gun control legislation is strict, often described as among the strongest in Europe (Andelman 2018), which means that the attacks of 2015 took place against a backdrop of legislation that in theory should have made them harder to carry out. It is true that mass shooting events like these are rare in France, with only one having been documented in the years between 2000 and 2014 (Frenchly 2018). Nevertheless, the scale of the attacks of 2015 was sufficient to call into question the utility of French gun control. The biggest reason behind the Hebdo and Bataclan attacks was that laws were undermined by the flourishing black weapons market that exists in Europe, which stems in part from the Balkan wars of the 1990s. The remnants of the Balkan conflicts include a large supply of Category

A weapons left at-large in Europe, and it is from these sources that the AK-47s used in both attacks are believed to have been obtained (Graham-Harrison 2015). As is the case elsewhere, a ready supply of illegal arms can cause the legal mechanisms of gun control to fail, and in France illegal weapons are thought to outnumber legal ones by a ratio of two to one (Taylor 2015). In the aftermath of Bataclan, France acted to bolster its protections against such attacks and to apprehend any responsible parties. For three months following Bataclan, France authorized warrantless searches of people and devices, and the government was permitted to dissolve groups and block websites suspected of being linked to terrorism (Masse 2015). These measures were taken, in part, because prior to the attacks the French government had already expanded its surveillance capacities several times, meaning that the only responses available to them were highly intrusive. For example, since 2014, surveillance powers have been expanded via the Military Programming Law, Anti-Terrorism Law, Intelligence Law, and International Surveillance Law, which together allow the French government to collect and maintain data for long periods, monitor the populace, and intercept private communications both in France and elsewhere (Masse 2015). This impacts gun regulation because all of this is designed to dampen the activity of the firearm black market, which the Hebdo and Bataclan attacks show did not happen. Despite the attacks of 2015 and the failures of French gun control that they may represent, France is generally a safe country with respect to gun violence. It is certainly far safer than the United States, with France’s gun deaths per 100,000 residents being 2.65, compared to 10.63 in the United States. Further, the number of guns in



France declined from an estimated nineteen million in 2006 to only ten million by 2016. Although gun safety benefits exist alongside France’s gun control legislation, the legislation itself may not be entirely to credit for those gains (Frenchly 2018).

Japan Japan is unique with respect to its gun laws and the cultural reasons for the gun control environment of the country. Weapons control in Japan has a much more diverse and lengthy history than exists elsewhere, and the Japanese are considered the first to enact bans on firearms (Low 2017). Additionally, Japanese citizens have not been as resistant to the idea of state control of firearms. There are no Japanese advocacy groups that are comparable to the American NRA or the Canadian NFA, which stems from both the country’s history with weapons control and the generally more authoritarian nature of Japanese government (Low 2017). The government’s goal in modern Japan is to achieve total state ownership or control of firearms in the country (Koon 2019), which is partially an outgrowth of centuries of weapons control efforts. Noteworthy early attempts by Japan to control weapons included policies known as “sword hunts,” whereby swords, spears, and firearms in private hands were sought by government officials, confiscated, and melted down. One such hunt took place in 1588, with the government creating religious statues from the metal in the confiscated weapons and promising citizens that their cooperation earned them a chance at a better afterlife (Koon 2019). These hunts continued periodically until 1876 (when even the Samurai class were banned from carrying swords) and comprise a part of the cultural fabric of Japan that enables its strict contemporary gun control measures.

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Modern Japanese gun control policy is rooted in the Firearm and Sword Control Law of 1958, which was itself a formalization of policies adopted during the post– WWII allied occupation of the country. During that occupation, the government demanded that all privately held weapons (guns and swords) be surrendered (Aoki 2017). The framework established at that time included a broad ban on civilian ownership of firearms along with provisions for exceptions to that general rule (Library of Congress 2015). In the intervening decades, the policies established were expanded, often in the aftermath of gunrelated incidents often stemming from escalations within the realm of Japanese organized crime. Currently, private Japanese citizens can own firearms, but the conditions under which such ownership is permitted are extremely strict, as is the process by which those conditions can be satisfied. In each of Japan’s forty prefectures (administrative sections in Japan that do not have easy equivalents in the U.S. system of government), only three gun sellers are permitted to operate. Handguns also are banned completely and there is no process that allows for their private ownership. Firearms that may be owned are mostly restricted to shotguns and air rifles, and the sale of ammunition is also tightly controlled (Low 2017). Such sales require records of how many rounds were purchased, and to buy more, a customer must present all spent shell casings to verify that no unused rounds remain at large. Similarly, when Japanese police train with guns, they must collect all spent casings to ensure that no live rounds can be smuggled from the training range (Adelstein 2013). Furthermore, weapons and ammunition must be stored separately and securely when privately owned, and the

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storage location must be reported to police along with a map indicating that location. The licensing requirements in Japan are substantial and include similar provisions that exist elsewhere regarding background checks on mental health and criminal history. Specifically, a prospective gun owner cannot have a criminal history of any kind and must be medically certified as healthy both mentally and physically. Further, applicants must pass a drug screen and are checked for connections to extremist groups. Finally, guns can be owned only for specific purposes such as hunting, competition, or target shooting and may only be used for their licensed purpose once obtained. An average seven-year prison sentence attaches to any discharge of even a licensed firearm for purposes other than the authorized one (Lopez 2018). Gun control in Japan does not end with the granting of licenses. Once licensed, a gun owner must document that they use the gun for its intended purpose and remain current by renewing their license every three years. The weapons themselves must be also inspected by police annually. Further, police can seize weapons from licensed owners at any time, require no warrant to do so, and are authorized to visit the neighborhoods of gun owners to ask residents about the behavior of licensees to ensure that there are no domestic or other problems (Adelstein 2013). When the license for guns or gun-owners lapses but the weapons remain at large, the firearms become known as “sleeping guns,” the recovery of which is a high priority for Japanese law enforcement. Penalties for gun violations in Japan are severe. In addition to penalties for unauthorized discharge of a firearm, “possession” of weapons is interpreted broadly in Japanese law such that associates of a person who illegally owns a gun can also be

charged with violations that incur substantial prison time. Further, it forbidden to import gun parts, and firing a weapon in a criminal context carries the potential for a life sentence. This has discouraged firearm ownership even among Japan’s organized criminal element, and Yakuza members are known to consider guns a legal liability (Adelstein 2013). Nevertheless, of the gun violence that does persist in Japan, organized criminal elements are the most prominent cause (Aoki 2017). For example, in 2016, the number of gun incidents increased to twentyseven from only eight the prior year. This increase was attributed to violent activity stemming from tensions within Yakuza factions. The result was a massive police operation that saw nearly 1,000 Yakuza arrested and in which police utilized otherwise obscure Japanese laws to apprehend and detain suspects for minor infractions (Watkinson 2016). The gun control laws in Japan exist alongside widespread approval of the citizenry, which itself is steeped in cultural traditions that include an aversion to interpersonal violence (Low 2017). This makes it difficult to entirely credit the overall high levels of safety from gun violence in Japan to their gun laws, but gun control in Japan is pervasive and intense, and there are correspondingly low levels of gun violence in the country. Gun possession in Japan has been steadily declining from consistently low rates for decades, and gun homicides in Japan are significantly rarer than they are in the United States.

Mexico Gun laws in Mexico are like those in the United States in the sense that it is one of only two other countries with a national equivalent to the U.S. Second Amendment

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(the other being Guatemala). Enshrinement in national constitutions of a right to bear arms is exceedingly rare, but Mexico’s constitution does this in Article 10: The inhabitants of the United Mexican States have the right to possess arms in their home, for their safety and legitimate defense, with the exception of those prohibited by Federal Law and those reserved for the exclusive use of the permanent Armed Forces and reserves. Federal Law shall determine the cases, conditions, requirements and places where inhabitants are authorized to carry weapons. Article 10 went into effect in 1857 and remains valid today; unlike similar such provisions in other countries, it has not been overturned or repealed (Weiss and Pasley 2019). Like the Second Amendment in the United States, Article 10 grants broad rights to Mexican citizens to own firearms for the protection of their property. However, unlike the Second Amendment, Article 10 has been interpreted and applied in increasingly restricted ways since its inception. Article 10 was first amended in 1917 following the Mexican revolution, with new language preventing citizens from owning guns that were “reserved for use by the military” or from carrying guns in “inhabited places without complying police regulations.” The 1917 changes explicitly narrowed and specified the mandate of the original Article. However, perhaps most relevant to contemporary gun control in Mexico was the passage of the Federal Firearms and Explosives Law of 1971, which is often seen as a turning point in Mexico between lax gun laws and strict ones (Johnson 2019). The Federal Firearms and Explosives Law came about in the aftermath of a deadly conflict known as El Halconazo (the Corpus

Cristi Shooting) that resulted in 120 dead. This event was itself the product of years of civil unrest within Mexico, in which social causes were taken up throughout society in ways reminiscent of what occurred during the 1960s in the United States (Smyth 2014). The bloodshed at El Halconazo prompted the passage of the law, which further restricted gun rights to the degree that afterwards Mexican gun laws could credibly be described as strict (McMullin 2019). The new law mandated that no guns could be legally owned in Mexico by private citizens that were greater than .380 caliber, though it also banned .357 magnums. Further, registration of any firearm with the federal government became a feature of Mexican gun control that remains in place today. Limitations on how much ammunition could be sold were also set by the law, which at the time allowed for up to 1,000 shotgun rounds, 500 .22 caliber rounds, or 200 rounds of other calibers. Such restrictions on ammunition also persist, though they have been enhanced to limits of 200 rounds of any caliber (McMullin 2019). Mexican citizens who wish to own a legal firearm are restricted by the type of gun and also must fulfill numerous requirements to obtain their license, including proof of residency, employment, and a clean criminal background check that is current within six months and issued by the attorney general for the Mexican state in which the prospective licensee lives (McMullin 2019). Though these requirements are broadly consistent with background checks elsewhere, the restrictions imposed on carrying legally owned weapons are substantially stronger in Mexico than are the barriers to ownership. Specifically, it is almost impossible for nonmilitary personnel to obtain a permit to carry their weapon outside of their home, as the original intent of Article 10 upon which

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Mexican gun laws are largely based was to provide Mexicans with the capacity to defend their homes (Mexperience 2019) rather than to defend their persons or businesses. The requirements of legal gun ownership in Mexico are robust, and those that apply to carrying weapons outside the home are more so. However, a unique feature of the Mexican gun trade is that there is only a single legal gun store in the entire country, which is housed in a military base in Mexico City and sells approximately forty guns daily (Weiss and Pasley 2019). What this means for Mexicans is that even among those who obtain the proper licenses, actually purchasing a legal gun can prove to be difficult, which in turn may limit the number of legally held firearms within the country. This touches upon a crucial distinction that applies to all nations, but to Mexico in particular, which is the disconnect between gun legislation and gun availability (Johnson 2019). Mexico has strong gun laws and federal control over firearms, but unlike many other countries with these features, it also has widespread availability of weapons. Gun availability in Mexico is largely not of the legal variety, but instead derives from black market imports via the global arms trade and from illicit smuggling from the United States. For example, in 2017, 70 percent of firearms confiscated in Mexico and released by Mexican authorities to the ATF of the United States were found to have U.S. origins (Guerrero 2019). Furthermore, as a federal registry of firearms does not exist in the United States, it is plausible that substantially more of the Mexican gun supply comes through their northern border. Similarly, officials in the city of Tijuana report that almost all the guns they seize there come from the United States. There are many guns in Mexico circulating in private hands, but because of the

proportion of those guns that are illicit, it is difficult to estimate exactly how many there are. However, what is known is that guns are a major threat to the Mexican public, with over 33,000 murders reported in 2018, many of which involved guns (Guerrero 2019). There were also approximately 18,000 confirmed gun homicides in Mexico in 2017, and this was up from only around 2,000 in 1997 (Johnson 2019). Mexico is a highly dangerous country despite its strong gun control legislation. This is due to many factors involving the operation of drug cartels, corruption within the Mexican police and military ranks, and the ongoing Mexican drug war, of which those things are a part (Johnson 2019). It is important to note is that weapons smuggling and trafficking into Mexico from the United States and elsewhere contributes to the high availability of weapons to meet correspondingly high Mexican demand, and stringent gun laws in this case have not correlated with increases in safety the way that they have in other nations.

United Kingdom The history of gun control in the United Kingdom (UK) is long, and there have been numerous shifts in public opinion regarding firearms over the past century. Briefly, at the turn of the last century (1900), there was broad approval for the availability of guns, but the contemporary gun control landscape of the UK has shifted substantially away from that position. The reasons for that shift are many, but as has happened elsewhere, highly lethal and publicized mass shooting incidents have been the impetus for reforms that have created the contemporary gun control landscape of the UK (Barnett 2017). The first of these events happened in 1987 in Hungerford, Berkshire, England on August 19, 1987. In what became known as



the Hungerford Shooting, sixteen victims were killed along with the gunman, who committed suicide (Hannaford 2016). The perpetrator in Hungerford used (among others) a 9-mm semiautomatic pistol and an M1 carbine to carry out his attack, and the response of the government to satisfy public outcry was swift. They passed the Firearms (Amendment) Act in 1988, which substantially changed the gun control landscape of the UK. First, the 1988 law expanded the list of banned firearms in England to include those that the shooter used, which were at the time of the killings both legal in general and specifically licensed to the perpetrator. This meant that semiautomatic weapons were banned, as were pump-action firearms, though exceptions were made for guns firing the .22 “rimfire” cartridge, which was deemed less lethal and therefore still permitted (Hannaford 2016). Restrictions were also placed on the barrel length of legal weapons, restricting weapons to twenty-four-inch barrels or shorter. Further, federal registration of firearms was mandated by the law. The second mass shooting event took place at Dunblane Primary School in Scotland on March 13, 1996. In this instance, the perpetrator killed seventeen victims and himself, but in this case, sixteen of his victims were schoolchildren. Also, like at Hungerford, the weapons used in the attack were legal and licensed to the shooter at the time. The age of the victims in this case sparked even greater public outcry than occurred in the aftermath of Hungerford, and again the UK government acted quickly with sweeping gun control legislation, this time in the form of the Firearms (Amendment) Act in 1997. The 1997 law expanded on the provisions enacted the decade prior, largely by effectively banning all handguns everywhere in the UK except for Northern Ireland (The Week 2019).

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The legislation of 1988 and 1997 has been extremely influential in the UK with respect to its gun control environment, and although there have been other laws before and since, these have notably contributed to the overall strong gun control that exists in the country, and both still apply. Currently, prospective gun owners must pass rigorous licensing procedures, which include providing a “good reason” to own a firearm in the first place (Lopez 2018). As is the case in Australia, personal protection is not viewed as a “good reason,” but participation in sports shooting, pest control needs, and job requirements are. If an applicant can satisfy the good reason requirement, UK police are expected to verify it, such as by inspecting a property for the presence of pests or by confirming participation in a shooting club. Background checks are also necessary for a person to legally own a gun in the UK, and such checks include a clean criminal history as verified by the National Police Computer (Casciani 2010). Further, applicants are screened for histories of alcoholism or drug addiction, and references testifying to mental soundness, home life, and attitudes regarding guns are required (Lopez 2018). Once granted, licenses must be renewed every five years and can be revoked by police if they determine that the licensee has either become a threat to the community or has lost the “good reason” attached to their license for any cause. Finally, “British Safety Standards” must consistently be met regarding storage, such that unauthorized access by relatives or friends is not judged to be a problem. Finally, punishments for violations are severe, including mandatory five-year prison terms for the unlawful possession of a firearm. The impact of these laws in the UK has been positive in terms of both gun homicides and mass shooting events, which are

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both very rare (Hannaford 2016). For example, the school shooting that prompted the 1997 legislation was the first of its kind in the UK—and, to date, the last. Further, the gun homicide rate in the UK is much lower than in the United States, and mass acts of violence are generally far rarer (Lopez 2018). However, as in France, the UK is supplied with illicit guns via Eastern Europe and along many of the same avenues. The illegal arms trade in Europe is not confined to the French, and in the case of the UK, many firearms are smuggled in as parts and then assembled later (Barnett 2017). Also, 3D printers are sometimes used to manufacture illegal gun parts such as bump stocks, and there are fears that the Dark Web has been important in bringing illegal guns into the country. There is the problem of gun laws versus gun availability, but the UK has strong legal controls of firearms, and the country seems to have been made safer because of them.

U.S. Comparison The United States is unique from the countries described here in important ways that prevent the easy adoption of many of the laws that exist elsewhere. Perhaps most importantly, all these countries apart from Mexico lack a national equivalent of the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. This absence allows countries like France, the UK, and Australia to pass and implement strict national gun control measures that would be exceedingly difficult to install in the United States. Furthermore, enthusiasm for guns in the United States is higher than it is elsewhere and is expressed by vocal and powerful lobbying groups. Similar such groups are also in play in Canada and Australia (Beck 2017), for example, but they lack the backing of constitutional legitimacy (Pedwell 2014) that the NRA has in the United States.

It is also clear in the cases of Canada and Mexico that proximity to the United States and its comparatively lax gun control laws compromise their own national efforts to limit the availability of firearms within their borders. Both countries report large numbers of illicit guns of U.S. origin crossing their borders, which can stymie their efforts at control. In the case of Mexico, this is particularly dangerous, as well-armed cartel operatives pose a threat to both Mexican and U.S. citizens, and smuggling weapons from the United States to Mexico is recognized as a problem by Mexican and U.S. authorities (Guerrero 2019). Finally, citizens of most of the nations described are comparatively safer from gun violence than U.S. citizens are, and all of these countries have stricter gun control. It is important to note that the safety is not explained perfectly by the legislation, but the two do coincide, and it is reasonable to think they are related. Mexico aside, gun control does appear to be broadly beneficial internationally, though the question of gun availability probably matters more. Marcus Tyler Carey See also: Arms Trade Treaty; Assault Weapons; Availability of Guns, Effects on Crimes; Immigrants and Guns; Mass Murder (Shootings); Semiautomatic Weapons; Surplus Arms; Terrorist Screening Database and Firearms; United Nations (UN)

Further Reading Adelstein, Jake. “Even Gangsters Live in Fear of Japan’s Gun Laws.” Japan Times, January 6, 2013. https://www.japantimes.co.jp /news/2013/01/06/national/media-national /even-gangsters-live-in-fear-of-japans-gun -laws/#.XumOsed7lPY (accessed May 16, 2022). Alpers, Philip. “The Big Melt: How One Democracy Changed after Scrapping a Third of Its Firearms.” GunPolicy.org,

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2013. https://www.gunpolicy.org/firearms /region/cp/australia (accessed May 16, 2022). Andelman, David A. “How France Cut Its Per Capita Gun Ownership in Half.” CNN, February 26, 2018. https://www.cnn .com/2018/02/26/opinions/france-america -gun-laws-opinion-andelman/index.html (accessed May 16, 2022). Aoki, Mizuho. “Strict Gun Laws Mean Japan Sees Fewer Shooting Deaths.” Japan Times, October 13, 2017. https://www.japan times.co.jp/news/2017/10/03/national/strict -gun-laws-mean-japan-sees-fewer-shooting -deaths/#.XumPxud7lPY (accessed May 16, 2022). Barnett, David. “Firearms Act: Twenty Years On, Has It Made a Difference?” Independent, December 16, 2017. https://www .independent.co.uk/news/long_reads/fire arms-act-twenty-years-on-has-it-made-a -difference-dunblane-port-arthur-a8110911 .html (accessed May 16, 2022). Beck, Katie. “Are Australia’s Gun Laws the Solution for the U.S.?” BBC News, October 4, 2017. https://www.bbc.com/news/world -australia-35048251 (accessed May 16, 2022). Casciani, Dominic. “Gun Control and Ownership Laws in the UK.” BBC News, November 2, 2010. https://www.bbc.com/news /10220974 (accessed May 16, 2022). “Firearms: Are France and the United States Really That Different?” Frenchly, March 20, 2018. https://frenchly.us/firearms-are -france-and-the-united-states-really-that -different/ (accessed May 16, 2022). “Firearms Control Legislation and Policy: Canada.” Library of Congress, July 30, 2015. https://www.loc.gov/law/help/firearms -control/canada.php (accessed May 16, 2022). Gismondi, Melissa. “What You Need to Know about Gun Control in Canada.” Chatelaine, May 1, 2020. https://www.chatelaine.com /news/gun-control-canada/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Graham-Harrison, Emma. “Paris Attacks Highlight France’s Gun Control Problems.”

Guardian, November 15, 2015. https:// www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/15 /paris-attacks-highlight-frances-gun-con trol-problems (accessed May 16, 2022). Guerrero, Jean. “Mexico’s American gun problem.” KPBS, April 30, 2019. https:// w w w. k p b s . o r g / n e w s / 2 019 / a p r / 3 0 /mexicos-american-gun-problem-record -homicides-and-/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Hannaford, Alex. “What the U.S. Can Learn from UK Gun Control.” GQ Magazine, June 14, 2016. https://www.gq-magazine .co.uk/article /american-vs-british-gun -control-laws (accessed May 16, 2022). “History of Firearms in Canada.” Royal Canadian Mounted Police, April 22, 2020. https://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/en/history -firearms-canada (accessed May 16, 2022). Ingber, Sasha. “Deadly Shooting Shocks Australia, Known for Tough Gun Control Laws.” National Public Radio. June 5, 2019. https://www.npr.org/2019/06/05/729 901315/deadly-shooting-shocks-australia -k now n-for-t oug h-g u n- cont rol-laws (accessed May 16, 2022). Johnson, Timothy. “WSJ Gives Discredited Researcher John Lott a Platform to Falsely Blame Gun Regulation for the Mexican Drug War.” Media Matters. October 23, 2019. https://www.mediamatters.org/john -lott/wsj-gives-discredited-researcher-john -lott-platform-falsely-blame-gun-regula tion-mexican (accessed May 16, 2022). Koon, Wee Kek. “U.S. Gun Laws: Disarming a Nation Can Be Done, Japan Took All the Swords from Its Samurai.” Post Magazine, July 18, 2019. https://www.scmp.com/maga zines/post-magazine/short-reads/article /3018993/us-gun-laws-disarming-nation -can-be-done-japan (accessed May 16, 2022). Library of Congress. “Firearms Control Legislation and Policies: Japan.” July 30, 2015. http://www.loc.gov/law//help/firearms -control/japan.php (accessed May 16, 2022). Ling, Justin. “Canada’s Gun Laws Are Only as Good as Its Neighbor’s.” Foreign Policy, May 26, 2020. https://foreignpolicy.com

476 | International Firearms Laws /2020/05/26/canada-gun-control-laws -united-states-nova-scotia-mass-shooting -justin-trudeau/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Lopez, German. “How Gun Control Works in America, Compared with 4 Other Rich Countries.” Vox.com, March 14, 2018. https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics /2015/12/4/9850572/gun-control-us-japan -switzerland-uk-canada (accessed May 16, 2022). Low, Harry. “How Japan Has Almost Eradicated Gun Crime.” BBC News, January 6, 2017. https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine -38365729 (accessed May 16, 2022). Lu, Alicia. “What Are France’s Gun Laws Like? The Attacks Took Place in a City with Strict Firearms Prohibitions.” Bustle, November 13, 2015. https://www.bustle.com /articles/123809-what-are-frances-gun-laws -like-the-attacks-took-place-in-a-city-with -strict-firearms (accessed May 16, 2022). Masse, Estelle. “After the Paris Attacks, France Enacts Sweeping Legislation Limiting Fundamental Freedoms.” Access Now, November 25, 2015. https://www.access now.org/after-the-paris-attacks-france -enacts-sweeping-legislation-limiting-fun damental-freedoms/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Matthews, Dylan. “Here’s How Gun Control Works in Canada.” Vox.com, October 24, 2014. https://www.vox.com/2014/10/24/70 47547/canada-gun-law-us-comparison (accessed May 16, 2022). McMullin, Spencer. “Mexico Gun Laws and Regulations Clarification.” Mazatlan Post, November 24, 2019. https://themazatlan post.com/2019/11/24/mexico-gun-laws -and-regulations-clarification/ (accessed May 16, 2022).

Student Press, April 7, 2018. https://waylandst udent press.com /63815/ar ticles /weekly-exchange-gun-control-in-the-u-s-vs -in-france-and-germany/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Nunn, Gary. “Darwin Shooting: Why Mass Shooting Feels Unfamiliar to Australia.” BBC News, June 5, 2019. https://www.bbc .com /news /world-australia- 48522788 (accessed May 16, 2022). Pedwell, Terry. “Is Gun Ownership a Legal Right in Canada?” CBC News, July 31, 2014. https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/is -g u n- ow nership-a-legal-r ight-in- can ada-1.2723893 (accessed May 16, 2022). Smyth, Tim. “The 1971 Student Massacre That Mexico Would Rather Forget.” Vice News, June 12, 2014. https://www.vice.com /en_us/article/xwpmmw/the-1971-student -massacre-that-mexico-would-rather-for get (accessed May 16, 2022). “Some Basic Facts about Gun Control in Mexico.” Mexlaw, 2020. https://mexlaw .ca/some-basic-facts-about-gun-control -in-mexico-2/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Taylor, Adam. “France Has Strict Gun Laws. Why Didn’t That Save Charlie Hebdo Victims?” Washington Post, January 9, 2015. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news /worldviews/wp/2015/01/09/france-has -strict-gun-laws-why-didnt-that-save-charlie -hebdo-victims/ (accessed May 16, 2022). Tutton, Michael. “Witness Said Killer in N.S. Mass Shooting ‘Recently’ Acquired Gun from Friend’s Estate.” CBC News, June 12, 2020. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova -scotia/witness-killer-in-n-s-mass-shooting -acquired-gun-estate-1.5610352 (accessed May 16, 2022).

“Mexico’s Strict Gun Laws.” Mexperience, January 28, 2019. https://www.mexperience .com/mexicos-strict-gun-laws/ (accessed May 16, 2022).

“UK Gun Laws: Who Can Own a Firearm?” The Week, March 21, 2019. https://www .theweek.co.uk/100333/uk-gun-laws-who -can-own-a-firearm (accessed May 16, 2022).

Nallet, Emma, and Teresa Hank-Gomez. “Weekly exchange: Gun control in the U.S. vs. in France and Germany.” Wayland

Watkinson, William. “Japan: Gangland Crackdown Sees 976 Alleged Yakuza Arrested to Avert Brutal In-Fighting.” Yahoo.com. Sep-

tember 1, 2016. https://sg.news.yahoo .com/japan-gangland-crackdown-sees-976 -204922309.html (accessed May 16, 2022). Weiss, Brennan, and James Pasley. “Only 3 Countries in the World Protect the Right to Bear Arms in their Constitution: The US, Mexico, and Guatemala.” Business Insider, August 6, 2019. https://www.businessinsider .com/2nd-amendment-countries-constitu tional-right-bear-arms-2017-10 (accessed May 16, 2022). “What It’s Like to Own a Gun in a Country with Strict Gun Control Laws.” Time, January 13, 2016. https://time.com/4172274 /what-its-like-to-own-guns-in-a-country -with-strict-gun-control/ (accessed May 16, 2022). “What You Need to Know about the Government of Canada’s New Prohibition on Certain Firearms and Devices.” Royal Canadian Mounted Police, May 1, 2020. https://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/en/firearms /need-k now-the-gover n ment-canadas -new-prohibition-certain-firearms-and -devices (accessed May 16, 2022).

Iron Pipeline The term “iron pipeline” refers to the movement and trafficking of guns from states with less restrictive gun control measures to those states with stronger regulations. The interstate trade in guns creates conditions for a national gun market, with the implication that states that establish strict gun control measures may find these are undermined because buyers can secure guns in jurisdictions that have shorter waiting periods, less extensive background checks, fewer licensing requirements, and other provisions. Some reports have suggested that firearms move through a so-called iron pipeline from the south to the north along interstate highways I-95 in the east and along I-55 in the Midwest.

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Documenting the Travel and Traffic of Guns The extent to which guns have traveled from one jurisdiction to another has been the subject of much research and debate. Howard Andrews of Columbia University testified in a 2003 trial that guns from southern states provided the bulk of those recovered during the course of crimes in the state of New York (New York Times 2003). An extensive study published by Mayors against Illegal Guns, a coalition of over 500 U.S. mayors, using gun trace data collected by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), found substantial interstate trade in guns. The purpose of this study was to investigate the link between states’ gun regulations and the likelihood that guns secured in these states would be would in out-of-state crimes (Mayors against Illegal Guns 2010). By relying on the gun’s serial number, make, model, and manufacturer, gun trace data permit law enforcement to determine where and when the gun was purchased from a federally licensed dealer, who purchased it, where and when the gun was confiscated (for example, as the result of arrest), the offense linked to the gun, characteristics of the gun holder, and other information. Trace data collected by ATF in 2006 and 2007 revealed important patterns of purchasing and trafficking for the approximately 141,380 and 141,577 guns traced in each of these respective years. Approximately 30 percent of the guns subjected to trace investigations were bought in one state and recovered in another jurisdiction. In its review of national data, this report documented the top ten source states, that is to say, the states where confiscated weapons were obtained—in each of the study years. Nine states, including Georgia, Florida, Virginia, Texas, California, Ohio, Indiana,

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North Carolina, and Pennsylvania, appeared on the top ten in each of the study years. The report also examined the level of gun control measures in states to investigate whether those states more likely to export weapons to other states had restrictive or less restrictive gun control measures. In this study, measures such as the existence of background checks at gun shows, the prevalence of required reporting to law enforcement of stolen gun, and existence of permits of the purchase of all handguns, were assessed. Using these measures, the report found that states with lax regulations of illegal guns had higher export rates, that is, they were more likely to be supplying guns confiscated during the commission of crimes in out-of-state jurisdictions. Gun trace data from 2009 in the state of Rhode Island reported that for 63 percent of the 383 weapons recovered and traced by the ATF, it was possible to identify the source state of purchase. Fifty-seven percent of these weapons had been purchased in Rhode Island; nearly 5 percent in Massachusetts; nearly 15 percent in the combined states of Virginia, Alabama, Georgia, and Florida—and the rest from other states. Six out of 10 (63%) traced weapons had been purchased three or more years before they were confiscated at arrest (Mayors against Illegal Guns 2010). Relying on trace data that identified gun dealers where weapons are purchased, a report published by ATF found that a very small percentage (1.2%) of gun dealers were responsible for over half the guns involved in crimes that were traced by law enforcement (Mayors against Illegal Guns 2010). Another study by Pierce et al. (2004) examined the dynamics of markets for illegal guns and found important relationships between the severity of gun

control measures and the use of out-of-state sources for recovered guns. Using gun trace data, researchers discovered that strict gun control measures push criminals to seek weapons through secondary markets and through illegal means, such as stealing and other crimes. Investigations like these provide authorities with the ability to identify dealers that are responsible for a sizable percentage of guns that end up in the hands of criminals. “Straw purchases” at gun shows, where a buyer purchases a weapon on behalf of someone who is prohibited from making such a purchase, also provide a source of firearms trafficked across state lines along the iron pipeline (City of New York 2009).

The Limitations of Gun Trace Data While gun trace data provide a valuable source of information on how guns move between states, the use of this data is not without limitations. The guns analyzed are by no means a random sample or a complete survey of all the guns involved in crimes confiscated by law enforcement. However, some states have implemented comprehensive tracing, subjecting all recovered guns to tracing by the ATF (Pierce et al. 2004). Trace data reflect only those firearms that have been submitted to ATF for trace by law enforcement agencies. A confiscated weapon that has been subjected to a guntracing request to the ATF could have been informally traded and trafficked, or stolen several times between the time of purchase and the time the gun was confiscated by law enforcement. Guns that are not suspected of being trafficked may not be subject to further examination by a police department. Critics have also noted that many of the guns used in crimes either are stolen or are



traded informally among family members, acquaintances, and others, and not reflected in official statistics. Also, not all confiscated guns can be traced due to poor record keeping or age of the weapon. Finally, limitations have been placed on the release of ATF gun trace data by the Tiahrt Amendment, which for several years restricted the issuance of reports by the ATF and the use of the data by investigators (Krouse 2009). Beginning with 2006 data, the ATF has issued state-by-state reports of guns subjected to AFT traces, identifying the number and type of weapons traced, the source states, the crime for which the weapon was confiscated, and the time-to-crime—that is, the time between the date the gun was purchased and the date it was confiscated (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives 2021). Other data collected by the ATF has not been released to the general public or researchers.

Addressing the Iron Pipeline If, as the research suggests, guns are imported into states with strict controls from those with weaker controls, then one solution would be for more uniform regulation, with perhaps the imposition of federal laws that would impose regulations that would mirror those of the more restrictive states. Recent calls to close the so-called gun show loophole aim to reduce the movement of guns along the iron pipeline (City of New York 2009). The likelihood that such legislation would pass Congress is low, according to most advocates of such an approach. Critics argue that such regulations would be ineffective because guns used in the commission of crimes are purchased or stolen, whether they are acquired from rogue dealers or from friends, family, and acquaintances. Research on gun

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trafficking lends itself to smarter enforcement strategies based on a sophisticated understanding of guns markets (Pierce et al. 2004), examining both demand-side and supply-side factors related to acquisition of guns and their use in crimes (Braga and Pierce 2005). Beginning in the mid-1990s, gun control advocates, frustrated by the lack of stricter gun control measures, began seeking alternative routes to address the problem of the iron pipeline and other issues related to the trade of guns. With a mixed record of court rulings, dozens of civil suits were brought against gun manufacturers and dealers, charging them with reckless marketing and sales of their merchandise. Among the most significant of these cases is Hamilton v. Beretta (Benston and Vandall 2006). These legal actions asked for court orders, rather than monetary damages, and asked as well that the dealers self-impose so-called one-gun-permonth policies, which limit handgun purchases to one per month. Virginia had passed such a law in 1993, which, some researchers suggested, effectively reduced the number of guns flowing out of Virginia to other states in the commission of crime (Weil and Knox 1996). More generally, however, the passage of the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005 has greatly reduced the number of lawsuits being filed, as manufacturers and dealers can no longer be sued for the criminal or other misuse of the weapons and ammunition they sell. Sandra L. Enos See also: Background Checks; Black Market for Firearms; Gun Control; Gun Shows; Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; One-Gunper-Month Laws; Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005

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Further Reading Benston, George J., and Frank J. Vandall. “Legal Control over the Supply of Handguns: An Analysis of the Issues, with Particular Attention to the Law and Economics of the Hamilton v. Beretta Lawsuit against Handgun Manufacturers.” Pace Law Review 26 (2006): 305–96. Braga, Anthony A., and Glenn L. Pierce. “Disrupting Illegal Firearms Markets in Boston: The Effects of Operation Ceasefire on the Supply of New Handguns to Criminals.” Criminology and Public Policy 4 (2005): 717–48. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives. “Fact Sheet – National Tracing Center.” Last modified September 2021. https://www.atf.gov/resource-center/fact -sheet/fact-sheet-national-tracing-center (accessed June 12, 2022). City of New York. “Gun Show Undercover: Report on Illegal Sales at Gun Shows.” October 2009. http://www.nyc.gov/html / o m / p d f / 20 0 9 / p r4 42 - 0 9_ r e p o r t .p d f (accessed January 27, 2022). “Editorial: Shutting Down the ‘Iron Pipeline.’” New York Times, May 8, 2003. htt p://w w w.ny times.com /2003/ 05/ 08 /opinion/shutting-down-the-iron-pipeline .html (accessed January 27, 2022). Krouse, William J. Gun Control: Statutory Disclosure Limitations on ATF Firearms Trace Data and Multiple Handgun Sales Reports. Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, 2009. Mayors Against Illegal Guns. Trace the Guns: The Link between Gun Laws and Interstate Gun Trafficking. New York: Mayors against Illegal Guns, 2010. https://search .issuelab.org/resources/14321/14321.pdf (accessed June 12, 2022). Pierce, Glenn L., Anthony A. Braga, Raymond R. Hayatt Jr., and Christopher S. Koper. “Characteristics and Dynamics of Illegal Firearms Markets: Implications for a Supply-Side Enforcement Strategy.” Justice Quarterly 21 (2004): 391–422.

Weil, Douglas S., and Rebecca Knox. “Effects of Limiting Handgun Purchases on Interstate Transfer of Firearms.” Journal of the American Medical Association 275 (1996): 1759–61.

Izaak Walton League of America (IWLA) Named for the seventeenth-century English angler who wrote The Compleat Angler, the Izaak Walton League of America is among the nation’s oldest conservation organizations and was the first to focus on effecting environmental protection through changes in public policy. The IWLA identifies hunting as a major component of wildlife conservation and consequently takes a positive and constructive stance toward firearm use and ownership. The league places heavy emphasis on ethical behavior in the field and has traditionally been in the forefront in advocating hunter ethics and gun safety education. Founded by a small group of hunterconservationists in Chicago in 1922, the IWLA was initially formed to combat water pollution and other environmental abuses that interfered with wildlife-related recreational activities. Over the ensuing years, the IWLA expanded its interests beyond water quality to include soil conservation, air pollution, forestry issues, the protection of wildlife habitat and endangered species, outdoor recreational opportunities (particularly hunting and fishing), and sustainable resources. The league has lobbied for initiatives as diverse as the 1972 Clean Water Act, the creation of the National Elk Refuge in Wyoming and Everglades National Park, the 1976 Federal Land Policy and Management Act, and the federal agricultural



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Conservation Reserve Program. Major recent initiatives have included urging a moratorium on the issuance of permits for hydraulic fracturing (“hydrofracking”) until the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) can establish guidelines for the process based on the requirements of the Safe Drinking Water Act and a resolution calling for the establishment of nationwide standards for hunter safety apparel. Major themes running through all of IWLA’s work are outdoor ethics and public environmental education. Headquartered today in Gaithersburg, Maryland, the IWLA claims a national membership of 50,000 in 270 chapters nationwide. It publishes the quarterly magazine Outdoor America. The IWLA has an official policy on firearm use. It supports the individual constitutional right to keep and bear firearms and generally opposes any legislation that would impede or restrict the lawful activities of private gun owners, firearms professionals like gunsmiths, and firearms dealers or manufacturers. It opposes legislative initiatives that fail to make meaningful distinctions between “assault weapons” and other semiautomatic firearms and would thereby limit or ban the legitimate use of semiautomatic sporting arms. The IWLA supports the Pittman-Robertson tax on firearms and ammunition but opposes any tax on firearms that diverts revenues away from conservation initiatives or research. The league is opposed to the registration of firearms. At the same time, it supports those laws already on the books that prevent firearm sales to, or possession by, convicted felons, individuals found by courts to be mentally incompetent or insane, and individuals under the age of eighteen. The IWLA also supports the legislation of severe and mandatory penalties for gun-related

crimes, and it opposes any attempts to classify crimes involving the use of firearms as public health issues. Finally, the IWLA supports legislation to protect privately operated shooting ranges from “nuisance” lawsuits or civil liability arising from natural or foreseeable risks, and it urges the creation of state commissions that would set the standards for ranges and define range liability. Nationally, approximately one hundred shooting ranges are operated by local IWLA chapters. In 1978, the IWLA established its Outdoor Ethics Program to act as a clearinghouse for information on outdoor ethics and to promote responsible behavior among hunters and other outdoor recreationists. The program has sponsored several major events, including a 1987 International Conference on Outdoor Ethics that brought together academics and wildlife professionals from a variety of disciplinary and organizational contexts. It also sponsored a 1994 survey titled “Hunter Behavior in America,” involving state fish and game agencies and hunter organizations. Both the conference proceedings and the published survey results indicate that hunter behavior, while apparently improving as a result of increasing emphasis on hunter ethics education, remains an issue of concern both for wildlife professionals and for the general public. However, in neither the conference proceedings nor the survey did firearm abuse (with the exception of hunters shooting too close to roads) appear to figure prominently in unethical hunter behavior, which had more to do with trespassing on private lands and violation of various state hunting regulations. Mary Zeiss Stange See also: Hunting; Recreational Uses of Guns; Target Shooting

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Further Reading Izaak Walton League of America. “About Us.” n.d. http://www.iwla.org/index.php?ht =d/sp/i/191/pid/191 (accessed November 17, 2019). Izaak Walton League of America. Proceedings of the International Conference on

Outdoor Ethics. Arlington, VA: Izaak Walton League of America, 1987. Scott, Cassie. “ATA Partners with Izaak Walton League of America.” Archery Trade. n.d. https://archerytrade.org/ata-partners -with-izaak-walton-league-of-america/ (accessed November 17, 2019).

J Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research. See Center for Gun Policy and Research

The Johnson administration included individuals with a wide variety of opinions on gun rights. On the one hand, Vice President Hubert Humphrey had told Guns magazine in 1960 that “certainly one of the chief guarantees of freedom under any government, no matter how popular and respected, is the right of citizens to keep and bear arms. The right of citizens to bear arms is just one guarantee against arbitrary government, one more safeguard against the tyranny which now appears remote in America

Johnson, Lyndon B. (1908–1973) As the thirty-sixth president of the United States, Lyndon Baines Johnson fought for and signed the United States’ first comprehensive national gun control legislation. Johnson took office in November 1963 following the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. From 1965 through 1968, the United States suffered through a devastating series of urban summer riots, primarily involving Blacks who destroyed and looted small businesses in their neighborhoods. In March 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, sparking a new round of riots. In June 1968, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated the night he won the California presidential primary. The growing sense of national lawlessness and disorder helped spur President Johnson to make a major speech to promote comprehensive gun registration a few weeks later. Calling for every gun and every gun owner to be placed on a government list, President Johnson argued that “in other countries which have sensible laws, the hunter and the sportsman thrive.” Johnson’s speech provided important support for antigun legislation—which had long been endorsed by the Johnson administration and was being pushed in Congress by Sen. Thomas Dodd (D-CT).

Lyndon B. Johnson, 36th president of the United States, was a fierce supporter of gun control. He advocated for, and ultimately signed into law, the nation’s first comprehensive gun control legislation, the Gun Control Act of 1968. (Library of Congress)

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but which historically has proven to be always possible” (Guns 1960, 6). On the other hand, Johnson’s attorneys general, Nicholas Katzenbach and Ramsey Clark, were strong opponents of Second Amendment rights. Indeed, Clark’s position on gun prohibition, expressed after he left the Johnson administration, showed him to be an even more determined opponent of guns than President Clinton’s attorney general, Janet Reno. After a summer of political struggle in Washington, a compromise version of the Dodd bill was passed as the Gun Control Act of 1968 and eagerly signed into law by President Johnson. As president, Johnson ranks second only to William J. Clinton in using the presidency as a platform to push for extensive gun controls. David B. Kopel See also: Clinton, William J.; Gun Control Act of 1968; Gun Registration

Further Reading Califano, Joseph A., Jr. “Gun Control Lessons from Lyndon Johnson.” Washington Post, December 16, 2012. Johnson, Lyndon B. “President Johnson’s June 24, 1968 Speech.” Congressional Record, June 4, 1968, H5371–72. “Know Your Lawmakers [Hubert Humphrey].” Guns (February 1960): 6. Longley, Kyle. LBJ’s 1968: Power, Politics, and the Presidency in America’s Year of Upheaval. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018.

Juvenile Gun Courts Juvenile gun courts are specialized parts of the criminal justice system intended to move juvenile gun-related offenses to quick adjudication, achieve high conviction rates,

and consistently impose tough sentences to increase the consequences of gun-related offenses. They also seek to move beyond penalties to education of the youth offender, and sometimes parents as well, about the impacts of gun violence, and to teach communication skills and nonviolent means to settle disputes. The first juvenile gun court was established in Jefferson County, Alabama, under the leadership of Judge Sandra Ross Storm in 1995. The idea quickly drew national attention, and the Jefferson County program was cited by the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention as a model program for reducing gun violence. The idea of establishing gun courts was included in 1997 legislation as a possible purpose for states seeking federal Juvenile Accountability Incentive Block Grants. Gun courts targeting juveniles and adults have been established in a number of states and major cities across the United States and in other countries. They have been praised for reducing average disposition time of gun cases, increasing punishments, and reducing recidivism rates. Historically, juvenile violence was a growing problem in Birmingham, Alabama, with close to three dozen juveniles killed in 1994 alone. Gun-related cases were slow to move through the overburdened court system. Defendants sometimes would leave the area before their trials, and juveniles rarely came before the court while their actions were fresh in their minds. Once before the court, juveniles charged with gun possession often were simply turned over to their parents. Knowing the likely outcomes, Birmingham police did not even pursue some gun possession cases. Judge Storm learned about an adult gun court recently established in Providence, Rhode Island, and was aware of the



development of other specialized courts such as drug courts. She led efforts to establish the new juvenile gun court as a division of the Jefferson County family court system. She was able to reorganize the existing court docket and procedures, so that no new legislation was needed to create the gun court. The Jefferson County court handles only first-time gun offenders. Youth with multiple gun charges or violent offenses are transferred to adult court or the Department of Youth Services. There are several offenses defendants can be charged with, such as menacing with a gun, using a gun in a crime, and firing a gun, but the majority of cases involve gun possession. All juveniles arrested for gun offenses must receive a gun court hearing within seventy-two hours. The vast majority of defendants plead “true,” or guilty. If they request a trial, it must begin within ten working days. Those pleading true or found guilty are immediately transferred to the High Intensive Training program, a regimented boot camp for juvenile offenders in Prattville, Alabama. The youth spend a minimum of thirty days at the camp, but their time can be extended for poor behavior. The camp program includes exercise, counseling, and academic remediation. The parents of the youth are required to attend a seven-week workshop with weekly meetings that impress upon parents the causes and severity of gun violence, and teach parenting and communication skills. Parents who do not attend the sessions can be sent to jail. When youth complete their camp time, they join their parents at the weekly sessions. After their release from the camp, youth also are placed on maximum supervision probation for one to six months. At first, they are under house arrest except for school attendance or work. They must make twice-daily

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calls to their probation officer, are subject to unannounced nighttime visits from their probation officer, and must complete drug testing and a substance abuse program. The gun court also includes an outreach component that sends staff into the schools to discuss the court and overall issues of gun violence. In theory, therefore, the overall program can reduce gun violence by removing offenders from society and retraining them, deterring future offenders who fear the punishments, or preventing gun usage and violence through education about the problem. In establishing their court, Jefferson County had certain conditions that promoted success. Rising violence had convinced many in the community that previous programs were not effective. Family court judges had existing authority for mandatory detention of juvenile offenders, and state law allowed juveniles as young as fourteen to be tried as adults for serious offenses. The family court is on a campus that includes a holding facility, drug-testing services, a probation office, and mental health therapists, so it was logistically possible to obtain multiple services quickly. It was also important that the caseloads of the staff were comparatively low, so they could introduce the intensive postrelease monitoring. Impact Inc., a local nonprofit organization, was already providing counseling for families and so was able to tailor its parent program to gun issues. The gun court was not expensive to begin with, since most of the people and facilities were in place. Costs to expand the program were partly covered by a federal grant. The University of Alabama at Birmingham’s Center for Law and Civic Education received Justice Department funding to study the gun court’s effects. In its first year, the gun court handled 323 offenses.

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This was a rise in adjudicated offenses compared to the previous year, which was attributed to the police now arresting all youths found possessing guns. Four years after its establishment, the gun court saw a 54 percent decrease in cases compared to 1995. Concurrently, violent crimes and gunrelated deaths in Birmingham also dropped significantly. There are, of course, multiple variables that could account for these drops, so researchers compared a group of youths who went through the gun court’s intensive supervision program to a group of Birmingham youth with prior offenses who did not participate in a similar program. The intensive supervision group had an overall 17 percent recidivism rate compared to 37 percent in the nonintensive group. The percentage of youths rearrested for gun offenses specifically was also lower for those in the intensive group (see Sheppard and Kelly 2002). The Jefferson County court has been the model for others, but because of differing circumstances and decisions, the policies of gun courts vary. There are, though, general consistencies. Gun courts emerge in areas of high gun availability, possession, and violence. They are usually created by judges or others in the judicial system by reworking existing procedures and caseloads, so they do not require initial legislative support or significant additional funds. They focus on speeding adjudication of gun cases and have frequently led to significant reductions in average disposition time. They seek to increase the conviction rates for gun offenses and to lengthen the terms and other punishments imposed. They include major efforts to educate the juveniles, families, and communities about gun violence and

use extensive probation monitoring and other methods to ensure that juveniles complete these education programs. Some scholars have therefore pointed to the emergence of gun courts as an effort by some in the judicial branch to bring back the rehabilitative focus of juvenile courts that the legislative branch had gradually abandoned in favor of more punitive courts. John W. Dietrich See also: Gun Courts; Youth and Guns

Further Reading Filler, Daniel M., and Austin E. Smith. “The New Rehabilitation.” Iowa Law Review 91 (2006): 951–91. Huddleston, C. West, III, Douglas B. Marlowe, and Rachel Casebolt. Painting the Current Picture: A National Report Card on Drug Courts and Other Problem-Solving Court Programs in the United States. Washington, DC: National Drug Court Institute, 2008. Noble, Robin. “Gun Courts.” In Swift & Certain Gun Violence Prosecution Program. Alexandria, VA: National District Attorneys Association, American Prosecutors Research Institute, 2008. Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. Promising Strategies to Reduce Gun Violence. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, 1999. http://www .ojjdp.gov/pubs/gun_violence/173950.pdf (accessed January 27, 2022). Sheppard, David, and Patricia Kelly. “Juvenile Gun Courts: Promoting Accountability and Providing Treatment.” Juvenile Accountability Incentive Block Grants Bulletin, 2002. http://www.ncjrs.gov/html/ojjdp/jaibg _2002_5_1/contents.html (accessed January 27, 2022).

K Kasky, Cameron. See March for Our Lives Movement

civil rights law do not need to pursue administrative remedies first. (Kates’s name does not appear on the brief in the case because he had been practicing law for only six months, and the Supreme Court Bar requires five years of practice before an attorney is admitted.) Kates has litigated scores of firearm law cases. His most notable victory was in Doe v. San Francisco (136 Cal. App. 3d 507 [1982]), in which the California Supreme Court ruled that San Francisco’s handgun ban was contrary to a state law restricting local firearm ordinances. Kates served as a professor at St. Louis University Law School from 1976 to 1979, where he taught classes on federal courts, criminal law, criminal procedure, constitutional law, and other subjects. Later, Kates has served as an adjunct professor at Stanford Law School, where he cotaught a class on firearm law and policy. He has also served as a fellow at the Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy, a San Francisco think tank. Opinion editorials by Kates have appeared in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Christian Science Monitor, and many other newspapers. He has edited two books: Restricting Handguns: The Liberal Skeptics Speak Out (1979), and Firearms and Violence: Issues of Public Policy (1984). Along with Gary Kleck, he coauthored The Great American Gun Debate: Essays on Firearms and Violence (1997). But Kates’s most significant writings are his law review articles. In 1983, the Michigan Law Review published his “Handgun

Kates, Don B., Jr.(1941–2016) Don Kates’s scholarship and litigation have played important parts in the modern renaissance of the Second Amendment. More importantly, Kates has played a major role in bringing together scholars and opinion leaders. Along with Stephen Halbrook, Kates deserves the primary credit for making Second Amendment scholarship an important topic of scholarly interest. After growing up in the San Francisco Bay Area, Kates matriculated at Reed College. He then attended Yale Law School and served as a law clerk for the famous radical attorney William Kunstler. Kates spent one summer during law school in the South as a civil rights worker. Like many other civil rights workers, he carried a firearm for personal protection against the Ku Klux Klan and other violent white supremacists whose attempts to murder civil rights workers were tacitly supported by local sheriffs. After graduating from Yale, Kates went to work for California Rural Legal Assistance and the San Mateo Legal Aid Society. In 1969, he was awarded the Reginald Heber Smith Medal by the National Legal Aid and Defender Association as poverty lawyer of the year. The award was based partly on his work in the case of Damico v. California (389 U.S. 416 [1967]), in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that persons wishing to sue under Section 1983 of the federal 487

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Prohibition and the Original Meaning of the Second Amendment,” which was the first in-depth treatment of the Second Amendment to appear in a major law review. When Attorney General John Ashcroft announced in May 2001 that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual the right to arms, the Kates article was among those he cited. The article was a well-written synthesis of work by other scholars, but its importance derived mainly from the prestige of the Michigan Law Review. Kates’s greatest theoretical contribution to Second Amendment scholarship was “The Second Amendment and the Ideology of Self-Protection,” which appeared in Constitutional Commentary in 1992. Drawing on numerous sources from the founding era, Kates provided the first indepth scholarly exposition of the Second Amendment as a guarantee of the right of personal protection against criminals. Citing American founders and other sources, Kates argued that the framers of the Second Amendment saw no distinction between resistance to a lone criminal and resistance to a large army controlled by a criminal government. The difference was only quantitative (more criminals to resist) rather than qualitative; good people had a right to use arms against criminal violence, Kates argued, no matter whether the perpetrator was a lone criminal or a despot with many accomplices. Hence, the Second Amendment (originally described mainly as a right to resist tyranny) encompassed a right to resist more mundane criminals. Kates’s other notable contribution to Second Amendment theory is “The Second Amendment and States’ Rights: A Thought Experiment,” coauthored with Glenn H. Reynolds in the William and Mary Law Review. Kates and Reynolds explored the “states’ rights” theory of the Second Amendment (that the amendment is only a

guarantee of a state government’s power to maintain a state militia), and argued that the theory is internally incoherent and leads to dangerous policy results. Kates has also written extensively on criminological issues related to firearms. By far the most important of his policy articles is “Guns and Public Health: Epidemic of Violence or Pandemic of Propaganda?” which appeared in a symposium issue of the Tennessee Law Review in 1994. Along with several coauthors from medical and related disciplines, Kates surveyed the “public health” scientific literature on guns and delivered a scathing critique accusing the public health authors of fraud, extreme carelessness, willful blindness, and a host of other errors. Defenders of the public health literature have tended to acknowledge the accuracy of Kates’s claims about the articles he critiques, but have argued that other articles are not so flawed. Media treatment of the gun issue is another of Kates’s recurring topics. In The Great American Gun Debate: Essays on Firearms and Violence (1997), he argues that media bias against gun owners poisons the political debate and frightens many gun owners into a “no compromise” mentality. Kates’s greatest significance, however, has been in his tireless work as a behindthe-scenes advocate of the Second Amendment. Working with Academics for the Second Amendment, the National Rifle Association, and the Second Amendment Foundation, Kates has presented many weekend-long courses on an introduction to firearms law and policy. These courses are invitation-only events for scholars, journalists, or other writers interested in learning more about the Second Amendment. The seminars have been an important cause of the increased scholarly attention paid to firearms issues.



In addition, scores of academics and other writers have also been brought into the gun issue (or brought along on it) by Kates and his incessant networking. From the late 1970s through the mid-1990s, there were very few scholars who looked favorably on the right to arms who were not connected in some way to the Kates network. While vigorously opposed to the prohibition of any type of firearms, Kates differed from many so-called Standard Model scholars (those who believe the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to arms for all legitimate purposes) in that he found no constitutional impediment to many regulatory forms of gun control. Stephen Halbrook has denounced Kates’s defense of certain gun controls as “Orwellian newspeak.” Because Kates (in sharp contrast to John Lott) tended to avoid electronic media (including the internet), he had not created the kind of high profile that attracts personal attacks from gun control groups. Contributing to Kates’s relatively low public profile was his utter lack of interest in working with grassroots gun rights activists and his noninvolvement in politics. Kates died on November 1, 2016, after a long struggle with health issues. David B. Kopel See also: Halbrook, Stephen P.; Kleck, Gary

Further Reading Hardy, David. “Don Kates, Rest in Peace.” Of Arms & the Law. 2016. https://armsandthe law.com/archives/2016/11/don_kates_rest _.php (accessed November 17, 2019). Kates, Don B., Jr. “Handgun Prohibition and the Original Meaning of the Second Amendment.” Michigan Law Review 82 (1983): 204–73. Kates, Don B., Jr. “The Second Amendment and the Ideology of Self-Protection.” Constitutional Commentary 9 (1992): 87–104.

Kellermann, Arthur L. | 489 Kates, Don B., Jr., and Gary Kleck. The Great American Gun Debate: Essays on Firearms and Violence. San Francisco: Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy, 1997. Kates, Don B., Jr., and Glenn H. Reynolds. “The Second Amendment and States’ Rights: A Thought Experiment.” William and Mary Law Review 36 (1995): 1737–68. Kates, Don B., Jr., Henry E. Schaffer, John K. Lattimer, George B. Murray, and Edwin H. Cassem. “Guns and Public Health: Epidemic of Violence or Pandemic of Propaganda?” Tennessee Law Review 62 (1994): 513–96.

Kellermann, Arthur L.(1955–) Arthur L. Kellermann is best known for his research on the epidemiology of firearmrelated injuries and deaths and is one of the most controversial scholars in this area. Kellermann’s research is focused on whether the benefits of keeping a firearm in the home are worth the risks. Proponents of strong firearms restrictions easily accepted the value of his findings that guns kept for self-defense purposes are dangerous and ineffective, while those who favor free access to firearms were able to point out many flaws with his scientific procedures which led to erroneous conclusions. Kellermann received his MD degree from the Emory University School of Medicine in 1980 and his MPH degree from the University of Washington in 1985. At Emory University, he founded and chaired the Department of Emergency Medicine. He also founded the Center for Injury Control at Emory’s Rollins School of Public Health, which he directed until 2006. He was appointed to the Rand Corporation’s Paul O’Neil Alcoa Professorship in Policy Analysis in January of 2010. By that November he became head of Rand’s new health

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research division and guided such projects as controlling the cost of medical services while promoting quality care. He left Rand Corporation in 2013 to become Dean of the F. Edward Hebert School of Medicine. Kellermann’s first study that gained widespread attention was published in 1986 in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM). Analyzing firearm-related deaths in the home in King County (Seattle), Washington, Kellermann and Donald T. Reay found forty-three “suicides, criminal homicides, or accidental gunshot deaths involving a gun kept in the home for every case of homicide for self-protection” (Kellermann and Reay 1986, 1560). They concluded that “the advisability of keeping firearms in the home for protection must be questioned” (Kellermann and Reay 1986, 1557). Their finding that suicides, criminal homicides, and accidental gunshot deaths were forty-three times more likely to occur than was a homicide for self-protection is a widely quoted factoid in the American gun control debate. It has been criticized for many reasons, including that it counts only deaths as the measure of the protective benefits of a firearm and ignores nonlethal defensive uses, and that it lumps together high-risk homes (e.g., homes with alcoholics or people with violent felony convictions) with ordinary homes. In another study coauthored by Kellermann, published in the July 1992 issue of the Journal of Trauma, the authors concluded: “When women kill, their victim is five times more likely to be their spouse, an intimate acquaintance, or a member of the family. . . . In light of these data, the wisdom of promoting firearms to women for self-protection should be seriously questioned” (Kellermann and Mercy 1992, 5). Dr. Edgar A. Suter retorted, “Most women kill in defense of themselves and their

children. In these common circumstances, lawful self-defense by women against their attackers [even self-defense against a violent ex-husband] is not ‘murder’ in any jurisdiction” (Suter 1994, 140). In 1993, Kellermann again sought to demonstrate that a gun in the home presents a greater risk to its owner than to a criminal, and specifically to address the issue of “whether keeping a firearm in the home confers protection against crime or, instead, increases the risk of violent crime in the home.” In the October 7 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, Kellermann and his coauthors concluded that “rather than confer protection, guns kept in the home are associated with an increase in the risk of homicide” (Kellermann et al. 1993, 1091). The authors make the claim that the risk for homicide by a family member or acquaintance was 2.7 times higher if a gun was kept in the home than if one was not. Among the criticisms leveled at this study by Henry Schaffer and others were its failure to account adequately for false denials of gun ownership (in other words, telling a pollster that one does not own a gun when, in fact, one does) by some of the control population, and its failure to connect the victim’s gun with any role in most of the homicides (Schaffer 1993). As is common in scientific disputes (Young 2016), some scholars requested that Kellermann make his data sets available for study. In response, “Kellermann has slowly made some, but far from all, of the requested data available” (Carter 2012). Much of Kellermann’s research was funded by taxpayer funds through the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which did not require its researchers to reveal their data as a condition for funding. Kellermann’s firearm research has received extensive and highly favorable



media attention. His research was of great value to gun control advocates—as a result of his knack for distilling the results of a study into an easily remembered numerical factoid that was used by media to promote societal fear of firearms and their owners. More than any other CDC grant recipient, Kellermann’s work sparked congressional interest in the CDC’s gun control agenda. After U.S. House of Representatives hearings in 1996, where Kellermann’s work received both scathing attacks and passionate defenses, Congress prohibited the CDC from spending any funds to “advocate or promote gun control.” Upon rejection of his subsequent application for additional grant money from the CDC, Kellermann stated that “this will be the first time in my career that I won’t be funded by the CDC. I will look elsewhere” (Carter 2012). He soon began to receive research support from the National Institute of Justice (NIJ), which is part of the U.S. Department of Justice. At the NIJ, Kellermann did not abandon efforts at firearm prohibition, but he did narrow his focus to the group that was primarily committing firearm-related violence, while at the same time expanding the agenda to include a multipronged strategy that included teenage discussion groups. In September of 2013, he became Professor and Dean of the F. Edward Hebert School of Medicine of the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences. Since receiving this appointment, he has not addressed these controversies. In addition to his research papers on firearms policy, he has published over 250 journal articles and lay papers, books and articles on various aspects of preventive and emergency medicine. Topics include rapid intervention after trauma, emergency cardiac care, traumatic brain injury treatment, health care insurance and the role of emergency

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departments in the provision of health care to the poor. He edited Out of the Crucible: How the U.S. Military Transformed Combat Casualty Care in Iraq and Afghanistan, published in 2017. Among his many awards, he received the John G. Wiegenstein Leadership award in 2007 from the American College of Emergency Physicians. He received the Hal Jayne Academic Excellence Award from the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine and was also awarded the Excellence in Science Award from the Injury Control and Emergency Health Services section of the American Public Health Association. Paul Gallant and Joanne Eisen See also: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC); Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Guns in the Home; National Institute of Justice (NIJ)

Further Reading Brodale, Sean. “Medical Establishment’s War on Guns: From Kellermann On.” Presentation at thirty-first annual Gun Rights Policy Conference of the Second Amendment Foundation, September 2016. Carter, Gregg Lee. “Kellermann, Arthur L. (1955–).” In Guns in American Society: An Encyclopedia of History, Politics, Culture and the Law, vol. 3, 470. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2012. Faria, Miguel, Jr. “Public Health and Gun Control—A Review.” Medical Sentinel 6 (2001): 11–18. Kates, Don B., Henry E. Schaffer, John K. Lattimer, George B. Murray, and Edwin H. Cassem. “Guns and Public Health: Epidemic of Violence or Pandemic of Propaganda?” Tennessee Law Review 62 (1994): 513–96. Kellermann, Arthur L., and Eric Elster, eds. “Out of the Crucible: How the U.S. Military Transformed Combat Casualty Health

492 | Kennesaw, Georgia Care in Iraq and Afghanistan.” The Borden Institute, U.S. Army Medical Department, 2017. Kellermann, Arthur L., and Donald T. Reay. “Protection or Peril? An Analysis of Firearms-Related Deaths in the Home.” New England Journal of Medicine 314 (1986): 1557–60. Kellermann, Arthur L., and James A. Mercy. “Men, Women, and Murder: GenderSpecific Differences in Rates of Fatal Violence and Victimization.” Journal of Trauma 33 (1992): 1–5. Kellermann, Arthur L., Frederick P. Rivara, Norman B. Rushforth, Joyce G. Banton, Donald T. Reay, Jerry T. Francisco, Ana B. Locci, Janice Prodzinski, Bela B. Hackman, and Grant Somes. “Gun Ownership as a Risk Factor for Homicide in the Home.” New England Journal of Medicine 329 (1993): 1084–91. Kellermann, Arthur L., Frederick P. Rivara, Grant Somes, Donald T. Reay, Jerry Francisco, Joyce Gillentine Banton, Janice Prodzinski, Corinne Fligner, and Bela B. Hackman. “Suicide in the Home in Relationship to Gun Ownership.” New England Journal of Medicine 327 (1992): 467–72. Schaffer, Henry E. “Serious Flaws in Kellermann, et al.” NEJM, 1993. http//www.firar msandliberty.com/Kellerman-schaffer.html (accessed March 14, 2020) Suter, Edgar A. “Guns in the Medical Literature—A Failure of Peer Review.” Journal of the Medical Association of Georgia 83 (1994): 133–48. U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, National Institute of Justice. “Reducing Gun Violence: Community Problem Solving in Atlanta.” http://www .ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/209800.pdf (accessed June 12, 2011). U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on Appropriations, Subcommittee on the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies. Departments of Labor, Health and

Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies’ Appropriations for 1997. Part 7, “Testimony of Members of Congress and Other Interested Individuals and Organizations.” Washington, DC: Government Publishing Office, 1996. Waters, David. “The Memphis Doctor, the Arkansas Legislator, and the 20 Year Ban on Gun Violence Research.” Memphis Commercial Appeal, February 22, 2018. Young, Robert B. “Critiquing the ‘Research’ Criticizing Guns.” Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership, February 4, 2016.

Kelley v. RG Industries, Inc. See Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers Kennesaw, Georgia In 1982, government officials in the small town of Kennesaw, Georgia, passed a local ordinance requiring that all heads of households own a firearm and ammunition. This ordinance was passed in response to ordinances in other small towns banning gun ownership. “According to a council member, the ordinance was conceived in reaction to a law in Morton Grove, Illinois, which banned the civilian possession of guns” (McDowall, Wiersema, and Loftin 1989, 48). Although the ordinance clearly was intended to demonstrate to the world the town’s support for gun ownership, it was not intended to coerce individuals who did not want to own guns into doing so. There was no provision in the ordinance for enforcement, and the provision itself included several clauses “excusing” those who did not want to own a gun for moral or religious reasons, or because they were a convicted felon or mentally or physically disabled. There were no penalties imposed on those excused



from the mandate (McDowall, Wiersema, and Loftin 1989). The apparent intention of the ordinance was twofold: (1) to promote publicity for the support of gun ownership rights; and (2) to promote gun ownership itself. Since the ordinance was passed in 1982, those who support unregulated gun ownership in the United States have pointed to Kennesaw’s subsequent decline in crime rates as proof that gun ownership can in fact deter crime. It is indisputably true that Kennesaw’s already low crime rate became somewhat lower following enactment of this ordinance. “According to statistics cited by city officials, burglaries dropped by 53 percent from 1981 to 1982; by 1985, burglary had declined to only 20 percent of its 1981 value” (McDowall, Wiersema, and Loftin 1989, 48). However, the interpretation of this decline is open to question. Other analyses reported that the mandatory gun law did not deter burglaries (McDowall, Wiersema, and Loftin 1989). While some point directly to the notion that criminals avoid Kennesaw due to fear of universal gun ownership, others suggest that the publicity generated by the ordinance itself had the effect of deterring criminals. A more systematic analysis of the crime rates in Kennesaw (and other towns promoting gun ownership) was published in the journal Criminology in 1991 by McDowall, Lizotte, and Wiersema. They found that the crime reduction noted in Kennesaw was more likely part of a normal crime fluctuation than a real response to the ordinance. Crime rate reductions were also found in towns banning guns. In addition, other experts have noted that crime was very low in Kennesaw before the ordinance and that since the entire United States underwent a reduction in crime rates in the mid-1990s, it is at any rate difficult to gauge

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the long-term consequences of enforced gun ownership. Elizabeth K. Englander and Patricia Snell See also: Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime; More Guns, Less Crime Thesis

Further Reading McDowall, David, Alan J. Lizotte, and Brian Wiersema. “General Deterrence through Civilian Gun Ownership: An Evaluation of the Quasi-Experimental Evidence.” Criminology 29 (1991): 541–59. McDowall, David, Brian Wiersema, and Colin Loftin. “Did Mandatory Firearm Ownership in Kennesaw Really Prevent Burglaries?” Sociology and Social Research 74 (1989): 48–51.

Kentucky Long Rifle. See Long Rifle (Pennsylvania/Kentucky) Killeen, Texas, Shooting On October 16, 1991, thirty-five-year-old George Hennard Jr. drove his pickup truck through the plate glass window of a Luby’s Cafeteria in Killeen, Texas. Using a pair of handguns, the perpetrator murdered twentythree people and then killed himself. Among the victims were Al and Ursula Gratia, the parents of chiropractor Suzanna Gratia, whose handgun had been left in her car in the parking lot, in conformance with Texas law prohibiting the carrying of concealed handguns. Dr. Gratia became a crusader for reform of handgun-carry laws, both in Texas and nationally. It was at about 12:40 p.m. on a Wednesday afternoon that the perpetrator rammed his truck into the cafeteria. Killeen, Texas, is located in Bell County in east Texas, southwest of Waco. The Luby’s Cafeteria,

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located near U.S. Route 190, was part of a ten-state chain of 175 restaurants. Four months earlier, the perpetrator had been arrested at the Lake Mead National Recreation Area on charges of drunk driving and carrying loaded weapons. Pursuant to a plea bargain, he pled guilty and paid a fine of $170. Unemployed, he lived in Belton, Texas, east of Killeen. When the perpetrator’s truck broke through the plate glass, many diners were sprayed with glass fragments, and one man was caught underneath the truck. He exited the truck, shouting, “This is for what the women of Bell County did to me!” It was later revealed that he considered his mother a “viper” who had ruined his childhood. He also had a history of stalking and making threats against women. Most, but not all, of his victims were women. The man under the truck pulled himself out and was immediately shot in the head. The perpetrator was armed with a Glock 17 and a Ruger P-89 pistol. Both pistols are self-loading, use detachable magazines, and are generally considered to be excellent handguns, similar to the Colt .45 (but less powerful). The Glock is carried by many police officers, while the Ruger is a favorite of target shooters. Neither firearm is considered an assault weapon. The Ruger’s magazine holds fifteen rounds, whereas the Glock uses seventeen-round magazines. The perpetrator had a large supply of reserve magazines, and as one magazine was emptied, he quickly popped in a replacement. There were 162 people in the restaurant, but (with one exception detailed below) no one offered any resistance. The last victim to die was Kitty Davis, who died from chest wounds three days later. Over the course of seventeen minutes, the perpetrator fired sixty-one rounds from the

Ruger and forty-one from the Glock—killing twenty-three people and wounding twentyone others. In addition to Al and Ursula, the other fatalities were Patricia Carney, Jimmie Caruthers, Kreimhild Davis, Steven Dody, Debra Gray, Michael Griffith, Venice Henehan, Clodine Humphrey, Sylvia King, Zonna Lynn, Connie Peterson, Ruth Pujol, Su-Zann Rashott, John Romero Jr., Thomas Simmons, Glen Spivey, Nancy Stansbury, Olgica Taylor, James Welsh, Lula Welsh, and Iva Williams. A police training class was taking place at a hotel near the cafeteria, and when police arrived on the scene, a marksman wounded the perpetrator, who fought an intense gun battle with the police and eventually killed himself in a restroom. As medical personnel and ambulances arrived, a refrigerated truck was brought to the scene. It served as a temporary morgue so that the corpses would not begin to rot in the hot Texas sun. A search of the perpetrator’s home during the after-action investigation turned up a revealing videotape in his VCR: a documentary about the 1984 mass murder at a McDonald’s in San Ysidro, California.

Responses to the Shooting The Killeen Luby’s reopened in 1992, after spending $350,000 on repairs and security features. The cafeteria closed in 2000 due to declining customer visits. In addition, a 1994 study in the American Journal of Psychiatry reported that nearly a third of the survivors appeared to suffer from posttraumatic stress disorder (North et al. 1997). Almost all of the survivors had at least some symptoms. The Killeen murders ended up aiding the passage of both assault weapon prohibition and “shall-issue” concealed handgun laws. The U.S. House of Representatives had



been scheduled to vote on an assault weapon ban the next day. Sponsored by Reps. Charles Schumer (D-NY) and Richard Gephardt (D-MO), the bill would have given the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms the administrative authority to outlaw any self-loading rifle or pistol that accepts a detachable magazine. Magazines of over seven rounds would also have been outlawed. The shooting turned out to have little impact on the vote, however, as the bill was defeated 247–177. The one vote that did switch to the pro-ban side was that of Democrat Chet Edwards, whose district included Killeen. In 1992, when the Democratic Party nominated Bill Clinton for president, its platform called for various gun controls, including a ban on large magazines; this portion of the platform specifically mentioned Killeen. In May 1994, a tremendous lobbying effort by President Clinton pushed a milder assault weapon bill to passage by a one-vote margin. Although Representative Edwards’s vote appeared essential, House Speaker Tom Foley (D-WA) would have voted in favor of the ban had the vote been tied, and two other Democratic representatives (Jolene Unsoeld of Washington and Blanche Lambert Lincoln of Arkansas) would have switched their votes and supported the ban if their votes had been needed. Enacted into law in September 1994 as part of a comprehensive crime bill, the law also outlawed new production of magazines holding more than ten rounds of ammunition (18 U.S.C. § 921(v) and (w)). The ban sunset by its own terms in September 2004. Shortly after the Killeen shooting, Killeen’s police chief suggested that citizens ought to be able to carry guns for protection. Earlier that year in Texas, the senate

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had passed a bill to allow trained, licensed adults to obtain permits to carry concealed handguns for lawful protection. There were enough votes to pass the bill on the floor of the Texas House. The House Rules Committee, acting in secret, killed the bill by keeping it from coming to the House floor for a vote. Even if the bill had passed the legislature, however, Governor Ann Richards would have vetoed it, as she did when a handguncarry bill passed the next legislature. That veto played a major role in Richards’s 1994 election defeat by Republican George W. Bush. In 1995, Bush signed a concealed carry bill nearly identical to the one vetoed by Richards. The Killeen shooting played a major role in influencing the political climate, both nationally and in Texas, in favor of concealed carry. Two months after Killeen, a pair of criminals with stolen pistols herded twenty customers and employees into the walk-in refrigerator of a Shoney’s restaurant in Anniston, Alabama. Hiding under a table in the restaurant was Thomas Glenn Terry, armed with the .45 semiautomatic pistol he carried legally under Alabama law. One of the robbers discovered Terry, but Terry killed him with five shots to the chest. The second robber, who had been holding the manager hostage, shot at Terry and grazed him. Terry returned fire and mortally wounded the robber. Advocates argued that in Alabama, where concealed carry is lawful, only the criminals died, but in Texas, where concealed carry was prohibited, twenty-three innocents died. But much more influential than the Anniston incident was the personal testimony of Suzanna Gratia. Along with her parents, Gratia, it will be recalled, was in the Luby’s Cafeteria when the perpetrator

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opened fire, and her Smith & Wesson .38 Special was in her car in the parking lot, because Dr. Gratia had been afraid that if she were caught carrying a gun, she could lose her chiropractor’s license. She later testified to the Missouri legislature that after the perpetrator drove in and opened fire: My father and I immediately put the table up in front of us and we all got down behind it. Your first opinion is, is this guy robbing this place? What’s the deal? And then you’re realizing that all he’s doing is simply shooting people. As he was working his way toward us, I reached for my purse, thinking, “Hah! I’ve got this son of a gun.” Now, understand, I know what a lot of people think. . . . They think, “Oh, my God, then you would have had a gunfight and then more people would have been killed.” Unhunh, no, I was down on the floor; this guy is standing up; everybody else is down on the floor. I had a perfect shot at him. It would have been clear. I had a place to prop my hand. The guy was not even aware of what we were doing. I’m not saying that I could have saved anybody in there, but I would have had a chance. My gun wasn’t even in my purse . . . it was a hundred feet away in my car! My father was saying “I gotta do something! I gotta do something! This guy’s going to kill everyone in here!” So I wasn’t able to hold him down and when my father thought he had a chance, he went at the guy! The guy turned, shot him in the chest and my dad went down. It made the guy change directions and he went off to my left. Shortly after that somebody broke out a window in back and I saw a chance to get out. I grabbed my mother and tried to get her up, hoped she was following me, and I grew wings

on my feet. As it turned out, my mother crawled over to my father and stayed with him; and this—I’m trying to think of a civil word to use—this person eventually came around and shot her also. Police told Dr. Gratia that they had seen her mother cradling her father’s head in her lap. She looked up at the perpetrator, then bowed her head just before he shot her in the head. Over the next decade, Dr. Gratia testified to legislatures all over the United States, as the number of states with concealedhandgun-permit laws grew. Among those states was Texas. Gratia later married and became Suzanna Gratia Hupp. She is the mother of two boys and served as the Republican state representative in Texas for the district that includes Killeen from 1997 through 2007. In the Texas legislature, she was a strong proponent of Second Amendment rights. She applauds the Texas concealed carry licensing law but favors replacing it with a law patterned after Vermont’s law, under which adults who do not have criminal records can carry firearms without needing to obtain a permit. David B. Kopel See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Concealed Weapons Laws; Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Mass Murder (Shootings)

Further Reading Hupp, Suzanna Gratia. From Luby’s to the Legislature: One Woman’s Fight against Gun Control. San Antonio, TX: Privateer Publications, 2009. Karpf, Jason, and Elinor Karpf. Anatomy of a Massacre. Waco, TX: WRS Publishing, 1994. Kuempel, George. “Despite Tragedy, Many Sad to See Killeen Luby’s Go.” Dallas Morning News, September 8, 2000.

Morello, Carol. “A Daughter’s Regret: After Massacre, a Vow to Shoot Back.” Washington Post, May 13, 2000, A1. North, Carol S., Elizabeth M. Smith, and Edward L. Spitznagel. “One-Year FollowUp of Survivors of a Mass Shooting.” American Journal of Psychiatry 154 (1997): 1696–702.

Kiyani, Omer. See Intelligent Gun Safety Systems Kleck, Gary(1951–) Gary Kleck is the David J. Bordua Emeritus Professor of Criminology at Florida State University. His extensive research on violence, crime control, and the impact of firearms and gun control on violence determined the figure of 2.5 million defensive gun uses (DGUs) in the United States per year. His research also contributed to his move from a self-described believer in the contribution of firearms to violence in the United States to one who argues that the best possible evidence available indicates that guns do not measurably contribute to increased rates of homicide, suicide, robbery, assault, rape, or burglary. Kleck asserts that although gun ownership is related to the rates of gun violence, the total rates of violence in the United States are not affected by gun availability. Before 1995, about a dozen social science polls had attempted to estimate the frequency of armed self-defense in the United States. The results suggested that there were hundreds of thousands of instances of armed self-defense. The U.S. government’s National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), which does not directly ask about armed selfdefense but does allow people to volunteer that they used a firearm for self-defense

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against a crime, found about 100,000 instances annually. Kleck’s 1995 survey was designed to avoid flaws in the methodologies of previous surveys. For example, when a respondent indicated that he had used a firearm for self-defense, Kleck’s pollsters were required to ask a detailed series of follow-up questions designed to weed out persons who might be inventing an incident. Kleck and Gertz’s polling indicated that there were probably 2.5 million or more defensive uses of firearms every year in the United States. The vast majority of uses involved merely brandishing a gun, or referring to a gun, with no shots fired. Kleck’s position, which is so diametrically opposed to the beliefs that are the foundation for anti-gun organizations such as the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, and the Violence Policy Center, has attracted much criticism. Kleck’s research methodology has been attacked by a number of scholars, most notably Cook and Ludwig (1997, 2000). Hemenway (1997) has also criticized the Kleck DGU data on a variety of grounds, including arguments that the frequency of real-world events that would be correlated with DGUs (e.g., hospital admissions of criminals with gunshot wounds) is not as great as would be implied by Kleck’s DGU figures. Kleck responds that DGU skeptics are merely speculating and that they have failed to produce actual data to refute his figures. In support of Kleck, the prominent criminologist and gun control advocate Marvin Wolfgang (1995, 188), in a discussion of the research on which Kleck bases his estimates, has admitted, “I do not like their conclusions that having a gun can be useful, but I cannot fault their methodology.” More recently, Kleck has investigated firearms trafficking. He found that high-volume

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firearms traffickers are of little relevance to the criminal gun supply. Rather, the main source of criminal guns is theft from lawful gun owners. Another Kleck article found that higher levels of gun ownership at the city level resulted in lower homicide rates. Kleck suggested that the reason was that the defensive and deterrent effects of lawful gun ownership outweighed the harmful effect of gun ownership by criminals. This finding has not been confirmed at the U.S. state and cross-national levels of analysis, where, indeed, gun ownership and homicide are strongly positively correlated, higher gun prevalence goes with higher rates of homicide (Carter 2017, 4–9, 20–22). Among other subjects of Kleck’s twentyfirst-century research are public opinion and gun control, effects of victim resistance on crime outcomes, school and mass shootings, shootings by police, the impact of gun control on violent crime reduction, and defensive gun use. Kleck is the author of many scholarly articles and books on the gun control debate, including Point Blank: Guns and Violence in America (1991), which won the 1993 Michael J. Hindelang Award from the American Society of Criminology as the year’s most outstanding contribution to criminology. Carol Oyster, David B. Kopel, and Gregg Lee Carter See also: Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime; Cook, Philip J.; Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Hemenway, David A.; Lott, John R., Jr.; More Guns, Less Crime Thesis; National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS)

Further Reading Carter, Gregg Lee. Gun Control in the United States. 2nd ed. Santa Barbara, CA: ABCCLIO, 2017.

Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. “Guns in America: National Survey on Private Ownership and Use of Firearms.” National Institute of Justice Research in Brief, report no. NCJ165476. Washington, DC: National Institute of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice, May 1997. http://www.nij.gov/pubs-sum/16 5476.htm (accessed June 2, 2011). Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. Gun Violence: The Real Costs. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Florida State University. “Faculty: Gary Kleck.” https://criminology.fsu.edu/faculty -and-staff/gary-kleck (accessed September 22, 2021). Hemenway, David. “Survey Research and Self-Defense Gun Use: An Explanation of Extreme Overestimates.” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 87 (1997): 1430–35. Kates, Don B., Jr., and Gary Kleck, eds. Armed: New Perspectives on Gun Control. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2001. Kates, Don B., Jr., and Gary Kleck. eds. The Great American Gun Debate: Essays on Firearms and Violence. San Francisco: Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy, 1997. Kleck, Gary. “Large-Capacity Magazines and the Casualty Counts in Mass Shootings: The Plausibility of Linkages.” Justice Research and Policy 17 (2016): 28–47. Kleck, Gary. Point Blank: Guns and Violence in America. Hawthorne: NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1991. Kleck, Gary. Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1997. Kleck, Gary. “What Do CDC’s Surveys Say about the Prevalence of Defensive Gun Use?” American Journal of Criminal Justice 46 (2021): 401–21. Kleck, Gary, and Marc Gertz. “Armed Resistance to Crime: The Prevalence and Nature of Self-Defense with a Gun.” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 56 (1995): 150–87.

Kleck, Gary, and Tomislav Kovandzic. “CityLevel Characteristics and Individual Handgun Ownership: Effects of Collective Security and Homicide.” Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice 25 (2009): 45–66. Kleck, Gary, and Jongyeon Tark. “Resisting Crime: The Effects of Victim Action on the Outcomes of Crimes.” Criminology 42 (2004): 861–909. Kleck, Gary, and Shun-Yung Wang. “The Myth of Big-Time Gun Trafficking.” UCLA Law Review 56 (2009): 1233–94. http:// uclalawreview.org/?p=100 (accessed June 2, 2011). Wolfgang, Marvin. “A Tribute to a View I Have Opposed.” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 86 (1995): 188–93.

Kloepfer, Kai. See Intelligent Gun Safety Systems Knox, Neal(1935–2005) Neal Knox was one of the most vocal U.S. advocates of the individualist interpretation of the Second Amendment (that is, that the amendment guarantees the right of individuals to keep and bear arms). Knox associated with many of the important players in the debate over gun rights in the United States. He took part in founding Gun Week, Handloader, and Rifle magazines and was a frequent contributor to newspapers and gun magazines. Knox worked closely with the National Rifle Association (NRA). He was executive director of its Institute for Legislative Action (ILA) from 1977 to 1982. Under Knox’s leadership, and following the directions of then NRA president Harlon B. Carter, the ILA effectively established a strong political lobbying presence on Capitol Hill. During the 1980s, Knox and Carter assisted in the crafting of the McClure-Volkmer Act (the

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Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986), which weakened the 1968 Gun Control Act. Despite this success, the NRA chose to replace Knox with the more flexible Warren J. Cassidy as a result of Knox’s unwillingness to negotiate and compromise. Knox’s NRA affiliations have been highly controversial throughout the years. Among the most important was his participation in the “Revolt at Cincinnati” at the NRA national meeting in 1977. The “revolt” was a watershed event in the NRA’s history, taking it from an organization that was willing to compromise on selected gun control measures to one that would fight any and all such measures at local, state, and national levels of government. Knox served on the NRA’s Board of Directors on several occasions. After being ousted in the mid-1980s, Knox staged a comeback in 1991. Eventually he rose to the position of first vice president, only to face another ousting when Charlton Heston was elected to that NRA position on a “Stop Knox” ticket in 1997. Knox was a vocal critic of the NRA not only in his own newsletters but also in columns and articles written for Guns & Ammo and other gun magazines. Knox wrote his own column, “Knox’s Notebook,” for American Rifleman magazine from 1994 to 1997. However, his column in American Rifleman refrained from any critique or self-promotion. Knox generally believed the NRA was stepping away from the important issues and not being confrontational enough. Knox’s attitude and manner were often criticized as confrontational and extreme. To paraphrase him, the Second Amendment is about the fundamental human right to defend self, family, home, and country. Knox believed the Second Amendment does not permit any legislation that limits the availability and ownership of firearms.

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Each piece of gun control legislation was met with severe opposition by him, and in this capacity, Knox testified before Congress on several occasions. He founded a fundraising organization, the Firearms Coalition, to help in his work to protect Second Amendment rights. Knox passed away on January 17, 2005—too soon to see vindication for his fundamental belief that the Second Amendment protects of the right of individuals to possess and bear arms, as was supported by the U.S. Supreme Court in its famous District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) and McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010) decisions. Tiia Rajala See also: District of Columbia v. Heller; Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986; Heston, Charlton; Institute for Legislative Action (ILA); McDonald v. City of Chicago; National Rifle Association (NRA); Periodicals, Guns; Second Amendment

Further Reading Knox, Chris, ed. Neal Knox: The Gun Rights War. Manassas, VA: MacFarlane Press, 2009. Tarrant, David. “Meet the 2 Texans Who Took Over the NRA and Made the Gun Rights Group a Feared and Powerful Force.” Dallas Morning News, April 27, 2018. https:// www.dallasnews.com/news/2018/04/27 /meet-the-2-texans-who-took-over-the-nra -and-made-the-gun-rights-group-a-feared -and-powerful-force/ (accessed January 28, 2022).

Kopel, David B.(1960–) The research director of the Independence Institute since 1992, David B. Kopel is an internationally respected expert on the Second Amendment, national and international

firearm law, and firearm policy. He is the vice-chair of the Colorado State Advisory Committee and the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, and also serves as an adjunct scholar with the Cato Institute (1988 to the present). He also serves as an adjunct professor of advanced constitutional law at Colorado’s Sturm College of Law, Denver University and also has previously adjuncted for the New York University School of Law. Kopel earned his bachelor’s degree in history with highest honors from Brown University (1982), and his juris doctorate (law degree), magna cum laude, from the University of Michigan Law School (1985), where he also was a contributing editor to the Michigan Law Review. He has served as an assistant district attorney in New York City, as well as assistant attorney general for the state of Colorado, where he specialized in environmental law. Kopel also was admitted to the bar of the Supreme Court of the United States, and played a role in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) and McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010), both landmark Second Amendment cases. He was the former editor-in-chief of the Journal on Firearms and Public Policy and was a contributing editor for Gun Week. Kopel also served as a media critic for the Rocky Mountain News until the paper closed in 2009. He currently is a frequent contributor to the Volokh Conspiracy weblog, part of Reason Magazine, and also serves as a columnist for the Wall Street Journal. He has authored more than 1,000 articles in magazines and newspapers, in addition to making frequent appearances on both television and radio. Kopel has contributed more than one hundred scholarly articles to top law reviews, including those from Harvard, Yale, Johns Hopkins, Brown, and others,

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including The ‘Sensitive Places’ Doctrine: Locational Limits on the Right to Bear Arms (2018). He also is the author or editor of seventeen books, such as Aiming for Liberty: The Past, Present, and Future of Freedom and Self-Defense (2009) and The Morality of Self-Defense and Military Action: The Judeo-Christian Tradition (2017). He also is coauthor of Sturm’s law school textbook on the Second Amendment, Firearms Regulation, Rights and Policy. His research has been cited in more than 700 law review articles, as well as twenty-two state court appellate and fifteen circuit court of appeals opinions. Kopel has received a number of awards for his steadfast defense of civil liberties. Among them are the Gun Rights Defender of the Year award for 1999 from the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, Journalist of the Year in 2002 and 2006, and the Defender of Liberty in 2012 from the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF). SAF also honored him in 2014 with their Global Leadership Award and their Defender of the Constitution Award in 2017. His research also has received accolades. In 1992, the American Society of Criminology named his work The Samurai, the Mountie, and the Cowboy, a landmark examination of the international evolution of firearm laws across cultures, as their Book of the Year. In 1997, Kopel received the Thomas S. Szasz Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Cause of Civil Liberties from the Center for Independent Thought for his book, No More Wacos, a detailed examination of the constitutional and public safety issues raised by the growth and inappropriate use of heavily militarized, federally controlled law enforcement agencies. Kopel is an avid supporter of the Second Amendment, particularly as it relates to self-defense, and the Constitution, and his

commitment to civil rights has been a cornerstone of his career. His research incorporates cultural and legal history as a foundation for understanding modern-day jurisprudence. It also emphasizes how changes in public policy and the law affect both individual behavior and the dynamics of social systems. He has testified numerous times before both Congress and state legislatures, and holds memberships with organizations, including the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences, Mariological Society of America, and the National Rifle Association. A protégé of Don B. Kates, Jr., Kopel now works to mentor other up-andcoming civil rights advocates, including young scholars, lawyers, and activists. Paul Gallant and Joanne Eisen See also: Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA); District of Columbia v. Heller; Independence Institute; Kates, Don B., Jr.; McDonald v. City of Chicago

Further Reading Johnson, Nicholas J., David B. Kopel, Michael P. O’Shea, and George Moscary. Firearms Law and the Second Amendment: Regulation, Rights, and Policy. New York: Aspen Publishers, 2012. http://www.firearmsreg ulation.com (accessed October 23, 2011). Kopel, David. Aiming for Liberty: The Past, Present and Future of Freedom and SelfDefense. Bellevue, WA: Merril Press, 2009. Kopel, David. Personal website. http://www .davekopel.org/ http://www.davekopel.com/ (accessed June 12, 2011). Kopel, David. The Samurai, the Mountie, and the Cowboy: Should America Adopt the Gun Controls of Other Democracies? Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 1992. Kopel, David, and Paul H. Blackman. “To Heller and Back.” Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice 25 (2009): 106–12.

502 | Ku Klux Klan (KKK) Kopel, David, Paul Gallant, and Joanne D. Eisen. “The Human Right of Self-Defense.” BYU Journal of Public Law 22 (2008): 43–178. Kopel, David, Paul Gallant, and Joanne D. Eisen. “Is Resisting Genocide a Human Right?” Notre Dame Law Review 81 (2006): 1275–346. Kopel, David, and Joseph G. S. Greenlee. “The ‘Sensitive Places’ Doctrine: Locational Limits on the Right to Bear Arms.” Charleston Law Review 13 (2018): 203–92. Kopel, David, and Alan Korwin. The Heller Case: Gun Rights Affirmed. Scottsdale, AZ: Bloomfield Press, 2008.

Ku Klux Klan (KKK) The Ku Klux Klan is the nation’s bestknown and most visible racial hate group. The white supremacist organization actively opposes ethnic and religious minorities. The Klan—or KKK, as it is commonly known—has a history of violence and was originally founded to prevent African Americans from achieving full equality. For most of the 1800s and well into the 1900s, the KKK used a near-monopoly on gun ownership in certain regions of the nation to suppress minorities. The Klan was established in 1866 in the aftermath of the Civil War. A group of former Confederate soldiers formed the secret organization in an effort to undermine Reconstruction governments and suppress African Americans. The name of the organization was based on the Greek word “kuklos,” or circle. The majority of the first members of the Klan were former Confederate soldiers and white landowners. The first leader, or “Grand Wizard,” of the Klan was Confederate general Nathan Bedford Forrest. The KKK was organized into local

units, known as “klaverns.” To hide their identities and cover their operations, members of the Klan wore robes and hoods and usually operated at night. Hence, members were often known as “nightriders” and the organization as the “invisible empire.” During the Reconstruction Era, African Americans had a difficult time obtaining weapons because of local and state ordinances. These laws were part of the “Black Codes” that endeavored to overturn the newly won political freedoms of African Americans. This gave the Klan a virtual monopoly on firearms. The group used its superior firepower to target Reconstruction officials and African Americans in the southern states. The Klan flogged, shot, or lynched targeted individuals. Often, a cross would be burned as a warning to people that they faced increasing levels of violence from the Klan. Within a few years after its formation, Klan violence was widespread throughout the South. Congress responded with legislation designed to suppress the organization. These laws included the Force Bill, which authorized the use of federal troops to quell the violence. The passage of various civil rights acts and the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868 further increased legal pressure to end the campaign of violence. The Civil Rights Act of 1866 specifically forbade state laws that prohibited African Americans from possessing firearms. The federal pressure led Forrest to officially disband the Klan in 1869. However, many individual klaverns continued their operations throughout the nineteenth century. Individual state governments enacted legislation that benefited the Klan. For instance, many states passed laws that banned the sale of inexpensive handguns. These laws affected only the purchase of



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The Ku Klux Klan is one of the most well-known hate groups in the United States. The white supremacist organization has historically used firearms as a means of oppression towards racial, ethnic, and religious minorities. (Library of Congress)

new weapons, not the possession of existing guns. Hence, members of the Klan were able to keep their weapons, many of which were acquired through service during the Civil War, whereas African Americans were unable to obtain new guns. States including Alabama, Arkansas, Tennessee, and Texas passed such legislation. In 1875, the Supreme Court ruled in United States v. Cruikshank that the federal government did not have the authority to prevent the KKK from disarming African Americans. The court ruled that African Americans had to rely on local and state agencies to protect them from the Klan. As these government bodies were dominated by whites, there was little real enforcement of federal equal

protection laws during the 1800s and early 1900s. The Klan’s power and size peaked during the first decades of the twentieth century. Col. William J. Simmons revived the Klan in Atlanta in 1915. Simmons sought to recast the Klan as a legitimate conservative political organization to broaden the appeal of the secret society beyond the South. The renewed Klan portrayed itself as a faithbased conservative Protestant group that sought to promote traditional American values. It took advantage of the growing anti-immigrant sentiment in the nation and came to oppose not just African Americans but also religious minorities, especially Jews and Roman Catholics. At its height in

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the 1920s, Klan membership reached almost four million and had klaverns in states ranging from Oregon to Indiana to Maine. KKK candidates even won some local and state offices. The Klan had its greatest political success in opposing the presidential candidacy of Alfred E. Smith, a Roman Catholic, in the 1928 election. However, the new Klan continued to utilize the same violent tactics that it had in the past. During the 1920s, there was a renewed wave of racially motivated shootings and lynchings throughout the country. The Great Depression of the 1930s and the onset of World War II led to the demise of the new Klan. By the end of World War II, Klan membership had declined significantly and KKK activity was mainly concentrated in the South and some Midwestern states. In 1946, Samuel Green, an Atlanta physician, endeavored to once again revive the Klan as a national organization. But Green died in 1949, and the national Klan split into a number of factions. Klan membership and activity increased dramatically in the 1950s in response to the civil rights movement. A new wave of violence swept across the South and resulted in the murder of several civil rights workers and leaders. The Klan was also involved in numerous bombings, including the infamous bombing of a Birmingham church. These acts led the Federal Bureau of Investigation to undertake a concentrated campaign to suppress the illegal activities of the KKK. Numerous Klansmen were arrested and a number of klaverns were broken up. By the mid-1970s, Klan membership had fallen below 5,000. Klan membership briefly expanded during the 1980s. By 1985, there were approximately 10,000 members. The KKK actively sought to include women and children and

to once again promote itself as a religiousbased organization. Some Klan groups also moderated their anti-Catholic positions. Nonetheless, this resurgence was shortlived. By 2010, membership in the Klan had fallen to around 6,000 in approximately 180 klaverns across the country. Meanwhile, links between local Klan chapters and other white supremacist groups, including neoNazi organizations such as the Aryan Brotherhood, became increasingly common, beginning in the 1990s. Since 2000, the Klan has continued to struggle, as organizational infighting, recruitment by other supremacist groups, and COVID-related disruptions in activities all took their toll (Southern Poverty Law Center, n.d.). Tom Lansford See also: African Americans and Gun Violence; NAACP and Gun Control; Racism and Gun Control; Saturday Night Specials; Vigilantism

Further Reading McVeigh, Rory. The Rise of the KKK: Right Wing Movements and National Politics. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2006. Nelson, Jack. Terror in the Night: The Klan’s Campaign against the Jews. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1993. Quarles, Chester L. The Ku Klux Klan and Related American Racialist and Antisemitic Organizations: A History and Analysis. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 1999. Ruiz, Jim. The Black Hood of the Ku Klux Klan. San Francisco: Austin & Winfield, 1998. Southern Poverty Law Center. “Ku Klux Klan.” splcenter.com, n.d. https://www.splcenter .org/fighting-hate/extremist-files/ideology /ku-klux-klan (accessed January 28, 2022).

L LaPierre, Wayne R., Jr.(1950–)

He accepted his current position as NRA executive vice president in 1991, replacing J. Warren Cassady. The position of president has typically been considered a more ceremonial role, so true power rests with LaPierre. His accession was generally regarded as moving the NRA in a direction of taking a firmer stance on Second Amendment rights issues. It also meant power was in the hands of a career political operative, not a longtime hunter. Over time, LaPierre has tried to burnish his image as more than just a “suit” by being photographed and shown on NRA television shows hunting. Although much of LaPierre’s influence comes from quiet political interactions in Washington, he has not shied away from using sharp public rhetoric. An early 1995 fundraising letter bearing his name asserted that some Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) agents behave like “jack-booted thugs.” The phrase had been used by Representative John Dingell of Michigan in an earlier NRA film, but coming two years after an ATF raid of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, and just before the Oklahoma City bombing, it drew major controversy. Former President George H. W. Bush publicly announced that he was resigning from the NRA because of the fundraising letter. (Bush had joined the NRA in January 1988, just before he began to run for president.) The Bush resignation and other discussions of the “jack-booted thugs” letter was a major public relations disaster for the NRA.

Wayne LaPierre is the executive vice president and chief executive officer of the National Rifle Association (NRA). Along with the NRA’s board, LaPierre is responsible for overseeing and implementing the organization’s nationwide policies and is a frequent public spokesman for the group and for broad gun rights. His firm, and sometimes controversial, gun rights statements have led to sharp criticism from gun control advocates. He also has faced some criticism from within the NRA on several issues but has maintained his leadership for decades as the NRA has doubled its membership to roughly 5 million, increased its revenue to over $300 million annually, and grown in political influence. LaPierre has been rewarded with a large salary and many other benefits. Beginning in 2018, he faced a series of new challenges from shifting political circumstances, sharp infighting within the NRA leadership, and legal investigations of the group’s finances. LaPierre joined the NRA in 1978 as a regional lobbyist just as the group was expanding its political activities. In 1980, LaPierre was promoted to director of federal affairs, the lobbying arm responsible for overseeing the organization’s congressional and executive branch relations. Six years later, he was named director of the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action and assumed responsibility for superintending all of the NRA’s lobbying efforts at the federal, state, and local levels.

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In 1999, LaPierre again was the source of controversy. On a Sunday morning television program, he claimed that President Bill Clinton accepted a certain amount of gun violence in the United States to further his political agenda. LaPierre argued that Clinton barely enforced the many federal gun laws already on the books. He further pointed out that Clinton had recently opposed legislation containing certain gun controls that the NRA said it would accept and suggested Clinton preferred to make extreme gun control demands so as to preserve the gun control issue for the 2000 election. The White House fired back, and President Clinton himself spoke out in response to LaPierre. The LaPierre-Clinton showdown garnered significant media attention for over two weeks. Although the media reports at the time were generally supportive of Clinton, the public showdown did expose a broad public to LaPierre’s message that Clinton was interested in politicking about new gun control laws rather than enforcing existing laws. As leader of the NRA, LaPierre has overseen both the best of times and the worst of times for the group. Some of its worst defeats came soon after LaPierre rose to be executive vice president. Congress passed the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act in 1993 and the Assault Weapons Ban and a host of other gun controls in the 1994 Clinton crime bill. Often, though, a political defeat, or even threat of defeat, then allows the NRA to rally greater support from those who oppose the changes and want to preserve extensive gun rights. For example, the NRA’s tenacious opposition to the Assault Weapons Ban helped set the stage for the greatest election in NRA history in November 1994. After Republicans won control over the House of Representatives, President Clinton and

others argued that the NRA was a major reason. Pro-gun candidates also swept to victory in state legislative races around the country. Despite LaPierre’s fundraising gaffe noted above, 1995 saw many pro-gun laws enacted or expanded in dozens of states and many state gun control laws were rolled back or repealed. On April 20, 1999, two young men murdered twelve students and a teacher at Columbine High School near Littleton, Colorado. The NRA and LaPierre were sent reeling by the shooting. LaPierre told the NRA to maintain public silence until the NRA’s annual meeting a week and a half later, which, by terrible coincidence, was scheduled for Denver. LaPierre canceled all of the annual meeting public events except for the formal membership meeting required by the group’s bylaws. Soon, the U.S. Senate passed a juvenile crime bill, which included various gun controls, the most significant of which was a restrictive provision on gun shows. The NRA appeared in political retreat and in a difficult rhetorical position as guns became associated with school shootings. But by the time the action shifted to the House of Representatives in June, LaPierre had rallied his forces. Working closely with the Republican leadership, LaPierre acceded to a variety of compromise gun control measures and gained the leadership’s support in standing firm against more extensive proposals. Relying on support from moderate and conservative Democrats, especially those in rural districts, the NRA was able to pick its battles in the House, and it emerged tactically victorious. The Senate and House versions of the bill were so different that the Conference Committee failed to agree on shared language, and no final bill was passed. With new pressures, such as the “Million Mom March,” threatening to turn support



for gun rights into a political liability, LaPierre developed new talking points. He hammered the theme that the problem was lack of enforcement of existing gun laws and that there was no need for more laws. He also argued that events like school shootings were a product of mental health issues, not access to guns. The NRA increased use of the internet to communicate directly with gun rights supporters, thus bypassing the traditional media and reinvigorating its vaunted grassroots network. By January 2001, departing President Clinton credited the NRA with delivering five southern and border states to Bush in defeating Al Gore and in assisting Republicans in retaining control of the House of Representatives. In May 2000, Fortune magazine’s annual ranking of lobbying strength named the NRA the most powerful lobbying group in Washington. By 2010, gun control was becoming a “third rail” of national politics, with large bipartisan majorities in both houses of Congress opposed to new restrictions on gun owners. The cycle of a major event drawing attention to gun issues, talk of new gun control measures, and then NRA counterarguments stressing that there are existing gun laws so further measures would be a limit on Second Amendment rights and that gun violence is triggered by deeper issues than gun access has repeated many times; thus far it has yielded few new gun control measures. Supporters suggest that LaPierre has great political sense in making small tactical compromises while maintaining core principles, but some critics within the gun rights movement complain that he is too willing to compromise, whereas gun control advocates portray him as an extremist. In the 2016 election, the NRA used major financial and other resources to support Donald Trump. The NRA, and LaPierre

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Wayne R. LaPierre Jr., executive vice president of the National Rifle Association, speaks at the Conservative Political Action Conference in 2011. (John-Paul Zajackowski/Dreamstime .com)

specifically, has enjoyed continued significant access to the former president and his advisers and likely has helped shape some Trump statements and actions on gun control. At the same time, Republican power reduces the likelihood of new restrictions and thus takes away a major rallying cry for NRA membership. The group has therefore focused more attention on possible statelevel reforms in Democratically controlled states, such as Virginia. The NRA also has had to deal with continued prominent mass shootings, such as those in Las Vegas and Parkland, Florida. These events put LaPierre and the NRA on the defensive rhetorically, and they may be leading to changes within public opinion. Still, no major national gun control has come close to Congressional passage.

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Within the NRA, the first major challenge to LaPierre’s position came in 1996– 1997 when longtime gun rights activist Neal Knox argued that LaPierre was mismanaging the group’s finances. LaPierre narrowly survived a NRA Board of Directors vote in early 1997. At the NRA’s annual meeting that spring, he brought in Charlton Heston as a director and officer and proceeded to purge Knox’s supporters from the board. Two decades later, divisions within the NRA and disputes over finances have again become prominent. The disputes have pitted LaPierre and supporters against new NRA President Oliver North and others; new NRA lawyer William A. Brewer III versus long-standing NRA lawyer Charles J. Cooper; and the NRA suing its longtime advertising and public relations firm Ackerman McQueen. Many of the disputes center on financial questions of whether the NRA was overpaying for certain services and whether LaPierre was receiving excessive benefits, such as high-end clothing, purchased by Ackerman McQueen and then charged to the NRA. As a result of leaks and disclosures related to the lawsuit, many internal emails and documents have revealed deep personal animosity among the players. LaPierre was able to rally support on the board leading to the removal of North and many of his supporters, but in a 2019 interview, LaPierre did acknowledge that “it’s the most painful period of my life” (Hakim 2019). At the same time, New York State Attorney General Letitia James has initiated a civil investigation into NRA finances that also could lead to criminal charges. During her campaign for the office, James sharply criticized the NRA, so NRA lawyers have portrayed the ongoing investigation as a politically driven effort. The Attorney

General’s office attained a subpoena for records related to political donations, tax compliance, payments to board members and to the charitable NRA Foundation. LaPierre told board members the legal issues have cost the group $100 million. It is unclear how long LaPierre will be able to retain his leadership position. His influence has been felt for decades and will continue to live on in some ways through established tactics, speeches, and several books he has authored. He has been a political tactician and a leader in developing gun rights legal and rhetorical arguments. Brannon P. Denning, David B. Kopel, and John W. Dietrich See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Bush, George H. W.; Clinton, William J.; Columbine High School Shooting; Concealed Weapons Laws; Enforcement of Gun Control Laws; Gun Shows; Heston, Charlton; Institute for Legislative Action (ILA); Knox, Neal; Million Mom March; National Rifle Association (NRA); Republican Party and Gun Control; Second Amendment

Further Reading Hakim, Danny. “How Wayne LaPierre Survived a Revolt at the N.R.A.” New York Times, August 22, 2019. Hakim, Danny. “Inside Wayne LaPierre’s Battle for the N.R.A.” New York Times, December 18, 2019. LaPierre, Wayne R., Jr. Guns, Crime, and Freedom. Washington, DC: Regnery Publishing, 1994. NPR. “Secret Recording Reveals NRA’s Legal Troubles Have Cost the Organization $100 Million.” April 21, 2020. https://www.npr .org/2020/04/21/839999178/secret-record ing-reveals-nras-legal-troubles-have-cost -the-organization-100-mill (accessed May 18, 2022).



Las Vegas Shooting At approximately 10:05 p.m. on October 1, 2017, more than 22,000 concertgoers were enjoying music from headliner Jason Aldean at the Route 91 Harvest Festival in Las Vegas, Nevada. Seconds later, gunshots rang out, sending the crowd running as bullets rained down upon them. Over the next eleven minutes, fifty-eight people were killed. An additional 869 people were injured, 413 of those from gunfire, in what remains the deadliest mass shooting in the United States as of June 2020. Six days before the shooting occurred, sixty-four-year-old Stephen Paddock, a retired auditor and real estate businessman, checked into the Mandalay Bay Hotel & Casino, located along the famed Las Vegas Strip and across the street from Las Vegas Village, where the concert was to be held. His room (32-135), a Vista Suite booked two weeks earlier, overlooked the venue. Two days before the shooting, he also checked into the adjoining room (32-134), which was booked in his girlfriend’s name. Between his initial check-in and October 1, he brought twenty-one suitcases into his rooms, sometimes with the assistance of hotel staff and by way of the service elevator. These suitcases contained his vast arsenal, which included fourteen AR-15 and eight AR-10 semiautomatic assault rifles, a bolt-action rifle, and a revolver. All of the AR-15 rifles were equipped with bump stocks (used to mimic automatic firing), and twelve had been fitted with 100 round magazines. At 10:00 p.m. on October 1, 2017, Mandalay Bay security officer Jesus Campos responded to an open-door alert on the thirty-second floor of the hotel. When he attempted to access the floor by stairwell, he found that he was unable to do so; the

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perpetrator had secured it using an L-bracket to slow down any potential response. Accessing the floor by way of the guest elevators from the floor above, Campos quickly cleared the call and reported the barricade to the hotel’s maintenance supervisor. Moments later, the perpetrator broke out two windows, one in each suite, and began firing. Campos reported hearing “rapid drilling” sounds coming from down the hall and went to investigate; as he neared the perpetrator’s rooms, he was struck in the calf from bullets fired down the hallway. Over the next ten minutes, the perpetrator fired more than 1,100 rounds from the firearms, moving between the two hotel rooms, on the concertgoers below, who attempted to take cover. Those who attempted to escape the venue completely were hindered by the eight-foot-high security fence that enclosed the grounds, with many of the entrances chained shut. During the course of the shooting, the perpetrator also fired eight rounds at a fuel tank located just behind the concert venue on the grounds of the McCarran International Airport, attempting to cause an explosion; although he struck the tank twice, it failed to detonate. Between 10:16 and 10:18 p.m., as law enforcement neared his rooms, the perpetrator committed suicide. In addition to the 1,100 rounds fired into the crowd, another 5,000 unspent bullets were found in the rooms, along with other equipment. During the rampage, the following individuals lost their lives: Hannah Ahlers, Heather Alvarado, Dorene Anderson, Carrie Barnette, Jack Beaton, Stephen Berger, Candice Bowers, Denise Burditus, Sandra Casey, Andrea Castilla, Denise Cohen, Austin Davis, Thomas Day Jr., Christiana Duarte, Stacee Etcheber, Brian Fraser, Keri Galvan, Dana Gardner, Angela Gomez,

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A makeshift memorial was set up for people to gather and leave tokens near the “Welcome to Las Vegas” sign on the Las Vegas strip. The memorial sits near the site of the October 1, 2017, shooting at the Route 91 Harvest Festival, which left 58 concertgoers dead and more than 400 injured by gunfire. (Melissa Kopka/Alamy Stock Photo)

Rocio Guillen, Charleston Hartfield, Christopher Hazencomb, Jennifer Irvine, Teresa “Nicol” Kimura, Jessica Klymchuk, Carly Kreibaum, Rhonda LeRocque, Victor Link, Jordan McIldoon, Kelsey Meadows, CallaMarie Medig, James “Sonny” Melton, Patricia Mestas, Austin Meyer, Adrian Murfitt, Rachael Parker, Jennifer Parks, Carolyn Parsons, Lisa Patterson, John Phippen, Melissa Ramirez, Jordyn Rivera, Quinton Robbins, Cameron Robinson, Tara Roe, Lisa Romero-Muniz, Christopher Roybal, Brett Schwanbeck, Bailey Schweitzer, Laura Shipp, Erick Silva, Susan Smith, Brennan Stewart, Derrick “Bo” Taylor, Neysa Tonks, Michelle Vo, Kurt Von Tillow, and William Wolfe Jr. Kimberly Gervais, who was injured in the shooting, died on November 15, 2019; a year later, her

death was ruled a consequence of her injuries, and she became the shooting’s fiftyninth victim (Seeman 2020). On May 26, 2020, a second woman, Samantha Arjune, also died from complications from the gunshot wound to her leg she sustained during the shooting, becoming its sixtieth victim (Lacanale 2021). Subsequent investigation after the incident revealed that the perpetrator had planned his attack for at least a year. In addition to the Route 91 venue, which he had scouted in September 2017 on a trip with his girlfriend, he also considered the Lollapalooza festival in Chicago, IL (booking a room the August prior to the shooting but failing to go) and the Life is Beautiful festival at The Ogden, also located in Las Vegas. Reviews of his internet search



history revealed numerous searches for topics, including open-air concert venues, SWAT weapons (including explosives), and expected attendance at a number of different events. Between October 2016 and the shooting, the perpetrator legally purchased fifty-five firearms; by comparison, he had purchased twenty-nine between 1982 and September 2016. Although most public mass shootings result in little or no success with respect to legislative efforts in their aftermath, the Las Vegas shooting was different. Concern immediately was raised regarding the bump stocks outfitted on the rifles that allowed the perpetrator to fire off so many shots in a short period of time, thereby increasing the lethality and overall number of casualties related to the shooting. On December 18, 2018, the U.S. Department of Justice, acting upon a directive from President Donald J. Trump, issued an administrative ban on bump stocks; the rule, which made these devices illegal, went into effect on March 26, 2019. Prior to it taking effect, gun rights activists petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to block the ban, but the court rejected their bid. Jaclyn Schildkraut and Daniel Beutler See also: Assault Weapons; Bump Stocks; Mass Murder (Shootings); Pulse Nightclub Shooting; Semiautomatic Weapons; Trump, Donald J.

Further Reading Federal Emergency Management Agency. 1 October After-Action Report. Washington, DC: Author, 2018. https://www.policefoun dation.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/1 OctoberAfterActionReport.pdf (accessed June 17, 2020). Flanagan, Andrew. “The Basics: Las Vegas Shooting, Jason Aldean & the Route 91 Harvest Music Festival.” NPR, October 2,

Las Vegas Shooting | 511 2017. https://www.npr.org/sections/therecord /2017/10/02/555016081/the-basics-jason -aldean-the-route-91-harvest-music-festival (accessed June 17, 2020). Hurley, Lawrence. “U.S. Supreme Court Rebuffs Bid to Block Trump’s Gun ‘Bump Stock’ Ban.” Reuters, March 28, 2019. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa -court-guns/u-s-supreme-court-refuses -to-block-trumps-gun-bump-stock-ban -idUSKCN1R9230 (accessed June 17, 2020). Lacanlale, Rio. “Las Vegas Woman Becomes 60th Victim of October 2017 Mass Shooting.” Las Vegas Review-Journal, September 17, 2020. https://www.reviewjournal .com/crime/shootings/las-vegas-woman -becomes-60th-victim-of-october-2017 -mass-shooting-2123456/ (accessed June 12, 2022). Lacanlale, Rio. “Potential 59th Las Vegas Shooting Victim’s Cause of Death Still Pending.” Las Vegas Review-Journal, December 18, 2019. https://www.review journal.com/crime/homicides/potential -59th-las-vegas-shooting-victims-cause -of-death-still-pending-1916985/ (accessed June 17, 2020). Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department. LVMPD Preliminary Investigative Report: 1 October / Mass Casualty Shooting. Las Vegas, NV: Author, 2018. https://www.lvmpd .com/en-us/Documents/1_October_FIT _Report_01-18-2018_Footnoted.pdf (accessed June 17, 2020). Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department. 1 October After-Action Review. Las Vegas, NV: Author, 2019. https://www.lvmpd.com /en-us/Documents/1_October_AAR_Final _06062019.pdf (accessed June 17, 2020). Savage, Charlie. “Trump Administration Imposes Ban on Bump Stocks.” New York Times, December 18, 2018. https://www .nytimes.com/2018/12/18/us/politics/trump -bump-stocks-ban.html (accessed June 17, 2020). Seeman, Matthew. “Coroner: California Woman Died from Gunshot Wound Suffered in One

512 | Lautenberg, Frank R. October.” 3 News Las Vegas, August 25, 2020. https://news3lv.com/news/local/califor nia-woman-died-gunshot-wound-las-vegas -october-coroner (accessed June 12, 2022).

Lautenberg Amendment. See Lautenberg, Frank R. Lautenberg, Frank R.(1924–2013) Frank R. Lautenberg, a five-term Democratic U.S. senator from New Jersey, has been one of the Senate’s most liberal members and a strong advocate of gun control. Lautenberg served from 1982 until his initial retirement from the Senate in 2001. Two years later, he became a late ballot replacement for incumbent Bob Torricelli, who was facing federal corruption charges. Lautenberg easily won that election, as well as reelection in 2008. He is best known as the author of and primary force behind a major federal gun control provision, usually termed “the Lautenberg Amendment,” which barred anyone convicted of domestic violence against a spouse or child from buying or owning a firearm. He has been a strong supporter of banning assault weapons and requiring trigger locks on all guns. For more than a decade, Lautenberg has sought to close the gun show loophole. He also has submitted controversial legislation to limit suspected terrorists from purchasing firearms and to extend the time that background check information is stored after a gun purchase. The 1996 Lautenberg Amendment, also called the Domestic Violence Offender Gun Ban, modified the Omnibus Consolidated Appropriations Act of 1997. Previously, laws banned those convicted of felonies from purchasing a gun, but did not apply to many domestic violence offenders whose

cases are deemed only misdemeanors; these offenders were added to the “prohibited persons” list, as were those under courtordered domestic abuse restraining orders (18 U.S.C. §922(g)(9); and 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(8)). Lautenberg won passage of his proposal over the intense opposition of the National Rifle Association, the Gun Owners of America, and other prominent gun rights organizations. Lautenberg and his supporters also overcame the opposition of House Republicans, led by Speaker Newt Gingrich of Georgia. House Republicans blocked passage of the overall appropriations bill while seeking to weaken Lautenberg’s amendment by limiting the ban to cover only persons convicted by judges. Because most misdemeanor convictions were made by juries, the Republicans’ proposal would have greatly reduced the number of persons covered by the ban. However, fearing a political backlash for delaying passage of the appropriations measure, the Republicans withdrew their proposal after Lautenberg, supported by President Bill Clinton, declined to compromise. The law has been challenged in the courts on several grounds, including having a federal law punish violators of state statutes and limiting Second Amendment rights, but it has been upheld. Supporters of the amendment estimate that it has blocked over 150,000 attempted gun purchases and deterred many others from even trying to buy a gun. Critics see the rules as a sweeping limit on Second Amendment rights. The amendment also has come under fire from some law enforcement organizations. Leaders of these groups were responding to complaints from members who were prohibited from carrying firearms because of previous misdemeanor domestic violence convictions. Soldiers also are not exempt. Army policy is that soldiers



convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence are nondeployable for missions that require possession of firearms or ammunition and not eligible for overseas assignment. This can effectively end a soldier’s military career. Throughout his Senate career, Lautenberg has waged a continuous campaign to expand federal control of the sale of firearms. In 1997, he won passage of a measure to establish security regulations to protect stores selling guns. The proposal, which Lautenberg cosponsored with Joseph Biden (D-DE), directed the Treasury Department to establish minimum gun safety and security standards governing federally licensed firearm dealers. Lautenberg also worked for such gun control measures as banning the importation of high-capacity ammunition clips, passing and renewing the Assault Weapons Ban, and mandating that all handguns be sold with child safety trigger locks or safety storage boxes. In 1999, Lautenberg led Senate passage of his amendment to mandate background checks of customers buying weapons at gun shows. The amendment passed in dramatic fashion, with Vice President Albert Gore breaking a 50–50 tie. Ultimately, though, the underlying Juvenile Justice Bill died when Senate and House conferees could not agree on a number of differences. Ten years later, Lautenberg was still pursuing the issue. In 2009, he, Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), and Jack Reed (D-RI) led nine other cosponsors in introducing legislation to require background checks at gun shows. The legislation was sharply criticized by the NRA and never made it out of committee. After the September 11, 2001, attacks, Lautenberg became very interested in the idea of limiting terrorist access to guns. He encouraged researchers at the General Accountability Office and Congressional

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Research Service to investigate cases of suspected terrorists on the federal watch lists attempting to buy guns or explosives. Over the years, he submitted a number of legislative proposals related to the issue. In 2009, he, along with Rep. Peter T. King (D-NY), submitted the Denying Firearms and Explosives to Dangerous Terrorists Act of 2009. The bill would allow the attorney general to deny the transfer of a gun to anyone known or “appropriately suspected” of having been engaged in domestic or international terrorism. It also would allow the attorney general to withhold some information used to deny a license if that information would likely compromise national security. Lautenberg argues the bill is needed because between 2004 and 2010, there were over 1,100 cases in which someone on terrorist watch lists cleared background checks to purchase a weapon. Critics of the bill contend most people on terrorist watch lists already are banned from gun purchase for one reason or another, and that a determined terrorist is unlikely to seek a weapon from a licensed dealer; so the proposal would mostly affect innocent citizens who had committed no crimes but whose names were on watch lists, either from broad government suspicion or a simple mistake. Lautenberg also actively challenged a series of provisions introduced by Rep. Todd Tiahrt (R-KS) since 2004 that require the quick destruction of information generated as part of background checks using the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). Arguing that data could be used by the police to trace guns from crimes and to verify that terrorists do not acquire guns, Lautenberg introduced the Preserving Records of Terrorist and Criminal Transactions Act of 2009. The act was designed to require the FBI to retain

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records for ten years if someone on the terrorist watch list attempted to purchase a gun and require that records of all nonterrorist transactions be maintained for 180 days, significantly different than the existing rule of twenty-four hours. Critics contended that the bill is the first step to a national registry of firearms owners. The bill ultimately failed to make it past introduction. Given his consistent efforts for gun control, it is not surprising that Lautenberg received the lowest possible ratings from gun rights groups, or that he touted that fact on his own campaign website as “a proud accomplishment.” Lautenberg passed away in New York City on June 3, 2013, at age eighty-nine. His death was the result of viral pneumonia. He was buried four days later at Arlington National Cemetery in Washington, DC, with full military honors. Robert Dewhirst and John W. Dietrich See also: Gun Shows; National Instant Criminal Background Check System

Further Reading Clymer, Adam. 2013. “Frank Lautenberg, New Jersey Senator in His 5th Term, Dies at 89.” New York Times, June 3, 2013. https://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/04/ny region/frank-lautenberg-new-jersey-senator .html (accessed May 18, 2022). “Fighting Crime and Gun Violence.” Lautenberg for Senate website. http://www.lauten bergfornj.com/issues-fighting-crime-and -gun-violence.php (accessed February 7, 2011). Ivry, Bob. 2003. “No Time to Coast: A Tenacious Lautenberg, Nearing 80, Has Long To-Do List.” Record (Bergen County, NJ), December 26, 2003. “Lautenberg Introduces Bill to Preserve Gun Records Critical to Law Enforcement, Terrorism Prevention” Press Release, December

1, 2009. Lautenberg for Senate website. http://lautenberg.senate.gov/newsroom /record.cfm?id=320300& (accessed February 7, 2011). U.S. Government Accountability Office. “Terrorist Watchlist Screening: FBI Has Enhanced Its Use of Information from Firearm and Explosives Background Checks to Support Counterterrorism Efforts” (Highlights of Report No.: GAO10-703T). May 5, 2010. http://www.gao .gov/new.items/d10703t.pdf (accessed July 25, 2011).

Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers Since the late 1970s, victims of gun violence have turned to the judicial system to seek redress against gun manufacturers and sellers, drawing on traditional legal principles applied in other contexts to argue that the gun industry should bear some responsibility for the damage its products cause. Some victim suits have involved allegations of irresponsible sales practices by gun retailers, targeting such practices as selling to buyers acting as “straw purchasers” for persons legally prohibited from buying guns, sales to persons who may be mentally impaired, and sales in violation of regulatory requirements. In these cases, victims typically rely on theories of negligence, negligent entrustment, or, in the case of regulatory violations, negligence per se. Although some courts have rejected such suits on the ground that the shooting of the victim was a superseding cause of the injury, cutting off the dealer’s liability, other courts have imposed liability where the shooting was a foreseeable result of the dealer’s negligence. In Kitchen v. K-Mart Corp., 697 So. 2d 1200 (1997), for example, the Florida



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Supreme Court unanimously held that a gun dealer could be liable for selling a gun to a visibly intoxicated buyer who then used the gun to shoot his estranged girlfriend. The court reversed a lower court ruling that had dismissed the suit on the ground that Florida law did not prohibit gun sales to intoxicated persons. The state Supreme Court held that a cause of action for negligent sale did not require that the sale violate statutory law where the injury inflicted was the foreseeable result of the negligence. The court held that because guns involve “such a high degree of risk of serious injury or death,” gun sellers owe a duty to exercise the “highest degree of care” in their activities. The Kansas Supreme Court imposed a similarly high standard of care on gun sellers in Shirley v. Glass, 308 P.3d 1 (2013). The general duty to exercise care to avoid increasing the risk of gun violence also has been invoked by gun violence victims in lawsuits against gun manufacturers. The most noteworthy victim cases alleging negligence by gun manufacturers leading to criminal violence are Hamilton v. Accu-Tek (62 F. Supp. 802 (E.D.N.Y., 1999)), which was vacated (Hamilton v. Beretta U.S.A. Corp. [264 F.3d 21 (2d Cir., 2001)]); Merrill v. Navegar, Inc. (89 Cal. Rptr. 2d 146 [Cal. Ct. App. 1999]), which was reversed (28 P.3d 116 [Cal., 2001]); and Soto v. Bushmaster Firearms, Intl., LLC, 202 A.3d 262 (Conn. 2019) which, as of December 2021, remains pending in a Connecticut trial court. Hamilton v. Accu-Tek was a lawsuit against twenty-five major gun manufacturers by victims of shootings by juveniles. The suit alleged that the manufacturers fuel the illegal market by “oversupplying” the legitimate handgun market in southern states with weak gun laws, knowing that the guns would be trafficked into the illegal market in states with strong gun laws, like

New York. The suit also charged that the manufacturers impose no control over their distributors and sellers to prevent the diversion of guns to the illegal market. In February 1999, Hamilton produced the first jury verdict against gun makers for negligent conduct leading to violence, as a New York jury found fifteen gun manufacturers had negligently distributed their products and awarded damages to one of the victims against three defendant manufacturers. After federal judge Jack Weinstein refused to overturn the verdict, on appeal, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit referred two legal questions to the highest state court: (1) whether the defendant manufacturers owed plaintiffs a duty to exercise reasonable care in the distribution of handguns, and (2) whether liability may be apportioned among the manufacturers on a market-share basis. In April 2001, the New York Court of Appeals answered both questions in the negative. However, as to the duty issue, the court emphasized that its answer was based only on the evidence presented in this case, observing that “whether, in a different case, a duty may arise remains a question for the future.” The court suggested, for example, that a stronger case could be made by showing that the manufacturers sold guns through particular dealers that they knew or had reason to know were disproportionate sources of guns for the illegal market. The court also cited the absence of proof that the particular guns used to inflict the plaintiffs’ injuries (which were not recovered) were sufficiently connected to the defendants’ alleged negligence in distribution. On the basis of the Court of Appeals’ answers to the certified questions, the Second Circuit overturned the verdict. Merrill v. Navegar produced the first appellate court ruling that a gun manufacturer

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could be liable for the criminal use of a gun. The suit was brought in 1994 by several victims of a 1993 multiple shooting in a San Francisco office building against Navegar Inc., the manufacturer of the two TEC-9 semiautomatic assault weapons used in the attack. The suit alleged that the TEC-9 was designed for use in close combat, with maximum firepower to efficiently kill large numbers of people very quickly, but that it had little or no legitimate sporting or self-defense uses. The TEC-9 had been banned in California since 1989 as a threat to public safety (the shooter had acquired his TEC-9s in Nevada shortly before the shooting). The plaintiffs alleged that it was negligent to have sold such a gun to the general public without safeguards to prevent misuse, instead of confining sales to the military, the police, and shooting ranges. In September 1999, in a landmark ruling, the California Court of Appeals reversed a lower court ruling dismissing the suit, holding that a gun manufacturer owes “a duty to exercise reasonable care not to create risks above and beyond those inherent in the presence of firearms in our society.” The California Supreme Court later reversed the decision 5–1, but on other grounds. The court held the case barred by a 1983 California statute immunizing gun manufacturers in product liability actions based on an assessment of the risks of guns versus their benefits. Only the dissenter, Justice Kathryn Mickle Werdegar, who found the statute inapplicable to claims of negligent marketing and distribution, reached the underlying tort issues. She concluded that manufacturers owed the public “a duty of care in the conduct of their design, distribution and marketing activities.” Public outrage about the dismissal of the case led the California legislature to repeal the immunity statute in 2002.

The public nuisance doctrine also has been invoked to seek the liability of the gun industry for distributing guns in a manner that fuels the illegal market. In a suit brought by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), federal judge Jack Weinstein (who also presided over the Hamilton case) found that the industry’s irresponsible distribution of guns so substantially contributed to the illegal market as to constitute a public nuisance. Judge Weinstein found that “careless practices and lack of appropriate precautions” by some gun dealers led to “the diversion of a large number of handguns from the legal primary market into a substantial illegal secondary market.” He also found that manufacturers and distributors contributed to the nuisance by failing to implement “a responsible and consistent program of monitoring their own sales practices, enforcing good practices by contract, and the entirely practicable supervision of sales of their products” by the dealers to which they sold guns. However, he dismissed the lawsuit because the NAACP, as a private party bringing a public nuisance action, had not made the requisite showing that it had suffered harm from the industry’s conduct that was different in kind from the harm to the public generally. Gun manufacturers also have faced suits grounded in strict product liability. Most such cases have involved accidental shootings that allegedly were caused by specific manufacturing or design defects in guns. During the 1980s, more potentially farreaching cases were brought seeking to make manufacturers of handguns, or particular kinds of handguns, strictly liable for criminal acts committed with their products, even though no claim was made that the guns could have been made safer. These suits charged that manufacturers were



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liable because the risks to society posed by their guns outweighed the benefits. This theory generally was rejected by the courts on the ground that the plaintiffs had made no allegation of a true defect in the gun’s design. However, the Maryland Court of Appeals in Kelley v. RG Industries, Inc. (497 A.2d 1143 [Md. 1985]) recognized a new strict liability cause of action against manufacturers of Saturday night special handguns characterized by short barrels, easy concealability, poor quality, and special appeal to criminals. The Kelley cause of action, however, was superseded by legislation in Maryland that banned the guns at issue. Strict liability causes of action have been recognized in cases involving unintentional shootings that could have been prevented through the installation of specific safety devices in guns. For example, in Hurst v. Glock (684 A.2d 970 [N.J. Super. Ct. App. Div. 1996]), a New Jersey appeals court held that a gun maker could be liable for failing to install a magazine disconnect safety to prevent a pistol from firing with the magazine out of the gun. In the most extensive discussion of the pertinent legal principles, the New Mexico Court of Appeals in Smith v. Bryco Arms (33 P.3d 638 [N.M. Ct. App. 2001]), denied certiorari (34 P.3d 610 [N.M. 2001]), held that a teenage victim of an unintentional shooting had stated a valid strict liability claim that the gun manufacturer “could have—and therefore should have—incorporated longknown design features which would have helped prevent this shooting and others like it.” The Smith appeals court ruling reversed a lower court’s dismissal of a lawsuit asserting that the manufacturer’s failure to use a magazine disconnect safety or a chamberloaded indicator rendered the handgun at issue defective in design.

In October 1998, New Orleans inaugurated a new era in the history of gun litigation by filing the first lawsuit ever brought by a public entity against the gun industry. Inspired by state and city suits against the tobacco industry, New Orleans sought to recover the public costs of gun violence, including the costs associated with law enforcement, criminal prosecution, increased school security, and medical treatment of victims in public hospitals. The New Orleans case focused on the industry’s sale of guns without safety mechanisms to prevent unintentional shootings and unauthorized use. Chicago followed with its own suit two weeks later, charging that the industry had contributed to a public nuisance by maintaining a distribution system that ensures the easy flow of guns into the illegal market. Between 1998 and 2002, over thirty cities and counties, and the state of New York, filed suit. Most of the suits adopted elements from both the New Orleans and the Chicago approaches. The New Orleans case eventually was dismissed by the Louisiana Supreme Court, relying on the retroactive application of a Louisiana statute barring cities in that state from suing the gun industry (Morial v. Smith & Wesson Corp., 785 So.2d 1 [La. 2001], cert. denied, 122 S.Ct. 346 [U.S. 2001]). The Chicago case ultimately was dismissed by the Illinois Supreme Court, which found that the city had failed to state a legally sufficient cause of action for public nuisance under Illinois law (City of Chicago. v. Beretta U.S.A. Corp., 821 N.E.2d 1099 [Ill. 2004]). Other appellate courts split on the validity of the various causes of action asserted in the municipal cases, with the Supreme Courts of Ohio (City of Cincinnati v. Beretta U.S.A. Corp., 768 N.E.2d 1136 [Ohio 2002]) and Indiana (City of Gary v. Smith & Wesson Corp., 801 N.E.2d 1222

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[Ind. 2003]), and an appeals court in New Jersey, Janes v. Arms Technology, Inc. (820 A.2d 27 [N.J. Super. Ct. App. Div. 2003]), allowing municipal cases to proceed. However, in response to the municipal lawsuits, various states passed legislation limiting the liability of the gun industry similar to the statute barring the New Orleans case. Those statutes were used to defeat some of the municipal suits (see e.g. Sturm, Ruger & Co. v. City of Atlanta, 560 S.E.2d 525 [Ga. Ct. App. 2002]; Mayor of Detroit v. Arms Technology, Inc., 669 N.W.2d 845 [Mich. Ct. App. 2003]; City of St. Louis v. Cernicek, 145 S.W.3d 37 [Mo. Ct. App. 2004]). Thirty-four states currently have statutes prohibiting local government entities from filing lawsuits against gun manufacturers. In 2005, President George W. Bush signed into law the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA), which also limited the liability of gun manufacturers and dealers and was the basis for dismissal of other municipal lawsuits (see, e.g., District of Columbia v. Beretta, 940 A.2d 163 (D.C. 2008), cert. denied, 129 S.Ct. 1579 [U.S. 2009]). The PLCAA also has substantially limited lawsuits by victims against gun manufacturers. An important exception is the ruling of the Connecticut Supreme Court in Soto v. Bushmaster Firearms Int’l, LLC, 202 A.3d 262 (Conn. 2019), cert. denied, __ S.Ct. __ (2019), a lawsuit brought by the victims of the 2012 shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. The plaintiffs alleged that the manufacturer of the AR-15 assault rifle used in the shooting had marketed it in an “unethical, oppressive, immoral and unscrupulous manner,” through advertisements and catalogs promoting use of the AR-15 for offensive, military-style missions. Plaintiffs charged that this marketing

violated the prohibition against “unfair . . . acts or practices in the conduct of any trade or commerce” in the Connecticut Unfair Trade Practices Act (CUPTA). The court found that the plaintiffs had stated a cause of action for personal injuries under CUPTA as a result of the manufacturer’s advertising. It also ruled that the lawsuit was not barred by the PLCAA because it came within the one of the exceptions in the statute to the legal protection given the industry: for “an action in which a manufacturer or seller of a qualified product [which includes firearms] knowingly violated a State or Federal statute applicable to the sale or marketing of the product, and the violation was a proximate cause of the harm for which relief is sought.” The court rejected the defendant’s argument that the exception could be based only on a statute specifically applicable to firearms, holding that generally applicable statutes like CUPTA support application of the exception because they are capable of being applied to firearms. The Soto decision may well have opened the door for victims to pursue lawsuits under state consumer protection laws against gun manufacturers whose irresponsible marketing can be causally linked to specific shootings. Dennis A. Henigan See also: Product Liability Lawsuits; Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005; Smith & Wesson Settlement Agreement

Further Reading Henigan, Dennis A. “Guns Don’t Kill People, People Kill People” and Other Myths about Guns and Gun Control. Boston: Beacon Press, 2016. Legal Action Project. http://www.gunlawsuits .org/ (accessed January 22, 2011).



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Lowy, Jonathan E. “Litigating against Gun Manufacturers.” Trial 36 (2000): 42–48. Siebel, Brian J. “City Lawsuits against the Gun Industry: A Roadmap for Reforming Another Deadly Industry.” St. Louis University Public Law Review 18 (1999): 247–90.

League of Women Voters and Gun Control The League of Women Voters (LWV) is a nonpartisan political organization that encourages informed and active participation in government. LWV works to increase understanding of major public policy issues and to influence public policy through education and advocacy. The league has always taken a strong stand on gun control, with an emphasis on protecting “the health and safety of citizens through limiting the accessibility and regulating the ownership of handguns and semiautomatic assault weapons.” The League endorsed the Million Mom March in 2000 and has continued to support gun control positions. Founded by Carrie Chapman Catt in 1920 as an outgrowth of the suffragist movement, LWV has over 130,000 members and supporters. It operates at local, state, and national levels, with over 1,000 local and 50 state leagues. At its 1990 convention, the league adopted its comprehensive “Statement of Position on Gun Control.” The 1994 and 1998 conventions amended the statement. According to the LWV, the proliferation of handguns and semiautomatic assault weapons in the United States is a major health and safety threat. Because of that threat, the league supports (1) strong federal measures to limit the accessibility and ownership of those weapons by private citizens; (2) the regulation of

firearms for consumer safety; (3) licensing procedures for gun ownership by private citizens, including a waiting period for a background check, personal identity verification, gun safety education, and annual license renewal; (4) a ban on Saturday night specials; (5) enforcement of strict penalties for the improper possession of and crimes committed with handguns and assault weapons; and (6) allocation of resources to improve regulation and monitoring of gun dealers. The league takes the position that the Second Amendment does not confer on private citizens the right to keep and bear arms— despite the rulings of the U.S. Supreme Court in 2008 (District of Columbia v. Heller) and 2010 (McDonald v. City of Chicago). After adopting this gun control position in 1990, the league wrote to all members of Congress to inform them of it and to urge passage of federal legislation to control the proliferation of handguns and semiautomatic assault weapons. The league strongly supported passage of the Brady Bill and legislation to ban semiautomatic assault weapons and joined other organizations in 1995–1996 to lobby against efforts to repeal the Brady Bill and the Assault Weapons Ban. In 2004, the LWV opposed the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act because it banned gun suits against the gun industry by cities, counties, or individuals. In addition to supporting efforts to extend the Assault Weapons Ban in 2004, in both 2004 and 2006, the organization also opposed congressional efforts to repeal District of Columbia gun safety laws (League of Women Voters 2010). LWV support for gun control legislation to reduce gun violence has remained consistent since then at both the national and chapter levels. In response to a mass shooting in Boulder, Colorado, that claimed ten lives in March 2021, for

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example, League of Women Voters of Boulder County and League of Women Voters of Colorado issued a joint statement declaring “it is time for Congress to adopt legislation that will mandate universal background checks, ban assault weapons, place limits on high-capacity ammunition magazines, and fund research and reporting on gun violence in America. Curbing gun violence is a critical matter of public safety, public health, and public confidence” (League of Women Voters 2021). Walter F. Carroll See also: Assault Weapons; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Consumer Product Safety Laws; District of Columbia v. Heller; McDonald v. City of Chicago; Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005; Second Amendment; Washington, DC

Further Reading League of Women Voters. https://www.lwv .org/ (accessed January 28, 2022). League of Women Voters. “League Calls Gun Laws Tied to DC Voting Rights Bill Unacceptable.” April 19, 2010. https://www.lwv .org/newsroom/press-releases/league-calls -gun-laws-tied-dc-voting-rights-bill-unac ceptable (accessed June 12, 2022). League of Women Voters. “LWV Statement on Gun Violence in Boulder, Colorado.” March 25, 2021. https://www.lwv.org/news room/press-releases/lwv-statement-gun -violence-boulder-colorado (accessed January 28, 2022). Stuhler, Barbara. For the Public Record: A Documentary History of the League of Women Voters. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2000. Young, Louise Merwin, with Ralph A. Young. In the Public Interest: The League of Women Voters, 1920–1970. New York: Greenwood Press, 1989.

Legal Implications of Firearms Characteristics A weapon’s appearance and presentation may influence a legal proceeding involving the weapon’s use. The core principle is that a weapon’s presence may prime aggressive and negative ideation and thus influence juror behavior. Berkowitz (1993, 70) postulated: “If we tend to think of guns . . . as instruments that are deliberately used to hurt others, rather than as objects of sport and enjoyment, the mere presence of a gun may stimulate us to assault others more severely than we intend.” Many studies have found that weapons do prime aggressive ideation and behavior. Berkowitz and LePage (1967) found that subjects gave more shocks to others in the presence of weapons. More recently, Klinesmith, Kasser, and McAndrew (2006) found manipulating a simulated gun increased aggression as measured by administering different levels of hot sauce to others. Anderson, Benjamin, and Bartholow (1998) speculated that the “gun pulls the trigger”—as the presence of weapons influences subjects to recognize aggressive words faster than other words. Such effects are also dependent on the subjects’ knowledge. Bartholow et al. (2005) found that assault weapons primed more aggressive thoughts in hunters than in nonhunters. It was presumed that the former were more aware of assault weapons being designed for use against humans. A bias against assault weapons was evidenced by some in the sport firearms community by the comments of Jim Zumbo, a huntingoriented journalist who called those who owned such guns “terrorists,” unleashing a firestorm in the firearms community. This research speaks to the issue of whether firearms appearance and presentation influences a trial. Several studies



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indicate that an emphasis on the weapon can lead to negative priming against defendants. Researchers have concluded that weapons’ presence can influence legal proceedings through jurors’ evaluation of motives. Dienstbier et al. (1998) found that with increased weapon salience, due to more direct exposure, mock jurors attributed more guilt and assigned longer sentences to the gun user—in that case, an armed burglar. Females gave longer sentences and were more affected by weapons exposure. Branscombe, Crosby, and Weir (1993), conducting mock trial research involving a homeowner who shot at a burglar, found that incompetent male shooters and competent female shooters were dealt with more harshly than the reverse pairing. The interaction seemed due to whether homeowners breached stereotypical standards (males being competent shooters and females incompetent). Shooters who violated gender roles were perceived more negatively for their use of a firearm than those who did not breach normal gender roles. Similarly, there is evidence that the use of assault weapons in a defensive gun situation has a negative impact on a defendant (Ayoob 2000; Rauch 2004). Meyer et al. (2009) found in a mock juror experiment in the shooting of a burglar by a homeowner, where the district attorney viewed the shooting as unjustified, that the homeowner using an assault weapon was viewed more harshly—as reflected in a stiffer recommended verdict and sentence. Interestingly, women using an assault weapon were even more negatively evaluated by men and even more severely by other women. The women were seen as violating gender stereotypes in these studies, and more blame accrued to them. The implication for the legal profession is that emphasizing weapons’ appearance might prejudice a jury. Prejudicial

evidence may be disallowed in court even if probative. For example, Rule 403 of the U.S. Federal Rules of Evidence states that evidence may be excluded if its value is “outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice, confusion of the issues, or misleading the jury, or by considerations of undue delay, waste of time, or needless presentation of cumulative evidence.” Glenn E. Meyer See also: Demonization of Guns

Further Reading Anderson, Craig A., Arlin J. Benjamin, Jr., and Bruce D. Bartholow. “Does the Gun Pull the Trigger? Automatic Priming Effects of Weapon Pictures and Weapon Names.” Psychological Science 9 (1998): 308–14. Ayoob, Massad. “Firepower: How Much Is Too Much?” Combat Handguns 21 (2000): 8–9, 90–91. Bartholow, Bruce D., Craig A. Anderson, Nicholas L. Carnagey, and Arlin J. Benjamin Jr. “Interactive Effects of Life Experience and Situational Sues on Aggression: The Weapons Priming Effect in Hunters and Nonhunters.” Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 41 (2005): 48–60. Berkowitz, Leonard. Aggression: Its Causes, Consequences, and Control. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1993. Berkowitz, Leonard, and Anthony LePage. “Weapons as Aggression-Eliciting Stimuli.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 7 (1967): 202–7. Branscombe, Nyla, Paul Crosby, and Julie A. Weir. “Social Inferences Concerning Male and Female Homeowners Who Use a Gun to Shoot an Intruder.” Aggressive Behavior 192 (1993): 113–24. Dienstbier, Richard A., Scott C. Roesch, Ayumi Mizumoto, S. H. Hemenover, Roger C. Lott, and Gustavo Carlo. “Effects

522 | Lethality Effect of Guns of Weapons on Guilt Judgments and Sentencing Recommendations for Criminals.” Basic and Applied Social Psychology 20 (1998): 93–102. Klinesmith, Jennifer, Tim Kasser, and Francis T. McAndrew. “Guns, Testosterone, and Aggression: An Experimental Test of a Mediational Hypothesis.” Psychological Science 17 (2006): 568–71. Meyer, Glenn E., Alicia S. Baños, Tiffany Gerondale, Christine Kiriazes, Claire M. Lakin, and Amanda C. Rinker. “Juries, Gender, and Assault Weapons.” Journal of Applied Social Psychology 39 (2009): 945–72. Rauch, Walter. “A Rifle for Home Defense.” S.W.A.T. 23 (2004): 74–76. Rule 403. Federal Rules of Evidence. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 2009. http://www.law.cornell.edu /rules/fre/ (accessed May 31, 2011).

Lethality Effect of Guns Assumptions and assertions about the comparative lethality of various potentially deadly weapons have been critical in the debate over gun policy. Zimring’s influential study (1968, 728) asserted that gun wounds are five times more lethal than knife wounds and that homicide would decline substantially if outlawing guns caused the less deadly knife to become the primary weapon used in assaults. A flaw in this argument is that attackers who would have inflicted a gunshot wound would presumably substitute a very large, very dangerous knife if a gun were not available. Zimring’s data do not, however, focus on large knives, but rather on an undifferentiated sample of wounds inflicted with knives defined to include any edged or pointed weapon (e.g., hairpins, fingernail files, forks, safety razors, etc.) as wounding agents. A comparison of wounds

inflicted by such trivial weapons with lethal gunshot wounds does not tell us how much more lethal guns are than long-bladed knives. Although, in the context of penetrating abdominal wounds, stabbings are more common occurrences, research has suggested that gunshot wounds are up to eight times deadlier than knife wounds (Gad et al. 2012). This differential increases exponentially when the wounds are self-inflicted versus the individual being harmed by another person (Bukur et al. 2011). The major reason guns in general are so much deadlier than even large knives is that rifles, and particularly shotguns, are so much deadlier than either knives or handguns (Fackler 1987; Kleck 1984). Long gun wounds may be as much as fifteen times deadlier than knife wounds, which would make long guns five to eleven times deadlier than handguns, depending on the calibers involved (Kates 1989, 205; see also Braga and Cook 2018). All this reflects negatively on “handgunonly controls”—that is, controls aimed at reducing handgun ownership without imposing the same politically unpalatable restrictions on long gun ownership. For the sake of argument, assume a ban made it impossible for criminals to obtain handguns. That would only reduce the number of homicides if the great majority of those criminals, upon being deprived of handguns, switched to using knives when committing their crimes. If instead any substantial number of criminals began using the much more deadly sawed-off shotgun, homicide would actually increase. What would happen if a handgun ban caused 50 percent of woundings that now occur with handguns to occur with sawed-off shotguns instead, while the other 50 percent of woundings were inflicted with knives instead of handguns? Given comparative



lethality figures like those set out in the last paragraph, the number of murders would double from the shotgun woundings alone— even if none of the 50 percent of woundings caused by knifing resulted in death. A hypothetical 50-50 shotgun-knife substitution is realistic. “Anywhere from 54 percent to about 80 percent of homicides occur in circumstances that would easily permit the use of a long gun,” Gary Kleck has observed (1984, 186–94). Indeed, if a handgun-only ban actually kept handguns from criminals, long guns might be substituted by far more than 50 percent of those criminals. In a National Institute of Justice survey of 2,000 felons in ten prisons across the country, 82 percent agreed that “if a criminal wants a handgun but can’t get one he can always saw off a long gun.” Further, according to 87 percent of those felons who had often used handguns in crime and 89 percent of those who had often used shotguns, it would be “easy” to do this (Wright and Rossi 1986, 221, Table 11.3). Based on these responses, Lizotte (1986) calculated that the current handgun death toll could more than triple if a handgun ban led to long gun substitution at the rates indicated. Two caveats to the foregoing must be noted. First, Col. Martin Fackler, MD, an experienced battle surgeon who founded and for a decade directed the U.S. Armed Services Wound Ballistics Laboratory and who is a leading technical expert on woundings, discounts all the precise comparison figures given above (including Zimring’s) because no study compares wounds and deaths with all these weapons based on tracing actual wound paths. Fackler does nevertheless agree that, all other things being equal, a knife wound is less likely to kill than a handgun wound, which, in turn, is less deadly than one inflicted with a long gun, particularly a large-gauge shotgun.

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Second, the fact that knives are short-range weapons whereas guns allow killing at a distance has little practical import because the great majority of shootings occur at very short range. In sum, a fundamental principle of gun policy should be to avoid any legislation that would drive criminals to use more deadly weaponry rather than less deadly weaponry. This principle counsels against banning Saturday night specials (SNSs) instead of, or without, banning all other handguns or firearms in general. The controversy over SNSs is an odd one in which each of the opposing parties holds a position that is difficult to square with their general views. The NRA exalts the important defensive value of guns, so why does it not endorse banning SNSs as a consumer protection measure? If the SNS label is strictly limited to apply only to cheap, low-caliber handguns, such guns have far less “stopping power” (ability to disable an attacker rapidly) than larger-caliber handguns. On the other hand, the anti-gun lobby denies the defensive value of guns and sees handguns as tools for crime: so why would it lobby for banning SNSs, with the inevitable result of driving criminals to obtain largercaliber, more deadly handguns? As for the defensive utility of firearms, several other points require clarification because they have been the subject of so much mythology. Movie portrayals create the false impression that bullets can pick shooting victims up and throw them backward. If firing a gun actually released that much energy, Newton’s third law (“equal and opposite reaction”) would mean the shooter would concomitantly be knocked backward. In fact, shooting victims usually fall forward in whatever direction they were traveling. If victims exhibit violent body motion at all, it is not from the physical

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force of the bullet, but from neuromuscular reaction. That does not necessarily cause the victim to move backward, but rather may impel the body in any number of directions. Similarly, gun owners’ faith in the efficacy of their firearms is often highly exaggerated. It is nonsensical to suggest that a victim could be knocked down by being hit in the finger with a .45-caliber gun. Indeed, the supposedly definitive military testing establishing the .45’s “stopping power” was a farce: the experts doing the testing began with a strong bias favoring the .45 and manipulated a wholly inadequate testing program to support that result. Incidentally, though most any rifle bullet will penetrate the Kevlar vests police wear under their shirts, neither .45s nor other handguns will reliably do so. By the same token, the idea of a single hit, particularly with a handgun, physically incapacitating an attacker is also largely a myth. With the exception of shots that penetrate the brain, anyone who immediately falls down after being shot only once has been mentally rather than physically incapacitated (i.e., he has lost the will to continue). Even a shot through the heart does not physically incapacitate the victim for ten or more seconds; persons shot through the heart have been able to continue strenuous activities for that long, including returning fire. There are many verified instances of persons continuing to attack, fight, or flee for short periods after being shot multiple times in vital areas. This is not to deny that firearms represent the only or most practical resort for victims who are likely to be both taken by surprise and physically weaker than criminal attackers. This is effectively conceded even by opponents of defensive gun use when they

suggest that, rather than using any other weapon, “the best defense against injury” for victims facing robbers or rapists “is to put up no defense—give them what they want or run” (Shields 1981, 124–25; Yeager, Alviani, and Loving 1976; Zimring and Zuehl 1986). And in instances when criminal attackers are killed by victims, the weapon is generally a handgun and almost always a firearm of some kind (MacDonald and Tennenbaum 1999). The point, however, is that though comparatively powerful, firearms are still not as effective a weapon as many owners think they are. Victims who pull a gun on an attacker are fortunate that, in the great majority of cases, doing so suffices to frighten criminals into flight rather than provoking a gunfight in which both sides might suffer severe injury or death (Kleck 1997, 162–63). Don B. Kates Jr. See also: Gunshot Wounds (Wound Ballistics); Saturday Night Specials; Weapons Instrumentality Effect

Further Reading Braga, Anthony A., and Philip J. Cook. “The Association of Firearm Caliber With Likelihood of Death From Gunshot Injury in Criminal Assaults.” JAMA Network Open 1, no. 3 (2018): e180833. Bukur, Marko, Kenji Inaba, Galinos Barmparas, Joseph J. DuBose, Lydia Lam, Bernardino C. Branco, Thomas Lustenberger, and Demetrios Demetriades. “SelfPenetrating Injuries at a Level I Trauma Center.” Injury 42, no. 5 (2011): 474–77. Fackler, Martin. “Physics of Missile Injuries.” In Evaluation and Management of Trauma, edited by Norman E. McSwain Jr. and Morris D. Kerstein, 25–41. Norwalk, CT: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1987.

Gad, Mohammad A., Aly Saber, Sherief Farrag, Mohamed E. Shams, and Goda M. Ellabban. “Incidence, Patterns, and Factors Predicting Mortality of Abdominal Injuries in Trauma Patients.” North American Journal of Medical Sciences 4, no. 3 (2012): 129–34. Kates, Don B. “Firearms and Violence: Old Premises and Current Evidence.” In Violence in America, edited by Ted Robert Gurr, vol. 1, 197–215. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage Publications, 1989. Kleck, Gary. “Handgun-Only Control: A Policy Disaster in the Making.” In Firearms and Violence: Issues of Public Policy, edited by Don B. Kates, 167–200. Cambridge, MA: Ballinger, 1984. Kleck, Gary. Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1997. Lizotte, Alan J. “The Costs of Using Gun Control to Reduce Homicide.” Bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine 62 (1986): 539–58. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih .gov/pmc/articles/PMC1629249/pdf/bull nyacadmed00051-0173.pdf (accessed January 21, 2022). MacDonald, John M., and Avraham N. Tennenbaum. “Justifiable Homicide by Civilians.” In Advances of Criminological Theory: The Criminology of Criminal Law, edited by William S. Laufer and Freda Adler, vol. 8, 463–91. Piscataway, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 1999. Shields, Pete. Guns Don’t Die—People Do. New York: Arbor House, 1981. Wright, James D., and Peter H. Rossi. Armed and Considered Dangerous: A Survey of Felons and Their Firearms. New York: Aldine, 1986. Yeager, Matthew G., Joseph D. Alviani, and Nancy Loving. How Well Does the Handgun Protect You and Your Family? Handgun Control Staff Technical Report No. 2. Washington, DC: U.S. Conference of Mayors, 1976.

Libertarianism and Gun Control | 525 Zimring, Franklin E. “Is Gun Control Likely to Reduce Violent Killings?” University of Chicago Law Review 35 (1968): 721–37. Zimring, Franklin E., and James Zuehl. “Victim Injury Death in Urban Robbery: A Chicago Study.” Journal of Legal Studies 15 (1986): 1–40.

Liability of Gun Manufacturers. See Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005 Liberalism and Gun Control. See Ideologies—Conservative and Liberal Libertarianism and Gun Control Libertarians and the Libertarian Party have been among the strongest and most consistent supporters of gun rights, which have been one of the cornerstones of their platforms for decades. Libertarian objections to gun control rest on both philosophical and practical grounds. In general, Libertarians seek to maximize personal freedom, which they believe can be accomplished only through severely limiting the scope of government. They seek to minimize the impact of government in all areas—economic, social, and international. Their core beliefs include liberty, responsibility, and tolerance. Although Libertarian Party candidates rarely win elections, a significant minority of Americans support some or many of their positions. Libertarian political philosophy combines the social positions of liberals and the economic positions of conservatives into what may fairly be described as a general “hands-off”

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approach. Individuals should be free to live their lives as they choose, so long as they do not interfere with the rights of others to exercise their freedoms. Likewise, individuals are responsible for their behaviors and should not turn to the government for assistance. Libertarians oppose virtually all restrictions on firearms. According to the 2010 party platform, “We oppose all laws at any level of government requiring registration of, or restricting, the ownership, manufacture, or transfer or sale of firearms or ammunition.” They explicitly oppose banning “assault rifles” on their website. Libertarians believe that restricting access to firearms endangers law-abiding citizens while emboldening criminals. They equate many gun laws to Prohibition, stating that restrictive gun laws will create a lucrative black market for firearms. They believe firearms are the most effective deterrents to crime, and that “[A] man with a gun in his home is no threat to you if you aren’t breaking into it.” It is not clear if Libertarians would deprive convicted felons from possessing firearms, although such a position would not contradict their philosophy. Often lost among the issue positions and philosophy is a strong Libertarian belief in personal responsibility. Indeed, “if a person commits a crime with a gun, then impose the severest penalties for the injuries done to the victim. Similarly, hold the negligent gun user fully liable for all harm his negligence does to others” (emphasis in original). Philosophical and practical support for gun rights may be found at the Cato Institute, a Libertarian-leaning think tank in Washington, D.C. Robert A. Levy, a senior fellow at the Cato Institute, was cocounsel for Dick Heller in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), and he and Ilya Shapiro, also

with the Cato Institute, authored an amicus brief in McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010). In addition, the Cato Institute publishes research supportive of gun rights and hosts public events and forums that address the issue. The Libertarian Party’s website best summarizes their position on the issue of gun control: “Rather than banning guns, the politicians and the police should encourage gun ownership, as well as education and training programs. A responsible, wellarmed and trained citizenry is the best protection against domestic crime and the threat of foreign invasion. America’s founders knew that. It is still true today” (emphasis in original). Harry L. Wilson See also: District of Columbia v. Heller; McDonald v. City of Chicago

Further Reading Cato Institute and Joyce Lee Malcolm. “In the Supreme Court of the United States: District of Columbia, et al. (Petitioners) v. Dick Anthony Heller (Respondent): Brief of the CATO Institute and History Professor Joyce Lee Malcolm as Amici Curiae in Support of Respondent.” http://www.cato .org/pubs /legalbriefs /dc_v_heller.pdf (accessed January 28, 2022). Cato Institute and Pacific Legal Foundation. “In the Supreme Court of the United States: Otis McDonald, et al. (Petitioners) v. City of Chicago, IL, et al. (Respondents): Brief Amicus Curiae of CATO Institute and Pacific Legal Foundation in Support of Petitioner.” http://www.cato.org/pubs/legal briefs/mcdonald_v_chicago.pdf (accessed January 28, 2022). Kates, Don B., Jr. “Why a Civil Libertarian Opposes Gun Control.” Civil Liberties Review 3 (1976): 24–28. Learn Libertarianism. http://www.libertari anism.com/ (accessed January 28, 2022).

Licensing | 527

Licensing Licensing is a method of control employed by the government to regulate behavior through the granting of permission to engage in some behavior or activity. With respect to guns, the states or federal government have considered or enacted systems of licensing pertaining to gun manufacturers, gun dealers, and gun owners. Licensing is defended on up to four grounds: it prevents certain categories of individuals, including criminals, children, and those considered mentally incompetent, from gaining easy access to guns; it ensures that those having guns demonstrate some degree of competency (although not all states impose this as a requirement); it facilitates criminal investigations and prosecutions; and it regulates the accessibility of an inherently dangerous commodity based, for example, on the requirements of one’s occupation. Gun and ammunition manufacturers are required to have a federal license and to pay annual fees ($50 for gun manufacturers, $10 for ammunition makers), according to the Gun Control Act of 1968. Manufacturers of armor-piercing ammunition or “destructive devices” (such as land mines, bombs, and hand grenades) pay annual fees of $1,000. Since enactment of the Federal Firearms Act of 1938, gun dealers have been required to have a federal firearms license (FFL) if they buy or sell firearms across state boundaries. The Gun Control Act of 1968 tightened some of these regulations. The license fee of $1 set in the 1938 law was increased to $10 in 1968. The act also banned the interstate shipment of most guns and ammunition to private individuals and strengthened dealer record-keeping requirements. Because of the small fee, relative ease of

acquisition, and limited enforcement, many private individuals acquired FFLs to receive discounted prices or make gun shipments easier rather than to set up a retail or wholesale business. Up until the early 1990s, about 80 percent of all FFLs went to such individuals. The Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986 relaxed interstate regulations, allowing for interstate sales of long guns. Gun dealers were also allowed to conduct sales in locations other than their stores; restrictions were placed on the ability of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) to regulate dealers; and record-keeping requirements were reduced. The Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 tightened certain regulations, requiring licensees to be photographed and fingerprinted, and requiring that they cooperate with firearm trace requests and report any thefts to the ATF. License fees were also increased to $200 per year, with annual renewal fees of $90. This plus stricter regulation prompted a dramatic drop in the number of FFLs, from just under 300,000 in the early 1990s to about 50,000 by 2007. Calls to enact a national system of licensing for gun owners date to at least the 1930s, but no such national system has been enacted. In recent years, the subject has not been discussed much at the national level. During the 2000 presidential election, however, both of the Democratic candidates for president, Vice President Al Gore and former senator Bill Bradley, endorsed licensing. Gun owners are licensed in some states. Handgun owners must obtain licenses or permits in Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, and the District of Columbia. While every state and the District of Columbia allow concealed carry in some form,

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thirty-five of these (plus Washington, DC) issue licenses for citizens to carry concealed handguns. Of these, eight states and Washington, DC, have “may-issue” laws where the states issue licenses at their discretion, meaning that citizens must demonstrate a justifiable reason for gun carrying; the other twenty-seven states are “shall-issue” states where the state must issue the license unless citizens are barred from possessing a gun, such as if the applicant has a felony record. Fourteen states allow citizens to carry guns openly in public with a state-issued license. Robert J. Spitzer See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF); Concealed Weapons Laws; Federal Firearms Act of 1938; Firearm Dealers; Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986; Gun Control Act of 1968; Open Carry Laws

Further Readings Giffords Law Center. “Concealed Carry.” n.d. https://lawcenter.giffords.org/gun-laws /policy-areas/guns-in-public/concealed -carry/ (accessed November 17, 2019). Giffords Law Center. “Open Carry.” n.d. https://lawcenter.giffords.org/gun-laws /policy-areas/guns-in-public/open-carry / (accessed November 17, 2019). Harcourt, Bernard E. Guns, Crime, and Punishment in America. New York: New York University Press, 2003. Spitzer, Robert J. Gun Control: A Documentary and Reference Guide. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2009.

Loaded-Chamber Indicator Gun design is one way to make firearms safer and less attractive to thieves. Minor alterations to guns can prevent at least a small number of deaths and accidental shootings

every year. Among the many manufacturing designs developed to make guns safer— including combination locks, gun childproofing (e.g., hard-to-pull triggers), and increased barrel length (making a gun more difficult to conceal)—the loaded-chamber indicator is one of the most popular. A loaded-chamber indicator is a mechanism giving an alert that the gun is both loaded and chambered. The indicator is often a tiny protruding pin or color-coded display. Loaded-chamber indicators are most commonly used on semiautomatic pistols, as someone holding such a gun may be unaware that a cartridge is in the chamber if the magazine has been detached. The first patent for a loaded-chamber indicator was granted in 1888. The device used a raised pin to indicate that the firearm was loaded. By the early 1900s, pistols manufactured by Browning, Luger, Colt, and Winchester were available with such a device. A drawback to the loaded-chamber indicators is that it may not be readily understandable to someone unfamiliar with the operations of a firearm. An individual handling a gun must be aware that it has an indicator, understand what the indicator is implying, and what to do based on this knowledge (e.g., to render the gun harmless by ejecting the chambered cartridge). Gun control advocates want legislation to standardize the design of loaded-chamber indicators for ease in use and to let such use become common knowledge. Another concern is that the design and manufacture of firearms and their safety devices are subject to little regulation. Laws tend to focus on the individual who abuses guns, not the manufacturers who design them. The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) is responsible for setting standards on most consumer products. One

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of the key products that the CPSC is barred from regulating is firearms and ammunition. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives has overall authority over firearms, but this authority does not include the regulation of the safety of gun designs. There has been some research on the effectiveness of loaded-chamber indicators. A 1991 Government Accounting Office (GAO) study found that 23 percent of a sample of accidental-shooting deaths could have been prevented by loaded-chamber indicators. Extrapolating to the national level, 345 deaths and many more accidentalshooting injuries could have been prevented if loaded-chamber indicators were found on all firearms. The GAO report was further supported by the work of Vernick et al. (2003), who found that 20 percent of deaths were avoidable by the inclusion of a loadedchamber indicator in a sample of shootings in Maryland and Wisconsin. Loaded-chamber indicators are popular with the public health community, as they do not rely on changing the behavior of users (which public health researchers have found is often hard to do) but instead focus on the design of guns. It has been shown that loaded-chamber indicators can prevent gunrelated deaths and injuries in which the operator did not know the gun was either loaded or chambered. Despite the benefits of loaded-chamber indicators, the vast majority of firearm manufacturers do not provide these devices voluntarily. Estimates range from 10 to 20 percent of all guns equipped with a loaded-chamber indicator. Money is one factor that manufacturers offer for not adding this feature to all of their guns. The majority of the public supports gun safety features such as the loaded-chamber indicator. The National Rifle Association even agrees with designing guns to make them safer, provided these designs are not mandated

by law and are optional for those who want to purchase guns with such features. Sean Maddan See also: Accidents; Motor Vehicle Laws as a Model for Gun Laws; Smart Guns; Trigger Locks

Further Reading Harris, George. “Status Check: The Benefits of Loaded-Chamber Indicators.” ShootingIllustrated.com, January 9, 2018. https:// www.shootingillustrated.com/content/sta tus-check-the-benefits-of-loaded-chamber -indicators/ (accessed December 23, 2021). U.S. General Accounting Office. Accidental Shootings: Many Deaths and Injuries Caused by Firearms Could Be Prevented. Washington, DC: U.S. General Accounting Office, 1991. http://archive.gao.gov/d20t9/143619.pdf (accessed December 23, 2021). Vernick, Jon S., Zachary F. Meisel, Stephen P. Teret, John S. Milne, and Stephen W. Hargarten. “‘I Didn’t Know the Gun was Loaded’: An Examination of Two Safety Devices that Can Reduce the Risk of Unintentional Firearm Injuries.” Journal of Public Health Policy 20 (1999): 427–40. Vernick, Jon S., Mallory O’Brien, Lisa M. Hepburn, Sara B. Johnson, Daniel W. Webster, and Stephen W. Hargarten. “Unintentional and Undetermined Firearm Related Deaths: A Preventable Death Analysis for Three Safety Devices.” Injury Prevention 9 (2003): 307–11. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc /articles/PMC1731016/pdf/v009p00307.pdf (accessed December 23, 2021).

LodeStar Firearms. See Smart Guns Loesch, Dana(1978–) Dana Loesch, a former spokeswoman for the National Rifle Association and a significant voice of the conservative movement,

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has long been a prominent advocate and supporter of the Second Amendment and gun rights. She has a devoted online following and an extensive track record of fervently defending the Second Amendment, guaranteeing the right to bear arms. Loesch was born and raised in Missouri. After graduating from Fox High School in Arnold, Missouri, she enrolled at St. Louis Community College before transferring to Webster University to study journalism. Loesch had been raised by parents who voted for Democrats, despite being rifle owners, and she identified as a Democrat while in college. She worked on President Bill Clinton’s 1996 reelection campaign but soon became disenchanted with the Democratic party after the scandal with Monica Lewinsky. Loesch fully detached and outright rejected the Democratic Party and its policies after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. After resigning from Clinton’s reelection campaign, Loesch gave birth to her first child and soon dropped out of Webster University and got married. She entered the media field as an investigative writer for St. Louis Magazine. Around the same time, she began blogging and creating content for her website, Mamalogues, which centered around the complexities and day-to-day tasks of motherhood. The website quickly gained popularity, and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch ran a weekly column based on the content from 2006 until 2008; the column won Loesch the Riverfront Times’ “Best St. Louis Newspaper Columnist” in 2007. In 2008, she launched her radio program, “The Dana Show: The Conservative Alternative,” which soon became syndicated nationally and remains on-air at the time of this writing. In 2009, Loesch received an anonymous email threatening her family after she offered commentary defending a Black conservative activist. In response to the

threats, she underwent firearms training and began carrying a handgun. She also used the opportunity to transform herself into a powerful Second Amendment advocate as her vigorous stance on gun rights and razor-sharp public speaking skills resonated with conservatives across the United States. Around this same time, Loesch helped found the St. Louis Tea Party and was instrumental in organizing protests and speaking out at public rallies on issues related to gun rights and other right-wing governmental policies. In October 2010, Loesch joined Breitbart as a commentator and editor-in-chief of the site’s “Big Journalism” project. While working for the website, she, alongside other new and upcoming conservative voices, spoke out against mainstream media bias, establishment politics, and gun control measures. However, after Andrew Breitbart died in 2012, Loesch conflicted with Donald Trump’s former ally, Steve Bannon, who had been positioned as executive chairman of Breitbart News. The conflict between the two lasted until Loesch sued Breitbart News so she could leave her contract. According to Loesch, owner and operator Breitbart LLC bound her to “what amounts to indentured servitude in limbo” after she says she was forced to terminate her contract as the result of an “increasingly hostile” working environment (Howie 2012). During the dispute with Breitbart, CNN was intrigued with Loesch and her brashness and hired her as political commentator for their upcoming election coverage. However, Loesch’s tenure with CNN did not last long after she made several controversial remarks, in which she supported a group of marines who urinated on dead Taliban soldiers. Loesch claimed that the media backlash she received was “disingenuous.” The following year, Loesch was in another



predicament with CNN. Loesch was banned from the now-discontinued “Piers Morgan Live” after fighting with its host on Twitter, and the network quickly distanced itself from her. Loesch’s specific brand of attacks and aggressive presence on and off air proved to be unappealing to mainstream media outlets and their audiences. In 2014, Loesch left Breitbart and worked for conservative commentator Glenn Beck’s up-and-coming media organization, The Blaze. On January 10, 2014, Loesch launched her own television program, “Dana,” which lasted approximately four years. That same year, she released her first book, Hands Off My Gun: Defeating the Plot to Disarm America (2014), which focuses on the history of the Second Amendment and delves into what “gun confiscation would mean to Americans’ basic rights as citizens.” In it, she explores why the Founding Fathers included the right to

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bear arms in the Bill of Rights. One of Loesch’s arguments in the book is that gun control regulations throughout history have been used to keep minority populations under control. Additionally, she argues that current disputes in favor of gun control are mainly based on emotions and fear. Loesch’s time at The Blaze was considerably more successful than her work with other news outlets. She did, however, consistently attack mainstream media outlets over their bias against conservative values throughout her four years with the organization. In 2016, for instance, she labeled the mainstream media as “the rat bastards of the Earth.” She once declared the media the “worst thing” that could happen to the U.S. political system because of the way they cover various issues, especially gun control and immigration. After nearly four years with The Blaze, she parted amicably with the organization in pursuit of other opportunities.

Dana Loesch, a now former National Rifle Association (NRA) television personality, speaks at the annual NRA convention in Dallas, Texas, on May 4, 2018. (Reuters/Alamy Stock Photo)

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One such opportunity was a job with the National Rifle Association (NRA), which she joined in February 2017 (prior to leaving The Blaze) as a spokeswoman and special assistant to the group’s executive vice president for public communication. Often focusing on women’s policy issues, Loesch hosted a show on NRA TV until production for the channel ended in June 2019, where she continued to make controversial statements. One prominent NRA-featured video that Loesch was a part of that resulted in immense backlash was a video called The Violence of Lies, which depicts Loesch talking about an undefined “they” and showcases protests against President Donald Trump in a harsh, negative scope. The video was condemned by some commentators, including DeRay Mckesson, a prominent figure in the Black Lives Matter movement, who stated that the video was an “open call to violence to protect white supremacy” (Bromwich 2017). Loesch also faced backlash for her participation in a CNN town hall hosted by the network’s Jake Tapper following the February 14, 2018, shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. The town hall had been organized as a way to bridge and advance the conversation between gun rights and gun control in the United States, and she participated as the NRA’s representative. During the town hall, which was broadcast live, Loesch called the shooting’s perpetrator an “insane monster” who should have never been able to obtain a firearm and condemned his actions. She also pointed to flaws in the background check system, including the failure to report mentally ill persons to the NICS system, thereby making it easier for them to unlawfully pass background checks. During the event, Loesch clashed with Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel over law enforcement’s

responsibility for the attack, in which she claimed there were warning signs from the perpetrator that had been missed by the agency. She also took heat from shooting survivor X Gonzalez, who asked her several pointed questions that Loesch refused to answer. In response to the town hall, Loesch wrote an article for RealClear Politics expressing her opinions on the event, stating that the town hall was ultimately sought to inflame rather than inform people of gun control and gun rights. In addition to criticizing states and their flawed system of background checks, Loesch criticized the FBI’s response to warnings in advance of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting and stated that the organization had become politicized. Similarly, she argued that the media has become overly politicized by mass shootings because they love high ratings. For example, she made a controversial remark that “many in legacy media love mass shootings” during a speech at the 2018 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC). After her speech at CPAC, Loesch made several NRA videos and advertisements that were interpreted by some commentators to be inciting violence and division. In March 2018, she made a controversial NRA video targeted at politicians, media figures and celebrities, stating, “Your time is running out. The clock starts now” (Polianskaya 2018), which quickly caught the mainstream media’s attention. At times, Loesch’s comments via social media have not represented the National Rifle Association’s official position. In June 2019, the NRA severed ties with Ackerman McQueen, the advertising agency that was responsible for the production of NRA TV content and Loesch lost her role as a paid spokesperson for the NRA. Although she no longer represents the NRA, Loesch

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remains a significant voice in the conservative movement. She has an immense social media presence and uses her platform to spread gun rights advocacy while also continuing to attack the mainstream media. Brian J. Monahan See also: Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting; National Rifle Association (NRA); Republican Party and Gun Control; Second Amendment; Trump, Donald J.

Further Readings “Best Newspaper Columnist 2007.” RiverFront Times. https://www.riverfronttimes .com/bestof/2007/award/best-newspaper -columnist-377182/ (accessed July 2, 2021). Bromwich, Jonah Engel. “N.R.A. Ad Condemning Protests against Trump Raises Partisan Anger.” New York Times, June 29, 2017. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/29/us /nra-ad-trump-protests.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Hawkins, Derek. “Dana Loesch, the NRA’s Brash Spokeswoman, Dials Back the Rage at CNN Town Hall.” Washington Post, February 22, 2018. https://www.washingtonpost .com/news/morning-mix/wp/2018/02/22 /dana-loesch-the-nras-brash-spokeswoman -dials-back-the-rage-at-cnn-town-hall/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Howie, Craig. “Dana Loesch Sues Breitbart. com LLC.” Politico, December 21, 2012. https://www.politico.com/story/2012/12 /dana-loesch-sues-breitbartcom-llc-085436 (accessed May 18, 2022). Joyner, Alfred. “NRATV Canceled: Five Controversial Remarks Dana Loesch Made Hosting the Gun Rights Channel.” Newsweek, June 26, 2019. https://www.newsweek .com/nratv-cancelled-five-controversial -remarks-dana-loesch-made-hosting-gun -rights-channel-1446064 (accessed May 18, 2022). Loesch, Dana. “CNN’s Parkland Townhall Sought to Inflame, Not Inform.” RealClear

Politics, March 28, 2019. https://www.real clearpolitics.com/articles/2019/03/28/cnns _parkland_townhall_sought_to_inflame _not_inform_139891.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Loesch, Dana. Hands Off My Gun: Defeating the Plot to Disarm America. New York: Center Street, 2014. Polianskaya, Alina. “NRA Issues Threatening Video Warning Journalists ‘Your Time Is Running Out.’” Independent, March 5, 2018. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world /americas/nra-video-threatens-journalists -gun-laws-us-florida-shooting-twitter-dana -loesch-a8240341.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Vazquez, Maegan. “NRA Spox: ‘Many in Legacy Media Love Mass Shootings.’” CNN, February 22, 2018. https://www.cnn .com /2018/02/22/politics /dana-loesch -cpac-media/index.html (accessed May 18, 2022).

Long Gun A long gun is a long firearm that is fired from the shoulder. Most long guns owned by civilians are rifles, carbines (short-barreled long guns, often using pistol-caliber ammunition, which for most purposes may be considered a variety of rifle), or shotguns. According to the most recent comprehensive national surveys on the subject, in 2010, about one in every five U.S. households reported having a shotgun in the home, and the same proportion reported having a rifle (National Opinion Research Center 2010a, 2010b). Most owners cite hunting as their primary reason for owning a long gun. Other reasons included self-defense and target shooting. A relatively small number of people also collected long guns or owned them because of job-related needs (Cook and Ludwig 1996; Smith 2001).

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Long guns are used in crime much less frequently than handguns. In recent years, approximately three-fourths of all murders have been committed with firearms, and of firearm murders for which the firearm type was known, approximately 8 percent have been committed with long guns and 91 percent committed with handguns (Federal Bureau of Investigation 2020). Several features distinguish rifles from handguns. Rifles fire higher-power ammunition, which makes them more lethal at greater distances. They have longer barrels and a longer sight radius, which make them more accurate at greater distances, and they are brought to the shoulder to fire, which helps shooters to manage recoil and to aim accurately. Though it is difficult to hit targets with handguns at ranges of 50 yards, rifles can do so at 300 yards or more. Rifle bullets can kill game or humans more reliably and quickly at long-range distances. Dozens of rifle cartridges are available with different ballistic and wounding properties. For casual or competitive target shooting, or hunting small animals such as squirrels, a rifle chambered for the .22 longrifle cartridge is often used. Military assault rifles and civilian rifles used to hunt small vermin at long range usually use relatively small-caliber, high-velocity bullets. The 5.56 mm round used in the military M16 assault rifle is also used as a civilian “varmint” cartridge. Heavier, larger-diameter bullets are used to hunt larger animals such as deer; the .308 Winchester and .30-06 (pronounced “thirty aught six”) are venerable deer-hunting cartridges. The most powerful ammunition, such as the .458 Winchester Magnum, is demanded for large, dangerous game. Shotguns are smoothbore weapons that are usually used to fire shells containing small balls called “shot.” Unlike the caliber

designations of other firearms and ammunition, shotgun shells are designated by gauge and shot type. The most common type of shotgun is 12-gauge, meaning that 12 lead balls of the diameter of the shotgun bore would weigh one pound. (The bore diameter of a 12-gauge shotgun is .73 inch, or about 18.5 mm.) Large-gauge numbers indicate smaller bore size, so a 20-gauge shotgun is smaller than a 12-gauge. Shot types vary the size and number of balls for different purposes. Small numbers of relatively large balls (about 0.33 inch for 00 buckshot) are used for deer hunting or self-defense. Larger numbers of smaller pellets (about 0.12 inch for #5 birdshot) are used to hunt smaller game such as ducks, squirrels, and wild turkeys, and for clay target shooting. The shot from a shotgun begins spreading or dispersing as soon as it leaves the barrel. At short ranges, the shot remains in a dense cluster and will make one large hole in the target. At longer ranges, the shot disperses in a pattern that makes it easier to hit small moving targets such as birds. The extent of dispersion at a given range can be adjusted by means of a choke, which is a tubular barrel insert. By narrowing the barrel with a choke, the shot can be made to disperse less rapidly, producing denser shot patterns at longer ranges, increasing the effective range. By leaving the barrel open, the shot can be made to disperse more rapidly, making hits easier at close range and allowing game at close range to be taken without an overly dense shot pattern destroying an excessive amount of meat. Shot dispersion varies with ammunition and gun selection, but generally a full choke will put about 70 percent of the shot in a thirty-inch circle at forty yards. A modified choke will put about 60 percent of the shot in the same circle, whereas an improved cylinder places about half in the circle and a



cylinder bore places about 40 percent in the circle. There are six main types of modern long gun action. The break-open action, more often used with shotguns than rifles, consists of a barrel on a hinge that allows the gun to “break” so that the shooter can insert or remove single cartridges from the breech. Two barrels may be used to allow two shots. Double-barrel shotguns are often much more expensive than single-barrel shotguns. Lever action is used in rifles but not shotguns. The lever-action rifle is often chambered for pistol cartridges such as the .44 Magnum and usually holds cartridges in a tube magazine under the barrel. A lever behind the trigger is moved down to eject a spent cartridge and back up to reload the chamber. Pump action, also called slide action, is more often seen on shotguns than rifles. It requires that a handle under the barrel be pulled back to eject a spent cartridge and pushed forward to load a new cartridge. Bolt action, which is a common action on high-power hunting rifles because it is strong, reliable, and accurate, requires that the firer pull back the bolt handle to eject a spent cartridge and return the bolt handle to the forward position to load a new cartridge. Some bolt-action weapons are single shot, but most feed between three and ten rounds from an internal magazine. In semiautomatic weapons, some of the energy from the cartridge’s expanding gas is used to eject the spent cartridge and load a new one without any action by the shooter. Each time the trigger is pressed, this process is repeated. Fully automatic weapons repeat this process continuously as long as the trigger is held and the ammunition supply is not exhausted. Matthew DeBell See also: Assault Weapons; Handguns; Homicides, Gun

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Further Reading Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. Guns in America: Results of a Comprehensive National Survey on Firearms Ownership and Use. Washington, DC: Police Foundation, 1996. Ezell, Edward C. Small Arms Today. Harrisburg, PA: Stackpole Books, 1984. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Crime in the United States 2019 [Uniform Crime Reports online]. Baltimore, 2020. https://ucr.fbi .gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2019/crime-in-the -u.s.-2019 (accessed January 20, 2022). National Opinion Research Center. General Social Survey, 2010a. (“Rifle—Rifle in Home?”) http://www.norc.uchicago.edu /GSS+Website/ (accessed June 20, 2011). National Opinion Research Center. General Social Survey, 2010b. (“Shotgun—Shotgun in Home?”) http://www.norc.uchicago.edu /GSS+Website/ (accessed June 20, 2011). Smith, Tom W. National Gun Policy Survey of the National Opinion Research Center: Research Findings. Chicago: National Opinion Research Center, 2001.

Long Island Railroad Shooting The Long Island Railroad shooting took place on December 7, 1993, when thirtyfive-year-old Colin Ferguson boarded the crowded 5:33 p.m. train filled with commuters and Christmas shoppers leaving out of New York’s Pennsylvania Station. Armed with a 9-mm Ruger P89 handgun, he opened fire on the train’s passengers as it pulled into the Merillon Avenue Station in Garden City, New York. Passengers were shot at pointblank range as the perpetrator made his way through the car. When he stopped to reload, two passengers took the opportunity to tackle and subdue him until police were able to take him into custody. By the end of the rampage, six people had been killed: Amy

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Federici (age twenty-seven), James Gorycki (age fifty-one), Maria Magtoto (age thirty), Dennis McCarthy (age fifty-two), Richard Nettleton (age twenty-four), and Mi Kyung Kim (age twenty-seven). Nineteen others were wounded in the attack. The perpetrator, an African American man, claimed that he was the victim of a racist society that had caused him to take action. He also said that he had decided to open fire on the train after it left New York City so as not to embarrass Mayor David Dinkins, an African American who was completing his term after being defeated for reelection by Rudolph Giuliani. Dinkins described the perpetrator’s remarks as “nonsense” (Moore 1993, 177). The perpetrator was found competent to stand trial and was permitted to act as his own attorney. He invoked a “Black rage defense,” claiming that he should not be held responsible for his actions, because they had been triggered by the racism he experienced in American society. In February 1995, he was convicted of six counts of murder and nineteen counts of attempted murder and sentenced to 315 years and 8 months. Subsequent appeals, including one that argued that the perpetrator’s conviction should be overturned because he was not competent to defend himself, were rejected by the courts. Carolyn McCarthy, whose husband was killed and whose son was seriously injured by Ferguson, ran for the U.S. House of Representatives in 1996 after her congressman, Dan Frisa, voted to repeal an assault weapons ban. McCarthy, who was a registered Republican, was elected as a Democrat on a gun control platform. Her campaign victory was later the subject of a made-for-television movie produced by Barbra Streisand. In January 1997, a multimillion-dollar lawsuit brought by the families of the

victims against the Long Island Railroad was dismissed when a judge ruled that the railroad was not liable for the perpetrator’s actions. In August 2000, New York governor George Pataki stood at the site of the shooting to sign what was described as the “nation’s toughest state anti-gun bill” into law (Gearty and Goldiner 2000, 6). The law mandated background checks for gun buyers at gun shows; required child safety locks on all guns; outlawed assault weapons; raised the minimum age to buy guns from eighteen to twenty-one; ordered gun makers to equip handguns with unique ballistic markers; and ordered the state police to combat gun trafficking. The perpetrator originally was incarcerated at the Attica Correctional Facility, a maximum security prison within the New York State Department of Correctional Services. While at Attica, the perpetrator had a long-running feud with another inmate, serial killer Joel Rifkin; he also was beaten by five other inmates in 1994. A month after the assault, the perpetrator was punished for attempting to start a prison riot. He was later transferred to the Upstate Correctional Facility in Malone, New York, before being transferred to the Five Points Correctional Facility in Romulus, New York, where he remains incarcerated as of July 2020. Jeffrey Kraus and Jaclyn Schildkraut See also: Mass Murder (Shootings); McCarthy, Carolyn

Further Reading Gearty, Robert, and Dave Goldiner. “Pataki Signs Tough Gun Bill.” New York Daily News, August 10, 2000. http://articles.nydaily news.com/2000-08-10/news/18150063_1 _smart-gun-technology-gun-laws-anti-gun (accessed June 20, 2011).

Kuby, Ronald L., and William M. Kuntsler. “So Crazy He Thinks He Is Sane: The Colin Ferguson Trial and the Competency Standard.” Cornell Journal of Law and Public Policy 19 (1995–1996): 19–26. Moore, Colin. “Mayor Rips Suspect’s ‘Nonsense.’” Newsday, December 9, 1993. Schuler, Christine. The Long Island Railroad Massacre. Written and produced by Christine Schuler; narrated by Bill Kurtis. New York: A&E Home Video, 1996.

Long Rifle (Pennsylvania/ Kentucky) The Pennsylvania long rifle represents a unique American technological development, one that enthusiasts sometimes claim is the first distinctly American invention. If such a claim has real merit, it shows just how closely tied the Pennsylvania rifle is to the history of the first trans-Appalachian settlements. The Pennsylvania long rifle—also commonly known as the Kentucky rifle— resulted from a set of very specific technological adaptations in the design of firearms. The design made the weapon particularly suited to the frontier conditions prevalent in the eastern mountains and hardwood forests of Kentucky, Tennessee, and the Ohio River Valley. The Pennsylvania rifle’s importance to the early transAppalachian explorers and pioneers quickly gave it a prominent place in the lore and legends popular among Americans. As a design, the first Pennsylvania rifles appeared clearly only in the 1760s. Yet by the time of the American Revolution, the image of the hawkeyed, buckskinned sharpshooter from the frontier was already established in the American consciousness. Armed with the Pennsylvania rifle, this frontiersman of

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late-eighteenth-century lore became one of the United States’ most enduring icons. The Pennsylvania rifle was an adaptation, or hybrid; a cross between two earlier firearm technologies, the German jaeger rifle and the English fowling piece. The jaeger was a short (relatively) heavy-looking rifle of large caliber (over .60). These rifles were adapted for hunting large game in the forests of northern and central Europe. They were expected to hit hard and accurately, bringing an animal down immediately. The English fowling piece was, in effect, a flintlock shotgun with a relatively long barrel. These fowling pieces were expected to deliver a very small-caliber projectile, or buckshot, that would do minimal damage while killing very small game. The resulting technological merger brought together the rifling and accuracy of the German biggame weapon with the lightness, delicacy, and small bore of the English fowling piece. The “invention” took place in the purchase of guns from immigrant gunsmiths who worked on the western frontier of the 1750s and 1760s. At that time, the westernmost fringe of frontier settlements was still on the eastern slopes of the Appalachians, in the areas around York, Lancaster, and Reading, Pennsylvania. The German immigrant communities in and near these settlements provided the gunsmiths who were familiar with rifling technology and the techniques for fabricating rifled barrels. The explorers and pioneers who planned to cross the mountains placed the orders for weapons that drove the development of the new and highly specialized design that became known as the Pennsylvania rifle. The eastern hardwood forests of the Ohio River Valley and the mountains of Kentucky contained few animals that posed any serious threat to men. Firearms were

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Kit Carson portrayed on the 1877 cover of Frank Starr’s New York Library, holding a long rifle. (Library of Congress)

seldom needed for defense from animals, and in those few cases where there was such a need, nothing called for a weapon as heavy as the German hunting rifle. More importantly, the long treks required for penetration of the forests and wilderness placed a premium on the weight of equipment and supplies. A smaller-caliber weapon offered real advantages. Likewise, in this frontier world, where one might live for months at a time without visiting any settlement capable of providing supplies, a very accurate weapon that wasted little lead or powder would be highly prized. The Pennsylvania rifle was born out of such considerations. These were small-caliber weapons (usually in the range of .45 to .50 caliber) with an exceptionally long barrel and a characteristically strong curve to the butt stock.

Daniel Boone’s long rifle can provide a point of comparison to illustrate the economies of the Pennsylvania rifle. His weapon was five feet, three inches long. The barrel itself was over four feet long. Boone’s gun was .44 caliber and fired a ball that weighed 130 grains, which is equivalent in weight to the bullet fired from a modern .32 caliber weapon. It weighed eleven pounds. The length and weight of the weapon gave it stability and significantly helped steady the aim. Using round shot of such small caliber, Boone could expect to fire fifty-five rounds from a pound of lead. Each shot would require no more than a thimble full of gunpowder. On the other extreme, the standard Brown Bess musket of this era was bored at .75 caliber, which meant that its shot was molded at the rate of sixteen per pound. The standard charge was the equivalent of the ball in weight—one ounce. Boone’s rifled barrel would have allowed fairly reliable aim at distances in excess of 200 yards. The smoothbore of the Bess and the windage (or gap between the ball and the walls of the barrel) facilitated rapid loading, which meant that a marksman would not have been able to hit a human-sized target at much beyond fifty yards. The Pennsylvania rifle and the eighteenthcentury musket were very different weapons intended for very different purposes. The long rifle was a precision device intended to make carefully aimed shot count at relatively long range. The primary incentives for accuracy and range were the practicalities of long treks and distant supply. Survival in the forest often depended on hunting. Husbanding supplies of powder and shot as much as possible only made sense. The gun that resulted was heavy but fragile. It was very accurate, but required very careful loading. Even an expert marksman needed two to three minutes between



shots. The shot was sufficient for hunting the game of the eastern forests, but its small size meant that it lacked stopping power. Large game, such as deer, commonly bled to death while running away, but that mattered less than other considerations. Finally, its small shot could go wildly astray in even a mild crosswind. Despite the mythologies that surround the long rifle, it was not a weapon well suited for military use or even for fighting the Indian wars in which it played such a prominent role. The long rifle was most particularly suited to woodland hunting. After initially being enthusiastic about forming companies of riflemen in the Continental army, George Washington and most other military leaders quickly came to the point of disbanding such units. Critics of the frontiersman mythology often point to the independent and undisciplined ways of the frontiersmen as a cause for the military’s disenchantment, but it is just as valid to point to the technological limitations of their rifles as a cause for the difficulties these units faced during the American Revolution. This point can be illustrated by recalling the tactics the Native Americans developed for dealing with small groups of frontiersmen armed with Pennsylvania rifles. The most effective ploy was very simple: first to draw fire, and then to charge all out with tomahawk, knife, or club. No rifleman—not even the best—could fire and reload quickly enough to stop a determined charge. The range of the weapon, the speed of a runner, and the time required for reloading meant almost certain death or capture for the rifleman. If the rifleman fired and then turned to run, the Native Americans simply followed and ran him down. The lore and legends of the frontier are full of stories of frontiersmen on the run after they fired their one shot. Few eluded

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their pursuers, and when they did, they became the stuff of frontier legend. Even fewer, including the likes of Simon Kenton, Lewis Wetzel, and Daniel Boone, ever mastered the trick of reloading a long rifle on the run. According to the legends, that skill was an almost certain lifesaver. It countered the Native Americans’ skills in distance running and use of hand weapons. According to the legends, the pursuers always gave up the chase when their quarry managed the second shot from a long rifle. The same vulnerabilities that limited the long rifle’s effectiveness in the Indian fighting of the eastern forests also followed riflemen onto the battlefields of the American Revolution. Riflemen could never match the volume of fire possible with the massed infantry tactics based on the flintlock musket. The rifles were most effective at “picking off” selected targets at long distances. This tactic could be used to some effect in eliminating the officers who were so critical to the effectiveness of massed infantry. Logical as the idea seems, however, such sharpshooting found remarkably little effective use. The best-known instance was at the Battle of Saratoga, where the colonials did make very effective use of sharpshooters. There are a number of technical reasons for the problems sharpshooters faced on the battlefields of the eighteenth century. First and foremost, black-powder weapons produce very thick clouds of smoke. Except in the earliest stages of a battle, a pall of smoke typically disrupted the opportunities for any kind of systematic sharpshooting. Under normal circumstances, battlefield conditions simply did not lend themselves to effective use of rifles. Beyond the inherent limitations of the visibility on an eighteenthcentury battlefield, the rifle-equipped sharpshooter would face the same problem he

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found facing Native Americans in the forest—a determined charge could cover a great deal of ground during the time required for reloading. Once again, given the density of fire that a formation of riflemen could generate, the tactical advantage on the battlefield lay with the determined charge—not with the rifle. The determined charge was especially effective when carried out by infantrymen whose muskets mounted bayonets. The bayonet charge usually put the riflemen to flight quite easily. Moreover, troops particularly resented the sharpshooting tactics that made their officers the riflemen’s particular targets. Riflemen put to flight could expect no quarter from British troops, and there are numerous stories recounting the grisly slaughter of frontiersmen who fell into the hands of the troops they had tormented with their sharpshooting. The Pennsylvania rifle was too delicate to accept a bayonet. It broke easily when used as a club. The soft wrought-iron barrels bent easily in rugged use. All in all, it was a weapon poorly suited for the battlefield. Nevertheless, the effectiveness of the American sharpshooter during the Revolution and the War of 1812 has been firmly established in the myth and lore of U.S. history. Certainly, the sharpshooters existed, and they fought. Saratoga during the Revolution and the Battle of New Orleans were sites of the two most widely recognized battlefield triumphs for the long rifle. In each of those cases, the rifles did make important contributions to the victory. In both cases, however, it is important to note that the sharpshooters were heavily supported by troops using conventional arms to prevent the riflemen from being overrun. At Saratoga, it was infantry armed with muskets who protected the sharpshooters; at New Orleans, it was massed artillery. The rifles

were important for picking off officers— disrupting command and control—but conventional arms inflicted the heavy casualties. Eyewitness accounts, especially those of the British, make it clear that the American artillery batteries took the heaviest toll among the British troops at New Orleans. Nevertheless, in the American consciousness, when Packenham’s 93rd Regiment threw itself vainly against the redoubt south of New Orleans, it was the long rifle that turned the tide. The event was quickly celebrated in a popular song entitled “The Hunters of Kentucky.” This song clearly credited the victory at New Orleans to the riflemen from Kentucky: For we with rifles ready cock’d, Thought such occasion lucky, And soon around the general [Andrew Jackson] flock’d The Hunters of Kentucky. . . . We did not choose to waste our fire So snugly kept our places, But when so near we saw them wink, We thought it time to stop ’em, And it would have done you good, I think, To see Kentuckians drop ’em. “The Hunters of Kentucky” had two significant effects in American popular culture. First, it interpreted the victory at New Orleans entirely as a clear and unequivocal triumph of sharpshooting woodsmen over the British regulars. This interpretation has long endured in the historical consciousness of Americans. Second, it changed the name of the long rifles made in Pennsylvania. From 1815 on, these rifles became almost universally known as “Kentucky long rifles.” Actually, there have been numerous names applied to these distinctive long rifles, depending on where they were used and for what purpose. Nevertheless, whether called Kentucky rifles, Tennessee rifles,



barn guns, southern poor boys, the Schimmel, or the Pennsylvania long rifle, the manufacturing of these guns has consistently been centered in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Even when gunsmiths turning out long rifles appeared on the frontier in Kentucky, Tennessee, or the Carolinas, the origins of their skills can be traced to apprenticeships or contacts in the Lancaster County region of Pennsylvania. The Pennsylvania rifles were particularly well adapted to the geography and the kinds of game found in the Ohio Valley and the eastern woodlands. Their use was very widespread, a fact that is lost in focusing on the surviving models that exhibit intricately grained maple stocks, beautifully polished brass furniture, and silver chased inlays on the stock. Such examples were the showpieces of a culture; the plain, walnutstocked barn gun or southern poor boy was the rifle that actually did the daily work of hunting and protecting the homestead. The plain, unadorned Pennsylvania rifle was a working gun, which is illustrated by the fact that many of the plain barn guns continued in daily use in remote areas of the Carolinas, Kentucky, and Tennessee well into the twentieth century. The same qualities that recommended them to the likes of Daniel Boone continued to recommend them to people living in these areas: great accuracy and range, sufficient caliber for the local game, and excellent economy of shot and powder. The heyday of the Pennsylvania rifle ended in the 1820s as the frontier moved west. As the line of settlements crossed the Mississippi River, the particular conjunctions of geography, distributions of game, and challenges to survival that had called forth the Pennsylvania rifle simply disappeared. Very quickly, the much heavier Hawken and Henry rifles supplanted the

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light-caliber weapons appropriate in the eastern woodlands. These new rifles were designed for the Great Plains. The Hawken and Henry were altogether sturdier and more rugged weapons, firing projectiles that could stop a grizzly, drop a buffalo, or stand up to the confrontation with the Native Americans of the Great Plains. The Pennsylvania rifle does provide an early instance in which the specific circumstances of the American frontier experience called forth a very particular technological response. The Pennsylvania rifle achieved almost universal adoption among armsbearing frontiersmen and pioneers of the regions west of the Appalachians in the period from the 1760s to about 1820, but the same weapon has never been found in common usage outside the original areas of its use. The Pennsylvania rifle is widely known and admired by gun aficionados around the world; yet the need for its particular combination of accuracy and extreme economy was clearly bounded by geography and historical circumstances. David S. Lux See also: American Revolution; Brown Bess

Further Reading Brown, M. L. Firearms in Colonial America. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1980. Wilkinson, Frederick. The World’s Great Guns. London: Hamlyn Publishing Group, 1977.

Lost and Stolen Firearms Reporting Every year in the United States, lost or stolen firearms enter the underground gun market, end up in the hands of dangerous

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individuals, and are used in violent crimes. This occurs through multiple channels, but the lost or stolen firearms usually originate from one of two sources. First, guns are lost by or stolen from licensed dealers. Second, guns are lost by or stolen from private residents. When discussing the criminal acquisition of firearms, researchers define the former source as the “primary market” and the latter source as the “secondary market” for firearms (Cook and Pollack 2017). In order to deal firearms in the primary market, one must obtain a federal firearms license (FFL). Licensed gun dealers are subject to state and federal laws that regulate, among other things, who they can sell firearms to and how they must document and report gun transactions. Importantly, FFLs are required to report stolen or lost guns to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) within forty-eight hours of discovering the theft or loss. Despite strict regulations on FFLs, federal oversight is limited (OIG 2013). In most states, once a gun is in the secondary market, gun transactions are largely unregulated and there is almost no oversight. Unlicensed gun owners most often are not required to report stolen or lost guns to a law enforcement entity (Giffords Law Center 2018). There is currently no federal law requiring private citizens to report stolen or lost guns. Between 2004 and 2011, almost 175,000 guns were reported stolen or lost from the inventories of FFLs (OIG 2013). These stolen and lost guns make a nontrivial contribution to all illegally trafficked firearms. Results from firearm trafficking investigations show that around 10 percent of these investigations involve firearms stolen from an FFL (ATF 2000b; Braga et al. 2004). When FFLs report lost or stolen firearms, and they do not always do so, their reports show burglary and larceny account for

about 60 percent of lost or stolen guns, with employee errors and thefts accounting for almost all the remainder (ATF 2000a). More concerning than this is the theft or loss of firearms from unlicensed gun owners. In 2015, an estimated 2.4 percent of gun owners reported having a gun(s) stolen from them within the past five years, with a mean number of 1.9 guns taken per theft. These figures suggest that somewhere around 2.3 million guns were stolen during this time, which translates to nearly 500,000 stolen guns a year (Azrael et al. 2017; see also Cook and Ludwig 1996). Many of these deadly weapons were stolen from residents living in states without mandatory reporting laws. Importantly, research suggests that guns lost or stolen in the secondary market make a sizable contribution to gun crime (Alper and Glaze 2019; Wright and Rossi 1985). For instance, results from ATF traces show that of those guns implicated in a crime, most were purchased long before the occurrence of the crime and seldom by the offender (Collins et al. 2017; Cook and Braga 2001; MAIG 2010). This evidence suggests the existence of an extensive secondary gun market that has the effect of supplying criminals with firearms. Additionally, results from interviews with incarcerated gun offenders show theft is a common source through which criminals acquire guns (Alper and Glaze 2019; Collins et al. 2017; Wright and Rossi 1985). Together, these findings imply that reducing the number of firearms that are lost or stolen in the primary and secondary gun markets could meaningfully reduce the number of violent gun crimes. Enacting new state and federal legislation mandating the reporting of lost or stolen guns among nonFFLs would reduce the number of lost or stolen guns that end up in the hands of violent criminals.



Few states require residents to report lost or stolen firearms to law enforcement despite broad public appeal for such laws and the potential public health benefits (MAIG 2011). Reporting lost or stolen guns to law enforcement could help the police to reduce both gun trafficking and violence. This includes the selling of stolen guns, since law enforcement would have documentation that stolen guns for sale were in fact stolen. The police could also prevent much straw purchasing because individuals who purchase guns and immediately “lose” them would be forced to report this suspicious behavior or risk legal sanctions. Some felons who purchase guns before their conviction(s) falsely claim that they no longer possess the gun because it was either stolen or lost. Mandatory reporting laws would hold these individuals accountable to the law. Relatedly, it is difficult for red flag laws to work if persons can hide guns and simply state, without consequence, that they were lost or stolen. These examples, which are only a few of many, should demonstrate that by requiring private residents to report lost or stolen guns, policy makers can achieve substantial gains in the prevention of gun violence and trafficking. Importantly, mandatory reporting laws will be more effective if they are enacted in conjunction with laws regulating gun sales or other transfers made among private residents. Giving law enforcement the ability to review records of recent firearm thefts, losses, sales, gifts, or other transfers that occurred in their area would allow them to both identify patterns in and develop problem-oriented solutions to the criminal acquisition and use of guns. Thomas L. Scott See also: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF)

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Further Reading Alper, Mariel, and Lauren Glaze. “Source and Use of Firearms Involved in Crimes: Survey of Prison Inmates, 2016.” Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2019. ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives). “Commerce in Firearms in the United States.” Washington, DC: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, 2000a. ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives). “Following the Gun: Enforcing Federal Laws against Firearm Traffickers.” Washington, DC: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, 2000b. Azrael, Deborah, Lisa Hepburn, David Hemenway, and Matthew Miller. “The Stock and Flow of U.S. Firearms: Results from the 2015 National Firearms Survey.” RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences 3, no. 5 (2017): 38–57. Braga, Anthony A., Garen J. Wintemute, Glenn L. Pierce, Phillip J. Cook, and Greg Ridgeway. “Interpreting the Empirical Evidence on Illegal Gun Market Dynamics.” Journal of Urban Health 89, no. 5 (2004): 779–93. Collins, Megan E., Susan T. Parker, Thomas L. Scott, and Charles F. Wellford. “A Comparative Analysis of Crime Guns.” RSF: The Russell Sage Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences 3, no. 5 (2017): 96–127. Cook, Phillip J., and Anthony A. Braga. “Comprehensive Firearms Tracing: Strategic and Investigative Uses of New Data on Firearms Markets.” Arizona Law Review 43, no. 2 (2001): 277–309. Cook, Phillip J., and Jens Ludwig. Guns in America: Results of A Comprehensive National Survey on Firearm Ownership and Use. Washington, DC: Police Foundation, 1996. Cook, Phillip J., and Harold A. Pollack. “Reducing Access to Guns by Violent Offenders. A Comparative Analysis of Crime Guns.” RSF: The Russell Sage

544 | Lott, John R., Jr. Foundation Journal of the Social Sciences 3, no. 5 (2017): 2–36. Giffords Law Center. “Lost & Stolen Firearms: State by State.” 2018. https://lawcen ter.giffords.org/gun-laws/state-law/50-state -summaries /lost-stolen-firearms-state -by-state/. MAIG (Mayors against Illegal Guns). “Results from a National Survey of 1003 Registered Voters.” New York, NY: Mayors against Illegal Guns, 2011. MAIG (Mayors against Illegal Guns). “Trace the Guns: The Link between Gun Laws and Interstate Gun Trafficking.” New York, NY: Mayors against Illegal Guns, 2010. OIG (Office of the Inspector General). “Review of ATF’s Federal Firearms Licensee Inspection Program.” Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2013. Wright, James D., and Peter H. Rossi. The Armed Criminal in America: A Survey of Incarcerated Felons. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice, 1985.

Lott, John R., Jr.(1958–) John R. Lott Jr. is the author of More Guns, Less Crime, a study that concludes that concealed carry laws deter violent crime. Lott’s research also indicates that waiting periods for gun purchases and the passage of gun storage laws increase certain types of crimes. Lott’s work has been widely cited by gun rights advocates, but strongly criticized by gun control proponents and by some economists. Lott received his bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees in economics from the University of California, Los Angeles. The bulk of his research has been in the areas of law, economics, public choice, and public finance. Lott’s choice of research topics reflects a politically conservative and

libertarian view of government regulation, leading some critics to argue that his findings are biased. Lott has vigorously denied this criticism but has continued to publish books and articles that mix research with advocacy. Lott served as chief economist for the United States Sentencing Commission in the late 1980s and has held academic and research fellowships at prominent academic institutions, including Texas A&M, Rice, Stanford, the University of Pennsylvania, Yale Law School, and the University of Chicago. Lott served as a scholar for the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank, until 2006. Lott was a researcher with the University of Maryland College Park Foundation from 2007 to 2010. Some of these affiliations have been the subject of criticism; the Violence Policy Center has called Lott an “avid proponent” of the Chicago School that espouses “extreme points of view.” Other critics have erroneously linked Lott’s acceptance of a John M. Olin Foundation fellowship at the University of Chicago with research bias because the foundation was originally established by an ammunition manufacturer. Lott founded the Alexandria-based Crime Prevention Research Center in 2013 as a nonprofit organization to provide “academic quality research on the relationship between laws regulating the ownership or use of guns, crime, and public safety.” It does not accept donations from gun manufacturers or gun rights organizations, but also does not disclosure its major donors. It averaged about $250,000 a year in revenues in its first five years, enough to pay Lott a modest salary. It added an executive director, Nikki Goeser, who is a gun rights advocate based in Knoxville, Tennessee. Carl Moody, a professor at William and Mary, has been the research director. There has



been an academic advisory board and research fellows. The Center develops a high volume of research on a wide range of gun-rated topics; it disseminates its findings online, in op-ed pieces, in research articles, and in interviews. Lott has been a contributor to FoxNews and The Hill while continuing to regularly blog on research findings and other topics. Lott’s own research on the defensive use of weapons contains very complicated statistical analysis, by county, on how the number of weapons and the passage of concealed carry laws impact crime rates, types of crimes committed, and the use of firearms for self-defense. In subsequent editions of his comprehensive book, More Guns, Less Crime, Lott extends his research to include additional years, adds city-level data, and incorporates additional control variables. The basic premise behind Lott’s research is quite straightforward: as the number of concealed weapons held by law-abiding citizens increases, potential criminals will be less likely to directly confront victims, and violent crime rates will decline. Lott has consistently found evidence that supports this proposition, although there are a number of potential problems with his research methodology. Critics have pointed out the difficulty of proving that one factor causes another in time-series analysis. As crime rates declined across the country at the same time that many concealed carry laws were adopted, it is extremely difficult to isolate the effects of concealed carry legislation. It also is possible that other factors that reduced crime rates were not accounted for in Lott’s research. Finally, the choice of more local-level data rather than statewide data creates further problems in analyzing the effectiveness of state laws. As is common with peer-reviewed academic research, Lott has made his data set

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available to other researchers for replication. Yale scholar Ian Ayres and Stanford scholar John J. Donohue have re-analyzed Lott’s data and conducted additional analyses. They have argued in a series of articles that Lott’s findings are sensitive to changes in the variables used, there are data and interpretation errors in parts of Lott’s research, and the most consistent finding is that concealed carry laws are related to increases in aggravated assault rates. The National Research Council did its own analysis and concluded that the evidence was inconclusive on the effects of concealed carry legislation. Concerns about Lott’s research ethics have received national attention. In 2003, Lott admitted to defending his research by blogging under the name of Mary Rosh, a fictitious former student; he has also claimed that at least one item was written by one of his children. The deception was apparently first found by a researcher at the libertarian Cato Institute. In addition, Lott has been criticized for a study that showed a 98 percent deterrence rate when crime victims showed a weapon to would-be assailants; Lott has stated that a computer crash destroyed the data and other supporting documentation. These criticisms of Lott have been widely circulated through an editorial in Science, the best-selling books Freakonomics and Super Crunchers, a book on academic honesty controversies, and books on gun control issues. Lott has responded to personal and research criticisms at length in More Guns, Less Crime. Lott responds to over twenty different questions about his research in a chapter in the first edition of More Guns, Less Crime, and to an additional sixteen questions in the second edition. The third edition includes a lengthy new chapter that is divided between presentation of updated

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data analysis and refutation of critics. Lott also unsuccessfully sued the lead author of Freakonomics, economist Steven Levitt, for defamation. However, Lott states in the third edition of More Guns, Less Crime that Levitt issued a retraction and apology for part of his criticisms. Books authored by Lott after the first edition of More Guns, Less Crime have been more explicitly normative and often published by politically conservative presses. Lott reframes the More Guns, Less Crime thesis and gun control controversies for gun-rights advocates in The Bias against Guns: Why Almost Everything You’ve Heard about Gun Control Is Wrong (2003), The War on Guns: Arming Yourself Against Gun Control Lies (2016), and Gun Control Myths: How Politicians, the Media, and Botched “Studies” Have Twisted the Facts on Gun Control (2020). Lott covers a full range of topics in detail: media bias, polling data, assault weapon bans, background checks, gun locks, stand your ground laws, waiting periods, gun shows, mass shootings, comparisons to other countries, and international terrorism. Straight Shooting (2006) is a collection of essays that includes pieces published in both leading newspapers and more conservative media outlets such as the National Review Online, FoxNews.com, and the Washington Times. It is advocacy-oriented and is marketed as an information source for opponents of gun control by its publisher, Merril Press, founded by gun rights proponent Alan Gottlieb. Lott’s More Guns, Less Crime remains his best-known work, with the third edition published in 2010. The third edition is 200 pages longer than the first edition, running 442 pages with appendices and index. Nevertheless, More Guns, Less Crime, along with the Ayres and Donohue critiques, are

essential readings for those interested in gun policy research. Lott was appointed as a senior adviser for research and statistics at the Office of Justice Programs within the Department of Justice (DOJ) in October 2020. He participated in a call on January 2, 2021, during which President Donald J. Trump urged officials in Georgia to overturn the election results after he lost to Joe Biden. Lott subsequently resigned from his position at the DOJ two weeks later. Marcia L. Godwin See also: Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Hemenway, David A.; More Guns, Less Crime Thesis; Self-Defense, Legal Issues; Self-Defense, Reasons for Gun Use; Trump, Donald J.

Further Reading Ayres, Ian. Supercrunchers: Why Thinkingby-Numbers Is the New Way to Be Smart. New York: Bantam Books, 2007. Ayres, Ian, and John J. Donohue III. “More Guns, Less Crime Fails Again: The Latest Evidence from 1977–2006.” Econ Journal Watch 6 (2009): 218–38. Crime Prevention Research Center. https:// crimeresearch.org/ (accessed August 29, 2020). Goeser, Nikki. http://stalkedanddefenseless. com (accessed August 29, 2020). Goeser, Nikki. Stalked and Defenseless: How Gun Control Helped My Stalker Murder My Husband in Front of Me. Independently published, 2019. Henigan, Dennis A. Lethal Logic: Exploding the Myths That Paralyze American Gun Policy. Washington, DC: Potomac Books, 2009. Levitt, Steven D., and Stephen J. Dubner. Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything. New York: William Morrow, 2005. Lott, John R., Jr. http://johnrlott.blogspot.com (accessed August 29, 2020).

Lott, John R., Jr. At the Brink: Will Obama Push Us Over the Edge? Washington, DC: Regnery Publishing, 2013. Lott, John R., Jr. Dumbing Down the Courts: How Politics Keeps the Smartest Judges Off the Bench. Minneapolis, MN: Bascom Hill, 2013. Lott, John R., Jr. Freedomnomics: Why the Free Market Works and Other Half-Baked Theories Don’t. Washington, DC: Regnery Publishing, 2007. Lott, John R., Jr. Gun Control Myths: How Politicians, the Media, and Botched “Studies” Have Twisted the Facts on Gun Control. Independently published, 2020. Lott, John R., Jr. More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws. 3rd ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2010. Lott, John R., Jr. Straight Shooting: Firearms, Economics, and Public Policy. Bellevue, WA: Merril Press, 2006. Lott, John R., Jr. The Bias against Guns: Why Almost Everything You’ve Heard about Gun Control Is Wrong. Washington, DC: Regnery Publishing, 2003. Lott, John R., Jr. The War on Guns: Arming Yourself against Gun Control Lies. Washington, DC: Regnery Publishing, 2016.

Lott, John R., Jr. | 547 Lott, John R., Jr., and Lawrence W. Kenny. “Did Women’s Suffrage Change the Size and Scope of Government?” Journal of Political Economy 107 (1999): 1163–98. Lott, John R., Jr., and David Mustard. “Crime, Deterrence and Right-to-Carry Handguns.” Journal of Legal Studies 26 (1997): 1–68. National Research Council (U.S.): Committee to Improve Research Information and Data on Firearms. Firearms and Violence: A Critical Review. Edited by Charles F. Wellford, John V. Pepper, and Carol V. Petrie. Washington, DC: National Academics Press, 2004. http://www.nap.edu/openbook .php?isbn=0309091241 (accessed July 18, 2011). Norquist, Grover G., and John R. Lott Jr. Debacle: Obama’s War on Jobs and Growth and What We Can Do Now to Regain Our Future. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2012. Violence Policy Center. “Who Is John Lott and Why Is He Claiming That More Guns Mean Less Crime?” https://www.vpc.org /fact_sht/wholott.htm (accessed August 29 12, 2020). Wiener, John. Historians in Trouble: Plagiarism, Fraud, and Politics in the Ivory Tower. New York: New Press, 2005.

M Machine Gun. See Automatic Weapons Laws; Tommy Gun

institution. Miller’s Seattle constituents, many of whom were alarmed by the mail-order sale of guns to criminals, supported the bill. An effective grassroots strategy was initiated that garnered widespread support. The postmaster general supported the legislation, in part to remove the post office from the position of shipping guns to localities that had laws against them. The bill faced opposition from lawmakers in the southern and western states who believed it was a violation of the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. However, the bill passed both houses of Congress and was signed into law by President Coolidge in February 1927. The Miller Act had limited practical effects, as purchasers could use private companies, and legislation to stop those shipments never came close to passing. Supporters of the Miller Act argued that at least it meant a federal agency would no longer be involved in gun shipment, and they also noted that there was growing acceptance of the idea of federal gun laws. G. Edward Richards and John W. Dietrich

Mailing of Firearms Act of 1927 The Mailing of Firearms Act of 1927, also known as the Miller Act, was one of the few successes that gun control advocates enjoyed prior to contemporary efforts to legislate firearm ownership and management. Still in effect, the Miller Act proscribes sending concealable firearms through the U.S. Post Office with penalties of a $10,000 fine and two years’ imprisonment. The law was easy to skirt because mailers could legally send guns via private mail-delivery companies, so it was more important as a symbolic move to bring the issue to the federal level. From the late nineteenth century forward, concerns over guns increased with rises in crime. Some localities and states passed laws regulating gun sales or ownership. The laws were often difficult to fully enforce because each jurisdiction had different laws and enforcement agencies. Efforts to get uniformity with federal legislation were seen by some as a challenge to both states’ rights and Second Amendment rights. In 1921, proposed legislation to prohibit interstate shipping of all handguns except service revolvers drew such resistance that the bill never left the Senate Judiciary Committee. Rep. John F. Miller (R-WA) decided to try more limited legislation focused on post office shipments, as the post office was a federal

See also: Gun Control Act of 1968

Further Reading DeConde, Alexander. Gun Violence in America: The Struggle for Control. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2001. Leff, Carol Skalink, and Mark H. Leff. “The Politics of Infectiveness: Federal Firearms Legislation, 1919–38.” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 455 (1981): 48–62.

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Mail-Order Guns Mail-order guns played a prominent role in the push for what became the Gun Control Act of 1968. Prior to that statute, firearms could be sold interstate to ordinary individuals, the only legal restriction being that handguns could not be shipped by the U.S. Postal Service (since the federal Mailing of Firearms Act of 1927). Following World War II, large numbers of surplus firearms, in particular bolt-action rifles, became available at minimal prices. These were commonly acquired by mailorder houses, largely based in Chicago, and available by mail order at a very low cost, commonly $25–$40 for a rifle. Sportsmen purchased these and modified them, or hired gunsmiths to modify them, into sporting rifles. Common alterations were to shorten the military stocks, fit a telescopic sight, and bend the bolt handle to clear the telescopic sight. Even with the cost of modifications, the result was a presentable sporting rifle at half or a third of the cost of an American-made civilian rifle. This predictably placed economic pressure on American arms manufacturers, which in the late 1950s began lobbying for protective legislation. After President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in 1963 by an assassin using a mail-order rifle, the momentum for such measures increased and expanded from its original protectionist base. The Gun Control Act of 1968 eliminated the mail-order trade by forbidding most interstate transfers of firearms to nondealers and requiring that a purchaser appear in person at a licensed dealer’s premises to receive a firearm. Technically, it is still possible to “mail order” a firearm, but the firearm has to be received in person at the dealer’s premises. David T. Hardy

See also: Gun Control Act of 1968; Mailing of Firearms Act of 1927

Further Reading Hardy, David T. “The Firearm Owners’ Protection Act: A Historical and Legal Perspective.” Cumberland Law Review 17 (1986): 595–97.

Malvo, John Lee. See Washington, DC, Sniper Attacks Manufacturers, Gun. See Firearms Industry March for Our Lives Movement In the aftermath of the February 14, 2018, mass shooting at their high school, students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, organized pro– gun control events culminating in a day of protests called “March for Our Lives.” Through effective use of social media and financial support from celebrities and social action organizations, word spread quickly about the Parkland students’ planned march in Washington, DC, thereby spurring people elsewhere to plan events in their own communities. On March 24, 2018, an estimated 800 protest rallies in every state and several foreign countries drew more than a million participants (“March for Our Lives Highlights” 2018). Subsequently, additional events were organized under the slogan “March for Our Lives,” such as a day of town hall meetings throughout the country, held on April 7, 2018 (Gabbatt 2018). Eventually, the term “March for Our Lives” changed from a familiar slogan identified with activism led by the Parkland students to become the name of an advocacy organization with youth-led chapters.



During the Parkland shooting, one student, David Hogg, used his cellphone to film himself whispering into the camera from inside a locked closet. His video was shared widely on social media. In the footage, as the shooting unfolded nearby, Hogg and other students made heartfelt pleas for legislative action on gun control to prevent such tragic events (“Student David Hogg During Florida School Shooting” 2018). Hogg’s quick and effective use of social media was the initial step in what became student-led actions by Parkland students to turn their tragedy into a source of policy action. Another student, Cameron Kasky, created the hashtag #NeverAgain for use on Twitter. He quickly organized fellow students to jointly plan social media posts and other strategies to create political pressure for legislative action. Jaclyn Corin, the junior class president, came up with a plan for the students to take buses to Tallahassee in order to directly lobby Florida’s legislators on gun control. X Gonzalez became one of the most visible leaders among the Parkland students through her intensity when speaking publicly and during media interviews. Hogg, Kasky, Coring, and Gonzalez, along with Alex Wind, eventually appeared on the cover of Time magazine, representing the two dozen student leaders who led the effort to change gun laws (Alter 2018; Jones 2018). Within one week of the shooting, the student leaders had taken one hundred of their classmates to lobby the state legislature. The Parkland students were credited with successfully pressuring Florida’s state legislators and governor into enacting new gun control measures. Over the opposition of the National Rifle Association (NRA), Florida lawmakers imposed several new measures, including increasing the minimum age and

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waiting period for firearms purchases (Scherer 2018). The student leaders were also featured on a nationally televised CNN town hall confronting legislators, law enforcement officials, and NRA spokesperson Dana Loesch (Grinberg 2018; Swartz 2018). The Parkland student leaders’ savvy use of social media rallied support for gun control across the country. The #NeverAgain hashtag created by Kasky became the basis for the original organization created by the Parkland students, called Never Again MSD—for Marjory Stoneman Douglas, the name of their high school. Gonzalez, who gained national prominence through news coverage of her powerful speech at a Ft. Lauderdale rally three days after the shooting, gained more than a million followers on Twitter within weeks of the shooting. The student leaders were very effective in producing scathing responses to posts by the NRA and other opponents of gun control. Media experts attributed the spread and effectiveness of the student leaders’ social media communications to their authenticity, generation of empathy, and biting humor in responding to opponents (Breland 2018). Their plan for a nationwide protest on March 24, 2018, called “March for Our Lives,” was announced within days of the shooting and reached millions of people through the viral nature of social media communications. The primary focus was the Parkland students’ planned protest march in Washington, DC, but others around the country began to organize parallel events in their own communities. Some commentators saw the students’ announcement of nationwide protests a mere five weeks after the shooting as a test of their ability to translate the initial success in grabbing public attention into widespread political action (Witt 2018).

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Student activist X Gonzalez of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School raises her fist at the March for Our Lives in Washington, D.C., on March 24, 2018. The student-organized march for stricter gun control followed the shooting on February 14 at the Parkland, Florida, school, which left 17 people dead. (Abaca Press/Alamy Stock Photo)

The planning for March for Our Lives gained momentum through the support of established advocacy organizations, celebrities, and sponsors. Billionaire Michael Bloomberg, the former mayor of New York City and founder of Everytown for Gun Safety, gave $1 million in grants to organizers of March for Our Lives events. Support was also provided by the advocacy group founded by former Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. Oprah Winfrey, Steven Spielberg, and George Clooney each donated $500,000, and other celebrities also contributed. The Parkland students themselves raised more than $3 million through a GoFundMe page, another element of their success with social media. Organizers of the successful Women’s March protests in January 2017 and January 2018 provided organizational guidance and assistance.

The ride-hailing service Lyft offered free transportation to March for Our Lives events in fifty cities, and Ben & Jerry’s ice cream company paid for buses to transport participants to the event in Vermont (Blinder, Bidgood, and Wang 2018; Leguizamon and Ahmed 2018). Estimates of the crowd size at the Washington, DC, protest became a subject of debate, with the organizers claiming 800,000 in attendance but news agencies reporting that consulting firms’ geographic analysis of crowd attendance produced figures as low as 200,000. Yet, it was generally acknowledged to be the largest youth-initiated protest since the anti-war events during the Vietnam War era. Observers agreed that more than one million people participated in events nationwide, and perhaps as many as two million, including tens of thousands at events in New



York City, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Oakland, and other large cities. There were additional supportive protest rallies overseas in such places as Sydney, London, and Berlin. Celebrities were quite visible at March for Our Lives events, including actor George Clooney in Washington, former Beatle Sir Paul McCartney in New York, Congressman John Lewis in Atlanta, and comedian Amy Schumer in Los Angeles. In addition, there were celebrity performers at the Washington rally, including Jennifer Hudson, Miley Cyrus, Ariana Grande, and Lin-Manuel Miranda. The social media posts by and about celebrity participants brought March for Our Lives to the millions of Twitter and Instagram accounts of people who follow these celebrities on social media. The speakers at the Washington event included the Parkland student leaders. Gonzalez gained additional national recognition through the use of a dramatic and emotional four minutes of silence, along with reciting the names of those killed at Parkland, in order to time her speech to match the sixminute period in which the Parkland shooting took the lives of seventeen people (Conti 2018). Other speakers included teens from Chicago, Virginia, California, and elsewhere whose lives had been touched by gun violence. News coverage also focused on the brief speech by nine-year-old Yolanda King, the granddaughter of the late Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Dr. King’s granddaughter effectively reminded viewers that even very young children are victims of gun violence. By referencing her famous grandfather, she also connected the youth-initiated gun control effort with the legacy of the civil rights movement in which public protests led to changes in law and policy. After the March 24, 2018, event, the Parkland student leaders partnered with a

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group called the Town Hall Project to organize Town Hall for Our Lives events on April 7, 2018, to pressure members of Congress to speak about gun violence and gun regulation. In some districts, they held “empty chair” events when members of Congress declined to appear. In other districts, political candidates for Congress and other elective offices appeared to answer questions from members of the public (Clemens 2018). The term “March for Our Lives” was originally coined as the title for the march and rally in Washington, DC. The visibility, success, and worldwide participation that blossomed around the March 24, 2018, events made the term “March for Our Lives” firmly associated with the Parkland student leaders and the broader movement to enact gun control legislation. Subsequently, March for Our Lives became the formal name of a national organization headquartered in Florida that emphasized the development of youth-led chapters around the country to push for gun regulation. March for Our Lives chapters are centered in individual high schools, colleges, or communities under state boards composed by representatives from the chapters. In order to start a chapter, the organization’s website (https://MarchForOurLives.com) asks interested individuals to list the names of four students who will jointly found the chapter. The chapters and state boards receive guidance and support from regional directors who work under national officials. March for Our Lives seeks to partner with other advocacy groups for coordination, advice, and support of the youth-led chapters. The organization’s website lists ten policy priorities sought by March for Our Lives: 1. Gain government funding for gun violence research

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2. Eliminate gun lobby-engineered restrictions on the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives 3. Require universal background checks for all firearms sales 4. Ban high-capacity ammunition magazines that enable weapons to fire more than ten bullets without reloading 5. Ban semiautomatic assault rifles and initiate buyback programs for such weapons already in possession of civilians 6. Gain government funding for researchbased violence reduction programs in communities 7. Enact extreme risk protection order laws to remove weapons from people whose behavior indicates that they are a threat to themselves or others 8. Disarm domestic abusers, including dating partners 9. Strengthen federal laws and enforcement efforts aimed at gun-trafficking networks that move firearms between states 10. Enact laws to mandate safe storage practices and require reporting of stolen firearms The March for Our Lives website prominently features photos and video clips of X Gonzalez, David Hogg, and other Parkland student leaders who became recognizable public figures through social media and news stories. In its call to action, the organization’s website encourages interested young people to take specific actions to organize events, raise money, and encourage voting in their own communities. Voting became a special focus for the Parkland student leaders and the March for Our Lives organization during 2018. Taking inspiration from the Freedom Riders of the civil rights movement, the Parkland student leaders took bus trips around the country to mobilize voter registration drives among

young voters. On its website, the organization claimed credit for registering 50,000 new voters and contributing, in conjunction with other organizations’ efforts, to the registration of 800,000 voters. Even after they graduated from high school, the Parkland student leaders remained active and visible, especially through speaking engagements around the country. The Parkland student leaders endured unpleasant personal consequences as a result of their activities as March for Our Lives founders. They endured ugly disparaging comments posted on social media, conspiracy theories characterizing them as paid crisis actors promoting a nonexistent mass shooting, and even death threats. Despite these attacks, they persevered in pressing for new gun control laws. Scholars have analyzed gun-control advocates’ failure to generate a social movement against gun violence that can effectively counter the political dominance of the NRA in legislative battles over gun regulations (Goss 2006). After the Sandy Hook Elementary School mass shooting in 2012, it appeared that gun-control advocacy organizations had begun to develop political mobilization with the potential to influence legislation (Goss 2018). The widespread mobilization and success of March for Our Lives in 2018 may embody a significant acceleration of public mobilization for gun control as commentators credit the Parkland student leaders’ important role in shifting the political landscape around gun policy (Dionne 2018). Several states in addition to Florida enacted extreme risk protection order legislation in 2018 and the newly constituted U.S. House of Representatives passed stronger background check requirements in 2019 after years of inaction by Congress. March for Our Lives clearly had important impacts on political mobilization



affecting gun violence regulation in the United States. In addition, there was an even broader impact on youth empowerment worldwide. In particular, climate-change activist Greta Thunberg, the Swedish teenager who gave invited speeches to the British and European Parliaments, said she found her inspiration in observing March for Our Lives activism by American teens. She used that inspiration to organize a school walkout by students around the world on March 15, 2019, as a protest against governments’ inaction on environmental issues (Cohen and Heberle 2019). Thus, the influence of March for Our Lives extended beyond national borders and the specific issue of gun control. Christopher E. Smith See also: Everytown for Gun Safety; Loesch, Dana; Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting; Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting

Further Reading Alter, Charlotte. “The School Shooting Generation Has Had Enough.” Time, March 22, 2018. https://time.com/longform/never -again-movement/ (accessed June 18, 2019). Blinder, Alan, Jess Bidgood, and Vivian Wang. “In Gun Control Marches, Students Led but Adults Provided Key Resources.” New York Times, March 25, 2018. https:// www.nytimes.com /2018/03/25/us /gun -march-organizers.html (accessed June 19, 2019). Breland, Ali. “Teen Shooting Survivors Leverage Huge Social Media Followings for Gun Control.” The Hill, March 3, 2018. https://thehill.com /policy/technology /376530-teen-shooting-survivors-leverage -huge-social-media-followings-for-gun (accessed June 19, 2019). Clemens, Danny. “Town Hall for Our Lives: Parkland Survivors Unveil Next Step in

March for Our Lives Movement | 555 Gun Reform Agenda.” ABC-7 News, March 30, 2018. https://abc7news.com /politics/march-for-our-lives-organizers -reveal-movements-next-step/3283071/ (accessed June 19, 2019). Cohen, Ilana, and Jacob Heberele. “Youth Demand Climate Action in Global School Strike.” Harvard Political Review, March 19, 2019. https://harvardpolitics.com /united-states/youth-demand-climate-action -in-global-school-strike/ (accessed June 20, 2019). Conti, Meredith. “The Sound of Silence: A Viewer’s Guide to Emma Gonzalez’s March for Our Lives Speech.” Theatre Journal 70 (December 2018): E8–E11. Dionne, E. J. “It’s the Beginning of the End for the Gun Lobby’s Power.” Washington Post, December 16, 2018. https://www .washingtonpost.com /opinions /its-the -beginning-of-the-end-for-the-gun-lobbys -power/2018/12/16/515e8dfa-ffe2-11e8-862a -b6a6f3ce8199_story.html?utm_term=.f b 28b4c5082b (accessed June 20, 2019). Gabbatt, Adam. “Fight for Gun Control Heads to Town Halls after March for Our Lives.” The Guardian, March 31, 2018. https:// www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/mar /31/resistance-now-gun-control-march-for -our-lives (accessed June 18, 2019). Goss, Kristin. Disarmed: The Missing Movement for Gun Control in America. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006. Goss, Kristin. “Whatever Happened to the ‘Missing Movement’? Gun Control Politics Over Two Decades of Change.” In Gun Studies: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Politics, Policy, and Practice, edited by Jennifer, Carlson, Kristin Goss, and Harel Shapira, 136–50. New York: Routledge, 2018. Grinberg, Emanuella. “Students at Town Hall to Washington, NRA: Guns Are the Problem, Do Something.” CNN, February 22, 2018. https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/21 /politics/cnn-town-hall-f lorida-shooting /index.html (accessed June 18, 2019). Jones, Maggie. “The March for Our Lives Activists Showed Us How to Find Meaning

556 | Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting in Tragedy.” Smithsonian Magazine (December), 2018. https://www.smithsonian mag.com/innovation/march-for-our-lives -student-activists-showed-meaning-trag edy-180970717/ (accessed June 18, 2019). Leguizamon, Mercedes, and Saeed Ahmed. “Lyft Offers Free Rides to March for Our Lives Participants.” CNN, March 23, 2018. https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/23/us/free -lyft-ride-for-march-for-our-lives-trnd /index.html (accessed June 19, 2019). “March for Our Lives Highlights: Students Protesting Guns Say ‘Enough Is Enough.’” New York Times, March 24, 2018. https:// www.nytimes.com/2018/03/24/us/march -for-our-lives.html (accessed June 18, 2019). Scherer, Michael. “Florida Governor Rick Scott Breaks with NRA to Sign New Gun Regulations.” Washington Post, March 9, 2018. https://www.washingtonpost.com/power post/florida-gov-rick-scott-breaks-with-nra -to-sign-new-gun-regulation/2018/03/09 /e5d1f02e-23b2-11e8-86f6-54bfff693d2b _story.html?utm_term=.1646dac499bf (accessed June 20, 2019) “Student David Hogg During Florida School Shooting: ‘It’s Time to Take a Stand on Gun Control.” Los Angeles Times, February 15, 2018. https://www.latimes.com/visuals /video/95939817-132.html (accessed June 18, 2019). Swartz, Martha. “Why Is It Different This Time?” Journal of Pediatric Health Care 32 (2018): 213. Witt, Emily. “How the Survivors of Parkland Began the Never Again Movement.” New Yorker, February 19, 2018. https://www.new yorker.com/news/news-desk/how-the-survi vors-of-parkland-began-the-never-again -movement (accessed June 19, 2019).

Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting On February 14, 2018, nineteen-year-old Nikolas Cruz, a former student, arrived at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in

Parkland, Florida. He made his way to the school’s Building 12, which largely housed the freshman classes. Just after 2:20 p.m., he opened fire and began methodically making his way through the building’s three floors, attempting to kill as many people as possible. In under five minutes, he had killed seventeen people and injured seventeen others. He then dropped his weapon and fled the school with other students who were trying to escape. He was apprehended by law enforcement less than two miles from the campus just over seventy-five minutes later. After taking an Uber to the school, where he arrived at 2:19 p.m., just over twenty minutes before the end of the school day, the perpetrator crossed the campus entered the east hallway of Building 12 carrying a large bag. He made his way to the nearby stairwell, where he loaded his weapon—a Smith & Wesson M&P15 Sport II semiautomatic rifle—and put on a vest to carry additional magazines. While there, he encountered a student, who he warned to leave before something bad happened; the student fled the building through the same door the perpetrator had just entered. Several seconds later, he entered the firstfloor hallway and began firing. Students Luke Hoyer, Martin Duque, and Ashley Baez, who had entered the building just before the perpetrator did, all were shot. Hoyer and Duque were killed, as was student Gina Montalto, who was sitting in the alcove to her classroom; Baez was injured but survived. As the shooting continued, the reverberations from the gun shook dust from the ceiling tiles loose, which caused the building’s fire alarms to activate. The perpetrator continued through the first-floor hallway over the next two minutes, shooting into classrooms at people he could see—he never entered a single room but instead fired through doors and the windows next to



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them. Students Alyssa Alhadeff, Nicholas Dworet, Alaina Petty, Helena Ramsay, Alex Schachter, and Carmen Schentrup were killed in their respective classrooms; twelve other students were injured. Less than two minutes after the shooting began, campus monitor Chris Hixon entered the building from the west end and sprinted down the hallway toward the perpetrator to try and stop him. The perpetrator exited an alcove between two of the classrooms he had been firing into, aimed his weapon at Hixon, and shot him. Hixon was able to crawl down the hall and hide behind a wall. At the same time that he was shot, a group of students who had fled a third-floor classroom and were running down the stairs heard the gunfire and turned around to run back upstairs. Hearing the fire alarm over the gunshots, many students and teachers

on the third floor were calmly beginning to evacuate in response to the notification. The perpetrator began to move west through the first-floor hallway, again shooting Hixon as he passed by him. Aaron Feis, another campus monitor, arrived at the building seconds later through the same west entrance Hixon had come in. The perpetrator immediately fired at him, killing him almost instantly, before making his way up to the second floor. Having heard the gunshots going off, teachers and students on that level had taken shelter out of sight of the doors and windows. The perpetrator fired several rounds into various classrooms, but no one was injured. On the third floor, the hall continued to fill with students evacuating. As the gunshots were fired on the second level, a teacher heard them and immediately responded,

Students gather in Parkland, Florida, at the memorial site for the 17 lives that were lost at Marjory Stoneman Douglas on February 14, 2018. Seventeen others also were wounded in the attack. (SOPA Images Limited/Alamy Stock Photo)

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trying to get students back into their classrooms. By the time the perpetrator made his way to the third floor, approximately twenty people remained in the hallway. He opened fire, shooting ten of them. Five students— Jaime Guttenberg, Cara Loughran, Joaquin Oliver, Meadow Pollack, and Peter Wang— and teacher Scott Beigel were killed. The perpetrator then entered the teacher’s lounge and attempted to shoot fleeing students through the windows, but they were storm resistant for hurricanes and held. He then dropped his weapon and fled the school by blending in with other students. Less than six minutes after the first shot was fired, the last round was captured on a responding sheriff’s deputy’s body camera. During the shooting, 140 rounds had been fired from the rifle. Once off school grounds, the perpetrator made his way to a Walmart less than a mile from the school. While there, he went into the Subway restaurant and ordered a drink. He left several minutes later and went to a McDonald’s about half a mile south of the shopping center, where he remained for a minute before leaving again. At 3:37 p.m., the perpetrator was detained about two miles southwest of the school by a police officer from a neighboring jurisdiction who had been assisting with the response, and he was taken into custody without further incident. The perpetrator was charged with and subsequently indicted on seventeen counts of first-degree murder and seventeen counts of attempted first-degree murder. Following his arraignment six days later, the prosecutor’s office filed a notice of intent to seek the death penalty. When the perpetrator refused to enter a plea, the judge entered one of not guilty on his behalf. The defense team offered multiple times to plead guilty in exchange for the death penalty being removed as a possible sanction, but the prosecutor’s office declined. On the evening of November 13, 2018, the perpetrator

attacked a jail officer, and subsequently was charged with aggravated assault, battery, and use of an electric weapon against the officer after getting ahold of his taser. The assault case, for which jury selection began in October 2021, carries the potential for an additional fifteen years to be added onto his sentence for the shooting itself. This hearing was held until after the trial for the shooting. On October 21, 2021, the defense entered a plea of guilty for the shooter, and on October 13, 2022, a jury recommended that he be given a sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Responses at the Federal and State Levels As with many other school shootings, there was an immediate visceral reaction to the events that had unfolded in Parkland. As they had done in the past, many Republican politicians attempted to refocus the narrative on mental health, arguing that it was either “too political or too soon” to talk about gun control efforts. Some Republican representatives, however, did seem open to discussing restrictions. Governor John Kasich (R-OH) called for restrictions on AR-15 sales, while Senator James Lankford (R-OK) indicated he was open to more comprehensive background checks. Senator Pat Roberts (R-KS) indicated that he supported raising the age of ownership on assault-style rifles to at least twenty-one. Many of the students who attended Stoneman Douglas, however, were not satisfied. They criticized representatives, telling them they wanted action rather than just “thoughts and prayers.” Three days after the shooting, Never Again MSD, an anti–gun violence group formed the day after the attack, held a rally in Fort Lauderdale demanding action. One month after the attack, on March 14, they organized a nationwide school walkout protesting firearm violence. Ten days later, in collaboration with Everytown for



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Gun Safety, Never Again MSD held the March for Our Lives demonstration in Washington, DC, with more than 800 sibling events across the nation, which drew upward of two million protestors and supporters. During the March for Our Lives events, protestors urged for commonsense gun restrictions, including universal background checks, banning assault-style weapons and high-capacity magazines, raising the age of ownership to twenty-one, and closing the gun show loophole. Despite their efforts, very little movement was made with respect to gun control after the shooting. On February 20, 2018, just six days after the shooting, President Donald Trump ordered the Department of Justice to issue regulations that would effectively ban the use of bump stocks. Notably, however, bump stocks were not used in the Parkland shooting but instead were an artifact response to the Las Vegas mass shooting that killed 58 and wounded more than 400 others four and a half months earlier. Two days after issuing the directive, President Trump held a listening session with survivors and others, during which time he vocally supported a policy that effectively expanded gun rights—armed teachers— suggesting that up to 20 percent of teachers should be armed and that they would be an effective response in such a crisis, despite no evidence to support such a claim. He doubled down on this statement the next day, saying that schools, which are historically gun-free zones, are magnets for violence. Other efforts at the federal level, including a bill to reinstate the federal Assault Weapons Ban that had lapsed in 2004, failed to gain any traction. Some success related to gun control efforts, however, was seen at the state level in Florida. On March 9, 2018, Governor Rick Scott (R-FL) signed into law the

Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Act (Senate Bill 7026). Included in the provisions of the law were a ban on bump stocks, raising the minimum age of firearms purchase from eighteen to twenty-one, and mandatory waiting periods between purchases and delivery of guns. At the same time, the Act also established the Coach Aaron Feis Guardianship Program, named after one of the school monitors who was killed in the shooting, which would allow sheriffs departments to establish armed teacher programs. Teachers seeking to be able to carry their weapons under the program would have to undergo extensive background and psychological tests as well as complete 144 hours of comprehensive firearms training. While widespread legislative efforts related to gun control did not result from the shooting and its subsequent activism, the Never Again MSD movement, which was largely driven by and through social media, was effective in other ways. Two weeks after the shooting, on February 28, Dick’s Sporting Goods discontinued selling assault-style rifles, bump stocks, and highcapacity magazines; they also restricted the sale of firearms to anyone over the age of twenty-one. That same day, Walmart announced that they would require background checks for all purchases and would raise the required age for both gun and ammunition sales to twenty-one. The next day, Fred Meyer, a chain of forty-five superstores under the Kroger umbrella, instituted the same age requirements, as did retailer L. L. Bean. On March 16, the grocery chain also discontinued the sale of any gunrelated periodicals that included content about assault rifles. The teen activists also took on the NRA, calling for Americans to boycott the organization, particularly in light of their fervent

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support for armed teachers and opposition to the regulation of assault-style rifles like the one that had been used in the shooting. The boycott efforts also challenged companies to sever their ties with the NRA or cancel discounts or other perks for their members. Several corporations did sever their ties with the embattled organization, including the Avis and Enterprise car rental groups, Delta, United Airlines, Best Western, and the Wyndham Hotel Group. First National Bank of Omaha, the largest privately held bank in the nation, was one of the first to respond to the calls for the boycott, noting that they would not renew their partnership to provide the “official credit card of the NRA.” Publix, a national grocery chain that had supported an NRAbacked candidate for Florida governor, suspended its political donations after David Hogg, a founding member of Never Again MSD, organized a “die in” and public boycott against the chain. Other companies, like Bass Pro Shops, Cabela’s, Lloyds of London, and Wells Fargo, received similar calls to boycott the NRA but did not sever their ties with the organization. Streaming services like Amazon, Apple TV, Roku, and SiriusXM also were pressured to stop streaming NRATV but have not discontinued their agreement as of the time of this writing. Gun rights supporters, conservative commentators, and NRA executives called the boycotts an attack not only against the organization but against free speech. In response to Delta severing their ties with the NRA, Georgia’s Republican state senators voted to remove sales tax exemptions on jet fuel until the company reinstated their relationship with the NRA, to which the airline’s CEO responded, “Our decision was not made for economic gain and our values are not for sale” (Josephs 2018).

Red Flag Laws and Warning Signs The investigation into the shooting, particularly through the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission also established as part of the 2018 Act, revealed that there were numerous warning signs leading up to the attack. Both in and out of school, the perpetrator had an extensive history of violent outbursts, behavioral issues, and engaging in cutting, self-harming behaviors, and animal abuse. At some point, his suicidal ideation was augmented with homicidal thoughts. Those who knew the perpetrator, particularly in the years leading up to the shooting, described him as having an unusual fascination with weapons. He often posted online about firearms, including one in February 2016 where he posted a photo of a gun on Instagram with the caption, “I am going to get this gun when I turn 18 and shoot up the school.” The perpetrator turned eighteen on September 24, 2016. Four days later, he underwent a threat assessment initiated by the school after a student and teacher reported that he had disclosed consuming gasoline in a suicide attempt. Although the perpetrator underwent an evaluation for a Baker Act, which is Florida’s seventy-two-hour involuntary psychiatric hold, and it was determined that he did not meet the criteria to be taken in, the investigator from the Department of Children and Families who conducted the in-home assessment indicated that his counselor from the behavioral health center expressed concerns of his mixing guns with his depression. On the day of the threat assessment, law enforcement searched his home for weapons, though they did not find any. Despite this, two days later, he secured the necessary identification to be able to lawfully purchase a gun. Within just over two months, he purchased his first gun and then



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purchased six others in the fourteen months leading up to the shooting. On November 1, 2017, just three and a half months before the perpetrator’s attack, his mother passed away. At the end of the same month, a family friend called into the Broward County Sheriff’s Office from out of state after seeing concerning posts online, noting that she believed he was a “Columbine in the making.” When she received no response, she followed up with the FBI in January 2018, just over a month before the shooting. She reported the leakage and threats he was making on social media, indicating that he not only wanted to shoot up the school but had the means to do it. Both tips, however, went unaddressed. Although an estimated thirty or more people knew about the perpetrator’s threats to shoot up the school, very few came forward. Those who did were met with little in the way of action, either from the school or law enforcement. This was due, in part, to the absence of a red flag or extreme risk law in the state. These laws, depending on the state, allow for law enforcement or individuals like family members to petition the court for temporary removal of an individual’s firearms if they pose a danger to themselves or others. The premise is that acts of violence either against oneself or others often are made in the heat of the moment so by removing the firearms, even temporarily, it would allow the situation to de-escalate and potentially save lives. As part of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Act, the state established “The Risk Protection Order Act” (RPOA) to give law enforcement the power to file such petitions. While the RPOA required that hearings on such petitions be carried out within fourteen days of filing, it also provided mechanisms for temporary orders to be granted prior to the

hearing when individuals pose an immediate danger to themselves or others and has access to firearms. The Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Act also addressed the loopholes that allowed for the perpetrator to avoid being Baker Acted, and expanded the provisions so that individuals subjected to such holds also could have their firearms and ammunition held until the individual is no longer subject to involuntary detention, unless a risk protection order has been issued. Jaclyn Schildkraut See also: Armed Teacher Policies; Columbine High School Shooting; Everytown for Gun Safety; Extreme Risk Protection Orders; National Rifle Association (NRA); Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting; March for Our Lives Movement; School Shootings; Semiautomatic Weapons; Trump, Donald J.; Universal Background Checks

Further Readings Cullen, Dave. Parkland: Birth of a Movement. New York: HarperCollins, 2019. Josephs, Leslie. “Delta CEO Says, ‘Our Values Are Not for Sale,’ after Georgia Lawmakers Drop Tax Break.” CNBC, March 2, 2018. https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/02 /delta-ceo-our-values-are-not-for-sale.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission. “Report Submitted to the Governor, Speaker of the House of Representatives and Senate President.” Tallahassee, FL: Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission, 2019. http://www.fdle.state .fl.us/MSDHS/MSD-Report-2-Public-Ver sion.pdf (accessed May 18, 2022). Mark, Michelle, Kieran Corcoran, and David Choi. “Timeline Shows How the Parkland Florida School Shooting Unfolded.” Business Insider, February 14, 2019. https:// www.businessinsider.com/timeline-shows

562 | Martin, Trayvon, Shooting of -how-the-parkland-florida-school-shooting -unfolded-2018-2 (accessed May 18, 2022). Schildkraut, Jaclyn, Rebecca G. Cowan, and Tessa M. Mosher. “The Parkland Mass Shooting and the Path to Intended Violence: A Case Study of Missed Opportunities and Avenues for Future Prevention.” Homicide Studies (2022). https://doi.org/10 .1177/10887679211062518. South Florida SunSentinel. “Florida School Shooting at Stoneman Douglas High School.” n.d. https://www.sun-sentinel .com /local / broward /parkland /f lor ida -school-shooting/ (accessed October 9, 2021).

Martin, Trayvon, Shooting of On the evening of February 26, 2012, twenty-eight-year-old George Zimmerman, of mixed race, fatally shot Trayvon Martin, a Black seventeen-year-old high school student, during a physical altercation. At the time of the shooting, Martin was visiting his father’s fiancée at the gated Twin Lakes community in Sanford, Florida, where Zimmerman was the neighborhood watch captain. On the day of the shooting, at an unverified time, Martin walked from the home he was visiting to a nearby 7-Eleven convenience store. Around 7:00 p.m., Zimmerman called the Sanford Police Department’s nonemergency number to report a “suspicious person” running in the neighborhood— presumably Martin. Zimmerman, who was instructed to stay in his SUV and avoid contacting the individual, ignored police instructions and began following the teen, first by vehicle—then on foot. Minutes later, witnesses called 911 to report a fight and pleas for help. By the time officers arrived, Zimmerman had shot Martin once in the chest at close range with a 9-mm Kel-Tec

semiautomatic, killing the teen (Horwitz and McCrummen 2012). Although Martin was unarmed during the attack, Zimmerman claimed that the killing was in self-defense. According to documents released by a Florida prosecutor, a hand-to-hand struggle occurred before Martin was killed. Zimmerman told police that the teenager punched him, knocking him to the ground, and began pounding his head into the pavement. A police report revealed that Zimmerman was bleeding from the nose and the back of the head (Williams 2012). To this day, the exact movements of Zimmerman and Martin remain a mystery. Zimmerman initially avoided prosecution, but on April 11, 2012, he was charged with second-degree murder and manslaughter after intense public pressure (CNN 2013). Zimmerman was released on a $150,000 bail on April 20, 2012. On June 1, 2012, a judge revoked his bond on the grounds that Zimmerman and his wife previously misrepresented their finances. On July 5, 2012, a new bond was set at $1 million, and Zimmerman was released the following day after paying the required 10 percent of the bail bond amount. The following year, on July 13, 2013, after sixteen hours of deliberation, an all-female jury of six found Zimmerman not guilty in Martin’s death.

Trayvon Martin Trayvon Benjamin Martin was born February 5, 1995, to Sybrina Fulton and Tracy Martin, who divorced in 1999. At nine years old, Martin reportedly pulled his father out of a house fire, saving his life. Prior to his death, Martin lived in Miami Gardens, FL, with his mother and older brother, Jahavaris Fulton. Martin attended Norland Middle School and Highland Oaks



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Protestors march in Sanford, Florida, following the acquittal of George Zimmerman. Zimmerman was accused of fatally shooting unarmed 17-year-old Trayvon Martin following an altercation. (Turkbug/Dreamstime.com)

Middle School. He attended Miami Carol City High School in Miami Gardens for his freshman and sophomore years in high school and at the time of his death, Martin was a junior at Dr. Michael M. Krop High School in Miami, Florida. According to reports, Martin was suspended from school three times related to a series of nonviolent incidents (Daily Mail Reporter 2012). The infractions involved graffiti, truancy, and possession of marijuana residue. Martin was serving a ten-day suspension at the time of his death. Despite his disciplinary history, Martin has been described as “a typical teen” (Burch and Isensee 2012; Memmott 2012).

George Zimmerman George Michael Zimmerman, born October 5, 1983, was a part-time student at Seminole State College and employed as an insurance

fraud investigator at the time of the shooting (CNN 2013). Zimmerman, who identifies as Hispanic, once had hopes of becoming a law enforcement officer and has told cops his goal was to become a judge (Memmott 2012). Zimmerman married Shellie Dean, a licensed cosmetologist, in 2007. The couple moved to The Retreat at Twin Lakes, where the killing occurred, in 2009. Two years later, Zimmerman began to focus his energy on a series of robberies occurring in the neighborhood and was asked by the community to serve as neighborhood watch captain. At least eight burglaries were reported within Twin Lakes in the fourteen months prior to the Trayvon Martin shooting, according to the Sanford Police Department. According to residents, dozens of reports of attempted break-ins and would-be burglars stalking homes had created an atmosphere of growing fear in the neighborhood. In

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several of the incidents, witnesses identified the suspects to police as young Black men. This may have contributed to Zimmerman’s suspicion of Martin on the night of the killing (Francescani 2012). Years after the killing, Zimmerman and his sometimes-controversial personal life have remained in the spotlight. In July 2013, four days after his acquittal, Zimmerman and another man made headlines for helping a family get out of an overturned SUV in Florida. A few weeks later, Zimmerman was pulled over and given a warning for speeding in Forney, Texas (Yan 2015). In 2013, a month after his acquittal, Zimmerman’s wife pleaded guilty to perjury for claiming her family was indigent during a bond hearing for her husband. She was sentenced to one year of probation and one hundred hours of community service. Mrs. Zimmerman filed for divorce in September 2013 (Francescani 2012). Later that year, Zimmerman was charged with the felony assault of his girlfriend, Samantha Scheibe. He allegedly pointed a gun at Scheibe after an argument. Zimmerman’s girlfriend asked that the charges against him be dropped and that the restraining order barring him from seeing her be lifted, after which prosecutors said that they would drop the case against him (Yan 2015). In January 2015, Zimmerman was again arrested on suspicion of domestic violence. He allegedly threw a wine bottle at a different woman than the one involved in the earlier incident. Zimmerman was released without charges after the woman recanted her statement. Months later, he was shot at during a road rage incident in Lake Mary, Florida. The shooter, Matthew Apperson, claimed that Zimmerman followed him, threatened him, and brandished a gun. Zimmerman was not shot in the incident but

was hit with broken glass (Yan 2015). On September 20, 2016 Apperson was convicted of attempted murder and aggravated assault with a firearm. A month later, he was sentenced to twenty years in prison (Nottingham 2016). Shortly after the shooting, a woman known as “Witness 9” came forward alleging Zimmerman molested her on and off for over a decade. The woman claimed to have close ties with Zimmerman’s family and told investigators that, based on the family’s history, she thought the Martin shooting was racially motivated (Luscombe 2012). In 2018, Zimmerman was kicked off the dating app Bumble because he violated a rule about shirtless pictures. He was removed from the site a second time because he tried to return without permission. In April 2019, Zimmerman was banned from another dating app, Tinder, for violation of Community Guidelines and Terms of Use, compromising user safety. He had allegedly been using a fake profile (Russo 2019).

Response On March 19, 2012, the Department of Justice and FBI announced that they launched an investigation into Martin’s death (CNN 2019). The incident was reviewed by the Department of Justice for potential civil rights violations, but no additional charges were filed, citing insufficient evidence. On March 22, 2012, a petition on Change. org calling for the arrest of Zimmerman, created by the parents of Martin, surpassed 1.3 million people (CNN 2019). On the same day, Sanford Police Chief Bill Lee announced that he stepped down “temporarily” as head of the department, which was criticized for its handling of the fatal shooting (CNN 2019). Lee was ultimately fired on June 20, 2012.



The killing of Trayvon Martin sparked protests nationwide, challenging views on gun laws, self-defense, and racism (Williams 2012). Rallies took place across the country, including in Sanford, Florida, where Martin’s parents spoke at a town hall held by the City Commission a month after the shooting. The Trayvon Martin case was a catalyst for the efforts of several groups, including Black Lives Matter, the Black Youth Project 100, and Million Hoodies (Crumpton 2018). The mission of Black Lives Matter is to organize and build local power to intervene in violence inflicted on Black communities by the state and vigilantes. The Black Youth Project 100, a justice-reform organization, was convened in response to the acquittal of George Zimmerman. Million Hoodies is a human rights organization dedicated to ending gun violence, named after the hoodie that Trayvon Martin wore on the night he was killed. The Justice for Trayvon Martin Foundation was established by Martin’s parents in March 2012. On February 9, 2013, the foundation hosted a “Day of Remembrance Community Peace Walk and Forum” in Miami. The event took place four days after what would have been Martin’s 18th birthday. The foundation also hosts a program called Circle of Mothers that supports women whose children are victims of gun violence. In 2018, international sports retail company Puma released a new sneaker, with the proceeds from every pair sold donated to the Trayvon Martin Foundation (Telusma 2018). In 2018, rapper Jay-Z (given name Shawn Carter), Martin’s parents, and others produced the docuseries entitled “Rest in Power: The Trayvon Martin Story.” The six-episode series premiered on Black Entertainment

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Television Network (BET) and Paramount Network on July 30, 2018, drawing 1.2 million viewers (Pederson 2018). Whytnee M. Foriest See also: Black Lives Matter; Extreme Risk Protection Orders; South (U.S.) and Gun Violence

Further Reading Burch, Audra D. S., and Laura Isensee. “Trayvon Martin, a Typical Teen with Dreams of Flying or Fixing Planes.” Tampa Bay Times, March 27, 2012. http://www.tampa bay.com/news/publicsafety/crime/trayvon -martin-a-typical-teen-with-dreams-of -flying-or-fixing-planes/1221425 (accessed May 18, 2022). CBS News. “Trayvon Martin’s Father: ‘He Saved My Life.’” CBS News, March 23, 2012. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/tray von-mar tins-father-he-saved-my-life / (accessed May 18, 2022). CNN. “Trayvon Martin Shooting Fast Facts.” CNN, May 6, 2013. https://www.cnn.com /2013/06/05/us/trayvon-martin-shooting -fast-facts/index.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Crumpton, Taylor. “On the Sixth Anniversary of Trayvon Martin’s Killing, Activists Remember the Spark That Ignited a Movement.” Teen Vogue, February 27, 2018. https://www.teenvogue.com/story/sixth-anni versary-trayvon-martins-killing-activists -ignited-a-movement (accessed May 18, 2022). Daily Mail Reporter. “Trayvon Suspended THREE Times for ‘Drugs, Truancy, Graffiti and Carrying Burglary Tool’ and Did He Attack Bus Driver Too? New Picture Emerges of Victim as Parents Claim It’s All a Smear.” Daily Mail UK, March 27, 2012. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article -2120504/Trayvon-Martin-case-He-sus pended-times-caught-burglary-tool.html (accessed May 18, 2022).

566 | Mass Murder (Shootings) Francescani, Chris. “George Zimmerman: Prelude to a Shooting.” Reuters, April 25, 2012. https://www.reuters.com/article/us -usa-florida-shooting-zimmerman/george -zimmerman-prelude-to-a-shooting-idUS BRE83O18H20120425 (accessed May 18, 2022). Horwitz, Sari, and Stephanie McCrummen. “Trayvon Martin Documents Reveal New Details in Case.” Washington Post, May 17, 2012. https://www.washingtonpost.com /politics/trayvon-martin-autospy-report - indicates struggle/2012/05/17/gIQAxw6 HXU_story. html?utm_term=.a45d0a037238 (accessed May 18, 2022). Luscombe, Richard. “George Zimmerman Accused of Racial Bias and Molestation in New Statement.” The Guardian, July 16, 2012. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012 /jul/16/george-zimmerman-racial-bias-state ment (accessed May 18, 2022). Memmott, Mark. “Trayvon Martin Was ‘Typical Teen,’ George Zimmerman Is Hard To Categorize.” National Public Radio, March 23, 2012. https://www.npr.org/sections/the two-way/2012/03/23/149206896/trayvon -martin-was-typical-teen-george-zimmerman -is-hard-to-categorize (accessed May 18, 2022). Nottingham, Shawn. “Man Sentenced in Road Rage Shooting Involving George Zimmerman.” CNN, October 17, 2016. https://www.cnn.com/2016/10/17/us/george -zim mer man-matthew-apperson-road -rage-sentencing/index.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Pederson, Erik. “‘Rest in Power: The Trayvon Martin Story’ Premiere Draws 1.2 M Viewers over Two Cable Networks.” Deadline, July 31, 2018. https://deadline .com/2018/07/rest-in-power-the-trayvon -martin-story-ratings-premiere-paramount -network-bet-1202437756/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Russo, Amy. “Tinder Bans George Zimmerman from Dating App, Citing User Safety.” Yahoo News, April 21, 2019. https://news .yahoo.com/george-zimmerman-banned

-from-tinder-203341904.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Telusma, Blue. “PUMA teams up with Trayvon Martin Foundation to Launch New Sneaker and #REFORM Social Justice Platform.” The Grio, December 21, 2018. https://thegrio.com/2018/12/21/puma-tray von-martin-foundation-launches-reform -social-justice-platform/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Williams, Matt. “George Zimmerman Told Police Trayvon Martin Beat His Head into Pavement.” The Guardian, March 26, 2012. https://www.theguardian.com/world /2012/mar/26/george-zimmerman-trayvon -martin-police-report (accessed May 18, 2022). Yan, Holly. “George Zimmerman’s Encounters with the Law and Public Spotlight.” CNN, May 12, 2015. https://www.cnn .com/2015/05/12/us/george-zimmerman -timeline/index.html (accessed May 18, 2022).

Maryland One-Gun-per-Month Law. See One-Gun-per-Month Laws Mass Murder (Shootings) According to the FBI’s Crime Classification Manual, mass murder is defined as a singleevent, single-location homicide involving four or more victims. Mass murder is distinguished from serial murder and spree murder in specific ways. Serial murder is the killing of three or more people in more than a thirty-day span with a significant cooling-off period between the murders. Spree murder is the killing of three or more people within a thirty-day period and typically during the course of another felony. Mass murders can include gang killings, felony-related murders, school shootings, and other types of group homicides, such as



workplace mass murders (the most common type of mass murder) and domestic violence when four or more family members are killed in one place. The only new type of mass murder observed as emerging during the twentieth century is drug-related mass killings. Mass murder is not a new phenomenon in the United States. There have been cases of mass murder since early in American history. This fact appears to be downplayed because of two main reasons. First, historically, mass murders may not have been reported as such, meaning they were simply categorized as murders or homicides. Second, the public appears to have been more fascinated with serial murder in the past. However, the media pays much more attention to mass murder than serial killing today. Mass murders typically do not generate a significant level of public fear and anxiety for long periods of time relative to have serial murders. If fear and anxiety do exist as a result of mass murder, it is short-lived due to the manner in which the situation is brought to an end: mass murderers often either commit suicide or place themselves in a situation where they can be killed by police (sometimes referred to as “suicide by proxy”). In some cases, the mass murderer is captured unharmed or surrenders to the police. It is difficult to locate accurate data on the number of mass murders in the United States. The contentions of scholars that mass murders have increased since the mid-1960s may be due to a significantly greater number of public mass killings and/or sensationalistic news reporting of such events. Additionally, these murders may be classified as mass murders when they have not been in the past. For example, domestic violence-related mass murders are often only categorized as domestic violence-related homicides. Familicides

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(murder of an entire family by a single family member) were more prevalent prior to the 1970s than they are today. Despite the lack of research on mass murder prior to 1965, scholars contend that the onset of an unprecedented and increasing mass-murder wave occurred in the mid1960s. During the 1990s, there were 909 mass killings in the United States (Duwe 2004). Presently, there is still not an accurate picture of mass murders in the United States because statistics vary according to the source and associated definition used to classify events. The rate of killings in the United States involving four or more victims represents less than 1 percent of all homicides, according to Everytown for Gun Safety (2019). A survey by Chapman University found that 41 percent of Americans reportedly fear mass shootings (Sheth 2019). The pattern is that a mass murder occurs about every two weeks in the United States. Multiple-victim homicides are more likely than single-victim homicides to involve guns. Analysis of the characteristics of offenders indicated that mass murderers during the first two-thirds of the twentieth century were older, more suicidal, and less likely to use guns. In the latter part of the century, they were more likely to be white males and middle class. In fact, 64 percent of mass murderers are white males, 20 percent are Black males, and the remainder comprise Latinos, Asians, and other (Statista 2020). Regarding gender, the vast majority of mass murderers are male. Of 114 mass shootings between 1982 and 2019, 110 were carried out by males. Three were committed by females and one by a pair comprising a male and female (Taylor 2019). There are many well-known cases of mass murder, both past and present. A notorious past mass murder occurred on July 31, 1966, at the University of Texas at Austin.

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Prior to the shooting, the perpetrator began his reign of terror by stabbing both his mother and his wife several times, killing them. He left a note claiming to have killed his mother to release her from an evil world; another note was left claiming to have killed his wife but gave no explanation. The next day, he climbed the tower at the university. When he reached the thirteenth floor, he killed the receptionist; and then from atop the tower, he fired onto the campus grounds. The shooting lasted for almost two hours. Whitman killed fifteen people in all and wounded several others before he was shot to death by the police (Neuberger 2016). This tragedy had lasting effects on American society, but more mass murders in the United States have occurred since then. This mass murder did not significantly affect gun control policies in that there were not strong calls for stricter regulations. Mass murders using guns became increasingly more common following the University of Texas shooting. On April 20, 1999, two students killed twelve of their classmates and a teacher before taking their own lives at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado. Their arsenal consisted of an IntraTec TEC-DC9 semiautomatic pistol, a Hi-Point 9 mm carbine, a Savage 67H pump-action shotgun, and a Savage 311-D 12-gauge shotgun, as well as nearly 100 improvised explosive devices (e.g., pipe bombs, Molotov cocktails). The Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings, which occurred in Newtown, Connecticut, on December 14, 2012, left twenty-six people, mostly children, dead. All of the guns were purchased legally and were easily accessible to the shooter in the home he shared with his mother. In 2018, seventeen people were killed by a former student at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida; another

seventeen were injured (Chuck, Johnson, and Siemaszko 2018; Torres 2019). A race-related mass murder occurred at an El Paso, Texas, Walmart on August 3, 2019. Here, the perpetrator killed twenty-two people and injured twenty-six more. The shooter posted a racist message before the shooting and was alleged to have targeted this Walmart because it was frequented by a large Hispanic population (Romo 2019). Following all of these murders was a cry for stricter gun legislation, but very little changed.

Explanations of Mass Murder More than 74 percent of mass murderers kill with firearms (Melgar 2019). The United States is characterized as having lenient legislation with regard to gun control. As a result, it is easy for anyone to purchase guns and ammunition needed to commit mass murder. Although firearms are not to blame for all mass murders, their use is correlated with higher fatality counts comparative to other weapons. It is nearly impossible to murder a large number of people with a knife or with one’s bare hands. Guns may also be perceived as an impersonal way to kill people as mass murderers generally distance themselves from their victims. Mental illness is often cited as an explanation for mass murders. However, most people with mental illness are not violent, and most mass murderers are not mentally ill (Knoll and Annas 2015). A consideration is that society would like to believe that a mass murderer is mentally ill, given the disturbing aspects of the violence. It is a way to dismiss the supposition that U.S. society is violent, and it would take considerable time and thought to eradicate such violence. Blaming mental health issues also takes the focus off gun control. As most mass murderers are male, links between gender and violence have been



suggested. Dominant definitions of masculinity include the attributes of power and control, and when resistance to these privileges abound, violence may result. Most males who commit mass murders are of low status and may believe masculinity is all they have left when everything else related to power is missing (Madden 2018). Mass shootings follow a consistent pattern: The men who commit them have often experienced what they perceive as threats to their masculinity. They may be bullied by peers, gay-baited by classmates, or perceive themselves as unable to live up to societal expectations associated with masculinity, such as holding down a steady job or being tough or strong (Bridges and Tober 2017). Coupling gendered violence with the availability of guns in the United States, mass murder may well be perceived as a viable outlet for males who feel emasculated.

Responses to Mass Murder Stricter gun control will not necessarily deter or reduce mass murders. Waiting periods and background checks as prescribed by the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act of 1993 are not generally perceived as preventive measures (Mascia 2015). Few mass murderers have criminal or psychiatric records. In addition, background checks and waiting periods usually encompass short periods of time and would not significantly delay a planned execution. The majority of mass murderers use legal firearms. Similar countries (like Canada) have the same mental health issues and issues related to gun violence, and yet the country has very few mass murders. The difference may be that Canada has stricter gun control policies than the United States (McManus 2019). As far as gun control being an effective preventive measure against mass murder, consideration has been given to banning

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high-powered weapons with rapid-fire capability. Before 1966, weapons available to potential mass killers were pistols, rifles, and shotguns, whereas in more modern times, the use of semiautomatic or “assaultstyle” rifles is becoming more prevalent. Although this change in legislation may not prevent all murders, it may reduce the actual body count in mass murders as these weapons have been found to be correlated with higher numbers of fatalities (Schildkraut 2019). Restrictions on extended ammunition magazines may help reduce the body count as smaller magazines would require perpetrators to reload more frequently, thereby creating more windows of opportunity for people to respond. Related to gun rights, an opposite response strategy from such control measures, some politicians argue for the right to carry concealed weapons as a means of protection from armed assault. For example, President Donald Trump, among others, has suggested that teachers should be armed to protect schools (Blodget, Friedman, and Salter 2018). Evidence suggests that arming more people does not reduce violent crime, but in fact increases such crime. Violent crime is estimated to be 13–15 percent higher with these laws (Martinovich 2017). After the mass murder in Florida, the state raised the age to purchase an assault weapon to twenty-one. Oregon enacted a new gun control bill before Florida but after the mass murder. This law, known as the “boyfriend loophole bill,” prevents people who have been convicted of stalking or domestic violence, as well as those under restraining orders, from owning or buying guns and ammunition (Thomas 2019). Kim A. MacInnis See also: Concealed Weapons Laws; Columbine High School Shooting; Gun Control; Homicides, Gun; Long Island Railroad

570 | Mass Murder (Shootings) Shooting; Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting; School Shootings; Tucson, Arizona, Shooting; Virginia Tech Shooting

Further Reading Blodget, Henry, Noah Friedman, and Lamar Salter. “Will Arming Teachers with Guns Help Stop School Shootings?” Insider, February 24, 2018. https://www.businessinsider .com/henry-blodget-will-arming-teachers -guns-help-stop-school-shootings-2018-2 (accessed June 10, 2020). Bridges, Tristan, and Tara Leigh Tober. “The Sociological Explanation for Why Men in America Turn to Gun Violence.” Quartz, October 7, 2017. https://qz.com/1095247 /the-sociological-explanation-for-why-men -in-america-turn-to-gun-violence/ (accessed June 10, 2020). Chuck, Elizabeth, Alex Johnson, and Corky Siemaszko. “17 Killed in Mass Shooting at High School in Parkland, Florida.” NBC News, February 14, 2018. https://www .nbc news.com /news /u s-news /pol ice -respond-shooting-parkland-florida-high -school-n848101 (accessed June 10, 2020). Duwe, Grant. “A Circle of Distortion: The Social Construction of Mass Murder in the United States.” Western Criminology Review 6 (2005): 59–78. Duwe, Grant. “Patterns and Prevalence of Mass Murder in Twentieth Century America.” Justice Quarterly 21 (2004): 729–61. Everytown for Gun Safety. “Ten Years of Mass Shootings in the United States: An Everytown for Gun Safety Support and Fund Analysis.” 2019. https://everytown research.org/massshootingsreports/mass -shootings-in-america-2009-2019/ (accessed June 22, 2020). Knoll, James L., and George D. Annas. “Mass Shootings and Mental Illness.” American Psychiatric Association, 2015. https://psychi atryonline.org/doi/pdf/10.5555/appi.books .9781615371099 (accessed June 10, 2020). Madden, Lauren. “Making Sense of the Senseless: A Sociological Perspective on

Mass Shootings.” 2018. https://www.every daysociologyblog.com/2018/12/making -sense-of-the-senseless-a-sociological-per spective-on-mass-shootings.html (accessed June 10, 2020). Martinovich, Milenko. “States with Right-toCarry Concealed Handgun Laws Experience Increases in Violent Crime, According to Stanford Scholar.” 2017. https://news .stanford.edu/2017/06/21/violent-crime -increases-right-carry-states/ (accessed June 22, 2020). Mascia, Jennifer. “How America Ended Up with a Gun Background Check System Built More for Speed Than Certainty.” The Trace, July 21, 2015. https://www.thetrace .org / 2015 / 07/ br ady-bill-a mend ment -default-proceed-loophole-amendment -nra/ (accessed June 10, 2020). McManus, Doyle. “Column: Is There Something Wrong with Us?” Los Angeles Times, August 6, 2019. https://www.latimes.com/politics /stor y/2019-08-06/is-there-something -wrong-with-us-new-story (accessed June 10, 2020). Melgar, Luis. “Since 1982, 74 Percent of Mass Shooters Obtained Their Guns Legally.” NPR for Northern Colorado, November 2, 2018. https://www.kunc.org /post /1982-74 -percent-mass-shooters -obtained-their-guns-legally# stream /0 (accessed June 10, 2020). Neuberger, Joan. “Charles Joseph Whitman 1941–1966.” 2016. http://behindthetower .org/charles-joseph-whitman (accessed June 10, 2020). Romo, Vanessa. “El Paso Walmart Shooting Suspect Pleads Not Guilty.” NPR, October 10, 2019. https://www.npr.org/2019/10/10 /769013051/el-paso-walmart-shooting -suspect-pleads-not-guilty (accessed June 10, 2020). Schildkraut, Jaclyn. “Assault Weapons, Mass Shootings and Options for Lawmakers.” Albany, NY: Regional Gun Violence Research Consortium, Rockefeller Institute of Government, 2019. https://rockinst.org /issue-area/assault-weapons-mass-shootings

-and-options-for-lawmakers/ (accessed June 22, 2020). Sheth, Shreya. “America’s Top Fears 2019.” 2019. https://www.chapman.edu/wilkinson /research-centers/babbie-center/_files/ameri cas-top-fears-2019.pdf (accessed June 22, 2020). Statista, “Number of Mass Shootings in the United States between 1982 and February 2020, by Shooter’s Race and Ethnicity.” 2020. https://www.statista.com/statistics /476456/mass-shootings-in-the-us-by-shoo ter-s-race/ (accessed June 10, 2020). Taylor, Rebecca. “Why Are White Men Carrying Out More Mass Murders?” Sky News, August 6, 2019. https://news.sky .com/story/why-are-white-men-more-likely -to-carry-out-mass-shootings-11252808 (accessed June 10, 2020). Thomas, Elizabeth. “A Look at Gun Laws in Texas and Ohio, Where 2 Deadly Mass Shootings Took Place within 15 Hours.” ABC News, August 4, 2019. https://abcnews .go.com /Politics /gun-laws-texas-ohio -deadly-mass-shootings-place/story?id =64766695 (accessed June 10, 2020). Torres, Ella. “Sandy Hook Shooting: Victims of Gun Violence Commemorate 7th Anniversary of Massacre.” ABC News, December 14, 2019. https://abcnews.go.com/US/sandy -hook-shooting-victims-gun-violence -commemorate-7th/story?id= 67735556 (accessed June 10, 2020).

Massachusetts Gun Law Firearms laws in Massachusetts are among the most severe of any U.S. state. Thus, they serve as an aspirational model for some people and a nightmare come true for others. Massachusetts is the state where the American Revolution began, when the militia of Lexington and Concord resisted the British redcoats’ attempt to confiscate weapons. Along with Connecticut, Massachusetts once served as the home state of

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much of the U.S. firearm industry. Accordingly, it might seem counterintuitive that in the early twenty-first century, Massachusetts’s gun laws are so much more restrictive than the laws of most other states, including other New England states. The explanation lies in the conjunction of factors that have, in the last several decades, eliminated many of the checks and balances that in most states limit how far gun laws can go. Although Republicans occasionally win statewide elections, party registration in Massachusetts is overwhelmingly Democratic, and the state legislature is under nearly complete Democratic control. The Boston Globe newspaper, which strongly supports gun control from both the editorial pages and news pages, is by far the most powerful media outlet in the state; no other newspaper comes close to its statewide distribution and power. The Boston-Cambridge area is also a center for the nation’s anti-gun intelligentsia, based at Harvard and other institutions. In addition, southern New England has the lowest household rate of gun ownership of any American region, thus reducing the number of citizens with a personal interest in Second Amendment rights. Massachusetts does have an unusually well-organized grassroots gun group, the Gun Owners’ Action League (GOAL). Yet, however well GOAL lobbies, it has a weaker demographic foundation than almost every other state-level gun group. Finally, one cannot underestimate the importance of the Massachusetts judiciary, which has gone to great lengths to uphold gun controls. Like forty-three other states, Massachusetts has a state constitutional provision guaranteeing the right to keep arms. According to the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights, Article XVII, “The people have a right to keep and bear arms for the common defense.” In 1976, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court interpreted this

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constitutional provision as protecting nothing except “service in a broadly based, organized militia” (Commonwealth v. Davis, 343 N.E.2d 847 [Mass. 1976]). This decision represented a break from the court’s previous ruling on state gun rights, which had upheld restrictions on armed public parades simply as a reasonable regulation of the personal right to arms (Commonwealth v. Murphy, 166 Mass. 171 [1896]). The decision also represented a sharp break from judicial interpretation of state constitution arms rights in other states. Courts in other states had tended to interpret “common defense” and similar language to provide contours for the exercise of the right to keep arms (e.g., by limiting the right to include only weapons useful for the common defense, such as rifles, and to exclude weapons such as brass knuckles), rather than to negate the existence of the right. In 1976, a state ballot initiative 5 proposed the confiscation of almost all handguns in the state. The measure was defeated in a landslide, 69 percent to 31 percent. Yet for measures short of broad gun prohibition, Massachusetts has proven a good place for the enactment of gun control laws. Since 1906, Massachusetts has required that persons carrying handguns must possess a permit. In 1968, the legislature required that anyone who simply possesses a firearm must obtain a firearm identification card (FID). The FID law took effect on January 1, 1969. The most significant subsequent change came in 1998, when a sixtytwo-page bill banning assault weapons and changing many other gun laws was enacted. In 2014, the Massachusetts General Court (the state legislature) passed another major firearms restriction bill, establishing new prohibitions to disqualify individuals from obtaining an FID and bolstering the “suitable person” standard so that local police chiefs

can refuse to issue a license to carry. The 2014 bill also required the state to develop an online portal so that any private gun sale or transfer must be recorded and that the state must approve of the sale or transfer. Most recently, in 2018, Massachusetts enacted “red flag” laws, or extreme risk protection orders (ERPOs). The Massachusetts ERPO allows petitioners to file an order against a person if they believe the person in danger of causing bodily harm to self or others. The person does not have to be a gun owner, and the threatened harm need not have anything to do with firearms. The alleged threat need not be imminent or in the near future. Petitioners can be family members, the local licensing authority, and past or present dating partners. When a petitioner requests confidential information such as a residential address be withheld from an order, the court may allow it. Within ten days of filing, the court conducts a hearing; the burden of proof is preponderance of the evidence, the lowest standard in civil law. If the order is issued, licenses to carry, FIDs, and firearms are confiscated. Under current law, the possession, sale, or transfer of a firearm—or even a single round of ammunition—is a felony, unless one has the proper card, license, or permit. For most firearms and ammunition, an FID is required. “Large-capacity” firearms and magazines require a special Class A or Class B license, depending on the particular item. To obtain an FID, a person must apply to licensing authority, which may be the local police chief, a board, or some other government official. To obtain a permit to carry a firearm outside the home or place of business, such as to a target range or for lawful protection, a separate Class A or Class B carry permit must be obtained. Persons aged fourteen or younger may not be granted FIDs, but they may hunt or target shoot with



rifles or shotguns when under direct supervision of a person with an FID or permit and with the consent of a parent or guardian. Applicants for any kind of card or license must be fingerprinted and must present a certificate showing that they have passed a firearm safety class that has been approved by the colonel of the state police. A cardholder or license holder who moves to a new address must notify the licensing authority that issued the FID, the new local police chief by certified mail and must also notify the executive director of the Criminal History Systems Board. FIDs for home or business gun possession are granted unless the applicant has some disqualifying factor. A licensing authority chief may not impose special conditions on a home or business FID. In contrast, carry permits are highly discretionary, may have special restrictions imposed, and depend on obtaining the favor of the local licensing authority. In some jurisdictions, such as Boston, carry permits for lawful defense are nearly impossible to obtain. A Second Amendment challenge to the system was rejected by U.S. First Circuit Court of Appeals (Gould v. Morgan 2018). Any form of unlicensed possession outside the home or business results in a oneyear mandatory sentence under the 1974 Bartley-Fox law. At present, the mandatory sentence does not apply if the defendant had an FID to possess the gun lawfully but did not have a permit to carry the gun outside the home. FID holders may sell firearms directly to each other, but the transaction must be reported to the police and permission granted in advance. No person (except for licensed gun dealers) may transfer more than four guns per year. Even air guns (such as BB guns) must be licensed under the FID system. All guns must be locked up when

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not in use. Antique guns (made in 1898 or before) and replica guns (copies of such guns for which ammunition is not currently manufactured) do not require an FID for home possession, but they may not be carried in public without a carry permit. As enacted, the 1998 law required that museums put trigger locks on all guns (even inoperable guns in display cases) and made it nearly impossible for veterans’ groups and others to carry firearms in parades. The musket carried by Captain John Parker hangs in the chamber of the Massachusetts Senate. A trigger lock had to be attached to the musket in 1998. The next year, the legislature repealed the trigger lock mandate for antique firearms and the trigger lock was removed. Massachusetts has two major categories of gun bans. First, it is illegal to sell, transfer, or possess “any assault weapon or a large capacity ammunition-feeding device that was not otherwise lawfully possessed on September 13, 1994.” The assault weapon definition is identical to the definition that was part of federal law from 1994 to 2004. Massachusetts also created a separate, broader category of “large-capacity weapon.” This includes assault weapons and any semiautomatic firearms that can hold more than ten rounds of ammunition. Both assault weapons and large-capacity weapons require the Class A or Class B permits. Boston has a separate, more extensive prohibition of assault weapons. The Massachusetts Consumer Protection Act (Massachusetts General Laws, chapter 93A) gives the state attorney general the power to prevent “unfair or deceptive acts.” In 1996, Attorney General Scott Harshbarger decided to use this power in an extremely novel way: he declared that all handguns that did not meet certain standards (which he created) were unsafe, and therefore sales of such guns were unfair and

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deceptive. He also decided that it was fraudulent for handguns to be sold unless the buyer was given an information sheet that contained certain warnings reflecting the attorney general’s views of the dangers of firearm possession. The American Shooting Sports Council (a trade association that later merged into the National Shooting Sports Foundation) filed a lawsuit, arguing that the consumer fraud statute did not give the attorney general unilateral authority to make up laws about gun design and gun sales. A state superior court agreed, but the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, interpreting the consumer fraud statute very broadly, decided that the attorney general did have such power. Among the attorney general’s new regulatory requirements were (1) “tamperproof” serial numbers (e.g., hidden inside the gun) and (2) the prohibition of handguns made from “inferior materials.” Inferior materials were defined as metal with a melting point of less than 900 degrees Fahrenheit, any material that could not withstand pressure of 55,000 pounds per square inch, and any powdered metal with density less than 7.5 grams per cubic centimeter. Notably, all handgun models had to be put through a “drop test” in which the gun was repeatedly dropped on a slab of concrete to see if the gun could be made to discharge accidentally. In addition, the handguns had to have mechanisms to prevent an “average fiveyear-old child” from pulling the trigger. In practice, this meant increasing the pressure necessary for trigger pulls to a level that makes handguns more difficult to use for the elderly or other persons with weak upper bodies. Handguns were also required to have “loaded” indicators. In 1998, the Massachusetts legislature enacted a statute that

replaced the attorney general’s regulations; the general approach was the same, but there were some significant technical differences. In 2004, Governor Mitt Romney signed a compromise bill that was supported by both sides in the Massachusetts gun control debate. The bill reformed some aspects of the gun licensing system, to make them less arbitrary and onerous. The bill also solidified the Massachusetts ban on assault weapons. The previous ban had incorporated the definition of assault weapon in the 1994 federal ban. Since the federal ban sunset in 2004, Massachusetts statutes needed their own direct definition. In 2016, Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Healey issued “guidance” to administratively ban many additional firearms, by classifying them as copies or duplicates or assault weapons. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit upheld the new bans against a Second Amendment challenge (Worman v. Healey 2019). During the COVID-19 pandemic, Governor Charlie Baker ordered all gun stores closed, regardless of compliance with safety measures. The closures were ruled unconstitutional by a federal district court (McCarthy v. Baker 2020). David B. Kopel See also: Bartley-Fox Carrying Law; Consumer Product Safety Laws; Extreme Risk Protection Orders; Gun Control; Gun Owners’ Action League (GOAL)

Further Reading Bejar, Benjamin. “Wielding the Consumer Protection Shield: Sensible Handgun Regulation in Massachusetts: A Paradigm for a National Model?” Boston University Public Interest Law Journal 7 (1998): 59–84. Bordua, David J. “Adversary Polling and the Construction of Social Meaning: Implications in Gun Control Elections in

Massachusetts and California.” Law and Policy Quarterly 5 (1983): 345–66. Code of Massachusetts Regulations, Title 940, §§ 16.02–16.07 (Harshbarger handgun regulations). 1997. Gould v. Morgan. 907 F.3d 659 (1st Cir. 2018). Gun Owners’ Action League. http://www .goal.org (accessed August 25, 2020). Halbrook, Stephen P. “The Right to Bear Arms in the First State Bills of Rights: Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Vermont, and Massachusetts.” Vermont Law Review 10 (1985): 255–320. Massachusetts General Laws, Chapter 140, §§ 121–131; Chapter 209A, § 3B; Chapter 269, §§ 10–12. McCarthy v. Baker, 2020 WL 2297278, Nos. 20-10701-DPW & 20-40041-DPW (D. Mass. May 7, 2020). Worman v. Healey. 922 F.3d 26 (1st Cir. 2019).

Mayor of Detroit v. Arms Technology, Inc. See Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers McCarthy, Carolyn(1944–) Carolyn McCarthy was first elected to the House of Representatives from New York’s Fourth District in 1996, after her husband was killed and her son was wounded in the Long Island Railroad Shooting. She is one of the leading gun control advocates in Congress. McCarthy, who was born Carolyn Cook on January 5, 1944, in Brooklyn, New York, was a licensed practical nurse living in Mineola, New York, when her husband, Dennis, was killed, and her son, Kevin, was wounded, on a Long Island Railroad train at the Merillon Avenue station on December 7, 1993. The perpetrator opened fire on random unarmed passengers, killing six,

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including Dennis, and wounding nineteen others. After the “Long Island Railroad Shooting,” McCarthy became a gun control activist, giving lectures around the country. In March 1996, McCarthy testified at a House hearing called by Representative Charles Schumer when Republicans proposed a repeal of the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban. In her testimony, McCarthy said, “I’m proud to be a Republican, but when I talk to Republican Congressmen who are going to repeal this bill, I am ashamed” (Associated Press 1998). Though the effort was unsuccessful, Dan Frisa, the Republican who represented McCarthy’s district, voted in favor of the repeal. Initially, McCarthy planned to challenge Frisa in a primary. However, when local Republican leaders expressed a lack of interest in her candidacy, McCarthy accepted the Democratic Party nomination (though sitting as a member of the Democratic caucus since her first election, she did not change her party registration to Democrat until 2003). McCarthy defeated Frisa in the general election by a margin of 58 percent to 41 percent. Since entering the House, McCarthy has continued her advocacy of gun control. In 1997, she sponsored bills requiring trigger locks on guns and banning the sale of guns to foreign tourists to the United States after the Empire State Building shooting. Following the Columbine High School shooting in 1999, McCarthy proposed bills requiring firearms be child-resistant and making it more difficult for young adults to buy guns. Since the expiration of the Assault Weapons Ban in September 2004, McCarthy has supported its restoration. In 2007, following the Democratic takeover of Congress, she introduced the Assault Weapons Ban and Law Enforcement Protection Act (H.R.

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1022). The bill would reinstate the 1994 ban and extend the prohibition to any “semiautomatic rifle, shotgun or handgun” that was “originally designed for military or law enforcement use, or a firearm based on the design of such a firearm, that is not particularly suitable for sporting purposes, as determined by the Attorney General.” After the shootings at Virginia Tech in 2007, it was determined that the perpetrator, who murdered thirty-two people and wounded seventeen, was able to pass the background check to legally buy a firearm despite mental health problems because this information was not available to the FBI. McCarthy sponsored the NICS Improvement Amendments Act of 2007 (PL 110180), which provides grants to states to upgrade information and identification technologies for firearms eligibility determinations and require all federal agencies that have records on persons for whom it is illegal to purchase a firearm to provide that information to the attorney general for inclusion in NICS. The fiscal year 2010 appropriations bill included $20 million for improvements to NICS. In the 111th Congress, McCarthy is sponsoring legislation that would prohibit people who are listed on the “No Fly List” from buying guns (H.R. 2401); that would define “gun trafficking” between states a federal crime (H.R. 4298); and that would make it unlawful for any person who lawfully possesses or owns a firearm to fail to report the theft or loss of such firearm within seventytwo hours after discovering its theft or loss (H.R. 5736). The National Rifle Association (NRA) has described McCarthy as “among the most anti-gun Members of Congress” (NRA 2007). The Gun Owners of America has given her ratings of F since 2005

(Project Vote Smart 2010). In contrast, gun control groups such as the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence and the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence have given her 100 percent ratings (Project Vote Smart 2010). In 2009, McCarthy considered challenging Kirsten Gillibrand for the U.S. Senate in 2010. Gillibrand was appointed by New York governor David Patterson on January 23, 2009, to replace Hillary Rodham Clinton after she resigned her Senate seat to become secretary of state in President Obama’s administration. Gillibrand had been criticized by many New York Democrats for her support of gun rights. McCarthy said that she objected to the appointment of anyone to the Senate seat who had a 100 percent favorable rating from the NRA, calling her “the poster child for the NRA” (Lovett 2009). In June 2009, McCarthy announced she would not challenge Gillibrand in 2010 (Kleefeld 2009). McCarthy was reelected to her House seat in both 2010 and 2012, and she continued to push for legislative change for gun control. In 2013, for example, she introduced bills closing the gun show loophole (H.R. 141), banning assault weapons (H.R. 437) and large-capacity magazines (H.R. 138), and prohibiting online ammunition sales (H.R. 142). She announced that she would not run for reelection on January 8, 2014, citing health concerns, and formally retired in 2015. Fellow Democrat Kathleen Rice replaced her in the House. A 1998 made-for-television movie (originally broadcast on NBC), The Long Island Incident, depicted the shooting and McCarthy’s transformation from suburban housewife to gun control activist and member of the House of Representatives. The film was produced by Barbra Streisand’s production



company (Barwood Films); McCarthy was played by actress Laurie Metcalf. Jeffrey Kraus See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Brady: United against Gun Violence; Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV); Columbine High School Shooting; Gun Owners of America (GOA); Long Island Railroad Shooting; National Rifle Association (NRA); NICS Improvement Act; Schumer, Charles E.; Virginia Tech Shooting

Further Reading Associated Press. “Congressional Roundup: Personal Plea on Gun Ban.” New York Times, March 22, 1996. http://www.ny times.com/1996/03/22/us/congressional -roundup-personal-plea-on-gun-ban.html (accessed June 16, 2011). Kleefeld, Eric. “McCarthy Not Challenging Gillibrand In 2010 Senate Primary.” TPMDC, June 4, 2009. http://tpmdc.talk ingpointsmemo.com/2009/06/mccarthy -not-challenging-gillibrand-in-2010-senate -primary.php (accessed June 16, 2011). Lovett, Kenneth. “Critics Pounce on Gov. Paterson’s Choice of Rep. Kirsten Gillibrand for Hillary’s Senate Seat.” New York Daily News, January 23, 2009. http://articles .nydailynews.com/2009-01-23/news/179 14452_1_hillary-clinton-gun-control-rep -kirsten-gillibrand (accessed June 16, 2011). NRA (National Rifle Association). “‘NICS Improvement Amendments Act’ Not Gun Control!” NRA-ILA 14 (June 15, 2007). http://www.nraila.org/grassrootsalerts /Read.aspx?ID=398 (accessed June 16, 2011). Project Vote Smart. “Representative Carolyn McCarthy-Interest Group Ratings.” http:// www.votesmart.org/issue_rating_category .php?can_id=693&type=category&categ ory=37&go.x=11&go.y=15 (accessed June 16, 2011). Wasniewski, Matthew A. Carolyn McCarthy. Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, 2006.

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McClure-Volkmer Act. See Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986 McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010) The Supreme Court’s 2008 decision in District of Columbia v. Heller recognized a Second Amendment right to possess firearms for purposes of private self-defense, marking the first time the high court directly acknowledged the existence of a Second Amendment right analytically distinct from the right to hold weapons suitable for service in the lawfully established militia. The question of whether that constitutional right to armed self-defense applied against state and municipal actors as well as the federal government was left open by the Heller court and became the subject of much attention and debate over the next two years. Shortly after Heller was announced, Otis McDonald, an elderly resident of a highcrime neighborhood in Chicago, challenged the city’s tough restrictions on handgun ownership in federal district court. McDonald’s lawyers argued that the right to arms should be construed to limit state and municipal regulatory authority in the same way the Heller court held it limited the power of federal governmental actors. It may seem self-evident to most nonlawyers today that the provisions of the Bill of Rights apply to action by state and local government as well as to action by Congress or federal officials. For much of U.S. history, however, the Supreme Court construed the Bill of Rights as binding only to the federal government. The most famous articulation of the old understanding that the Bill of Rights did not apply to the states is that of

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Chief Justice John Marshall, who in Baron v. Baltimore in 1833 refused to allow a Fifth Amendment claim related to the taking of property by a municipal government. Following the Civil War and Reconstruction, some forward-looking Republicans argued that either the privileges or immunities clause or the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment made federal Bill of Rights guarantees applicable against the states. The Supreme Court rejected this argument in the Slaughter-House Cases of 1873 (denying claims alleging the unconstitutionality of a monopoly granted by the city of New Orleans) and United States v. Cruikshank (decided 1876, refusing to enforce a Second Amendment claim against anyone other than the federal government). The Supreme Court has never accepted the argument that the Fourteenth Amendment applied the entire Bill of Rights against the states, but over the course of the twentieth century, the Supreme Court gradually recognized in piecemeal fashion that particular provisions of the Bill of Rights applied to the states and municipalities through the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. This process of “selective incorporation” had largely run its course by the early 1970s, with almost all provisions of the Bill of Rights held applicable against the states. Prominent exceptions included the Second Amendment right to arms, which had at that time not yet been enforced against federal action; the Seventh Amendment right to jury trial in civil cases; and the Fifth Amendment right that a criminal trial not commence unless the defendant had first been indicted by a grand jury. Thus, the McDonald case presented the federal judiciary with the question of whether the newly recognized Second Amendment right should join most other provisions of the Bill of Rights in limiting

state and municipal authority in exactly the same fashion it limited federal authority. The federal trial court rejected McDonald’s challenge to Chicago’s gun control law, reasoning that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit (the federal circuit that embraces Illinois) had previously upheld a handgun ban and that Heller had not addressed state and municipal restrictions on gun ownership. The Seventh Circuit affirmed the trial court, relying on United States v. Cruikshank, Presser v. Illinois, and Miller v. Texas, three Supreme Court cases declining to apply Second Amendment restrictions to the states through the privileges or immunities clause decided in the late nineteenth century before the Supreme Court had begun the process of incorporating Bill of Rights guarantees against the states through the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The court of appeals acknowledged that there was reason to question the continuing validity of these precedents but made clear that any decision to overturn Supreme Court decisions must rest with the Supreme Court itself. Oral argument in McDonald v. City of Chicago took place in the U.S. Supreme Court on March 2, 2010, with Alan Gura, who successfully represented Heller in his suit against the District of Columbia, appearing for the petitioner; former solicitor general Paul Clement appearing for the National Rifle Association (who had filed a related case against Chicago and Oak Park, Illinois, that was consolidated with McDonald’s case in the Seventh Circuit); and James Feldman, who argued over forty cases before the Supreme Court during a long career with the Solicitor General’s Office, representing the city of Chicago. The Supreme Court announced its decision on June 28, splitting 5-4 on the question of whether the right to hold firearms for



purposes of self-defense recognized in Heller applied to the states. Justice Alito wrote the lead opinion, which was joined by Chief Justice Roberts, Justice Scalia, and Justice Kennedy. The four-justice plurality held that a Second Amendment right to weapons for purposes of self-defense applied against the states through the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Justice Thomas provided the fifth vote in favor of applying the right against the states, but maintained in a separate opinion that this should be accomplished via the medium of the privileges or immunities clause. Justice Breyer dissented in an opinion joined by Justices Ginsburg and Sotomayor, arguing that Heller was wrongly decided, that bans on using firearms in urban settings were commonplace when the Second Amendment was ratified, and that democratic experimentalism cautioned against aggressive federal judicial enforcement of a newly minted right that might severely undercut the ability of state and local legislatures to combat deadly violence. Justice Stevens’s dissent, the last opinion he authored before his retirement, provided a final opportunity for him to engage Justice Scalia on the question of when and by what standards judicial review of policy decisions made by democratically enacted branches of government is appropriate and legitimate. Justice Stevens chided the originalist reasoning of Justice Alito in McDonald and more particularly of Justice Scalia in Heller, and defended in spirited fashion the legal process theory rationale that had dominated the court from the late 1930s through the early 1980s. Justice Scalia answered Stevens in an animated concurrence that defended originalist methodology against charges of judicial activism. Justice Alito’s opinion for the four-justice plurality clearly rejected Chicago’s argument

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that the Second and Fourteenth Amendments leave state and local government free to issue total prohibitions on possession of handguns in the home for private selfdefense. At the same time, the four-justice plurality and the four dissenters joined in rejecting Alan Gura’s argument that the Slaughter-House Cases should be overturned, and the entire Bill of Rights made applicable against the states via the privileges or immunities clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Gura’s bold initiative found favor only with Clarence Thomas among the nine. Respecting matters apart from total hand gun bans and overturning SlaughterHouse, it is probably fair to say that the McDonald plurality left open more questions than it answered. The plurality endorsed Justice Scalia’s formulation regarding the substance of the right to arms first articulated in Heller, writing that “[i]n Heller, we held that the Second Amendment protects the right to possess a handgun in the home for the purpose of self-defense. Unless considerations of stare decisis counsel otherwise, a provision of the Bill of Rights that protects a right that is fundamental from an American perspective applies equally to the Federal Government and the States. . . . We therefore hold that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment incorporates the Second Amendment right recognized in Heller” (citations omitted). The plurality also echoed Justice Scalia’s tentative list of presumptively valid reasonable restrictions on that right, including prohibitions of weapons not in common use (such as machine guns), prohibitions against felons or the mentally ill possessing weapons, and prohibitions against carrying weapons in certain sensitive places (for instance, schools). But the plurality did not announce a standard against which to judge the reasonability of restrictions on the right to arms, endorsing

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neither “rational basis review,” “intermediate scrutiny,” “strict scrutiny,” or any other more or less permissive or unforgiving formula for judicial review of laws burdening constitutional rights that the Supreme Court has frequently employed in the past. Hence, questions such as the constitutionality of restrictions on minors carrying guns, carrying guns outside the home or in cars, possession of veritable arsenals, and using guns for purposes other than self-defense will be left for lower courts to wrestle with on a case-bycase basis pending eventual further guidance from the Supreme Court. The McDonald case joined a rich array of constitutional issues and subissues. The questions presented in the case engendered heated debate among the general public, among politicians, and in the academy. The five Supreme Court opinions in the case not only reflect crosscurrents of popular and political thinking regarding gun control and the right to arms; they also engage fundamental questions regarding the role of the Supreme Court in rights enforcement and in adjusting policy choices embraced by political actors responsible to democratic majorities. The five opinions ultimately reflect profoundly different approaches to the problem of justifying judicial review under the Constitution. Issues confronted in the various opinions include the binding effects of precedent, notably the Slaughter-House Cases, in which the Supreme Court articulated what is generally taken to be a severely limited reading of the privileges or immunities clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, and Cruikshank, in which the Supreme Court held that the privileges or immunities clause did not make the Second Amendment or any other provision of the Bill of Rights applicable to the states. The five Heller opinions wrestle with the legitimacy of “substantive due process” as a vehicle for

enforcing rights not specifically applicable against the states under the text of the Constitution or not mentioned in that text at all, and the closely connected issue of whether constitutional rights against governmental actors must have precisely the same scope when applied against state and federal authorities. In the process, the opinions revisit four questions fundamental to the Heller case: (1) what role (if any) the Second Amendment’s militia clause plays in circumscribing the right to arms; (2) whether the right to arms encompasses a right to self-defense even though the latter is not mentioned in the Constitutional text; (3) whether there is a constitutional right to self-defense independent of any right implied by the Second Amendment; and (4) whether the meaning of the right to arms is frozen in time to reflect the original understanding of the right in 1791 when the Second Amendment was ratified or in 1868 when the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified. For the plurality, Justice Alito unequivocally endorsed Justice Scalia’s controversial maneuver of subordinating the Second Amendment’s first thirteen words into an easily dismissed “prefatory clause” and concomitant elevation of the amendment’s closing fifteen words into an “operative clause” fully capable of defining the amendment’s meaning even standing on its own. For the McDonald plurality as for the Heller majority, then, the Constitution commands that “the right of the people, to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed,” and this command ultimately applies independent of the “well regulated militia” to which it was coupled in the text ratified by the people. The four McDonald dissenters rejected this position, with Justice Breyer’s opinion emphatically calling for reversal of Heller on the grounds that historians have



generally dismissed Justice Scalia’s divorce of the right to arms from the militia in Heller as wholly incompatible with the late eighteenth-century American focus on the militia as a constitutional check against a politically and fiscally dangerous professional army. Justice Sotomayor, who had replaced Justice Souter since the decision in Heller, signed Breyer’s opinion, suggesting that her addition to the Supreme Court did not alter its balance respecting the Second Amendment. The McDonald court divided on the question of the exclusively military meaning of bearing arms along exactly the same lines as it did respecting the importance or otherwise of the militia clause, with Justice Breyer again calling for Heller to be overturned because a strong majority of historians and linguists commenting on Heller have rejected Justice Scalia’s position that the predominant meaning of bearing arms in the late eighteenth century was to carry weapons for purposes of confrontation, not necessarily in a military capacity. For the Heller majority and the McDonald plurality, the original public understanding of “keep and bear arms” at the time the Second and Fourteenth Amendments were ratified encompassed keeping weapons at the ready for purposes of private self-defense. For the four justices who dissented in each case, however, the constitutional text does not speak to the question of weapons possession outside the context of service in the lawfully established militia; and this raises the issue of whether a right to armed private self-defense might be implicit in the American constitutional system even if it is not commanded directly by the constitutional text. For the dissenters, recognition of a right to private self-defense presents a question entirely analogous to that presented by the issues of constitutional protection for marriage, family relations,

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sexual privacy, abortion, and same-sex intimacy, all of which the Supreme Court has recognized as constitutionally protected rights not expressly described in the text of the Constitution. Since the retirement of Hugo Black in 1971, every justice on the court has at least on occasion accepted the legitimacy of some nonenumerated rights, strong but inconsistent protestations from Justices Scalia and Thomas notwithstanding. Debates have focused on what formula or standard might allow the judiciary to constitutionally enforce some rights not written into the Constitution, and decline to recognize others asserted by litigants. Since the 1950s, this issue has dovetailed with the question of what elements of the Bill of Rights are so important as to merit federal judicial application against the states. From the 1930s through the 1970s, in landmark cases, including Palko v. Connecticut (1937), Adamson v. California (1947), and Duncan v. Louisiana (1968), the court embraced different formulas for assessing which rights to apply against the states. Application of related but distinguishable standards such as “fundamental to ordered liberty” (Palko) and “fundamental to the American schemed of justice” (Duncan) suggested very different things respecting the appropriateness of foreign reference points in ascertaining whether a putative right merited constitutional inclusion. Since the United States stands virtually alone among the states of the world committed to constitutionalism and the rule of law in its tolerance of broad access to deadly weapons, any transnational frame of reference rooted in abstract considerations of reason or justice or in empirical assessment of practices among states would point strongly against recognition of a right to weapons possession. The outcome in McDonald then hinged in part on Justice

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Alito’s rejection of Chicago’s claim that the appropriate standard for decided whether to apply the right to arms against the states was the Palko test with its implicit invocation of a worldwide frame of reference. Quite apart from normative considerations regarding the value of particular rights, concerns respecting democratic bona fides and constitutional legitimacy contributed to tension on the McDonald court regarding deference to public policy choices of local legislatures. In many respects, the argument in favor of policy making by democratically accountable actors revisited arguments against judicial rights enforcement familiar from the debates over incorporation during the era of Chief Justice Warren, but Justice Breyer in particular attempted to distinguish decisions respecting gun policy and the right to arms from those involving other incorporated rights on the grounds of the extreme social cost associated (at least by some scholars, observers, and voters) with easy access to guns. Justice Breyer embraced an argument once associated with Justice Louis Brandeis, holding that federalism provides a laboratory, and that multiple locally tailored approaches to crime control are preferable not only from the standpoint of legitimacy, but also from the perspective of best practices and democratic experimentalism. Thus, Justice Breyer argued for special solicitude to local preferences given the severity of gun violence in urban areas. Finally, McDonald is notable as the ultimate installment in a long exchange between Justices Stevens and Scalia concerning the philosophies underlying their constitutional jurisprudence. Since his appointment in 1982, Antonin Scalia emerged as the principal spokesman for originalism among jurists and academics. Justice Stevens, meanwhile, has remained committed to the jurisprudence

of legal process theory that was dominant on the Supreme Court from the late New Deal through the early 1980s. For Justice Stevens, McDonald afforded an opportunity to offer a final systematic justification of his jurisprudential philosophy and a detailed critique of Justice Scalia’s contrary jurisprudence. Justice Scalia responded with perhaps his most detailed defense of originalism since his 1997 book, A Matter of Interpretation. The legal process theory endorsed by Justice Stevens was first articulated on the court by then justice Harlan Fiske Stone in his famous Footnote 4 in the Carolene Products decision of 1937. Justice Stone explained that that judges in constitutional cases should let legislative and executive determinations of policy alone unless the government action in question (1) violated clear constitutional text; (2) was incapable of correction through the democratic process because the process had become warped or corrupted in favor of special interests; or (3) unfairly burdened a discreet or insular racial or religious minority who could not hope for redress by majoritarian means. As Justice Stevens (like Justice Breyer) rejected the majority’s position that the Second Amendment plainly protects a right to weapons for private purposes and that it was originally understood to do so, he maintained that Chicago’s gun ban did not fall within the first Carolene Products category of laws fit for judicial invalidation. It likewise fell outside the second and third Carolene Products categories because gun owners and advocates are not shut out of the political process by unfair means or through prejudice. Justice Scalia’s concurrence defended his originalist reasoning in Heller against Justice Stevens’s attack, and argued that other philosophies supporting judicial review and in particular legal process theory allowed judges free reign to veto legislative choices in favor of their own political values



and preferences. For Justice Scalia, strict judicial adherence to the original understanding of constitutional text possessed by the general public at the time of its ratification provides the best, although not a foolproof, guarantee against judicial subjectivity in constitutional adjudication. For Justice Stevens, in contrast, the indeterminacy of original understanding and the strong supposition that Justice Scalia had clearly departed from the dominant meaning the Second Amendment held when it was ratified suggested that the method of originalism was neither neutral nor objective and that it should be abandoned in favor of nuanced, honest applications of the legal process theory and substantive due process case law developed during the eras of Harlan Fiske Stone, Earl Warren, and Warren Burger. William G. Merkel See also: District of Columba v. Heller; Fourteenth Amendment; Second Amendment

Further Reading Aynes, Richard L. “McDonald v. Chicago, Self-Defense, the Right to Bear Arms, and the Future.” Akron Journal of Constitutional Law and Policy 2 (2011): 181–203. http://www.akronconlawjournal.com/arti cles/Aynes_ConLaw_6-21-11.pdf (accessed July 5, 2011). Supreme Court of the United States Blog (SCOTUSblog). “McDonald v. City of Chicago.” 2011. http://www.scotusblog.com /case-files/cases/mcdonald-v-city-of-chi cago/ (accessed July 5, 2011).

McNamara, Robert G.(1965–) Robert McNamara is a cofounder of the TriggerSmart Company, which began in Limerick, Ireland. The company patented a smart gun utilizing radio frequency identification

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(RFID) technology. Manufacturers used these technologies to design a firearm with enhanced safety features. Before cofounding the TriggerSmart Company, McNamara worked in real estate as a managing partner for My Home International Property. However, news stories of mass shootings and the gun interests of his friend and later cofounder, Patrick O’Shaughnessy, influenced his interests in firearms. Specifically, McNamara gained his interest in smart gun technology as a method of protecting law enforcement officers, as well as a way to reduce mass shootings. To increase officer safety, McNamara saw gun technology to be a viable solution in reducing the chances of an attacker using an officer’s gun against them. Generally, there has been a growing interest in the use and development of smart gun technology. In January 2016, President Barack Obama issued a memorandum to the U.S. Departments of Justice, Homeland Security, and Defense to develop a strategy for the expedition of gun safety technology and smart guns. In addition to governmental expansion, there is evidence of a growing interest among the general population for smart gun development as well (Wolfson et al. 2016). This interest has led several startup companies to begin working on creating smart guns and smart gun products, such as Armatix and TriggerSmart. Initially, McNamara and O’Shaughnessy’s idea for the solution behind reducing firearm casualties was to focus on creating new biometric approaches to enhance firearm safety. Specifically, their initial focus centered on fingerprint activation. However, several issues with the use of biometrics impeded the development. The costs associated with biometric technology would make the firearms too expensive for police departments. In addition, the fingerprint activation would

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require a short delay of access (between five and ten seconds) before the firearm could be used. The speed impairments caused by the fingerprint activation could prevent it from becoming successful in the market and may be particularly problematic for officers who rely on quick responses. In an attempt to combat some of the issues associated with the use of biometric technology, McNamara and O’Shaughnessy began exploring RFID technology. On February 5, 2010, the partners filed a patent to secure the idea for their design. The firearms safety system they designed requires three distinct elements: a base unit with includes a transmitter and/or receiver, a tag device (a device imbedded with a transmitter-receiver that is used to activate the firearm), and a safety system embedded within the firearm. These RFID guns serve two key functions. The first purpose of this device is to reduce unauthorized users from firing a gun. The proposed firearms will be embedded with a safety system that automatically locks the firearm until the tag device is detected. These tags are incorporated within rings, bracelets, watches, or other pieces to be worn by the owner. This allows the firearm to remain locked and unusable until the owners hand is within close distance of the gun. The second function of this technology is to prevent the firearms from being used in unauthorized areas. This is done using RFID to override the unlocking abilities of the gun. Therefore, in designated areas, a close proximity of the tag device will no longer activate the firearm. This enables designated areas, such as schools, police stations, and other gun-free locations, to send out a signal to disable firearms from being used within the space. Since the company’s founding in 2009, McNamara and O’Shaughnessy have continued working on the design. In 2011, they

collaborated with the Georgia Tech Research Institute in Athlone, Ireland, for the research and development of the patented firearm safety system. However, due to barriers with accessing guns for the study, they continued the research in the United States. Currently, a prototype of the gun is ready and being tested before becoming available on the market. Following the development of the TriggerSmart company, McNamara has also become outspoken in the field of smart gun technology. He has presented on task force committees and been an active advocate for gun violence prevention. This has led him to do interviews with a variety of media organizations, such as CNN and Fox News. Jenna L. Borseth See also: Intelligent Gun Safety Systems; RFID Guns; Smart Guns

Further Reading O’Shaughnessy, Patrick, and Robert McNamara. “Patent Safety Systems for Firearms. US 20110030262 A1.” United States Patent and Trademark Office, August 12, 2010. USPTO Search Patent Database. Rogers, Chip. “Georgia Tech Developed Gun Technology May Bring Irish Company to U.S.” Georgia Public Broadcasting, June 4, 2013. Wolfson, Julia A., Stephen P. Teret, Shannon Frattaroli, Matthew Miller, and Deborah Azrael. “The US Public’s Preference for Safer Guns.” American Journal of Public Health 106, no. 3 (2016): 411–13. https:// doi.org/10.2105/ajph.2015.303041.

Medicine and Gun Violence Organized medicine has generally redefined violence as a public health problem, adding a new dimension to violence’s historical



aspects as a criminal justice and acute medical care problem. By redefining the issue and attempting to apply classic epidemiologic and preventive medicine modalities to injury prevention and gun violence, a number of medical organizations, foundations, and research centers have expanded their focus from safety and treatment to tracking firearms deaths, policy evaluation, and advocacy. This transition has not been without controversy, as when Congress cut firearmsrelated funding for the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control in 1996 as a result of complaints and political opposition from political conservatives and libertarians, the National Rifle Association, and some criminologists. A number of medical and health-related organizations, associations, and publications have taken public and advocacy positions calling for substantially stricter gun control laws. These organizations include (but are not limited to) the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Medical Association, the American Medical Women’s Association, the American Nurses Association, the American Psychological Association, the American Public Health Association (APHA), the American Trauma Society, and the National Association of School Psychologists. Many of these organizations, such as the APHA, advocate for a wide range of social changes as well. Journals (some of which are hosted or sponsored by medical organizations) that have published articles advocating for a public health approach to firearm regulation include: Journal of the American Medical Association, New England Journal of Medicine, American Journal of Public Health, Journal of Trauma and Infection, and Pediatrics. The positions taken by these organizations vary somewhat but often include tighter restrictions

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on the storage, sale, and ownership of firearms and ammunition; gun registration and tracking; promotion of gun safety features; and additional restrictions against gun access and ownership by youth, those with mental illnesses, and those convicted of crimes. These organizations also generally have supported proposed bans on the private ownership of handguns and semiautomatic firearms. Public health researchers and medical organizations began to focus on firearm violence in the late 1970s, through reports developed by the U.S. surgeon general and the Department of Health and Human Services. The surgeon general sponsored a key workshop on violence and public health in 1985; advocacy for a public health approach to gun violence was also the subject of a 1992 editorial in the Journal of the American Medical Association by then surgeon general Antonia Novello. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) expanded its efforts related to violence prevention over this same time period by establishing a Violence Epidemiology Branch in 1983 and then including a Division of Violence Prevention within the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control (NCIPC) when it was created in the early 1990s. Concurrently, injury violence prevention research centers affiliated with medical schools were established or expanded, and private health foundations, such as the California Wellness Foundation, began funding violence prevention initiatives. However, at least three organizations were also established that criticized the expansion of medical organizations and public health professions into what was perceived as anti-gun, advocacy research being conducted outside of medical professionals’ areas of expertise. They emphasized that the benefits of private firearm ownership

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were generally ignored in the public health research. Two of these have essentially fallen by the wayside, but Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership (DRGO) remains as an active organization and project of the nonprofit Claremont Institute. Its founder, Dr. Timothy Wheeler, continues to be concerned about the American Academy of Pediatrics and other medical organizations’ endorsement of the practice of having pediatricians counsel parents on gun ownership and gun storage; there have been recent efforts by state legislators in Virginia and West Virginia to prohibit medical professionals from providing such counseling. A Florida law restricting counseling that passed in 2011 is being litigated by physician and gun control organizations. DRGO and other gun rights proponents have argued that the mainstream medical establishment promotes a dominant epidemiologic paradigm that specifies, without rigorous scientific evidence, that homes with guns are more likely to experience homicides, suicides, and unintentional injuries involving guns; that guns provide limited protection and result in a net loss of security; that the prevalence of gun ownership is correlated with the prevalence of homicides, suicides, and unintentional injuries; and that restrictive firearm laws reduce the prevalence of gun ownership. These efforts and the shift to a Republican Congress in the mid-1990s led to legislation that essentially defunded firearms research by the CDC and slowed down efforts to create a nationwide tracking system of firearms-related injuries and deaths. However, Harvard University’s Injury Control Research Center was able to attract foundation funding and, by including all violent deaths regardless of means, was able to transfer responsibility for the National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS)

back to the CDC in 2002. The CDC has continued to receive foundation funding to help expand the system to additional states. Federal money also funded eleven Injury Control Research Centers in 2009, although this was a reduction from previous years. The CDC also offers online violence prevention education information; as of 2011, this included descriptions of both public health and socio-ecological approaches to violence prevention. David Cowan and Marcia L. Godwin See also: American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP); American Medical Association (AMA); Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC); Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Health Care Professionals and Gun Violence; Hemenway, David A.; Kellermann, Arthur L.; Motor Vehicle Laws as a Model for Gun Laws; Victimization from Gun Violence

Further Reading American Academy of Pediatrics, Committee on Injury and Poison Prevention. “FirearmRelated Injuries Affecting the Pediatric Population.” Pediatrics 105 (2000): 888–95. American Medical Association, National Advisory Council on Violence and Abuse. “Policy Compendium.” http://www.ama -assn.org/ama1/pub/upload/mm/386/vio _policy_comp.pdf (accessed July 9, 2011). Blackman, Paul H. “A Critique of the Epidemiologic Study of Firearms and Homicide.” Homicide Studies 1 (1997): 169–89. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “National Center for Injury Prevention and Control. Division of Violence Prevention.” Last updated January 18, 2022. https:// www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/about/ (accessed June 14, 2022). Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “Violence Prevention: A Timeline of Violence as a Public Health Issue.” Last

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updated January 18, 2022. https://www.cdc .gov/violenceprevention/about/timeline .html (accessed June 14, 2022). Christoffel, Katherine Kaufer. “Firearm Injuries: Epidemic Then, Endemic Now.” American Journal of Public Health 97 (2007): 626–29. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih .gov/pmc/articles/PMC1829336/pdf/0970 626.pdf (accessed July 6, 2021). Finch, Stacia, Victoria Weiley, Edward H. Ip, and Shari Barkin. “Impact of Pediatricians’ Perceived Self-Efficacy and Confidence on Violence Prevention Counseling: A National Study.” Maternal and Child Health Journal 12 (2008): 75–82. Harvard School of Public Health, Harvard Injury Control Research Center. “Current Highlights.” https://www.hsph.harvard.edu /hicrc/ (accessed July 6, 2021). Harvard School of Public Health, Harvard Injury Control Research Center. While We Were Sleeping: Success Stories in Injury and Violence Prevention. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009. Hemenway, David. Private Guns, Public Health. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2006. Kates, Don B., Henry E. Schaffer, John K. Lattimer, George B. Murray, and Edwin H. Cassem. “Guns and Public Health: Epidemic of Violence or Pandemic of Propaganda?” Tennessee Law Review 62 (1994): 513–96. Kellermann, Arthur L., and Donald T. Reay. “Protection or Peril? An Analysis of Firearms-Related Deaths in the Home.” New England Journal of Medicine 314 (1986): 1557–60. Kellermann, Arthur L., Frederick P. Rivara, Norman B. Rushforth, Joyce G. Banton, Donald T. Reay, Jerry T. Francisco, Ana B. Locci, Janice Prodzinski, Bela B. Hackman, and Grant Somes. “Gun Ownership as a Risk Factor for Homicide in the Home.” New England Journal of Medicine 329 (1993): 1084–91. Runyan, Carol W., Stephen Hargarten, David Hemenway, Corinne Peek-Asa, Rebecca

M. Cunningham, Julia Costich, and Andrea C. Gielen. “An Urgent Call to Action in Support of Injury Control Research Centers.” American Journal of Preventive Medicine 39 (2010): 89–92. Sloan, John, Arthur L. Kellermann, Donald T. Reay, James A. Ferris, Thomas Koepsell, Frederick P. Rivara, Charles Rice, Laurel Gray, and James LoGerfo. “Handgun Regulations, Crime, Assaults, and Homicide: A Tale of Two Cities.” New England Journal of Medicine 319 (1988): 1256–62. Suter, Edgar A. “Assault Weapons’ Revisited— An Analysis of the AMA Report.” Journal of the Medical Association of Georgia 83 (1994): 281–89. Suter, Edgar A. “Guns in the Medical Literature—a Failure of Peer Review.” Journal of the Medical Association of Georgia 83 (1994): 133–48. Suter, Edgar A., William C. Waters, and George B. Murray. “Violence in America: Effective Solutions.” Journal of the Medical Association of Georgia 84 (1995): 253–63. University of California, Davis. Violence Research Prevention Program. https:// health.ucdavis.edu/vprp/ (accessed July 6, 2021). Vernick, Jon S., Stephen P. Teret, Gary A. Smith, Daniel W. Webster. “Counseling about Firearms: Proposed Legislation Is a Threat to Physicians and Their Patients.” Pediatrics 18 (2006): 2168–72. http://pedi atrics.aappublications.org/content/118 /5/2168.full.pdf+html (accessed July 6, 2021). Wheeler, Timothy, and E. John Wipfler III. Keeping Your Family Safe: The Responsibilities of Firearm Ownership. Bellevue, WA: Merril Press, 2009. Wintemute, Garen J., Anthony A. Braga, and David M. Kennedy. “Private-Party Gun Sales, Regulation, and Public Safety.” New England Journal of Medicine 363 (2010): 508–11. http://www.nejm.org/doi/pdf/10 .1056/NEJMp1006326 (accessed July 6, 2021).

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Mental Disabilities and Gun Use and Acquisition In recent years, particularly with the rise of mass shootings, there has been growing interest in the link between mental health and firearm usage, with some arguing that better mental healthcare services or new legal restrictions could limit gun violence. Regarding mental disabilities and guns, core questions include the following: (1) Is there enough agreement on terms and data available to conclude what linkages there may be between mental illness and gun violence? (2) If a person has a mental illness and a firearm, is it more likely for the gun to be used against others or oneself as compared to the general population? (3) Should past history of mental illness be used to limit gun ownership or screen gun purchases as part of background checks? The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders from the American Psychiatric Association recognizes over 200 distinct mental health diagnoses, but some observers push them together under a broad heading of mental illness. Any real proof of linkages to violence needs to begin by defining which particular diagnoses are of concern. There also are many people who remain undiagnosed, so they can shift the data in various ways. Overall, conservative estimates are that approximately one-quarter of all people suffer from diagnosable mental illness at some time in their lives, but the vast majority of them will never use a gun for violence; meanwhile, many people who do commit violence are never diagnosed. Thus, mental illness is neither a sufficient nor a necessary cause of gun violence, but it could be an exacerbating factor. Studies examining mental health and violence against others have reached conflicting conclusions, in part because of disputes

over terminological classifications. Studies generally find that there is at best a limited role of clear mental illness and violence (Matejkowski et al. 2014). Other studies indicate that “mass shooting perpetrators had significantly higher rates of mental illness than the general population” (Meszaros 2017, 359), but this is a small sample, and any correlation does not assure there is causation. There are also studies looking at the role of guns in suicide. Gun use by those suffering mental illness is more prevalent in suicide than in violence against others (Baumann 2018). In looking at whether gun access increases suicide rates, there seems to be almost complete substitution of other means of suicide where strict firearm regulations are instituted. Also, countries with low firearm-ownership rates can have substantial suicide rates (Kleck 1997). However, some argue for a relationship based on other population survey studies (e.g., Wintemute et al. 1999). Thus, the subject is not without controversy, and the analyses are based in a polarized research universe that may influence result interpretations (Vizzard 2000). Further, there can be variance in success of suicide methods, so actual deaths can increase when people choose firearms over other methods. Nevertheless, mental status is used in state and federal regulations to determine worthiness to own or purchase a firearm. At the federal level, the Federal Firearms Act of 1938 did not specifically prohibit purchase by the mentally ill. However, it set the conceptual groundwork for future federal gun control legislation. Specific terminology that remains in place today was added in the Gun Control Act of 1968, which banned federal firearm licensees from transferring a gun or ammunition to someone who “has been adjudicated as a mental defective or has been committed to any



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mental institution.” Such individuals also could not receive a firearm from interstate or foreign commerce. The first limiting clause covers people who have an appointed legal guardian or who were judged insane in a court or military tribunal, but the phrase “mentally defective” is not a clinical term. The second covers people involuntarily committed to a mental institution for mental defectiveness, mental illness, or drug use, but it does not cover voluntary admissions or short observations. Such blanket provisions have been challenged on constitutional grounds. A case was brought before the U.S. Supreme Court challenging the law (Department of Treasury v. Galioto, 477 U.S. 556 [1986]). Several mental health organizations—including the American Psychological Association (APA)—filed amicus briefs in the case. Of several points made by the APA, these two stand out: “(4) the statute did not prevent firearm abuse because individuals with no history of arrest prior to commitment are no more likely than the general population to commit violent acts; and (5) administrative convenience alone did not constitutionally justify permanent disqualification under an overbroad classification based on false, stigmatizing stereotypes.” In 1986, Congress passed the Firearms Owners Protection Act, which established a “relief from disabilities” process. Individuals could petition the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) to restore their firearms rights upon a showing that they “will not be likely to act in a manner dangerous to public safety and that the granting of the relief would not be contrary to the public interest.” However, by 1992, Congress stopped providing funding for such review, and the ATF stopped accepting restoration petitions. Many states have adopted standards similar to or more expansive than the federal

wording. As Norris et al. (2006, 1393) summarized for state firearms prohibitions for persons with mental illness: [F]orty-three states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico have prohibitions for persons with mental illness. Thirty-six states and Puerto Rico have prohibitions for drug abuse. Thirty-one states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico have prohibitions for alcohol abuse. Twenty states and the District of Columbia have databases tracking individuals with mental illness. The firearms statutes are not uniform; they vary considerably in ownership and/or carry restrictions on the manner in which restricted individuals are defined. Prohibited persons range in various states from those who receive outpatient psychiatric treatment to persons who have been civilly committed to treatment or found not guilty by reason of insanity. Some statutes restrict individuals with a history of alcohol or substance abuse (with different criteria for inclusion in this restricted class). (2006, 1393) At the federal level, the passage of the Brady Bill put in place an instant background check for firearm purchases. As part of this process (via the National Instant Criminal Background Check System [NICS]), purchasers fill out ATF Form 4473—Firearms Transaction Record. Question F on the form asks: “Have you ever been adjudicated mentally defective or have you been committed to a mental institution?” There was, though, no legal requirement that states report their findings to NICS, so many states reported little information, and the number of prohibited people remained low.

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The vivid instances of rampage shootings led to some new measures. The Virginia Tech shooting might have been prevented if the perpetrator’s psychiatric problems were reported promptly and his ability to purchase firearms limited. This led to passage of the NICS Improvement Act (2008). The legislation aids states in correctly reporting disqualifying mental disabilities to the federal government for the NICS system. It also has important provisions for “relief”— that is, for regaining one’s right to purchase and possess firearms. Voluntarily getting treatment is not a disqualifier in most cases for firearms ownership. In the years following Virginia Tech, state reporting to NICS vastly increased to include over three million records in the next years. Some states continue to report little information to NICS, and other bureaucratic issues remain, so it is unknown how many people should actually be legally limited from purchases. President Obama tried to clarify definitions of those considered as mentally defective by shifting regulations. The Social Security Administration would have to report anyone who successfully filed a disability claim for mental health reasons and anyone that requested that another person have authority over their payments. This could have affected roughly 750,000 people. The action was very controversial since these were not court adjudications. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) joined many disability groups to argue that this was an unlawful restriction on Second Amendment rights. When President Trump took office, Congress quickly passed legislation that he signed reversing Obama’s actions. Trump was criticized by some for lowering restrictions related to mental illness even as he frequently spoke of mental illness as the cause of mass shootings, but the Obama regulations might not have

withstood legal challenge. Meanwhile, states continue to have varying laws touching on mental illness, and increasingly, “red flag” laws have been developed to allow courts increased ability to take guns away from potentially dangerous people, including, in some cases, those with mental health issues. Glenn E. Meyer and John W. Dietrich See also: Extreme Risk Protection Orders; Gun Control Act of 1968; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Guns in the Home; NICS Improvement Act; Substitution Effects; Suicide, Guns and; Suicide, International Comparisons; Sutherland Springs Church Shooting; Victimization from Gun Violence; Violent Video Games and Gun Violence; Virginia Tech Shooting

Further Reading American Psychological Association. Amicus Brief for Department of Treasury v. Galioto. 1985. http://www.apa.org/about/offices /ogc/amicus/galioto.pdf (accessed June 14, 2022). Baumann, Miranda Lynne, and Brent Teasdale. “Severe Mental Illness and Firearm Access: Is Violence Really the Danger?” International Journal of Law & Psychiatry 56 (2018): 44–49. Edwards, A. A. “Firearms and the Mentally Ill: A Legislative Overview and Jurisprudential Analysis.” Behavioral Sciences and the Law 11 (1993): 407–21. Javanbakht, Arash. “Mental Illness and Gun Laws: What You May Not Know about the Complexities.” The Conversation, March 1, 2018, https://theconversation.com/mental -illness-and-gun-laws-what-you-may-not -k now-about-the-complexities-92337 (accessed May 18, 2022). Kates, Don B., and Gary Mauser. “Would Banning Firearms Reduce Murder and Suicide?” Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy 30 (2007): 649–94.

Kleck, Gary. Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1997. Matejkowski, Jason, Jaymes Fairfax-Columbo, Sara W. Cullen, Steven C. Marcus, and Phyllis L. Solomon. “Exploring the Potential of Stricter Gun Restrictions for People with Serious Mental Illness to Reduce Homicide in the United States.” Journal of Forensic Psychiatry & Psychology 25, no. 3 (2014): 362–69. Meszaros, John. “Falling through the Cracks: The Decline of Mental Health Care and Firearm Violence.” Journal of Mental Health 26, no. 4 (2017): 359–65. Miller, Matthew, and David Hemenway. “Guns and Suicide in the United States.” New England Journal of Medicine 359 (2008): 989–91. Norris, Donna M., Marilyn Price, Thomas Gutheil, and William H. Reid. “Firearm Laws, Patients, and the Roles of Psychiatrists.” American Journal of Psychiatry 163 (2006): 1392–96. Vizzard, William J. Shots in the Dark: The Policy, Politics, and Symbolism of Gun Control. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000. Wintemute, Garen J., Carrie A. Parham, James Jay Beaumont, Mona Wright, and Christiana Drake. “Mortality among Recent Purchasers of Handguns.” New England Journal of Medicine 341 (1999): 1583–89.

Merrill v. Navegar, Inc. See Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers Metal Detectors The first metal detector was used in an attempt to save President James Garfield after he was shot in Washington, D.C. on July 2, 1881. The gunshot did not kill him, but the bullet could not be located. Alexander

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Graham Bell built a metal detector for the President in order to find the bullet. The iron springs in the mattress confused the detector and President Garfield eventually died from an infection caused by the wound on September 19, 1881 (Bernzweig 2014). Bell’s prototype became the base upon which future detectors were built. Early metal detectors were used to find and destroy landmines and unexploded bombs throughout Europe after World War I and World War II (Bernzweig 2014). Security has become a major issue in the United States, especially since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. High-tech security is in increased demand, with the primary aim being tighter and more reliable protection measures. Metal detectors have been used for decades in airports, schools, and other security-sensitive arenas. Since the terrorist attacks, transportation officials in particular have been struggling to improve airport security. Even with improved staffing and additional checkpoints in place, modern metal detectors still cannot detect nonmetallic weapons or explosives. A more high-tech form of scanning, such as multimeter-wave scanners are effective in terms of detecting both metallic and nonmetallic objects (Tyriver 2019). The hijackers of September 11 did not carry guns, explosive materials, or other metals that could be easily detected by airport security. Instead, they allegedly carried devices with plastic handles and embedded razors. As a result, they easily boarded the aircraft with their weapons. Materials such as graphite epoxy could easily pass through existing scanning technologies according to security experts (Kehaulani-Goo and Eggen 2004). Metal detectors were unable to detect the weapons used by the 911 terrorists because of their nonmetallic nature. Experts warn,

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however, that metal weapons, including guns, knives, and explosives can be passed through airport metal detectors at floor level. Handheld metal detectors appear to be the most reliable and can detect weapons made of all types of metals. Unfortunately, they cannot detect nonmetallic explosives or weapons. Nonmagnetic scanning technology exists that can perform whole-body scanning and is now in widespread use. Other technology possibilities include retinal and other forms of biometric scanning as a way of identifying potential perpetrators. These systems scan passersby by identifying such facial measurements as the distance between the eyes, angle of the nose, and thickness of the lips. The system can find a match against a database of eight million images in less than one second to augment human security efforts at airports and other public arenas (van der Kleut 2020). As recently as 2017, some airports had fail rates as high as 95 percent on screening checks for weapons and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) had an 80 percent fail in terms of identifying metal weapons (Schildkraut and Grogan 2019). Many public institutions have added higher levels of security in the past decades. The threat of a terrorist or other form of violent attack has increased the demand for additional security at public events and public institutions. For example, schools across the country are seeking ways to protect their students from school shootings. About 3 percent of public schools in the United States have metal detectors, which is largely due to parental pressures, particularly after a high-profile school shooting (Stein 2018). There are, however, concerns over metal detectors in schools. Often the machines misidentify metal objects, which results in invasive searches on students. According to Ortiz (2019), Congress afforded millions of

dollars to provide safety equipment to schools, including metal detectors, but school shootings continued. The Educator’s School Safety Network provided data on school shootings and indicate that there was a 185 percent spike in school violence from 2016 through 2019 (Ortiz 2019). According to the National School Safety and Security Services, there is no single strategy that can provide a 100 percent guarantee that there will not be a shooting at a school in the United States. Metal detectors can be bypassed. They are also expensive and in order to be somewhat effective, they should be manned by someone explicitly trained to operate them. The person manning the metal detector may be the first person to be shot. Advocates for metal detectors argue that they make schools safer. Metal detectors became popular in the 1980s as a way to prevent school violence, especially in urban areas (Schildkraut and Grogan 2019). However, opponents believe metal detectors will create a prison-like environment and burden schools with unnecessary costs, given that school shootings are rare. Additionally, metal detectors may only serve a symbolic role. Parents and students may be reassured that school shootings will be prevented by the use of a metal detectors, but other research indicates that students may feel less safe in schools housing metal detectors (Schildkraut and Grogan 2019). A study by the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention found that school violence involving multiple victims is rare and accounts for only 2 percent of youth homicides. In fact, school violence remains almost the same as that in 1994 (Cave 2019). The role of metal detectors is not clear in terms of preventing school shootings. Carriers of concealed weapons who see a metal detector may be deterred from boarding a plane or entering a school or other



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public arena. However, the public did learn from the American Airlines “shoe incident” that it cannot be lulled by technology into a false sense of security. Metal detectors appear to be only one part of the security solution. Kim A. MacInnis See also: Columbine High School Shooting; School Shootings; Youth and Guns

Further Reading Bernzweig, Daniel. “The History of the Metal Detector.” 2014. https://www.metaldetector .com/learn/metal-detector-history/history -of-the-metal-detector (accessed July 15, 2020). Cave, Anthony. “Multiple-Victim School Shootings Are Rare but They Are Becoming More Common and More Deadly.” WAMU, February 21, 2019. https://wamu .org /stor y /19 / 02 / 21/mu lt iple -v ict i m -school-shootings-are-rare-but-they-are -becom i ng-more - com mon-and-more -deadly/ (accessed July 15, 2020). Kehaulani-Goo, Sara, and Dan Eggen. “911 Hijackers Used Mace and Knives, Panel Reports.” Washington Post, January 28, 2004. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive /politics/2004/01/28/911-hijackers-used -mace-and-knives-panel-reports/797594cd -7f6a-4a0e-bbd4-095273d102ae/ (accessed July 14, 2020). Ortiz, Jorge L. “How to Keep Schools Safe? We’re Focusing Our Time, Energy and Money On All the Wrong Things, Expert Says.” USA Today, November 21, 2019. https://www.usatoday.com /story/news /nation/2019/11/21/school-shootings-metal -detectors-solution-experts/4255318002 / (accessed July 15, 2020). Schildkraut, Jaclyn, and Grogan, Kathryn. “Are Metal Detectors Effective at Making Schools Safer?” Washington, DC: WestEd. 2019. https://cdpsdocs.state.co.us/ccjj/Resources /Ref/2019_MetalDetectorsSchools.pdf (accessed July 13, 2020).

Stein, Perry. “Do Metal Detectors and X-ray Machines Belong in Schools?” Washington Post, August 14, 2018. https://www .washingtonpost.com/local/education/do -metal-detectors-and-x-ray-machines -belong-in-schools/2018/08/14/b4c31674 -9f2d-11e8-8e87-c869fe70a721_story.html (accessed July 13, 2020). Tyriver, Corey. “Metal Detectors Add a Valuable Security Layer.” 2019. https://www .security101.com/blog/metal-detectors-add -a-valuable-security-layer (accessed July 14, 2020). Van der Kleut, Jennifer. “Biometrics and Biometric Data: What It Is and Is It Secure?” 2020. https://us.norton.com/internetsecurity -iot-biometrics-how-do-they-work-are-they -safe.html (accessed July 15, 2020).

Methodologies for Studying Gun Violence Public Health Approach In the United States, there are approximately 38,000 deaths related to firearms (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National 2020), and twice as many nonfatal injuries (Fowler et al. 2015), resulting in over $200 billion in total costs (U.S. Congress Joint Economic Committee Democratic Staff 2019) annually. Firearms are a leading cause of injury deaths across the lifespan (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control 2018). An important cause of premature death, illness, and disability for decades, gun violence is considered a critical public health issue. Public health is the science of protecting and improving the health of people and their communities, and the call to formally utilize the public health approach to address gun violence has been increasing. The public health approach includes a four-step

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process: (1) define and monitor the problem, (2) identify risk and protective factors, (3) develop and test prevention strategies, and (4) assure widespread adoption of effective prevention strategies. This approach has been successfully implemented with other forms of injury prevention, such as motor vehicle injuries (Hemenway and Miller 2013), and incorporates currently accepted methodologies for studying gun violence.

Descriptive Epidemiology The first step in the public health approach, define and monitor gun violence in the United States, is accomplished by utilizing descriptive epidemiology. Descriptive epidemiology is defined as the assessment of patterns in the frequency and distribution of disease in a population according to person, place, and time (Aschengrau and Seage 2020). Therefore, within the context of gun violence, descriptive epidemiology assesses who is affected by gun violence, where gun violence occurs, and how the frequency of gun violence is changing over time. The frequency of gun violence is often measured with incidence, which measures the occurrence of new cases and can be calculated as either a cumulative incidence, which is the proportion of a population that experiences a new event over a specified period of time, or as an incidence rate, which is the number of new events over a denominator that integrates time. Prevalence, on the other hand, is a measure of existing cases and is the proportion of the population that is currently affected. In the context of gun violence, prevalence is commonly used to measure behaviors, such as gun ownership. Incidence and prevalence can be examined for trends over time, compared between populations, and examined geographically. The raw data needed to analyze these variations in patterns of gun violence by

person, place, and time is ascertained from several sources. Surveillance systems, such as the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission’s National Electronic Injury Surveillance System (NEISS) or the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Violent Deaths Reporting System (NVDRS), provide national-level data. For example, in a paper using data from two national surveillance systems, Fowler and colleagues (2015) described firearm injuries in the United States according to personal characteristics, such as age, sex, and race/ ethnicity, geographic region of the country, and the annual percent change in incidence over a twenty-year period. Studies like this provide information on who is most at risk for gun violence (victimization or perpetration), including which types of violence (e.g., suicide, homicide), where gun violence is more likely to occur, and how gun violence rates have changed over time. Other sources of data commonly used for the descriptive epidemiology of gun violence in the United States include hospital emergency department records, medical examiner records, national, regional, and local law enforcement records, media records, and survey research data. While several sources of data are available to examine the descriptive epidemiology of gun violence, they are disjointed and are often missing critical information.

Analytic Epidemiology While descriptive epidemiology is important for generating hypotheses, or possible explanations about factors that are associated with gun violence, analytic epidemiology is a tool for testing the hypotheses. Analytic epidemiology quantifies the association between exposures and outcomes and addresses the second step in the public health approach, identification of risk and



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protective factors. There are several types of analytic epidemiology studies that can be used to research gun violence: ecological, cross-sectional, case-control, cohort, and experimental studies. To draw conclusions from the study designs described below, appropriate statistical analyses are required and include calculations such as measures of effect and correlations, and techniques such as statistical testing and regression analyses (Selvin 2004). Ecological studies examine the relationship between exposure and disease with population-level rather than individual-level data (Aschengrau and Seage 2020). Ecological studies are a useful tool for studying violence within communities when the unit of analysis is geographic, such as states or counties (Zeoli, Paruk, and Pizarro 2019). For example, Montuneaux and colleagues (2015) examined the association between rates of household firearm ownership and violent crime at the state level and found that states reporting higher levels of firearm ownership had higher levels of firearm assault and firearm robbery. Ecological studies of gun violence have frequently been used to examine the effects of gun laws and policies, the prevalence of firearms, and other community-level factors. However, a significant limitation of ecological studies is the inability to make inferences at the individual level. Cross-sectional studies generally examine the relationship between exposure and the prevalence of disease at a single point in time (Aschengrau and Seage 2020). Unlike ecological studies, cross-sectional studies utilize data at the individual level. Crosssectional studies of gun violence can be used to describe the population most likely to be affected as well as identify factors associated with specific types of gun violence. For example, Shenassa and colleagues

(2004) conducted a cross-sectional study of suicide and storage of firearms in the home and found that those who stored their firearms locked or unloaded were less likely to commit suicide by firearm. Cross-sectional studies are commonly used to examine the association between personal and behavioral characteristics associated with gun violence but are limited by an inability to examine the impact of changes in characteristics over time. Case-control studies generally examine the relationship between exposure and disease by defining cases and controls and comparing them with respect to their exposure histories (Aschengrau and Seage 2020). Case-control studies of gun violence provide the opportunity to study a multitude of factors associated with victimization and perpetration of gun violence. For example, in a case-control study of patients who had been shot and community controls, Kondo and colleagues (2017) found that being under tree cover was inversely associated with gun assault victimization. In another example of a case-control study of gun violence, cases who committed a firearm crime were compared to controls who committed a crime, but without a firearm, and several factors were found to be associated with firearm perpetration, including education level and history of firearm injury (Chuang 2018). One limitation of case-control studies is their retrospective nature, increasing the likelihood of bias. Cohort studies examine the relationship between exposure and disease by defining at-risk subjects by their exposure and following them over time for the occurrence of the outcome of interest (Aschengrau and Seage 2020). Cohort studies provide the opportunity to explicitly examine the association between the risk of specific types of gun violence and related behaviors with

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various exposures, including those that can change over time. Cohort studies have been used to examine the effect of changes in firearm legislation and policies over time, as well as characteristics and behaviors associated with gun violence. While cohort studies of gun violence confirm correct temporal sequence of exposure and outcome risk, they are limited by the resources required to conduct them. Experimental studies are often considered the gold-standard with respect to establishing cause and effect (Szklo and Nieto 2019). Experimental studies, or trials, “involve the use of designed experiments to investigate the role of some agent in the prevention or treatment” of an outcome and often include random assignment (Aschengrau and Seage 2020). Quasi-experimental studies, on the other hand, are missing the element of randomization and include designs such as prepost studies (Harris et al. 2006). Experimental and quasi-experimental studies of gun violence can not only identify risk and protective factors but are also frequently used to test gun violence prevention strategies, the third step in the public health approach. These study designs have been used to evaluate the impact of gun violence prevention efforts, such as policing programs, firearm legislation and policies, hospital-based, school-based, and community-based violence intervention programs, firearm safety programs, and environmental design. For example, Moyer and colleagues (2019) conducted a randomized clinical trial of vacant lot stabilization in Philadelphia and found that areas surrounding treated vacant lots saw a reduction in gun violence. Much like cohort studies, experimental and quasiexperimental studies are limited by the substantial resources needed to conduct them. Additionally, some risk and protective factors of gun violence are not conducive to

interventions (such as demographic characteristics) and cannot by examined with experimental and quasi-experimental study designs.

Qualitative Methodologies While the methodologies to study gun violence described above have been quantitative in nature, qualitative research methods can also be used to better understand gun violence. Qualitative research aims to gain insight in how people make sense of their world and their experiences in it (Merriam 2009) using text, images, and sound (Guest, Namey, and Mitchell 2013). Qualitative research of gun violence is used commonly in the disciplines of social sciences, criminology, and public health, and incorporate methods such as, participant observation, in-depth interviews, and focus groups. These methodologies result in field notes, audio and video recordings, and transcripts (Guest, Namey, and Mitchell 2013), which are analyzed with approaches such as thematic analysis, content analysis, and grounded theory (Raskind et al. 2019). Qualitative studies around the issue of gun violence have investigated areas such as the needs of victims, motivation for owning and carrying firearms, perceptions of community gun violence, perceptions of firearm legislation and policies, and illegal gun markets. For example, a recent qualitative study by Pallin and colleagues (2019) used interviews of firearm owners and enthusiasts to inform framing and content around suicide prevention counseling. Other Methodologies Research that incorporates aspects of both quantitative methods and qualitative methods is called mixed-methods research and has been increasingly used in the study of gun violence. For example, a study was



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recently published by Braga and colleagues (2020) that included both firearm trace data and in-depth interviews to analyze the underground gun market in New York City. In another mixed-methods study, Van Sparrentak and colleagues (2018) elicited youth opinions about guns and gun control through a text messaging survey in which responses to open-ended questions were analyzed for themes and then quantified. Economic analyses are yet another methodology that can be used to gain a better understanding of gun violence in the United States. Types of economic analyses include economic impact analysis, programmatic cost analysis, cost-benefit analysis, and cost-effectiveness analysis (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Division for Heart Disease and Stroke Prevention 2017). These types of analyses can provide information on the burden of health care costs associated with gun violence, societal costs associated with gun violence, cost-benefit information associated with gun violence interventions, and even the public’s willingness to pay to reduce gun violence. Finally, policy analysis can also be utilized to gain insight into the fourth step in the public health approach, widespread implementation of effective prevention strategies. Policy analysis is “the process of identifying potential policy options that could address your problem and then comparing those options to choose the most effective, efficient, and feasible one” (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Office of the Associate Director for Policy and Strategy 2019). Policy analysis encompasses identification of policy options, environmental scans and surveys of best practices, assessment of impact, cost, and feasibility of implementation, and ranking of policies.

Policy analysis has been used within the context of gun violence to identify the ideal prevention strategies dependent on the setting and population. In the report entitled The Science of Gun Policy: A Critical Synthesis of Research Evidence of the Effects of Gun Policies in the United States, as an example, eighteen policies related to firearm deaths, violent crime, the gun industry, and gun use were systematically analyzed to determine best practices and areas for improvement (RAND Corporation 2020).

Future Work While the methodologies to study gun violence exist, rigorous research in this area has been scant due to the divisive nature of the topic of guns, the scarcity of available funding, and the resulting lost generation of researchers (Galea et al. 2018). This critical gap in our understanding of the causes of gun violence and effective strategies to ameliorate it have limited our ability to adequately address the public health crisis in the United States. However, recent restoration of federal funding for gun violence research (Ollove 2019), along with an increase in scientific publications and researchers new to the field (Galea and Vaughan 2019) provide encouraging evidence of progress in tackling the problem of gun violence in the United States. Margaret K. Formica See also: Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime; Crime and Gun Use; Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Gun Control; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Lethality Effect of Guns; More Guns, Less Crime Thesis; Motor Vehicle Laws as a Model for Gun Laws; Victimization from Gun Violence

Further Reading Aschengrau, Ann, and George R. Seage III. Essentials of Epidemiology in Public

598 | Methodologies for Studying Gun Violence Health. 4th ed. Burlington, MA: Jones & Bartlett Learning, 2020. Braga, Anthony A., Rod K. Brunson, Philip J. Cook, Brandon Turchan, and Brian Wade. “Underground Gun Markets and the Flow of Illegal Guns in the Bronx and Brooklyn: A Mixed Methods Analysis.” Journal of Urban Health (2020). https://doi.org/10 .1007/s11524-020-00477-z. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Division for Heart Disease and Stroke Prevention. “Five-Part Webcast on Economic Evaluation.” Evaluation Resources, April 26, 2017. https://www.cdc.gov/dhdsp/evaluation _resources/economic_evaluation/index .htm (accessed September 19, 2020). Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control. “Causes of Injury Death: Highlighting Violence.” Leading Causes of Death and Injury, 2018. https://www.cdc.gov/injury/wis qars/pdf/leading_causes_of_injury_deaths _highlighting _violence_2018-508.pdf (accessed September 19, 2020). Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control. Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System (WISQARS), Fatal Injury Reports, 5-Year Average: 2014–2018. July 7, 2020. www.cdc.gov /injury/wisqars (accessed September 19, 2020). Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Office of the Associate Director for Policy and Strategy. POLARIS, Policy Process, Policy Analysis. January 2, 2019. https:// www.cdc.gov/policy/polaris/policyprocess /policy_analysis.html#:~:text=Policy%20 Analysis%20is%20the%20process,%2 C%20efficient%2C%20and%20feasible %20one (accessed September 19, 2020). Chuang, Chi Yang. “Firearm Assault Perpetration in King County: A Case-Control Study of Antecedent Sentinel Events.” Semantic Scholar. 2018. https://www.semanticscholar .org/paper/Firearm-Assault-Perpetration

-in-King-County%3A-A-of-Chuang/5d55a 98a0769971635b6caef2daa2f671da2c568 (accessed September 19, 2020). Fowler, Katherine A., Linda L. Dahlberg, Tadesse Haileyesus, and Joseph L. Annest. “Firearm Injuries in the United States.” Preventive Medicine 79 (2015): 5–14. Galea, Sandro, and Roger D. Vaughan. “Tendrils of Hope in the Gun Epidemic: A Public Health of Consequence, November 2019.” American Journal of Public Health 109, no. 11 (2019): 1490–91. Galea, Sandro, Charles C. Branas, A. Flescher, Margaret K. Formica, N. Hennig, K. D. Liller, H. N. Madanat, A. Park, J. E. Rosenthal, and J. Ying. “Priorities in Recovering from a Lost Generation of Firearms Research.” American Journal of Public Health 108 (2018): 858–60. Guest, Greg, Emily E. Namey, and Marilyn L. Mitchell. Collecting Qualitative Data: A Field Manual for Applied Research. London: Sage Publications, LTD, 2013. Harris, Anthony D., Jessina C. McGregor, Eli N. Perencevich, Jon P. Furuno, Jingkun Zhu, Dan E. Peterson, and Joseph Finkelstein. “The Use and Interpretation of Quasi-Experimental Studies in Medical Informatics.” Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association 13, no. 1 (2006): 16–23. Hemenway, David, and Matthew Miller. “Public Health Approach to the Prevention of Gun Violence.” New England Journal of Medicine 368 (2013): 2033–35. Kondo, Michelle C., Eugenia C. South, Charles C. Branas, Therese S. Richmond, and Douglas J. Wiebe. “The Association Between Urban Tree Cover and Gun Assault: A Case-Control and Case-Crossover Study.” American Journal of Epidemiology 186, no. 3 (2017): 289–96. Merriam, Sharan. Qualitative Research: A Guide to Design and Implementation. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2009. Monuteaux, Michael C., Lois K. Lee, David Hemenway, Rebekah Mannix, and Eric W.

Fleegler. “Firearm Ownership and Violent Crime in the U.S.: An Ecologic Study.” American Journal of Preventive Medicine 49, no. 2 (2015): 207–14. https://doi.org /10.1016/j.amepre.2015.02.008. Moyer, Ruth, John M. MacDonald, Greg Ridgeway, and Charles C. Branas. “Effect of Remediating Blighted Vacant Land on Shootings: A Citywide Cluster Randomized Trial.” American Journal of Public Health 109 (2019): 140–44. Ollove, Michael. “Federal Spending Bill Contains Money for Gun-Related Research.” Associated Press, December 19, 2019. https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research -and-analysis/blogs/stateline/2019/12/16 /federal-spending-bill-contains-money -for-gun-related-research (accessed September 19, 2020). Pallin, Rocco, Bonnie Siry, Deborah Azrael, Christopher E. Knoepke, Daniel D. Matlock, Ashley Clement, Megan L. Ranney, Garen J. Wintemute, and Marian E. Betz. “‘Hey, Let Me Hold Your Guns for Awhile’: A Qualitative Study of Messaging for Firearm Suicide Prevention.” Behavioral Sciences & The Law 37, no. 3 Suppl. 2 (2019): 259–69. RAND Corporation. The Science of Gun Policy: A Critical Synthesis of Research Evidence on the Effects of Gun Policies in the United States, Second Edition. Report, Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2020. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research _reports/RR2088-1.html (accessed September 19, 2020). Raskind, Ilana G., Rachel C. Shelton, Dawn L. Comeau, Hannah L. F. Cooper, Derek M. Griffith, and Michelle C. Kegler. “A Review of Qualitative Data Analysis Practices in Health Education and Health Behavior Research.” Health Education and Behavior 46, no. 1 (2019): 32–39. Selvin, Steve. Statistical Analysis of Epidemiologic Data. 3rd ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004. Shenassa, Edmond D., Michelle L. Rogers, Kirsten L. Spalding, and Mary B. Roberts.

Microstamping (Bullet Serial Numbers) | 599 “Safer Storage of Firearms at Home and Risk of Suicide: A Study of Protective Factors in a Nationally Representative Sample.” Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health 58, no. 10 (2004): 841–48. Szklo, Moyses, and F. Javier Nieto. Epidemiology: Beyond the Basics. 4th ed. Burlington, MA: Jones & Bartlett Learning, 2019. U.S. Congress Joint Economic Committee Democratic Staff. A State-by-State Examination of the Economic Costs of Gun Violence. Report, Washington, DC: Joint Economic Committee, 2019. https://www .jec.senate.gov/public/_cache/files/9872 b4d4-4151-4d3e-8df9-bc565743d990/eco nomic-costs-of-gun-violence---jec-report .pdf (accessed September 19, 2020). Van Sparrentak, Murphy, Tammy Chang, Alison L. Miller, Lauren P. Nichols, and Kendrin R. Sonneville. “Youth Opinions about Guns and Gun Control in the United States.” JAMA Pediatrics 172, no. 9 (2018): 884–86. Zeoli, April M., Jennifer K. Paruk, and Jesenia M. Pizarro. “Ecological Research for Studies of Violence: A Methodological Guide.” Journal of Interpersonal Violence 34, no. 23–24 (2019): 4860–80.

Microstamping (Bullet Serial Numbers) Fairly recent technology for stamping a serial number or other identifying mark on bullets and casings has spawned a great deal of controversy between gun control advocates, gun control opponents, the gun industry, law enforcement, and lawmakers. The concept of giving guns serial numbers that would be imprinted on each bullet fired from that particular gun dates back to the Johnson administration in 1969. The purpose of such a system is to give law enforcement the ability to connect a crime scene bullet with a particular gun and its owner

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through a database of registered weapons. In response, a technology was eventually developed to laser engrave markings on the firing pin, which would in turn stamp the unique mark on the shell casing before it was ejected from the gun. Another proposal is for ammunition manufacturers to engrave every bullet and casing with a serial number linking the ammunition to the box in which it was sold and requiring purchasers to register to purchase the ammunition. These methods have met with great enthusiasm by lawmakers. Critics of this technology assert that it is unworkable. George G. Krivosta of the Suffolk County (New York) Crime Laboratory tested the NanoTag technology, which laserengraves markings on firing pins. He found that the vast majority of markings on fired casings were illegible (Krivosta 2006). Similarly, a study conducted at the University of California, Davis, found that the markings on the firing pin itself were subject to severe degradation after extended use (Howitt 2006). Finally, both studies found that the microengraved firing pin was easily defaced with household tools to render the markings illegible, and the defaced pin could still be utilized in the weapon. Another firearm examiner, C. Rodney James, further criticized bullet serialization as unrealistic because the equipment for coding and collating bullets and cartridges is nonexistent, and such a system would be incompatible with the manufacturing methods employed by the ammunition industry (James 2008). In 2007, California became the first state to mandate the technology, enacting a law requiring that all new semiautomatic handguns be equipped to microstamp the make, model, and serial number of the gun onto the spent cartridge case. The Crime Gun Identification Act, as the law was known, went into effect in 2013 after the state’s

Department of Justice issued the necessary certification that the technology was available to more than one firearm manufacturer (Giffords Center to Prevent Gun Violence 2021). In response, both Smith & Wesson and Sturm, Ruger, & Co. announced their plans to stop selling new semiautomatic handguns in the state in 2014. The National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) and Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers Institute (SAAMI) also jointly filed a petition for injunctive relief to invalidate the Act, though a federal judge upheld the law in early 2015. The case’s dismissal was reversed in December 2016 by a California Appellate Court and in 2018, the California Supreme Court upheld the microstamping requirement. The State of California passed new legislation in 2020 related to the technology as the original law applied the requirement only to new semiautomatic pistol models, which manufacturers were effectively refusing to develop. The updated legislation broadened its parameters to encompass more firearms sold and manufactured in the state. Various pieces of federal legislation have been aimed at either requiring this technology on a national level or studying its feasibility (Carter 2006; NRA-ILA 2008). No such legislation, however, was successfully enacted. Robert H. Wood and Jaclyn Schildkraut See also: Association of Firearm and Tool Mark Examiners (AFTE); National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF); Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers’ Institute (SAAMI)

Further Readings Carter, Gregg Lee. Gun Control in the United States: A Reference Handbook. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2006.

Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Microstamping & Ballistics in California.” n.d. https://giffords.org/lawcenter /state-laws/microstamping-ballistics-in -california/ (accessed July 7, 2021). Howitt, David, Frederic A. Tulleners, and Michael T. Beddow. “What Micro Serialized Firing Pins Can Add to Firearm Identification in Forensic Science: How Viable Are Micro-Marked Firing Pin Impressions as Evidence?” Davis: California Policy Research Center, 2006. https://www.nssf .org/wp-content /uploads /2021/ 02/UC -Davis-Microstamping-Study.pdf (accessed July 7, 2021). James, Rodney C. “Why Micro-Stamping and Bullet Serialization Won’t Work.” https:// www.nraila.org/articles/20080801/why -microstamping-and-bullet-serializat (accessed July 7, 2021). Krivosta, George G. “NanoTag Markings from another Perspective.” AFTE Journal 38 (2006): 41–47. National Rifle Association, Institute for Legislative Action. “Micro-Stamping (Summary).” September 26, 2008. https://www .nraila.org/articles/20080926/micro-stam ping-summary (accessed July 7, 2021).

Miller Act. See Mailing of Firearms Act of 1927 Miller v. Texas (1894) Miller v. Texas arose from a racially charged confrontation between a man and the Dallas police. The case’s importance in regard to the Second Amendment involved whether the Fourteenth Amendment made Second Amendment rights enforceable against state governments. However, once McDonald v. City of Chicago definitively resolved the Fourteenth Amendment issue, Miller v. Texas remained of interest only for historical purposes.

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Franklin P. Miller was the son of a successful Virginia planter. After spending some time in Indian territory, Miller moved to Texas in 1890 and established a home and a shoemaking business in Dallas. About a year after settling in Texas, Miller hired Mattie Anderson, a twenty-four-year-old Black woman, to wash and cook for him in exchange for a monthly stipend and room and board for herself and her two-year-old daughter. Anderson was separated from her husband, Harry Anderson, a Black man who lived in the eastern section of Dallas County. Notwithstanding the suspicions of certain townspeople, both Anderson and Miller denied that Miller was the father of her daughter. They insisted that their relationship was entirely a professional one. In early 1892, Miller was arrested by Dallas police officers on charges relating to the fact that Miller and Anderson were living together. Miller was unhappy about his brush with the law, and he publicly threatened the officers in the months following his arrest. Miller owned a .38-caliber Smith & Wesson revolver and, after expecting trouble with the officers, he purchased a Colt .45 revolver as well. After learning of Miller’s public statements about resisting any future arrest, Dallas police obtained an affidavit charging Miller with carrying weapons, cursing, and swearing. Regarding the weapons charge, Miller was arrested for violating a statute entitled “An Act to Regulate the Keeping and Bearing of Deadly Weapons,” which read in part: “Any person carrying on or about his person . . . any pistol . . . for the purpose of offense or defense, unless he has reasonable grounds for fearing an unlawful attack on his person, and that such ground of attack shall be immediate and pressing . . . shall be guilty of a misdemeanor. . . . Provided, that this section shall not be so

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construed as to prohibit any person from keeping or having arms on his or her own premises or place of business.” The law allowed law enforcement officials to arrest a suspect without a warrant. The Texas state courts, when interpreting this act, relied on the precedent set by State v. Duke, in which the Texas Supreme Court ruled that the federal Second Amendment did not limit state action (42 Tex. 455 [1874]). Dallas police officers Lamar and Estelle gave their affidavit to Officer Riddle and Officer Early to serve on Miller. On the morning of June 18, 1892, a shootout took place at Miller’s shop. Miller claimed that he was sitting on his bench, mending a shoe, when he heard the click of a pistol and someone walking on the sidewalk. Miller looked up and saw two officers standing side by side within two feet of him. Without explanation, they each fired one shot, which missed Miller and struck the wall. Miller reached under his bench, grabbed his Colt .45, and returned fire. One officer ran across the street and continued shooting at Miller, and the other officer fell. Mattie Anderson stated that she was in the middle room of the building when she heard the first shot. She ran into the kitchen and asked Miller what was happening. He responded, “These d—n policemen are bothering me,” and went to his safe to retrieve more cartridges. According to Officer Early, he and Officer Riddle wanted to execute a cautious approach as they neared the building because they considered Miller a dangerous subject. Miller drew one of his pistols from under his bench and fired two shots at Early, who stumbled backward and fell on the sidewalk. Miller then opened fire on Riddle, striking him once above the left eye and once through the left arm. Early unsuccessfully returned

fire at Miller, who had concealed himself inside the building. Once Miller and Early ceased firing, Miller retreated to the center of the room, “swearing that he would kill anybody who approached him.” A large crowd had begun to form, and although some of them were armed, Miller kept them at bay with his pistol. Two men in the crowd walked across the street, picked up Riddle, and took him to a house, where he died about half an hour later. Assistant chief of police Cornwell negotiated Miller’s surrender. The police risked their lives to protect Miller from the angry mob. Miller was tried for murder the next month. On July 23, 1892, the jury returned a verdict of guilty of murder in the first degree and sentenced him to death. The jury rejected Miller’s defense of justifiable homicide and refused to find him guilty of the lesser offenses of second-degree murder and manslaughter that had been included in the indictment. Miller appealed his case to the Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas, which upheld his conviction on January 21, 1893 (Miller v. State, 20 S.W. 1103 [1893]). On July 17, 1893, Judge Tucker sentenced Miller to death and fixed August 18, 1893, as the date of execution. Miller took his case to the U.S. Supreme Court and lost in a unanimous decision. After Miller lost his Supreme Court appeal, his conviction was affirmed on May 9, 1895, and he was sentenced to death on May 16, 1895. On July 8, 1895, Governor C. A. Culberson commuted his death sentence to life imprisonment. After serving sixteen years in the penitentiary, Miller was pardoned by Governor T. M. Campbell on December 14, 1908. In the 1876 case United States v. Cruikshank, the Supreme Court had stated that the Fourteenth Amendment gave Congress the power to prevent interference with

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“privileges or immunities” granted by the Constitution. The court maintained, however, that the right to assemble and the right to arms were not rights granted or created by the Constitution, because they were fundamental human rights that predated the Constitution. In the 1886 case Presser v. Illinois, the Supreme Court upheld a state law banning armed parades in public. The purpose of the law was to suppress demonstrations by labor organizations, which wanted to show that they could resist company goons and the like. The court held that the Illinois ban on armed parades did “not infringe the right of the people to keep and bear arms.” This holding is consistent with traditional English common-law boundaries on the right to arms, which prohibited terrifyingly large assemblies of armed men (see, for example, Hawkins 1716, Book 1, chaps. 60, 63, 1716). Furthermore, the court noted that the Second Amendment by its own force “is a limitation only upon the power of Congress and the National Government, and not upon that of the States.” Could the Second Amendment— or any other part of the Bill of Rights—be protected from state and local infringement by the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment? The court had nothing to say on the subject, as due process incorporation did not yet exist as a legal theory. Miller was the first Supreme Court case after Presser to address the Second/Fourteenth Amendment issue. The court ruled unanimously against Miller and held that the record did not reflect that Miller had been denied his rights under the Second or Fourth Amendments. The court explained: In his motion for a rehearing, however, defendant claimed that the law of the State of Texas forbidding the carrying of weapons, and authorizing the arrest without

warrant of any person violating such law, under which certain questions arose upon the trial of the case, was in conflict with the Second and Fourth Amendments to the Constitution of the United States, one of which provides that the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed, and the other of which protects the people against unreasonable searches and seizures. We have examined the record in vain, however, to find where the defendant was denied the benefit of any of these provisions. This excerpt is indicative of the Supreme Court’s Bill of Rights jurisprudence at the end of the nineteenth century. In Robertson v. Baldwin, the court said that a ban on concealed weapons was one of the exceptions implicit in the Bill of Rights—similar to the implicit exception in the First Amendment to allow a ban on blasphemy, libel, or indecency. The Miller court then addressed the question of whether the Second or Fourth Amendments were even applicable to Texas law: “[A]nd even if he were [denied the benefit of the Second and Fourth Amendments], it is well settled that the restrictions of these amendments operate only upon the Federal power, and have no reference whatever to proceedings in state courts.” This part of the opinion follows the straightforward interpretation of the holding in Presser and the dicta in Cruikshank—that the Second Amendment by its own terms restricts only the federal government. The Supreme Court then turned to the claim that the Texas statute violated the Second and Fourth Amendments as incorporated in the Fourteenth Amendment. The court refused to address the claim, as it was not made in a timely fashion: “And if the Fourteenth Amendment limited the power

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of the States as to such rights, as pertaining to citizens of the United States, we think it was fatal to this claim that it was not set up in the trial court. . . . A privilege or immunity under the Constitution of the United States cannot be set up here . . . when suggested for the first time in a petition for rehearing after judgment.” In District of Columbia v. Heller, the Supreme Court wrote that Miller v. Texas “reaffirmed that the Second Amendment applies only to the Federal Government” (District of Columbia v. Heller, 128 S.Ct. 2783, 2813 n. 23 (2008)). Two years later, in McDonald v. City of Chicago, the court ruled that the Second Amendment is made applicable to the states by the Fourteenth Amendment. David B. Kopel See also: District of Columbia v. Heller; Fourteenth Amendment; Fourth Amendment; McDonald v. City of Chicago

Further Reading Hawkins, William G. A Treatise on the Pleas of the Crown. n.p.: London, 1716. Leonardatos, Cynthia, David B. Kopel, and Stephen P. Halbrook. “Miller versus Texas: Police Violence, Race Relations, Capital Punishment, and Gun-Toting in Texas in the Nineteenth Century—and Today.” Journal of Law and Policy 9 (2001): 737–66. Oyez. Miller v. Texas. 153 U.S. 535 (1894). https://www.oyez.org/cases/1900-1940 /307us174 (accessed January 28, 2022).

Million Mom March The Million Mom March was a grassroots movement of women in support of stronger gun laws that staged a massive rally in Washington, DC, on Mother’s Day, 2000.

The idea originated with New Jersey mother Donna Dees-Thomases. Outraged by a 1999 shooting at a Jewish community center in California, Dees-Thomases, who also worked part time as a publicist, contacted other like-minded women who eventually established fifty state-based organizations to coordinate a march on Washington styled after the Million Man March held in Washington in 1995. The organization identified six policy goals: uniform “cooling-off” periods and background checks for gun purchases; licensing of handgun owners and registration of all handguns; mandatory safety locks for all handguns; one-handgun-per-month purchase limits; strict enforcement of existing gun laws; and enlistment of help from corporate America. Turnout for the march, according to the organizers, exceeded expectations, as the daylong event attracted about 700,000 people. Rally speakers included women whose lives had been affected by gun violence, public officials, and celebrities. Smaller rallies were held simultaneously in at least twenty cities around the country. The rally was one of the largest demonstrations ever staged in the nation’s capital and the first large-scale rally on behalf of gun control in modern times. Much of the impetus for the event, and its resonance among women, arose from the fact that women support gun control in significantly greater numbers than men. During the 2000 elections, polls showed that the gender gap between men and women on the gun issue was greater than for any other issue. For example, a May 2000 Gallup Poll asked the question, “In general, do you feel that the laws covering the sale of firearms should be made more strict, less strict, or kept as they are now?” to which 52 percent of men responded “more strict” compared to 72 percent of women.



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Tens of thousands of participants joined together on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., for the Million Mom March, held on May 14, 2000. Marchers demanded that the U.S. Congress pass gun control measures to try to stem the gun violence that claims 30,000 lives in the U.S. each year. (Reuters/Alamy Stock Photo)

After the march, the organization reorganized itself as the Million Mom March Foundation (MMM), hoping to sustain its momentum and political impact in the way that Mothers against Drunk Driving influenced drinking-age laws in the 1980s. MMM activities won support from the U.S. Conference of Mayors, the League of Women Voters, the National Parent Teachers Association, and other gun control groups. However, in 2001 the MMM suffered a decline in membership and financial support, and it was never able to recapture its initial groundswell of support. In response, it merged with the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence (formerly Handgun Control Inc.). By 2005, about fifty

chapters operated in twenty states, engaging in lobbying, electioneering, and public education efforts. By its tenth anniversary, the MMM organization claimed chapters in all fifty states. A counterdemonstration group was formed in 2000. A group named the Second Amendment Sisters (SAS) sought to rally women in support of gun ownership at what it called the Armed Informed Mothers March. Closely paralleling the National Rifle Association’s (NRA) stand on gun issues, it argued that stronger gun laws would infringe on a woman’s ability to defend herself. The NRA also launched a parallel advertising campaign to counter the MMM’s arguments. The SAS counterdemonstration, held at the

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opposite end of the Washington Mall in 2000, attracted about 2,000 protestors. Robert J. Spitzer See also: Background Checks; Brady: United against Gun Violence; Gun Registration; Licensing; National Rifle Association (NRA); One-Gun-per-Month Laws; Waiting Periods; Women and Guns

Further Reading Brown, Kris. “The Million Mom March: Continuing Its Legacy 20 Years Later.” Medium, March 11, 2019. https://krisbrownbrady. medium.com /the-million-mom-march -continuing-its-legacy-18-years-later -2f203678fd3c (accessed January 28, 2022) Goss, Kristin A. Disarmed: The Missing Movement for Gun Control in America. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006. Homsher, Deborah. Women and Guns: Politics and the Culture of Firearms in America. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 2001. Kelly, Caitlin. Blown Away: American Women and Guns. New York: Pocket Books, 2004. Sullivan, Liam. “Brady Celebrates the 20th Anniversary of the Million Mom March, a Watershed Moment in the Gun Violence Prevention Movement.” Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, May 14, 2020. https://elections.bradyunited.org/press -releases/brady-celebrates-the-20th-anni versar y-of-the-million-mom-march-a -watershed-moment-in-the-gun-violence -prevention-movement (accessed January 28, 2022).

Miniguns Miniguns are small handguns specifically designed for concealment. Throughout the history of firearm development, very small arms have been produced for defensive use,

with their small size allowing them to be kept out of sight when not in use. German and Swedish miniguns have been found that date from the early 1400s. Small wheel-lock handguns from the late 1500s still survive and are serviceable. The relative sophistication of these weapons was a product of cooperation between early gunsmiths and clockmakers. Early small, single-shot flintlock pistols with barrels of three to four inches (7.6–10.2 cm) were commonly noted in the late 1700s. Often sold in pairs and ornately decorated, they were small enough to be carried in a lady’s muff or in a man’s pocket. Birmingham, England, was a center of production during this era. In the percussion era, beginning in the 1840s, boot guns and large-caliber derringers came into fashion, particularly on the frontiers of the American republic. Abraham Lincoln was killed by a .41-caliber ball fired from such a gun. By the 1860s, however, cap-and-ball derringers were rapidly replaced by those using metal cartridges. Some small guns were also made to be hidden up one’s sleeve, or could be concealed in a bandage; such a weapon killed President McKinley. More significant were the smaller versions of the cap-and-ball revolvers of Colt. The .31-caliber pocket revolver of 1849 was a five-shot weapon that had one variant with a barrel just three inches long. Other American arms makers followed with imitations. Some found their way to police departments, and many were carried during the Civil War. Beginning in the 1870s, small revolvers using metal cartridges dominated this market niche. Many of these guns were wellmanufactured variations of the Colt single-action Army Model 1873, whereas others were poor-quality knockoffs that became known as “suicide specials.”

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Millions of these guns were sold from the 1870s to 1900, when the market became fully saturated. Companies such as Harrington and Richardson, Iver Johnson, and Smith & Wesson entered the small-pistol market in earnest in this period with higherquality small handguns. Marketing became intense in the late 1800s, leading to higher sales. In addition, guns were available from mail-order catalogs, with no questions asked, further increasing guns’ accessibility to the general populace. In the 1920s, Colt debuted the shortbarreled Detective Special and the Banker’s Special, giving rise to a myriad of .38caliber “snubbies”—made popular in the detective novels, movies, and television of the 1950s and 1960s. Many gun enthusiasts consider the snub-nosed .38 an excellent concealable defensive option, though the weapon has been criticized by the gun press as too anemic and having an insufficient number of rounds. Other variations on this design can be found in more powerful calibers such as the .357 Magnum or .44 special. However, with more powerful cartridges, the short length of the barrel becomes a control issue—as recoil becomes severe and accuracy and comfort can both suffer. The issue of recoil becomes less problematic if one uses a semiautomatic handgun. The early 1900s Belgian-made Brownings and Colts were among the first in this category, with .25, .32, and .38 calibers all becoming popular in the first half of the twentieth century. The pre–World War II–era German arms industry produced high-quality weapons for its armed forces and Nazi party officers. The gun manufacturer Walther produced the PP and PPK, and Mauser produced similar weapons. The popularity of these guns led to imitation by the Italian gun maker

Beretta. In the United States, Colt followed with a series of smaller versions of the 1911A, in .380 caliber. But these guns were not wildly popular among American gun owners, who tended to prefer weapons with stronger calibers. Since 2000, large numbers of miniguns in a variety of shapes and calibers have entered the market. Their popularly has been fed by gun rights organizations and conservative politics. Specifically, these organizations have promoted concealed carry laws nationwide. This had led to a bonanza of new advertising and finely engineered products (popularly called “wondernines” or “pocket rockets”) to meet market demands. Writers such as Massad Ayoob promote a CCW (carry a concealed weapon) lifestyle in which responsibility and safety go hand in hand with extreme preparedness and “wardrobes” of clothing, guns, and holsters. “Pocket pistols” (many of which are of such a size as would stretch one’s pockets considerably) are now common sights in gun magazines, shops, and shows—including popular models such as Ruger’s polymer-framed LCP .380 and its .38 LCR revolver. Ruger’s SR9 was too large for any but the largest pockets, so Ruger came up with a compact version, the SR9C (also in 9 mm). Ruger’s downsizing tactic has been common in the history of handgun manufacturing—that is, reduce the size of a larger, successful model for the CCW market. Currently, almost all major handgun manufactures have responded to the upswing in the popularity of 9 mm and .38-caliber pocket pistols with new products. Prominent among these companies are Beretta, CZ, Glock, Kahr, Kel-Tec, Kimber, Seecamp, Sig Sauer, Smith & Wesson, Taurus, and Walther. Guns in both calibers have streamlined, polymer frames and highcapacity magazines (greater than ten rounds). However, as in most shooting situations, very

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few shots are fired, the classic six-round revolver would be more than enough firepower in a defensive situation. As such, many would argue that high-capacity magazines, some containing eighteen rounds, are simply not necessary and are just dead weight. Francis Frederick Hawley See also: Concealed Weapons Laws; Derringers; Handguns

Further Reading Ayoob, Massad. The Gun Digest Book of Concealed Carry. Iola, WI: Gun Digest Books, 2008. Diaz, Tom. Making a Killing: the Business of Guns in America. New York: New Press, 1999. Miller, David. The Illustrated Directory of Guns. Leeds: Colin Gower Enterprises, 2005. Sigler, Derek. Guns Illustrated 2009. Iola, WI: Krause, 2009. Walter, John. Secret Firearms: An Illustrated History of Miniature and Concealed Handguns. London: Arms and Armour Press, 2008.

Minimum Ages to Purchase and Possess Firearms The U.S. Constitution dictates age requirements for two things: holding political office and voting. It does not mention how old a person must be to buy or possess a firearm. Before 1968, states largely controlled the age at which one could buy a gun (Little 2019). The Gun Control Act (GCA) of 1968 was developed as a response to the assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The GCA is the primary federal foundation for the regulation of firearms. Its stated goals are to “keep firearms out of the hands

of those not legally entitled to possess them because of age, criminal background or incompetency, and to assist law enforcement authorities in the states and their subdivisions in combating the increasing prevalence of crime in the United States.” To achieve these goals, the GCA created the first comprehensive federal framework to investigate and prosecute firearms crimes. In particular, the GCA required individuals engaged in the business of dealing in firearms to obtain a federal license, prohibited transfers of firearms to certain persons, restricted the interstate transportation of firearms, and regulated the importation of certain firearms not suitable for sporting purposes. In 1994, the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act addressed gun purchasing age limits. This law said that a person had to be 18 to possess or buy a handgun, while still leaving in effect the 1968 law’s stipulation that licensed dealers could only sell handguns to persons twenty-one years old and older (Little 2019). This meant that an individual could effectively buy a handgun from a private person when they were eighteen, but they had to be twenty-one to purchase from a licensed dealer. Age requirements for purchasing and possessing firearms seem innumerable and confusing as states can have policies that vary from one another and differ from federal mandates. As it stands, federal regulations require individuals to be the minimum age of eighteen to possess a handgun or handgun ammunition; it is illegal to sell, transfer, or deliver a handgun or ammunition to a person under the age of eighteen. The only exceptions include employment where a gun may be required, such as ranching, hunting, and farming but the juvenile must have written permission from his or her parents to be in possession of a



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firearm in restricted areas. If a juvenile is a member of the armed forces, he or she is permitted to use a firearm. Additional exceptions include inheriting a firearm or using one against an intruder in the home or in a home where the juvenile is a welcome guest (usconcealedandcarry.com). Federal law requires a person to be twenty-one to buy a handgun from a federally licensed firearms dealer. This applies to all states even if the state supports a younger age. Federal law requires a minimum age of eighteen to purchase a rifle or shotgun from a federally licensed dealer. State law may require a younger age but will deny the sale to a person under eighteen. Additionally, if a state requires a minimum age higher than twenty-one, the purchaser must honor the higher age requirement (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives 2015). The inconsistency makes amending gun control difficult. As of January 1, 2020, seventeen states (California, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Maryland, Massachusetts, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington, Wyoming, and the District of Columbia) have minimum age requirements that are higher than the federal minimum for the purchase of a handgun from unlicensed persons, and eight states (Illinois, Iowa, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Washington and the District of Columbia) have minimum age requirements that exceed the federal minimum for handgun possession. In these states, the age to purchase handguns through private sales is raised from eighteen to twenty-one and the minimum age for private sales of long guns is eighteen (RAND 2020). Five states (California, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, and Vermont) restrict sales for all firearms to those twenty-one or older. Some

states, such as Maine, require a minimum age of eighteen for handguns and sixteen for long gun sales. The minimum age for possession of a long gun in Alaska, Minnesota, and New York is sixteen, and it is fourteen in Montana. These sales are from nondealers since minimum age requirements for all other sales are governed by the federal government (RAND Corporation 2020). According to the RAND Corporation’s research on gun policy in America, laws requiring a minimum age for purchasing firearms are attempting to make it more difficult for underage individuals to acquire a handgun. Laws requiring a minimum age for possessing handguns are intended to make it more difficult for individuals to carry firearms. Both laws are designed to limit the availability of guns to young people in the hopes of reducing gun violence. These laws are purposeful since most gun homicides and violent crimes involve youth under the age of twenty-one. In theory, stricter age limits on purchasing or possessing a firearm may reduce gun violence, including defensive gun use by youth. However, it may increase the likelihood of violence against youth if offenders believe fewer youth are armed with guns (RAND 2020). The effect of minimum age requirements on obtaining firearms largely depends on how the firearms are acquired. While retailers may be able to prevent sales to underage youth seeking guns, firearms can be obtained in other ways, including from family, friends, or even the black market. The National Fatality Review Case Reporting System found that 88 percent of firearms used in suicides by children aged ten to eighteen were owned by someone other than the child (Schnitzer et al. 2019). The effects of laws requiring a minimum age of possession may well depend on the costs youth may perceive when possessing a

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firearm or attempting to acquire one. However, research by Kann and colleagues (2018) found that in 2017, 4.8 percent of high school male students admitted to carrying a gun on at least one day for purposes other than hunting or recreation. There are laws that may prevent individuals from purchasing or possessing firearms. Extreme risk laws, sometimes referred to as “red flag” laws, allow loved ones or law enforcement to intervene by petitioning a court for an order to temporarily prevent someone in crisis from accessing guns, regardless of age. Waiting period laws provide some buffer between when a person can buy a gun and possess it. Finally, permitto-purchase laws, in addition to background checks, ensure that a person attempting to buy a gun is not legally prohibited from having a gun (Everytown Research and Policy 2020). Following most mass shootings and mass murders is a cry for stricter gun control. There are debates for better background checks, banning certain types of weapons, and changing the minimum age requirement to purchase firearms. Shortly after the Parkland, Florida, mass shooting in 2018 that left seventeen people dead, the governor raised the minimum age requirement to purchase firearms and ammunition to twenty-one (Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence 2021). The gunman was nineteen years old and legally owned multiple firearms, including an AR-15 used to commit the mass murder. Raising the legal age to twenty-one may or may not prevent future tragedies but several corporations that sold guns raised their minimum age requirement. Walmart followed suit by also removing products from its website that resemble assault-style rifles, including nonlethal airsoft guns and toys. Dick’s Sporting Goods made the same policy changes, and

both department stores are being sued by the state of Oregon for the new age restrictions (Troise 2018). It is difficult to determine whether these corporations believed a higher age would prevent future violence or that the change was a great marketing strategy. The Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence (2021) indicated that more than half of states passed at least one gun safety measure in 2018 after the Florida shooting. Five states—Alabama, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Utah—have seen “red flag” bills introduced since the shooting to make it easier for police to confiscate weapons from someone found to pose a threat of violent behavior (Allen 2018). Only three amendments included changes to age requirements. While background checks make sense as do waiting periods, there are thirty states where individuals may buy guns from a private seller without any background checks or verification of age. A more complex problem exists between federal and state gun laws. Licensed arm dealers cannot sell a handgun to anyone under 18, but they can sell AR15s to anyone eighteen or older. Gun rights groups do not generally like age restrictions. The National Rifle Association (NRA) is one such group very much against gun restrictions. The NRA filed a lawsuit against the state of Florida for raising the minimum age for buying or possessing a firearm. The suit alleged that the new law violated the Second and Fourteenth Amendments of the Constitution. There are additional issues with just focusing on age restrictions, especially with regards to mass shootings. The Sandy Hook Elementary School shooter was twenty years old at the time of the shooting, but he used his mother’s guns, which she purchased legally (Polumbo 2018). The Columbine



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gunmen were only seventeen years old when they acquired their guns—three were purchased by an eighteen-year-old friend at a gun show who specifically bought from dealers who did not conduct background checks, and the fourth was bought from a friend and coworker. The Parkland perpetrator was eighteen when he legally purchased the gun used in the shooting. The point is that age will not stop anyone intent on committing murder. There have been attempts by courts to declare age restrictions unconstitutional. On July 13, 2021, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit declared that preventing the sale of handguns to young adults under the age of 21 is unconstitutional. This was a divided decision and the appeal focused on firearms dealers. The panel argued that the current minimum age requirement for purchases from federally licensed gun dealers restricts the rights of law-abiding citizens (Marimow 2021). Another component of the decision was a reluctance to relegate both the Second Amendment and eighteen- to twenty-yearolds to second-class status. The decision is expected be appealed to the full court. The dissenting judge, Judge James A. Wynn Jr., argued that the decision was not consistent with the proper role of the federal judiciary. He believed these rulings should be decided by lawmakers who are directly involved with promoting public safety. Lankford and Hoover (2019) point out in their research that age has little effect on obtaining firearms, given that most young offenders acquire their firearms illegally. Determining specific age requirements to obtain and possess firearms seems arbitrary and contradictory as there is no consistent minimum age requirement for purchasing and possessing firearms at either the state or federal levels. As it relates to gun violence,

age is not a significant factor regarding predicting or preventing gun violence. This is not to say that there should not be an age requirement, but the minimum age requirement should be nationally consistent and adhere to legal avenues in which to purchase and possess firearms, such as background checks, waiting periods, assault weapons bans, and red flag laws. Kim A. MacInnis See also: Assault Weapons; Extreme Risk Protection Orders; Gun Control Act of 1968; Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting; National Rifle Association (NRA); Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting; School Shootings; Youth and Guns

Further Reading Allen, Jonathan. “Florida Governor Signs Gun-Safety Bill into Law after School Shooting.” Reuters, March 9, 2018. https:// www.reuters.com /article /us-usa-guns -florida-law-idUSKCN1GL2RA (accessed May 18, 2022). Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives. “Gun Control Act | Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.” January 23, 2020. https://www.atf .gov/rules-and-regulations/gun-control-act (accessed May 18, 2022). Everytown for Gun Safety. “The Rise of Firearm Suicide Among Young Americans.” September 10, 2020. https://everytownre search.org/report/the-rise-of-firearm-sui cide-among-young-americans/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Minimum Age to Purchase & Possess in Florida.” April 28, 2021. https:// giffords.org/lawcenter/state-laws/minimum -age-to-pu rchase-possess-in-f lor ida / (accessed May 18, 2022). King, Taylor. “Address Gun Violence by Going After the Root Causes.” Brennan Center for Justice, April 14, 2021. https://

612 | Modular Weapons System www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis -opinion /address-gun-violence-going -after-root-causes (accessed May 18, 2022). Lankford, Adam, and Kaitlyn B. Hoover. “Do the Ages of Mass Shooters Matter? Analyzing the Differences between Younger and Older Offenders.” Violence and Gender 6, no. 1 (2019): 11–15. https://doi.org/10.1089 /vio.2018.0021 (accessed May 18, 2022). Little, Becky. “1960s Unrest Was the Impetus for the First Gun Age Limits.” HISTORY, March 18, 2019. https://www.history.com /news/gun-age-limits-history (accessed May 18, 2022). Kann, Laura, Tim McManus, William A. Harris, Shari L. Shanklin, Katherine H. Flint, Barbara Queen, Richard Lowry, Davis Chyen, Lisa Whittle, Jemekia Thornton, Connie Lim, Denise Bradford, Yoshimi Yamakawa, Michelle Leon, Nancy Brener, and Kathleen A. Ethier. “Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance— United States.” MMWR Surveillance Summaries 67, no. 8 (2018): 1–114. https://read .qxmd.com /read /29902162/youth-risk -behavior-surveillance-united-states-2017 (accessed May 18, 2022). Marimow, Ann E. “Gun Laws Barring Sales to People under 21 Are Unconstitutional, Appeals Court Rules.” Washington Post, July 13, 2021. https://www.washington post.com/politics/courts_law/gun-laws -age-requirement/2021/07/13/574446b8 -e3f3-11eb-8aa5-5662858b696e_story.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Polumbo, Brad. “Gun-Purchase Age Limits: Raising Them Won’t Reduce Mass Shootings | National Review.” National Review, March 12, 2018. https://www.nationalre view.com /2018/03/stricter-age-restric tions-on-gun-purchases-dont-make-sense/ (accessed May 18, 2022). RAND Corporation. “The Effects of Minimum Age Requirements.” April 22, 2020. https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy /analysis/minimum-age.html (accessed May 18, 2022).

Schnitzer, Patricia G., Heather K. Dykstra, Theodore E. Trigylidas, and Richard Lichenstein. “Firearm Suicide among Youth in the United States, 2004–2015.” Journal of Behavioral Medicine 42, no. 4 (2019): 584–90. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/313 67924/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Troise, Damian J. “Retailers Dick’s and Walmart Take Harder Line against Guns.” AP News, February 28, 2018. https://apnews .com/article/us-news-ap-top-news-ar-state -wire-sports-north-america-2663d23b8d5 442fbb1d92f6845d0f65d (accessed May 18, 2022). United States Concealed Carry Association. “Federal Minimum Age to Purchase and Possess Handguns.” https://www.usconcealed carry.com/resources/federal-ccw-law/fed eral-minimum-age-to-purchase-and-pos sess-handguns/ (accessed October 9, 2021).

Mining Towns and Gun Violence. See Frontier Violence Modular Weapons System A modular weapons system (MWS) is a weapon that has components that can be reconfigured to give it different capabilities. In its most basic form, it resembles a rifle or a long gun. However, it can also be arranged to form a carbine, a top-fed light machine gun, a vehicle-mounted weapon, or a beltfed squad automatic weapon. This is made possible by one common receiver—the part of a firearm that houses the internal components such as the hammer, firing pin, and trigger mechanism—that can be paired with interchangeable components via threaded interfaces. Like other machine-gun-type weapons, these can fire between 50 and 1,000 rounds per minute in their various configurations. These modularizations are



beneficial primarily to military organizations since they can be quickly tailored to be meet immediate tactical needs, used to repair weapons swiftly, and reduce overall logistical burdens and costs. However, it makes tracking the general public’s weapons more complicated as they can be easily converted into other types of firearms. Possibly the best-known version of these modular weapons systems is the Stoner 63, also known as the Mk 23 Mod 0 machine gun, as well as variants, including (but not limited to) the M63, XM22, XM23, and XM207. The Stoner 63 was designed by Eugene Stoner in 1963 and was manufactured by Cadillac Gage, which is now Textron Marine and Land Systems. Textron Systems is an American military contractor that is owned by Textron and was formed in the merger between Cadillac Gage and Textron Marine in 1994. About 4,000 of the Stoner 63 were produced between 1963 and 1971, although it was in service from 1963 to 1983 and was used by U.S. Navy SEALs and the U.S. Marine Corps in the Vietnam War (1954–1975) and the 1983 U.S. invasion of Grenada (although a few were also sold to law enforcement agencies). While there were several prototype versions produced prior to the Stoner 63 (the Stoner M69W and the Stoner 62), it was formed with a newer 5.56 × 45mm small caliber high-velocity cartridge in mind—the same type of cartridge that influenced the creation of the AR-15. There was also an improved version of the Stoner 63, the Stoner 63A, which began production in 1966 after feedback from the Army. The Stoner 63 was able to be assembled in up to fifteen ways and had accessories such as a winter trigger guard, 40-mm grenade launcher, slings, and bayonets. By the 1980s, the Stoner 63 was phased out in favor of the M249 Squad Automatic

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Weapon, more recently designated as the M249 light machine gun (LMG) and colloquially referred to as a “squad assault weapon.” The M249 LMG is the American adaptation of the Belgian FN Minimi and is manufactured by FN Manufacturing LLC in Columbia, South Carolina. Originally designed in 1976, this weapon was introduced in 1984 as a solution to the lack of automatic firepower in smaller units. Combining the high rate of fire of a machine gun with the accuracy and portability of a rifle (seventeen pounds empty, twenty-two pounds loaded), the M249 has been used from the U.S. invasion of Panama (1989– 1990), and the Gulf War (1990–1991), up through the Afghanistan (2001–2021) and Iraq Wars (2003–2011). Like the Stoner 63, the M249 uses the 5.56 × 45 mm NATO cartridge. The M249 has a sustained rate of fire is 50 rounds per minute (RPM), its rapid rate of fire is 100 RPM, and its cyclic rate of fire is 650–850 RPM—less than the Stoner 63’s 700–1,000 RPM, although its effective firing range is 2,300–11,800 feet in comparison to the approximately 650– 3,000-foot effective firing range of the Stoner 63. The M249 is a gas-operated light machine gun, fed by belts of cartridges that are usually held in a hard plastic or soft canvas box attached to the underside of the weapon. These belts usually hold 200 rounds. Cartridges are stripped from the belt, put into the chamber of the weapon, and then discharged, firing a bullet. Gases are diverted from the barrel into the chamber, and the pressure from that diversion moves a piston that extracts and ejects the spent casings, continues to move the belt, and compresses the recoil spring to prepare for the next round(s). In 2010, the U.S. Marine Corps began testing and later fielding the M27 Infantry

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An M249 machine gun, built with different interchangeable components, sits attached to a tripod. Modular weapons systems like these allow for the caliber, barrel length, and weapons well of the gun to be changed relatively quickly and easily. (Travis Zwickle/Dreamstime.com)

Automatic Rifle to partially replace the M249, of which it has about 10,000 in use. Ultimately, they decided not to introduce the M27 to all infantry squads because of the cost—each gun costs up to $3,000. Similarly, the U.S. Army does not plan to introduce the M27 to its troops because of its inferior firepower, instead choosing to adopt another weapon to replace the M4 and M249. In early 2017, the army began soliciting bids for a weapon to replace the M4 and M249, and in July 2018, they awarded contracts to six companies for prototypes. After evaluation of these prototypes beginning in June 2019, the Army awarded transaction authority agreements to Sig Sauer, General Dynamics Ordinance, and Tactical Systems and Textron Systems. These three companies are scheduled to provide a second round of prototypes for soldier evaluation by the end of 2020 (Suciu 2020). In the

interim, other modular firearm systems are making their way into the sport shooter market. Rifles with quick-change barrels like the Blaser R8, Roessler Titan, and Sig Sauer 200 STR allow for the replacement of a worn barrel or a caliber change with an Allen wrench. Jessica Trapassi Migliaccio See also: Automatic Weapons Laws; Long Gun

Further Reading Johnston, Gary Paul, and Thomas B. Nelson. The World’s Assault Rifles. (Chapter 67: “United States, The Stoner Weapons System”). Nanjemoy, MD: Ironside International Publishers, Inc., December 16, 2016. Military Factory. 2018. “Stoner 63 (Universal Combat Weapon) Modular Weapons System.” Military Factory, February 26, 2018. h t t p s : / / w w w. m i l i t a r y f a c t o r y.c o m /

smallarms/detail.asp?smallarms_id=168 (accessed October 14, 2019). Suciu, Peter. 2020. “U.S. Army’s New Infantry Weapon Down to Three Competitors.” Clearance Jobs, January 30, 2020. https:// news.clearancejobs.com/2020/01/30/u-s -armys-new-infantry-weapon-down-to -three-competitors/ (accessed February 19, 2020). Woody, Christopher. 2017. “The Army Wants to Ditch the M249 SAW and Give the Infantry More Firepower.” Business Insider, June 12, 2017. https://www.busi nessinsider.com/army-looking-for-replace ment-for-m249-squad-automatic-weapon -2017-6 (accessed October 14, 2019).

Moms Demand Action Moms Demand Action (MDA) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan group organized for preventing gun violence in the United States. As their leaders proclaim, their aim is to promote gun safety and commonsense gun laws, not to abolish or undermine the Second Amendment. They also note that one does not need to be a mom or even a female in order to join their movement. Members include dads, students, families, and gun violence survivors. However, MDA does recognize the leverage that women have in affecting widespread change as the majority voting bloc in the U.S. population. Women also have enormous purchasing power as both moms and working professionals. The grass roots organization formed from the outrage expressed at congressional inaction following the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in December 2012. This inaction compelled stay-at-home mom and Indiana resident Shannon Watts to take action. Drawing inspiration from another mom-based movement, Mothers against Drunk Driving, Watts took to Facebook and

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urged others to take a stand (Chozick 2019). The Facebook page called for a march in the nation’s capital, and the group’s first official chapter began days later in Brooklyn with five other women (Follman 2014). Under Shannon Watts’s leadership, MDA joined forces with Mayors against Illegal Guns in 2014, effectively creating the group known as Everytown for Gun Safety. MDA operates autonomously but is also the vanguard of activism for the parent organization, Everytown for Gun Safety. Everytown’s social, political, and financial connections enabled MDA to expand into a six millionmember movement with roughly 300,000 active volunteers and volunteer-led MDA chapters in all fifty states (Moms Demand Action 2019). In addition to the main state chapters, there are hundreds more local chapters at the city and county level. Though MDA is grassroots and volunteer led, it is highly organized in its structure and messaging. Each state and local chapter designates volunteer leaders and selects volunteers who assume responsibility for a variety of activities and community outreach. Those in leadership serve for a limited term. MDA also operates Gun Sense University, an annual national gathering and training conference for MDA members. This forum is available for supporters who wish to become more involved in MDA, run for political office in their jurisdictions, or be better educated about how to make a difference in their communities. The overarching strategy of MDA is to initiate changes in public opinion, policy, and corporate behavior. The means for realizing this change are varied, but the personal stories of gun violence victims are intentionally kept at the forefront. The problem of gun violence is often communicated through faceless numeric reports of the large numbers of victims annually. MDA

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Georgia state senator Elena Parent speaks at a Moms Demand Action anti-gun, anti-NRA rally in Atlanta, Georgia, on April 29, 2017. Moms Demand Action is one of the largest grassroots gun control advocacy groups in the United States. (Russ Ensley/Dreamstime.com)

seeks to keep the problem of gun violence real and on a personal scale. It is believed that lived experiences are what best motivate others to take an active role. The types of advocacy MDA engages in are both typical and creative in their form. Their methods of advocacy include using social media; organizing rallies, vigils, petition drives, marches, and other awareness events; maintaining a presence at state capital hearings; targeting corporate America; meeting with local, state and national representatives; and speaking to the local and national press. MDA’s “sea-of-red” presence especially distinguishes the group’s activism. The signature color of MDA is red, and supporters can be found wearing their highly visible T-shirts at every gathering, large or small.

Some of the more creative forms of MDA activism come from the imaginations of their individual members. One example of this is sending boxes of letters inserted in children’s books to representatives. Another measure intended to grab the attention of politicians included sending bags of Valentine candy to legislators after the February 14, 2018, mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida. MDA activism achieved considerable success in a relatively short period. Some of the most notable successes include their impact on the policies of large corporations, including restaurant, drugstore, grocery store, internet, and other retailer chains. Through traditional protests and pervasive social media postings, they have helped enact stricter oversight in policies concerning the



sale, promotion, and open carrying of guns. For example, using public relations tactics, such as negative press, MDA succeeded in getting Starbucks, Publix, Aldi, Target, Panera, Albertsons, Walgreens, CVS, Kroger, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Walmart, Sonic, and Chili’s to ban firearms on their premises and/or to stop selling guns or ammunition (Chozik 2019; Follman 2014). As a case in point, MDA’s push to prevent firearms on Starbucks’s premises involved fifty-four Facebook posts that reached more than five million people and generated a 40,000-signature petition (Follman 2014). The state-by-state presence of MDA has also helped to derail 90 percent of National Rifle Association (NRA)–sponsored bills (Dovere 2018). They have been equally successful in passing hundreds of their own bills. They have helped pass background check laws and laws preventing domestic abusers from using guns, and they have defeated efforts to allow guns on college campuses and in primary and secondary schools. Additionally, they have been instrumental in pressuring states to pass “red flag” laws targeting potentially dangerous gun owners. These laws function much like a civil restraining order. An individual who poses a threat to others can have their weapon temporarily removed by law enforcement and returned only after a judicial hearing deems it safe to return the weapon to its owner. MDA is also an information resource. Their website provides numerous statistics, graphs, and charts detailing the prevalence, types, and impact of gun violence in the United States. Their website also includes two interactive maps. One is a continuously updated map that identifies all the locations where any gunfire on school grounds has occurred. This includes primary and secondary schools and college campuses.

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Another accessible map is the Gun Law Navigator tool established by Everytown Research. This database furnishes information on gun laws in every state and tracks gun law trends across the United States. MDA’s Be SMART campaign focuses on information dissemination as well. This education campaign emphasizes responsible gun storage in the home. The acronym SMART stands for the following words of caution: Secure all guns in your home and vehicles; Model responsible behavior around guns; Ask about the presence of unsecured guns in other homes; Recognize the role of guns in suicide; and Tell your peers to be SMART (Moms Demand Action 2019). Since its formal inception in 2013, MDA has ushered in cultural change as much as legal change. In implementing this change, MDA has been hailed as an “army of angry moms” (Dovere 2018) and the “NRA’s worst nightmare” (Follman 2014). These descriptions reflect their dogged persistence in resisting what they see as the dangerous proliferation of guns in everyday society. Contrary to what pro–gun rights advocates claim, MDA believes the normalization of gun possession in routine settings such as churches, stores, restaurants, and schools not only increases gun violence but actually makes people feel less safe. Karol Lucken See also: Everytown for Gun Safety; Extreme Risk Protection Orders; Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting

Further Reading Chozik, Amy. “Shannon Watts’s Work Diary: The Demanding Job of Running ‘Moms Demand Action.’” New York Times, June 6, 2019. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/06 /business/shannon-watts-moms-demand

618 | More Guns, Less Crime Thesis -action-g u n-cont rol-work-diar y.ht ml (accessed May 18, 2022). Dovere, Edward-Isaac. “How to Raise an ‘Army of Angry Moms and Women’ From Your Own Kitchen.” Politico, August 7, 2018. https://www.politico.com/magazine /story/2018/08/07/moms-demand-action -gun-control-219160 (accessed May 18, 2022). Follman, Mark. “These Women Are the NRA’s Worst Nightmare.” Mother Jones, September/October 2014. https://www .motherjones.com/politics/2014/09/moms -demand-action-guns-madd-shannon-watts -nra/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Moms Demand Action. 2019. https://momsdemandaction.org (accessed May 18, 2022).

More Guns, Less Crime Thesis A majority of U.S. states have now implemented laws that allow the public possession of a concealed handgun for all people without a diagnosed mental disability or felony conviction. The explosion of these “right-to-carry” (RTC) laws has ignited a spirited debate among researchers about the social and economic effects of these laws. As of January 2022, every state and the District of Columbia authorizes people to, in some form, carry a concealed weapon; twenty-nine of these states and Washington, DC, require a state-issued permit (under either “may-issue” or “shall-issue” laws), whereas the other twenty-one do not (Giffords Law Center n.d.). Supporters of RTC legislation suggest that by relaxing restrictions on gun carrying by ordinary citizens, criminals are forced to consider whether their next potential victim (or a bystander) has a gun that can be used to foil a crime. Thus, the threat of citizen response increases the expected cost to criminals of engaging in certain illegal acts, and hence deters crime—leading to the fittingly

named “More Guns, Less Crime” (MGLC) premise. Conversely, opponents of virtually unrestricted gun-carrying privileges claim that increased gun possession brought about by RTC laws has pernicious externalities (effects on others over which they have no choice). For example, even if RTC laws deter some delinquents, they may also induce some criminals to carry guns themselves for protection during planned crimes, as well as to be more violent with potential victims (O’Flaherty and Sethi 2009). Furthermore, increased circulation of handguns brought on by RTC laws naturally increases criminal access to handguns, which may lead to more spontaneous shootings, accidental killings, and gun suicides, as well as increased gun thefts that further arm criminals and facilitate opportunistic criminal acts. Both effects likely operate to at least some degree, meaning researchers may best answer the question of how RTC laws impact crime rates by empirically identifying whether either effect dominates the other. If it turns out that the net effect is a wash, researchers will be interested to know whether gun purchasers protect themselves against crime while pushing it on to others, or whether gun purchasers deter some crime for the populace at large but impose greater burdens on themselves. The case for the MGLC hypothesis was first made in a highly publicized and controversial article by John Lott and David Mustard in the Journal of Legal Studies. In “Crime, Deterrence, and Right-to-Carry Concealed Handguns,” Lott and Mustard (1997) claimed to find significant net economic and social benefits of right-to-carry laws through crime reduction. They analyzed crime data at the county level to determine if states with right-to-carry laws had

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lower rates of violent and property crimes than those without. (Note: violent crime categories include murder, rape, aggravated assault, and robbery; while property crimes include auto theft, burglary, and larceny.) Using econometric methods for panel data, they concluded that RTC laws (which are implemented at the state level) were the primary driving force behind falling rates of violent crime between the late 1970s and the early 1990s. Their results were based on an analysis using a statistical model of the following form: Yit = hRTCjt+ gXijt + ai + qt + Îit  (1) This model isolates the effect of RTC laws on crime rates after separating the effects of other factors on crime. The dependent variable Yit denotes the violent and property crime rates for county i and year t (natural logarithm of the crime rate is used, thus allowing researchers to interpret the coefficient estimate as a percentage change in the dependent variable). The explanatory variable of interest—the presence of an RTC law within a particular statej in year t—is a dummy or trend variable represented by RTCjt. Using this method, a calculation of h will yield the average effect of all right-tocarry laws nationwide. As in any econometric analysis, one must also control for factors other than RTC laws that may influence crime rates. To this end, the term Xijt represents a matrix of control variables believed by Lott and Mustard to also influence criminal behavior. These factors include average income and racial and age composition, as well as another measure of criminal deterrence: a county’s arrest rate. (Other researchers believe additional control variables should be used; for example, Aneja, Donohue, and Zhang [2010] argue for other measures of deterrence, such as

incarceration levels or police presence). Finally, the variables ai and qt indicate county and year-fixed effects, respectively. “Fixed effects” account for unobserved heterogeneity across space and time. In this analysis, county-fixed effects indicate unmeasured (and time-invariant) county characteristics that may influence crime, while year-fixed effects capture secular trends in crime that cannot be accounted for by using observable policy and demographic variables. In essence, Lott and Mustard used this “difference-in difference” model to ascertain the average net impact of RTC laws on crime rates in the 10 RTC-adopting states over the time period 1977–1992. The change in crime in these ten adopting states is compared with the change in crime in the nonadopting states. The implicit assumption is that the control factors will explain other crime trends across states, and the remaining differences can be attributed to the presence or absence of the RTC laws. Lott and Mustard were unequivocal in their conclusions on the ability of gun-toting citizens to deter violent crimes, arguing that handguns are a cost-effective method of reducing crime. They further declared that had remaining non-RTC states enacted such legislation, over 1,400 murders and 4,100 rapes would have been avoided. A short time after the publication of this first “More Guns, Less Crime” study, Lott (1998) then made the case to the American public in a general-interest book, More Guns, Less Crime. The Lott-Mustard analysis and the subsequently published book by Lott had immediate political effects. For example, their research was cited by eighteen state attorneys general in their 2002 letter to then attorney general John Ashcroft in support of a decision to interpret the Second

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Amendment as protecting an individual right to possess a firearm (Pryor 2002). Lott himself used his research as evidence while advocating for the passage of state-level concealed carry handgun legislation, providing testimony about the social benefits of RTC laws in front of state legislatures in Nebraska, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin (Ayres and Donohue 2003). The MGLC hypothesis also generated some initial support within the academic community. Indeed, several economists and applied statisticians have claimed to bolster Lott’s contention that right-to-carry laws— and by extension, increased gun carrying— reduce crime by raising the potential cost to criminals of committing a violent crime. For example, Plassmann and Tideman (2001) analyze the effects of RTC legislation using data on the total number of crimes (rather than crime rates). They conclude that RTC laws have strongly beneficial effects; in fact, in many cases, they find even stronger crime-reducing effects than those concluded by Lott and Mustard. The authors suggest that RTC laws are responsible for an 11.2 percent drop in murders nationwide between 1977 and 1992. Plassmann and Whitley (2003) extended the Lott-Mustard study to include data through 2000; adopting the Lott-Mustard approach, they conclude that RTC laws lead to annual reductions in murder rates between 1.5 percent and 2.3 percent per year. Moreover, they find the economic benefit from reduced crimes ranges between about $2 billion and $3 billion per year (for the first five years that such a law is in effect). The MGLC thesis has also been met with considerable skeptical academic commentary. Almost immediately upon the release of the Journal of Legal Studies article, several analyses were published criticizing its methods and results. In most cases, researchers

again used the same basic difference-anddifference approach of Lott and Mustard, but reached very different conclusions. For example, Zimring and Hawkins (1997) claimed that the comparison of crime between RTC and non-RTC states is misleading because of factors such as poverty, drugs, and gang activity, which vary significantly across gun-friendly and non-gunfriendly states. Using the same data as Lott and Mustard, Black and Nagin (1997) find that the Lott-Mustard results are highly sensitive to minor changes in their sample. For example, if Florida is excluded from the analyzed sample, the aggregate impact of RTC laws on rates of murder and rape (cited explicitly by Lott and Mustard) virtually disappears. The list of studies rejecting the More Guns, Less Crime thesis has continued to grow over the last decade. In one of the most prominent analyses attacking the MGLC proposition, Ayres and Donohue (2003b) used the panel data approach of Lott and Mustard to illustrate the grave infirmities of the statistical evidence offered in support of the MGLC hypothesis. For instance, they showed that the effects of early RTC-adopting states are vastly different from late adopters. When restricting the period of analysis to 1991–1999 (only analyzing the states that adopted RTC laws during the 1990s), the results actually showed uniformly positive and significant estimates suggesting that RTC laws increase crime in a number of states. They also bolstered past critiques of the LottMustard study by suggesting that the results are likely driven by factors that are not considered in the model. Ayres and Donohue pointed out that crime was rising across the board from 1985 to 1992, the years at the end of Lott and Mustard’s period of analysis, and most dramatically in non-RTC



states. Crime declined rapidly after 1992, however, and again more markedly in nonRTC states than in RTC states. This observed trend undermines the MGLC thesis by illustrating that estimates of the impact of RTC laws are sensitive to the time period under analysis. Ayres and Donohue (2003a) followed up their frequently cited and exhaustive study with another article pointing how statistical coding errors were driving the results of the Plassmann and Whitley study. After correcting these computational mistakes, Ayres and Donohue claimed that any evidence of RTC laws reducing crime disappeared. Further evidence undermining the MGLC thesis comes from econometric studies that directly measure how the number of guns in a county (or state) correlates with criminal activity in a given area. Mark Duggan (2001) examined this question in a prominent study using an “instrumental variables” approach. Instrumental variables are used to estimate causal relationships when the explanatory factor of interest is thought to be correlated with the regression error term. This type of correlation can occur when the dependent variable is causally related to at least one of the covariates—for example, if increasing crime causes people to purchase firearms for protection. This dilemma is referred to in applied statistics as endogeneity. One way that econometricians can sidestep the problem is by employing an instrument—that is, a variable that does not influence the dependent variable (crime) except through its relationship with the endogenous factor. Duggan uses gun magazine subscriptions as an instrument that correlates strongly with handgun ownership, but has no direct influence on crime rates. Having circumvented the plausibly endogenous relationship between gun possession and crime, Duggan concludes that a

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10 percent increase in gun prevalence increases a county or state’s homicide rate by around 2 percent the following year. In a more recent paper, Cook and Ludwig (2006) also found that high levels of gun ownership increase crime. They rely on a different proxy for handgun levels: the percentage of suicides committed using a firearm. This proxy has been demonstrated in a number of analyses to provide an accurate measure of gun ownership (Azrael, Cook, and Miller 2004). A study by Kovandzic and Marvell (2003) centers on the effects of Florida’s right-to-carry law. They examine the effects on violent crime due to increases in the number of people with concealed carry handgun permits after the passage of the law, and find virtually no evidence that the law reduces violent crime. In 2005, the National Research Council (NRC)—under sponsorship from the National Academy of Sciences—appointed a blue-ribbon panel of economists, statisticians, and sociologists to critically review the myriad issues related to gun violence in the United States, including the value of right-to-carry laws as a crime control measure. The committee of sixteen prominent academic experts included sociologist Charles Wellford (the committee chair), criminologist/political scientist James Q. Wilson, and empirical economists Joel Horowitz, Joel Waldfogel, and Steven Levitt. They critically reviewed all of the past literature on RTC laws, and also conducted their own evaluation of the effects of RTC laws using county-level crime data (note that the NRC’s analysis was completed for the time period 1977–2000 using data compiled by John Lott). The NRC employed the same regression techniques used by Lott and Mustard (1997) as well as Lott (1998), Ayres and Donohue (2003b), and the

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myriad other researchers who have written on this topic. While there was hope that the NRC would decisively conclude whether RTC laws decrease or increase crime, the NRC’s final assessment concluded that there was no evidence for the Lott-Mustard hypothesis, and, further, that it was simply not possible to ascertain the impact of these laws on crime because the results were highly sensitive to changes in model specification. Moody and Marvell (2008) have since updated the original Lott-Mustard model by adding a few arguably important criminogenic factors that were initially excluded: levels of incarceration and police force, as well as the prevalence of crack usage. They claim to demonstrate that RTC laws have reduced crime, resulting in cost savings of $28 billion for all laws passed nationwide between 1977 and 2000. In a response to these findings, Ayres and Donohue (2009b) describe the problems with these results that are generally applicable to the Lott-Mustard approach. First, they demonstrate that it is risky to extrapolate linear crime trends for many years beyond the year of RTC passage. Second, they note the potential problems with using county data to analyze RTC laws (Maltz and Targonski [2002] argue that too much crime data at the county level is missing to allow for the proper testing of the MGLC thesis). In a follow-up study, Ayres and Donohue (2009a) analyze the MGLC thesis using state-level crime data, which has been demonstrated to be significantly more reliable than county-level crime data. They again demonstrate that the MoodyMarvell model provides no consistent evidence that RTC laws reduce crime. Rather, state-level data suggests that RTC laws may have increased aggravated assaults nationwide.

The divergence in the conclusions of MGLC studies that use essentially similar models has led researchers to question the current statistical tools used to analyze the effects of laws and public policies, and to apply new methods to explore the effects of RTC laws on crime. Strnad (2007), for example, proposes Bayesian-model averaging as a way to sift through conflicting empirical estimates of various differing models. The Bayesian method allows researchers to adjust their assumptions about how a policy works according to the data that are collected. Given enough information, confidence in a hypothesized relationship between a factor and its outcome should become either high or low. Bayesian-model comparison also allows researchers to collectively consider all of the plausible specifications. This method does not depend on the parameters estimated in each model. Rather, Bayesian-model averaging considers the probability of the model considering all possible parameter values. In this manner, Bayesian methods can be used to select between conflicting hypotheses. Thus, Strnad argues that the Bayesian approach provides a systematic approach for choosing an appropriate model to evaluate legislation and policy. Strnad uses the MGLC debate over which model is correct to show how Bayesian methods are applied. While Strnad’s primary objective is to demonstrate the strengths of Bayesian-model averaging, his results undermine the proposition that guns reduce crime. Strnad also finds that the two most important explanatory variables for explaining crime rates are the abortion rate and the incarceration rate. Aneja, Donohue, and Zhang (2010) provide methodological insights that are relevant to the more traditional analysis of crime data using panel data techniques. They extensively review the methodological



choices made by the National Research Council in its 2005 report on RTC laws and find numerous problems, though they echo the NRC’s conclusion that there is no evidence in aggregate econometric data that would support the existence of a net crimereducing effect of right-to-carry legislation. After their exhaustive study of how RTC laws influence the seven major categories of crime, only one consistent, statistically significant finding emerges: that RTC laws increase the rate of aggravated assault. More recent studies continue to contradict Lott’s thesis that more guns equal less crime (for a list of studies, see GVPedia Gun Violence Research n.d.). For example, Siegel and colleagues (2017) examined homicide rates in all fifty states over twentyfive years, finding that shall-issue laws were associated with a 6.5 percent higher homicide rate, as well as firearm homicide and handgun homicide rates that were 8.6 percent and 10.6 percent higher, respectively. Similarly, Crifasi and colleagues (2018) found that both right to carry and stand your ground laws were associated with increased homicide rates in large urban counties. Lott continues to publish responses to many of these studies defending his thesis and questioning the methodological rigor of his critics. Moyer has responded by noting that “when all but a few studies point in the same direction, we can feel confident that the arrow is aiming at the truth—which is, in this case, that guns do not inhibit crime and violence but instead make it worse” (Moyer 2017). The “More Guns, Less Crime” thesis has generated one of the most heated academic debates over a public policy issue in recent years. Empirical researchers have used an array of statistical techniques to understand the net effects of these laws on crime. Yet after so many studies, there remains no

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consensus on whether RTC legislation decreases crime, increases crime, or has no meaningful net effect in either direction. Despite the forceful claims in favor of the MGLC thesis from a small continually diminishing group of researchers, it may be wise to agree with the NRC’s conclusion that there is no convincing evidence that RTC laws generate any net benefits. Given the seemingly irreconcilable differences over the truth of the MGLC hypothesis, perhaps the most valuable lesson we have learned from this academic debate relates to research methods, not policy implications. The back-and-forth has demonstrated how evaluations of policy can be extremely sensitive to researcher decisions. The morass of conflicting results on this topic has led social scientists to seriously assess whether the right methods are being used, and to explore what ways may be better for delving into controversial and policy-relevant research topics. Analyses of RTC legislation highlight an important lesson to take away from the More Guns, Less Crime debate: researchers should use caution when making strong policy-oriented prescriptions on the basis of statistical evidence—particularly prior to the emergence of a large and sophisticated body of critical literature. Abhay Aneja and John J. Donohue III See also: Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime; Background Checks; Black Market for Firearms; Concealed Weapons Laws; Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Felons and Gun Control; Gun Control; Gun Control Act of 1968; Lott, John R., Jr.; Right to Self-Defense, Philosophical Bases; Safety Courses

Further Reading Abadie, Alberto, Alexis Diamond, and Jens Hainmueller. “Synthetic Control Methods

624 | More Guns, Less Crime Thesis for Comparative Case Studies: Estimating the Effect of California’s Tobacco Control Program.” Journal of the American Statistical Association 105 (2010): 493–505. Aneja, Abhay, John Donohue, and Alex Zhang. “The Impact of Right-to-Carry Laws and the NRC Report: Lessons for the Empirical Evaluation of Law and Policy.” Yale Law School Working Paper Series, 2010. Ayres, Ian, and John Donohue. “The Latest Misfires in Support of the ‘More Guns, Less Crime’ Hypothesis.” Stanford Law Review 55 (2003a): 1371–98. Ayres, Ian, and John Donohue. “More Guns, Less Crime Fails Again: The Latest Evidence from 1977–2006.” Econ Journal Watch 6 (2009a): 218–38. Ayres, Ian, and John Donohue. “Shooting Down the ‘More Guns, Less Crime’ Hypothesis.” Stanford Law Review 55 (2003b): 1193–12. Ayres, Ian, and John Donohue. “Yet Another Refutation of the More Guns, Less Crime Hypothesis—With Some Help from Moody and Marvell.” Econ Journal Watch 6 (2009b): 35–59. Azrael, Deborah, Philip J. Cook, and Matthew Miller. “State and Local Prevalence of Firearms Ownership Measurement, Structure, and Trends.” Journal of Quantitative Criminology 20 (2004): 43–62. Black, Dan, and Daniel Nagin. “Do Right-toCarry Laws Deter Violent Crime?” Journal of Legal Studies 27 (1997): 209–19. Crifasi, Cassandra K., Molly Merrill-Francis, Alex McCourt, Jon S. Vernick, Garen J. Wintemute, and Daniel W. Webster. “Association between Firearm Laws and Homicide in Urban Counties.” Journal of Urban Health 95 (2018): 383–90. Donohue, John. “The Impact of Right-to-Carry Laws and the NRC Report: Lessons for the Empirical Evaluation of Law and Policy.” Yale Law School Working Paper Series, 2010. Duggan, Mark. “More Guns, More Crime.” Journal of Political Economy 109 (2001): 1086–114. Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. Guns in Public: Concealed Carry.

https://giffords.org/lawcenter/gun-laws /policy-areas/guns-in-public/concealed -carry/ (accessed January 23, 2022). GVPedia Gun Violence Research. MYTH: Most Studies Show That More Guns Mean Less Crime. https://www.gvpedia.org/gun -my ths /more-g u ns-mean-less-cr ime / (accessed January 23, 2022). Kovandzic, Tomislav V., and Thomas B. Marvell. “Right-to-Carry Concealed Handguns and Violence Crime: Crime Control through Gun Decontrol.” Criminology and Public Policy 2 (2003): 363–96. Lott, John R., Jr. More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998. Lott, John R., Jr., and David B. Mustard. “Crime, Deterrence, and Right-to-Carry Concealed Handguns.” Journal of Legal Studies 26 (1997): 1–68. Maltz, Michael, and Joseph Targonski. “A Note on the Use of County-Level UCR Data.” Journal of Quantitative Criminology 18 (2002): 297–318. Moody, Carlisle, and Thomas Marvell. “The Debate on Shall-Issue Laws.” Econ Journal Watch 5 (2008): 269–93. Moyer, Melinda Wenner. “More Guns Do Not Stop More Crimes, Evidence Shows.” Scientific American, October 1, 2017. https:// w w w.scientif icamer ican.com /ar ticle /more-guns-do-not-stop-more-crimes-evi dence-shows/ (accessed January 23, 2022). O’Flaherty, Brendan, and Rajiv Sethi. “Why Have Robberies Become Less Frequent but More Violent?” Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization 25 (2009): 518–34. Plassmann, Florenz, and T. Nicolaus Tideman. “Does the Right to Carry Concealed Handguns Deter Countable Crimes? Only a Count Analysis Can Say.” Journal of Law and Economics 44 (2001): 771–98. Plassmann, Florenz, and John Whitley. “Confirming More Guns, Less Crime.” Stanford Law Review 55 (2003): 1313–69. Siegel, Michael, Ziming Xuan, Craig S. Ross, Sandro Galea, Bindu Kalesan, Eric Fleegler, and Kristin A. Goss. “Easiness of



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Legal Access to Concealed Firearm Permits and Homicide Rates in the United States.” American Journal of Public Health 107, no. 12 (2017): 1923–29. Strnad, Jeff. “Should Legal Empiricists Go Bayesian?” American Law and Economics Review 9 (2007): 195–303. Zimring, Franklin, and Gordon Hawkins. “Concealed Handguns: The Counterfeit Deterrent.” Responsive Community 2 (1997): 46–60.

Morial v. Smith & Wesson Corp. See Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers Morton Grove, Illinois. See Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers Motor Vehicle Laws as a Model for Gun Laws The improvement in motor vehicle safety in the United States was deemed an important “20th century public health achievement” by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Between 1952 and 1999, the U.S. death rate per motor vehicle mile fell 80 percent. And by 2009, death rates had fallen so low that fewer people died on the roads in that year than in any year since 1950, even though the population has doubled, and there are far more automobiles per person. Experts do not believe that drivers today are any better than they were sixty years ago; instead, this dramatic increase in highway safety is credited to improvements in roadways, motor vehicles, and emergency medical care. The motor vehicle success story may provide a helpful model for reducing firearm injuries. In the 1950s, the focus of efforts by traffic safety experts was on the driver. They believed that almost all motor vehicle

injuries were caused by driver error and by deliberate lawbreaking. Indeed, most motor vehicle deaths are caused by illegal behavior (e.g., alcohol, speeding, running red lights). The automobile industry mantra became, in effect, “motor vehicles don’t kill people, people kill people.” The industry argued exclusively for policies of better education for drivers and increased punishment for unlawful behavior. One focus was on finding “accident-prone” motorists and taking them off the highway. However, beginning in the late 1940s, independent medical and engineering professionals had begun to investigate not “who caused the accident” but rather “what caused the injury.” Studies of automobileinjury victims revealed that most injuries were directly linked with specific features of vehicle design. These design features included inflexible steering columns, windshields that shattered into sharp shards of glass, unyielding dashboards, passenger compartments that crushed on impact, and automobiles that allowed passengers to be thrown from the car. There were obvious technical solutions for these risk factors, such as collapsible steering columns, shatterproof windows, padded interiors, crushresistant passenger compartments, and seatbelts and airbags. There were also obvious solutions to unsafe highway design features, such as unyielding roadside hazards and guard rails that channeled cars into these hazards. Rather than policies focusing solely on the behavior of the driver, it became apparent that there were more effective ways to reduce the likelihood of injury by improving motor vehicles and the highway environment. The goal became to build a traffic safety system that made it less likely for people to make errors or behave inappropriately, yet one that was also more forgiving when errors were made or people behaved badly. A key was

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reframing the policy question from the fatalistic, “How can you change human nature?” to the realistic, “What are the most costeffective ways to reduce injury?” Politically, the critical next step was creating a national regulatory agency, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, with the power to mandate and enforce safety standards, recall unsafe products, and create a comprehensive motor vehicle injury data system. Today, motor vehicles are much safer, as are highways; the emergency medical system is improved; and data are available to permit the evaluation of which policies are effective and which are not. Injury experts believe that in the firearm field, the United States is currently where it was in motor vehicle safety in the 1950s. The gun lobby claims that “guns don’t kill people, people kill people,” and argues that the only appropriate policies are consumer education and enforcement of criminal laws. Guns are manufactured with triggers that can be worked by small children. Each day, teenagers take out the clip of semiautomatic pistols and, believing the firearm to now be unloaded, point and accidentally shoot their friends. Firearms still are manufactured with serial numbers that are easily obliterated, and felons and terrorists can still buy firearms without background checks at flea markets and gun shows. A policy approach in the firearm field parallel to that undertaken in the motor vehicle area would be the creation of a federal agency with the power to require that manufacturers produce safe guns (such as guns that are childproof and have magazine safeties); recall unsafe guns (such as those that go off when dropped); require background checks for all gun sales, including those made in the secondary market; and create a comprehensive data system that

provides the information needed to determine which policies help to save lives and which are ineffective. The motor vehicle model has taught us that it is not enough for policies to focus exclusively on changing the conduct of individuals who may be behaving inappropriately. We also must consider policies that modify the product and the environment. A key step is to stop worrying solely about the pathologies of people who injure themselves and others with guns each year and instead to determine why these events occur with such regularity; why our nation continually has a firearm problem worse than that of any other developed country; and why certain communities, cities, states, and regions consistently bear such a disproportionate share of the burden. David Hemenway See also: Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws; Gun Control; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Loaded-Chamber Indicator; Smart Guns; Trigger Locks

Further Reading Hemenway, David. “The Public Health Approach to Motor Vehicles, Tobacco, and Alcohol, with Applications to Firearms Policy.” Journal of Public Health Policy 22 (2001): 381–402. Hemenway, David. While We Were Sleeping: Success Stories in Injury and Violence Prevention. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009. Institute of Medicine. Reducing the Burden of Injury. Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 1999.

Muhammed, John Allen. See Washington, DC, Sniper Attacks

N NAACP and Gun Control

NAACP was attacked by an armed Ku Klux Klan motorcade for his activities in support of desegregation. Armed members of the local chapter, however, stood their ground, directing a barrage of gunfire at the Klansmen. According to Robert Franklin Williams (1998), a former marine and the Monroe chapter president who wrote about the episode in 1962, this show of arms stopped the assault and deterred the Klansmen from launching future attacks. Williams contended that “[t]he stand taken by our chapter resulted in the official reaffirmation by the NAACP of the right to self-defense.” Williams pointed to the preamble of the resolution of the July 1959 annual convention in New York City, which stated: “[W]e do not deny, but reaffirm, the right of an individual and collective selfdefense against unlawful assaults.” Williams rejected the national chapter’s suspicion of gun ownership, saying that “[w]here there is a breakdown in the law, the individual citizen has a right to protect his person, his family, his home and his property.” In 1991, the NAACP chapter in Richmond, Virginia, reflecting a similar pro-gun position, defeated a Richmond housing board attempt to prevent some 14,000 residents in public housing from keeping legal guns in their homes. Jack W. Gravely, the Virginia NAACP state president and radio talk show host, together with other civil rights leaders, said that it was wrong to disarm the very group of people who are most frequently the targets of criminals. There have thus been some local chapters that have either explicitly or implicitly

Since its founding on February 12, 1909, the national chapter, and most local chapters, of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) have as a general matter favored—and advocated—strict gun control. During its October 2000 National Board of Directors meeting, for example, the NAACP passed a resolution calling for mandatory trigger locks on all new guns, registration of all firearms, and background checks, and demanded that “consumer safety standards” be made applicable to the gun industry. Moreover, in 2003, the NAACP filed suit against forty-five gun manufacturers, charging that they created a “public nuisance” through the “negligent marketing” of handguns. More recently, for both the landmark 2008 Supreme Court District of Columbia v. Heller case, and the follow-up 2010 McDonald v. City of Chicago case, the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund filed amicus briefs arguing in Heller that the Second Amendment was not an individual right, and, thereafter in McDonald, that the right to keep and bear arms recognized in Heller did not apply to state and local governmental action. (In both instances, the NAACP’s arguments failed to persuade the court.) Though the national leadership of the NAACP has historically endorsed gun control, it should be noted that this has not always been so for the local chapters. In 1957, for example, the vice president of the Monroe, North Carolina, chapter of the 627

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endorsed private gun ownership. The NAACP as a general matter, however, has not formally shared these positions. The national chapter of the NAACP, as well as the overwhelming number of local chapters, has consistently favored gun control as a means of reducing crime, and has in fact advocated for additional restrictions on the availability of firearms and for an increase in the mandatory safety features accompanying new guns. T. Markus Funk See also: African Americans and Gun Violence; Black Codes; District of Columbia v. Heller; Ku Klux Klan (KKK); Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; McDonald v. City of Chicago; Racism and Gun Control

Further Reading Funk, T. Markus. “Gun Control and Economic Discrimination: The Melting-Point Casein-Point.” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 85 (1995): 764–806. http:// www.constitution.org/2ll/2ndschol/30econ .pdf (accessed April 12, 2011). Funk, T. Markus. “Is the True Meaning of the Second Amendment Really Such a Riddle? Tracing the Origins of an Anglo-American Right.” Howard Law Journal 39 (1995): 411–36. National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. http://www.naacp.org/con tent/main/ (accessed April 12, 2011). National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. “NAACP Files Federal Lawsuit against Gun Manufacturers.” Press Release. July 16, 1999. Polsby, Daniel D., and Don B. Kates Jr. “Of Holocausts and Gun Control.” Washington University Law Quarterly 75 (1997): 1237– 75. http://lawreview.wustl.edu/inprint/75-3 /753-4.html (accessed April 12, 2011). Williams, Robert Franklin. Negroes with Guns. Detroit, MI: Wayne State University Press, 1999.

National Association of Firearms Retailers (NAFR) The National Association of Firearms Retailers provides retailers with a unified voice in regulatory and legislative matters, facilitates communications with the manufacturers and other areas of the industry, and provides support related to legal compliance and general retail operations. Through NAFR, retailers have a better opportunity to lobby for their positions, which are usually against any form of gun control legislation. NAFR also represents its members with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and has quarterly meetings with these agencies. The FBI runs the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), which affects retailers on a daily basis. NAFR is a division of the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), an important trade association for the firearms, ammunition, sport-shooting, and hunting industry. More than 5,500 companies and organizations claim membership in NSSF. In addition, NAFR partners with independent state retailer organizations in California, Connecticut, Illinois, Massachusetts, Maryland, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania. NAFR provides support for retailers involved in lobbying efforts. NAFR dispenses the bulk of its help to retailers via seminars and webinars. Examples of informational seminars include how to sell firearms, low-cost ways to generate business, and the benefits of add-on sales to the bottom line and customer satisfaction. The organization also helps consumers to identify local firearm retailers. NAFR has several cooperative ventures with law enforcement agencies. For example,



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for the past many years, it has partnered with the ATF and the Office of Justice Programs to assist law enforcement in educating firearms retailers in how to better identify and deter illegal “straw purchases” and to raise public awareness that straw purchasing is a serious crime. The “Don’t Lie for the Other Guy” program is designed to deter lawabiding citizens from procuring firearms for criminals (a “straw purchase”). Since 1999, and in conjunction with the U.S. Department of Justice, NAFR and NSSF have also funded the distribution of millions of trigger locks through Project Homesafe/Childsafe. Sean Maddan See also: Black Market for Firearms; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF); Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI); Firearm Dealers; Firearms Industry; National Instant Criminal Background Check System; National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF); Trigger Locks

Further Reading National Shooting Sports Foundation. http:// www.nssf.org (accessed January 22, 2011).

In subsequent years, military surplus weaponry was given away for distribution by the NRA, which proved to be an important inducement to increase NRA membership at a time when the organization was struggling to survive. In addition, the NBPRP has overseen the hosting of government-financed marksmanship contests, held at Camp Perry, Ohio, since 1907, through the Civilian Marksmanship Program. From its founding until 1996, the NBPRP was an advisory body to the secretary of the army. With the enactment of the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 1996, however, the NBPRP was disbanded and replaced by the Corporation for the Promotion of Rifle Practice and Firearms Safety, a tax-exempt, nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization that may not receive government funding to conduct its activities, although the government continues to cover the costs associated with the use of government facilities. Instead, the organization relies on sales, donations, and fees. The current Civilian Marksmanship Program operates under the aegis of the corporation. Robert J. Spitzer See also: National Rifle Association (NRA)

National Board for the Promotion of Rifle Practice (NBPRP) The National Board for the Promotion of Rifle Practice (NBPRP) was established by an act of Congress as part of the Militia Act of 1903 (also known as the Dick Act) to improve marksmanship skills. Created with the support of President Theodore Roosevelt and the then-fledgling National Rifle Association (NRA), the NBPRP provided an early, important boost to the survival of the NRA by authorizing the sale of government surplus weapons and ammunition to rifle clubs at the NBPRP’s first meeting in 1905.

Further Reading Civilian Marksmanship Program (NBPRP/ Corporation for the Promotion of Rifle Practice website). http://www.odcmp.com/ (accessed January 17, 2011). Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021.

National Center for Injury Prevention and Control (NCIPC) The National Center for Injury Prevention and Control (NCIPC) was established in June 1992 as part of the Centers for Disease

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Control and Prevention (CDC), which, in turn, is part of the Department of Health and Human Services. The NCIPC grew out of the CDC’s earlier work on home and injuries in the early 1970s and on violence prevention starting in 1983. It is a federal agency specifically created for reducing injury, disability, death, and their associated costs outside the workplace. The NCIPC works closely with other federal agencies; national, state, and local organizations; state and local health departments; and research institutions. The NCIPC’s dispersal of research grants to hospitals and universities has helped build significant political support for the NCIPC across the nation. With great vigor in the first half of the 1990s, the NCIPC pursued a research agenda that attempted to build evidence for the need for increasingly restrictive firearm laws. This sparked intense controversy about whether violence could properly be considered a disease. Congress defunded the NCIPC’s gun research in 1996 on grounds that it was biased and unscientific. That defunding sparked a sea change in the NCIPC’s treatment of firearms research. Indeed, the “CDC Research Agenda: 2009–2018” mentioned firearms only in the context one would recognize as appropriate to the strategic goal of injury prevention. Heretofore, according to the NCIPC, violence was considered a serious public health problem because of its impact on the wellbeing of Americans. The NCIPC adopted the public health approach that violence, like disease, does not occur randomly and is preventable using techniques based on disease control. Violence prevention strategies include environmental design, product design, human behavior, education, and legislative and regulatory requirements that

foster environmental and behavioral change. The NCIPC’s Division of Violence Prevention has four priority areas: youth violence, family and intimate violence, suicide, and firearm injuries. In 1993, the director of the NCIPC, Dr. Mark Rosenberg, articulated his vision for the agency: “a long-term campaign, similar to [those pertaining to] tobacco use and auto safety, to convince Americans that guns are, first and foremost, a public health menace.” In 1994, Rosenberg stated, “We need to revolutionize the way we look at guns, like what we did with cigarettes.” The CDC incorporated firearm-related violence into the public health model and considered the reduction of firearm ownership as an important public health goal. The CDC (in the 1980s and early 1990s) and the NCIPC (after its creation in 1992) bestowed numerous grants for firearm research. Results of some of the CDC- or NCIPC-funded studies were heavily publicized by gun control advocates. However, this became an increasing focus of criticism, as the NCIPC was accused of funding biased and scientifically flawed studies. A number of congressional critics sought to eliminate the NCIPC. In the September 21, 1995, issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, editor Dr. Jerome Kassirer commented: One of the agencies singled out for elimination in the recent spate of Congressional budget cutting was the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control . . . [and] there is reason to believe that the NCIPC . . . was far more selectively targeted. . . . Despite howls of protest from the National Rifle Association and its surrogates about the validity of these studies, epidemiologic research on the prevention of injuries—including injuries



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from guns—has achieved both scientific credibility and public recognition. . . . The NCIPC serves a vitally important function and, in my view, should be preserved. . . . Regrettably the NCIPC story is yet another example of the corrupting influence that powerful lobbies for special interests can exert on members of Congress by tying financial support in election campaigns to particular votes. In this instance, it is science that is at the mercy of this deplorable system; by continuing to permit the votes of our elected representatives to be bought, we threaten research that could greatly benefit our health, especially that of our children. On the other hand, an article in the spring 1995 issue of the Tennessee Law Review summarized what was viewed with alarm by many in the medical community as the use of a taxpayer-funded agency to promote a political agenda. In it, Don Kates et al. concluded that CDC-funded studies on guns promote “an emotional anti-firearms agenda” and “are so biased and contain so many errors of fact, logic, and procedure that we cannot regard them as having a legitimate claim to be treated as scholarly or scientific studies.” In 1996, congressional hearings were held on the fate of the NCIPC. Among those testifying was Dr. Miguel A. Faria Jr., a neurosurgeon and adjunct professor of medical history at Mercer University School of Medicine in Macon, Georgia. Stated Faria: “I have yet to see a published report that has been funded by the NCIPC in which any benefits of firearms in the hands of lawabiding citizens had been published, even though they are there. . . . If you don’t conclude that guns are bad and that they need to be eradicated because they are a ‘public health menace,’ they are not published.”

The result was that Congress shifted $2.6 million from the NCIPC (the amount the NCIPC had spent in 1995 on firearm studies), earmarking those funds for other health research. Congress also mandated that none of the public funds appropriated to the CDC “may be used to advocate or promote gun control.” In May 1996, the CDC announced that, for the first time in over a decade, it would not seek research proposals on firearm injuries, but would instead fund studies that examine the “social and economic factors that contribute to violence.” Some of the researchers who had relied on the NCIPC grants began, instead, to receive research subsidies from the National Institute of Justice, which is part of the Department of Justice. Paul Gallant and Joanne Eisen See also: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC); Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Motor Vehicle Laws as a Model for Gun Laws; National Institute of Justice (NIJ); National Violent Death Reporting System

Further Reading Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “National Center for Injury Prevention and Control.” http://www.cdc.gov/injury (accessed June 12, 2011). House Subcommittee on the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies. Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies Appropriations for 1997. Part 7, Testimony of Members of Congress and Other Interested Individuals and Organizations. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1997. Kassirer, Jerome P. “A Partisan Assault on Science—The Threat to the CDC.” New England Journal of Medicine 333 (1995): 793–94.

632 | National Council of Churches (NCC) and Gun Control Kates, Don B., Jr., Henry E. Schaffer, John K. Lattimer, George B. Murray, and Edwin H. Cassem. “Guns and Public Health: Epidemic of Violence or Pandemic of Propaganda?” Tennessee Law Review 62 (1994): 513–96. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention National Center for Injury Prevention and Control. “CDC Research Agenda: 2009–2018.” Atlanta, GA: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, 2009. http://www .cdc.gov/injury/ResearchAgenda/CDC _Injury_Research_Agenda-a.pdf (accessed June 12, 2011).

National Coalition to Ban Handguns. See Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV) National Council of Churches (NCC) and Gun Control Since its founding in 1950, the National Council of Churches (NCC) has been the leading force for ecumenical cooperation among Christians in the United States. The NCC’s member communions—from a wide spectrum of Protestant, Anglican, Orthodox, Evangelical, historic African American and Living Peace churches—include 45 million persons in more than 100,000 local congregations in communities across the nation. The NCC is a community of Christian communions, and from time to time, its member faith groups issue a public expression of common witness, often in the form of a resolution. There have been two NCC resolutions formally addressing the issue of gun violence. Along with these two official policy proclamations, the NCC has issued a

number of statements speaking to the urgency of bringing gun violence to an end. Through its Governing Board, the NCC adopted its first anti–gun violence resolution in 1967. Entitled Firearms Contro—a Policy Statement of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America, the statement affirmed the council’s belief in a God-given and sacred right to life and described the impossibility of “protect[ing] life and maintain[ing] public order when individuals have unregulated access to firearms.” Advocating firearm control, the statement called for “strong and adequate legislation regulating the sale, transportation, ownership, and use of firearms,” while recognizing “that firearms control legislation does not take the place of constructive measures to eliminate the causes of crime and social disorganization.” In 2000, then NCC general secretary Bob Edgar condemned gun violence, especially as it affects children, and observed that children are victimized not only when they are killed or maimed by guns, intentionally or unintentionally, but also when they suffer “the loss of parents and friends.” Reiterating the point from the 1967 policy statement that “new laws alone will not end the wave of gun violence sweeping the nation,” Edgar argued that “the number of shootings will be reduced by making it harder for individuals to purchase the kinds of guns which have no function except to injure and kill humans.” Bearing witness to the 100,000 Americans who are killed or injured with a gun each year, in 2010, NCC communions again decried by way of a formal resolution the “grievous problem of gun violence in the United States.” The resolution and call to action the NCC Governing Board adopted on May 17, 2010, speaks of the disproportionate impact gun violence has on communities of



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color—pointing out, for example, that African Americans make up 12 percent of the U.S. population but account for 27 percent of all U.S. gun-related deaths, and that while Latinos are 15 percent of the population, they suffer the second-highest rate of gun homicide and gun assaults. Following the passage of its second anti– gun violence resolution, the Rev. Dr. Michael Kinnamon, NCC general secretary, wrote to the heads of all NCC communions, calling on them to encourage their congregations to partner with organizations such as “Heeding God’s Call” that are engaged in on-the-ground efforts to eliminate gun violence through methods such as direct action against gun shops that fail to adopt responsible gun selling policies. The letter encouraged congregations to work to close the gun show loophole—a gap in federal law that currently permits private sellers, who often congregate at gun shows, to sell guns without background checks or record keeping of any kind, even though federal law requires licensed gun sellers to perform criminal background checks on everyone to whom they sell a gun. Through its member communions, the NCC continues to work toward ending gun violence. It is actively engaged, for example, in the interfaith coalition “Faith United to Prevent Gun Violence in the United States” (FUPGV). FUPGV supports a wide range of gun control measures which it believes will reduce firearm violence and improve public safety. “I stand firmly with the vast majority of Americans who are demanding an end to gun violence and the passage of legislation that requires greater screening, longer waiting periods for background checks, and the elimination of rapid fire guns,” stated Rev. Dr. John Dorhauer, General Minister and President of the United Church of Christ and Chair of the

NCC Governing Board in a 2021 NCC statement (National Council of Churches 2021). NaKeisha Sylver Blount See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Boxer, Barbara; Gun Shows; National Violent Death Reporting System

Further Reading National Council of Churches. http://www .ncccusa.org/ (accessed January 24, 2022). National Council of Churches. “Statement on Senseless Deaths Due to the Lack of Gun Laws.” March 24, 2021. https://nationalcoun cilofchurches.us/statement-on-senseless -deaths-due-to-the-lack-of-gun-laws / (accessed January 28, 2022).

National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) The National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) is—with the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Uniform Crime Reports— one of the two major sources of data on crime in the United States. Collected from a representative sample of the nation’s residents, the NCVS provides information about the nature and frequency of criminal incidents. Much of the currently available knowledge about firearm offenses comes from the survey’s data. The NCVS uses a large probability sample; in 2019, this equaled about 95,000 households (more than 160,000 persons). Survey workers contact the sample households every six months for three years and interview all residents who are age twelve or older. The U.S. Bureau of the Census draws the sample and administers the survey, and the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics analyzes the data and reports the results.

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The NCVS measures the crimes of rape, robbery, assault, burglary, larceny, and motor vehicle theft, along with variations of their subtypes. It gives information on characteristics of the victims and offenders (such as age, gender, and race) and details about the incidents (such as location, weapon use, and injuries). Unlike the Uniform Crime Reports, the NCVS includes offenses that the victims failed to report to the police. Also unlike the Uniform Crime Reports, the NCVS considers only nonfatal crimes, and so it does not collect data on homicides. Table 1 presents NCVS estimates for rapes, robberies, and aggravated assaults in 2018, a representative year. As the table shows, relatively few robberies and rapes involve weapons, but offenders generally prefer guns when they do arm themselves. The pattern for aggravated assaults is different from rapes and robberies, in part because weapon use helps define the crime. This difference aside, firearms are also a popular instrument for committing assaultive violence. The table further shows that

guns are the weapons most frequently employed in robberies and assaults that are committed by strangers. Although not displayed in the table, males are generally more vulnerable to firearm crimes than females; nonwhites are more vulnerable than whites; and persons aged eighteen to twenty-four are more vulnerable than those who are younger or older (Planty and Truman 2013). Though criminal firearm use is relatively rare, nonfatal injuries from gun crimes are rarer still. Estimates of the frequency of gunshot wounds are accordingly more stable when they combine several years of data. Nonfatal injury percentages by weapon type for 1993 through 2011 are shown in Table 2. Persons who faced offenders armed with guns suffered injuries less often than did other victims. When firearm injuries did occur, however, they were more likely to be serious and to require medical treatment. (Recall that the survey does not include victims who died, so it cannot provide estimates of the frequency of fatal injuries).

Table 1: Firearm Use in Crime, National Crime Victimization Survey Estimates, 2018 Percentage of Victimizations

Rape/Sexual Assault   Involving stranger   Involving nonstranger Robbery   Involving stranger   Involving nonstranger Aggravated Assault   Involving stranger   Involving nonstranger

Number of Victimizations 734,630 173,070 561,560 573,090 222,550 350,540 1,058,040 385,940 672,090

Firearm 5.1 0.6 6.5 16.8 26.5 10.6 31.8 37.9 28.4

Knife 12.8 4.9 3.8 4.0 15.6 11.0 23.1 28.1 20.2

Other Weapon 13.6 1.9 1.0 1.2 10.9 15.3 33.5 27.2 37.1

No Weapon/ Don’t Know 56.8 92.6 88.7 89.7 47.0 63.1 11.6 6.8 14.3

Source: U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics. Generated using the NCVS Victimization Analysis Tool at www.bjs.gov.



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Table 2: Victim Injuries in Violent Crimes, by Weapon, National Crime Victimization Survey Estimates, 1993–2011 Victims Injured (%) Offender used firearm Offender used other weapon or no weapon

23.0 25.3

Injuries Serious (%)

Injuries Require Treatment (%)

29.0 16.6

72.5 39.5

Serious injuries include gunshot or knife wounds, broken bones, internal injuries, and loss of consciousness. Minor injuries include bruises and cuts. Source: Adapted from Michael Planty, and Jennifer L. Turman. Firearm Violence, 1993–2011. Washington, DC: U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2013.

The same findings appear in other data sources. Victims usually do not resist offenders who have guns, and this reduces their chances of harm. Yet, if the offender does attack, the risk of serious injury to the victim is greater from guns than from other weapons. Besides giving information on firearm use in crime, the NCVS also collects data on a variety of other gun-related topics. The survey asks respondents about stolen property, for example, allowing estimates of the frequency of gun thefts. Between 2005 and 2010, the survey recorded an annual average of about 154,000 victimizations in which offenders stole a firearm (Langton 2012). Allowing for multiple thefts in a single crime, the number of stolen guns totaled about 230,000 per year. About 60% of the victimizations occurred during burglaries, and these thefts were split almost equally between handguns and long guns. The NCVS also provides an estimate of the frequency with which victims use guns for self-defense. If victims say that they saw an offender, NCVS interviewers ask them to describe any protective actions that they took. The interviewers code the responses into a set of categories that include firearm defense as a possibility. With data from 1987 through 1990, McDowall and Wiersema (1994) found an

annual average of 65,000 incidents of armed defense. Following a 1992 procedural change to the survey’s methods, McDowall et al. (1998) obtained an annual average of 116,000 incidents. In both studies, victims used guns to defend themselves in less than 1 percent of violent crimes. Table 3 provides additional information about the defenses: they typically involved an assault and a stranger, and the victim used the gun only to threaten the offender. NCVS also estimates of the frequency of firearm defense vary somewhat from year to year, but only within a narrow range. Between 1995 and 2005, for example, methods like those used by McDowall et al. produce an annual average of 60,500 defenses. With slightly different methods and more recent data, the Violence Policy Center (2020) found an annual average of 100,400 defenses between 2014 and 2016. The NCVS estimates of firearm defense are controversial. Although large in absolute terms, the figures are only a fraction of those produced by a variety of one-time telephone surveys, which often find one million or more defensive incidents. Kleck and Gertz (1995) argue that the NCVS estimates are wrong and that respondents routinely lie to the interviewers about their gun use. Alternatively, other researchers (in particular, Hemenway 2017) suggest reporting

636 | National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS)

errors should operate in the direction of vastly inflating the results of the telephone surveys. Another possibility is that the NCVS and the telephone surveys measure different phenomena altogether (e.g., McDowall et al. 2000). The NCVS asks about defense only after respondents say that someone tried to victimize them. The telephone surveys include defense reports from respondents who, perhaps mistakenly, thought they might be facing a victimization and retrieved a gun to thwart the presumed offender. Due to these uncertainties, a report by the National Research Council (2005) urged caution in interpreting estimates of firearm Table 3: Firearm Use in Self-Defense, National Crime Victimization Survey Estimates, 1992–1994 (Mean Number of Incidents per Year) Rape Robbery Assault Burglary Larceny Motor vehicle theft

406 18,238 74,692 12,849 5,723 4,490

Offender stranger Offender known by sight only Offender casual acquaintance Offender well known Relationship to offender undetermined

68,613 16,317 6,420 16,709 8,339

Threatened offender only Attacked offender with gun Both attacked and threatened offender

93,168 20,420 2,810

Source: Adapted from David McDowall, Brian Wiersema, and Colin Loftin. “Estimates of the Frequency of Firearm Self-Defense from the Redesigned National Crime Victimization Survey.” Violence Research Group Discussion Paper 20, 1998. University at Albany, State University of New York.

defense and recommended additional work on how to measure it. Unfortunately, researchers have been slow to follow up on this recommendation and the topic remains a matter of contention. If its estimates of defense are accurate, the NCVS permits limited inferences about what happens when victims use guns. Table 4 compares firearm resistance with other types of self-defense. Victims who defended themselves with guns were more likely to believe that their actions were helpful, and few of them think that gun use worsened the situation. The NCVS thus suggests that incidents of firearm defense are infrequent but are often successful when they do occur. These findings are clearly insufficient to support a simple causal interpretation. One explanation of the pattern, for example, is that armed defense is rarely a realistic possibility. Criminals usually take control of events rapidly, and most persons would be foolish to reach for a gun. Yet the few victims who Table 4: Outcomes of Firearm Self-Defense and Other Methods of Protection, National Crime Victimization Survey Estimates, 1987–1990 Victim Victim Resisted Resisted with with Other Means Firearm (%) (%) Actions helped situation Actions hurt situation Victim was first to use or threaten force

90.6

71.0

5.2

18.1

57.0

15.0

Source: Analysis of data from U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics. “National Crime Survey, Concatenated File, 1882–2014.” Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor].



can retrieve a firearm have a valuable tool for defense. Supporting this possibility, Table 4 shows that firearm defenders were more likely to act quickly, before the offender could threaten or attack them. David McDowall See also: Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Justifiable Homicides; Right to Self-Defense, Philosophical Bases; Self-Defense, Legal Issues; Self-Defense, Reasons for Gun Use; Uniform Crime Reports (UCR); Victimization from Gun Violence

Further Reading Bureau of Justice Statistics. https://www.bjs .gov. Hemenway, David. Private Guns, Public Health. New ed. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2017. Kleck, Gary, and Marc Gertz. “Armed Resistance to Crime: The Prevalence and Nature of Self-Defense with a Gun.” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 86, no. 1 (1995): 150–87. Langton, Lynn. Firearms Stolen during Household Burglaries and Other Property Crimes, 2005–2010. Washington, DC: Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. Department of Justice, 2012. McDowall, David, Colin Loftin, and Stanley Presser. “Measuring Civilian Defensive Firearm Use: A Methodological Experiment.” Journal of Quantitative Criminology 16 (2000): 1–19. McDowall, David, and Brian Wiersema. “The Incidence of Defensive Firearm Use by U.S. Crime Victims, 1987 through 1990.” American Journal of Public Health 84, no. 12 (1994): 1982–84. McDowall, David, Brian Wiersema, and Colin Loftin. Estimates of the Frequency of Firearm Self-Defense from the Redesigned National Crime Victimization Survey. University at Albany, State University of New York, Violence Research Group Discussion Paper 20, 1998.

National Firearms Act of 1934 | 637 Morgan, Rachel E., and Barbara A. Oudekerk. Criminal Victimization, 2018. Washington, DC: U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. Department of Justice, 2019. National Research Council. Firearms and Violence: A Critical Review. Edited by Charles F. Wellford, John V. Pepper, and Carol V. Petrie. Washington, DC: National Academies Press, 2005. Planty, Michael, and Jennifer L. Truman. Firearm Violence, 1993–2011. Washington, DC: U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. Department of Justice, 2013. Violence Policy Center. “Firearm Justifiable Homicides and Non-Fatal Self-Defense Gun Use.” 2020. https://vpc.org/revealing -the-impacts-of-gun-violence/self-defense -gun-use (accessed May 18, 2022).

National Firearms Act of 1934 The National Firearms Act (NFA) of 1934, the first major federal statute to deal with the regulation of firearms, mandated all persons who were engaged in the business of selling certain types of firearms and all owners of these firearms to register with the collector of internal revenue and pay applicable taxes for the firearm transfer. The NFA covered only a narrowly defined class of firearms. In an era of violence and gang wars during the Prohibition decade, the NFA was designed to protect the public welfare and safety by regulating the possession of a limited set of highly dangerous, gangster-type weapons—such as machine guns, sawed-off shotguns, silencers, bazookas, bombs, and grenades—to ensure that these covered firearms did not fall into the hands of persons intent on misusing them. The NFA was passed as part of Congress’s taxing power under Article I, Section 8, of the Constitution. Indeed, when Congress first contemplated the enactment of the NFA,

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it first held hearings to determine whether it had the constitutional authority to regulate the manufacture, transfer, and possession of firearms. As these hearings predated the vast New Deal expansion of the congressional commerce clause power, then attorney general Homer S. Cummings explained to the gathered representatives that Congress could not ban machine guns because it had “no inherent police power to [make law concerning] local crime.” Only through the congressional power to tax, explained Cummings, could machine guns be regulated. Thus was born the NFA, which imposed a tax on the manufacture and transfer of machine guns pursuant to the congressional power to tax and raise revenue. Although the 1934 statute was enacted under the taxing power, four years later, Congress used the commerce clause to regulate firearms with the passage of the Federal Firearms Act of 1938. All subsequent federal firearm legislation would be enacted under the commerce clause. The NFA is administered by the secretary of the treasury, who has delegated the authority to administer the NFA to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF). Among its central provisions, the NFA institutes a unique system of registration whereby NFA firearms are registered to their owners in a central registry maintained by ATF. In addition, the NFA prohibits the transfer or manufacture of NFA firearms without prior ATF approval. Finally, the NFA levies a tax on each permissible transfer or manufacturing of an NFA firearm. The statute makes it illegal to move a firearm in interstate commerce without payment of the tax or to possess a firearm transferred in contravention of the tax and form requirements. Its prohibitions are keyed to the imposition of an excise tax on the business of dealing in such weapons and on transfers of them, together with

related requirements for registration of the dealer, the transfers, and the weapons. Thus, the statute requires all owners to register their weapons, subjects all sales and transfers to a tax, and requires that they be accompanied by written application forms, which require among other things that the person submit a photograph and fingerprint card to ATF. It should be noted that approximately half a century later (in 1986), Congress banned the sale of new machine guns altogether. Section 922(o) of the Firearms Owners’ Protection Act (FOPA) of 1986 prohibits a private citizen from possessing or transferring a machine gun that was not made and registered before May 19, 1986, unless such transfer or possession is authorized by federal or state governments or their departments or agencies. Since the enactment of the FOPA, ATF will not approve any NFA application to make, transfer, and pay the $200 tax on any machine gun made after May 19, 1986. James A. Beckman See also: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF); Federal Firearms Act of 1938 (Public Law No. 75-785); Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986; Gun Control Act of 1968; Sawed-off Shotguns; Tommy Gun

Further Reading Breed, Allen G., and Sharon Cohen. “Echoes of Al Capone Heard in Today’s GunControl Debate.” Associated Press, March 15, 2018. https://apnews.com/article/north -america-us-news-ap-top-news-chicago -assassinations-18cc9f83d13b4b66b7daf 05525808e67 (accessed January 28, 2022). House Ways and Means Committee. National Firearms Act of 1934: Hearings before the House Committee and Ways and Means. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1934.



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Kates, Don B., Jr. “Handgun Prohibition and the Original Meaning of the Second Amendment.” Michigan Law Review 82 (1983): 204–73.

National Instant Criminal Background Check System When the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill) was signed into law in November 1993, it required that a National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) be established by November 30, 1998. The NICS enables federal firearms licensees (FFLs) to contact the system to obtain information on whether a person attempting to purchase a firearm is disqualified under federal or state law from owning such a weapon. Over 100 million checks have been carried out, with more than 700,000 denials (Federal Bureau of Investigation 2011). In the wake of the Virginia Tech shooting on April 16, 2007, the NICS Improvement Amendments Act of 2007 was developed. The act, signed into law on January 8, 2008, strengthens the NICS system and was supported by both the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence and the National Rifle Association (NRA). Conducting background checks of gun buyers was first discussed in the United States in the 1930s, but it was not until 1986 that various groups began concerted efforts to create a waiting period for background checks. The Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act required a five-day waiting period for purchasing a handgun. That requirement would lapse in 1998, when the NICS would come into effect. Until the NICS was established, local law enforcement authorities would conduct background checks. However, in Printz v. United States (521 U.S. 898 [1997]), the Supreme Court

ruled against the five-day waiting period. The five-day waiting period was replaced in 1998 by the NICS. The Criminal Justice Information Services (CJIS) Division of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) maintains the NICS, a computerized system designed to respond almost immediately to most requests for information. According to the FBI, the NICS completes 95 percent of all background checks within two hours. The system contains records, including criminal information, on persons who are disqualified from owning a firearm, who include (1) convicted felons or those under indictment for a felony; (2) fugitives from justice; (3) unlawful drug users or drug addicts; (4) individuals who have been involuntarily committed to a mental institution or determined to be mentally incompetent; (5) illegal aliens and legal aliens admitted under nonimmigrant visas; (6) individuals who have been dishonorably discharged from the military; (7) persons who have renounced their citizenship; (8) persons subject to certain domestic violence restraining orders; and (9) persons convicted of misdemeanor crimes of domestic violence. Research indicates that 1.4 million prohibited persons have been prevented from buying guns. The NICS Improvement Act aims to remedy a major problem with the NICS, which is that some of those in prohibited categories can buy guns because their records are not in NICS. This includes 80–90 percent of those with mental health records that would prevent them from obtaining a gun and 25 percent of those with felony convictions. Ten states do not provide information on domestic violence records that would disqualify some prospective purchasers. The Improvement Act provides funds to aid states in sending records and penalizes those who do not (Mayors against Illegal Guns 2011). It

640 | National Institute of Justice (NIJ)

also requires federal agencies to share information with NICS on those federally disqualified from owning a firearm. There are three ways of performing NICS background checks. Thirteen states have agreed to conduct Brady background checks and have a state point of contact (POC) for FFLs to contact for all firearms checks. A POC is a state agency that has agreed to conduct NICS checks. In states that have not agreed to serve as POCs, FFLs contact the FBI directly for the NICS check. In ten states, POCs contact the NICS for handgun purchases but not for long gun purchases. The FBI processes the checks for long gun purchases in those states. Walter F. Carroll See also: Background Checks; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI); NICS Improvement Act; Virginia Tech Shooting; Waiting Periods

Further Reading Carter, Gregg Lee. The Gun Control Movement. New York: Twayne, 1997. Federal Bureau of Investigation. “National Instant Criminal Background Check System.” 2011. http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis /nics (accessed February 28, 2011). Mayors against Illegal Guns. Fatal Gaps How Missing Records in the Federal Background Check System Put Guns in the Hands of Killers. November 2011. http:// www.mayorsagainstillegalguns.org/down loads/pdf/maig_mimeo_revb.pdf (accessed December 30, 2011). Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021. Vizzard, William J. Shots in the Dark: The Policy, Politics, and Symbolism of Gun Control. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000.

National Institute of Justice (NIJ) The National Institute of Justice (NIJ), the research and development agency of the U.S. Department of Justice, provides “objective, independent, evidence-based knowledge and tools to meet the challenges of crime and justice” (National Institute of Justice 2011). Within a broad focus on crime prevention and control, the NIJ sponsors both social and physical science research on firearms and gun violence, including some of the most influential social science research in the field. The NIJ sponsored the Boston Gun Project, a problem-oriented policing initiative aimed at reducing homicides among young urban youth. The NIJ emphasizes research on the state and local level. NIJ research and tools aim to help prevent and reduce crime, improve law enforcement and the administration of justice, and promote public safety. To achieve this mission, NIJ promotes and sponsors a wide range of research on crime and delinquency; develops applied technologies and tools for criminal justice practitioners; evaluates programs and responses to crime; tests innovative concepts and program models; assists policy makers, program partners, and justice agencies; and disseminates knowledge. NIJ has developed a broad set of strategic goals that lead to more specific research objectives. The enabling legislation for the NIJ was the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968, and amendments to that act. As a federal agency, the NIJ is subject to political pressures, although it has a highly professional staff. According to NIJ staffers, during the Reagan and George H. W. Bush administrations, they were discouraged from conducting research on the links between guns and crime. That changed



under the Clinton administration (Vizzard 2000). During the George W. Bush administrations, research on guns and violence again appears to have been de-emphasized. Notwithstanding political pressures, NIJ has funded some of the most influential social research on guns and gun violence. For example, in 1978, the NIJ funded James D. Wright, Peter H. Rossi, and Kathleen Daly’s review and analysis of previous studies of weapons, crime, and violence (1983). The NIJ also sponsored a survey by Wright and Rossi of 1,800 convicted felons to ascertain their attitudes toward and use of firearms in crimes (1986). In 1994, the NIJ funded research by Philip J. Cook and Jens Ludwig for the Police Foundation to investigate the private ownership of guns. Cook and Ludwig looked at how individuals acquired, stored, and carried firearms, and examined the defensive use of firearms against criminal attacks (1997). The NIJ sponsored the Boston Gun Project, a problem-oriented, policing initiative aimed at reducing homicide victimization among young people in the city. As part of the project, Operation Ceasefire included direct attacks on illicit firearms traffickers and direct interventions with gang members to deter them from gun violence. The program was associated with major decreases in both youth homicides and nonfatal serious violence. NIJ published the report on the efficacy of this initiative for reducing gun violence in its Reducing Gun Violence publication series, which reports on the implementation and effects of NIJ-funded or co-funded firearm violence reduction programs in various cities. In addition to Boston, the series reports on firearm violence reduction programs in Indianapolis, St. Louis, Los Angeles, Atlanta, and Detroit. The NIJ also sponsors and carries out research drawing on the physical sciences.

National Institute of Justice (NIJ) | 641

For example, the NIJ had responsibility for supervising a 1995 project to develop models of concealed weapons detectors. Such a detector would enable detection of a concealed weapon from a distance of about twelve feet and would be a substantial improvement over current metal detectors. The NIJ also has established minimum performance standards for body armor to protect against gunfire. Finally, the NIJ has funded studies to evaluate gunshot detection technologies (GDT). GDTs are designed to detect the sound of a muzzle blast from a gun within seconds of the shot being fired, pinpoint the location from where the shot was fired, and then alert the police about the shot being fired. GDTs seek to identify the location and time of gunfire in a specified target area through a series of acoustic sensor modules (Mazerolle et al. 1999). The NIJ Data Resources Program, which preserves and makes available data collected in NIJ-funded research, extends the usefulness of that research. The NIJ cooperates with the Bureau of Justice Statistics to support the National Archive of Criminal Justice Data at the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) located at the University of Michigan. The archive provides data online and in a variety of formats from all NIJsponsored research. Walter F. Carroll See also: Acquisition of Guns; Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime; Boston Gun Project (BGP); Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS); Bush, George H. W.; Clinton, William J.; Cook, Philip J.; Crime and Gun Use; Gunshot Detection Technologies (GDTs); Methodologies for Studying Gun Violence; Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act; Reagan, Ronald Wilson; Wright, James D.; Youth and Guns

642 | National Rifle Association (NRA)

Further Reading Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. Guns in America: National Survey on Private Ownership and Use of Firearms. National Institute of Justice Research in Brief. Washington, DC: National Institute of Justice, May 1997. Kennedy, David M., Anthony A. Braga, and Anne M. Piehl. Reducing Gun Violence: The Boston Gun Project’s Operation Ceasefire. Washington, DC: National Institute of Justice, 2001. http://www.ncjrs .gov/pdffiles1/nij/188741.pdf (accessed June 14, 2022). Mazerolle, Lorraine Green, Cory Watkins, Dennis Rogan, and James Frank. Random Gunfire Problems and Gunshot Detection Systems. National Institute of Justice Research in Brief. Washington, DC: National Institute of Justice, December 1999. http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/179 274.pdf (accessed June 14, 2022). National Institute of Justice. http://www.ojp .usdoj.gov/nij/ (accessed February 28, 2011). Vizzard, William J. Shots in the Dark: The Policy, Politics, and Symbolism of Gun Control. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000. Wright, James D., and Peter H. Rossi. Armed and Considered Dangerous: A Survey of Felons and Their Firearms. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1986. Wright, James D., Peter H. Rossi, and Kathleen Daly. Under the Gun: Weapons, Crime, and Violence in America. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1983.

National Rifle Association (NRA) The National Rifle Association (NRA) is the nation’s largest, oldest, and most politically powerful interest group that opposes gun laws and favors gun rights. It publishes several magazines (American Rifleman, American Hunter, America’s First Freedom,

Shooting Illustrated, Shooting Sports USA, and NRA Insights) and consists of several divisions, the largest and most powerful of which is its political arm, the Institute for Legislative Action (ILA). Other activities include gun safety, education, public service and youth programs, and a variety of shooting, hunting, and collecting programs and information. The NRA also includes a 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation, the NRA Foundation, spanning activities that include the Firearms Civil Rights Legal Defense Fund, the International Shooter Development Fund, the NRA Junior Programs Fund, the National Firearms Museum Fund, the NRA Range Development Fund, and the NRA Special Contribution Fund. The NRA also offers various estate planning and will services, hoping to encourage gifts and donations to it from life insurance, securities, or real estate gifts and charitable remainder trusts. The NRA has maintained long and close ties to the firearms manufacturing industry, serving as its political front until the 1990s when the industry assumed a more visible and active political role. The NRA’s enduring political clout rests on three factors. First, it is one of the nation’s oldest and most experienced political lobby groups, and its resources and experience dwarf those of other gun-related organizations. Second, it maintains a grassroots membership base that cares deeply about the single issue of guns and that can be effectively mobilized to vote, write letters, attend meetings, contribute money, and otherwise make its political voice heard. The members’ single-issue devotion to guns and gun issues makes them a potent political force, even though most Americans favor stronger gun laws, because gun control foes maintain much stronger feelings for their cause than their opponents. NRA members’ intensity of feeling often carries the day over majority wishes on gun



issues precisely because that majority is not similarly intense in its political beliefs on behalf of gun control. Third, the organization is consistently successful at raising and spending large amounts of money for political purposes through the ILA and the NRA’s political action committee, the Political Victory Fund. In the 2008 elections, for example, the NRA spent $40 million to support political allies and oppose its foes. The NRA was formed in 1871 by Col. William C. Church, editor of the Army and Navy Journal, and Capt. George W. Wingate, an officer in the New York National Guard. Its original stated purpose, reflecting concern over the Union army’s poor marksmanship skills during the Civil War, was “improvement of its members in marksmanship.” Despite support from New York State, including subsidies for shooting matches, the organization languished in its early years, prompting the withdrawal of state subsidies in 1880. In 1900, the moribund group served as the vehicle for a revival in marksmanship, spurred partly by the Spanish-American War of 1898, when Albert Jones, an officer in the New Jersey National Guard, co-opted its involvement. With the assistance of gun enthusiast President Theodore Roosevelt, Congress was prompted to create the National Board for the Promotion of Rifle Practice as part of the Militia Act of 1903. At the first meeting of this board in 1905, it authorized the sale of government surplus weapons and ammunition to rifle clubs, which proved to be a critical boost for the organization. Two years later, the NRA moved its headquarters to Washington, DC. In 1909, the NRA amended its bylaws to include five additional governing board members selected by the secretaries of war and navy and the heads of the state National Guards. In 1910, the army decided to give away surplus rifles and ammunition, but again only to NRA

National Rifle Association (NRA) | 643

members and their recognized groups. Needless to say, these giveaways provided a powerful incentive for gun enthusiasts to join the organization, and the giveaways continued into the 1970s. In 1921, the 3,500-member NRA took on new life thanks to the efforts of C. B. Lister, the organization’s promotions manager, who affiliated the NRA with 2,000 local sporting clubs. By 1934, membership had grown tenfold, making the organization the largest and best-organized association of firearm users in the nation. While the NRA played a role in limited political efforts to alter national gun policy in the 1920s and 1930s, its primary focus continued to be marksmanship and related sporting activities. Nevertheless, it did exercise key influence over two limited national gun laws enacted in 1934 and 1938. Yet its stand on gun control during this period was far less rigid than it would become in later years. For example, in the 1930s, the NRA supported taxes on machine guns and helped draft a law for the District of Columbia creating a forty-eight-hour waiting period for handgun purchases. At the end of World War II, the influx of returning soldiers provided a significant membership boost. Within three years of the end of the war, membership had tripled, although most of these new members had a greater interest in hunting than in marksmanship. The NRA quickly adapted to this new priority. In the mid-1950s, with a membership of 300,000 and 140 paid employees, the organization moved from its old Washington location to an eight-story building in downtown Washington, which it occupied until the end of 1993, when it moved to a new location in Fairfax, Virginia. When Congress turned its attention to gun control in the 1960s, so did the NRA. From that point on, the NRA devoted increasing time and resources to its political

644 | National Rifle Association (NRA)

agenda. The NRA opposed enactment of what became the Gun Control Act of 1968. Despite its failure to block enactment of the bill, the NRA and its allies did succeed in weakening the original bill, which had included provisions for nationwide firearm registration and gun licensing. By the mid-1970s, membership reached a million. It hit 2 million by the early 1980s, peaked at over 3 million in the mid-1980s, declined to about 2.5 million around 1990, and then climbed to almost 4 million by 2000. In 2010, membership was just over 4 million. The organization’s annual budget in 2000 was about $168 million. In 2009, its budget topped $300 million. Although the NRA opposed gun controls for decades, the NRA leadership had maintained the organization’s primary focus on sporting, hunting, and other recreational gun uses through the 1960s. The “old-guard moderates” in control of the organization sought to turn the organization away from politics and back toward hunting and conservation. Symptomatic of this effort were plans promoted by the old guard to create a national shooting center in New Mexico and move the NRA’s headquarters to Colorado Springs. Meanwhile, the NRA’s recently formed ILA, headed by hard-liner Harlon Carter, complained bitterly at the devotion of organizational resources to these nonpolitical efforts. The response of the old guard was to fire seventy-four employees, most of whom were hard-liners. The simmering dispute surfaced at the NRA’s 1977 national convention in Cincinnati. Rallying a faction called the Federation for NRA, Carter won organizational changes giving the convention members greater control over decision-making. He and his allies then used those rules to depose the old guard at the convention in what was dubbed the “Revolt at Cincinnati.”

From this point forward, the ILA became the primary power center of the NRA, and politics became the NRA’s primary focus. Since that time, the hard-liners have pushed the organization toward total, complete, and unwavering opposition to all forms of gun regulation. For example, up until the mid-1970s, the NRA supported waiting periods for handgun purchases. Since that time, however, it has opposed waiting periods and fought vehemently against the ultimately successful enactment of a five-business-day waiting period for handgun purchases enacted in 1993 as part of the Brady Bill. This emphasis on 100 percent purity has helped the organization mobilize and activate its faithful, but it has also alienated former and potential allies and tarnished the organization’s national reputation. The NRA’s right-wing turn reached its furthest point in the early 1990s, when it refused to support conservatives with long records of backing the organization, including President George H. W. Bush in 1992 and Republican presidential nominee Robert Dole in 1996, despite the fact that both of these candidates were opposed by gun control supporter Bill Clinton. The organization’s reputation suffered its most damaging blow when it sent out a fundraising letter shortly before the bombing of a federal office building in Oklahoma City in 1995. Among other things, the letter compared federal agents to Nazis and charged that they were known to “harass, intimidate, even murder law-abiding citizens.” The parallel between the NRA’s antigovernment rhetoric and the beliefs of those responsible for the bombing prompted everfiercer criticism of the organization. Key to the effort to improve the NRA’s image, and to beat back efforts by an even more extreme element to win control of the organization, was the elevation of actor



Charlton Heston to the presidency of the organization in 1998. Heston’s well-known face became the embodiment of the NRA’s new image, which it advanced aggressively, and successfully, to blunt new national gun control initiatives advanced in the wake of the 1999 Columbine High School shooting. Heston was reelected president every year until 2003, when he stepped down after having been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. The NRA reached new heights of political influence during the presidency of George W. Bush, the most gun-friendly president in history. Bush’s first attorney general, John Ashcroft, had been the NRA’s staunch ally during his years in the U.S. Senate, and he embraced NRA positions on a host of legal matters related to guns. Most significantly, he reversed decades of Justice Department policy that had long interpreted the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms as a militia-based right. Under Ashcroft, the government embraced the individualist view, meaning that the amendment was seen as granting a personal right to guns. This change helped precipitate the Supreme Court’s about-face in Second Amendment interpretation when the high court embraced the individualist view in the 2008 case of District of Columbia v. Heller. Ironically, NRA legal strategists initially opposed the suit that led to the Heller ruling, feeling that the court was not ready to take the step it ultimately did. Two years later, the Supreme Court applied or “incorporated” the Second Amendment to the states in the case of McDonald v. City of Chicago. In the first decade of the twenty-first century, the NRA also logged legislative successes, including enactment of the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005, which provided legal immunity for the gun industry, the right to carry guns in national

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parks, and the destruction of gun background check data after twenty-four hours. A former NRA president offered this advice to those trying to understand the NRA’s single-minded zeal: “You’d get a far better understanding if you just approach us as if [we were] one of the world’s great religions” (as quoted in Powell 2000, W8). The NRA endorsed Donald Trump for president in 2016 and spent three times as much supporting his election as compared to the previous cycle. They also continued to promote their gun rights agenda and aggressively lobby against control measures offered in the wake of other high profile mass shootings, including the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, in 2012; the Route 91 Harvest Festival concert in Las Vegas, Nevada, in 2017; and Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, in 2018. In 2019, the attorney general of New York, Letitia James, filed a civil suit against the organization, alleging fraud, financial misconduct, and misuse of charitable funds by several of its executives, including longtime executive vice president Wayne LaPierre. The attorney general for the District of Columbia filed a similar suit, also alleging misuse of charitable funds, on the same day as the New York filing. In response, the NRA announced in January 2021 that they and one of their subsidiaries had filed bankruptcy, though the petitions were dismissed several months later without prejudice. The NRA also announced plans to reincorporate in Texas, though indicated that they intended to keep the organization’s headquarters in Virginia. Robert J. Spitzer See also: Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Columbine High School Shooting; District of Columbia v. Heller;

646 | National School Safety Center (NSSC) Federation for NRA; Heston, Charlton; Institute for Legislative Action (ILA); McDonald v. City of Chicago; Political Victory Fund (PVF); Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005

Further Reading Brown, Peter Harry, and Daniel G. Abel. Outgunned: Up Against the NRA. New York: Free Press, 2003. Carter, Gregg Lee. The Gun Control Movement. New York: Twayne, 1997. Diaz, Tom. Making a Killing: The Business of Guns in America. New York: New Press, 1999. LaPierre, Wayne, and James Jay Baker. Shooting Straight: Telling the Truth about Guns in America. Washington, DC: Regnery Publishing, 2002. Leddy, Edward F. Magnum Force Lobby: The National Rifle Association Fights Gun Control. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1987. Melzer, Scott. Gun Crusaders: The NRA’s Culture War. New York: New York University Press, 2009. National Rifle Association. http://www.nra .org (accessed July 5, 2021). Powell, Michael. “Call to Arms.” Washington Post, August 6, 2000, W8. Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021.

National School Safety Center (NSSC) Created in 1984 by presidential directive, the National School Safety Center (NSSC) is a partnership of the Department of Justice, Department of Education, and Pepperdine University that addresses issues that disrupt the learning process, such as school crime, gang activity, weapons in schools, and violence. The NSSC provides training

and support for educators to address these concerns, conducts onsite assessments of school safety, compiles statistics and research on safety topics, and tries to mobilize politicians and the community to address the issues. The NSSC published the School Safety News Journal and School Safety Update, which published several articles and special editions about guns in school. They still publish books, resource papers, and videos that address particular safety topics. The NSSC works at the local, state, and national levels for legislation that make schools safer. Its executive director testifies regularly before congressional committees on school crime and youth violence prevention. The NSSC has been a strong supporter of gun-free school zones. G. Edward Richards and John W. Dietrich See also: Gun-Free School Laws; School Shootings; Youth and Guns

Further Reading Butterfield, George E., and Brenda Turner. Weapons in Schools. Malibu, CA: NSSC, 1989. National School Safety Center. http://www .schoolsafety.us/home (accessed March 14, 2011).

National Self-Defense Survey on Carrying Guns. See Kleck, Gary National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) Founded in 1961, the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) promotes recreational hunting and sport shooting. It is the largest trade association for the shooting,



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hunting, and firearms industry—whose members include manufacturers, distributors, and retailers of firearms, ammunition, and shooting accessory equipment. More than 5,500 companies and organizations belong to the NSSF. It also represents the hunting and shooting sports industry through one of its major divisions, the National Association of Firearms Dealers. Since 1979, most funding for the NSSF’s programs and activities comes from the NSSF-owned industry trade show, the SHOT SHOW (National Shooting Sports Foundation 2011b). The NSSF’s headquarters are in Riverside, Connecticut. Early in its history, the organization focused its efforts on public outreach to inform a growing urbanized public about the sport shooting community’s role in conservation and wildlife management. One of its first major efforts was the creation of National Hunting and Fishing Day. Inaugurated in 1973, this annual celebration is held on the fourth Saturday of September and continues to this day (NHFD 2011). In the early 1980s, the organization began aggressively promoting the sport of “shooting clays.” Among its successes was getting ESPN to televise the Sportsman’s Team Challenge; the telecasts were made through the 1990s. Promotional efforts also included the inauguration of the Scholastic Clay Target Program, aimed at students and the younger generation. The NSSF is actively engaged in lobbying and informing its membership and the wider public about legal, regulatory, and legislative issues involving the rights of gun owners. For example, the organization sponsored a national media campaign designed to correct what the organization believed were misperceptions about Colt AR-15 and related rifles. Some gun control

groups have held up the AR-15 as an example of a military-style “assault weapon,” but the NSSF campaign emphasized that most AR-15s have been and are used in sport shooting competitions (National Shooting Sports Foundation 2011a). The NSSF also cooperates with law enforcement agencies. For example, the organization partners with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives and the Office of Justice Programs to assist law enforcement in educating firearms retailers to better identify and thus deter illegal “straw purchases”—and to raise public awareness that straw purchasing is a serious crime. The “Don’t Lie for the Other Guy” program and retailer kits are designed to halt individuals with no criminal records from procuring firearms for convicted felons and others barred by federal law from buying or possessing guns. In a related cooperative effort, the NSSF works with the U.S. Department of Justice to fund the distribution of millions of cable and related trigger locks through Project Homesafe/ Childsafe. Sean Maddan See also: Black Market for Firearms; Hunting; National Association of Firearms Retailers (NAFR); Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturer’s Institute (SAAMI); Target Shooting

Further Reading National Shooting Sports Foundation. http:// www.nssf.org (accessed January 22, 2011). National Shooting Sports Foundation. “Background Information on So-Called ‘Assault Weapons.’” 2011a. http://www.nssf.org/fact sheets/semi-auto.cfm (accessed December 21, 2011). National Shooting Sports Foundation. “SHOT Show: Where the Industry Comes Together”

648 | National Student Safety and Security Conference (NSSSC) (event website). 2011b. http://www.shot show.org/ (accessed June 21, 2011). NHFD. “National Hunting and Fishing Day.” 2011. http://www.nhfday.org/Page/About -Us.html (accessed January 22, 2011).

National Student Safety and Security Conference (NSSSC) In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the United States experienced an onslaught of mass school shootings—including those at Littleton, Colorado (Columbine High School); Santee, California; Springfield, Oregon; Pearl, Mississippi; West Paducah, Kentucky; Jonesboro, Arkansas; Edinboro, Pennsylvania; Richmond, Virginia; and Conyers, Georgia. Though the number of school shootings has decreased in recent years, other forms of violence still occur on a regular basis in U.S. schools. Especially common are bullying and crimes related to gang activity (including theft and assault). To combat all forms of school violence, the National Student Safety and Security Conference (NSSSC) was organized in the fall of 2007. The goal of the NSSSC’s organizers centered on developing effective models to mobilize communities to work with schools to curb campus violence. The NSSSC’s first annual meeting was held in Las Vegas, Nevada, in November 2007. Although the organization’s development had been in the works for some time, it was prompted to hold its first conference that November in response to the mass shooting that had occurred at Virginia Tech earlier in the year. The 300plus participants included faculty, school administrators, law enforcement, emergency first responders, safety experts, and community leaders. The participants shared experiences, training, and enforcement strategies

for curbing violence. Particular topics included how to identify troubled students; assessing security infrastructure; developing and testing emergency response plans; closing down schools during crisis situations; legal-responsibility issues; and postcrisis recovery. In subsequent annual meetings, the NSSSC extended its topics to include teenage suicide, alcohol and drug abuse, and aggressive driving. Sean Maddan See also: Columbine High School Shooting; Gun-Free School Laws; Guns in the Home; National School Safety Center (NSSC); School Shootings; Virginia Tech Shooting; Youth and Guns

Further Reading National Student Safety and Security Conference. http://www.safetyissues.com/site /school (accessed January 22, 2011).

National Tracing Center (NTC) The National Tracing Center (NTC) of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) is the country’s only facility that traces the origins and ownership of recovered guns used in crimes. The NTC attempts to follow the gun from its origin at the manufacturer or importer, through its distribution at the wholesale and retail levels, to the initial retail purchaser. The NTC is also the repository for records of multiple gun sales, guns stolen from dealers, and out-of-business records of former federally licensed dealers. The volume of gun traces was relatively low until the mid-1990s, but the spread of comprehensive gun-tracing programs such as the Youth Crime Gun Interdiction Initiative (YCGII) and new applications of technology allowed



the NTC to more than quadruple the number of requests handled annually in just a few years. By fiscal year 2009, the NTC was processing more than 340,000 requests from both domestic and international law enforcement agencies. The tracing data is used in investigating specific crimes, trying to establish patterns of gun sales that can aid investigations of gun traffickers, and, more controversially, producing statistics on gun usage. Some observers have suggested that gun trace statistics are an invalid measure of overall gun usage, a danger to ongoing police investigations, and a political tool of gun control groups, and so have supported a series of legislative actions led by Rep. Todd Tiahrt (R-KS) that limit the public release of gun trace statistics. Therefore, though police still have access to trace information, most research and other commentary uses publicly released data dating from the 1990s. The earliest applications of gun tracing date to 1934, when Congress passed legislation requiring individuals to register all Prohibition-era “gangster weapons.” Largescale tracing was not possible, however, until the Gun Control Act of 1968 established several new record-keeping requirements. Four years later, the ATF began its first major tracing efforts. By the early 1990s, the ATF was processing roughly 50,000 trace requests a year, with an average response time of nearly two weeks. Today, the NTC handles many times more requests annually, but has significantly reduced the processing time and is increasingly using technology that allows real-time tracing. Requests come not only from U.S. law enforcement agencies but also from agencies in more than thirty other countries that have signed memorandums of understanding with the ATF to trace U.S. guns spreading globally.

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To initiate a search, law enforcement officials submit either an urgent request, if the weapon was used in a crime of violence or when the trace information may be essential in obtaining a search warrant or in holding a suspect, or a routine trace request. Requests may be submitted by telephone, facsimile, mail, or now online through the eTrace submission system. ATF forms request a description of the gun, the serial number, the names of individuals possessing or associated with the gun, the recovery location, and the underlying offense that led to the gun’s recovery. The NTC then uses the gun’s serial number or other available information to trace the gun’s history. Once a gun has been traced, the information is retained in the computer system. Starting in 1996, the ATF began the YCGII as a pilot program to comprehensively trace all guns recovered by police in seventeen selected major cities around the country. The idea of comprehensive tracing, as opposed to earlier policies of tracing only guns used in homicides or other specific crimes, quickly became a popular tool in addressing gun trafficking. This growing popularity along with expansions of the YCGII greatly increased trace requests and allowed the ATF to use trace data in new ways. The ATF developed Project Lead, an automated system that analyzes the NTC’s data to establish patterns in gun trafficking, such as whether a number of weapons used in crimes came from a single licensed dealer or a single purchaser. This information has been used in hundreds of ATF and local investigations. The ATF also published annual summaries of the tracing data, providing statistics on such issues as the age of gun possessors, the preferred weapons of criminals, the ways criminals acquired their guns, and how much time elapsed between a gun’s purchase and its use in a crime.

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A second major development in the 1990s was the NTC’s strong commitment to new technologies to speed up the tracing process and increase the number of successful traces. In addition to permitting electronic filing of trace requests, ATF developed an online version of Project Lead, which enables ATF agents in the field to get realtime access to information. The ATF also sped up the return of trace reports by using electronic files over a secure network. Additionally, the ATF contracted out to Kodak to microfilm and index 60 million records from out-of-business dealers. When comprehensive tracing began, only guns purchased after 1990 could be traced, but this new system makes it possible for the NTC to more quickly and accurately trace older firearms. This system was considered so successful that it received a Hammer Award from Vice President Al Gore’s reinventing government office for its contributions to National Performance Review Principles. Reduced processing time and the ability to trace older weapons have solved two of the NTC’s long-standing issues, but it still faces some limitations. The NTC can usually trace weapons as far as the initial purchaser, but because federal law does not require unlicensed dealers or private sellers to maintain transfer records, and because many guns used in crimes are stolen, traded, or acquired through straw purchasers, the NTC often cannot trace how a criminal got final access to a weapon or who has owned it recently. Still, NTC information can be useful both in giving investigators new leads in specific cases and in establishing some patterns of gun movement over time. Another major limitation in tracing is the obliteration of a gun’s serial number or other gaps in available information. Obliteration is a clear indication that, at some

point, the gun was in the possession of a person with a premeditated intent to commit a crime. The NTC has developed techniques to try to restore obliterated serial numbers and begin traces even with only a partial number. The NTC also can try to trace the weapon through other means, such as the Integrated Ballistics Identification System, which matches projectile and shell casing ballistic evidence in a national database. Incomplete or inaccurately reported information on manufacturer, seller, or law enforcement forms is also a major barrier. Given these and other limitations, the NTC did not initiate a trace for 12.8 percent of the trace requests in 2000. For those guns that were traced, the NTC identified initial retail purchasers for slightly more than half of all guns used in crimes. Even if it is unable to trace the weapon at all, the NTC encourages law enforcement officials to submit informational traces to record gun type, possessors, and recovery locations. The ATF preformed some analysis of NTC findings, gave several scholars access to data, and publicly released some information in the late 1990s. This work advanced several variables as indicators of gun trafficking. A 2000 ATF publication on Commerce in Firearms reported that while 86 percent of federally licensed gun dealers had no crime gun traces in 1998, 1.2 percent of the dealers were responsible for more than half of all crime gun traces. It was suggested that at least some of the high-tracecount dealers were engaged in trafficking. Researchers also focused on the time between a gun’s sale and its use in a crime and suggested that short “time-to-crime” was an indication of trafficking. Guns with out-of-state origins, particularly those moving from states with comparatively lax gun laws to states and cities with tight requirements, were seen as more likely to have



been trafficked. Guns sold as part of multiple handgun purchases were suggested to be cases in which straw purchasers were buying guns in bulk to hand over to blackmarket dealers. Finally, guns with obliterated serial numbers were considered very likely to have been trafficked. Collectively, these findings gave insight into the gun market and suggested that there might be ways to limit crime gun supply through further sales regulations. The data was therefore frequently cited by those suggesting or defending gun control legislation as well as by cities and others suing the gun industry for negligence and public nuisance. Other scholars and politicians challenged the use and further public release of NTC data. One main contention is that guns traced are not a representative sample of all crime guns, since many crime guns are never recovered by police. Additionally, even of those recovered, many are not sent to the NTC for tracing; and among those submitted to the NTC, not all are successfully traced. Therefore, NTC results are based on a small subset of all crime guns. Critics also question most of the variables suggested to be related to trafficking. For example, dealers with high trace counts may simply be large dealers or ones that sell guns in high-crime areas where they are more likely to be stolen from a legitimate buyer and then used in a crime through no fault of the retail seller or buyer. Some of these critics, as well as police organizations and the ATF, also suggested that releasing data could impede ongoing police investigations by tipping off criminals that certain traces were being conducted. This idea had been a major point of contention in the evidence allowable in several lawsuits begun by the cities of Chicago and New York. The rise of civil lawsuits and view that NTC data was being misused to support

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gun control goals were clear factors that led Rep. Tiahrt to initiate efforts to limit the release of trace data. From 2003 to 2008, Tiahrt Amendments were added to appropriations bills. In 2010, language was included in actual bill text, making it permanent law. The exact wording of the restrictions changed each year in response to lobbying and court rulings, but the essence remained that trace data should be released only to police officials. The language did not explicitly bar the ATF from releasing aggregated statistical data free of specific names, and after 2008, legislative language explicitly said the ATF could release such data. Still, the ATF has not released a major analysis of trace data since 2002. John W. Dietrich See also: Ballistic Identification System; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF); Gun Control Act of 1968; Youth Crime Gun Interdiction Initiative (YCGII)

Further Reading Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. ATF Crime Gun Trace Analysis Reports: The Illegal Youth Firearms Markets in 27 Communities. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of the Treasury, 1999. http://www.atf.gov/publications/historical /ycgii/ycgii-report-1999.html (accessed February 20, 2011). Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Crime Gun Trace Reports (2000). Washington, DC: U.S. Department of the Treasury, 2002. http://www.atf.gov /publications/download/ycgii/1999/ycgii -report-1999-cover.pdf (accessed February 20, 2011). Greco, Joseph P. “Pattern Crimes.” FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin 67 (1998): 6–13: h t t p : / / w w w 2 .f bi .gov / p u bl ic a t io n s / leb/1998/sept98.pdf (accessed February 20, 2011).

652 | National Violent Death Reporting System

National Violent Death Reporting System The first step in addressing any public health problem is collecting data that help describe the extent and nature of the problem. This requires the ongoing and systematic collection of comprehensive health information. Although limited data on firearm fatalities were available from vital statistics (e.g., the age and gender of victims) and from crime databases (e.g., on the victim-perpetrator relationship), until recently, the United States did not have an adequate data system on intentional injury generally and firearm injury in particular. National data were not being systematically assembled on the circumstances associated with firearm suicides or unintentional gunshot fatalities, or on the characteristics of the firearms used to inflict any type of injury. The enormous benefits that can be provided by a national injury data system are well known from the motor vehicle area. For every motor vehicle fatality, more than a hundred pieces of information are collected—including the make and model of the vehicle, vehicular speed, speed limit, seat belt use, and alcohol involvement— consistently across all fifty states. These data are part of the Fatality Analysis Reporting System operated by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and are made available to researchers at no cost. Studies using such data have established the effects of driver behavior, vehicle characteristics, and environmental conditions on collision frequency and severity. The data have permitted the scientific evaluation of a wide variety of interventions, including drunk-driver legislation, child restraint laws, mandatory belt-use laws, revised speed limits, vehicle crash survivability

standards, motorcycle helmet laws, vehicle inspection laws, minimum age drinking laws, driver education programs, driver licensing restrictions, no-fault automobile insurance, and right-turn-on-red laws. In contrast to discussions about U.S. motor vehicle policy, debates about firearm policy have been driven more by rhetoric than by fact. In part, this is because comprehensive national information about firearm injuries did not exist, so many policy questions in the firearm area were unanswerable. Only now are we beginning to systematically collect information on such issues as the temporal trends in the proportion of gun-related deaths from small, cheap handguns, whether certain types of guns are used preferentially by adolescents to commit crime, or whether there are particular characteristics common to guns involved in unintended shootings of children. A good national violent injury data system is crucial for answering such questions like these, as well as providing critical data for the evaluation of child access protection laws, assault weapons bans, one-gun-per-month laws, and other regulations. An initial step toward the creation of a national firearm injury data system occurred in 1994 when funding from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) led to the development or enhancement of more than a half dozen firearm surveillance systems, primarily at state health departments. Unfortunately, federal funding for the system was withdrawn in 1997. Fortunately, in the late 1990s, seven foundations, led by the Joyce Foundation and the Open Society Institute, provided financial support to the Harvard Injury Control Research Center to create a prototype for such a system. In key decisions, the system was limited to fatalities rather



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than all shootings, and broadened to include all violent deaths (suicides and homicides), whether or not they involved firearms. As the majority of both suicides and homicides were firearm-related, this latter decision did not substantially increase the cost of the system, but did provide more complete information for scientific analysis, and also made the system more politically palatable. The NVDRS does not require the collection of any new data. Instead, it assembles data already collected from four sources: (1) death certificates, (2) medical examiner/coroner reports, (3) police reports, and (4) crime lab information on the firearm. These data are coded in a consistent manner across sites and over time to ensure comparability. In the early 2000s, the prototype was handed off to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). As of 2010, eighteen states are funded by the CDC to assemble the relevant information. Data summaries are currently available from the CDC (2020). More complete data are available to researchers on request. NVDRS data have already been used by state practitioners and by researchers. For example, when the Oregon NVDRS found that over one-third of older adults who died by suicide had visited a physician in the preceding month, the state launched a plan to improve physicians’ skills in identifying and treating potentially suicidal older adults. Researchers discovered that the vital statistics system misreports many unintentional firearm fatalities—for example, underreporting deaths to children shot accidentally by friends and family. It is crucial to have accurate information, now provided by the NVDRS, to determine the actual effects of firearms policies. The federal government needs to provide support for

all fifty states to have a complete NVDRS system. David Hemenway See also: Accidents; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Motor Vehicle Laws as a Model for Gun Laws; Suicide, Guns and

Further Reading Azrael, Deborah, Catherine Barber, and James Mercy. “Linking Data to Save Lives: Recent Progress in Establishing a National Violent Death Reporting System.” Harvard Health Policy Review 2 (2001): 38–42. Barber, Catherine, and David Hemenway. “Too Many or Too Few Unintentional Firearm Deaths in Official U.S. Mortality Data?” Accident Analysis and Prevention 43 (2011): 724–31. Barber, Catherine, David Hemenway, Stephen Hargarten, Arthur Kellerman, Deborah Azrael, and Susan Wilt. “A “Call to Arms” for a National Surveillance System on Firearm Injuries.” American Journal of Public Health 90 (2000): 1191–93. CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention). “WISQARS™—Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System.” Wikipedia, 2020. Last modified December 2, 2021. https://www.cdc.gov/injury/wisqars /index.html (accessed July 1, 2022). Hemenway, David, Catherine W. Barber, Susan S. Gallagher, and Deborah R. Azrael. “Creating a National Violent Death Reporting System: A Successful Beginning.” American Journal of Preventive Medicine 37 (2009): 68–71. Paulozzi, Leonard, James A. Mercy, Leroy Frazier Jr., and Joseph L. Annest. “CDC’s National Violent Death Reporting System: Background and Methodology.” Injury Prevention 10 (2004):47–52. Weiss, Hank, Maria Gutiérrez, James Harrison, and R. Matzopoulos. “The US National Violent Death Reporting System: Domestic and International Lessons for Violence Injury Surveillance.” Injury Prevention 12 (2006): ii58–ii62.

654 | Native Americans and Gun Violence

Native Americans and Gun Violence Firearms played an important role in the warfare between whites and Native Americans that led to the white conquest of North America. Today, conflicts continue involving white attempts to suppress gun ownership by Native Americans. Like horses, guns were brought to North America by Europeans. Perhaps the first major battle involving firearms and Native Americans was fought in 1609 at Ticonderoga, New York. There, the Mohawk (an Iroquois tribe) were defeated by an alliance of Huron, Montagnais, Ottawa, and French. The French, commanded by Samuel de Champlain, were armed with the harquebus (a shoulder firearm whose muzzle rested on a forked stick for support, and which was fired by applying a match to the gunpowder in the “touch-hole”). The thunder and smoke that firearms produced made them especially impressive psychologically. As ethnologist John C. Ewers (1967) notes: “Indians gained a respect for the old muzzle-loading, smoothbore trade musket which was all out of proportion to its effectiveness as a lethal instrument.” Meriwether Lewis’s travel diary recounts an August 17, 1805, meeting with some far-western Indians: “I also shot my air-gun which was so perfectly incomprehensible that they immediately denominated it the great medicine.” The Mandan developed a ceremony for consecrating firearms, and some tribes, such as the Crow, would attribute their success or failure in battles with firearms to the magical effects of good or bad medicine, rather than to marksmanship or tactics. (Lest these views be considered primitive, one might note that in 1989, a Denver priest

said that guns were “demons.” People on both sides of the U.S. gun control debate sometimes anthropomorphize objects that are nothing more than assemblies of metal and wood.) As different waves of Europeans arrived in North America, each took distinct approaches to relating to the Native Americans, including whether to trade guns with them. The Dutch settling in New Netherland (now lower New York State) came from one of history’s greatest trading empires. The Dutch of the Hudson River Valley bartered guns to the Mohawk tribes in exchange for beaver pelts. The firearms helped the Mohawk considerably in their wars with the Algonquian. In 1643, some of the Mohawk launched a two-year war against Dutch settlements, but took care to spare the Hudson communities that continued to sell guns to the Native Americans. In 1648, the directors of the Dutch West India Company had observed that the Indians were so determined to obtain firearms that they would start a war if the trade were cut off. The directors suggested that private firearm trading with Native Americans be outlawed, except that the Dutch West India Company would be allowed to sell small quantities to Native Americans. (This would not be the last time that a firearm-selling company would propose gun controls in the name of public safety, and that also would suppress the company’s competitors.) The Dutch attempted to license gun traders in 1650, with a view to shutting off the supply. The Dutch West India Company protested, arguing that Native Americans would pay a black-market price so high that controls were impossible. In 1656, the government decreed that settlers could possess only matchlock rifles; modern flintlock



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rifles, which were more reliable and easier and faster to fire, were banned. A death penalty for selling guns to the Native Americans was enacted, but the laws failed to stop the trade. No matter what the Dutch did, the Native Americans had a ready supply of guns from the French. Based in Canada, the French penetrated deep into the interior of the continent and traded firearms as they went. One firearm, usually a musket, was worth 20 beaver pelts. The main partners of the French were the Ottawa (whose name means “to trade”), who brought guns even deeper into North America and shared the French prosperity—much to the annoyance of their rivals, the Iroquois. In the early seventeenth century, the Iroquois nations allied with the Dutch settlers in the Hudson Valley and with the nearby British to buy guns. By midcentury, the Iroquois were heavily armed and began a sixty-year campaign called the Beaver Wars to destroy the trade of France and her Native American allies, especially the Ottawa. The Iroquois’s main objective was to replace the Ottawa as middlemen trading western beaver pelts for European guns. The French and Ottawa prevailed, however, and their trade continued to expand. The victory in war with the Iroquois confirmed to the governor of New France, the Comte de Frontenac, that friendship with Native American traders was the best policy. Building an empire of commerce that stretched deep into what would become the Louisiana Territory, Frontenac did everything possible to supply the Native Americans with guns. Because guns made big-game hunting so much more profitable, and because many Native American tribes were involved in wars with each other, firearms were the most valuable commodity a

European could offer. The French explorer La Salle observed: “The savages take better care of us French than of their own children. From us only can they get guns and goods.” Frontenac’s policy was the right one for France. Unlike the English (and later the Americans), the French were not settling the land with immigrant farmers. Trade was what they wanted, and the sparse population necessary for trading throughout the Louisiana Territory and Canada did not threaten the Native Americans. Thanks to the success of commerce with the Native Americans, the French, coming down from Canada, reached western Pennsylvania and Ohio before English settlers from the Atlantic Coast found their way through the gaps in the Appalachian Mountains. Exploring the southern part of North America, the Spaniards adopted the opposite policy from the French and enslaved the Native Americans to expand the Spanish Empire. In 1501, only nine years after the discovery of the New World by Spain’s navigator Christopher Columbus, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella banned the sale of guns to Native Americans. Many Florida and southwest Native Americans, though, stole guns from the Spanish or bought them from the trading network linked to the French. The enslaved Pueblo of New Mexico acquired and hoarded guns one at a time. They revolted in 1680, and Pueblo attacks in the next sixteen years killed hundreds of whites, pushing white settlement out of Santa Fe and all the way back to El Paso. In the 1750s, Comanche raiders, using guns supplied by the French, forced Spain to abandon northern Texas. When the guns were not going into Spanish territory, the Spanish realized that gun trade with Native Americans could be in Spain’s interest. For example, Spanish

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Florida supplied firearms to the Native Americans of the Gulf Plain to be used to harass white American settlers in Georgia and Alabama. Sometimes the English colonizers followed a policy similar to the Spanish. In 1641, the British Crown ordered that no person should give the Native Americans “any weapons of war, either guns or gunpowder, nor sword, nor any other Munitions, which might come to be used against ourselves.” But despite the Crown’s orders, many merchants in the diverse North American colonies found trade with the Native Americans advantageous. Soon enough, though, the British were trading guns with tribes in Illinois and the rest of what would become the Northwest Territory. As trouble with the American colonists worsened, the British saw the advantage

of arming the Indians to attack the encroaching American farmers and backwoodsmen. With Native Americans who did not pose an immediate threat to Britain’s interests, the arms trade thrived. When the British did cut off the arms trade, as they did in the Great Lakes region in 1763, the Native Americans were outraged. Chief Pontiac— acting on the advice of a prophet who preached that guns should be rejected as evil instruments of the whites—organized the Ottawa and nine other tribes into a confederacy that annihilated numerous English frontier posts in the west. But the Native Americans were incapable of carrying out sustained warfare, and when English reinforcements arrived, the Native Americans retreated to Illinois. The invention, refinement, and growing sales of reliable revolvers by Col. Samuel

Modoc Indians battle from the lava beds during the Modoc Indian War in California, 1873. (Library of Congress)



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Colt in the 1830s and 1840s brought a major change to white warfare with the Native Americans. Almost all guns invented before the revolver needed to be reloaded after every shot; the few guns that could hold three or more rounds (such as the “pepperbox”) were awkward. With the mass production of Colt’s revolving handguns, whites gained massive firepower superiority over Native Americans. The first major application of Colt technology was in Texas; there, Native Americans on horseback could launch arrows at a higher rate than settlers could fire and reload single-shot rifles. Moreover, a rifle was heavy and difficult to discharge from horseback. With Colt revolvers, Texans could exceed the Native Americans’ rate of fire and could shoot while mounted. The leap in technology from single-shot guns to the revolver was of far greater significance than subsequent refinements of multishot weapons. According to historian Carl Russell (1957), the “Colt is strongly in evidence as the arm which marked the turning point in Indian warfare in the Far West by giving the white man superiority.” The gun had been what the Native Americans had wanted in trade with the whites. But the gun, so potent at first for the Native Americans, had become their undoing. “The gun had a greater influence in changing the primitive ways of the Indians than any other object brought to America by the white man,” Russell says. The spread of French guns into Louisiana Territory changed relations among the many tribes. Warfare was already endemic. The French trade shifted the balance of power to tribes that could get guns, and it set all tribes on a feverish arms-trading race. Moreover, tribes that lived near the encroaching English faced “the choice of buying guns to defend themselves, or else being killed or enslaved.”

Guns were used for more than war. Especially for the Plains tribes, the combination of guns and horses (brought to the New World by the Spanish) engendered a new era of material prosperity. Hunting and survival became much easier, and the standard of living skyrocketed. George Bancroft ([1875] 1967), in his History of the United States of America, from the Discovery of the Continent (written over several decades in the middle of the nineteenth century), explained: “Every Indian of today excels his ancestors in skill, in power over nature, and in knowledge; the gun, the knife, and the horse, of themselves, made a revolution in his condition and the current of his ideas.” Nevertheless, the firearm remained a symbol of white superiority. Most tribes did not know how to make gunpowder. Although Native Americans became adept at firing the guns, they still could not manufacture or repair them. A malfunctioning rifle was apt to be coerced with fire, water, and brute force. Weapons were also destroyed through neglect and lack of maintenance. Although Native Americans mastered the breeding and care of horses, the manufacture and repair of firearms were beyond the grasp of a people who had been using Stone Age technology. Moreover, the gun trade itself drew the Native Americans into an economically dependent relationship with the whites. Firearms were, of course, the weapons most used by whites to kill Native Americans. For example, at the 1864 Sand Creek Shooting in Colorado, 70 to 600 Cheyenne were killed. At the Washita River in 1868, 103 were killed. At Bear River in 1863, 250 Shoshoni died. At the famous Wounded Knee Shooting in 1890, 146 were killed. As Native Americans faced defeat, prophets would sometimes arise. By returning to the old ways, the prophets said—to the ways

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before the gun and whites and the technology that could never be mastered—the tribes could restore harmony with the spirits. An essential teaching of these prophets was that Native Americans should not use firearms. The spiritual rejection of firearms and other white technologies was first preached by a Delaware in 1764 and taken up by Pontiac in his efforts to unite all eastern tribes to push the whites into the sea. Half a century later, as the whites were conquering the upper Midwest, the mystic Tenskwatawa implored the tribes of the Northwest Territory to reject firearms, alcohol, textiles, and other evils introduced by the Europeans. The mystic’s half-brother, Tecumseh, organized tribes from Alabama to North Carolina to Canada in a grand alliance to stop white expansion. Tecumseh disdained firearms because the explosions frightened the deer. Practicality intervened, though, and the prophecy was elaborated to allow guns for fighting the whites but not for hunting, and eventually the taboo against firearms was fully lifted. In any case, Tecumseh, like Pontiac before him, could not drive the whites away, with or without firearms. At the end of the nineteenth century, the Lakota Sioux danced the Ghost Dance. Wearing their muslin “ghost shirts” and praying for a revival of the “old buffalo days,” they believed they could become immune from bullets. Faith in the Ghost Dance’s vision of the imminent destruction of the whites led many Sioux to abandon the reservations and head for the Badlands of South Dakota. They lived outside of federal authority for several months, until starvation forced them to return to reservation life and meager rations from the whites. At Wounded Knee, the Seventh Cavalry disarmed one group as Colonel James Forsyth ordered, “Now you tell Big Foot [a chief] he need have no fear in giving up the weapons

I know his people have, as I wish to treat them with nothing but kindness.” As the Sioux were surrendering their guns, the Seventh Cavalry opened fire, massacring men, women, and children. The failure of the ghost shirts to provide protection destroyed faith in the Ghost Dance. Several thousand other Sioux, seeing the shooting, kept up an armed resistance for several weeks longer, but they eventually surrendered due to starvation. The Sioux rebellion was the last effort at armed resistance to the White invasion. During the Indian wars, state governments made various attempts to suppress arms possession by Native Americans. Even after the complete defeat of the Native Americans, there were efforts to prohibit gun possession by Native Americans. In the late nineteenth century, for example, Colorado made it a felony for anyone to give a gun to a Native American; the statute remained Colorado law for well over half a century. Currently, no states formally forbid Native Americans to possess guns. Indian writer David Yeagley (quoted in Poe 2001, 212–13) explains the role of firearms today: Weapons are an integral part of our culture. In Indian country, it’s taken for granted that everyone shoots and hunts. . . . Among Indians, the weapon is a symbol of honor. . . . It was the women who taught Comanche boys how to use their weapons. Long before anyone ever heard of Xena the Warrior Princess, a woman called the “adiva,” or governess, ran the Comanche training camps. Americans nowadays seem to be forgetting what it means to be a warrior. They don’t value preparedness. They think the government will always be there to defend them from

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enemies and criminals. But that’s not the Indian way. That’s not the way of a man. A study by the Bureau of Justice Statistics of violent crimes from 1993 to 1998 revealed the following victimization patterns of American Indians and other races: When a Native American was a victim of a violent crime, the perpetrator used a gun 9 percent of the time. This compares to 8 percent for white victims, 18 percent for Black victims, and 14 percent for Asian victims (Rennison 2001). Based on data from 1976 to 1996, 28 percent of Native American murder victims were killed with a handgun, compared to 50 percent of murder victims of other races. Seventeen percent of Indian murder victims were killed with a long gun, compared to 11 percent of other races (Greenfield and Smith 1999). In both the United States and Canada, Indian reservations sometimes have become centers of armed resistance to white control. For example, during the spring and summer of 1990, Mohawk Indians led by the Mohawk Warrior Society armed themselves with semiautomatic Kalashnikov rifles and other weapons and seized part of the town of Oka, near Montreal, Quebec, Canada, to prevent the expansion of a golf course and housing project into a pine forest that was Mohawk ancestral land and held the Pine Tree Cemetery. In addition to Kalashnikovs, the Mohawks had Fabrique Nationale semiautomatics, high-powered hunting rifles, shotguns, a variety of handguns, RPK machine guns, Molotov cocktails and other homemade explosives, and a large number of booby traps. After the Mohawks repulsed a raid by the Sûreté de Québec (the provincial police), Quebec premier Robert Bourassa requested the intervention of the federal army because his provincial force was

outgunned by the Indians. The Mohawks considered themselves the legitimate armed forces of a sovereign nation defending their territory from attack. After some skirmishing, the federal government agreed to buy the golf course and give it to the Mohawks, and the Mohawks surrendered, ending the seventy-seven-day siege. A similar siege took place in upstate New York, where Mohawks seized and held an abandoned girls’ camp near Moss Lake from 1974 to 1977, forcing the state government to lease them two tracts of land near Plattsburgh, New York. In Canada, Indians have strongly resisted new federal gun control laws, and many are refusing to register their guns in defiance of a 1995 law. At the 2000 annual meeting of the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples, the congress directed its leaders to oppose the Firearms Control Act. The Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations claims that a 1995 gun control law infringes treaties that guarantee First Nations the right to hunt as they did before the treaties and that entitle them to a perpetual supply of ammunition. David B. Kopel See also: Colt, Samuel; Frontier Violence; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; International Firearms Laws

Further Reading Bancroft, George. History of the United States of America, from the Discovery of the Continent. Reprint ed. Port Washington, NY: Kennikat Press, [1875] 1967. Carter, Gregg Lee. The Gun Control Movement. New York: Twayne, 1997. Ewers, John C. “The White Man’s Strongest Medicine.” Bulletin of the Missouri Historical Society 24 (1967): 36–46. Greenfield, Lawrence A., and Steven K. Smith. American Indians and Crime. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 1999.

660 | Needle-in-the-Haystack Problem Poe, Richard. The Seven Myths of Gun Control. Roseville, CA: Forum, 2001. Rennison, Callie. Violent Victimization and Race, 1993–98. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2001. Rummel, Rudolph J. Death by Government. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 1994. Russell, Carl P. Guns on the Early Frontiers. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1957. Silverman, David G. Thundersticks: Firearms and the Violent Transformation of Native America. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2016.

Natural Disasters and Gun Control. See Hurricane Katrina and Gun Control Needle-in-the-Haystack Problem As applied to gun control, the needle-inthe-haystack problem suggests that there are so many guns in the United States, and so few are used to commit crimes, that reducing the availability of firearms through broadly based gun regulation would not reduce criminals’ access to guns and thus would not reduce gun violence. In reviewing Under the Gun (Wright, Rossi, and Daly 1983) and Firearms and Violence (Kates 1984), Franklin E. Zimring appears to have first applied the old adage about the needle in the haystack to gun control and gun policy (1985). Zimring criticizes Wright and his colleagues for not analyzing specific gun control strategies and instead endorsing “‘a needle-in-the haystack’ perspective, the attempt to minimize the potential of gun regulation to reduce firearm-related violence because there are so many guns now in civilian

hands and only a small proportion of those are involved in criminal violence” (1985, 960). Arguing that 99 percent of all privately owned firearms are never used in crimes, the authors of Under the Gun suggest that the stock of guns is now adequate to supply all criminals for the next century, even if no new guns were manufactured. Kates’s estimates go even further. “If Under the Gun speaks of a ‘century’s supply’ of crime guns, Kates appears to up the ante to a millennium’s worth” (Zimring 1985, 963). Zimring and Hawkins (1987) criticize these proponents of the needle-in-thehaystack problem. First, they arrived at estimates of the criminal use of guns by dividing an estimate of all firearms in private hands by an estimate of how many criminal uses of guns occurred in one year. Zimring and Hawkins suggest that it is essential to examine the career risk of the use of guns in serious crimes or violent episodes, and they claim that this risk is probably under 10 percent. Second, those making the needle-in-the-haystack argument assume that all privately owned firearms are potentially available for criminals. This is not the case. Patterns of ownership are such that the vast majority of guns are just not available for use in crimes. Finally, some argue specifically against restricting access to handguns because they suggest that if criminals cannot get handguns, they will substitute more deadly rifles and shotguns. Zimring and Hawkins note the lack of an evidentiary basis for this assumption. Kleck (1997) discusses the needle-in-thehaystack problem in a more sophisticated fashion, noting that it presents problems for gun control measures aimed at the general public. Kleck notes that the percentage of privately owned guns used in crimes in one year is small, but, he acknowledges, “over a gun’s lifetime, the fraction of guns involved



in crime would necessarily be higher” (1997, 9). He argues that one set of assumptions leads to an estimate that “at most 6.7 percent of handguns sold in a given year would ever be involved in even one crime” (1997, 9). Using what he considers a more plausible set of assumptions, the figure would be under 2 percent. Regardless of which set of assumptions one accepts, the needle-in-the-haystack problem needs more investigation. Jeffrey Snyder (1997) notes that the “defensive gun use” debate would benefit from more data and less speculation. His point also holds for this problem. Even accepting the arguments of those who argue that the problem militates against the effectiveness of broad-based gun control aimed at the general public, the problem does not weaken arguments for gun control measures aimed at specific high-risk segments of the population. Walter F. Carroll See also: Acquisition of Guns; Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime; Black Market for Firearms; Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Gun Ownership; Kates, Don B., Jr.; Kleck, Gary; Weapons Instrumentality Effect; Wright, James D.; Zimring, Franklin E.

Further Reading Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. Guns in America: Results of a Comprehensive National Survey on Firearms Ownership and Use. Washington, DC: Police Foundation, 1996. Kates, Don B., Jr., ed. Firearms and Violence: Issues of Public Policy. Cambridge, MA: Ballinger, 1984. Kleck, Gary. Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1997. Snyder, Jeffrey R. Fighting Back: Crime, SelfDefense, and the Right to Carry a Handgun.

News Media and Gun Control | 661 Policy Analysis No. 284. Washington, DC: Cato Institute, 1997. https://www.issuelab .org/resources/495/495.pdf (accessed June 14, 2022). Wright, James D., Peter H. Rossi, and Kathleen Daly. Under the Gun: Weapons, Crime, and Violence in America. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1983. Zimring, Franklin E. “Book Review: Two New Books on Guns.” Michigan Law Review 83 (1985): 954–64. Zimring, Franklin E., and Gordon Hawkins. “Gun Ownership and Gun Control: On the Needle-in-the-Haystack and the Deadly Long Gun.” In The Citizen’s Guide to Gun Control, edited by Franklin E. Zimring and Gordon Hawkins, 93–96. New York: Macmillan, 1987.

Negligence Law and Gun Suits. See Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers News Media and Gun Control There has been much debate on the way the mainstream media represent the gun control issue, gun rights activists, and the National Rifle Association (NRA), especially among gun advocates. In general, the mainstream media are oriented far more toward gun control than gun rights. This does not mean that the media purposely disseminate false information. The ways in which they frame the issue toward pro-gun control are much more subtle. They do it through things such as selective coverage omission of relevant information. For example, the media rarely mention defensive uses of guns. They also fail to mention research that supports the gun advocate position, more often cite polling data that are pro-gun control, and downplay data supporting the gun advocate position. Other ways in which

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the media frame the debate toward gun control is through the choice of language (for example, “cop killer” bullets), one-sided expert opinion, and a lack of fact-checking. While some of this is due to resource and other constraints (noted below) on the media, there still appears to be an overemphasis on the “more control” side of the gun debate. Given the imbalanced coverage, the media help create a general worldview that guns are bad and dangerous, and that progun people should be looked at with caution and suspicion. A good example of this is the way in which the media report on the NRA and its members. Though the NRA’s rigid stance on gun control has not helped its public image, there does appear to be an imbalance in the way the NRA as a political action committee is described in the mainstream media when compared to other political action committees. It is described with different language (that is, more derogatorily), and its members more often referred to as lobbyists than other political action committees. In addition, coverage of the NRA is less often accompanied with a visual image, and members with extremist views are more often examined compared to other political action committees. This framing of gun advocates as zealots or as uninformed has led to a marginalization of their views in the mainstream media. The role of the news media in framing the gun control debate must be looked at in the context of the limitations of the way in which the mainstream media operate. The media are a business and, like all businesses, must make money to exist. Since 2000, most media outlets have become part of larger conglomerations, and many are run by nonmedia entities. Media organizations are held to the same standards as other nonmedia businesses in these conglomerations—they

must make money. Therefore, the general trend is toward reduced budgets for news gathering, a reduced workforce, less emphasis on critical inquiry, and more emphasis on increasing viewership—even at the expense of objectivity and balanced coverage. While there does seem to be an imbalance in the way that the media portray the two sides of the gun control issue, this should not be misconstrued as a calculated, liberal-leaning agenda of media organizations. The ultimate goal of a media organization is to make money. Selective exposure tells us that people tend to expose themselves to news and opinions that are congruent with their previously held beliefs. Therefore, the media tend not to challenge ingrained societal beliefs for fear of losing viewers (and thus not being able to charge as much for advertising). They tend not to be critical of issues such as gun control. A parallel example is sexuality on television. Though there is little substantial evidence that sex and sexuality on television has any serious detrimental effects, the debate in the media is essentially over. Much like the gun control issue, members of the media do not challenge the validity of statements made about the harmful effects of sexuality on television. They assume them to be true. That being said, negative media coverage and the overall public ignorance of the gun control issue has contributed to negative perceptions of gun advocates, gun rights, and the NRA. The media do not want to advocate or even present positively a position that would not resonate with the perceived worldview of their viewers. Though gun control has become a partisan issue, the negative framing of gun advocates by the media is much more complicated. Although many think it is overt bias by media organizations, this is not necessarily the case. General ignorance, the limitations of the



media, the focus on gaining a larger audience, and the perceived immorality of liking guns complicate the issue. Though the media should introduce new frames of discourse and provide a more balanced coverage of the issue, it is unlikely to do so under current economic realities. Kevin Pearce See also: Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Gun Control, Attitudes toward; Gun Lobby; More Guns, Less Crime Thesis; National Rifle Association (NRA)

Further Reading Callaghan, Karen, and Frank Schnell. “Assessing the Democratic Debate: How the News Media Frame Elite Policy Discourse.” Political Communication 18 (2001): 183–213. Downs, Douglas. “Representing Gun Owners: Frame Identification as Social Responsibility in News Media Discourse.” Written Communication 19 (2002): 44–75. Kleck, Gary. “Media Bias: Gun Control, Assault Weapons, Cop-Killer Bullets, the Goetz Case, and Other Alarms in the Night.” In The Great American Gun Debate: Essays on Firearms and Violence, edited by Don B. Kates Jr. and Gary Kleck, 53–92. San Francisco: Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy, 1997. Mauser, Gary A., and David B. Kopel. “Sorry, Wrong Number: Why Media Polls on Gun Control Are Often Unreliable.” Political Communication 9 (1992): 69–92. Moriarty, Laura J., and John E. Hearne. “Exploring the Relationship between Support for Gun Control Measures and Understanding of Gun Control Issue.” Journal of Security Administration 21 (1998): 12–27.

NICS Improvement Act The NICS Improvement Act was signed into law by President George W. Bush in 2008, less than one year after the Virginia

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Tech shooting. The mass shooting was committed by student Seung-Hui Cho, who used two firearms to kill 32 people and wounded many more on the campus of Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. Public and congressional discussion of gun control followed the shooting, with a specific focus on why Cho was able to purchase firearms despite his mental health record. The shooting brought national attention to the incomplete records contained in the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). The 1993 Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act required the creation of the NICS instant background check system within five years. In the interim, buyers were subject to a five-day waiting period while authorities conducted a background check. NICS records are used to certify that purchasers should not be disqualified for mental health reasons, felony convictions, misdemeanor domestic violence records, and more, as established in the Gun Control Act of 1968 and the Lautenberg Amendment (1997). Less than two months after the shootings, Representative Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY), a longtime gun control advocate, introduced the NICS Improvement Amendments Act of 2007 (H.R. 2640) to improve federal record keeping of ineligible gun buyers. Prior to the new legislation, most states did not provide the FBI with all of the necessary information to accurately check gun buyers’ eligibility. McCarthy’s bill was approved by voice vote in the U.S. House of Representatives two days after it was introduced, but did not proceed as quickly in the U.S. Senate. Gun rights advocates such as Gun Owners of America (GOA) raised concerns about the legislation, namely the issue of disability relief, or under what conditions

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previously disqualified individuals could regain their eligibility to purchase firearms after an adjudication process determined that they were no longer dangerous. The National Rifle Association (NRA) met privately with leading Democrats in Congress, including Representative John Dingell (D-MI), a former NRA board member, to lobby for changes to the bill. The negotiations resulted in several concessions in exchange for the NRA’s support. The final bill included the central provisions to improve NICS record keeping, in part by providing federal dollars in support of states’ efforts to maintain and submit the appropriate data. States could also receive punishments for noncompliance, including loss of funding for other programs. NRAnegotiated provisions included (1) a series of processes and requirements allowing opportunities for interested gun buyers previously deemed ineligible to seek disability relief, (2) correcting errors in the NICS database believed to deny eligible citizens from making purchases, and (3) preventing the FBI from charging fees to firearms sellers or buyers for the background checks. The NRA deemed the legislation “pro-gun,” and emphasized that the relief from disabilities provisions would ensure that people could have their gun rights restored as appropriate. However, not all gun rights groups were pleased with the outcome. The GOA and the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms were skeptical of any bill sponsored by gun control advocate Carolyn McCarthy, and contended that the new legislation would still prevent military veterans from obtaining mental health adjudications that would result in regaining their gun rights. They criticized the NRA for endorsing what was widely labeled as the first federal gun control legislation since the Assault Weapons Ban of 1994. The NRA argued

that the NICS Improvement Act was not a gun control act because it did not restrict the gun rights of anyone who was legally able to purchase a firearm prior to the new law. The NRA said its support of the legislation was consistent with the organization’s stance that criminals and those adjudicated as mentally defective should not have access to firearms. Further, NRA executive vice president Wayne LaPierre argued, “lawabiding” citizens and gun owners would benefit from the improvements offered by the new legislation (Conroy 2007). The revised bill also received mixed reviews from gun control groups. The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence supported the bill, touting its anticipated role in reducing future gun violence. Strengthening background checks, they argued, would prevent prohibited buyers from purchasing weapons and using them unlawfully. The Violence Policy Center, the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, and the Legal Community Against Violence disagreed, all warning that the changes negotiated by the NRA tarnished the legislation, resulting in a law that did too much for gun rights and too little for gun control. These and other critics noted that, after the most deadly single shooter attack in U.S. history, a Democratic-controlled Congress failed to produce restrictive gun control proposals let alone create restrictive gun control laws. Ultimately, the NICS Improvement Act was approved with overwhelming bipartisan support, due in no small part to its backing by gun debate adversaries the Brady Campaign and the NRA. The NICS Improvement Act offered the incredibly rare event whereby gun control and gun rights politicians and the most powerful and influential organizations for each respective cause agreed on a piece of gun legislation. Scott Melzer

See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Brady Legal; Brady: United against Gun Violence; Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA); Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV); Dingell, John D.; Gun Control Act of 1968; Gun Owners of America (GOA); LaPierre, Wayne R., Jr.; Lautenberg, Frank R.; McCarthy, Carolyn; National Instant Criminal Background Check System; National Rifle Association (NRA); Virginia Tech Shooting; Violence Policy Center (VPC); Waiting Periods

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Further Reading Bureau of Justice Statistics. “NICS Improvement Amendments Act of 2007.” http://bjs .ojp.usdoj.gov/index.cfm?ty=tp&tid= 49 (accessed May 31, 2011). Conroy, Scott. “NRA, Democrats Team Up to Pass Gun Bill.” CBS News, June 13, 2007. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories /2007 /06/13/politics/main2923101.shtml (accessed May 31, 2011). Melzer, Scott. Gun Crusaders: The NRA’s Culture War. New York: New York University Press, 2009.

O Obama, Barack(1961–)

disappointments for gun safety advocates. In May 2009, the president signed a credit card reform bill that included a provision allowing firearms to be carried in national parks. In December 2009, he signed an appropriations bill that included language reversing the post-9/11 ban on transporting guns in locked luggage on Amtrak trains. The White House also silenced Attorney General Eric Holder after he commented, in February 2009, that the administration supported reinstituting the federal Assault Weapons Ban. In terms of the political calculus involved, Obama’s timidity was not surprising. The president did not have the support in Congress—even among members of his own party—to pass gun safety legislation. As a consequence, the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence gave Obama a failing report card for his first year in office (O’Brien 2010). Following the January 2011 shooting in Tucson, AZ, which killed six people and injured nineteen others, including U.S. Representative Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ), Obama continued to largely ignore pressure from gun safety advocates to push for strong gun safety legislation. Just weeks after the event, he referenced the “tragedy in Tucson” in his State of the Union address, but did not make a case for policy reform, which the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (2011) decried as “cowardice.” In an op-ed published by the Arizona Daily Star that April, Obama took a consensus-building approach by offering vague goals, including better enforcement of gun laws and improving the background check system, while

Public mass shootings increased in frequency during President Barack Obama’s eight years in the White House. His two terms in office (2009–2017) were marked by more mass shooting events than had occurred during the three previous presidential administrations combined. Particularly noteworthy was Obama’s effort to use the power of the federal government to bring about substantial policy changes after the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in December 2012. Though small steps toward increasing gun safety resulted from these efforts, significant legislative reforms were consistently blocked by congressional Republicans, and some Democrats, during the Obama presidency. Obama supported limiting access to guns as a Democratic member of the Illinois State Senate (1997–2004) and the U.S. Senate (2005–2008), but downplayed the issue as a presidential candidate. For example, while his campaign website outlined his support for reinstituting the ban on assault weapons, closing the “gun show loophole,” and child safety locks, Obama did not actively campaign for these reforms. Obama’s ambiguity frustrated gun safety advocates, while still attracting attacks by the National Rifle Association (NRA). In 2008, the NRA dedicated more than $10 million to attack Obama, claiming that he would be “the most anti-gun president in American history” (NRA-ILA 2008). Despite the NRA’s concerns, Obama’s first years in office brought major 667

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Barack Obama, pictured here at an event in Denver, Colorado, on February 8, 2010, served as the 44th president of the United States. While being an open supporter of gun control regulations, his time in office was marked by little effort to enact such measures. (Bambi L. Dingman/Dreamstime.com)

assuring gun rights advocates that “there’s room for us to have reasonable laws that uphold liberty, ensure citizen safety and are fully compatible with a robust Second Amendment” (Obama 2011). In July 2012, thirteen people were killed and seventeen wounded when a shooter opened fire at a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado. In the wake of this shooting, Obama clarified his support for new gun laws and pledged to work across party lines to “arrive at a consensus” on how to reduce gun violence in the United States. However, he did not offer any specific legislative proposals. He also frustrated gun safety advocates by again reaffirmed his position supporting the constitutional right of individuals to own guns. One explanation for

his inaction is that making a strong case for reform, just months before the November election, would have risked putting his support in key battleground states—including Colorado—in jeopardy. The tenor and specificity of Obama’s rhetorical and policy responses changed in the wake of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, in December 2012, just weeks after his reelection. The event, which left twenty-six people dead, including twenty-six- and seven-year-old children, was a turning point in the president’s approach to the gun issue. Two days after the shooting, at an interfaith prayer vigil in Newtown, Obama stated: “We can’t tolerate this anymore. These tragedies must end. (. . .) No single law—no set of laws can eliminate evil from the world, or prevent every senseless act of violence in our society. But that can’t be an excuse for inaction” (quoted in Mechaber 2012). Obama immediately formed a GunViolence Working Group, headed by Vice President Joe Biden, which met twenty-two times, heard from 229 organizations, and delivered recommendations to the president by early January 2013 (Rucker and Wallsten 2013). Obama proclaimed, “I will put everything I’ve got into this,” and unveiled a plan that included twenty-three executive actions, including efforts to strengthen background checks, launch a national safe and responsible gun ownership campaign, and improving mental health care (Baker and Shear 2013). Obama’s plan also called on Congress to pass twelve legislative proposals that would go much further than his executive actions by closing purchasing loopholes and mandating universal background checks, banning the sale of assault weapons and large capacity magazines, and increasing penalties for gun trafficking (The White House 2013). These aggressive



efforts were universally praised by gun safety advocates. Most Republicans were critical and the NRA promised all-out opposition in preparation for what its chief executive, Wayne LaPierre, referred to as “the fight of the century” (MacAskill and Pilkington 2013). In early 2013, polls indicated that broad, bipartisan majorities existed in support of closing loopholes in the background check system (85%) and creating a federal database to track gun sales (67%). Smaller majorities backed a ban on semiautomatic weapons (58%), assault-style weapons (55%), and high-capacity magazines (54%) (Pew Research Center 2013). Yet, the Sandy Hook tragedy was not the galvanizing event for new gun safety policies that many expected it to be. One of Obama’s January 2013 executive actions directed the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to resume research into the causes and means to prevent gun violence, but the Republican-controlled House of Representatives blocked funding. A bill to ban assault weapons and large capacity ammunition magazines was introduced by Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) in late January 2013. It failed when all but one Republican senator was joined by fifteen Democrats and an Independent to defeat its passage in April 2013, which a visibly angry Obama referred to as a “shameful day” (O’Keefe and Rucker 2013). That same month, a bipartisan bill to require background checks for all commercial sales of guns, written by Joe Manchin (D-WV) and Pat Toomey (R-PA), secured a majority in the Senate but could not overcome a filibuster. Mass shootings during the Obama administration continued. Twelve people were killed in a shooting at the Navy Yard in Washington, DC, in September 2013. In April 2014, three were killed in a shooting

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at Fort Hood military base near Killeen, Texas, and three were killed at a Jewish Community Center shooting in Overland Park, Kansas. In June 2015, nine members of the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina, were killed. The next month, six people were killed in a shooting at two military centers in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and then ten were killed at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon, in October 2015. Fourteen people were killed in a shooting at an office holiday party in San Bernardino, California, in December 2015. Six people were randomly killed by an Uber driver in Kalamazoo, Michigan, in February 2016. Then, in June of that year, fortynine people were killed at the Pulse Nightclub in Orlando, Florida, in what was the deadliest mass shooting to date. “Somehow this has become routine,” Obama acknowledged after the 2015 shooting in Oregon. “The reporting has become routine. My response here, from this podium, has become routine.” His frustration, anger, and sadness with this cycle— each time met with legislative silence—was clear (Korte 2016). Though still portrayed by Congressional Republicans and the NRA as the “most anti-gun president ever,” Obama’s record on the gun issue was largely one of failure when he left office in January 2017. Despite his focus on the issue throughout his second term, his executive actions had very little effect, and he was unable to secure the passage of any new gun safety laws. After leaving office, Obama continued his advocacy for gun safety. He responded to the “senseless tragedy” in Las Vegas that left fifty-eight people dead and hundreds wounded in October 2017 and then again called for “long overdue, common-sense gun safety laws that most Americans want”

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after seventeen students, teachers, and staff were killed in the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, in February 2018 (Stracqualursi 2018). Richard Holtzman See also: Assault Weapons Ban, Renewal Attempts of; Aurora Theater Shooting; Biden, Joseph, Jr.; Charleston Church Shooting; Democratic Party and Gun Control; Giffords, Gabrielle; Gun Control; Mass Murder (Shootings); National Rifle Association (NRA); Pulse Nightclub Shooting; San Bernardino Shooting; Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting

Further Reading Baker, Peter, and Michael D. Shear. “Obama to ‘Put Everything I’ve Got’ into Gun Control.” New York Times, January 16, 2013. https://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/17/us/poli tics/obama-to-ask-congress-to-toughen -gun-laws.html (accessed May 27, 2020). Coalition to Stop Gun Violence. “The Latest (Cowardice) from the White House.” February 9, 2011. https://app.e2ma.net/app /view:CampaignPublic/id:1404253.6957 417978/rid:4739f85e938a168c0be4688597 0b2c76 (accessed July 18, 2011). Korte, Gregory. “14 Mass Shootings, 14 Speeches: How Obama Has Responded.” USA Today, June 12, 2016. https://www.usa tod ay.com /stor y /news /polit ics / 2016 /06/12/14-mass-shootings-14-speeches -how-obama-has-responded/85798652/ (accessed May 27, 2020). MacAskill, Ewen, and Ed Pilkington. “NRA Promises ‘Fight of the Century’ over Obama’s Bold Gun Control Plan.” The Guardian, January 17, 2013. https://www .theg uardian.com /world /2013/jan /16 /obama-gun-control-plan-nra (accessed May 27, 2020). Mechaber, Ezra. “President Obama at Prayer Vigil for Connecticut Shooting Victims: ‘Newtown, You Are Not Alone.’” The

White House, December 16, 2012. https:// obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/blog/2012 /12/16/president-obama-prayer-vigil-con necticut-shooting-victims-newtown-you -are-not-alone (accessed May 27, 2020). NRA-ILA (National Rifle Association, Institute for Legislative Action). “On the Second Amendment, Don’t Believe Obama!” 2008. http://www.nraila.org/barackobama /barackobama4.htm (accessed July 18, 2011). Obama, Barack. “We Must Seek Agreement on Gun Reforms.” Arizona Daily Star, March 13, 2011. http://azstarnet.com/article_011e 7118-8951-5206-a878-39bf bc9dc89d.html (accessed July 18, 2011). O’Brien, Michael. “Gun Control Group Gives Obama an ‘F.’” The Hill, January 19, 2010. https://thehill.com /homenews /admini stration/76717-gun-control-group-gives -obama-an-f (accessed May 27, 2020). O’Keefe, Ed, and Philip Rucker. “Gun-Control Overhaul Is Defeated in Senate.” Washington Post, April 17, 2013. https://www. washingtonpost.com/politics/gun-control -overhaul-is-defeated-in-senate/2013/04 /17/57eb028a-a77c-11e2-b029-8f b7e977 ef71_story.html (accessed May 27, 2020). Pew Research Center. “In Gun Control Debate, Several Options Draw Majority Support.” January 14, 2013. https://www.people-press .org/2013/01/14/in-gun-control-debate-sev eral- options- d raw-major it y-suppor t / (accessed May 27, 2020). Rucker, Philip, and Peter Wallsten. “Biden’s Gun Task Force Met with All Sides, but Kept Its Eye on the Target.” Washington Post, January 19, 2013. https://www.washing tonpost.com/politics/bidens-gun-task-force -met-with-all-sides-but-kept-its-eye-on -the-target/2013/01/19/520d77a6-60c5 -11e2-b05a- 605528f6b712 _ stor y.html (accessed May 27, 2020). Stracqualursi, Veronica. “Obama Calls for ‘Common-Sense Gun Safety Laws’ after Florida School Shooting.” CNN, February 15, 2018. https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/15



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/politics/obama-f lorida-shooting/index .html (accessed May 27, 2020). The White House. “Now Is the Time.” January 16, 2013. https://obamawhitehouse.archives .gov/issues /preventi ng-g u n-violence (accessed May 27, 2020).

Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act In July 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson created the President’s Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice in response to growing concerns about an increasing crime rate, civil rights protests, Vietnam War demonstrations, and other activities (notably, the acts of violent groups like the Weathermen). The commission concluded that crime was a national problem that might spill across state borders (up until this time, crime had been considered a state concern). The commission also determined that some crime-related issues might be addressed at the national level and that few states and communities had the resources to fund innovative programs (O’Bryant 2000). The commission recommended federal support for state and local criminal justice planning, education and training of criminal justice personnel, development of national criminal justice information systems, technical assistance, and demonstration programs to improve the effectiveness of criminal justice systems nationally. The Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 (PL 90-351; 82 Stat. 197) was the first federal block-grant program (block grants are given to a state or community in a lump sum, giving the recipient discretion on how to spend the money). The legislation was supported by Johnson,

who believed that the federal government should do more to assist state and local law enforcement agencies. Funds were allocated to states by a per capita formula that could be used for any purpose associated with reducing crime. In Title I of the statute, Congress established the Law Enforcement Assistance Administration (LEAA) to administer the grants. LEAA’s initial budget was $63 million (1969) and peaked at $895 million (1975). The program’s critics charged that the block-grant mechanism prevented the LEAA from having control over how the funds were used and that some funds were misused (O’Bryant 2000). Also, as crime rates continued to rise, it appeared that the program had no impact on crime. By 1982, funding for the program ended, and the LEAA was abolished on April 15, 1982, by Congress’s failure to appropriate additional funds. Titles IV and VII of the statute dealt with gun control. These provisions prohibited felons, fugitives from justice, illegal drug users, minors, those committed to mental institutions, honorably discharged members of the armed services, undocumented aliens, and individuals who have renounced their U.S. citizenship from purchasing or possessing weapons. Sanctions were also established for possessing firearms during crimes of violence or drug trafficking. The law prohibited sawed-off shotguns, sawed-off rifles, machine guns, silencers, and conversion kits. These titles, as well as the Gun Control Act of 1968 (PL 90–618; 82 Stat. 1213), constituted the Gun Control Act of 1968. Since then, five additional omnibus crime bills have been enacted: the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984 (PL 98-473; 98 Stat. 2077), the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 (PL 99-570; 100 Stat.

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3207), the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988 (PL 100-690; 102 Stat. 4181), the Crime Control Act of 1990 (PL 101-647; 104 Stat. 4789), and the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 (PL 103-322; 108 Stat. 1796). Jeffrey Kraus See also: Gun Control Act of 1968; Johnson, Lyndon B.

Further Reading Brekke, Jerald. An Assessment of the Block Grant Provisions of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act: The Missouri Experience. Washington, DC: University Press of America, 1977. Congressional Budget Office. The Law Enforcement Assistance Administration, Options for Reauthorization. Washington, DC: Congressional Budget Office, 1979. Feeley, Malcolm M., and Austin D. Sarat. The Policy Dilemma: Federal Crime Policy and the Law Enforcement Assistance Administration. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1980. Law Enforcement Assistance Administration. Index to the Legislative History of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 1973. Lynch, Beth. The Dollars and Sense of Justice: A Study of the Law Enforcement Assistance Administration as It Relates to the Defense Function of the Criminal Justice System. Chicago: National Legal Aid and Defender Association, 1973. O’Bryant, JoAnne. Police and Law Enforcement: Selected Issues. Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, 2000. President’s Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice. The Challenge of Crime in a Free Society. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1967. Winkler, Adam. Gunfight: The Battle Over the Right to Bear Arms in America. New York: W. W. Norton, 2011.

One-Gun-per-Month Laws Restricting firearm accumulation has always been an important priority of gun control organizations. In the 1990s, Virginia, Maryland, and California enacted legislation to limit handgun purchases to one per person in a thirty-day period. Advocates of “onegun-per-month” laws claim that they reduce gun trafficking. Opponents dispute this claim and assert that such laws amount to government rationing of the exercise of constitutional rights. One-gun-a-month laws are the most politically successful type of proposal to impose quantitative limits on the acquisition or possession of firearms, but they are by no means the only approach. In the mid-1990s, the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence (at the time known as Handgun Control Inc.) promoted its “Brady II” legislation that would define an “arsenal” as (1) twenty or more guns (with various gun parts counting as a “gun” for this purpose); or (2) 1,000 rounds of ammunition in any combination of calibers, including .22 caliber (which is commonly sold in 500-round “bricks” costing less than $10). Any home containing an “arsenal” would be subject to unannounced police inspections up to three times every year. Sarah Brady’s proposal for needs-based licensing, with “need” determined by the local police, would presumably prevent the accumulation of some inventories of firearms. In Great Britain, for example, needsbased rifle licensing is interpreted by the police so that a hunter who has a rifle in a particular caliber may not acquire a second rifle in that caliber. Governments in some nations impose limits on firearms possession, such as allowing licensed gun owners to have only one or two firearms. But in the U.S. political context, quantitative restrictions on ownership have so far



not enjoyed much success, and consequently, efforts to limit firearm accumulation have focused on one-gun-a-month laws. These laws help lay the foundation for broader restrictions by setting the precedent that the government can quantitatively limit the exercise of firearm rights, based on the government’s determination that an individual does not “need” to exercise the right so much. Nationally, the first regulations on multiple handgun purchases came as a result of the Gun Control Act of 1968. Although the statute itself said nothing about multiple purchases, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) created a regulation for a multiple purchase form. Whenever a federally licensed firearm dealer sold more than one handgun to an individual in a thirty-day period, the dealer had to send the multiple purchase form to the ATF. Typically, the ATF did nothing with the forms that it received. The ATF regulation for the multiple purchase form was codified in the Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986 (18 U.S.C. § 923(g)(3)). In 1994, the Clinton crime bill mandated that the multiple purchase form also be sent to the local chief of police or to the sheriff. Federally, this is as far as controls on multiple purchases have gone— although not for lack of effort by the anti-gun lobbies. During the late 1970s and early 1980s, Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-MA) and Rep. Peter Rodino (D-NJ), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, proposed a handgun licensing law that would, among other things, allow the purchase of no more than two handguns per year. Opponents of one-gun-a-month laws argue that once the gun-rationing principle is established, the principle could be used to limit gun purchases to two per year, or two per lifetime, or none per lifetime, based on

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the government’s determination of whether people “need” any more guns. In 1993, Rep. Robert G. Torricelli (D-NJ) introduced H.R. 544, the Multiple Handgun Transfer Prohibition Act of 1993. The bill would have made it a federal crime to buy more than one handgun in a thirty-day period. The maximum penalty was a year in federal prison. A comprehensive gun control proposal by Sen. Howard Metzenbaum (D-OH) and Rep. Charles Schumer (D-NY), S. 1878/H.R. 3932, included the one-handguna-month restriction. Gun rationing was introduced in the 104th Congress by Torricelli as H.R. 964 and as part of Schumer’s farranging H.R. 1321. Similar proposals have been introduced in subsequent Congresses. The first state to enact explicit multiple purchase restrictions was South Carolina. In 1975, a television network news report said that the main source of handguns for New York City street crime was South Carolina. In response, the South Carolina legislature enacted a law allowing only one handgun purchase in a thirty-day period (Code of Laws of South Carolina, § 23-31140). New York State’s 1911 Sullivan Law, requiring police permission for every handgun purchase, had long been a de facto restriction on handgun accumulation, since some police departments, especially in New York City, used the law to discourage gun collections. The stated purpose of one-gun-a-month laws is not to reduce crime in the jurisdiction where the law is enacted, but to stop the jurisdiction from being a source of crime guns in other states. In the two decades following the enactment of the South Carolina law, the state’s already-high violent crime rate more than doubled. As of 1993 (when Virginia was considering whether to imitate the South Carolina law), South Carolina had the fifth-highest violent crime rate.

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Efforts to pass a one-handgun-a-month law in Virginia had floundered for years until Democratic governor Douglas Wilder made gun rationing his top priority for 1993. Wilder promoted the idea that “the surest way to stop the number of guns available for illegal sale is to place limits on the numbers that can be purchased legally.” In support of the proposal, Wilder sent every legislator a copy of a recent issue of the Batman comic book, which apparently had been written to assist the gun control cause in Virginia. In the Batman episode, Virginia was portrayed as the main gun running state in the East. One character complained that tough gun laws had not been enacted “because some fat white b——d wants to play with his guns on a weekend.” The writers made Batman himself endorse total gun prohibition, claiming that violence “will end when we decide that we don’t want guns in our houses, in our neighborhoods, in our schools, in our hands. It will end when we decide to get rid of the guns we have and not get more.” (Batman had apparently forgotten that most of the violent criminals he had battled over the previous decades had not used firearms.) According to Batman, non-Virginians traveled to Virginia, purchased multiple handguns, and then took them back to Gotham City to sell on the black market. Ever since the Gun Control Act of 1968 (which banned handgun purchases outside one’s state of residence), such purchases were federal felonies, with especially strict penalties for trafficking of multiple handguns (18 U.S.C. §§ 922(a)(1) and (1.5), 924(b)). The other major evidence used to portray Virginia as the main source of New York City crime guns was Project Lead, an ATF firearm-tracing operation. According to gun control advocates, Project Lead showed

that 41 percent of New York crime guns came from Virginia. Project Lead had traced 6 percent of the firearms recovered by New York City police in 1991 and 1992 (1,231 of the 13,382 firearms). Of firearms found at the scenes of violent crimes in New York City, thirty-two (17% of traced violent crime guns) had been originally sold at retail in Virginia. Of these thirty-two guns, three guns originally sold in Virginia were found at homicide scenes. Project Lead was unable to determine whether traced firearms had been stolen from the original buyer or how they had entered New York City. Most of the Virginia guns, then, appeared to have been associated with nonviolent crimes, including violations of New York City’s near-prohibitory handgunlicensing ordinances. After an intense legislative struggle, the normally pro-gun Virginia legislature enacted a law making it a misdemeanor for persons (other than licensed firearm dealers) to purchase more than one handgun in a thirty-day period. The law contained provisions for persons to obtain waivers if the multiple purchase was part of a collection (e.g., the purchase of a pair of matched pistols), a bulk purchase from an estate sale, a replacement for lost or stolen guns, or a similar reason (VA Code. Ann. § 18.2–308.2: 2Q). Perhaps the decisive factor in Wilder’s success was convincing the Virginia business community, especially in Richmond, that the absence of a gun-rationing law was nationally embarrassing to Virginia. In that same legislative session, the Virginia legislature required proof of residence for driver’s license applicants, thus making it harder for out-of-staters to buy guns in Virginia (VA Code. Ann. § 46.2–323). In 1995, Capt. R. Lewis Vass, of the Department of State Police, testified to



a Virginia crime commission that the gun-rationing law had “not significantly affected . . . the number of multiple handgun purchases within the Commonwealth.” According to Vass, 95 percent of applications for multiple handgun purchases were approved. As soon as the 1993 Virginia law was enacted, anti-gun lobbyists began to push for similar legislation in West Virginia. They did not succeed statewide, but they did win an ordinance in July 1993 in Charleston, West Virginia (Code of City of Charleston § 6–106.2.5(a)). The Charleston law, however, was nullified when the legislature passed a law making the existing statewide firearm preemption statute (banning local anti-gun laws) even more explicit and comprehensive. A one-handgun-a-month law has been at the top of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence’s agenda in many states, especially on the East Coast. Very intense lobbying in Delaware has come close to successfully passing such a law. Maryland enacted a one-handgun and assault weapons law in 1996. California enacted a similar law in 1999 as a result of the Columbine school murders—although the connection was somewhat vague since the Columbine killers had used only one handgun. New Jersey passed one-handgun-per-month in 2009 thanks to intense lobbying by Gov. Jon Corzine, who planned to make the law a centerpiece of his reelection campaign that fall. The South Carolina law was repealed in 2004, thanks to lobbying from the National Rifle Association. The group has come close, but not yet succeeded, in getting the Virginia law repealed. The effects of the Virginia law are unclear. One study of gun traces, by Brady

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Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence researchers Douglas S. Weil and Rebecca C. Knox (1996), found that after the Virginia law was enacted, the number of guns traced to a group of four southeastern states, including Virginia, declined. On the other hand, a study by the office of Rep. Charles Schumer (simply reporting the results of ATF gun traces) found that Virginia and South Carolina were two of the three states that supplied the most guns to New York. Other scholars, though, including Kopel (1999) and Kopel and Blackman (2000), argue that ATF firearm traces involve only a small and unrepresentative sample of crime guns, and therefore ATF traces are neither a solid foundation for creating a law nor a good basis for judging a law’s success or failure. The conventional wisdom in Virginia was summed up by a pair of newspaper headlines. In 1992, a Richmond Times-Dispatch article was headlined: “Virginia Gun-Running Is ‘Embarrassment.’” In 1998, an article by the same author had the headline: “Virginia Gun Limit Has Enthusiastic Following: But State Still Ranks High as Weapon Source.” In practice, gun rationing is difficult to implement without gun registration. Only if the state maintains a computerized list of gun buyers for at least thirty days after each purchase can the state tell if a person purchased more than one gun at retail; and only if private gun sales (e.g., buying a gun from a relative or a friend who is not a licensed gun dealer) are prohibited can the state be sure that the individual is not exceeding the rationing limit. Opponents of gun rationing therefore see rationing laws as a wedge to additional controls, while rationing proponents tout rationing as a good first step. Though proponents and opponents of gun rationing often focus on empirical issues, Stephen Halbrook (1993) believes that

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empirical data are irrelevant when constitutional rights are at stake. He asks: May a constitutional right be limited by a legislature’s determination of whether, to what extent, or how many times within a given time period a person has a “need” to exercise that right? Would it be consistent with the freedom of the press, for instance, to make it a crime to purchase more than one Bible . . . each month? Who, other than dealers in books, really “needs” more than one such book per month? . . . It could hardly be argued that the Sixth Amendment right to the assistance of counsel in criminal cases would not be violated if crime decreased as a result of not allowing an accused person to consult with counsel more than once each month. A bill of rights guarantee cannot be disregarded under the guise that its existence contributes to increases in crime or that its absence would make it harder to extract confessions. . . . The essence of a bill of rights is that the issue of whether a person “needs” to do a protected act is removed from legislative proscription. David B. Kopel See also: Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF); Columbine High School Shooting; Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986; Gun Control; Gun Control Act of 1968; Gun Registration; Gun Shows; Iron Pipeline; National Rifle Association (NRA); Preemption Laws

Further Reading Evans, Whittney. “A Look Back at Virginia’s One-Gun-a-Month Law as Democrats Work to Revive It.” VPM.org, July 8, 2019.

https://vpm.org/news/articles/3622/a-look -back-at-virginias-one-gun-a-month-law -as-democrats-work-to-revive-it (accessed January 28, 2022). Halbrook, Stephen P. “Rationing Firearms Purchases and the Right to Keep Arms: Reflections on the Bills of Rights of Virginia, West Virginia, and the United States.” West Virginia Law Review 96 (1993): 1–83. Kopel, David B. “Clueless: The Misuse of BATF Firearms Tracing Data.” Law Review of Michigan State University Detroit College of Law 1 (1999): 171–85. Kopel, David B., and Paul H. Blackman. “Firearms Tracing Data from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms: An Occasionally Useful Law Enforcement Tool, but a Poor Research Tool.” Criminal Justice Policy Review 11 (2000): 44–62. Weil, Douglas S., and Rebecca C. Knox. “Effects of Limiting Handgun Purchases on Interstate Transfer of Firearms.” Journal of the American Medical Association 275 (1996): 1759–61.

Open Carry Laws Open carry laws permit citizens within a state to do just that—carry firearms in plain sight. This may be on their person or in their vehicle. As with other gun laws, the details often vary by state. Some allow virtually unlimited open carry; others require a permit; some restrict where firearms may be carried. California allows open carry in rural areas. The right is thought to derive primarily from state constitutions and state statutes rather than from the Second Amendment. Just three states (California, Florida, and Illinois) and the District of Columbia prohibit people from openly carrying firearms in public. New York and South Carolina prohibit openly carrying handguns but not long guns (e.g., rifles), whereas Massachusetts, Minnesota, and New Jersey prevent openly



carrying long guns but not handguns. More than thirty states permit open carrying of handguns without a license or permit, whereas thirteen states require some form of licensing to do so. In some of these instances, the weapon must be unloaded when carried. Open carrying of long guns is legal in fortyfour states, though Tennessee does require that carried firearms be unloaded. In most areas, relatively few people carry firearms in the open, and these laws are often overlooked. There are notable exceptions, typically when a gun rights group stages a “gathering” at which owners are encouraged to carry their guns openly, a business attempts to ban open carry on its premises, or when some individuals carried firearms openly at events attended by President Barack Obama. More recently, open carrying of firearms has been used by white supremacists seeking to threaten and intimidate others at political rallies, places of worship, and electoral campaign offices. In 2017, white supremacists also openly carried military-style rifles in protest of the removal of a confederate statute in Charlottesville, Virginia. Open carry laws may sometimes divide the gun rights community. Often championed by smaller and more strident groups, there can be a sense that the National Rifle Association is overlooking the issue. For example, the controversy surrounding open carry and Starbucks coffee shops began with local open carry groups in California testing the extent to which retailers would allow them to carry firearms. Gun Owners of America does not encourage people to attend presidential speeches carrying sidearms, and Second Amendment Foundation founder Alan Gottlieb has been quoted as saying, “I just don’t think it’s politically intelligent . . . I would like to see gun owners think twice before they go to a rally like

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A waitress working in a West Texas restaurant wears her firearm in a holster on her waist under the state’s open carry provision. (William Jell/Dreamstime.com)

that with a firearm strapped on. It doesn’t necessarily put our best face forward” (as quoted in Stuckey 2009). At the same time, OpenCarry.org is self-described as “[a] progun Internet community focused on the right to openly carry properly holstered handguns in daily American life” (see OpenCarry.org 2011). There is also a school of thought that concealed carry may have a greater impact on crime rates, assuming that carrying a firearm does reduce crime rates. There is no doubt that it is easier to identify a person who is carrying openly as opposed to one who is carrying concealed. In the latter case, a would-be criminal can less easily identify a potential target. Concern exists, however, that allowing open carrying can increase the likelihood of conflict and potentially cause a danger to public safety, including for the person carrying, as it may

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create confusion for law enforcement in respect to who is the criminal and who is the “good guy with the gun.” Partly because of the small number of people who carry firearms openly, there has been virtually no research done on its actual impact on crime rates. Similarly, surveys that may ask if a respondent carries a concealed firearm typically fail to ask if the person ever or frequently carries openly. If open carry remains in the spotlight as a gun control issue, we may see it become a more common topic for legislation and for research. At present, it still remains in the shadows of its much bigger cousin, concealed carry. Harry L. Wilson See also: Concealed Weapons Laws; Gottlieb, Alan Merril; Gun Owners of America (GOA)

Further Reading Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Open Carry.” n.d. https://giffords .org/lawcenter/gun-laws/policy-areas/guns -in-public/open-carry/ (accessed July 5, 2021). Moran, Terry, and Ely Brown. “Pro-Gun Grassroots Groups Taking the Lead in Gun Rights Fight: Homespun Organizations Are Leaving the NRA Behind When Pushing for Broader Gun Laws.” ABC News, Nightline, August 3, 2010. http://abcnews

.go.com/Nightline/open-carry-gun-laws -pro-gun-grassroots-groups/story?id=11 313221 (accessed July 5, 2021). OpenCarry.org. 2011. http://www.opencarry .org/ (accessed July 5, 2021). Pierce, John. “Why ‘Open Carry’ Gun Laws Work.” U.S. News and World Report, April 15, 2010. http://www.usnews.com/opinion /articles/2010/04/15/why-open-carry-gun -laws-work (accessed July 5, 2021). Schultz, Howard. “Our Respectful Request.” September 17, 2013. https://stories.star bucks.com/press/2013/open-letter-from -howard/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Stuckey, Mike. “Guns Near Obama Fuel Open Carry Debate: Second Amendment Activists Divided by Public Displays of Firearms.” NBC News, August 24, 2009. https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna3249 2783 (accessed July 5, 2021). Urbina, Ian. “Locked, Loaded, and Ready to Caffeinate.” New York Times, March 7, 2010. https://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/08 /us/08guns.html (accessed July 5, 2021).

OpenCarry.org. See Open Carry Laws Operation Ceasefire. See Boston Gun Project (BGP) Opt-Out Statutes. See Gun-Free Business Practices

P Pennsylvania Long Rifle. See Long Rifle (Pennsylvania/Kentucky)

1972 and is the oldest association serving firearms dealers in the United States. Andrew Molchan, president of PGRA and NAFLFD, started the magazine in 1972, and published the first issue in January 1973. In 2014, the magazine became available online only and was discontinued shortly thereafter.

Periodicals, Guns All gun magazine writing can be divided into two types: firearms as a hobby, and firearms as political and legislative action. The first type includes all columns, articles, and advertising containing information about product reviews, technical comparisons, gun shows, trading, collecting, and practicing. This type of writing is typical of any leisure activity magazine. The amount of space and the types of firearms and accessories featured in each gun magazine vary. However, greater differences can be seen in magazine writing about political and legislative action. Guns are legislated and politicized to a degree that necessitates such writing. Gun magazines provide their readers with analysis and interpretation of legal issues, gun control movements, and pro-gun organizations while also offering advice on gun rights activism.

American Rifleman American Rifleman is the principal publication of the National Rifle Association (NRA). It has been published since 1885 and is both the oldest and the largest-circulation American firearm magazine. It was initially entitled The Rifle; in 1888, the title was changed to Shooting and Fishing, and in 1906, to Arms and the Man. In 1923, it assumed the present title of American Rifleman. A copy of the monthly magazine is a benefit of NRA membership. Regular features include reports from the NRA’s president, its executive vice president, and the head of the Institute for Legislative Action, focusing on Second Amendment issues before the U.S. Congress and various state legislatures. Also included are two features: “The Armed Citizen,” which summarizes reported uses of firearms in self-defense, product reviews, and reports of competitive firearm matches; and “From the Loading Bench,” which presents cartridge reloading data. In 1973, the NRA also began publishing American Hunter and, in the 1990s, America’s First Freedom as alternatives for those members primarily interested in hunting or political activism. In 2016, the NRA added its publication Shooting Illustrated to its list of official journals. As of June 2021 (the

American Firearms Industry Magazine The American Firearms Industry magazine was a trade publication for federally licensed firearms dealers (FFLs) and over 800 gun industry-related manufacturers. It was the official monthly publication of the Professional Gun Retailers Association (PGRA) and the National Association of Federally Licensed Firearms Dealers (NAFLFD). The NAFLFD was incorporated in Illinois in 679

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most recent official records from the Alliance for Audited Media), American Rifleman had a circulation of 1.6 million subscriptions, American Hunter had about 846,000, America’s First Freedom had about 591,000, and Shooting Illustrated had about 635,000.

Firearms News Firearms News, formerly called Shotgun News (until December 2015), is one of the oldest gun magazines. Founded in 1946, it is primarily a publication for the trading and selling of guns. The magazine offers possibly the widest selection of firearm listings in the world to its over four million readers. Gun shows are listed, and readers are offered the opportunity to post classified ads to sell or purchase firearms; the magazine also publishes information on federally licensed gun dealers. Firearms News touches on gun policy issues through columns such as the “Knox Update,” the Libertarian, and Clayton Cramer’s column. Firearms News is published thirty-six times a year and is available by subscription as well as at newsstands. Guns This magazine follows the standard model of attempting to include all technical aspects of firearms. Hunting and outdoor adventure are covered in monthly columns. Several columns focus on do-it-yourself tips for gun repairs while also offering product evaluations. Many gun magazines have an active readers-write column, and Guns magazine’s is titled “Crossfire.” In this column, readers can offer praise and commentary. Guns magazine seems to cover fewer gun policy issues than many of the other gun magazines, yet articles on firearm legislation are frequently featured along with occasional pieces on gun control developments.

Guns & Ammo Guns & Ammo is one of the most popular gun magazines in the world and publishes twelve issues per year. It boasts over 10.2 million readers each month in combined print and digital readership. According to the magazine’s reader profile, 97 percent of its readers are male. Guns & Ammo is a traditionalist in the field of gun magazines, having been founded in 1958, and it has been a constant favorite of gun enthusiasts. The magazine is part of the InterMedia Outdoors media group, and the publication covers all areas of shooting. The magazine deems hunting important, and hence hunting-related articles on firearms, accessories, and outdoor adventures are in each issue. New firearms and by-products are reviewed with respect to concealed carry laws and target shooting. Guns & Ammo promotes the safe handling of firearms at all times and includes extensive articles on gun-handling ethics, gun collecting, and the history of firearms. Ample space is given to the self-protective aspect of gun ownership, and gun policy issues are featured in the “Second Amendment” column by varying authors. Gun Week / TheGunMag.com Gun Week was a newspaper published by the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) created in 1966, with Neal Knox serving as its first editor. In 1985, Gun Week was acquired by Alan Gottlieb’s Second Amendment Foundation. For decades, the publication served as a leading source of information for news about gun policy, the firearms industry, and recreational gun use. For many professionals and serious activists on both sides of the gun policy debate, Gun Week was mandatory reading. Though Gun Week has a very explicit editorial point of view, its stories tend to have much less spin



than do the publications from other pro-gun groups or from anti-gun groups. Due to rising production costs and increasing reliance on new technology like the internet made it difficult to stay on track with publication. In January 1996, the publication scaled back to three times a month and then to twice a month in January 2007. On December 1, 2011, the final issue of Gun Week was published. Shortly thereafter, SAF introduced TheGunMag.com, a dually delivered publication that would help continue to promote the same material readers of Gun Week had become accustomed to. Subscribers would still be able to get hard copies via a subscription service delivered monthly, but having an online presence would allow for quicker and more frequent updates of content on news and issues of interest to readers.

Gun World Published twelve times a year by Beckett Media LLC, this magazine was directed at both target shooters and hunters with a special emphasis on law enforcement and military developments. Product reviews, how-to articles on shooting a particular firearm, and historical reviews of guns formed the core content of this magazine. After more than sixty years on newsstands, however, print publication ceased in late 2018. Although it appears the magazine issued some content online in early 2019, nothing else has been published since and the source’s website has since shut down. Handguns This magazine focuses on handguns and their use in recreational, sports, and self-protective shooting. Handguns form a fairly limited field of firearms, and the magazine explores their use by professional as well as recreational shooters. Law enforcement tactics, training classes, and handgun accessories are

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extensively reviewed for readers. Handguns magazine informs readers of correct selfdefense tactics for the home while also focusing on concealed carry etiquette. For history aficionados, the magazine frequently offers articles about Cowboy Action Shooting and historical handguns. Gun control issues are covered in the magazine but are less prominent than in many other gun magazines. Articles and columns deal with legislative issues relevant to handgun ownership and gun control initiatives. Annual circulation is around 700,000, and the magazine is published six times a year. On average, 99 percent of the readership is male. The magazine is published by InterMedia Outdoors, which also publishes Guns & Ammo.

Small Arms Review The intent of this magazine is to focus on firearms and accessories regulated by the Gun Control Act of 1968. Such weapons include machine guns, silencers, shortbarreled shotguns and rifles, and destructive devices like explosives and poison-gas weapons. Small Arms Review describes its readers as collectors, competitive and leisure shooters, law enforcement and military personnel, and firearms industry personnel. The magazine informs readers of gun shows and shooting events not only in the United States, but in Europe as well. Legislative aspects of gun ownership are prominently featured in the magazine’s articles due to the heavy legislation on ownership and trade of the weapons in question. One of the target audiences for this magazine is firearms industry personnel, for whom the magazine publishes an in-depth column on manufacturing, sales, and gun policies. For enthusiasts of firearms history, Small Arms Review evaluates historical weapons and reviews museums and books. Published by

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Moose Lake since October 1997, Small Arms Review is available both by subscription and at newsstands.

Soldier of Fortune Soldier of Fortune has been an international favorite among gun, adventure, and mercenary enthusiasts since 1975. The magazine’s editorial policy is “pro-military, pro–strong U.S. defense, pro-police, and pro-veteran” as well as generally pro-gun rights. Developments within the U.S. military as well as gun control policies and legislation are reviewed with a conservative and heavily pro–Second Amendment stance. Of the gun magazines reviewed here, Soldier of Fortune is by far the most global in its content. Each issue contains articles from the world’s current hot spots, where the magazine’s contributors observe or partake in activities. The magazine also offers historical reviews of military actions during wars; successes and mistakes are identified and lessons taught. The reporting is personal and highly in-depth. The magazine includes a limited number of reviews of firearms and firearm accessories. Soldier of Fortune can be purchased by subscription or at newsstands and is published twelve times a year to its nearly 800,000 readers. Women & Guns Women & Guns is a prominent, nationally circulated magazine that focuses on gun ownership, personal protection, and recreational sporting issues for women. The magazine serves as a forum for women’s gun-ownership issues and offers an advertising venue for gun manufacturers seeking to promote additional sales of firearms to women. The magazine’s unique perspective apparently has led to a more moderate stance on certain issues such as child safety

locks, a distinct difference from other gun rights organizations and publications. After attending the first Gun Rights Policy Conference in 1988, Sonny Jones—later director of the NRA’s “Refuse to Be a Victim” program—took the lead in establishing Women & Guns. The magazine debuted in 1989. Within the first year, the Second Amendment Foundation took over management, although Jones remained with the magazine for several years. Peggy Tartaro served as the longtime executive editor of Women & Guns, which was available via newsstands and sporting goods stores, as well as through print subscriptions mailed to homes across the nation. In January 2019, however, the final issue was printed. The publication was acquired by A Girl & A Gun Women’s Shooting League (AG & AG) that same month, and it transitioned over to a digital format. Tiia Rajala, David B. Kopel, David T. Hardy, Walter F. Carroll, Marcia L. Godwin, and Jaclyn Schildkraut See also: Firearms Industry; Gun Control Act of 1968; Gun Shows; Kates, Don B., Jr.; Knox, Neal; Kopel, David B.; National Rifle Association (NRA); Second Amendment Foundation (SAF)

Further Reading American Rifleman. https://www.americanri fleman.org/ (accessed October 10, 2021). Firearms News. https://www.firearmsnews .com/ (accessed October 9, 2021). Guns. http://www.gunsmagazine.com (accessed October 9, 2021). Guns & Ammo. http://www.gunsandammo .com (accessed October 9, 2021). Handguns. http://www.handgunsmag.com (accessed October 9, 2021).

Small Arms Review. http://www.smallarms review.com (accessed October 9, 2021). Soldier of Fortune. http://www.sofmag.com (accessed October 9, 2021). TheGunMag.com. http://www.thegunmag.com/ (accessed October 10, 2021). Women & Guns. https://www.womenandguns. com/ (accessed October 10, 2021).

Personalized Gun Technology. See Smart Guns Pistol. See Handguns Pittsburgh Synagogue Shooting On the morning of October 27, 2018, more than seventy-five people from three different congregations—Or L’Simcha Congregation, New Light Congregation, and Congregation Dor Hadash—had gathered at the Tree of Life synagogue in the Squirrel Hill neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, for Saturday morning prayer service. At approximately 9:45 a.m., forty-six-yearold Robert Bowers arrived at the synagogue. After sitting outside in his car for several minutes, he posted a chilling message on his social media page on Gab, a site known for its far-right userbase, before entering the building armed with a Colt AR-15 semiautomatic assault-style rifle and three Glock handguns. In less than ten minutes, he murdered eleven worshippers and injured six other people, including responding law enforcement. At the time the perpetrator entered the building, services for each of the three congregations were underway. He opened fire at the main entrance, first killing brothers Cecil and David Rosenthal (ages fifty-nine

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and fifty-six, respectively), who served as greeters for the temple. As shots continued to ring out through the building, worshippers took notice and began to act. In the basement, where the New Light Congregation was meeting, Rabbi Jonathan Perlman pushed several congregants into a storage closet. One of the congregants, eightyseven-year-old Melvin Wax, attempted to leave the closet when he heard the gunfire subside and was shot and killed; the others remained hiding in the closet, out of sight of the perpetrator. Other members of the New Light Congregation—Dr. Richard Gottfried (age sixty-five) and Daniel Stern (age seventy-one)—also were killed. In a separate area of the temple, the Or L’Simcha Congregation had been worshipping under the guidance of Rabbi Jeffrey Myers. After hearing the commotion, he attempted to help his parishioners get to safety. Although he was able to get the group at the front of the sanctuary out to safety, others who were left were killed: Joyce Fienberg (age seventy-five), Rose Mallinger (age ninety-seven), Bernice Simon (age eighty-four) and her husband Sylvan (age eighty-six), and Irving Younger (age sixty-nine). Rabbi Myers had gone back in to get them, but it was too late; he subsequently was rescued by a responding SWAT officer and helped out of the building to safety. Also hearing the commotion was Jerry Rabinowitz (age sixty-six), a member of the Dor Hadash Congregation praying in another area of the building. Hearing the commotion, Rabinowitz—a medical doctor— left the sanctuary to help render aid to others. He was shot and killed when he crossed paths with the perpetrator. The first call was placed to 911 at 9:54 a.m., approximately four minutes after the

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shooting began. Six minutes later, the first officers arrived on scene and began engaging with the perpetrator, who was attempting to flee the building. In an exchange of gunfire, one officer was shot in the hand and another was injured from shrapnel before the perpetrator retreated back into the building. The responding officers then established a perimeter around the building. By 10:30 a.m., the SWAT team had arrived and made entry into the building. They moved throughout the temple, clearing rooms and helping to evacuate surviving congregants. At approximately 10:47 a.m., they encountered the perpetrator, who had barricaded in a room on the third floor. Gunfire was exchanged, and the perpetrator and three of the responding SWAT officers were wounded. At 11:03 a.m., while the SWAT team attempted to negotiate a surrender, the perpetrator provided his name and date of birth to the officers. Five minutes later, the perpetrator began to crawl toward officers; he was taken into custody at 11:13 a.m. Investigation into the events leading up to and including the shooting revealed that the perpetrator was an active member of numerous anti-Semitic and white supremacist online forums, where he routinely posted about his hatred of Jewish people and shared anti-Semitic rhetoric and conspiracy theories. Coworkers described him as being radicalized as a white nationalist several decades earlier. The perpetrator expressed support for members of the alt-right fight group Rise Above Movement (RAM), who had incited their own violence during the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. He also posted racist views toward Blacks, including racial slurs and images of lynchings. The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) initially charged the perpetrator with

twenty-nine federal crimes; additional charges soon were added. On October 31, 2018, he was indicted on forty-four counts by a federal grand jury, including multiple counts of hate crimes, use of a firearm to commit murder during a crime of violence, obstruction of exercise of religious beliefs resulting in death, obstruction of exercise of religious beliefs resulting in bodily injury to a public safety officer, and use and discharge of a firearm during a crime of violence; collectively, these charges carried a maximum penalty of death or 535 years in federal prison. The following day, he pleaded not guilty. On January 29, 2019, the perpetrator was indicted on an additional nineteen counts by the grand jury, including thirteen more charges related to hate crimes. The DOJ indicated intention to seek the death penalty. In addition to the federal charges, the perpetrator also faced state charges in Pennsylvania. Thirty-five criminal counts were levied against him: eleven counts of criminal homicide, six counts of aggravated assault, six counts of attempted criminal homicide, and thirteen counts of ethnic intimidation. Like their federal counterparts, state prosecutors also filed intent to seek the death penalty at trial, citing the perpetrator’s desire to specifically terrorize members of the Jewish community and a lack of remorse. His defense attorneys have challenged the possibility of a death sentence, claiming it was unconstitutional. The Tree of Life shooting is another tragic event in a line of mass shootings aimed at the American Jewish community. Other similar attacks occurred at the North Valley Jewish Community Center in Granada Hills, CA (1999); the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle, WA (2006); the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC (2009) and the Jewish



Community Center of Greater Kansas City and Village Shalom, both in Overland Park, KS (2014). Jaclyn Schildkraut and Daniel Beutler See also: Assault Weapons; Charleston Church Shooting; Mass Murder (Shootings); Semiautomatic Weapons

Further Reading Cato, Jason. “Pittsburgh’s Darkest Day: A Minute-by-Minute Account of the Mass Shooting at Tree of Life Synagogue.” TribLive, November 3, 2018. https://archive .triblive.com/local/pittsburgh-allegheny /pittsburghs-darkest-day-a-minute-by -minute-account-of-the-mass-shooting-at -tree-of-life-synagogue/ (accessed June 17, 2020). Mallin, Alexander. “Justice Department to Seek Death Penalty against Tree of Life Shooting Suspect.” ABC News, August 26, 2019. https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/justice -department-seek-death-penalty-tree-life -shooting/story?id=65203204 (accessed June 17, 2020).

Plastic Guns “Plastic guns” are firearms made partially from high tech plastic polymers. The first such guns were invented by Glock in the 1980s and have achieved wide popularity among both government and nongovernment firearm owners. During the mid1980s, gun prohibition groups campaigned to have the Glock banned, but did not succeed. Instead, Congress passed a purely symbolic law, the Undetectable Firearms Act of 1988, which did not affect any guns. In 1963, Gaston Glock, an Austrian engineer, created the Glock company in Deutsch-Wagram, a town near Vienna, Austria. The company manufactured plastic and steel products. The company began

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combining plastic with steel and became an Austrian army supplier of such military products as machine-gun belts, practice hand grenades, plastic clips, field knives, and entrenching tools. In the early 1980s, the Austrian army asked a wide variety of manufacturers to submit bids for selling a new duty pistol to the army. Although Glock had never made firearms before, it was invited to bid. Glock won the contract with a bid for what became the Glock 17 pistol, a 9 mm self-loading pistol that incorporated plastic polymers. Although the gun still had a substantial metal component, the use of plastic made the gun much lighter and thus much more comfortable to carry or wear for extended periods. The Glock’s plastic frame weighed only 14 percent as much as a steel frame, yet it was stronger. The stronger frame helped the gun absorb recoil better, thus improving accuracy and comfort for the shooter. In addition, the gun was extremely reliable. Much more than most other self-loading pistols, it could handle a wide variety of ammunition. (Ammunition in a given caliber can vary greatly in the weight and shape of the bullet and in the amount of gunpowder.) The Glock was also easy to disassemble and reassemble for cleaning, and it was much less likely than many other guns to misfire because of lack of cleaning. The gun was also extremely sturdy and resistant to cracking or other damage, even after firing many thousands of rounds of ammunition. After being adopted by the military and law enforcement in Austria, the gun began to find a worldwide market. Norway was the first North Atlantic Treaty Organization country to adopt the Glock. In 1985, the company opened an office in Smyrna, Georgia, the first of what would be a series of Glock offices around the world. By 1999, Glock had sold two million pistols in a wide

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variety of calibers and sizes. The gun is extremely popular with police, who have to carry guns for extended periods. Today, some other gun manufacturers have begun to use polymers, but Glock remains the clear leader in building polymer firearms. As the Glock was beginning to win an American market, newspaper columnist Jack Anderson claimed that the gun could be passed through airport metal detectors. Gun prohibition groups asserted that the gun was a “terrorist special” and was used by Libyan agents. The campaign reflected a long-standing dynamic of the gun control movement in the United States: it is much easier for anti-gun groups to win support for campaigns against guns that are unfamiliar than against well-known guns or types of guns. Thus, the campaign against plastic guns began to acquire some traction in Congress. Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-MA), a strong anti-gun advocate, remarked that the plastic-gun debate had been very helpful in moving the gun control debate in a positive direction. The Federal Aviation Administration and other expert witnesses testified to Congress that the Glock was readily detectable, since it still contained a substantial metal component. Photos of a Glock under a metal detector revealed that the Glock’s profile was easily visible. Even so, Sens. Howard Metzenbaum (D-OH) and Strom Thurmond (R-SC) began to win substantial support for their plastic-gun bill. By 1988, the bill had been modified so that it would not affect the Glock (the only plastic gun then in existence), but would have outlawed tens of thousands of metal handguns—everything that had less than 8 ounces of steel. For example, the thirteen-ounce Raven pistol, which is made of alloys and therefore has less than eight ounces of pure steel, would

have been banned as a “plastic gun”— although it contains no plastic. The U.S. Department of Justice under Attorney General Edwin Meese (who had fought the National Rifle Association [NRA] for years over the bill that finally became the Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986) was poised to endorse the plastic-gun ban. Only the intervention of Vice President George Bush (who was running for president and seeking gun owner support) stopped the Department of Justice. Still, the issue had risen to a level where Congress had become determined to “do something.” What resulted was compromise legislation that the NRA agreed not to oppose— the Undetectable Firearms Act of 1988 (18 U.S.C. § 922(p)). The act banned the future production and sale of firearms with less than 3.7 ounces of metal. Also, the metal component must have the general shape of a handgun. The bill was prospective only and thus had no effect on any existing gun. It does not appear to have had any effect on any gun that anyone has wanted to build since 1988. The act satisfied the major lobbies on both sides of the gun issue. The NRA was pleased that nothing to actually increase the control of real guns was enacted. The antigun lobbies got to tell their members, correctly, that they had actually pushed a bill into law. The act was the first time that Congress had actually voted to ban a type of gun (albeit a type that nobody was manufacturing), and thus helped set the stage for the 1994 congressional ban on assault weapons (although, as with the 1988 law, the politics of the 1994 law were far more significant than the law’s actual effect). Because the Undetectable Firearms Act seemed to please both sides of the gun issue, it passed overwhelmingly. In the House of



Representatives, only four representatives voted “no.” One of them was Dick Cheney (R-WY), who would be elected vice president in 2000. By the early twenty-first century, many handguns from different companies were being manufactured with plastic polymers. David B. Kopel See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994

Further Reading Anderson, Jack. “Qaddafi Buying Austrian Plastic Pistol.” Washington Post, January 15, 1985. Glock Pistols. http://www.glock.com/english /index_pistols.htm (accessed January 14, 2011). Halbrook, Stephen P. “Firearms, the Fourth Amendment, and Air Carrier Security.” Journal of Air Law and Commerce 52 (1987): 585–680. Kasler, Peter Alan. Glock: The New Wave in Combat Handguns. Boulder, CO: Paladin Press, 1992.

Pocket Rocket. See Miniguns Police Shootings Technically speaking, police shootings may refer to the justifiable homicide, excessive use of force against, or unjust murder of citizens by police or to the murder of police officers, by citizens. According to 2018 Uniform Crime Report, fifty-five police officers died from injuries sustained in the line of duty during felonious incidents.

Police Officers Killed by Citizens The most recent statistics regarding officers shot in the line of duty are those from 2019. Of the forty-eight police officers killed in

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2019, forty-five were male, and three were female. Fifty-one officers were killed with firearms, thirty-seven of which were handguns. Handguns are the most common types of weapons used to kill officers, with rifles coming second. Regarding race, forty of the officers killed were white, seven were African American, and one was Asian (FBI Uniform Crime Report 2019). However, it is important to examine police deaths by citizens in order to acknowledge the different contexts within which the deaths take place. There are numerous circumstances within which police officers are killed in the line of duty. According to FBI statistics, eighty-nine law enforcement officers were killed in the line of duty in 2019. Forty-eight of these officers died as the result of felonious acts, including traffic violation stops, investigative activities and drug-related matters. Other officers were killed responding to a crime in process, serving warrants, making arrests and in the midst of foot pursuits. A few cases stand out regarding the killing of police officers by citizens. On July 17, 2016, Gavin Long shot six police officers in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, in the midst of a protest against the shooting of Black citizens by police officers, specifically Alton Sterling. Three officers died. Long left a note explaining why he shot the police, indicating it was in retaliation for police officers who shot African Americans and were not punished for it (Hanna 2017). On November 29, 2018, Chase White, age forty-one, was shot and killed in Tucson, Arizona, while serving a Tucson Police felony warrant. The warrant indicated that Ryan Schlesinger be taken into custody for a mandatory mental health check. Schlesinger opened fire before barricading himself in his home and eventually surrendering to police (Salzwedel 2019). On

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March 16, 2020, Christopher Walsh was shot and killed in Springfield, Missouri, while responding to a convenience store robbery. Officer Walsh was shot by Joaquin S. Roman, who shot three additional people at the store (Klar 2020). On April 26, 2020, Ronnie Kato Jr. shot two police officers in Baton Rouge, killing one. The police were looking for Kato in order to question him about a domestic violence-related charge. His girlfriend claimed he was seeking revenge against police officers for killing Black people. There are many more cases of police officers shot and killed while on duty but not near as many as civilians killed by police officers (Rambaran 2020).

Citizens Killed by Police Officers It is more common for police officers to shoot citizens than the other way around. According to a one study, since 2018, African Americans are 2.5 times more likely to be killed by police than white people (Edwards, Lee, and Esposito 2019). For Black women in particular, the rate is 1.4 times more likely than other racial and ethnic groups of women. Native Americans and Latinos are also more likely to be shot by police than their white peers. The killing of citizens by police officers outnumbers officers being killed by citizens. In 2018, police shot and killed 998 people, 11 more than the year before. In 2019, police officers killed 897 people, 205 of whom were Black (Sullivan et al. 2019). The Washington Post began tracking police shootings after Michael Brown, an unarmed Black man, was killed in Ferguson, Missouri, on August 9, 2014, by white police officer Darren Wilson. Wilson claimed Brown confronted him inside of his police car and a struggle ensued before two shots were fired. Brown was not in the car, but Wilson claimed he was during the initial

struggle. Brown’s friend, Dorian Johnson, claimed Wilson initiated the confrontation by grabbing Brown’s neck. Johnson claimed that he and Brown ran away and then Brown turned around, raising his hands. Wilson claims Brown charged him, resulting in Brown being shot twelve times. This incident created significant unrest in Ferguson. Ultimately, the state failed to indict Wilson for Brown’s death. Recent studies examine factors that might contribute to the use of lethal force by a police officer. As far as race playing a significant role in police shootings, there is mixed support. Research has found that police officers relied on weaponless tactics in almost half of the encounters with people of color, followed by nonimpact weapons such as Tasers and pepper spray (Lee, Vaughn, and Lim 2014). Though only about 13 percent of the American population is Black, 28 percent of people killed by the police are Black (Menifield, Shin, and Strother 2018). Numerous police killings of African Americans continued; though such incidents were occurring before the shooting of Michael Brown, his death led to the issue becoming more publicized. On October 20, 2014, for example, Officer Jason Van Dyke from Chicago shot and killed seventeenyear-old Laquan McDonald. McDonald had been walking down the street. A dashcam showed that McDonald was running from the police when he was shot. Approximately one month later, on November 22, 2014, twelve-year-old Tamir Rice was shot and killed by Cleveland, Ohio, police officer Timothy Loehmann. Responding to a dispatch call regarding a young Black male brandishing a gun, Loehmann shot Rice almost instantly after arriving on scene; the gun, however, turned out to be a toy replica of an Airsoft pistol. On April 9, 2015, a



white police officer, Michael Slager, shot Walter Scott in the back eight times while Scott ran away from the officer in North Charleston, South Carolina. Slager had pulled Scott over for a broken brake light, and Scott fled from the scene. Charleena Lyles was three months pregnant when, on June 18, 2017, she was killed by Seattle, Washington, police officers responding to an attempted burglary that Lyles herself reported (Menifield, Shin, and Strother 2018). The police officers, Steven McNew and Jason Anderson, claimed that Lyles lunged at them with knives, so they shot her seven times. Two other highly publicized cases of police shootings often are highlighted as unjustifiable. The killings of Alton Sterling and Stephon Clark are two of many cited unjustifiable shootings by police. A cellphone video taken on July 5, 2016, shows Alton Sterling, thirty-seven, being tackled and then held to the ground by two white officers in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Someone shouted, “He’s got a gun!” and one officer held a gun above Sterling’s chest. Multiple gunshots are heard while Sterling was pinned down. Sterling, who was unarmed, died at the scene. On March 18, 2018, police body camera footage and helicopter video showed two police officers fatally shooting Stephon Clark, twenty-two, in his backyard in Sacramento, California. A police statement said that the officers believed Clark was pointing a firearm at them, though investigators found a cellphone, but no weapons, near his body. The officers were placed on administrative leave, pending further investigation. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) has consistently condemned the justice system’s failure to protect Black lives and prosecute police officers who shoot a

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disproportionate number of Black people. Since 2005, the Police Integrity Research Group, charged with gathering data on police shootings and arrests, found that only thirty-five police officers (out of about ninety-eight arrested) have been convicted of killing a citizen at a lesser charge like manslaughter or negligent homicide. Only three officers were convicted of murder. Most officers claim they feared for their lives, and juries believe this is reasonable in most cases (Ross 2019).

Police Officer Use of Deadly Force State and federal laws governing the police use of deadly force generally defer to a split-second decision by a police officer to fire a weapon. According to the U.S. Supreme Court, the proper analysis for any police uses of force places the emphasis on the “reasonableness” of the force at the moment it is used. According to the United States Commission on Civil Rights (2018), most shootings by police officers take place at close range and end within a matter of seconds. In Aries S. Friedman and the Illinois State Rifle Association v. City of Highland Park (2015), it was surmised that with the increased popularity and availability of semiautomatic weapons, police officers may decide to make deadly force decisions sooner rather than later. In the event that an officer was to be tried for their involvement in a shooting, the likelihood of conviction is low. Two major Supreme Court cases set the precedent that gives police officers wide latitude in their decisions to use deadly force. Both cases occurred in the 1980s, one of which involved the death of a young Black male. In Tennessee v. Garner (1985), police shot a fifteen-year-old boy who was fleeing from a home he robbed. The boy, Edward Garner, who was unarmed, was

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shot in the back of the head. The Supreme Court ruled that the police could use “all necessary means to effect an arrest.” In Graham v. Connor (1989), the victim, who was a diabetic, was having an insulin reaction and asked his friend to take him to a store for orange juice. The line in the store was long, so Dethorne Graham left the store in a hurry to go elsewhere. A police officer, M. S. Connor, perceived his behavior as odd, deeming him drunk, and arrested him. Graham ended up with a broken foot and bruises in his encounter with the police officer. The officer was accused of using excessive force and the case went to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court sent the case back down to a lower court, indicating that police force is reasonable under the Fourth Amendment. The officer’s behavior was determined to be based on probable cause, thus reasonable, ending with the officer not convicted of a crime (Fuchs 2015). According to some studies, conflict between the police and racial minorities has long existed and should be considered within the broader discussion of policecommunity interactions (MacInnis 2019). It is imperative to not only examine the perception of police violence from a racial context but also to consider this violence from the perspective of police culture. This culture is what forms the foundations for prejudicial and discriminatory practices on the part of police officers toward some racial minorities. From their inception, police departments were comprised of predominantly white male officers, although the goal of incorporating Black officers in all police departments across the country was voiced as far back as the 1800s. Modern police departments can be traced back to “slave patrols” and “night watches” specifically formed to control racial minorities,

particularly African Americans. This ultimately became institutionalized in legal and economic orders all across the United States (Kappeler 2015). Moreover, the evolution of policing has been suggested to have occurred within the context of white dominant thought, elitism, and strained police-minority relations (Bonner 2014). President Barack Obama convened the Taskforce on 21st Century Policing in 2014. The taskforce was established as a response to police shootings of Black citizens, particularly the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. The taskforce hoped to identify best practices regarding policing in terms of reducing crime but also to build public trust and foster collaborative relationships between the police and the communities they serve. President Obama called for more community involvement to improve policing and develop positive relations between the police and Black communities in particular. Part of the focus was police reform but economic and social inequality as they relate to crime were overlooked. Under the Donald Trump administration, the Department of Justice reverted back to the tough on crime policies, which many accuse of being rife with racism. Kim A. MacInnis See also: Homicides, Gun

Further Readings “Aries S. Friedman and the Illinois Rifle Association v. City of Highland Park.” The Supreme Court of the United States, 2015. https://www.scotusblog.com/wp-content /uploads/2015/10/150807-for-filing.pdf (accessed May 2, 2020). “Black Lives Upended by Policing: The Raw Videos Sparking Outrage.” The New York Times, April 19, 2018. https://www.nytimes .com/interactive/2017/08/19/us/police-videos -race.html (accessed January 20, 2020).

Bonner, K. M. W. “Race, Space, and Being Policed: A Qualitative Analysis of Residents’ Experiences with Southern Patrols.” Race and Justice 4, no. 2 (2014): 124–51. Edwards, Frank, Hegwid Lee, and Michael Esposito. “Risk of Being Killed by Police Use of Force in the United States by Age, Race–Ethnicity, and Sex.” 2019. https:// doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1821204116 (accessed January 24, 2020) “Fact Sheet: Taskforce on 21st Century Policing.” 2014. https://obamawhitehouse.arch ives.gov/the-press-office/2014/12/18/fact -sheet-task-force-21st-century-policing (accessed May 4, 2020). FBI Uniform Crime Report. “Law Enforcement Officers Killed and Assaulted.” 2019. http://www2.f bi.gov/ucr/killed /2019/ (accessed January 24, 2020) “47 officers in the US Have Been Fatally Shot in the Line of Duty this Year.” CNN, December 2018. https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/12/us /officer-shooting-deaths-2018-trnd/index .html (accessed April 28, 2020). Fuchs, Eric. “There Are Two Major Supreme Court Cases That Protect Cops Who Kill Unarmed Civilians.” Business Insider, December 29, 2015. https://www.businessinsider .com/supreme-court-cases-police-shootings -force-2015-12 (accessed April 22, 2020). Hanna, Jason. “Baton Rouge Cop Killer Left Note, Fired at Least 43 Rounds.” CNN, July 9, 2017. https://www.cnn.com/2017/06/30/us /baton-rouge-gavin-long-police-killings /index.html (accessed April 28, 2020). Kappeler, Victor E. “A Brief History of Slavery and the Origins of American Policing.” Police Studies Online, 2015. https://plson line.eku.edu/insidelook/brief-history-slavery -and-origins-american-policing (accessed April 20, 2020). Klar, Rebecca. “Police Officer, Gunman Among 5 Dead in Missouri Shooting.” The Hill, March 16, 2020. https://thehill.com /homenews/state-watch/487793-police-officer -gunman-among-5-dead-in-missouri-shooting (accessed April 28, 2020).

Police Shootings | 691 Law Enforcement Officers Assaulted and Killed. Criminal Justice Information Services Division, 2018. https://ucr.fbi.gov /leoka/2018/topic-pages/officers feloniously -killed (accessed April 20, 2020). Lee, Hoon, Michael S. Vaughn, and Hyeyoung Lim. “The Impact of Neighborhood Crime Levels on Police Use of Force: An Examination at Micro and Meso Levels.” Journal of Criminal Justice 42, no. 6 (2014): 491–99. MacInnis, Kim. “Community Policing and Racism.” In Social Problems: Societal Crisis, Capitalism and Democracy, 258–64. San Diego, CA: Cognella, 2019. Menifield, Charles E., Geiguen Shin, and Logan Strother. “Do White Law Enforcement Officers Target Minority Suspects?” Public Administration Review 79, no. 1 (2018): 56–68. “NAACP Condemns Latest Injustices Surrounding Fatal Police-Involved Shootings Around Nation.” 2018. https://www.naacp .org/latest/naacp-condemns-latest-injus tices-surrounding-fatal-police-involved -shootings-around-nation/ (accessed January 24, 2020) NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People). “NAACP Denounces Verdict of Oscar Grant Case.” 2010. http://www.naacp.org/news/entry/na acp-denounces-verdict-of-oscar-grant-case/ (accessed June 22, 2011). Police Integrity Research Group. “Police Shootings: Data—What We Know and Don’t Know.” 2017. https://www.bgsu.edu /health-and-human-services /programs /department-of-human-services/criminal -justice/police-integrity-lost.html (accessed April 20, 2020). Rambaran, Vandana. “Baton Rouge Police Shooting Suspect Kept Firing at Dead Officer.” New York Post, April 27, 2020. https:// nypost.com/2020/04/27/baton-rouge-police -shooting-suspect-kept-firing-at-dead-officer -investigators/ (accessed April 28, 2020). Ross, Janell. “Police Officers Convicted for Fatal Shootings Are the Exception, Not the

692 | Political Victory Fund (PVF) Rule.” NBC News, March 14, 2019. https:// www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/police -officers-convicted-fatal-shootings-are -exception-not-rule-n982741 (accessed January 20, 2020). Salzwedel, Sam. “Police Find Rifles, Handguns and Pepper Gas, Booby Traps after Deadly Marshall Shooting.” KVOA News, April 25, 2019. https://www.kvoa.com /news/local/police-find-rif le-handguns -and-pepper-gas-booby-traps-after-deadly -marshal-shooting/article_cf811dec-66c2 -5398-811b-b14e6ff224cb.html (accessed May 2, 2020). Statistica Research Project. “Number of People Shot to Death by the Police in the United States from 2017 to 2020, by Race.” 2020. https://www.statista.com/statistics/585 152/people-shot-death-by-us-police-by -race/ (accessed April 20, 2020). Sullivan, John, Liz Weber, Julie Tate, and Jennifer Jenkins. “U.S. Police Shoot Almost 1,000 People Dead Every Year, Figures Show.” Independent, February 13, 2019. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world /americas/police-shootings-us-death-toll -g un-control-off icers-a8777046.html (accessed January 24, 2020). United States Commission on Civil Rights. “Police Use of Force: An Examination of Modern Policing Practices.” 2018. https:// www.usccr.gov/pubs/2018/11-15-Police -Force.pdf (accessed May 3, 2020).

Political Victory Fund (PVF) The Political Victory Fund (PVF) is the political action committee (PAC) of the National Rifle Association (NRA), managed by the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action; it raises and spends money on political campaign activities. The PVF was formed in 1976 with the specific purpose of funneling campaign contributions to sympathetic officeholders

and political candidates. In 1988, it contributed $1.5 million to George H. W. Bush’s presidential campaign. In all, it spent $4.6 million during the 1987–1988 election cycle, making it the fifth-biggest PAC spender during that period. During the 1991–1992 election cycle, the PVF contributed over $1.7 million to U.S. Senate and House candidates, ranking it the ninth-biggest PAC spender. However, in 1992, it refused to endorse Bush because of his support for restrictions on assault weapons imports. In addition, it spent $958,000 on its own independent spending against or in favor of selected candidates. In 1994, the PVF was the nation’s top-spending PAC, giving $5.3 million in campaign contributions and independent expenditures. During the 1995–1996 election cycle, it raised and spent over $6.6 million, although it gave virtually nothing to Republican presidential nominee Robert Dole, despite the fact that his opponent, President Bill Clinton, was hated by the NRA for his support of gun controls and public criticism of the NRA. The NRA refused to support Dole because, despite his long record of opposition to gun control in Congress, Dole, as majority leader, had refused to allow a Senate vote to repeal the Assault Weapons Ban of 1994. In the 1999–2000 cycle, the PVF raised and spent over twice as much as it had four years earlier, amounting to almost $20 million. Total campaign spending during the 2008 election cycle totaled $40 million. In recent years, the PVF has been among the top three biggest spending PACs. As is true of most PACs, the PVF gives most of its money to incumbents. It also favors Republicans over Democrats. During the 1985–1986 election cycle, for example, it gave about $644,000 to 139 Republican candidates and $255,000 to sixty-eight



Democratic candidates. It spent an additional $750,000 on independent expenditures and $73,000 in negative campaigning against twenty-nine Democrats and four Republicans. In the 2000 election cycle, the PVF tilted more strongly to the Republican Party and its candidates, giving about 90 percent of its contributions to Republicans. It worked aggressively on behalf of Republican presidential nominee George W. Bush and worked even harder to maintain a strong Republican Party presence in Congress, realizing that Republican leaders in Congress had sided with the NRA in opposing stronger gun laws, especially in 1999 when national pressures mounted to respond legislatively to the shootings at Columbine High School in Colorado. By 2006, when national political tides began to favor the Democrats, the NRA increased funding and endorsement to Democrats sympathetic to gun rights issues. The NRA’s increased devotion of resources to political activities has come at a cost. Fewer NRA resources have been devoted to traditional hunting, shooting, and other programs. In 1980, 19 percent of the NRA budget went to hunter-safety programs, police-training courses, and the like. By 1988, only 11 percent of the budget was devoted to such programs. Further, the dramatic upsurge in political spending ran the NRA deeply into the red in the early 1990s and into the 2000s. In 1991, it posted a $9 million debt. In 1992, the debt was over $30 million, out of a total budget of about $84 million, and its liquid assets dropped from $91 million to $68 million. In 1993, its debt was $32.7 million; in 1996, it reported a $43 million debt and laid off about 70 of its 400 employees. Clouding the financial picture further were charges of mismanagement. By the early 2000s, the NRA’s financial situation had improved, partly because of redoubled fundraising and membership increases that hit four million by the end of

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the 1990s. In the 2000s, the NRA logged major policy successes in Congress and in the courts, capped by the Supreme Court’s ruling in 2008 establishing, for the first time in history, a Second Amendment individual right to bear arms for citizens in the case of District of Columbia v. Heller. The only downside to these victories was that membership remained static at about four million throughout the decade; historically, NRA membership increased when the organization suffered political losses. Although membership took declined slightly following the 2016 presidential election, it rebounded in 2018 following the midterm elections, reaching its highest membership ever with 5.5 million members (Bedard 2019). Notably, however, the NRA spent far less on political activities and campaign contributions for the 2018 midterm elections—they spent just $1.6 million in such expenditures, compared to $16 million during the 2014 midterm elections (Basu 2018). In 2018, NRA revenues, including contributions, member dues, and investments, exceeded $412 million (Gutowski 2019). Despite the uptick in membership, however, expenditures by the organization continue to exceed the income brought in; in 2018, the NRA registered a deficit of more than $10 million at year’s end (Woody 2019). Robert J. Spitzer See also: District of Columbia v. Heller; Institute for Legislative Action (ILA); National Rifle Association (NRA)

Further Reading Basu, Zachary. “NRA’s Midterm Spending Down 90% from 2014.” Axios, October 2, 2018. https://www.axios.com/2018-midterm -elections-nra-spending-d82d4b38-045c -4206-b81b-10bfb5336e80.html (accessed July 13, 2020).

694 | Poverty and Gun Violence Bedard, Paul. “NRA Is Back, ‘Highest Ever’ Membership.” Washington Examiner, April 1, 2019. https://www.washingtonex aminer.com/washington-secrets/nra-is -back-highest-ever-membership (accessed July 8, 2020). Gutowski, Stephen. “NRA Membership Dues, Contributions Rebounded in 2018.” Washington Free Beacon, May 30, 2019. https://freebeacon.com/issues/nra-mem bership-dues-contributions-rebounded -in-2018/ (accessed July 8, 2020). Melzer, Scott. Gun Crusaders: The NRA’s Culture War. New York: New York University Press, 2009. Political Victory Fund (NRA). http://www .nrapvf.org/ (accessed July 8, 2020). Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021. Woody, Christopher. “Financial Documents Show the NRA Is Living ‘Paycheck to Paycheck,’ Ended 2018 $10.8 Million in the Red.” Business Insider, June 15, 2019. https:// www.businessinsider.com/documents-show -the-nra-is-facing-f inancial-problems -debt-2019-6 (accessed July 13, 2020).

Poverty and Gun Violence Paradoxically, low family income is associated with higher levels of gun-crime perpetration and victimization and with lower levels of gun ownership. By a very wide margin, the highest rates of firearm crime in the United States are found in inner cities. Scholars have long debated whether poverty itself is a cause of crime or whether poverty and crime are both caused by other factors—such as low education, bad work habits, substance abuse, family breakdown and fatherlessness, or other social pathologies. Johnson and colleagues (2021), for instance, find that the proportion of residents living below the poverty line is not a direct predictor of higher levels of gun

crime. However, high poverty rates in areas with higher median incomes was a strong predictor of higher levels of firearm crime. Whatever the effects of poverty at a given point in time, changes in poverty rates appear unconnected to changes in guncrime rates. For example, the 1920s were a period of rising prosperity, whereas the 1930s suffered through the Great Depression. Although statistics are sketchy, gun crime rose in the 1920s and fell in the 1930s; the effects of alcohol prohibition in causing gun crime (by stimulating turf wars among bootleggers) were apparently quite strong, and thus when Prohibition was repealed in 1933, the homicide rate began to fall sharply, notwithstanding the economic distress. In the 1960s, incomes rose substantially, and so did gun crime. Crime rates continued to increase until 1980, even as stagflation (increased unemployment plus inflation) slowed the economy. In the early 1980s, the nation entered a recession, but gun-crime rates began to fall, and they continued to fall during the mid-1980s boom. A sharp intensification of the drug war in the late 1980s was accompanied by sharp increases in gun crime; these increases were reversed in the mid-1990s, and gun-crime rates fell for the rest of the decade, during another economic boom (Carter 1997). Like gun crime, gun ownership appears to be little affected by changing economic circumstances. American gun ownership has increased from approximately 36,000 guns per 100,000 people in 1948 to about 93,000 guns per 100,000 people in 2004, with increases showing little relation to economic conditions. The periods with the fastest rate of increase have tended to be periods when concerns about crime or gun control were most intense. Gun ownership rates are highest in the American middle class, somewhat lower for



high-income levels, and lower still for people with low incomes. For people with annual incomes of less than $25,000, the gun ownership rate is 18 percent. For incomes of $25,000–$49,999, the rate is 31 percent, and for incomes of $50,000– $89,999, the rate is 40 percent. The rate is 46 percent for incomes of above $90,000 (Smith and Son 2019). David B. Kopel See also: African Americans and Gun Violence; Average-Joe Thesis; Gun Ownership; Urbanism and Gun Violence

Further Reading Carter, Gregg Lee. The Gun Control Movement. New York: Twayne, 1997. Johnson, Blair T., Anthony Sisti, Mary Bernstein, Kun Chen, Emily A. Hennessy, Rebecca L. Acabchuk, and Michaela Matos. “Community-level Factors and Incidence of Gun Violence in the United States, 2014–2017.” Social Science & Medicine 280 (2021): 113969. https://doi.org /10.1016/j.socscimed.2021.113969. Smith, Tom W, and Jaesok Son. General Social Survey Final Report: Trends in Gun Ownership in the United States, 1972– 2019. Chicago: National Opinion Research Center, 2019. https://gssdataexplorer.norc .org/documents/905/download (accessed July 19, 2021).

Pratt, Larry(1942–) Larry Pratt is the executive director emeritus of Gun Owners of America (GOA), one of the most prominent gun rights organizations in the United States. Pratt was born on November 13, 1942, in Camden, New Jersey. He joined GOA in 1976, shortly after it was founded, and served as its executive director from 1977 to

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2017, when he retired. He also served at various times as the Midwest director of the Intercollegiate Studies Institute, a conservative campus think tank; executive director of the American Conservative Union; and treasurer of the Heritage Foundation. From 1980 to 1981, he served in the Virginia House of Delegates. Pratt is author of Armed People Victorious, a study of Guatemala’s decision to fight domestic terrorism and insurgency by arming and training its civilians. His study concludes that the approach was effective in checking terrorism, both by enabling civilian resistance and by increasing their cooperation with authorities; once civilians were able to protect themselves against reprisal, they were willing to provide the army with information on the insurgents. It also explores events in the post-Marcos Philippines, where citizens armed and organized to protect themselves against extremist movements and were ultimately formed into a government-sponsored constabulary. Pratt is also author of On the Firing Line, a collection of essays on the Second Amendment and firearm ownership, and has been recognized as an important figure in the early development of America’s militia movement. In 1995–1996, Pratt cochaired Pat Buchanan’s campaign for the Republican presidential nomination. Three days before Buchanan won the New Hampshire primary, stories appeared charging that Pratt had spoken at rallies at which persons with white separatist or anti-Semitic views also appeared. Since then, Pratt’s critics have frequently accused him of harboring radical anti-governmental, theocratic, and racist views. The Southern Poverty Law Center offered a representative statement of this perspective when it claimed that “Pratt stands at the intersection of guns and Jesus,

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lobbying for absolutely unrestricted distribution of firearms while advocating a theocratic society based upon Old Testament civil and religious laws” (Southern Poverty Law Center, n.d.). David T. Hardy See also: Gun Owners of America (GOA)

Further Reading Gun Owners of America. http://www.gunown ers.org/ (accessed January 28, 2022). Pratt, Larry. Armed People Victorious. Nashville, TN: Legacy Publishing, 1991. Pratt, Larry. On the Firing Line. Nashville, TN: Legacy Publishing, 2001. Southern Poverty Law Center. “Larry Pratt.” Southern Poverty Law Center website. https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate /extremist-files /individual/larry-pratt (accessed January 28, 2022).

Preemption Laws In response to local efforts by municipalities to regulate firearms, the National Rifle Association (NRA) successfully lobbied state legislatures in the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s to enact “preemption” laws that would forbid localities from adopting their own gun control laws and regulations stricter than that of the state law. Today, forty-seven states have firearm preemption laws that preclude local governments from regulating the manufacture, sale, or possession of firearms. According to the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action, as of 2011, only three states—Hawaii, Illinois, and Nebraska—lack statewide firearm preemption of local ordinances (compared with eight states in 2000). Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and New York have preemption through judicial ruling, not

statute. In Massachusetts, local ordinances may be imposed if approved by the state legislature. In sum, most municipalities and local governments are forbidden by state law to enact their own more stringent gun control laws, even if such laws are desired or viewed as advantageous by the citizens of that municipality. The underlying legal justification for preemption laws is that police powers of a sovereign state exist independently within the state under the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution. Furthermore, municipal police powers are granted and bestowed by the state to subdivisions of the state—and may therefore be revoked by the state. Thus, a municipal government’s ability to enact its own firearm regulations is dependent upon the state, and the state is under no obligation to grant local municipalities this power. Generally, state law preemption is not an issue when local regulation by a city or local entity involves a matter of “municipal affairs” given to the city or local entity at the time of its creation by the state. However, the use and regulation of firearms have been held not to constitute “municipal affairs” by the courts. In the wake of an explosion of civil tort litigation initiated by municipalities against firearm manufacturers during the period 1998–2002, many states passed new state laws restricting the ability of local governments to sue gun manufacturers for creating a dangerous or defective product. Additionally, in 2005, President George W. Bush signed legislation entitled the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005, which also protected firearms dealers and manufacturers from civil liability in many types of actions in federal and state courts. In addition to the limitation of civil tort litigation, the constitutionality of preemption laws continue to be reviewed and have



revealed conflicting results. For instance, the Supreme Court of California made a landmark ruling in 2002 in support of “local governments in California hav[ing] the power to enact gun laws that are stricter than state law.” The court’s decision was in line with the belief of gun control proponents “that counties can ban gun shows on county-owned property and can ban the possession of guns on county-owned property” (Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence 2002). On the other hand, the Supreme Court of Ohio on December 29, 2010, in Cleveland v. State, upheld the 2006 Ohio preemption law, which provided that only federal or state-level regulations can limit the right to bear arms. This ruling invalidated a number of municipal law restrictions on gun possession in Ohio, including Cleveland’s ban on assault weapons. Thus, the overall prevalence of preemption laws generally makes it clear that citizens must look to the state or federal government for resolution of gun control issues and problems, and not counties or municipalities, although it should be emphasized that statespecific anomalies (e.g., California) to the above general rule also exist. James A. Beckman See also: Gun Control; Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; National Rifle Association (NRA); Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005; Tenth Amendment

Further Reading Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. “California Supreme Court Rules That Local Governments Can Adopt Stricter Gun Laws.” April 22, 2002. http://www .bradycampaign.org/media/press/view/394 (accessed July 8, 2011) Cleveland v. State, 128 Ohio St. 3d 135, 2010Ohio-6318 (December 29, 2010). http:// www.supremecourt.ohio.gov/rod /docs

Product Liability Lawsuits | 697 /pdf/0/2010/2010-Ohio-6318.pdf (accessed July 8, 2011). Gorovitz, Eric. “California Dreamin’: The Myth of State Preemption of Local Firearm Regulation.” University of San Francisco Law Review 30 (1996): 395–426. Herz, Andrew. “Gun Crazy: Constitutional False Consciousness and Dereliction of Dialogic Responsibility.” Boston University Law Review 75 (1995): 57–153. National Rifle Association. “Firearms Preemption Laws.” 2006. http://www.nraila .org/Issues/FactSheets/Read.aspx?id=48 (accessed July 8, 2011) Supreme Court of Ohio and the Ohio Judicial System. “Supreme Court Upholds as Constitutional State Law Displacing Local Gun-Control Ordinances: Legislation Does Not Violate Cities’ ‘Home Rule’ Powers.” 2010. http://www.sconet.state .oh.us/PIO/summaries/2010/1229/092280 .asp (accessed December 28, 2011). Warner, James. “Symposium: Municipal AntiGun Lawsuits: How Questionable Litigation Substitutes for Legislation.” Seton Hall Constitutional Journal 10 (2000): 775–95.

Private Sale Loophole. See Gun Shows Product Liability Lawsuits Product liability is a species of tort law allowing lawsuits against manufacturers and distributors of defective products, even when there is no evidence of negligent conduct. For decades, anti-gun organizations have brought lawsuits claiming that some or all handguns are, by their very nature, “defective.” Starting in 1998, some municipal governments filed claims on similar theories. With the notable exception of a 1985 case in Maryland, none of the product liability cases have succeeded. Many state legislatures have enacted laws to prohibit

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product liability suits against properly functioning firearms. In 2005, Congress enacted the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA), which prohibited almost all product liability and other suits against gun manufacturers and retailers, except for guns that malfunction, or are sold in violation of the law. Beginning in the 1940s, state courts began to change traditional tort doctrine and to allow lawsuits against manufacturers (and, later, distributors) of defective products. Unlike in previous decades, injured consumers would not need to prove that the manufacturer had acted negligently and would not have to prove that they had “privity of contract” (a contractual relationship) with the manufacturer—since consumers usually bought the products from retailers rather than directly from the manufacturer. Under the new system, manufacturers were “strictly liable” (without regard to mental fault) for defective products. The plaintiff still had to prove, however, that the product was defective. Allowing recovery without proof of an actual defect would be “absolute liability”—discussed below. Lawsuits involving manufacturing defects are uncontroversial. If a product fails to perform as intended because of a defect occurring during the manufacturing process, the product has a manufacturing defect. For example, if a ladder breaks because one of the steps is too weak, a person who falls from the ladder may sue the manufacturer. Similarly, if a gun discharges when it is dropped, or discharges even when the safety is engaged, the gun has a manufacturing defect (e.g., Caveny v. Raven Arms Co., 665 F.Supp. 530, 531 [S.D. Ohio 1987]; Armijo v. Ex Cam, Inc., 656 F.Supp. 771, 773 [D. N.M. 1987]). Manufacturing-defect lawsuits resulted in many victories by plaintiffs,

leading manufacturers of substandard guns (particularly, cheap European imports) to improve their guns or abandon the market. Another standard type of product liability case involves “failure-to-warn” about nonobvious dangers. Thus, manufacturers of electronic equipment, to avoid liability, include instruction manuals warning consumers not to drop the equipment in the bathtub, not to try to repair the interior of the equipment while the equipment is plugged in, and so on. Failure to warn does not apply when the danger is obvious. A person who was cut with a knife could not bring a failure-to-warn case, because everyone knows that knives are sharp and can cut. Regarding firearms, failure-to-warn cases are nearly impossible to win. Manufacturers routinely include extensive instruction manuals explaining how to handle the gun properly (e.g., do not clean the gun while it is loaded). And the primary danger of firearms—firing a projectile when the trigger is pressed—is obvious and well known. In contrast to manufacturing-defect cases, a design-defect lawsuit acknowledges that the particular product functioned as intended, but that the product could have been designed to be safer. To succeed, the plaintiff must show that the design change would not impair the product’s function and would be realistic to implement. If the radio knobs on an automobile were pointed and impaled a passenger during an accident, a plaintiff could win a design-defect case since rounded or flat knobs would not impair the radio’s function. Often, courts use a “risk-utility” test to weigh the advantages and disadvantages of a particular design issue. So, even though installing a roll bar on every car would plainly make the car safer, the disadvantages, including



aesthetics, are considered great enough that courts will not find a sedan manufacturer liable for failing to install a roll bar. Likewise, even though automobiles would be much safer if they had regulators preventing the car from traveling faster than thirty miles per hour, the regulator would impair a function of the automobile. Design-defect cases against gun manufacturers allege that the gun should have included a particular device, such as a magazine disconnect, a loaded indicator, or one of various types of locks. So far, none of these lawsuits have succeeded, as manufacturers have successfully argued that the device is not needed or would impede the gun’s function, especially the gun’s utility for self-defense. For example, if the magazine (ammunition holder) has been removed from a selfloading gun, a magazine disconnect prevents a self-loading gun from firing even if there is a bullet in the firing chamber. Some manufacturers use magazine disconnects, but most do not. Magazine disconnects might reduce accidents from reckless gun play, in which a person—thinking that the gun is empty because the magazine is removed—points the gun at someone and presses the trigger. On the other hand, if someone drops the magazine clip while attempting to insert it in the gun in an emergency, the gun becomes of no use, and the gun owner could be killed by a criminal— even though the gun had one bullet in the chamber and could have been used against the criminal but for the magazine disconnect. Thus, many police officers refuse to buy guns with magazine disconnects. Design-defect cases may also be brought based on nonexistent safety devices that the plaintiff alleges should have been invented, but these cases are much harder to win. Some of the municipal lawsuits against gun

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manufacturers alleged that manufacturers are liable for having failed to invent a palm print recognition device (or similar gadgetry) embedded in a gun to prevent unauthorized users from firing the gun. As of 2010, such devices do not yet function well enough to make the gun reliable for self-defense. Implicit in many of the design-defect lawsuits is the belief that guns (other than those owned by the government) should be used only for sports, and not for defense. If this theory were accepted, then many of the design-defect cases would have a better chance of success. Another form of design-defect lawsuit is the allegation that the gun (usually a handgun, although sometimes a particular type of gun, such as a “Saturday night special”) is by its very nature defective. Such lawsuits argue that handguns (or certain types of guns) cause many injuries and deaths, and that these harms far outweigh the sporting benefits of the guns. Further, it is argued that there are good substitutes (including long guns) that can provide many of the same sporting benefits, while not inflicting the harms that result from the nature of handguns (including the easier concealability of handguns). The cases further argue that defensive handgun use is rare, or that most people are not capable of using defensive handguns competently, or that long guns or other items can provide adequate substitutes. Though many of these lawsuits were brought starting in the 1970s, they achieved almost no success. Courts consistently ruled that the plaintiffs were asking courts to impose policy judgments that were the function of legislatures, not courts (e.g., Delahanty v. Hinckley, 686 F.Supp. 920 [D.D.C. 1986]; affirmed 900 F.2d 368 [D.C. Cir. 1990]; Miles v. Olin Corp., 922 F.2d

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1221 [5th Cir. 1991]; whether a properly functioning shotgun is a defective product belongs to the legislature). In response to these lawsuits, several states enacted statutes specifically forbidding product liability cases against manufacturers of properly functioning guns. The only strict liability case that succeeded was a 1985 Maryland case in which the Maryland Supreme Court, perturbed at the legislature’s decision not to enact new gun control laws, held that manufacturers of Saturday night specials were strictly liable (Kelley v. R. G. Industries, 497 A.2d 1143 [Md. 1985]). The next session of the Maryland legislature passed a statute prohibiting such liability, but, as a compromise, the legislature also created the Handgun Roster Board, whose approval was required for the sale of new models of firearms. The Handgun Roster Board turned out to be perhaps more useful to gun prohibition advocates than a liability standard would have been. Although presented to the public as a means of controlling Saturday night specials, the board delayed or stopped the sale of various models of large, expensive firearms, such as Glock pistols. Maryland governor Parris Glendenning failed to make required appointments to the Handgun Roster Board, and some board members who support gun prohibition chose not to attend meetings. Without a quorum, the board was frequently unable to approve the sale of any type of new-model handgun. Even before the development of product liability in the second half of the twentieth century, courts had imposed absolute liability on a narrow class of “abnormally dangerous activities.” For example, if a company were blasting with dynamite, it would be liable for any resulting injuries, even if the company had used all possible precautions. The doctrine covers “ultrahazardous activities”

and has also been applied to hazardous-waste disposal—but not to the manufacture or sale of dynamite or to the industrial processes that generate hazardous waste. The Restatement (Third) of Torts (the leading treatise on tort law) states that an is abnormally dangerous if “(1) the activity creates a foreseeable and highly significant risk of physical harm even when reasonable care is exercised by all actors; and (2) the activity is not one of common usage” (American Law Institute, Restatement (Third) of Torts § 20 [2010]). Several lawsuits have alleged that the manufacturing and selling of handguns should be considered an abnormally dangerous activity. None of these lawsuits have succeeded. In Perkins v. F.I.E. Corp. (762 F.2d 1250 [5th Cir. 1985]), the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals reasoned that the only ultrahazardous activities are those that “in and of themselves . . . can directly cause harm.” Making and selling handguns were not such activities because the harm is not directly caused by the making or selling, but is caused later, when an individual misuses the gun. Other courts have relied on the doctrine’s close tie to land-related activities, holding that only land-based activities that threaten neighboring landowners could be ultrahazardous. Some courts focus on the Restatement’s standard that the activity must not be a matter of common usage, whereas the tens of millions of handguns in private possession, with millions more sold every year, show that making and selling handguns is hardly uncommon. Claims that making or selling firearms is an abnormally dangerous activity have been unanimously rejected by the courts. The one victory of the ultrahazardousliability theory occurred in Washington, D.C., where the “Assault Weapon Manufacturing Strict Liability Act” was passed. The



“strict liability” in the title was a misnomer, as the law imposed absolute liability, so anyone injured by an assault weapon (even a violent criminal who was lawfully shot by a victim) could recover from the manufacturer. Congress has supervisory power over the District of Columbia, and in 1992 the U.S. Senate voted to repeal the DC absolute liability law. But Sen. Fritz Hollings (D-SC)—who had extremely close ties to the trial-lawyer lobbies—had the measure removed in conference committee. Because of the federal Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, the D.C. absolute liability law is no longer valid (District of Columbia v. Beretta, 940 A.2d 163 [D.C. 2008]). By the mid-1990s, product liability cases against nondefective guns appeared to have reached a dead end, and no court had chosen to follow the lead of the Maryland Supreme Court. Law professor Andrew J. McClurg (1991), perhaps the most sophisticated scholarly advocate of anti-gun tort suits, penned an article, “The Tortuous Marketing of Handguns: Strict Liability Is Dead, Long Live Negligence.” McClurg urged that anti-gun lawsuits abandon the strict liability theory and instead use other tort theories, such as claims that gun manufacturers were negligent in their marketing because they did not supervise the federally licensed retailers who sold the guns. In Hamilton v. Accu-Tek, anti-gun attorneys won a verdict based on such theories, overturned in 2001 by the federal Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, based on the unanimous holding by the New York Court of Appeals that New York law did not allow such suits (Hamilton v. Beretta, 264 F.3d 21 [2d Cir. 2001]; Hamilton v. Beretta, 92 N.Y.2d 222 [2001]). Beginning in 1998, the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence (the legal arm of

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Handgun Control, Inc.) organized thirtytwo local governments and one state attorney general (Elliot Spitzer of New York) to bring a new round of lawsuits against gun companies. The legal theories behind the lawsuits varied and included allegations of negligent marketing, unjust enrichment, public nuisance, and others. Product liability claims were brought in states where statutes or judicial precedent did not plainly foreclose such claims. All of the claims essentially involved the “risk/utility” issue, whereby plaintiffs allege that handguns (or handguns not containing features desired by the plaintiffs, or handguns not marketed in ways the plaintiffs prefer, or compact handguns that can fire intermediate-power ammunition) cause great risks that outweigh their utility. Again, the propriety of defensive gun use was very much at issue. For example, allegations that manufacturers improved their guns too much in response to consumer demand (such as by making smaller guns and guns with greater ammunition capacity, accuracy, and firepower) assumed that guns should not be carried for protection, since that is the main utility of such guns. Many, but not all, such cases were dismissed by courts because the governments were not the injured victims and because the risk/ utility issue is a legislative matter. Thirty-three states enacted laws against the new rounds of lawsuits. Some of these statutes simply preclude municipal suits, while others also bar lawsuits by individuals. Ohio and Colorado, for example, now forbid any kind of tort lawsuit, under any theory, for guns that are not actually defective. The 2005 federal Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA) outlawed all such suits in federal and state courts, including suits that had already been filed. Almost all the lawsuits have been dismissed,

702 | Project Exile

although a few linger on in search of a loophole in the PLCAA. Critics of the immunity statutes complain that the laws give special protection to the gun industry. The complaint is factually true, although legislatures do sometimes enact tort statutes for some industries facing special circumstances—such as Colorado’s law restricting lawsuits against ski resorts (Colo. Rev. Stats. § 33-44-112). Critics of the lawsuits complain that the cases attempted to win policy results that have been rejected in legislatures. They assert that the suits were an attempt by wealthy trial lawyers and deep-pocketed mayors to bankrupt the thinly capitalized gun industry, which, even combined into a single company, would not make the Fortune 500. David B. Kopel See also: Brady: United against Gun Violence; Consumer Product Safety Laws; Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Loaded-Chamber Indicator; Miniguns; Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005; Smart Guns

Further Reading Lytton, Timothy D., ed. Suing the Gun Industry: A Battle at the Crossroads of Gun Control and Mass Torts. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2005. McClurg, Andrew J. “Handguns as Products Unreasonably Dangerous Per Se.” University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Journal 13 (1991): 599–619. Oliver, Philip D. “Rejecting the WhippingBoy Approach to Tort Law: Well-Made Handguns Are Not Defective Products.” University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Journal 14 (1991): 1–35. “Symposium: Guns and Liability in America.” Connecticut Law Review 32 (2000). “Symposium on Firearms Legislation and Litigation.” Hamline Law Review 6 (1983).

“Symposium: Triggering Liability: Should Manufacturers, Distributors, and Dealers Be Held Accountable for the Harm Caused by Guns?” Seton Hall Legislative Journal 19 (1995).

Project Exile Project Exile was a program designed to increase the penalties for the illegal use of firearms. It mandated significant prison sentences for individuals engaged in gun crimes by prosecuting criminals at the federal level instead of through state courts. The program began in Virginia and it was trumpeted by the Republican Party as an effective alternative to controlling gun violence as opposed to restrictions on gun ownership. Project Exile was first put into place in Richmond, Virginia, in 1997. The program was developed by the U.S. attorney’s office in Richmond with support from both progun groups such as the National Rifle Association and gun control advocacy groups such as the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence (at the time called Handgun Control Inc.). The project was intended to take advantage of stricter federal sentencing guidelines by prosecuting individuals through the U.S. attorney’s office rather than the state prosecutor’s office. In Richmond, this meant that criminals convicted of federal gun crimes faced a mandatory five-year prison sentence. Project Exile also limited bail and parole possibilities, and the program was launched with a substantial public relations campaign. Under the guidelines of the program, suspected criminals were subject to mandatory five-year sentences without parole if they fell into one of three categories: those who had prior convictions for violent crimes and were convicted of using a firearm in a

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crime; those convicted of possessing or using a gun on school property; and those convicted of using a firearm while in possession of illegal drugs such as heroin or cocaine or more than at least a pound of marijuana (with the intent to sell the drug). While awaiting trial, those indicted for Project Exile crimes were not eligible for bail. Finally, those suspected of Project Exile–type crimes were given expedited trial dates. Since 1994, the murder rate in Richmond fell by more than 50 percent. While other factors, including increased communitypolicing efforts, contributed to this decline, Project Exile was credited with having a major impact on gun crime in the Old Dominion’s capital city. The Virginia Commonwealth attorney’s office credited Project Exile with reducing gun violence by 40 percent in its initial two years of operation and 10–15 percent per year thereafter. In Richmond, the program was responsible for 700 indictments, 380 convictions, and the confiscation of more than 850 weapons since 1997. More significantly, studies have shown that criminals were more reluctant to use guns because of the mandatory sentencing rules. Because of the project’s accomplishments, a number of other Virginia cities, including Roanoke, Lynchburg, Petersburg, Portsmouth, and Suffolk, have implemented Project Exile programs. Nationwide, such cities as Baton Rouge, Oakland, Philadelphia, Providence, and Rochester adopted the program. The success of the program in Richmond led then Virginia governor James Gilmore to propose a statewide initiative based on Project Exile in 1999. The new initiative was dubbed Virginia Exile. Virginia abolished parole in 1995 and subsequently enacted mandatory five-year sentences. Since its sentencing matches that of the

federal law, Project Exile cases are now divided between Virginia and the federal prosecutor’s office. The project was seen as a model by the Republican Party as a means to combat violent crime without enacting stricter gun control laws. However, the statewide program had only limited success. For instance, the state rate for successful prosecutions was only 40 percent compared with the federal rate of 80 percent. In addition, at the state level, some prosecutors arranged plea bargains before the cases went to trial. Gilmore became chairman of the Republican National Committee in 2000 and was influential in promoting Project Exile within the party. The project formed part of the core of President George W. Bush’s proposed Project Safe Neighborhoods, which also included community outreach and gang-suppression projects. Under this initiative, Project Exile was supposed to be expanded to include 150 cities, and through 2010, the initiative had received $1.5 billion in federal funding. The project was regarded within the party as a means to counter charges that Republicans neglected gun control issues and as a model for state legislation throughout the nation. Tom Lansford See also: Boston Gun Project (BGP); Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS); Crime and Gun Use; National Rifle Association (NRA); Project Safe Neighborhoods; Republican Party and Gun Control

Further Reading Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. Gun Violence: The Real Costs. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. DeConde, Alexander. Gun Violence in America: The Struggle for Control. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2001.

704 | Project Safe Neighborhoods Kleck, Gary, and Don B. Kates. Armed: New Perspectives on Gun Control. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2001. Miller, Maryann. Drugs and Gun Violence. New York: Rosen Publishing Group, 1995.

Project Safe Neighborhoods During the 1990s, the criminal justice system began experimenting with comprehensive strategies to curb gun crime. Their foundational idea was that this kind of crime was best fought by combining and coordinating the resources and efforts of attorneys, correctional staff, juvenile justice officials, law enforcement officers, academics, and members of the community. Among the more successful and better known of these programs were Project Triggerlock, Boston’s Operation Ceasefire, and Richmond’s (VA) Project Exile. Their success led to the federal government approving the Project Safe Neighborhoods Initiative.

The Basic Paradigm Developed by the U.S. Department of Justice in 2001, Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN) emphasizes enhanced federal prosecutions, which are undergirded by five core elements: (1) partnership, (2) strategic planning, (3) training, (4) community outreach and public awareness, and (5) accountability. The first of these, partnership, acknowledges that the best chances of public safety flow from collaborative efforts among crime-fighting agencies. Former president George W. Bush observed that PSN involves “an unprecedented partnership at all levels of government.” In particular, all law enforcement agencies from the same judicial districts are headed by their respective U.S. attorney. It is not simply collaboration, but the combining of resources that allows

for an aggressive approach to reducing gun crime. The second component of PSN, strategic planning, begins when the U.S. attorney’s office assesses the nature and scope of the district-specific gun-crime problem. To encourage objectivity, this assessment uses the expertise of academics, e.g., criminologists from local universities. Once the most significant areas of need are identified, a systematic and targeted effort can be developed. The third component, training, emphasizes proper search-and-seizure procedures necessary to successfully prosecute offenders. Other aspects of the training involve firearms identification, gun trafficking, public safety when arrests are being made, and evidence management. This training is offered to all levels of involved law enforcement—from the local police, to county sheriffs, to state police, and to federal agents. The fourth component, outreach and awareness, focuses on the local and community levels of the jurisdiction. Citizens are made aware of a collaborative effort against gun violence in their area. One goal is for the residents to become actively engaged, e.g., sharing information with authorities about where guns or drug transactions have been seen. This effort is encouraged by the distribution of brochures and other means of advertising. Residents are also encouraged not to become involved with “straw purchases” (buying a gun for a friend, or relative, or acquaintance when that person is barred from making a legal purchase himor herself, e.g., because he or she is a convicted felon). Area gun dealers are given a video, Don’t Lie for the Other Guy, to help them recognize and deter this kind of purchase. A second goal is to make potential gun offenders aware of the vigilant effort



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the authorities are giving toward reducing crime and getting guns and their criminal users off the streets. The fifth component of PSN is accountability, which is based on continuing evaluation of the tactics taken and making adjustments accordingly. Most critically, crime data are analyzed to see if the expected decreases actually occur in response to one or more intervention tactics.

Rosenfeld, Fornango, and Baumer’s (2005a, 2005b) methodology and causal inferences in evaluating Project Exile and Operation Ceasefire, while Ludwig (2005, 681) concludes that Exile and enhanced sentencing practices do not have a “supernormal” effect on gun crime—that is, the effect is not much larger than expected if the criminal justice system did nothing at all. Sean Maddan

The Efficacy of the PSN Initiative An overall evaluation of PSN is difficult to achieve as each district’s target areas incorporate individually tailored strategies for dealing with the gun crime at hand. The evaluations to date indicate varying degrees of success. Increased gun-crime prosecutions have increased across all districts in the program (McGarrell et al. 2009), whereas lower levels of gun crime have been reported in the Southern District of Alabama (O’Shea 2007), in the Middle District of Alabama (McGarrell et al. 2007), the Eastern District of Missouri (Decker et al. 2005; Decker et al. 2007), and in the Lowell District of Massachusetts (McDevitt et al. 2007; Rosenfeld, Fornango, and Baumer 2005a, 2005b) the researchers did not examine PSN per se, but their later evaluation of the similar Project Exile and Operation Ceasefire programs revealed a reduction of homicide rates in Richmond, Boston, and New York City. McGarrell et al. (2009) examined PSN nationally and found significant increases in the federal prosecution of criminals using guns in the commission of their offenses. Moreover, comparing violent crime in 82 target sites to 170 nontarget sites, cities in which PSN was implemented witnessed a significant reduction in violent crime. Not all of PSN reviews have been positive. For example, Berk (2005) criticizes

See also: Black Market for Firearms; Boston Gun Project (BGP); Project Exile; Project Triggerlock

Further Reading Berk, Richard A. “Knowing When to Fold ’Em: An Essay on Evaluating the Impact of Ceasefire, Compstat, and Exile.” Criminology and Public Policy 4 (2005): 451–65. Braga, Anthony A. “The Strategic Prevention of Gun Violence among Gang-Involved Offenders.” Justice Quarterly 25 (2008): 132–62. Braga, Anthony A., David M. Kennedy, Elin J. Waring, and Anne M. Piehl. “ProblemOriented Policing, Deterrence, and Youth Violence: An Evaluation of Boston’s Operation Ceasefire.” Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency 38 (2001): 195–225. Decker, Scott H., G. David Curry, Shannan Catalano, Adam Watkins, and Lindsey Green. Approaches to Community Safety Initiative (SACSI) in St. Louis. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2005. Decker, Scott H., Beth M. Huebner, Adam Watkins, Lindsey Green, Tim Bynum, and Edmund F. McGarrell. Project Safe Neighborhoods: Strategic Interventions. Eastern District of Missouri: Case Study 7. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2007. Ludwig, Jens. “Better Gun Enforcement, Less Crime.” Criminology and Public Policy 4 (2005): 677–716.

706 | Project Triggerlock Ludwig, Jens, and Philip J. Cook. Evaluating Gun Policy: Effects on Crime and Violence. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 2003. McCaleb, Ian Christopher. “Bush Pitches $550 Million Fight against Gun Crime.” CNN, May 14, 2001. https://www.cnn .com /2001/ALLPOLITICS/05/14/bush .guns/index.html (accessed January 22, 2011). McDevitt, Jack, Anthony A. Braga, Shea Cronin, Edmund F. McGarrell, and Tim Bynum. Project Safe Neighborhoods: Strategic Interventions. Lowell, District of Massachusetts: Case Study 6. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2007. McGarrell, Edmund F., Natalie K. Hipple, Nicholas Corsaro, Timothy S. Bynum, Heather Perez, Carol A. Zimmermann, and Melissa Garmo. Project Safe Neighborhoods: A National Program to Reduce Gun Crime—Final Project Report. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2009. McGarrell, Edmund F., Natalie K. Hipple, Nicholas Corsaro, Ed Pappanastos, Ed Stevens, and James Albritton. Project Safe Neighborhoods: Strategic Interventions. Middle District of Alabama: Case Study 5. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2007. O’Shea, Timothy C. “Getting the Message Out: The Project Safe Neighborhoods Public-Private Partnership.” Police Quarterly 10 (2007): 288–307. Project Safe Neighborhoods. “About Project Safe Neighborhoods.” http://www.psn .gov/about/index.html (accessed June 21, 2011). Rosenfeld, Richard, Robert Fornango, and Eric Baumer. “Did Ceasefire, Compstat, and Exile Reduce Homicide?” Criminology and Public Policy 4 (2005a): 419–50. Rosenfeld, Richard, Robert Fornango, and Eric Baumer. “The Straw Man Bluff: Reply to Berk.” Criminology and Public Policy 4 (2005b): 467–70.

Project Triggerlock During the 1980s, the United States experienced large increases in both violent and property crime. The crime problem was fueled, in part, by the crack cocaine epidemic and the rise in the use of guns by drug dealers for protection. In response, the Department of Justice—in coordination with federal, state, and local criminal justice agencies—launched Project Triggerlock. Under the program, every federal district’s U.S. attorney was tasked with forming a special team comprised of federal, state, and local actors to curb gun crime. By prosecuting gun offenders at the federal level, punishments for offenders are more effective. Federal sentencing has three generally recognized advantages over its counterpart at the state level. First, federal laws allow for mandatory minimum sentences without parole. Second, federal offenders are more likely to be subject to pretrial detention. Third, the federal criminal justice system has resources that make it more likely that offenders will serve their entire sentence. Project Triggerlock involved the creation of complex task forces to help state prosecutors—the forces being comprised of area FBI, ATF, DEA, state police, and local law enforcement. The success of Project Triggerlock was rooted in this interagency cooperation, which allowed for better apprehension rates of offenders and for paying special attention to violations of firearms laws—making sure such violations were prosecuted to the fullest extent. Ultimately, forty cities developed a Triggerlock program, a program that could be adapted to the unique circumstances of each city. For some cities, the focus was on drugs; for others, gangs; and for still others, the



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combination of gang wars over drug-selling turf. In 1991, the first year of Triggerlock, over 6,000 defendants were prosecuted for gun crimes, up from just over 3,000 prosecutions in 1990. By 1992, 10 percent of all federal prosecutions were charged under Triggerlock. However, this rosy start did not fully blossom. First, the program suffered when President Bill Clinton came into office in January 1993. His attorney general, Janet Reno, placed less emphasis on street-level offenders and more on major gun traffickers. Secondly, Project Triggerlock received a setback when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Bailey v. United States (1996) that it was not enough to merely possess a gun while committing a crime; rather, the offender must either brandish or discharge the gun if a distinct weapons charge were to be added to the originating criminal charge. In 1998, Congress passed a law known as the “Bailey Fix” that amended federal legislation and dictated that the mere possession of a firearm during a crime of violence or drug-trafficking crime would allow for an additional charge and for enhanced sentencing (18 U.S.C. § 924[c]). And soon thereafter, gun prosecutions began to rise as they had in the early 1990s, peaking in 2005 at over 9,600 cases. In 1999, the Clinton administration inaugurated Project Triggerlock II, which was aimed at intensifying even further the enforcement of federal firearm laws under the umbrella of U.S. attorney’s offices. As with the first Triggerlock program, the primary thrust of Triggerlock II was to prosecute firearms offenders in federal courts. Triggerlock II also expanded the program to more jurisdictions, and at the same time placed more emphasis on community awareness and education. The program

publicized through numbers local media outlets that “gun crime means hard time!” Although the Triggerlock moniker has largely disappeared, its legacy is a host of community-oriented, intensive, and interagency cooperative programs, including Operation Ceasefire, Project Exile, and Project Safe Neighborhoods. Sean Maddan See also: Boston Gun Project (BGP); Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS); Project Exile; Project Safe Neighborhoods

Further Reading Braga, Anthony A., David M. Kennedy, Elin J. Waring, and Anne M. Piehl. “ProblemOriented Policing, Deterrence, and Youth Violence: An Evaluation of Boston’s Operation Ceasefire.” Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency 38 (2001): 195–225. Carter, Gregg Lee. Gun Control in the United States: A Reference Handbook. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2006. U.S. Department of Justice. Project Safe Neighborhoods Tool Kit. Washington, DC: Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice, 2001. http://www.ojp .usdoj.gov/BJA/psngrants/psn_toolkit.pdf (accessed July 31, 2011).

Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005 The Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, signed into law by President George W. Bush in 2005, shields firearms manufacturers and dealers from certain civil liability actions in federal and state courts. Since its passage, the act has been the subject of vigorous litigation, addressing both its scope and its constitutionality. The act was passed in response to numerous lawsuits against gun manufacturers,

708 | Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005

brought during the period 1998–2002 by over thirty urban cities and counties. Those suits sought to recover the public costs of gun violence, including costs associated with law enforcement, criminal prosecution, and medical treatment of victims in public hospitals. The suits charged that gun makers were liable for failing to incorporate safety devices in guns to prevent misuse and for contributing to a public nuisance by maintaining a distribution system that facilitates the flow of guns into the illegal market. Though prompted by the municipal lawsuits against gun manufacturers, however, the Commerce in Arms Act applies to suits by gun violence victims as well as by municipalities, and it applies to gun dealers as well as to manufacturers. The act bars the filing of any “qualified civil liability action,” which it defines as a civil action or administrative proceeding against a manufacturer or seller of firearms or ammunition seeking any relief, including damages or injunctive relief, “resulting from the criminal or unlawful misuse” of a firearm or ammunition. It also directs courts to dismiss such actions pending on the effective date of the act. The definition of the affected lawsuits, however, expressly excludes several categories of civil actions against manufacturers and sellers from the scope of the act. Among the most significant exclusions are (1) actions for negligent entrustment or negligence per se; (2) actions in which a manufacturer or seller “knowingly violated a State or Federal statute applicable to the sale or marketing” of guns or ammunition, and the violation was a proximate cause of the harm (known as the predicate exemption); and (3) actions for injuries or other damages “from a defect in design or manufacturer of the product, when used as intended or in a reasonably foreseeable

manner.” The “defect” exception, however, is limited by language providing that “where the discharge of the product was caused by a volitional act that constituted a criminal offense, then such act shall be considered the sole proximate cause of any resulting death, personal injuries, or property damage.” In Adames v. Sheahan (909 N.E.2d 742 [2009]), the Illinois Supreme Court ruled that the act barred a product liability lawsuit involving an accidental shooting by a thirteen-year-old boy who found his father’s semiautomatic pistol in a closet and thought he had unloaded the gun by removing the ammunition magazine. He was unaware that a round remained in the chamber. The court held that, even though the shooter did not intend to harm his victim, the lawsuit was a “qualified civil liability action” involving “the criminal or unlawful misuse” of a firearm, because the shooter had been adjudicated delinquent based on a finding that he had committed involuntary manslaughter and reckless discharge of a firearm. The court held the “defect” exception did not apply because the shooter’s discharge of the gun “was caused by a volitional act that constituted a criminal offense.” Much of the litigation over the scope of the act has focused on the “statutory violation” exception and, specifically, on whether cases alleging that gun industry conduct violates a state’s public nuisance statute would come within the exception. In City of New York v. Beretta U.S.A. Corp. (524 F.3d 384 [2d Cir. 2008]), the court dismissed New York City’s lawsuit against various gun manufacturers as barred by the act, holding that a generally applicable statute barring conduct constituting a public nuisance is not a statute “applicable to the sale or marketing” of guns or ammunition.



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However, the Indiana Court of Appeals reached a different conclusion as to Gary, Indiana’s public nuisance lawsuit against various gun manufacturers and dealers, finding it not barred by the act. Smith & Wesson Corp. v. City of Gary (875 N.E.2d 422 [Ind. Ct. App. 2007]). The Indiana court held that the statutory violation exception should be construed to encompass any statute “capable of being applied” to gun or ammunition sales, regardless of whether the statute specifically regulates such products. The court further noted that Gary had supported its public nuisance claim by charging that gun dealers had violated federal statutes specifically regulating guns and that various manufacturers had facilitated the violation of gun regulatory statutes. In addition, courts have held that the act does not bar civil lawsuit against gun dealers for engaging in “straw sales” or other conduct in violation of federal or state gun laws (see, for example, City of New York v. A-1 Jewelry & Pawn, Inc. [252 F.R.D. 130 (E.D.N.Y. 2008)]). Other courts have held that statutes codifying or creating tort causes of action also do not qualify to invoke the statutory violation exception to the act. For example, the Ninth Circuit held, in Ileto v. Glock, Inc. (565 F.3d 1126 [9th Cir. 2009]), that California’s codification of general tort theories like negligence, nuisance, and public nuisance did not qualify for the statutory violation exception to the act, finding that Congress intended in the act to preempt generally tort claims against gun manufacturers and sellers, regardless of whether principles of tort law had been codified. In District of Columbia v. Beretta (940 A.2d 163 [2008]), the District of Columbia Court of Appeals held that damages claims brought under a local law imposing strict liability on assault weapon manufacturers

were barred by the Commerce in Arms Act. The court determined that the District’s strict liability law did not impose a duty on gun manufacturers and sellers to operate in any particular manner, as required by the statutory violation exception, but only a duty to pay compensation to assault weapon victims. Because the Commerce in Arms Act may be the first federal law to deprive a class of injured plaintiffs of the right to assert common-law remedies in court without providing an alternative system of remedies, and because it commands the immediate dismissal of pending claims in state as well as federal court, the act raises novel constitutional issues. Plaintiffs have challenged the law on a number of constitutional grounds, alleging violations of the due process clause, takings clause, Tenth Amendment, commerce clause, and separationof-powers principles. Courts generally have upheld the act against these challenges, with few exceptions. An Indiana state trial court ruling in the liability lawsuit brought by Gary held that the act violates the due process clause and separation-of-powers principles (Smith & Wesson Corp. v. City of Gary [875 N.E.2d 422 (Ind. Ct. App. 2007)]). As noted above, the Indiana Court of Appeals allowed Gary’s case to proceed, though the appellate court did not reach the constitutional issues decided by the trial court because it held the Commerce in Arms Act inapplicable to Gary’s public nuisance action. More recently, in 2019, the Connecticut Supreme Court upheld a decision to allow families of victims of the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting to proceed forward with a lawsuit against Remington Arms, the parent company of the manufacturer of the primary weapon in the attack (Soto v. Bushmaster Firearms Int’l, LLC–331 Conn. 53, 202 A.3d 262).

710 | Pulse Nightclub Shooting

The families argued that the manner in which Remington marketed their products “extoll[ed] the militaristic and assaultive qualities of the rifle,” which violated the Connecticut Unfair Trade Practices Act. The court held that the families’ claim fell within the act’s predicate exemption, paving the way for the families to pursue their lawsuit. Dennis A. Henigan See also: Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; Tenth Amendment

Further Reading Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Guns Industry Immunity.” https:// giffords.org/lawcenter/gun-laws/policy -areas/other-laws-policies/gun-industry -immunity/ (accessed January 20, 2022). Henigan, Dennis A. Lethal Logic: Exploding the Myths that Paralyze American Gun Policy. Dulles, VA: Potomac Books, 2009.

Pulse Nightclub Shooting Just after 2:00 a.m. on June 12, 2016, twenty-nine-year-old Omar Mateen arrived at Pulse, a gay nightclub, in Orlando, Florida, as more than 300 people were enjoying the venue’s “Latin Night.” Armed with a Sig Sauer MXC semiautomatic assault rifle, he opened fire as last-call drinks were being served, firing off around 200 rounds of ammunition in less than five minutes; he also had a Glock 17 9-mm semiautomatic pistol. The shooting quickly turned into a hostage situation, with local police agencies attempting to negotiate the release of the individuals trapped inside the club and the surrender of the perpetrator. A little more than three hours later, when negotiations failed and the perpetrator threatened to

strap bombs to hostages and blow up the building, police breached the building, drew him out from the bathroom he was hiding in using flash bangs, and shot and killed him. By this time, he had killed forty-nine people and wounded fifty-three others in what was, at the time, the most lethal mass shooting in U.S. history and the deadliest terrorist attack on U.S. soil since 9/11. The perpetrator gained access to the club at 2:02 a.m. and immediately opened fire with the semiautomatic assault rifle. Over the next several minutes, he moved throughout the club and its attached outdoor patio shooting people as they ran for cover or attempted to escape. Numerous patrons fled to the bathrooms, with some being killed or injured as he fired through the doors. Although there was an off-duty police officer at the club working as security at the time the shooting erupted, the firepower differential between his handgun and the assault-style rifle was too great. He took cover and called for backup, though he did engage the perpetrator when he came out onto the patio. Less than five minutes into the event, as additional officers were arriving on scene, the perpetrator retreated into the club and continued firing. At one point, the rifle jammed, and he switched to the handgun. He also was overheard by individuals in the club talking about having explosives, which caused further concern. Within minutes, more than one hundred law enforcement officers were dispatched to the club from city and county agencies. Officers from surrounding jurisdictions also responded to offer assistance. A team of six officers who were among the first responders shot through a plate glass window at the front of the club and gained entry. They followed the sounds of gunfire to the bathroom, where the perpetrator had retreated to. When the perpetrator stuck his



head out, the officers fired at him. The gunfire quickly subsided, and the situation transitioned to a hostage standoff, prompting the officers to hold their fire during negotiation efforts. Twenty minutes into the attack, the perpetrator stopped shooting and called 911. During the call, he referenced the perpetrators of the 2013 bombing at the Boston Marathon and an American citizen killed in a suicide bombing attack in Syria in 2014, and he pledged allegiance to the leader of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). He also stated that an impetus for the attack was the bombings against his country, which he wanted to stop. During the standoff, he made two additional calls to 911 dispatchers; he also searched online for news about the shooting and posted on Facebook expressing his support for ISIL.

Pulse Nightclub Shooting | 711

Around 2:45 a.m., the perpetrator also called one of the local news outlets and identified himself as the shooter. He told the channel’s producer that he was carrying out the attack on behalf of ISIL in response to the U.S.’s bomb strike on May 6, 2012, that killed one of the terrorist group’s leaders. Around the same time that the perpetrator placed the first call to 911, responding SWAT officers entered the building and began rescuing people who were trapped inside the club. They also were able to extricate most of the individuals who were injured by 2:35 a.m., who then were transported to the local hospitals for treatment. Crisis negotiators began communicating with the perpetrator around 2:48 a.m. and spoke with him three times over the next forty minutes. During those conversations, the perpetrator indicated that he had bombs

A memorial formed outside of the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida, following the June 12, 2016, mass shooting. A total of 49 people were killed and 53 others injured in the shooting at the LGBTQ+ nightclub during its Latin night. The perpetrator was killed by police after a threehour standoff. (JCPJR Photography/Dreamstime.com)

712 | Pulse Nightclub Shooting

and that his vehicle outside was rigged to explode, prompting first responders to retreat until the exterior of the club was deemed safe. Two hours into the standoff, police removed an air conditioning unit from an exterior wall, which allowed eight hostages to escape. Several minutes later, the perpetrator told negotiators that he planned to strap explosive vests to four of the hostages, place them each at different corners of the building, and detonate them to kill everyone inside of the building. Recognizing that the perpetrator was not willing to arrange an end to the standoff, the police department ended their negotiations and began planning their next move. At 5:02 a.m., three hours after the first shots were fired, police officers set off a controlled explosion along one of the exterior walls to breach the building closer to where the perpetrator was hiding. The explosion was partially successful, but the wall remained largely intact. Around the same time the explosion was occurring, the perpetrator opened fire in one of the bathrooms where people were hiding; at least two additional people were killed. Using an armored vehicle, SWAT officers then breached through a wall and drew the perpetrator out of the bathroom using flash-bangs as a distractor. The perpetrator engaged fire with the officers, who collectively returned approximately 150 rounds, striking him eight times and killing him. During the shooting, the following individuals lost their lives: Stanley Almodovar III, Amanda Alvear, Oscar AracenaMontero, Rodolfo Ayala-Ayala, Alejandro Barrios Martinez, Martin Benitez Torres, Antonio Brown, Darryl R. Burt II, Jonathan A. Camuy Vega, Angel Candelario-Padro, Simon A. Carrillo Fernandez, Juan ChevezMartinez, Luis Conde, Cory Connell, Tevin

E. Crosby, Franky J. Dejesus Velazquez, Deonka Drayton, Mercedez Flores, Peter Gonzalez-Cruz, Juan Guerrero, Paul Henry, Frank Hernandez, Miguel Honorato, Javier Jorge-Reyes, Jason Josaphat, Eddie Justice, Anthony Laureano Disla, Christopher Leinonen, Brenda Marquez McCool, Jean Mendez Perez, Akyra Monet Murray, Kimberly Morris, Jean Nieves Rodriguez, Luis Ocasio-Capo, Geraldo Ortiz-Jimenez, Eric Ivan Ortiz-Rivera, Joel Rayon Paniagua, Enrique Rios Jr., Juan Rivera Velazquez, Yilmary Rodriguez Solivan, Christopher Sanfeliz, Xavier Emmanuel Serrano Rosado, Gilberto Ramon Silva Menendez, Edward Sotomayor Jr., Shane Tomlinson, Leroy Valentin Fernandez, Luis Vielma, Luis Daniel Wilson-Leon, and Jerald Wright. Many of the victims were Latin and members of the LGBTQIA+ community, leading the event to be classified as a hate crime. The attack on Pulse was the deadliest mass shooting in the United States until the attack at the Route 91 Harvest Festival concern in Las Vegas, Nevada, sixteen months later. The subsequent investigation revealed that the firearms used in the attack were purchased two weeks before it was carried out from a gun shop a couple of hours south of Orlando. He also attempted to purchase body armor, but the store did not sell it. The week before the shooting, the perpetrator also had surveilled both Pulse and Disney Springs, an entertainment and dining complex at the Walt Disney World Resort just outside of the city, as possible sites for his attack. At the time, Walt Disney World was hosting its annual “Gay Days” celebrations, and Disney Springs specifically had less security challenges than the parks themselves because it was an open venue where people could come and go. According to records, the evening before the attack, the



perpetrator searched for Pulse on his computer. Investigators believed that the perpetrator’s wife, who flew to California to visit her parents on the day of the shooting, had prior knowledge of his plans. In March 2018, a jury acquitted her of any charges related to the attack. The investigation also revealed that prior to the shooting, the perpetrator had been on the FBI’s terrorist watch list. In 2013, while working for a South Florida–based security company, he told coworkers that his family had connections to Al-Qaeda and he had joined Hezbollah, another Islamic militant group. He also indicated that he had ties to the perpetrators of the 2009 mass shooting at Fort Hood and the Boston Marathon bombing. These comments were reported to the county sheriff’s office, who then reported him to the FBI, where he was classified as a person of interest. During the investigation, the perpetrator stated that he had made the comments in response to harassment he was experiencing and jokes made about him being a Muslim extremist. A second investigation was opened by the FBI in 2014, when links between the perpetrator and Moner Mohammad Abu Salha, an American radical who carried out a suicide bombing in Syria earlier that year, were discovered. The two men had lived in the same city and attended the same mosque. Both cases were subsequently closed without any significant findings warranting further investigation, thereby removing the perpetrator from the terrorist watch list. Even if he had still been on the list at the time he purchased the firearms, however, it would not have prevented the transaction from being completed. To prevent him or anyone else on the watch list from purchasing a firearm, there would have had to be an accompanying disqualifying criterion, such as a criminal conviction, being adjudicated

Pulse Nightclub Shooting | 713

mentally unstable by a court, or being an undocumented illegal immigrant. Without this criterion, purchasing a firearm while on the terrorist watch list would simply alert law enforcement about the transaction rather than stopping it completely. In addition to being classified as a terrorist attack, the Pulse shooting also was declared a hate crime given the LGBTQIA+ status of those who were killed. After the shooting, the fate of the nightclub seemed uncertain, with the City of Orlando expressing a desire to purchase the space and Pulse’s owner, Barbara Poma, declining to sell. Poma established the onePULSE Foundation and, in May 2017, announced plans to create a memorial to the shooting. A request for proposals was released in March 2019, and a winning design was chosen with input from the survivors and families of the victims. In 2021, Congress designated the nightclub’s location as a national memorial, and this is where the permanent memorial, opening in 2022, will be housed. A second site, also opening in 2022, will be located nearby and will serve as a museum to educate people about the shooting and its aftermath and commemorate those impacted by it. Brian J. Monahan and Jaclyn Schildkraut See also: Assault Weapons; Las Vegas Shooting; Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting; Mass Murder (Shootings); Terrorist Screening Database and Firearms

Further Readings Orange County Government, Florida. “Pulse.” n.d. https://www.orangecountyfl.net/Board ofCommissioners/Pulse.aspx#.YWG8AB DMIq0 (accessed May 18, 2022). Straub, Frank, Jack Cambria, Jane Castor, Ben Gorban, Brett Meade, David Waltemeyer, and Jennifer Zeunik. “Rescue, Response,

714 | Pulse Nightclub Shooting and Resilience: A Critical Incident Review of the Orlando Public Safety Response to the Attack on the Pulse Nightclub.” U.S. Department of Justice, Community Oriented Policing Services, 2017. https://www .policefoundation.org/wp-content/uploads /2017/12/Orlando-Pulse.pdf (accessed May 18, 2022).

Straub, Frank, Charles Jennings, and Ben Gorban. “After-Action Review of the Orlando Fire Department Response to the Attack at Pulse Nightclub.” Washington, DC: National Police Foundation, 2018. https:// www.orlando.gov/files/sharedassets/pub lic/initiatives/pulse/ofd-after-action-review -final5b98855d.pdf (accessed May 18, 2022).

Guns in American Society

Guns in American Society AN ENCYCLOPEDIA OF HISTORY, POLITICS, CULTURE, AND THE LAW Third Edition Volume 3: R–Z

Jaclyn Schildkraut and Gregg Lee Carter, Editors

Copyright © 2023 by ABC-CLIO, LLC All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Carter, Gregg Lee, 1951- editor. | Schildkraut, Jaclyn, editor. Title: Guns in American society : an encyclopedia of history, politics, culture, and the law / Jaclyn Schildkraut and Gregg Lee Carter, editors. Description: Third edition. | Santa Barbara, California : ABC-CLIO, [2023] | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2022012539 | ISBN 9781440867736 (hardcover ; 3 vol. set) | ISBN 9781440867743 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Gun control—United States—Encyclopedias. | Firearms—Law and legislation—United States—Encyclopedias. | Firearms—Social aspects—United States—Encyclopedias. | Violent crimes—United States—Encyclopedias. | Social movements—United States—Encyclopedias. Classification: LCC HV7436 .G8783 2022 | DDC 363.330973—dc23/eng/20220603 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022012539 ISBN: 978-1-4408-6773-6 (set) 978-1-4408-6775-0 (vol. 1) 978-1-4408-6776-7 (vol. 2) 978-1-4408-6777-4 (vol. 3) 978-1-4408-6774-3 (ebook) 27 26 25 24 23  1 2 3 4 5 This book is also available as an eBook. ABC-CLIO An Imprint of ABC-CLIO, LLC ABC-CLIO, LLC 147 Castilian Drive Santa Barbara, California 93117 www.abc-clio.com This book is printed on acid-free paper Manufactured in the United States of America

Contents

List of Entries, vii Preface, xiii Introduction, xv Chronology, xxi A–Z Entries, 1 Appendix 1: Key Federal Gun Laws, 967 Appendix 2: Key State Gun Laws, 977 Appendix 3: List of Judicial Developments, 993 Appendix 4: Organizations Concerned with the Role of Guns in Contemporary American Society, 1015 About the Editors and Contributors, 1033 Index, 1051

v

List of Entries

Accidents Acoustic Gunshot Detection Technologies Acquisition of Guns African Americans and Gun Violence AK-47 Alcohol and Gun Violence American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) American Bar Association (ABA) American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) American Jewish Congress (AJC) American Medical Association (AMA) American Revolution Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) Ammunition, Regulation of Ammunition, Types of Amnesty Programs Armed Teacher Policies Armor-Piercing Ammunition Arms Trade Treaty Articles of Confederation and Gun Control Assault Weapons Assault Weapons Ban, Renewal Attempts of Assault Weapons Ban of 1994 Association of Firearm and Tool Mark Examiners (AFTE) Aurora Theater Shooting Automatic Weapons Laws Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime Average-Joe Thesis Background Checks Ballistic Identification System

Bartley-Fox Carrying Law Baton Rouge Police Officers Shooting Beard, Michael K. Biden, Joseph, Jr. Black Codes Black Lives Matter Black Market for Firearms Bloomberg, Michael Body Armor Boston Gun Project (BGP) Bowling for Columbine Boxer, Barbara Brady, James S. Brady, Sarah Kemp Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill) Brady Legal Brady: United against Gun Violence Branch Davidians Brown, Michael, Shooting of Brown Bess Browning, John Moses Bullet Button Bulletproof Consumer Products Bump Stocks Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) Bush, George H. W. Bush, George W. Campus Carry Cartridges vii

viii | List of Entries

Castle Doctrine Categories of People Prohibited from Owning Firearms Cease Fire, Inc. Center for Gun Policy and Research Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence (CSPV) Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Charleston Church Shooting Chicago, IL Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws Children’s Defense Fund (CDF) Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA) Civil War and Small Arms Clinton, William J. Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV) Collectors Colleges and Gun Violence Colt, Samuel Columbine High School Shooting Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) Concealed Weapons Laws Congressional Voting Patterns on Gun Control Consumer Product Safety Laws Cook, Philip J. Copycat Shootings CornerShot Guns Crime and Gun Use Crime Prevention Research Center Dallas Police Officers Ambush DC Project Defensive Gun Use (DGU) Democratic Party and Gun Control Demonization of Guns Derringers DeVos, Betsy Dingell, John D. District of Columbia v. Heller Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership (DRGO)

Drive-By Shootings Dueling Dum-Dum Bullet Eddie Eagle Elections and Gun Control Enforcement of Gun Control Laws Ergonomics and Firearms Design Everytown for Gun Safety Extreme Risk Protection Orders Families vs. Assault Rifles Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Federal Firearms Act of 1938 (Public Law No. 75-785) Federalism and Gun Control Federation for NRA Feinstein, Dianne Felons and Gun Control Fifty Caliber Shooters Association, Inc. (FCSA) Firearm Dealers Firearm Sentence Enhancement (FSE) Laws Firearms Industry Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986 Firearms Shooting Accuracy Rates Florida Carry, Inc. Fourteenth Amendment Fourth Amendment Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) Frontier Violence Giffords, Gabrielle Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence Gottlieb, Alan Merril Gun Buyback Programs Gun Clubs Gun Control Gun Control Act of 1968 Gun Control, Attitudes toward Gun Courts Gun Culture Gun Lobby Gun Owners’ Action League (GOAL) Gun Owners of America (GOA)



Gun Owners of California (GOC) Gun Ownership Gun Registration Gun Rights Policy Conference (GRPC) Gun Sales Records Gun Shows Gun Violence Archive (GVA) Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem Gun-Free Business Practices Gun-Free School Laws Gunpowder Guns in the Home Gunshot Detection Technologies (GDTs) Gunshot Wounds (Wound Ballistics) Halbrook, Stephen P. Hammer, Marion P. Handguns Health Care Professionals and Gun Violence Hellfire Trigger Helmke, Paul Hemenway, David A. Henigan, Dennis A. Heston, Charlton High-Capacity Magazine Ban High-Capacity Magazines Hinckley, John Warnock, Jr. Hirsch, Margot Hollow Point Bullet Holocaust Imagery and Gun Control Homicides, Gun The Huey P. Newton Gun Club Hunting Hupp, Suzanna Gratia Hurricane Katrina and Gun Control Ideologies—Conservative and Liberal Immigrants and Guns Independent Firearm Owners Association, Inc. (IFOA) Institute for Legislative Action (ILA) Intelligent Gun Safety Systems International Firearms Laws Iron Pipeline Izaak Walton League of America (IWLA)

List of Entries | ix

Johnson, Lyndon B. Juvenile Gun Courts Kates, Don B., Jr. Kellermann, Arthur L. Kennesaw, Georgia Killeen, Texas, Shooting Kleck, Gary Knox, Neal Kopel, David B. Ku Klux Klan (KKK) LaPierre, Wayne R., Jr. Las Vegas Shooting Lautenberg, Frank R. Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers League of Women Voters and Gun Control Legal Implications of Firearms Characteristics Lethality Effect of Guns Libertarianism and Gun Control Licensing Loaded-Chamber Indicator Loesch, Dana Long Gun Long Island Railroad Shooting Long Rifle (Pennsylvania/Kentucky) Lost and Stolen Firearms Reporting Lott, John R., Jr. Mailing of Firearms Act of 1927 Mail-Order Guns March for Our Lives Movement Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting Martin, Trayvon, Shooting of Mass Murder (Shootings) Massachusetts Gun Law McCarthy, Carolyn McDonald v. City of Chicago McNamara, Robert G. Medicine and Gun Violence Mental Disabilities and Gun Use and Acquisition Metal Detectors Methodologies for Studying Gun Violence Microstamping (Bullet Serial Numbers)

| List of Entries x Miller v. Texas Million Mom March Miniguns Minimum Ages to Purchase and Possess Firearms Modular Weapons System Moms Demand Action More Guns, Less Crime Thesis Motor Vehicle Laws as a Model for Gun Laws NAACP and Gun Control National Association of Firearms Retailers (NAFR) National Board for the Promotion of Rifle Practice (NBPRP) National Center for Injury Prevention and Control (NCIPC) National Council of Churches (NCC) and Gun Control National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) National Firearms Act of 1934 National Instant Criminal Background Check System National Institute of Justice (NIJ) National Rifle Association (NRA) National School Safety Center (NSSC) National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) National Student Safety and Security Conference (NSSSC) National Tracing Center (NTC) National Violent Death Reporting System Native Americans and Gun Violence Needle-in-the-Haystack Problem News Media and Gun Control NICS Improvement Act Obama, Barack Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act One-Gun-per-Month Laws Open Carry Laws Periodicals, Guns Pittsburgh Synagogue Shooting

Plastic Guns Police Shootings Political Victory Fund (PVF) Poverty and Gun Violence Pratt, Larry Preemption Laws Product Liability Lawsuits Project Exile Project Safe Neighborhoods Project Triggerlock Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005 Pulse Nightclub Shooting Racism and Gun Control Reagan, Ronald Wilson Recreational Uses of Guns Regional Gun Violence Research Consortium Remington, Eliphalet, II Republican Party and Gun Control RFID Guns Right to Self-Defense, Philosophical Bases Roberti-Roos Assault Weapons Control Act of 1989 Ruby Ridge Ruger, William Batterman SAFE Act of 2013 Safety Courses San Bernardino Shooting Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting Sandy Hook Promise Saturday Night Specials Sawed-off Shotguns School Marshal and Guardian Programs School Shootings Schumer, Charles E. Second Amendment Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) Self-Defense, Legal Issues Self-Defense, Reasons for Gun Use Semiautomatic Weapons Shooting Ranges SHUSH Act Silencers



Slippery Slope Argument Smart Guns Smith & Wesson (S&W) Smith & Wesson Settlement Agreement Soto et al. v. Bushmaster Firearms International, LLC et al. South (U.S.) and Gun Violence Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers’ Institute (SAAMI) Sporting Purposes Test (SPT) States United to Prevent Gun Violence Stop Handgun Violence (SHV) Student Pledge against Gun Violence Students for Concealed Carry on Campus Substitution Effects Suicide, Guns and Suicide, International Comparisons Sullivan Law Surplus Arms Sutherland Springs Church Shooting Tactical Training Target Shooting Tartaro, Joseph P. Techno-Polymers Tenth Amendment Terrorist Screening Database and Firearms 3D Gun Printing Tommy Gun Toy Guns Trigger Locks Trump, Donald J. Tucson, Arizona, Shooting Uniform Crime Reports (UCR)

List of Entries | xi

United Nations (UN) United States Concealed Carry Association (USCCA) United States Conference of Mayors United States Constitution and Gun Rights Universal Background Checks Urbanism and Gun Violence Victimization from Gun Violence Vigilantism Violence Policy Center (VPC) Violence Prevention Research Program (VPRP) Violent Crime Rate Violent Video Games and Gun Violence Virginia Tech Shooting Waiting Periods Washington, DC Washington, DC, Sniper Attacks Washington Navy Yard Shooting Weapons Instrumentality Effect Winchester, Oliver Fisher Women Against Gun Control (WAGC) Women Against Gun Violence (WAGV) Women and Guns Workplace Shootings Wright, James D. Youth and Guns Youth Crime Gun Interdiction Initiative (YCGII) Youth Gun Control Legislation: The Juvenile Justice Bill of 1999 Zimring, Franklin E. Zip Guns

R Racism and Gun Control

advocating racially motivated gun control: “Let a negro board a railroad train with a quart of mean whiskey and a pistol in his grip and the chances are that there will be a murder, or at least a row, before he alights.” Perhaps one of the most blatant examples of the racist origins of certain gun control legislation can be found in a majority opinion of the U.S. Supreme Court authored by Chief Justice Roger B. Taney in the infamous 1856 case Dred Scott v. Sandford. Justice Taney wrote that, if Blacks were considered full citizens entitled to the privileges and immunities of citizenship, then they would of course also be entitled to the Constitution’s right to keep and bear arms. According to Taney, such an outcome would “inevitably produce discontent and insubordination among them” and would “endanger the peace and safety of the State.” After the Civil War, Blacks alone had to obtain licenses for their firearms in Mississippi and Louisiana, and Alabama in 1866 banned all gun ownership by Black citizens. As a practical reality, Alabama and Texas subsequently placed large taxes on the sale of handguns to put them out of reach of most minority citizens. Such court decisions and racist legislation were typically crafted and endorsed by lawyers and legislators who were members of the white “elite” unlikely to break ranks. However, a 1920 Ohio Supreme Court decision upholding the conviction of a Mexican citizen for carrying a concealed handgun while asleep in his bed caused controversial Ohio Supreme Court justice Reuben M. Wanamaker to speak refreshingly freely

American history reveals a pattern of racist thinking that caused the drafting, promotion, and rationalization of gun control laws that were anchored around the troubling notion that the poor, and the nonwhite poor in particular, were not to be trusted with firearms. The first mention of Blacks in any Virginia legislation, after all, came in 1644, when Virginia made it illegal for free Blacks to own a firearm. South Carolina’s 1712 race-based total gun ban, titled “An Act for the Better Ordering and Governing of Negroes and Slaves,” left little ambiguity concerning the act’s purpose and goal. The white population historically sought to exert social and economic control over minorities—particularly Blacks and Native Americans—in virtually every aspect of everyday life, and so it should not come as a surprise to discover that access to firearms was usually strictly regulated to ease white fears and dominate minority populations. Though Blacks and Native Americans were generally permitted to carry arms when their surroundings were still frontierlike, wild, and uninhabited, increased settlement corresponded with a ramped-up interest on the part of white legislators in disarming them for the purported “social good.” One 1840 North Carolina law, for example, provided that, with some narrow exceptions, “any free negro, mulatto, or free person of color” shall be guilty of a misdemeanor if found with a firearm. The interest in social control likewise comes through clearly in a 1909 law-review comment 715

716 | Racism and Gun Control

about the racism that he saw in many earlier gun control laws. Wanamaker, discussing the Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, and Kentucky decisions relied upon by the majority in affirming the conviction, pointedly stated that “[i]t is only necessary to observe that the race issue [in the South] has extremely intensified a decisive purpose to entirely disarm the negro, and this policy is evident upon reading the opinions.” Though some were willing to condemn such discriminatory motivations, others endorsed them, with U.S. senator John K. Shields (D-TN) providing an apt illustration. In 1924, Senator Shields sought to prevent the shipment of guns through interstate commerce. In an effort to drum up support for his proposed bill, the senator stated in the Congressional Record: “Can not we, the dominant race, upon whom depends the enforcement of the law, so enforce the law that we will prevent the colored people from preying upon each other?” Even in the 1940s, judges and politicians apparently felt entirely comfortable airing their racist views on guns in the hands of minority populations. Florida Supreme Court justice Rivers H. Buford, some eighty-five years after Dred Scott, voided the conviction of a white man for a firearm violation, claiming in his concurring opinion that the law in question had been “passed for the purpose of disarming the negro laborers” and was consequently never intended to be applied against “the white population.” Today, one would be hard-pressed to find such blatant and unambiguous examples of race and racism having an influence on gun control legislation. That said, racism arguably continues to play a part—often subtle, and sometimes perhaps even unconscious— in the gun control debate. Prime examples

are contemporary “melting-point laws” that seek to ban cheap handguns (e.g., Saturday night specials) as well as “bullet taxes.” These gun control measures can be said to perpetuate the United States’ unfortunate history of seeking to deprive the poor, and particularly minorities, from the rights enjoyed by their typically wealthier white counterparts. In the 1870s, for example, Tennessee sought to restrict the availability of firearms to Blacks by prohibiting the sale of all handguns except the expensive “Army and Navy” guns that were already owned by former Confederate soldiers. Today’s legislators and academics, however, tend to be somewhat more cryptic when they advocate increasing the cost of guns and ammunition to “keep firearms out of the hands of those people who are most likely to commit crimes.” The link between racism and gun control is certainly not as fortified and visible as it once was, but an examination of American history in this area can raise the suspicion that it has not yet entirely disappeared. T. Markus Funk See also: African Americans and Gun Violence; Black Codes; Ku Klux Klan (KKK); McDonald v. City of Chicago; NAACP and Gun Control; Saturday Night Specials

Further Reading Cottrol, Robert J., and Raymond T. Diamond. “Never Intended to Be Applied to the White Population: Firearms Regulation and Racial Disparity—the Redeemed South’s Legacy to a National Jurisprudence?” Chicago-Kent Law Review 70 (1995): 1307–35. http://www.constitution .org/2ll/2ndschol/11cd-reg.pdf (accessed April 12, 2011). Cottrol, Robert J., and Raymond T. Diamond. “The Second Amendment: Toward an

Reagan, Ronald Wilson | 717

Afro-Americanist Reconsideration.” Georgetown Law Journal 80 (1991): 309–61. http:// www.constitution.org/2ll/2ndschol/12cd-r .pdf (accessed April 12, 2011). Cramer, Clayton E. “The Racist Roots of Gun Control.” Kansas Journal of Law and Public Policy 2 (1995): 17–24. Funk, T. Markus. “Gun Control and Economic Discrimination: The Melting-Point Case-in-Point.” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 85 (1995): 764–806. http://www.constitution.org/2ll/2ndschol /30econ.pdf (accessed April 12, 2011). Funk, T. Markus. “Is the True Meaning of the Second Amendment Really Such a Riddle? Tracing the Origins of an Anglo-American Right.” Howard Law Journal 39 (1995): 411–36. McDonald v. City of Chicago (Justice Thomas’s concurring opinion). http://scholar.goo gle.com/scholar_case?case=514115424689 7960488&q=McDonald+v.+Chicago&hl =en&as_sdt=2,40 (accessed April 12, 2011). Tahmassebi, Stefan B. “Gun Control and Racism.” George Mason University Civil Rights Law Journal 2 (1991): 67–99.

Reagan, Ronald Wilson (1911–2004) Ronald Reagan was the fortieth president of the United States. He was generally credited with forging a broad coalition of groups that served as the basis for the modern conservative movement in the United States and with implementing policies that led to the end of the Cold War. Reagan’s ability to communicate with the American people allowed him to rise above partisan politics and political problems with his administration to become one of the most popular presidents of the twentieth century. While in office, Reagan actively worked to block gun control legislation.

However, after leaving office, he endorsed the Brady Bill, which established criminal background checks on people trying to purchase weapons and placed other restrictions on gun ownership. Ronald Wilson Reagan was born on February 6, 1911, in Illinois. He had an uneventful childhood, although he excelled at sports. He attended Eureka College on a football scholarship. After graduation in 1932, Reagan became a sports broadcaster. This marked the beginning of a long and distinguished career in entertainment. Ultimately, Reagan acted in more than fifty movies, including the 1940 classic Knute Rockne—All American. In 1941, Reagan married actress Jane Wyman, but the couple divorced in 1945 (Reagan became the first American president who had been divorced). In 1952, Reagan remarried, this time to Nancy Davis. Reagan was twice elected president of the Screen Actors Guild, and this propelled him into public politics. Although originally a Democrat, Reagan supported Republican president Dwight D. Eisenhower and officially switched parties in 1962. Four years later, Reagan successfully ran for governor of California. His campaign and subsequent administrations were based on policies that emphasized fiscal responsibility and limited government as well as increased law enforcement. As governor, Reagan supported some major gun control legislation. The most significant measure was the 1967 Mulford Act, which forbade individuals from carrying firearms in public or in vehicles while in public places. The act was the most restrictive gun control measure in California history and was passed in response to increasing violence and public fear of organized militant groups. Critics of the measure accused Reagan and the legislation of overreacting to

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the political activism of organizations such as the Black Panthers. Public concern was heightened when, on May 2, 1967, twentysix armed Black Panthers were arrested when they interrupted a session of the legislature as the Mulford Act was being debated. Before the passage of the act, Californians were allowed to carry weapons openly in public. However, when the Black Panthers began wearing sidearms or carrying other firearms, conservatives joined gun control activists in securing passage of the Mulford Act. Reagan also approved legislation that created a fifteen-day waiting period for the purchase of handguns. This period was designed to be a “cooling-off” spell that would hopefully keep people from purchasing weapons in the heat of the moment before they could think about their actions. In 1976, Reagan challenged President Gerald Ford for the Republican nomination and came within sixty votes of defeating Ford. On his next presidential bid, Reagan was successful. In the 1980 election, Reagan won by a wide margin, with 51 percent of the popular vote and 489 electoral votes compared with President Jimmy Carter’s 41 percent of the popular vote and 49 electoral votes. During the election, the Republicans regained control of the Senate, and many conservative Democrats supported Reagan. Many of these “Reagan Democrats” in the South began to switch parties. Reagan was easily reelected in 1984 with an even larger margin of victory. His tenure in office was marked by increased defense budgets, tax reforms, and a soaring budget deficit. The rise in military resources and aggressive policies to counter Soviet influence in the world helped speed the end of the Cold War. In addition, the nation underwent a dramatic period of economic growth during the 1980s.

On March 30, 1981, a deranged youth, John Hinckley Jr., attempted to assassinate Reagan. He fired six shots from a .22-caliber pistol at the president. Hinckley wounded Reagan, presidential press secretary James S. Brady, and two others. Although a bullet punctured his lung and lodged only one inch from his heart, Reagan recovered quickly and returned to the White House just twelve days after the assassination attempt. Brady was not as fortunate and became paralyzed. The event led Brady and his wife, Sarah, to become staunch advocates for gun control. In spite of the assassination attempt, Reagan opposed major gun control efforts during his time in office; although he did sign into law the Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986, which banned new sales of machine guns and the interstate sale of pistols. However, the overall effect of the act was a weakening of the Gun Control Act of 1968 (e.g., overturning the 1968 act’s prohibition of interstate ammunition sales). Among his key supporters were conservatives who opposed gun control efforts. In addition, groups such as the National Rifle Association and its membership were important in securing Reagan’s election victories and helping other Republican electoral campaigns. Reagan adopted the stance that attempts at gun control shifted the focus of the nation away from efforts to slow violent crime. Instead, the president favored tougher sentencing and laws to limit parole for violent offenders. Reagan did endorse waiting periods for handgun purchases, but he made it clear that his support was conditional on such legislation being adopted at the state level, not by the federal government. In 1988, Reagan refused to endorse a bill in the House of Representatives that would have created mandatory background checks and a



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President Ronald Reagan waves to the crowd immediately before the assassination attempt by John Hinckley Jr., on March 30, 1981, in Washington, D.C. (Ronald Reagan Presidential Library)

waiting period for those seeking to purchase handguns. The measure was ultimately defeated in the House. On March 30, 1991, on the tenth anniversary of the assassination attempt and two years after leaving office, Reagan reversed his earlier stance on federal laws regarding background checks and waiting periods. During a speech at George Washington University, Reagan announced his support for the Brady Bill and declared that waiting periods and background checks were “just plain common sense.” Reagan’s support for the Brady Bill provided political cover for many moderate Republicans and conservative Democrats who voted for the legislation. Reagan was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in 1994. He largely withdrew from public life following an appearance at the

funeral of former president Richard M. Nixon that year. Reagan died on June 5, 2004, and was given a state funeral. Tom Lansford See also: Brady, James S.; Brady, Sarah Kemp; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986; National Rifle Association (NRA); Republican Party and Gun Control

Further Reading Berman, Larry, ed. Looking Back on the Reagan Presidency. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990. Reagan, Ronald. An American Life. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1990. Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Library. http://www.reaganfoundation.org/ (accessed January 28, 2022).

720 | Recreational Uses of Guns Thompson, Kenneth W. Leadership in the Reagan Presidency. New York: Madison Books, 1992. Weber, Peter. “How Ronald Reagan Learned to Love Gun Control.” The Week, December 3, 2015. https://theweek.com/articles /582926/how-ronald-reagan-learned-love -gun-control (accessed January 28, 2022).

Recreational Uses of Guns The chief recreational or sporting uses of guns are hunting, formal target shooting, and informal target shooting or “plinking.” Three in ten U.S. adults report personally owning a firearm, and one in ten nonowners say they live in a household with a gunowner. Recreational uses of guns for hunting (38%) and target shooting (30%) rank second and third, respectively, on the list of reasons that gun owners possess a firearm (protection is cited as the top reason—67%) (Gramlich and Schaeffer 2019). In 2018, 20.4 million Americans, or 6.2 percent of the total population, reported regularly spending money and time participating in target shooting. Counting family members, friends, and others who sometimes accompany regular target shooters, as many as fifty million Americans went target shooting at least once in 2018. These numbers reveal increased participation in the sport over the past two decades, as in 2001, the estimated number of regular target shooters was 15.9 million, which at that time represented 5.6 percent of the total population (National Shoot Sports Foundation 2019). Since the early 1970s, hunting’s popularity has declined in the United States. The General Social Survey reveals a steady drop in the percentage of households in which there is at least one adult hunter: from 28.3

percent in 1980, to 17.0 percent in 2018 (National Opinion Research Center 2019). This still means, however, that millions of Americans, an estimated 11.5 million, enjoy the sport. Deer hunting is by far and away the most popular game, with 7.9 million estimated deer hunters; another 2.9 million hunt waterfowl (ducks and geese); and 1.6 million pursue small mammals, especially rabbits, and upland birds, such as dove, pheasant, and quail (National Shooting Sports Foundation 2018). For bird hunting, the shotgun is the preferred weapon because the shotgun shell’s multiple pellets, numbering in the hundreds for birdshot shells, make it easier to hit a small, moving target. Land animals may also be taken at close range using birdshot, and a shotgun may be loaded with a rifled slug for hunting big game such as deer. For most hunting at long range, rifles are preferred because they are the only weapons with the power and accuracy to kill game reliably at distances of several hundred yards. Although marksmanship is probably the most important factor in successful hunting, it is important for hunters to choose cartridges appropriate for the game they wish to kill. Excessively powerful cartridges will subject the hunter to unnecessary noise and recoil and needlessly destroy meat, while insufficiently powerful cartridges may only wound the game and allow it to escape, only to die later after needless suffering. Before the twenty-first century, big-game hunters customarily used rifles firing more powerful ammunition than standard military rifles. The standard military cartridge of the United States and many other countries is the 5.56 mm NATO, which is used in the multiple varieties of M16, M4, and M14 assault rifles. The 5.56 mm NATO cartridge



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is available in a civilian version, known as .223 Remington. To hunters, this was once known as a varmint round, suitable for use on small animals such as foxes, bobcats, or prairie dogs, but not ideal for such larger game, including deer, antelope, and wild boar. However, over the past few decades heavier bullets have been adapted to the .223, and in most U.S. states, this ammunition can be used to hunt deer and other big game. The traditional cartridges used for larger game, the .308 Winchester and the .30-06 Springfield, are still very popular and use heavier bullets that deliver more than twice the kinetic energy (“knockdown power”) than .223 to the target at any given range. Analyses of the General Social Survey (2018) reveal a consistent set of sociodemographic predictors of living in a household where there is a hunter, the most common recreational use of a gun. These include race (white), ethnicity (non-Hispanic), community size (small town; rural), education (less than college), place of birth (U.S.-born), and political philosophy (conservative). The decline in hunting’s popularity in recent decades reflects the increasing urbanization of the U.S. population, as well as its rising proportion of foreign-born people—with most immigrants coming from countries where gun ownership is rare and thus recreational hunting equally so. Matthew DeBell and Gregg Lee Carter See also: Collectors; Gun Culture; Hunting; Long Gun; Target Shooting

Further Reading Gramlich, John, and Katherine Schaeffer. “7 Facts about Guns in the U.S.” Pew Research Center, October 22, 2019. https://www

.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/10/22/facts -about-guns-in-united-states/ (accessed June 26, 2020). National Opinion Research Center. “Cumulative General Social Survey, 1972–2018.” 2019. https://gss.norc.org/ (accessed June 27, 2020). National Shooting Sports Foundation. “Hunting in America: An Economic Force for Conservation.” 2018. https://www.fishwild life.org/application/files/3815/3719/7536 /Southwick _ Assoc_-_NSSF_ Hunting _Econ.pdf (accessed June 27, 2020). National Shooting Sports Foundation. “Target Shooting in America: An Economic Force for Conservation.” 2019. https://www.nssf .org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Target -Shooting-in-America-Economic-Impact -report-2018zip.pdf (accessed June 27, 2020).

Red Flag Laws. See Extreme Risk Protection Orders Regional Gun Violence Research Consortium The Regional Gun Violence Research Consortium is made up of gun violence researchers from Connecticut, Delaware, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Puerto Rico, and Rhode Island. The consortium includes more than forty researchers in the academic fields of criminal justice, public health, public policy, sociology, law, data analytics, history, psychology, social welfare, cybersecurity, engineering, and social work. Also included are numerous state government officials in law enforcement, policy development, and criminal justice services. The Consortium’s mission is to inform the public and provide evidencebased, data-driven policy recommendations to disrupt the cycle of firearm-involved

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mass shootings, homicides, suicides, and accidents. The consortium was formed in March 2018 following the creation of the States for Gun Safety Coalition, an initiative started by Governors Dan Malloy (CT), John Carney (DE), Charlie Baker (MA), Phil Murphy (NJ), Andrew Cuomo (NY), Ricardo Rosselló (PR), and Gina Raimondo (RI) to create a multistate resource that shares information on firearms and law enforcement efforts and supplements the federal National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) database. The multistate task force also focuses on tracing and intercepting illegal guns in the region and sharing data on people who have been deemed mentally unfit to own guns. To complement the data-sharing provision, the governors also established the research consortium, which conducts studies to better inform policymakers on gun violence issues. The bulk of the research projects are released by the Rockefeller Institute of Government in Albany, New York. Part of SUNY Empire State College, the Rockefeller Institute is a nonpartisan public policy think tank founded in 1981 that conducts cutting-edge research and analysis. Through rigorous, objective, and accessible analysis and outreach, the Institute provides citizens and policymakers with reliable facts to inform public decisions. In collaboration with authors across states and disciplinary fields, the Regional Gun Violence Research Consortium has released policy briefs regarding issues critical to the reduction of gun violence: mass shootings, homicides, suicides, and state laws most effective in reducing these three, as well as child access prevention laws, stand your ground laws, media coverage of shooters, and many others. The Consortium’s members represent twenty-two institutions of higher education,

including: Boston University, Brown University, Columbia University, City University of New York Graduate Center, City University of New York John Jay College of Criminal Justice, Fordham University, Harvard University, New Jersey Institute of Technology, New York University, Northeastern University, Princeton University, Rochester Institute of Technology, Roger Williams University, Rowan University, Rutgers University, State University of New York at Albany, State University of New York at Buffalo, State University of New York at Cortland, State University of New York at Oswego, State University of New York Upstate Medical University, University of Connecticut, and University of Delaware. Nicholas J. Simons See also: Center for Gun Policy and Research; Crime Prevention Research Center; Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting; National Instant Criminal Background Check System

Further Reading Schildkraut, Jaclyn. Assault Weapons, Mass Shootings, and Options for Lawmakers. Albany, NY: Rockefeller Institute of Government, 2019. Schildkraut, Jaclyn, Margaret K. Formica, and Jim Malatras. Can Mass Shootings be Stopped? To Address the Problem, We Must Better Understand the Phenomenon. Albany, NY: Rockefeller Institute of Government, 2018. Siegel, Michael B., and Claire Boine. What Are the Most Effective Policies in Reducing Gun Homicides? Albany, NY: Rockefeller Institute of Government, 2019.

Registration. See Gun Registration



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Remington, Eliphalet, II (1793–1861) Eliphalet Remington II was a blacksmith, gunmaker, and businessman who built a small business based on his father’s farm into one of the most successful U.S. companies. His last name became globally associated with quality guns, typewriters, agricultural equipment, and other products. He was born in Connecticut, but as a youth, he moved to upstate New York with his family. He learned blacksmithing from his father and local experts and produced his own flintlock rifle at age twenty-three. Legend has it that sales took off for his business—founded in 1816—after Remington placed second in a local shooting contest. He soon moved production to a site near the Erie Canal in Ilion, New York— allowing for the easy transport for his first large-scale production item, rifle barrels. The company expanded and began producing full weapons, most popularly revolvers and breech-loading rifles with solid steel barrels. The Remington Arms Company supplied the U.S. Army during the MexicanAmerican War as well as during the Civil War. The company also sold many weapons to people moving to settle in the West. It is now the only U.S. manufacturer of both firearms and ammunition products. G. Edward Richards and John W. Dietrich See also: Browning, John Moses; Colt, Samuel; Winchester, Oliver Fisher

Further Reading Hatch, Alden. Remington Arms in American History. New York: Rinehart, 1956. Remington Arms Company. “About Remington.” https://www.remington.com/about -us.html (accessed January 28, 2022).

Eliphalet Remington was a blacksmith turned gun maker. The company that bears his name, Remington Arms, became one of the most successful companies in the United States. (Wildman, Edwin. Famous Leaders of Industry, 1921)

Republican Party and Gun Control Since the 1950s, the Republican Party has vigorously opposed most gun control efforts. Because of the party’s stance on gun control, it has consistently worked to defeat gun control legislation at the local, state, and national levels. Efforts by gun control moderates within the party to soften the stance have been repeatedly rebuffed. For Republicans, ideological resistance to gun control is grounded in the party’s general opposition to an expanded role for government in the regulation and cataloging of personal firearms. Furthermore, strict constitutional interpretationists within the party view gun control as part of a larger effort to undermine the Second Amendment (which

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Republicans believe provides a constitutional guarantee for private ownership of firearms, as affirmed by the 2010 Supreme Court case McDonald v. City of Chicago). Gun control also shifts the capability of selfdefense from the individual to the government since an unarmed citizenry has to rely on law enforcement for deterrence against crime. Instead, the Republican Party views a well-armed citizenry as the optimum means to deter crime. This also reflects the traditional Republican emphasis on individualism, especially as it relates to the capability of individuals for self-defense. The party has consistently devalued the utility of new gun control measures. Instead, it advocates for increased enforcement of existing legislation and more stringent penalties for criminals. Much of the basis for this resistance to new gun control legislation is the belief that since criminals operate outside of the law, gun control legislation has little impact on their access to weapons. Republicans point out that even in areas with strict gun control laws, criminals still find avenues to acquire firearms. This belief is reflected in the oft-quoted slogan, “If guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns.” Such sentiment has engendered widespread support for the party from the gun lobby and anti–gun control advocates. The party has allied itself with such groups as the National Rifle Association (NRA) and other anti–gun control lobbying organizations. These groups have developed highly effective political networks and raise large contributions for the Republicans. NRA endorsement and support has proved critical for many Republicans. For instance, in the 2018 midterm elections, the NRA provided approximately $638,000 to the Republican Party or Republican candidates, while giving Democrats about $14,000.

During the 2020 election cycle, the organization donated more than $16 million, with much of these funds used to oppose the Democratic nominee, Joe Biden, rather than support Donald Trump, the incumbent Republican president; an additional $12.2 million was spent on congressional campaigns, including more than $5 million in the highly contested Senate races in Georgia (Nass 2020). For gun control moderates within the party, the 1981 assassination attempt against President Ronald Reagan marked the beginning of a broad effort to reduce the power and influence of such groups as the NRA. Moderates within the party came to support specific gun control legislation, including waiting periods and background checks. At the federal level, this translated into support for the Brady Bill (named after Reagan’s press secretary, James Brady, who was wounded in the assassination attempt). Moderates gained clout when Reagan announced his support for the measure and when President George H.W. Bush announced his resignation of his lifetime membership in the NRA in response to the organization’s campaign against moderates within the party who supported such legislation as the 1993 Brady Bill. However, one of the core constituencies of the party is conservative and rural southerners and Midwesterners who vehemently oppose gun control. Even as there has been support for moderate gun control legislation at the national level, and in some state party organizations such as that of California, in many states, the Republican Party has led legislative efforts to loosen gun laws. For instance, several states, including Texas and Virginia, have adopted laws that allow for concealed handguns. In addition, Republicans led court challenges to the Brady Bill, including the 1997 case Printz v. United



States, which overturned some aspects of the federal law. Led by its Republican governor James Gilmore, who became chair of the Republican National Committee in 2000, and its Republican-controlled legislature, the state of Virginia worked with the NRA to develop a broad program to increase penalties for the illegal use of firearms. The program, Project Exile, mandates substantial prison sentences for the use of a firearm in violent or drug-related crimes by having all gun crimes prosecuted at the federal level. This makes criminals subject to mandatory fiveyear minimum sentencing and no parole. The program, which began in Richmond, Virginia, is now in place throughout the state and in such cities as Baltimore, Chicago, Miami, and Philadelphia. Project Exile is portrayed as a model for state gun legislation and as a means for the Republicans to counter charges that the party ignores gun control issues. This project formed the basis for the $550 million Project Safe Neighborhoods. In the 2000 presidential election, staunch NRA supporter George W. Bush gained the party’s nomination and subsequently won the presidency. As governor of Texas, Bush signed legislation that legalized concealed handguns and limited the ability of citizens to bring lawsuits against gun manufacturers. During the presidential election, campaign efforts by the NRA proved crucial in several key states, including Arkansas, Tennessee, and West Virginia. At the 2000 Republican National Convention in Philadelphia, the party adopted planks that reaffirmed its support for the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms and voiced opposition to efforts to register firearms. The centerpiece of the party’s effort to combat the spread of illegal weapons and possession of weapons by criminals

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was a call for increased penalties for gun violations. During the Bush administration, the Republican-controlled Congress allowed the Assault Weapons Ban to expire in 2004. The following year, Congress enacted the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, which forbade individuals or groups from suing gun manufacturers or dealers if their weapons were used for crimes. After Democrats regained control of Congress in 2006, the legislature adopted the National Instant Check System Improvement amendment in 2007. The measure closed some loopholes in the instant background check system. Bush signed the bill into law in 2008. Since then, the only federal gun control measure to pass was the ban on bump stocks following the 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. The devices, which allow semiautomatic weapons to fire more rapidly and mimic automatic gunfire, had been used on multiple weapons during the Route 91 Harvest Festival shooting in Las Vegas, Nevada, in October 2017, which left fiftyeight dead and more than 400 others injured by gunfire. Unlike most gun control measures that create polar opposition between Republicans and Democrats, a ban on bump stocks generated bipartisan support. Despite this support, however, the ban ultimately was implemented by way of a presidential executive order. Gun rights (anti-gun control) elements continue to dominate the Republican Party, prompting moderates to question their allegiance to the party. Hence, gun control remains one of the most contentious issues within the party. On the one hand, lowercrime rates have reduced pressure for new gun control legislation. On the other hand, highly spectacular episodes of violence at

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schools and other public venues around the nation have generated public support for increased gun control measures. Thus far, ideology and the need to retain the support of core constituencies have meant consistent opposition to gun control by the Republican Party. Tom Lansford See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Bush, George H. W.; Bush, George W.; Democratic Party and Gun Control; National Rifle Association (NRA); NICS Improvement Act; McDonald v. City of Chicago; Project Exile; Project Safe Neighborhoods; Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005; Reagan, Ronald Wilson; Second Amendment; Trump, Donald J.

Further Reading Belz, Herman. A New Birth of Freedom: The Republican Party and Freedmen’s Rights, 1861–1866. New York: Fordham University Press, 2000. DeConde, Alexander. Gun Violence in America: The Struggle for Control. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2001. Gould, Lewis. Grand Old Party: A History of the Republicans. New York: Random House, 2003. Joslyn, Mark R. The Gun Gap. New York: Oxford University Press, 2020. Kleck, Gary, and Don B. Kates. Armed: New Perspectives on Gun Control. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2001. Lutz, Norma Jean. The History of the Republican Party. Philadelphia: Chelsea House Publishers, 2000. Nass, D. “How Much Did the NRA Spend to Support Republicans in 2020?” The Trace, August 8, 2020. https://www.thetrace.org /2020 / 08/nra-2020-election-spending -trump/ (accessed July 8, 2021).

Revolt at Cincinnati. See National Rifle Association (NRA) RFID Guns RFID stands for radio frequency identification and refers to miniature mechanical tags that can be stored within firearms to allow communication between their receivers (which contain the trigger and the bolt) and another object, such as a piece of jewelry, via an electromagnetic field which allows the transfer of data (Smart Tech Challenges Foundation 2019). A communication channel is established between RFID-based readers, or interrogators, on the firearm and the token, or tag, that then deactivates a blocking mechanism, allowing the weapon to be fired. Common examples of RFID technology already in use are the key fobs used to unlock and start cars remotely. The first use of RFID technology was the use of aircraft radar in World War II (1939–1945) to identify enemy and friendly aircraft. In 1948, scientist and inventor Harry Stockman was credited with the official invention of RFID tags after publishing a paper on the subject, entitled “Communication by Means of Reflected Power.” Jonathan Mossberg and Robert McNamara adapted RFID technology for firearms in 1973 (Smart Tech Challenges Foundation 2019). RFID systems have also been used to track high-value clinical inventory, such as implantable cardiac defibrillators and stents (Marino 2018). In a user-unique RFID gun, only the authorized or licensed user can fire the weapon. Each RFID tag incorporates an integrated circuit (IC) with a unique identification number (UID) that cannot be altered. The RFID tag is associated with the federally regulated serial number of the



weapon and enables it to be tracked via this association. The area covered by a grip, typically a nonmetal material (such as plastic or rubber), has been identified as the “optimal location for a RFID tag” (Marino 2018). There is sufficient space to mount the tag flush with the surface (a 4-mm-diameter hole is required to seat the tag) and this modification would not necessitate any changes to firearms’ assembly procedures. The grip of the weapon would also provide added protection for the RFID tag. With the token for gun access placed in the gun handle, the corresponding chip to lift the block can be placed on or in a watch, ring, or bracelet. It can even be implanted in the authorized user’s hand. Once the two tokens are within range, the trigger will unlock and the gun can be fired. In most cases, this means the tokens must be within inches of each other. However, the block can also be lifted by entering a PIN code into the corresponding radio-controlled device, provided the device is a smart watch or something similar. When the tokens lose radio contact—for example, if the gun were to be knocked out of the shooter’s hand— the weapon automatically reactivates the blocking mechanism. In the event that the weapon is lost or stolen, it would also be deactivated. These tags have a read range of about one meter, depending on their size and the size of the reader’s antenna, commonly referred to as the interrogator antenna (IA) (Marino 2018). For smaller RFID tags, near-field-communications allows data to be exchanged over a distance of about 5 cm. These rely on inductive coupling, meaning “the orientation of the magnetic fields must align to achieve optimal read range performance” (Marino 2018). These short-range or passive RFID chips do not require a charge or a battery because

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they are powered by electromagnetic induction. The gun’s blocking mechanism may be battery powered if desired. RFID tokens and their radio frequency are not affected by water, mud, or fabric, meaning they can be worn under gloves or other articles of clothing. To demonstrate the new capability to track firearms and their receivers, small RFID tags are being used to track the lower receivers in AR-15s for smart gun applications. For AR-15s specifically, the lower receiver requires federal regulation and has a serial number. The receiver is often the only portion of a firearm that is regulated by state and/or federal law and required to have a serial number. This makes it ideal to test a tracking mechanism. Importantly, this lower receiver in AR-style firearms requires a significant level of routine maintenance (Marino 2018). This makes the weapon ideal for automated RFID tracking applications. Within an RFID tag, the firearm’s history is located. The IC specifically contains any pertinent information regarding any components that are part of the assembly. Other information can also be stored in within the IC’s programmable memory, such as owner data. The UID is able to track and identify the original serial number of the receiver, making it possible to identify firearms even when the serial numbers are removed (Marino 2018). The IC’s programmable memory can also be locked, making it unalterable. Law enforcement would be able to scan a weapon’s history in a few seconds, and cellphone applications are being developed that could provide officers with red flag indicators in less than a minute. The iGun Technology Corporation of Florida developed a prototype shotgun in 1998 that used an RFID-enabled ring to

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identify authorized users, but there was not enough demand at the time. German manufacturer Armatix is currently the only purveyor of a smart gun (the iP1 Pistol, a .22 caliber firearm that carries a ten-round magazine), pairing a handgun with an RFID-enabled watch at a cost of $1,798 ($1,399 for the gun and $399 for the watch) (Nguyen 2018). This weapon is only available abroad, and is pricey compared to similar pistols, which typically retail for $250–$1,000. A PIN is entered on the watch to activate or deactivate the weapon, and the pistol automatically shuts off after a certain interval of time or if the gun moves more than 10 inches from the watch. Armatix also possesses technology that does not allow the weapon to be activated if they approach electronic markers deployed in restricted zones such as airports, schools, or government buildings. A 2016 survey suggested that nearly 60 percent of Americans, if they were buying a new handgun, were interested in a smart firearm (Wolfson et al. 2016). The New Jersey Childproof Handgun Law (P.L. 2002, c.130), now repealed, was designed to restrict the sale of handguns in New Jersey to smart guns that could only be fired by an authorized or recognized user. This legislation was set to take effect three years after RFID weapons were available for retail purposes. Instead, the new legislation included a provision that the state attorney general was required to approve the final production model of the RFID gun and each firearms retailer in the state was subsequently be required to carry and display at least one smart gun on their shelves. The retailers were also required to tout the features of these “personalized handguns” not offered by traditional handguns. Legislation approved on July 16, 2019, in New Jersey (P.L. 2019, c. 164) mentions the use of

RFID. The legislation establishes a commission to approve personalized handguns and requires retailers to sell them. The unalterable ID number is a requirement in this case (New Jersey State Legislature 2019). In some cases, it is proposed that these RFID tags can be used to shoot weapons maliciously. Hackers can unlock or fire a weapon remotely. Additionally, gun owners are concerned that their gun may not work for them immediately, every time. One user showed that the range of the radio signal between the Armatix iP1 and its watch can be extended to more than ten feet, allowing another person to fire the weapon. The signal can also be disabled by another party, even when the watch was inches away and connected. Even a cheap magnet was able to disable the gun’s locking mechanism when placed alongside its barrel—firing the gun at will even when the watch was completely absent. Similarly, a nearby cordless phone could trigger interference between watch and gun (Greenberg 2017). The RFID tags can also be destroyed using tools such as a hammer or a microwave. Jessica Trapasso Migliaccio See also: Handguns; Long Gun; Smart Guns

Further Reading Greenberg, Andy. “Anybody Can Fire This ‘Locked’ Smart Gun with $15 Worth of Magnets.” Wired, July 24, 2017. https:// www.wired.com/story/smart-gun-fire-mag nets/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Marino, Ron. “Robust RFID Tags Track Firearms.” mwrf.com, June 21, 2018. https:// www.mwrf.com/components/robust-rfid -tags-track-firearms#close-olyticsmodal (accessed May 18, 2022). New Jersey State Legislature. “Bills 2018–2019.” 2019. https://www.njleg.state.nj.us/bills/Bill View.asp (accessed October 14, 2019).



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Nguyen, Nicole. 2018. “Here’s What’s Up with ‘Smart Guns’—And Why You Can’t Buy One in the U.S.” Buzzfeed News, March 9, 2018. https://www.buzzfeednews .com/article/nicolenguyen/what-is-smart -gun-technology (accessed May 18, 2022). Smart Tech Challenges Foundation. “RFID Guns.” 2019. https://smarttechfoundation .org/smart-firearms-technology/rfid-2 (accessed October 14, 2019). Stockman, Harry. “Communication by Means of Reflected Power.” Proceedings of the IRE 36, no. 10 (1948): 1196–204. Wolfson, Julia A., Stephen P. Teret, Shannon Frattaroli, Matthew Miller, and Deborah Azrael. “The US Public’s Preference for Safer Guns.” American Journal of Public Health 106, no. 3 (2016): 411–13.

Rifle. See Long Gun Rifling. See Association of Firearm and Tool Mark Examiners (AFTE) Right to Keep and Bear Arms. See Second Amendment Right to Self-Defense, Philosophical Bases The right of self-defense, that a person being unjustly assaulted has a right to use deadly force to preserve his or her life, has been taken for granted in most cultures at most times. Past thinkers took such a right to be self-evident, or a “law of nature.” Although a right of self-defense therefore is independent of political laws, self-defense is not “taking the law into one’s own hands,” has nothing to do with punishment, and is independent of many considerations of utility. Precise criteria for what counts as a

deadly assault and what circumstances warrant a deadly response are controversial and obscure. However, the world is well filled with clear-cut cases in which a response with deadly force would be appropriate. It is uncontroversial, for instance, that, had Jews at Auschwitz suddenly acquired access to weapons, they would have had a right to kill their guards, even though that would have been against the law. Guns are preeminently defensive weapons: they equalize differences in physical strength and agility. Moreover, guns, unlike many other technologies, enable a self-defender to impose costs on aggressors even though the defender is outnumbered. Philosophical defenses of the right have largely taken the right to be self-evident or to be a “law of nature” that could be accessed by pure reason. Locke, Montesquieu, and other seventeenth- and eighteenth-century thinkers derived the right of nations to defend their borders from the prior obvious right of an individual to defend his life and property. An assault by a criminal on a person is treated as a primitive “state of war,” of which political wars are a special case. Many early thinkers took self-defense not only to be a right, but a duty, either to God or to self. Seventeenth- and eighteenthcentury thinking of this kind appears to be the basis of the Second Amendment. The core conception of a right of selfdefense is that a person being subjected to an unjust deadly assault has a right to respond with deadly force, killing the assailant if practically necessary. Several terms call for comment in this conception. First, a right of self-defense requires an unjust assault. A gunman who shoots a knife-wielding woman trying to save her child from being murdered by that gunman is not exercising his rights. In borderline cases, of course, “unjust” is debatable.

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Second, the assault has to be deadly. “Deadly,” however, is a probabilistic term subject to interpretation. As Locke points out, cases in which a person attempts to make another person helpless are reasonably interpreted as deadly threats, as the perpetrator has made it clear that the person’s interests are not his. Locke therefore takes it as prima facie grounds for regarding an assault as deadly that a perpetrator seeks to get another person in his power. Various jurisdictions have various criteria for when a homicide is justifiable. Furthermore, “deadly” assaults can sometimes be indirect. If nomadic bandits attempt to steal one’s winter food supply, thereby threatening one with starvation, that is a deadly assault even if they refrain from directly killing their victims. Locke regards property crimes as essentially continuous with personal crimes, but a continuum of cases can be imagined so that judgment is required to adjudicate when an assault is actually life-threatening. Third, “practically necessary” is primarily a remark about the risks required of a defender. In a gun self-defense situation, shooting the gun out of the assailant’s hand might be a better outcome. Such shots, however, are very much less likely to be successful than a shot to the torso. So, whereas it may not be strictly necessary to shoot to kill to thwart a deadly assault, it may be practically necessary. The intended victim is not morally required to take serious risks to reduce the danger to the assailant. The interpretation of “serious risks” and the question of whether the assault was actually reasonably interpreted as deadly are tricky. In such circumstances, and many others, the “reasonable person” standard is applied. That is, a homicide is justifiable if a reasonable person would have concluded that only shooting to kill would save her life. This

“standard” is, of course, subject to much interpretation and is codified differently in different jurisdictions. Shooting someone in self-defense is not punishment, as Locke (1690, chap. 3, sections 19 and 20) points out. The woman is not legislating that attempted rape and murder is a capital crime. Self-defense prevents an unjust deadly harm. Self-defense is not in general a case of enforcement of laws against rape and murder. An abducted woman, for instance, may be against capital punishment for such crimes as are about to be committed upon her and still be resolved to shoot to kill. The situation in which the victim is already dead, and one is deciding whether the state can appropriately execute the criminal, is very different from the situation in which the victim is alive. That self-defense is not punishment, and therefore not a violation of any social contract, follows from the consideration that, even if the assailant is innocent, a right to self-defense allows resistance by deadly force. It could turn out that an assailant was under a hypnotic spell, for instance, or having delusions. Such an assailant is legally innocent but may still be killed if practically necessary to save one’s life. Given a right to self-defense, there can be no “social contract” to leave defense to the commonwealth. That is, unless one is willing to say that it is an assaulted woman’s duty to hope that the police will show up in a timely manner, one has to limit the social contract to a surrender of rights to determine what the law is and administer justice. So, an assaulted woman’s action cannot sensibly be described as “taking the law into her own hands.” Self-defense need not weigh utilities in seeking its justification. If there are three assailants, and she is lucky and skillful, the woman can legitimately shoot them all.



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Since there is a substantial chance that three lives are lost for the sake of one, if we think that it is permissible for her to shoot all three, then we cannot think that self-defense rests on utilities. To most people’s moral intuitions, the idea that there is an obligation to submit to superior numbers rather than destroy more lives than would be saved by submission is bizarre. Strategically speaking, self-defense must either consist of making oneself invulnerable to assault or discouraging assaults by making them risky and known by assailants to be risky. The use of a gun in self-defense deters assaults by imposing predictable costs on assailants. Guns are widely recognized by assailants to be dangerous to assailants. Guns, as opposed to other kinds of weapons, are the preeminent available technology. A great advantage of a gun is that differences in physical ability, strength, and agility become insignificant to one’s ability to impose costs on aggressors. Thus, guns provide the physically weaker with the ability to impose credible threats in self-defense. Furthermore, for many defensive situations, little expertise or training is required for there to be a great improvement in the defensive potential of a person so equipped. A person with ten hours of karate training, for instance, is little more dangerous to an assailant than without the training, whereas a person with ten hours of training with a pistol, and a pistol, is a dangerous target. Guns are therefore the weapon of choice in many social situations and are preferable to any other available self-defense device short of an armed bodyguard. Criminals and others recognize the above features of the gun. If there were devices as universally feared by assailants as handguns, the argument for guns as a selfdefense weapon would be much weaker.

The costs imposed on assailants by defense with guns are imposed even when the defenders are greatly outnumbered. A family of five surrounded by a mob of fifty can expect to impose substantial costs on the fifty when both sides are armed with guns. If the weaponry consists of swords or baseball bats, the mob can expect a costfree eradication. Thus, disarming a ghetto, for instance, is a necessary preliminary to being able to recruit enthusiastic volunteers to clear it of blacks. The relative insensitivity of gun-imposed costs to differences in numbers makes guns especially important in state-sponsored unjust assaults. Another positive feature of guns as a deterrent to private-sector assaults is that some very effective weapons are concealable. In a population where even 10 percent of a population is armed, but an assailant cannot tell who is armed, assaulting people is not a viable occupation or hobby. There is thus a substantial free-rider effect from guntoting citizens that other defensive strategies typically lack. On the other hand, my neighbor is, if anything, made more vulnerable by my muscular physique and my well-labeled security system, as an assailant will prefer to attack the least troublesome victim. Samuel C. Wheeler III See also: Concealed Weapons Laws; Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Holocaust Imagery and Gun Control; Lott, John R., Jr.; More Guns, Less Crime Thesis; Second Amendment

Further Reading “Exchange: Gun Control.” Criminal Justice Ethics 20 (2001): 17–44. Hall, Timothy. “Is There a Right to Bear Arms?” Public Affairs Quarterly 20 (2004): 293–312. Huemer, Michael. “Is There a Right to Own a Gun?” Social Theory and Practice 29 (2003): 297–324.

732 | Roberti-Roos Assault Weapons Control Act of 1989 Hughes, Todd C., and Lester H. Hunt. “The Liberal Basis of the Right to Bear Arms.” Public Affairs Quarterly 14 (2000): 1–5. LaFollette, Hugh. “Gun Control.” Ethics 110 (2000): 263–81. Locke, John. The Second Treatise of Civil Government. Project Gutenberg, 1690. https://www.gutenberg.org/f iles /7370 /7370-h/7370-h.htm (accessed January 28, 2022). Wheeler, Samuel C., III. “Self-Defense and Coerced Risk-Acceptance.” Public Affairs Quarterly 11 (1997): 431–43.

Right-to-Carry Laws. See Concealed Weapons Laws Ring of Fire. See Saturday Night Specials Roberti-Roos Assault Weapons Control Act of 1989 California’s Roberti-Roos Assault Weapons Control Act of 1989, also known as the Assault Weapons Control Act (ACWA), was the first state-level attempt to prohibit sales and ownership of semiautomatic assault weapons within the United States. Other state bans and the federal Assault Weapons Ban of 1994 were modeled after California’s ban. The legislation was not fully implemented until 2000, after the implementation of 1999 legislation to close loopholes and a decision by the California Supreme Court to uphold the original legislation. It was declared unconstitutional by a federal judge in 2021. Imports into the United States of Chinese semiautomatic rifles, most notably the AK-47 military-style assault rifle, increased exponentially during the 1980s. The increased sales appeared to be the product

of changed gun-consumer preferences toward foreign-made firearms. However, the sales also reflected increased U.S.– China trade after normalization of diplomatic relations and the popularity of action movies, such as the Rambo series, that featured heroes using assault weapons. Concern about these firearms, dubbed assault weapons, originated mainly in urbanized areas of California, such as San Francisco and Los Angeles. Given its large ports and proximity to Asia, California had especially large numbers of assault weapons sold in the state. In addition, crime rates rose in California until approximately 1990. Law enforcement officials identified an increase in gang-related activity and the potential for increased numbers of gun-violence victims if gang members used the semiautomatic weapons with large magazines. An assault weapons ban was first introduced in 1985, shortly after an Israeli-made semiautomatic Uzi was used to kill twentyone people at a McDonald’s in San Ysidro, near San Diego. The proposal was easily defeated in the California State Assembly, the lower house of the California legislature. A similar bill by Assembly Member Mike Roos (D-Los Angeles) was defeated in 1988. Roos and California State Senate majority leader David Roberti (D-Los Angeles) both introduced assault weapons bans at the start of California’s 1989–1990 legislative terms. Pundits did not expect either measure to pass, although law enforcement organizations had begun endorsing gun control measures, and an influential gun rights supporter had retired from the California State Senate. However, when five elementary schoolchildren were killed and another thirty-two wounded in Stockton in mid-January by a drifter using an AK-47, public opinion shifted significantly.



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As described by Roberti’s media director in a paper written for a 1989 seminar sponsored by the National Conference of State Legislatures, Roberti and his staff organized media events and, in conjunction with gun control groups, intensely lobbied key legislators. In comparison, gun rights organizations were ill prepared to counter the surge in support for the assault weapons ban. Donations to the Gun Owners of California had fallen off as the group’s founder wrapped up his legislative career. Members also apparently did not perceive a real threat to assault weapon ownership, and the National Rifle Association (NRA) lacked a coherent strategy at that time; it had just hired a new lobbyist after a fiasco involving their opposition to an armor-piercing-bullet ban passed in the previous session. Perhaps most critical was Republican governor George Deukmejian’s announcement, two days after the Stockton school shooting, that he would support an assault weapons ban. Whereas Roberti’s bill passed the State Senate by a wide margin, the Assembly version passed by a single vote. A combined bill, named the Roberti-Roos Assault Weapons Control Act of 1989, emerged from a conference committee. To ensure the support of Deukmejian and to preserve the narrow assembly majority, the assault weapons ban was limited in scope. For example, existing weapons had to be registered, but were not banned. Most notable, though, was that the ban was on named weapons rather than on particular features. The California attorney general was given the responsibility of keeping the ban updated by adding copycat weapons. Therefore, effective implementation was dependent upon future support by a separately elected, partisan official. The same general model of banning weapons by brand name was included in the 1994

federal Assault Weapons Ban sponsored by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA). Critics of assault weapons bans, such as criminology professor Gary Kleck, have pointed out that assault weapons bans typically do not exclude similar weapons that are popular with large numbers of voters. In addition, many of the military-style features targeted in bans are cosmetic. Implementation of the copycat provision languished as gun rights organizations filed suit. Republican attorney general Dan Lungren, who served from 1990 to 1998, appeared ambivalent about adding copycat models to the list of banned weapons, being caught between law enforcement officials supportive of gun control and gun rights groups. The California Supreme Court finally upheld the provisions in Kasler v. Lockyer in June 2000, overturning a lower court decision. Key sponsor Roberti attempted unsuccessfully for several years to sponsor revised legislation to strengthen the assault weapons ban and preempt litigation. However, this made him the target of a 1994 recall campaign sponsored by gun rights organizations. Although unsuccessful, the recall drained finances away from Roberti’s campaign for state treasurer, effectively ending his political career. The implementation of term limits, adopted by statewide ballot initiative, meant that new legislators from the Los Angeles area had to take over leadership on gun control legislation. After a brief period with a Republican majority in the Assembly in 1995–1996, Democrats regained majority status with the 1996 election and have held strong majorities in both houses of the California legislature. Democratic legislators more consistently supported gun control, and their ranks included several strong supporters of gun control who had initiated

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local gun control ordinances while serving on city councils. Gov. Pete Wilson vetoed assault weapons clean-up legislation in 1997 and 1998, but the legislation was passed again in 1999 and signed into law by newly elected Democratic governor Gray Davis. The revised law prohibited certain assault weapon characteristics such as clips holding more than ten rounds of ammunition, detachable magazines, pistol grips, folding stocks, grenade or flare launchers, and flash suppressors. The 1999 law was also subject to legal challenge. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit upheld the law in 2002 in Silveira v. Lockyer (312 F.3d 1052). The Ninth Circuit, widely recognized as the most liberal federal appeals court, ruled that the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution did not “confer an individual right to own or possess arms” and equal protection concerns only applied to a clause that allowed retired peace officers to have assault weapons; an exemption for active peace officers remained in effect. In June 2021, the constitutionality of the ACWA was again challenged when a board member of San Diego County Gun Owners, James Miller, sued the state’s attorney general alleging that it violated his Second Amendment rights as the term “assault weapon” was politically motivated in a petition that was supported by, among others, the Second Amendment Foundation and the California Gun Rights Foundation. U.S. District Court Judge Roger Benitez ruled that the Roberti-Roos Assault Weapons Act was unconstitutional, overturning the ban more than three decades after its passage. In his opinion, the judge noted that: Like the Swiss Army Knife, the popular AR-15 rifle is a perfect combination of home defense weapon and homeland

defense equipment. Good for both home and battle, the AR-15 is the kind of versatile gun that lies at the intersection of the kinds of firearms protected under District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008) and United States v Miller, 307 U.S. 174 (1939). Yet, the State of California makes it a crime to have an AR15 type rifle. Therefore, this Court declares the California statutes to be unconstitutional. (Miller v. Bonta 2021) The ruling was not a permanent injunction as to allow California’s attorney general to appeal the decision, which he did six days later. The stay was granted by a panel in the circuit court so that the appeal could be litigated. A decision has yet to be rendered at the time of this writing. Marcia L. Godwin See also: AK-47; Assault Weapons; Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Gun Owners of California (GOC); School Shootings; Semiautomatic Weapons

Further Reading Block, A. G. “The Roberti Legacy.” California Journal 25 (1994): 9–11. California Department of Justice, Bureau of Firearms. https://oag.ca.gov/firearms (accessed May 18, 2022). Christopher, Ben. “How California Got Tough on Guns.” Cal Matters, November 14, 2019, https://calmatters.org/explainers/cali fornia-gun-laws-policy-explained/ (accessed August 23, 2020). Forsyth, Robert. Assault Weapons in California: A Case Study in Issue Management and Media. Sacramento: California State Senate, 1989. Godwin, Marcia L., and Jean Reith Schroedel. “Gun Control Politics in California.” In The Changing Politics of Gun Control, edited by John M. Bruce and Clyde

Wilcox, 88–110. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998. Godwin, Marcia L., and Jean Reith Schroedel. “Policy Diffusion and Strategies for Promoting Policy Change: Evidence from California Local Gun Control Ordinances.” Policy Studies Journal 28 (2000): 760–76. Jeffe, Sherry Bebitch. “How the NRA Got Shot Down in California.” Los Angeles Times Magazine, July 10, 1988, and July 30, 1988. Kleck, Gary. “Media Bias: Gun Control, Assault Weapons, Cop-Killer Bullets, the Goetz Case and Other Alarms in the Night.” In The Great American Gun Debate: Essays on Firearms and Violence, edited by Don B. Kates Jr. and Gary Kleck, 53–92. San Francisco: Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy, 1997. Kleck, Gary. Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1997. McDonald, Katherine. “NRA—A Wounded Giant.” California Journal 20 (1989): 319–21. Purdum, Todd S. “California Enacts the Toughest Ban on Assault Guns.” New York Times, July 20, 1999, 1. Spitzer, Robert J. Gun Control: A Documentary and Reference Guide, 228–36 (excerpts from Silveira v. Lockyer and analysis). Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1999. Vanzi, Max. “Where Does Gun Control Go Next?” California Journal 31 (2000): 9–15.

Ruby Ridge Ruby Ridge, Idaho, was the site of the conflict between the Randy Weaver family and the U.S. government that took place between August 21 and August 31, 1992. During the incident, Vicki Weaver (Randy’s wife) and her son Sammy were killed by

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bullets fired by U.S. marshals and a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) sniper. Randy Weaver and houseguest Kevin Harris were wounded. Three of Weaver’s children— Sara (age sixteen), Rachel (ten), and Elisheba (ten months)—were not injured. U.S. Marshal William Degan was killed by gunfire from Harris. The incident has been the source of much controversy regarding the government’s role in the incident, and the aftermath has generated case law allowing the prosecution of federal officers. Ruby Ridge generated investigations within the FBI and by the U.S. Justice Department’s Office of Public Responsibility, and has been cited as one of the contributing factors to the bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City by Timothy McVeigh. The siege of Ruby Ridge began on the afternoon of August 21, 1992. U.S. Marshals Larry Cooper, William Degan, and Arthur Roderick (on the property conducting surveillance of Randy Weaver), threw pebbles into the Weavers’ yard and caught the attention of their dog, a yellow Labrador retriever named Striker. When Striker began to chase the marshals, Randy, his son Sammy, and Harris responded. All three were armed, and they later said that they thought Striker had found a deer. Accounts of what happened next differ widely. According to Randy, Sammy and Harris followed Striker down a logging road, while Randy followed a trail that intersected the road further down the hill. Striker, Sammy, and Harris caught up with the marshals, one of whom shot and killed Striker. Sammy screamed at the shooter, fired in the direction from which the shots had originated, and turned to run back up the hill to his home. Sammy was shot in the back and killed. Unaware of his son’s death, Randy, who had returned to the yard, heard the shots and then called for Sammy and

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Harris to return home. When Harris determined that Sammy was dead, he shot in the direction from which the shots originated and then ran up the hill. Degan was killed in the gunfire. The marshals’ version of the story was that the dog was shot when he tried to attack, that Weaver had shot his own son, and that Harris had shot the marshal without provocation. When the marshals returned to their unit, a roadblock was established on Ruby Creek Road, and the FBI was called in. The FBI Hostage Rescue Team (HRT), headed by Richard Rogers, was dispatched from Washington, D.C. By the end of the day, Idaho governor Cecil Andrus had declared a state of emergency. During that afternoon, while the HRT flew to Idaho, Randy, Vicki, and Harris retrieved Sammy’s body, cleaned him, wrapped him in a sheet, and placed him in the “birthing shed,” a small outbuilding thirty to fifty feet from the main cabin in which baby Elisheba had been born and where Vicki and Sara remained during their menstrual periods, which, according to the Weavers’ religious beliefs, rendered them “unclean.” On the plane, Rogers composed the “rules of engagement” for the situation. These rules govern the use of deadly force. Marshals on the site had falsely reported that the team had been pinned down by gunfire, and it was on the basis of this incorrect information the rules were written. Rogers claims to have discussed these rules with FBI assistant director Larry Potts, who in turn discussed them with FBI deputy assistant director Danny O. Coulson. According to Rogers, both men approved the rules, which read in part: “[I]f any adult is seen with a weapon in the vicinity of where this firefight took place, of the Weaver cabin, that this individual could be the subject of deadly force.” It is again a

matter of controversy whether and when the word “could” in the rules was changed to “should.” The next day, August 22, at approximately 6:00 p.m., Randy, daughter Sara, and Harris went to the shed where, Randy reports, they were going to pray over Sammy’s body. Randy and Harris were armed, Sara was not. Unbeknown to them, a team of FBI snipers, consisting of Lon Horiuchi and his “spotter” Dale Monroe, had set up approximately 200 yards to the north of the cabin. Horiuchi was armed with a Remington 700 single-shot target rifle equipped with a 10x-magnification scope, designed for accuracy up to 1,000 yards. When Randy reached to open the door of the shed, Horiuchi fired, wounding Weaver under his arm. Randy, Sara, and Harris ran for the cabin, with Sara trying to shield her father. She later stated that she thought no one would shoot an unarmed girl. At the cabin, Vicki opened the kitchen door and shouted for Randy, Sara, and Harris to get back into the house. She held baby Elisheba in her arms. After Randy, Sara, and Harris entered the house, Horiuchi fired a second shot that entered through Vicki’s temple, went through her mouth and tongue, shattered her jawbone, and severed her carotid artery. She dropped to her knees and then fell, still holding the baby, to the cabin floor, where she bled to death. The bullet that killed Vicki traveled on and wounded Harris in the arm and chest cavity. Horiuchi later claimed he had not seen Vicki at the door. Who were the Weavers, and why were the marshals on their property to begin with? Randy and Vicki Weaver were both born in Iowa. After high school, Randy enrolled at Iowa Community College and drove a school bus, when he met his future wife. Randy dropped out of school and enlisted in the army on October 9, 1968, hoping to



serve a tour in Vietnam. In the army, he received training as a combat engineer, scored in the top 1 percent in firearm proficiency, and was trained for the elite Special Forces unit as a Green Beret. Promoted to sergeant, Randy sat out the war at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. He was discharged on October 8, 1971, and married Vicki the next month. Randy enrolled at the University of Northern Iowa in the criminal justice program with the intent of becoming an FBI agent. The Weavers lived the American dream and bought a house, holding down two jobs and giving birth to three children (Sara, Sammy, and Rachel). Devoted members of the Waterloo (Iowa) Baptist Church, the Weavers began to study alternative religions, including Christian Identity, a racist, apocalyptic sect. They eventually adopted an eclectic set of religious beliefs that became the center of their lives. For religious reasons, the Weavers wanted to homeschool their children, which was illegal in Iowa. They believed that the world was nearing its end and that they were called to move to the mountains of the West. They left Iowa in 1983 and found the site of the future siege, where they built a two-story, twenty-four-by-thirty-two-foot cabin. Shortly thereafter they met Kevin Harris, who from then on intermittently lived with the family. Randy and Vicki attended several encampments at the Aryan Nations compound at nearby Hayden Lake, but they did not join. Aryan Nations was a white supremacist movement founded by Richard Butler and the source of the Order—a group that financed their terrorist activities with bank robberies. In 1989, Randy met a biker named Gus Magisono at one of the encampments. Magisono was actually a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF)

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undercover agent named Kenneth Fadeley. The Weavers had fallen on hard times financially, and “Magisono” suggested to Randy that money could be made by selling several shotguns sawed off to an illegal length. While all agreed that the sale was made, Randy stated that Fadeley himself sawed off the barrels after the transaction. Selling the shotguns was entirely lawful under federal and Idaho law, but when the barrels of the shotguns were shortened to less than eighteen inches, they became subject to the National Firearms Act of 1934, which requires that such guns be registered and that a tax be paid. After the transaction, Randy was approached by two ATF agents, who told him he could avoid arrest on the firearm charge if he would serve as a spy at the Aryan Nations encampments. Randy not only refused, but he informed the Aryan Nations that the ATF was trying to infiltrate their organization. Randy was subsequently arrested on the firearm charge on January 17, 1991, and released on bond. His trial date was set initially for February 21, but changed to February 20. The document mailed to Randy by probation officer Karl Richens stated the trial date was March 20. On March 14, even though Judge Harold Ryan had been informed about the mix-up in dates, he signed an arrest warrant for failure to appear. Randy refused to surrender and stayed on the mountain. Deputy U.S. Marshal Dave Hunt established surveillance that cost approximately $13,000 per week. It was a team of these marshals that encountered Striker on August 21, beginning the siege. On August 23, after Vicki Weaver had been killed, FBI agents entered the “birthing shed” and removed Sammy’s body. The next day, the HRT tried to no avail to establish communication with the individuals in

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the cabin by a telephone brought to the porch by an armored vehicle. The FBI negotiating agents claimed to be unaware of Vicki’s death. On August 26, as the standoff continued, Lt. Col. James “Bo” Gritz, a former Green Beret decorated sixty-two times for valor in Vietnam, taped a message to be played to Randy, encouraging him to end the standoff. The tape was not played by the FBI. Gritz arrived the same day with the intention of negotiating the surrender in person. He was not allowed to do so that day. On the following day, radio commentator Paul Harvey (knowing that Randy listened to his show) urged Randy to speak to the HRT and offered to pay for Randy’s legal representation himself. On August 28–31, Gritz was driven daily to the cabin. On August 28, he returned to the FBI roadblock with news of Vicki’s death and said that he had failed to gain entrance to the cabin. On August 29, Gritz brought Baptist minister Chuck Sandelin and Vicki’s best friend, Jackie Brown, to the cabin. Brown was allowed entry with medical supplies, and Randy gave her a written account of the standoff from his perspective. On the same day, Harvey contacted Spokane attorney Roger Peven, who called renowned defense attorney Gerry Spence. Spence conditionally agreed to represent Randy. On August 30, Harris was removed from the cabin to a medical tent, given first aid, and then flown to a Spokane hospital, where he remained for two weeks under guard. Vicki’s body was also removed from the cabin. On August 31, the Weavers surrendered. Randy was taken to Sandpoint, Idaho, and from there to a Boise hospital. After treatment, he was moved to the Ada County Jail. The girls were taken to their maternal grandparents, who had been waiting at the roadblock.

Randy Weaver and Kevin Harris were charged by a federal grand jury with murder, aiding and abetting murder, conspiracy, assault, and other crimes. The trial began on April 14, 1993, and the case was submitted to the jury on June 15. During the trial, Spence presented no defense evidence, stating that he felt it unnecessary since the prosecution had failed to present a credible case. The jury returned on July 1, 1993. Harris was acquitted of all charges and was released from custody. Weaver was found guilty of failure to appear on the original firearm charge and of violating the terms of his bail, but was found not guilty of the original firearm charge itself. He was acquitted of all other charges. He was sentenced to eighteen months in jail, fined $10,000, and given three years of probation. After receiving credit for fourteen months already served and time off for good behavior, Weaver was released from jail on December 18, 1993. A 1993 hearing by the U.S. Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility generated a 542-page report critical of the government handling of the incident; this report was supposed to be kept from the public but was eventually placed on the Internet. The FBI conducted its own internal investigation of Ruby Ridge, which was derided as a cover-up even by other FBI agents. In 1994, a coalition including the American Civil Liberties Union, the National Rifle Association, the Drug Policy Foundation, the National Legal Aid and Defenders Association, the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, and the Independence Institute mailed a letter to President Bill Clinton, citing the Ruby Ridge incident as an example of the basis for their concern that federal law enforcement was increasingly exceeding its legal authority and indiscriminately using deadly force.



In August 1994, two civil suits were brought on behalf of Weaver and Harris by the defense team headed by Spence. The first was a wrongful-death suit, seeking damages for the deaths of Vicki and Sammy Weaver. The second was filed against the federal government for violation of the constitutional rights of the Weavers and Harris. In 1995, Randy Weaver received $3.1 million in compensation from the government, which still denied any wrongdoing. In 2000, Harris received $380,000 in compensation from the government for his injuries. Eventually, the FBI disciplined twelve of its personnel in 1995 for the Ruby Ridge incident and for covering up or destroying evidence. The FBI continued to maintain that the shooting of Vicki was unintentional. Potts received a letter of censure to be placed in his personnel file. No action was taken against Horiuchi, who the Justice Department had ruled in 1994 would not be prosecuted for Vicki’s death. Later in 1995, Potts, Coulson, and two other FBI officials were suspended during criminal investigations of whether they had engaged in an attempted cover-up of their roles regarding the Ruby Ridge rules of engagement. In 1997, prosecutor Denise Woodbury filed a manslaughter complaint against Horiuchi with the state of Idaho under a clause covering careless, reckless, or negligent use of a firearm. The Justice Department paid for Horiuchi’s legal representation and argued that the supremacy clause of the U.S. Constitution forbade a state from prosecuting federal officials, except in a very narrow set of circumstances. “Federal lawenforcement officials are privileged to do what would otherwise be unlawful if done by a private citizen. It’s a fundamental function of our government,” the Justice Department told the federal Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals during oral argument.

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On June 5, 2001, an en banc panel of the court of appeals ruled 6-5 that “when federal officers violate the Constitution, either through malice or excessive zeal, they can be held accountable for violating the state’s criminal laws.” One week later, however, new Boundary County prosecutor Brett Benson dropped the case, stating he felt that the state could not make a convincing case against Horiuchi. Carol Oyster See also: Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF); National Firearms Act of 1934

Further Reading Bock, Alan W. Ambush at Ruby Ridge: How Government Agents Set Randy Weaver Up and Took His Family Down. Irvine, CA: Dickens Press, 1995. Goodman, Barak (director). Ruby Ridge. PBS: American Experience, April 13, 2021. https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americane xperience/films/ruby-ridge/#film_descri ption (accessed January 28, 2022). Siegler, Kirk. “How What Happened at Ruby Ridge 25 Years Ago Still Matters Today.” NPR: All Things Considered, August 18, 2017. https://www.npr.org/2017/08/18/544 523302/how-what-happened-25-years-ago -at-ruby-ridge-still-matters-today (accessed January 28, 2022). Walter, Jess. Every Knee Shall Bow: The Truth and Tragedy of Ruby Ridge and the Randy Weaver Family. New York: Regan Books, 1995.

Ruger, William Batterman (1917–2002) In October 1949, in a little red barn in Southport, Connecticut, a new firearm company opened for business. The founders were two young men, Alex Sturm and William (Bill)

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Batterman Ruger. Ruger had designed a .22-caliber automatic target pistol that he thought would appeal to gun enthusiasts like himself. Sturm, a wealthy fellow gun collector, invested $50,000. The gun sold so well that Sturm, Ruger & Company made a profit in the first year and over the next five decades never had to borrow and never lost money. The company claims to be the most profitable of all gun manufacturers. Born in 1917 and raised in Brooklyn, New York, Ruger became a gun fancier and collector in childhood. His father gave him his first gun, a Remington Model 12 pumpaction rifle, when he was twelve. In 1939, he left college and worked for a year at the Springfield Armory. In 1940, he sold a machine-gun design to the Auto-Ordnance Corporation in Bridgeport, Connecticut, and spent the war years there as a production engineer. In 1946, he decided to form his own company to make sporting firearms, but the venture failed after just two years. Success then came quickly. In 1949, perfection of his design for the target pistol and the financing provided by the equally enthusiastic Sturm resulted in the founding of Sturm, Ruger & Company. Unfortunately, Ruger’s partner died in 1951 at the age of twenty-nine. Before Sturm’s sudden death, the partners had been planning a frontier-type revolver that would resemble the famous Peacemaker that Colt had marketed from 1873 to 1940. Ruger’s Single-Six revolver used coil springs instead of the delicate flat springs of the Peacemaker and .22 caliber ammunition instead of .45 caliber. It was exactly the type of gun worshippers of western heroes wanted, as the early years of television were filled with programs like Gunsmoke, Wagon Train, and Wyatt Earp. Ruger not only engineered new forms of guns, but he introduced new ways of

making them, always with a keen eye as to how they looked. In the 1950s, one of his brilliant production ideas was to form the metal parts by precision investment casting rather than rough forgings. In 1963, the company established its own foundry, Paine Tree Castings, in Newport, New Hampshire. In an interview, the inventor said: “There are handsome guns and there are homely ones. . . . Throughout my life I’ve had continuous connection with the aesthetic of whatever I am interested in. That’s always been my guiding principle.” In 1955, the company introduced a center-fire, single-action revolver called the Black Hawk, which became popular with big-game hunters. Its success led to a series of other revolvers in different calibers, followed by the Bearcat—a compact, lightweight, single-action revolver. In 1960, the firm brought out its first rifle, the Ruger .44 Magnum Carbine, and opened its second and larger plant in New Port, New Hampshire. During the rest of the decade, Ruger produced the 10/22, a .22-caliber autoloading rifle with a unique ten-shot rotary magazine; the Number One single-shot rifle, which started a trend in big-game hunting; the M77, a classic bolt-action rifle; and, for the law enforcement market, the doubleaction .38 and .375 Magnum revolvers. The 1970s saw the introduction of several more models: the Old Army, Ruger’s first black powder cap-and-ball revolver; the Ruger Mini-14 Sporting Carbine; and the handsome Red Label shotgun. The company also pioneered the use of automatic safety features in its classic guns. In the 1980s, besides building a new facility in Prescott, Arizona, for producing the entire line of center-fire autoloading pistols, Sturm, Ruger & Company marketed the massive Redhawk .44 Magnum double-action revolver and new .22 center-fire bolt-action rifles.



Under the founder’s tenacious leadership, Sturm, Ruger & Company built up the most extensive client base of any firearm firm, totaling over thirteen million customers. Military and police forces across the nation use its law enforcement pistols, bolt-action rifles, and autoloading guns. The standard training and target pistol for the U.S. armed forces is a Ruger. As a sideline, the company also developed the “Big Bertha” line of high tech titanium clubs for Callaway Golf. Nearly 2,000 workers are employed in five U.S. plants and produce more than 700,000 firearms a year. Ellsworth S. Grant and David S. Lux See also: Browning, John Moses; Colt, Samuel; Winchester, Oliver Fisher

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Further Reading Delfay, Robert. “An Exclusive Interview with Bill Ruger.” Shot Business (1994). Pew, Katherine. Firearms Ownership in America—Our Responsibility for the Future. Southport, CT: Sturm, Ruger & Company, 1992. Pew, Katherine. Introduction to William B. Ruger & Sturm, Ruger & Company. Southport, CT: Sturm, Ruger & Company, 1995. Sturm, Ruger & Company. http://www.ruger .com/index.html (accessed January 28, 2022). Wilson, Robert L. Ruger and His Guns: A History of the Man, the Company and Their Firearms. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1997. Wilson, Robert L. “William B. Ruger, An American Legacy and His Legacy.” American Rifleman 146 (1998): 30–33.

S SAFE Act of 2013

stalking violations, drug-trafficking felonies, and weapons convictions, as well as the mentally ill. This was to be accomplished by either revoking existing licenses or preventing people with problematic histories from obtaining licenses in the first place. License oversight was facilitated by creating a statewide database of gun licensees and applicants who could then be checked for disqualifying circumstances, such as having been convicted of an applicable crime or being flagged by a mental health professional as being potentially dangerous. The law also provided for the state’s ability to seize weapons from such people. The means by which the law detects mentally ill gun owners and prospective gun owners is controversial; it largely rests on mental health professionals being subjected to mandatory reporting standards. The act requires that mental health professionals inform the state if, in their judgment, their patients seem likely to harm themselves or others. The names of such patients are then sent to the New York Division of Criminal Justice, which determines if there is a need to seize any firearms or prevent their acquisition. The impetus for the passage of the SAFE Act was largely public concern over the threat posed by mentally ill persons, but the law has been described as “comprehensive” because it includes a host of provisions that are not directly related to mental health (Jacobs and Fuhr 2015). There are several equipment bans that are included in the act, including on “high capacity” magazines (greater than ten rounds) and what the act

In the aftermath of the December 14, 2012, shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut, the New York State Legislature voted to enact the New York State Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement (SAFE) Act of 2013 on January 14, 2013. The proposal garnered bipartisan support, with the Republican-controlled Senate and the Democrat-controlled Assembly passing it within a day of each other. Governor Andrew Cuomo (D) signed the bill into law as soon as it reached his desk. The speed with which the act became law was the result of an expedited process known as a “message of necessity,” whereby New York governors can suspend the otherwise mandatory three-day waiting period that state legislators must observe before voting a bill into law. Cuomo summarized the law’s aims and scope, describing the act as having the capacity to deter crime, especially that which is committed by the mentally ill. He claimed that the background checks featured in the legislation would be so thorough and the penalties for gun crime so severe as to qualify the act as among the toughest in the country. Importantly, he also emphasized groups who would not be negatively impacted by the act, including sportsmen and other lawful gun owners (NYSAFE Act Gun Reform 2019). A major aim of the legislation was to limit access to firearms by many categories of people perceived to be dangerous, such as those with developmental disabilities, 743

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describes as “assault weapons.” In addition to expanding various gun-related bans, the SAFE Act also mandates universal background checks. Further, the law provides for stricter penalties for an array of gunrelated crimes, including mandatory sentences, while also elevating some crimes from misdemeanors to felonies. The act, which its supporters advertised as the “toughest in the country,” is the subject of enormous controversy along several dimensions. Broadly, there is disagreement about its morality and legality, as well as its implementation. Morally, the major point of contention rests upon the association of danger with the mentally ill. On one hand, analysts acknowledge that it is broadly reasonable for people to worry over gun ownership by the mentally ill (Weill 2014). However, critics point to concerns that the threats posed by the mentally ill are overblown, and they note that the provisions of the act further stigmatize an already marginalized population. This potentially carries the added risk that mentally ill patients may avoid seeking treatment over fears that their care providers will report them to external authorities who then might curtail their constitutional rights (Jacobs and Fuhr 2016; Weill 2014). The criticism of equating mental illness with inherent danger is that dangerousness is the issue that should be most looked at rather than mental illness itself, and that the two notions should remain distinct. The SAFE Act came about in direct response to a mass shooting, and the worry is that while placating a fearful public, the act reduces danger to a synonym for and natural symptom of mental illness (Gamsin 2014; Weill 2014). In addition to the potential perils of associating mental illness with dangerousness, there is substantial legal disagreement about

how the act interacts with and impacts the Second Amendment. Of concern for gun rights advocates are the terms used within the act itself, especially “assault weapons” and “high-capacity magazines” (Halbrook 2014). Opponents of the act claim that these terms are arbitrary and pejorative, suggesting that they are utilized as a means of making political points rather than accurately describing the types of weapons and equipment that are subject to the law. These critics argue that the SAFE Act fundamentally misunderstands the Second Amendment and seeks to restrict access to a select group of firearms on the grounds that they can be misused, while ignoring the fact that all types of armament can be misused and that that possibility should not restrict their accessibility under the law (Halbrook 2014). Others question the degree to which the act can plausibly prevent gun violence, especially given the evidence that obtaining contraband has proven to be quite easy throughout all sectors of society (Jacobs and Fuhr 2017). In other words, because access to things like drugs and illegal weapons is common, some are pessimistic about the act’s prospects for success. There are many millions of weapons at large in private hands in the United States, and it is not reasonable to expect that the owners of these guns will volunteer for registration and permits if they believe that their weapons will be taken away or their permits denied (Jacobs and Fuhr 2015). Finally, implementation critics point out that there are ways around the law, such as by having access to weapons owned by family members (such was the case with the Sandy Hook shooter) or theft. Despite the objections described above, there remains a robust advocacy on behalf of the New York SAFE Act and similar legislation. Clearly, support for the act in New



York State was substantial and bipartisan at the time of its passage. Gun control advocacy is by no means limited to policy makers, either, as there is ample support within the research community for the potential of laws like the SAFE Act to save lives and promote public safety. For example, Smith and Spiegler (2017) found that stricter gun control laws correlate to fewer gun deaths, and others have found that restrictions on firearm possession by criminals and the mentally ill can reduce violence and robberies (Kleck et al. 2016). Many scholars also suggest that much of the opposition to gun control legislation is based on pessimism and a misunderstanding of how regulations function (Spitzer 2014). In many cases, new regulations are met with hostility by the regulated, and often compliance is difficult to compel. However, when other recent policies aimed at changing public behavior are examined, such as seat belt laws and restrictions on smoking, people do eventually begin to comply as their reluctance fades with time (Spitzer 2014). Based on this, it is argued, implementation difficulties and legal challenges should not be considered insurmountable obstacles but rather as natural and expected bumps in the road as policies and popular opinion change. By this logic, legislation like the New York SAFE Act can have a bright future in the United States, and policy innovation should not be abandoned in the name of political convenience. Marcus Tyler Carey See also: Assault Weapons; Extreme Risk Protection Orders; High-Capacity Magazine Ban; Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting

Further Reading Eells, Gregory T. “The Implications of New York State’s Safe Act of 2013 on Mental

SAFE Act of 2013 | 745 Health Professionals Nationally.” Journal of College Student Psychotherapy 27, no. 3 (2013): 177–80. Gamsin, Matthew. “The New York SAFE Act: A Thoughtful Approach to Gun Control, or a Politically Expedient Response to the Public’s Fear of the Mentally Ill.” Southern California Law Review. Postscript 88 (2014): 16–54. Halbrook, Stephen P. “New York’s Not So SAFE Act: The Second Amendment in an Alice-in-Wonderland World Where Words Have No Meaning.” Albany Law Review 78 (2014): 789–817. Jacobs, James B., and Zoe A. Fuhr. “Preventing Dangerous Mentally Ill Individuals from Obtaining and Retaining Guns: New York’s SAFE Act.” Georgetown Journal of Law & Public Policy 14 (2016): 77–99. Jacobs, James B., and Zoe A. Fuhr. “The SAFE Act: New York’s Ban on Assault Weapons and Large Capacity Magazines.” Criminal Law Bulletin 53, no. 1 (2017): 4–33. Jacobs, James B., and Zoe A. Fuhr. “Universal Background Checking-New York’s SAFE Act.” Albany Law Review 79 (2015): 1327–54. Kleck, Gary, Tomislav Kovandzic, and Jon Bellows. “Does Gun Control Reduce Violent Crime?” Criminal Justice Review 41, no. 4 (2016): 488–513. “New York SAFE Act.” Madison County Sheriff, New York, August 15, 2017. https:// www.madisoncounty.ny.gov/1542/New -York-SAFE-Act (accessed May 18, 2022). “New York State Police Guide to the SAFE Act.” Shooter’s Committee on Political Education. 2014. https://www.scopeny2a .org/Guide-to-The-New-York-Safe-Act #home (accessed May 18, 2022). NYSAFE Act Gun Reform. December 17, 2019. https://safeact.ny.gov/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Smith, Jacob, and Jonathan Spiegler. “Explaining Gun Deaths: Gun Control, Mental Illness, and Policymaking in the American States.” Policy Studies Journal 48, no. 1 (2017): 235–56.

746 | Safety Courses Spitzer, Robert J. “New York State and the New York SAFE Act: A Case Study in Strict Gun Laws.” Albany Law Review 78 (2014): 749–87. Wiehl, Tom. “The Presumption of Dangerousness: How New York’s SAFE Act Reflects Our Irrational Fear of Mental Illness.” Seton Hall Legislative Journal 38 (2014): 35–69.

Safe Gun Storage Laws,. See Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws Safe Guns. See Smart Guns Safety Courses Gun safety courses and instruction are made available by and through private gun and sporting groups like the National Rifle Association, which has certified tens of thousands of instructors, and by some law enforcement authorities. Instruction made available to gun owners includes information on the safe use, handling, and storage of guns. Proper techniques pertaining to gun loading and unloading, determining whether a gun is loaded or not, proper use of gun safety locks or lockboxes, storage procedures in the home or elsewhere, and children and guns are subjects normally covered. Among the most commonly repeated axioms of gun safety are that individuals should always assume that guns are loaded; guns should never be pointed at a target that the gun user does not plan to shoot; fingers should always be kept off the trigger until one is ready to shoot; guns should be stored safely in the home or while traveling, meaning that they should be stored unloaded and locked with the ammunition stored elsewhere; and shooters should never use

alcohol or other judgment-impairing substances. Professionals who carry guns as a part of their jobs, such as police officers, receive regular, intensive training on proper gun use, handling, and storage. The primary purpose of safety instruction is to reduce the likelihood of unintended injury or death from guns and to prevent guns from falling into the wrong hands. Many states require some kind of gun safety training as a prerequisite to gun ownership. According to several studies, roughly half of all guns kept in homes are stored in an unsafe manner. Critics of gun training and safety courses argue that they fail to reduce unsafe gun practices. Surveys have shown that those who had taken gun safety courses were actually more likely to store guns unsafely—that is, unlocked and loaded— than those who had not taken such courses. Robert J. Spitzer See also: Eddie Eagle; National Rifle Association (NRA)

Further Reading Hemenway, David. Private Guns, Public Health. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2004. Kleck, Gary. Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1997. Sapp, Rick, and National Rifle Association. NRA Step by Step Guide to Gun Safety. New York: Skyhorse Publishing, 2015.

San Bernardino Shooting On December 2, 2015, Syed Rizwan Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, meticulously planned and committed what authorities deemed a terrorist attack in San Bernardino, California, killing fourteen people and



seriously injuring another twenty-two individuals. Farook, age twenty-eight, worked as an environmental health specialist for San Bernardino County. He was a Pakistani American born in Chicago, Illinois. Malik, twenty-nine, grew up in Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. She arrived in the United States from Saudi Arabia in 2014 on a K-1 visa, also known as a fiancée visa. In 2011, prior to his marriage to Malik, Farook and a friend, Enrique Marquez Jr., discussed plans to commit mass murder. Farook and Marquez had met as teenagers in 2004 living in Riverside, CA, and Farook had mentored the younger Marquez, even converting him to Islam. Farook introduced Marquez to the sermons of Anwar alAwlaki, the American-born imam who used the internet to inspire Muslims to commit terrorist attacks. Marquez purchased two .223 semiautomatic rifles to be used in the attack as well as smokeless powder for pipe bombs and two handguns. The two young men were about to carry out an attack, but they were scared off after federal agents arrested four men in nearby Chino, California, for planning to travel to Afghanistan and train with the Taliban (Finnegan 2016). Farook was a devout Sunni Muslim. In 2013, he began searching for a wife on several dating sites on the internet. Most importantly, Farook wanted a young wife who shared his Sunni Muslim faith. On one dating site, he wrote that he wanted a wife who took her religion very seriously. Farook met Tashfeen Malik on the matrimonial site Muslims.com, and she satisfied his standards as an extreme traditionalist in terms of her faith. Malik wore a veil to cover her face, refused to drive a car, and wanted to be a “stay at home” wife to serve her husband. Farook and Malik communicated online prior to meeting in person using private messages to discuss their mutual

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commitment to jihadism and martyrdom. According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), each had been radicalized by viewing extreme material on the internet prior to their communications online (Baker and Santora 2015, A20). After their marriage in the early months of 2014, the couple rented a two-story townhouse in Redlands, California, and Malik gave birth to a daughter on May 17, 2014. Prior to the birth of their daughter, Farook’s coworkers at the health department held a baby shower for him and asked to meet his wife, but he declined (Goffard 2015; Finnegan 2016). Beginning in late 2014 and throughout 2015, Farook and Malik used their middleclass suburban home in Redlands to stockpile weapons and create pipe bombs. On the morning of December 2, 2015, the couple left their six-month-old daughter with Farook’s mother, Rafia, informing her that they had a doctor’s appointment. On the same day, Malik posted a comment on a Facebook account, using an alias, pledging support for Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), while Farook attended an 8:30 a.m. staff meeting and training session for his health department job. The event was held in a conference room at the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino and was expected to transition into a luncheon celebrating the Christmas holiday (Ahmed 2015). At 10:30 a.m., Farook left the event, leaving behind a backpack containing three pipe bombs, and joined up with Malik, who apparently had been waiting outside the building. The couple put on ski masks and black tactical gear, including vests holding magazines filled with ammunition for their .223 semiautomatic rifles and two 9-mm pistols. Two people were shot and killed outside the building before Farook entered

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the facility at 10:58 a.m. and opened fire on the roughly eighty people in attendance. Malik quickly followed Farook into the building, and the couple fired more than one hundred rounds of ammunition in a few minutes, resulting in the deaths of fourteen people and injuries to twenty-two other individuals. They then fled the scene in a rented Ford Expedition SUV. It has been speculated that the couple then drove around in their SUV, attempting to detonate the pipe bombs left in the backpack at the scene of the shooting by way of a remotecontrol device. However, the pipe bombs were poorly constructed based upon a design from an Al-Qaeda magazine and failed to detonate (Braziel et al. 2016). After witnesses stated that they recognized Farook during the shooting based upon his voice and physique, investigators spotted the couple leaving their residence in the SUV at 3:08 p.m., and a police chase ensued on the local freeway, which included a fake pipe bomb being thrown at police from the SUV. After the couple exited the freeway, law enforcement officers from various departments connected to San Bernardino and Redlands that were in pursuit exchanged gunfire with the suspects on East San Bernardino Avenue in a suburban neighborhood. Malik initially began firing her semiautomatic rifle through the back window of the vehicle as Farook was driving the vehicle at a slow speed. He then stopped the vehicle and fired upon law enforcement after opening the driver’s-side door of the SUV, wounding a police deputy who was hit with shrapnel in his upper thigh. Malik continued to fire her weapon with the passenger door open from the back seat (Braziel et al. 2016). Farook was shot multiple times by police officers as he moved away from the vehicle. He appeared to be trying to flank the

officers by getting to the opposite side of the street. He was struck several times in the legs and upper body, resulting in his death. Malik continued to fire her weapon from the back seat of the vehicle, hitting a San Bernardino narcotics officer in the thigh. Officers eventually surrounded the vehicle and shot at Malik from multiple directions, striking her thirteen times in the body and twice in the head. She was pronounced dead at the scene at 3:14 p.m. It was reported that twenty-four different police officers had fired 440 shots at the vehicle during the shootout while the suspects shot at least eighty-one times at the officers (Braziel et al. 2016). A few hours after the shootout ended with police, investigators executed a search warrant on the home of Farook and Malik and discovered weapons, thousands of rounds of ammunition, and tools that could be used to create improvised explosive devices. The large arsenal inside the home, which included nineteen different types of pipes that could be converted into bombs, and the digital information from their computers suggested to authorities that the couple were planning a major attack in the future (Chan 2015; Serrano et al. 2015). The two AR-15 style .223 semiautomatic rifles used in the attack were the weapons purchased by Enrique Marquez in 2011 and 2012 when he and Farook had been planning to commit terrorist attacks of their own. Marquez was arrested and charged with several felonies, including conspiracy and providing material support to terrorists, even though he apparently was not involved in the plotting or execution of the San Bernardino attack. In February 2017, Marquez pleaded guilty to the charges, and the federal government recommended a prison sentence of twenty-five years (De Atley 2018). Scott P. Johnson



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See also: Assault Weapons; Semiautomatic Weapons

Further Reading Ahmed, Saeed. “Who Were Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik?” CNN, December 4, 2015. https://www.cnn.com /2015/12/03/us/syed-farook-tashfeen-malik -mass-shooting-profile/ (accessed August 22, 2019). Baker, Al, and Marc Santora. “San Bernardino Attackers Discussed Jihad in Private Messages, F.B.I. Says.” New York Times, December 17, 2015, A20. Bergen, Peter L. United States of Jihad: Who Are America’s Homegrown Terrorists and How Do We Stop Them? New York: Broadway Books, 2016. Braziel, Rick, Frank Straub, George Watson, and Rod Hoops. Bringing Calm to Chaos: A Critical Incident Review of the San Bernardino Public Safety Response to the December 2, 2015, Terrorist Shooting Incident at the Inland Regional Center. Critical Response Initiative. Washington, DC: Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, 2016. Chan, Melissa. “San Bernardino Suspects Left Behind Failed Remote-Controlled Bomb.” Time, December 3, 2015. http:// time.com/4135215/san-bernardino-remote -bomb/ (accessed August 22, 2019). De Atley, Richard K. “Government Recommends 25 Years in Prison for Enrique Marquez Jr., Friend of San Bernardino Terrorist.” San Bernardino Sun, April 9, 2018. https://www.sbsun.com/2018/04/09 /government-recommends-25-years-in -prison-for-enrique-marquez-jr-friend-of -san-bernardino-terrorist/ (accessed August 22, 2019). Finnegan, William. “Last Days: Preparing for the apocalypse in San Bernardino.” New Yorker, February 14, 2016. https://www .newyorker.com /magazine /2016/02/22 /preparing-for-apocalypse-in-san-bernar dino (accessed August 22, 2019).

Goffard, Christopher. “They Met Online, Made a Life in San Bernardino—And Silently Planned a Massacre.” Los Angeles Times, December 5, 2015. https://www.cnn .com/2015/12/03/us/syed-farook-tashfeen -malik-mass-shooting-profile/ (accessed August 13, 2019). Serrano, Richard A., Richard Winton, Sarah Parvini, and James Queally. “San Bernardino Shooters Planned Bigger Attack, Investigators Believe.” Los Angeles Times, December 10, 2015. https://www.latimes .com/local/crime/la-me-sb-shooting-2015 1211-story.html (accessed August 22, 2019). “What Is Known So Far about Syed Farook and Tashfeen Malik, the San Bernardino Shooting Suspects.” Orange County Register, December 5, 2015. https://www.ocregi ster.com/2015/12/04/what-is-known-so -fa r-about-syed-fa rook-a nd-t ashfeen -malik-the-san-bernardino-shooting-sus pects/ (accessed August 22, 2019).

San Ysidro, California Shooting. See Killeen, Texas, Shooting Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting On the morning of December 14, 2012, Adam Lanza (age twenty) arrived at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. Using a Bushmaster XM-15 .223 semiautomatic rifle, he shot through the school’s large plate glass windows to the side of its double vestibule entry and gained entry. Over the next five minutes, he killed the school’s principal and psychologist, as well as three teachers, a behavioral therapist, and twenty first-grade students. As law enforcement arrived on scene, the perpetrator killed himself. Further investigation revealed that prior to the attack at the school, he had killed his mother, Nancy, in their shared home as she slept.

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At 9:30 a.m. on the morning of the shooting, all exterior doors were locked in accordance with the school’s security plan, with visitors required to be buzzed into the building through the single point entry. After driving to the school from his home less than five miles away, the perpetrator gained entry to the building by shooting out its windows five minutes after it had locked down for the day. The sounds of the gunshots were heard by principal Dawn Hochsprung, school psychologist Mary Sherlach, and lead teacher Natalie Hammond, who were meeting in the main office’s conference room near the entrance. The three women attempted to confront the perpetrator, and all were shot. Hochsprung and Sherlach were killed; Hammond, who was injured, played dead until he passed and then was able to get herself back to the conference room. When the shooting began, the school’s intercom was on and broadcast the sounds of gunfire across the building, prompting many to act quickly. The perpetrator went through the main office but was unable to see any of the people in there who had sought cover. He exited and went into the first-grade classroom of substitute teacher Lauren Rousseau, who was rushing her students to the back of the classroom with the help of behavioral therapist Rachel D’Avino. As the women tried to get the children into the room’s bathroom, the perpetrator opened fire. Both women were killed alongside fifteen of the children. Only one student, who played dead during the attack, survived. The perpetrator then went into the classroom next door, where teacher Victoria Soto was approaching the entryway to lock it after hiding some of her students in the closet and bathroom. As the perpetrator entered the room, Soto placed herself

between him and the students and was fatally shot. Five students in the room, as well as teacher’s aide Anne Marie Murphy, who shielded a special needs student with her body, also were killed. As the perpetrator tried to reload his rifle, nine students ran and found safety in a nearby home. Two other students survived by hiding in the classroom’s bathroom. The first 911 call was received at 9:35 a.m. Just five minutes later, as police arrived at the school, the perpetrator killed himself with a gunshot to the head using a Glock pistol he also had with him. Within that time span, he had fired more than 150 rounds from the semiautomatic rifle. Most of the victims were struck with gunfire multiple times, with autopsy reports indicating that some of the children had been struck up to eleven times each. Two other firearms, a 9-mm Sig Sauer pistol (on the perpetrator) and an Izhmash 12-gauge shotgun (in his car’s trunk), also were brought to the scene but never fired. The identification card of the perpetrator’s brother, Ryan, with whom he had been estranged for several years, was found on the perpetrator, leading early reports to name Ryan as the shooter. This was cleared up several hours later. In addition to the six educators killed in the attack, twenty students between the ages of six and seven also were killed: Charlotte Bacon, Daniel Barden, Olivia Engel, Josephine Gay, Dylan Hockley, Madeline Hsu, Catherine Hubbard, Chase Kowalski, Jesse Lewis, Ana MarquezGreene, James Mattoli, Grace McDonnell, Emilie Parker, Jack Pinto, Noah Pozner, Caroline Previdi, Jessica Rekos, Avielle Richman, Benjamin Wheeler, and Allison Wyatt. As law enforcement began processing the scene at the school, other officers went to



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Mourners gather at a makeshift memorial outside of Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, on December 15, 2012. The day prior, a gunman killed 20 first grade students and six educators before taking his own life. (Reuters/Alamy Stock Photo)

the perpetrator’s home to begin their evidence collection. Upon arrival, they found the body of his mother, Nancy, who had been shot four times in the head while she slept. The twenty-two-caliber rifle used to kill her was found on the floor next to her bed. In the home’s gun safe, police located an additional firearm and nearly 1,500 rounds of ammunition. All weapons, including those used in the shooting, were lawfully purchased by and registered to Nancy.

The Aftermath As with other high-profile and particularly lethal school shootings, there was an immediate outcry for change to prevent the next tragedy. President Barack Obama indicated

during a speech given at a memorial service in Newtown two days after the shooting that he would use his office’s powers to prevent similar tragedies; three days later, he announced the formation of an interagency gun violence task force headed by Vice President Joe Biden. On January 16, 2013, President Obama announced a gun violence reduction plan that focused on four key areas: strengthening background checks and closing loopholes, banning assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, improving school safety, and increasing access to mental health services. Within the plan, there were twenty-three executive orders that were signed by the president immediately and

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included improved data sharing and incentives for reporting to the National Incident Criminal Background Check System (NICS); providing guidance from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) about how to properly conduct background checks; providing active shooter training to law enforcement, first responders, and school officials; and requiring law enforcement to trace guns recovered in criminal investigations. President Obama also provided twelve proposals to the U.S. Congress, including reinstating the federal assault weapons ban that had lapsed in 2004, limiting gun magazine capacities to ten rounds, banning the possession of armor-piercing bullets by civilians, and increasing criminal penalties for straw purchases (buying a firearm on behalf of someone who is unwilling and/or unable to purchase the gun themselves). The proposals put forth by President Obama were opposed by both the National Rifle Association (NRA), who instead suggested that violent media was a significant causal factor for the shooting rather than the guns, and National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF). Consistent with their regular messaging, NRA executive vice president Wayne LaPierre stated that “the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun,” a mantra he used to support a proposal for putting armed police in every school in the nation. In response, the Brady Campaign began collecting donations and ramping up their advocacy efforts. Former Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, who was injured in a mass shooting nearly two years before the Sandy Hook attack, launched the group Americans for Responsible Solutions. Moms Demand Action, a grassroots organization started by Shannon Watts the day after the Sandy Hook shooting, merged with Mayors against

Illegal Guns a year after the shooting to form Everytown for Gun Safety. At the federal level, the passage of gun control efforts was thwarted by Congressional Republicans and the efforts of gun rights advocates like the NRA. On January 24, 2013, Senator Dianne Feinstein, the author of the original Federal Assault Weapons Ban of 1994, introduced a bill to renew the ban, but the bill failed less than three months later. Another piece of legislation, the bipartisan Manchin-Toomey Amendment, sought to institute universal background checks, but it was defeated the same day as Feinstein’s assault weapons ban bill. More success was had at the state level related to gun control. In January 2013, New York became the first state to act when it passed the Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement (SAFE) Act, which remains one of the most comprehensive gun control packages enacted in the United States. Among the provisions of the SAFE Act were the creation of a state-level database to track pistol permits, instituting universal background checks, and expanding the definition of assault weapons that subsequently were banned in the state. On April 4, 2013, Connecticut’s General Assembly passed additional restrictions to the state’s assault weapons ban, including prohibiting the sale or purchase of extended magazines (holding more than ten rounds) and requiring background checks on all purchases, including private transactions. That same day, the Maryland General Assembly also passed a gun control bill that limited magazine capacity and banned forty-five different types of assault weapons. The bill also required licensing on all handguns and prohibited individuals who had been involuntarily committed to a mental health facility from purchasing a



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firearm. Despite these victories, however, little in the way of comprehensive gun control efforts were made in response to the murders of twenty first graders, prompting many to question what it would take to move the political dial relative to the regulation of firearms.

Lawsuit Against Gun Manufacturers Just over two years after the shooting, nine families who lost loved ones in the shooting filed a class-action lawsuit against Bushmaster, Remington Arms, and others, including the gun store where Nancy purchased the weapon used in the attack. Filed in Connecticut on December 15, 2014, the suit alleged that these organizations and individuals should not be protected under the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA) of 2005, which shields gun manufacturers and dealers from liability when their products are used in the commission of a crime. The suit argued that the firearm used in the shooting was made only for military and law enforcement use and was inappropriately marketed to civilians. Since the suit was filed in Connecticut and Bushmaster’s headquarters were in North Carolina, the gun manufacturer’s attorneys petitioned to have the case moved to federal court in January 2015. A month later, in response to the petition, the families submitted a request of their own to keep the case in state court. In April 2016, Bushmaster’s attorneys filed a motion to have the case summarily dismissed, which was denied. They filed a second motion with the same request a month later, and their petition was granted on October 14, 2016. The families appealed the dismissal of the suit to the Connecticut Supreme Court, citing the state’s Unfair Trade Practices Act. They demonstrated that the gun manufacturers had irresponsibly and dangerously

advertised assault weapons in a way that encouraged consumers to use them against perceived enemies. In a 4-3 decision given in March 2019, the court sided with the families, noting that such advertising was not protected under the PLCAA. In response, Remington petitioned for the U.S. Supreme Court in November 2019 to review the case, but their request was denied, allowing the families’ lawsuit to proceed. In July 2021, Remington offered to settle with the family ahead of the case going to trial that September, but the families declined. In February 2022, the families agreed to accept a new settlement offer of $73 million, with Remington admitting no liability to the shooting (Spitzer 2022). Jaclyn Schildkraut See also: Assault Weapons; Assault Weapons Ban, Renewal Attempts of; Columbine High School Shooting; Everytown for Gun Safety; Mass Murder (Shootings); Mental Disabilities and Gun Use and Acquisition; Moms Demand Action; Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005; SAFE Act of 2013; Sandy Hook Promise; School Shootings; Semiautomatic Weapons; Soto et al. v. Bushmaster Firearms International, LLC et al.

Further Reading Kellner, Douglas. “The Sandy Hook Slaughter and Copycat Killers in a Media Celebrity Society: Analyses and Plans for Action.” Logos: A Journal of Modern Society & Culture 12, no. 1 (2013). http:// logosjournal.com/2013/kellner/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Lysiak, Matthew. Newtown: An American Tragedy. New York: Gallery Books, 2013. Sandy Hook Advisory Commission. “Final Report of the Sandy Hook Advisory Commission.” Danbury, CT: Sandy Hook Advisory Commission, 2015. https://portal.ct .gov/- /media / Malloy-A rchive / Sandy

754 | Sandy Hook Promise -Hook-Advisor y- Com m ission / SH AC _Final_Report_3-6-2015.pdf (accessed May 18, 2022). Schildkraut, Jaclyn, and Glenn W. Muschert. “Media Salience and the Framing of Mass Murder in Schools: A Comparison of the Columbine and Sandy Hook Massacres.” Homicide Studies 18, no. 1 (2014): 23–43. https://doi.org/10.1177/1088767913511458. Schultz, James M., Glenn W. Muschert, Alison Dingwall, and Alyssa M. Cohen. “The Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting as a Tipping Point: ‘This Time Is Different.’” Disaster Health 1, no. 2 (2013): 65–73. https://doi.org/10.4161/dish.27113. Sedensky, Stephen J. “Report of the State’s Attorney for the Judicial District of Danbury on the Shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School and 36 Yogananda Street, Newtown, Connecticut, on December 14, 2012.” Danbury, CT: Office of the State’s Attorney, Judicial District of Danbury, 2013. https://portal.ct.gov/-/media/DCJ/San dyHookFinalReportpdf.pdf (accessed May 18, 2022). Spitzer, Robert. The Sandy Hook-Remington Settlement: Consequences for Gun Policy. Albany, NY: Regional Gun Violence Research Consortium and Rockefeller Institute of Government, 2022. https:// rockinst.org/blog/the-sandy-hook-reming ton-settlement-consequences-for-gun-pol icy/ (accessed June 14, 2022).

Sandy Hook Promise On December 14, 2012, twenty-six people were killed and one other injured in a shooting that took place at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT. A defining characteristic of the shooting is that twenty of the victims were children between the ages of six and seven years old. In the days following the shooting, Tim Makris, a parent whose son attended Sandy Hook Elementary but survived the attack, reportedly

received an email from a friend that said, “We need to do something” (Morioka 2016). Makris, along with Nicole Hockley and Mark Barden, who both lost their children in the tragedy, joined together with other parents and community members to create a nonprofit organization named Sandy Hook Promise. The formation of Sandy Hook Promise was announced on January 14, 2013, one month to the day after the shooting, with a mission to “prevent gun-related deaths due to crime, suicide and accidental discharge so that no other parent experiences the senseless, horrific loss of their child” (Sandy Hook Promise 2019). With the help of a Washington consultant, the seventeen cofounders grew Sandy Hook Promise into a “sophisticated, effective organization” with incredible speed (Bennett 2013; O’Leary 2013). The nonprofit organization, made up of the 501(c) (3) Sandy Hook Promise Foundation and a 501(c)(4) action fund, first focused its efforts on gun legislation, such as limits on permissible gun magazine capacity and closing gun show and internet loopholes to require all gun sales to go through federal firearms licensees who were required to run background checks (Bennett 2013). Although both the 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(4) organizations have the same core mission of healing communities impacted by gun violence and addressing the root causes of gun violence to eliminate it, they operate in different ways. According to the Operations Director James Belden (2013), “the [501(c) (3)] Foundation provides research and public education regarding the causes, and prevention, of gun violence and helps impacted families and communities health through financial and other aid, while the [501(c)(4)] Action Fund works to promote the end of gun violence through public education and advocacy.”



Within three months of the shooting, Sandy Hook Promise partnered with Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy to pass a new gun safety bill. Senate Bill 1160, also known as An Act Concerning Gun Violence and Children’s Safety, passed in the Connecticut Senate and was signed into law on April 4, 2013. The act restricted the permissible capacity of newly acquired magazines to 10 bullets, required registration of existing magazines, expanded the existing assault weapons ban, required background checks for all sales of firearms, and created a weapons offenders’ registry. The bill also focused on mental health issues and required insurers to expedite coverage decisions for mental health and substance abuse issues, increased the number of specialized treatment teams who provide support for people suffering from mental illness, and created a program to help those in education recognize signs of mental illness (Applebome and Rivera 2013). Hoping to have the same impact federally, Sandy Hook Promise met with members of Congress in 2013 to lobby for a bipartisan bill that designed to expand the use of background checks when purchasing a firearm and create a commission to study school safety as well as mental health, guns, and portrayals of violence in the media. The federal bill did not pass, and although the group continued to advocate for policy change, the experience led the group to focus on a broader, more long-term approach to achieving its goals of gun safety (Altimari 2013). In 2017, Sandy Hook Promise recognized success in achieving federal policy change when the Mental Health Reform Act was signed into law through the passage of the 21st Century Cures Act. The act strengthens coordination of mental health resources federally, increases access to mental health services,

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calls for meaningful reforms to criminal justice systems, and promotes suicide prevention. Sandy Hook Promise lists a multifaceted approach for achieving their mission that includes building a national base of supporters and volunteers, organizing at the community level, developing and delivering mental health and wellness programs, and advocating for state and federal policy (Sandy Hook Promise 2019). In late 2013, just prior to the one-year anniversary of the shooting, Sandy Hook Promise started a campaign named Parent Together, with a focus on shifting long-standing cultural beliefs on mental health and gun violence (Altimari 2013). Similar to national campaigns aimed at reducing smoking or drunk driving, Parent Together targeted changes at the community level, calling on parents to make a commitment to end gun violence while educating them on gun safety and mental health. In addition to the Parent Together campaign, Sandy Hook Promise has also created several programs aimed at training students and teachers in recognizing the signs of people who are at risk of hurting themselves or others. These “Know the Signs” programs include safety assessment and intervention, the SOS Signs of Suicide Prevention Program, Say Something—which is geared toward training children and teens on how to recognize when an individual may be a threat to themselves or others, especially on social media, and encourages them to say something to a trusted adult—and Start with Hello, which encourages social inclusion (Sandy Hook Promise 2019). Sandy Hook Promise has released several PSAs that have been viewed millions of times. Additionally, in June of 2017, the organization launched over 1,000 SAVE Promise Clubs in schools throughout the

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United States. SAVE (an acronym for Students against Violence Everywhere) Promise Clubs are student-led groups that help bring the information and training from the “Know the Signs” programs to their student body and organize events throughout the year aimed at protecting others from violence before it happens. In 2018, Sandy Hook Promise added to their Say Something program with the launch of the Say Something Anonymous Reporting System app, allowing students to anonymously report a variety of issues, including (but not limited to) bullying, abuse, crisis, and depression. As of 2019, Sandy Hook Promise has trained though a combination of their programming at over 7,000 schools, reaching over 7.5 million youth and adults. Over 6,400 volunteers have registered as Promise Leaders, who are tasked with implementing a Sandy Hook Promise Prevention Program or organizing a Sandy Hook Promise Awareness Building Activity within their organization or community at least two to three times each calendar year. In addition to the organization, anyone can take the “Sandy Hook Promise,” which is a pledge that states, “I promise to do all I can to protect children from gun violence by encouraging and supporting solutions that create safer, healthier homes, schools and communities.” As of June 2019, over 3.7 million people have officially taken the pledge through the Sandy Hook Promise website (Sandy Hook Promise 2019). Tasha J. Youstin

Hartford Courant, November 15, 2013. http://www.courant.com/politics/hc-xpm -2013-11-15-hc-sandy-hook-promise-1116 -20131115-story.html (accessed April 1, 2019). Applebome, Peter, and Ray Rivera. “Connecticut Senate Votes for Gun Limits; House Passage Is Expected.” New York Times, April 3, 2013. https://www.nytimes.com /2013/04/04/nyregion/connecticut-legisla ture-votes-on-sweeping-gun-limits.html (accessed April 3, 2019). Belden, James S. “Re: Sandy Hook Promise Foundation and Sandy Hook Promise Action Fund.” 2013. Letter to State of Connecticut Assistant Attorney General Karen Gano. https://portal.ct.gov/-/media/AG/Cha rities /SandyHook /SandyhookPromise ActionFundOrginial72313pdf (accessed August 1, 2019). Bennett, Matt. The Promise: The Families of Sandy Hook and the Long Road to Gun Safety. Brookings Institution Press, 2013. http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.7864/j.ctt 14qrxts (accessed May 18, 2022). O’Leary, Mary E. “Sandy Hook Promise Forms, Parents of Newtown Victims Call for Safer Nation.” New Haven Register, January 14, 2013. https://www.nhregister .com/connecticut/article/Sandy-Hook-Pro mise-forms-parents-of-Newtown-1140 3949.php (accessed April 1, 2019). Morioka, Sharon. “Preventing Tragedy.” Michigan Alumnus, 2016. http://alumnus .alumni.umich.edu/preventing-tragedy/ (accessed April 15, 2019). Sandy Hook Promise. “About Us.” 2019. ht t ps : //w w w.sa ndyhook prom ise.org /about#mission (accessed April 17, 2019).

See also: Assault Weapons; Background Checks; Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting; Soto et al. v. Bushmaster Firearms International, LLC et al.

Saturday Night Specials

Further Reading Altimari, Daniela. “Sandy Hook Promise Launches Parent Together Campaign.”

The term “Saturday night special” refers to a handgun, usually a semiautomatic pistol or a revolver, that is easily concealable and cheaply made. Presumably, it could also refer to a derringer or other single-shot handgun, although these are relatively rare.



Saturday night specials are also often called junk guns, and in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, they were called suicide specials. The United States banned the importation of most such guns with the Gun Control Act of 1968. Of course, this may well have been a simple restriction on trade designed to keep such manufacturing in the United States. At the present time, there is pressure to adopt laws restricting the sale of such guns, and some states and cities have in fact adopted such laws. However, state and federal preemption of these laws may render them invalid. The term “Saturday night special” was chosen to depict the gun as being used by some ne’er-do-well who might get drunk on a Saturday night and shoot it off randomly. It is deliberately pejorative, designed to prejudice the person who hears the term against the person owning the gun as well as against the gun itself. Apparently, the term dates from about the 1960s, where it was referred to in a brief prepared by the Congress of Racial Equality for United States v. Emerson (2001). The class of people to whom this has been applied are the poor, frequently belonging to minority groups, either immigrant or Indigenous. They are portrayed as irresponsible and essentially not to be trusted with a gun. The fact that this class of people is likely to include a disproportionate number of street criminals, probably because of a lower opportunity cost for the uneducated, adds to the fear others have of them. As poorer people have the tendency to purchase less expensive means of selfdefense as the result of limited income, their guns will generally be of lower quality than is the case for people with higher incomes. Lower quality here, as in the case of used cars for lower-income people, usually

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means guns that are not as reliable to use, not guns that are unsafe for the user. A gun that may be unsafe for the user may work well as a threat against an attacker as most personal defense is the threat rather than the firing of the gun. The first ban on such guns appears to have been in 1870 in Tennessee with “An Act to Preserve the Peace and Prevent Homicide.” This law was intended to restrict the sale of small, inexpensive guns that, at the time, cost about fifty to sixty cents apiece. Tonso (1985) argues that the reason for this was to restrict gun ownership by recently emancipated Blacks and poor whites as a means of control. The restriction still allowed the expensive “Army and Navy model handgun,” which was more affordable to the upper classes and was generally already owned by former Confederate soldiers. Note that in 1870, the average daily wage of a laborer was about $1.50 (U.S. Census Bureau 1975, 165); a cheap gun thus cost about 35 percent of a day’s pay. In 2020, by comparison, an average worker in the building and grounds cleaning and maintenance occupations earned about $15.75 per hour (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics 2020). An equivalently priced gun would cost about $34, well below the price of a Saturday night special today, which is typically over $130. Current laws banning these guns typically focus on their concealability and on the pressure built up in the barrel relative to its materials or on the melting point of the barrel or frame, which presumably makes the firearm unsafe to the user. For example, Minnesota defines a Saturday night special as “being made of any of the following materials”: (1) of any material having a melting point of less than 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit, or (2) of any material having an ultimate tensile strength of less than 55,000 pounds per square inch, or (3) of any

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powdered metal having density of less than 7.5 grams per cubic centimeter (Minn. Stat. §§ 624.712; 624.716). In San Francisco, the law (with substantially the same wording used by several other California cities) defines a “Saturday Night Special” to mean any of the following: 1. A pistol, revolver, or firearm capable of being concealed upon the person, as those terms are defined in California Penal Code Section 12001(a), which contains a frame, barrel, breechblock, cylinder or slide (that is not completely fabricated of heat-treated carbon steel, forged alloy, or other material of equal or higher tensile strength). 2. A semiautomatic pistol which: 1. is not originally equipped by the manufacturer with a locked breech action; and 2. is chambered for cartridges developing maximum permissible breech pressures above 24,100 Copper Units of Pressure as standardized by the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers Institute. 3. For purposes of this subsection (2), “semiautomatic pistol” shall mean a firearm, as defined in California Penal Code Section 12001 (b), which is designed to be held and fired with one hand, and which does the following upon discharge: (i) fires the cartridge in the chamber; (ii) ejects the fired cartridge case; and (iii) loads a cartridge from the magazine into the chamber. “Semiautomatic pistol” shall not include any assault weapon designated in California Penal Code section 12276. 3. A pistol, revolver, or firearm capable of being concealed upon the person, as

those terms are defined in California Penal Code Section 12001(a), which: 1. uses an action mechanism which is substantially identical in design to any action mechanism manufactured in or before 1989 that was originally chambered for rimfire ammunition developing maximum permissible breech pressures below 19,000 Copper Units of Pressure as standardized by the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers Institute; and 2. is chambered to fire either center-fire ammunition or rimfire ammunition developing maximum permissible breech pressures above 19,000 Copper Units of Pressure as standardized by the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacture[r]s Institute; and 3. is not originally equipped by the manufacturer with a nondetachable safety guard surrounding the trigger; or 4. if rimfire, is equipped with a barrel of less than 20 bore diameters in overall length protruding from the frame (Regulating the Sale of “Saturday Night Specials”). Eugene Wolberg, a firearms expert with the San Diego Police Department, points out that “the term Saturday night special does not exist as a type of firearm.” Indeed, the Association of Firearm and Tool Mark Examiners (an organization of court-qualified firearm experts) does not recognize the term because it is not a specific type of firearm. He also observes that the definitional part regarding it being of heat-treated carbon steel or better, or the melting-point criterion, would result in most police handguns and other very highquality handguns being treated as Saturday night specials. Wolberg further states that “those who favor attempting to ban SNSs



argue that safety is a prime factor. They say that pistols not made of steel are inherently unsafe. The myth spread by the uninformed is that these guns blow up while being fired. This is utterly false. As a police forensic specialist, I have been test-firing these firearms for 19 years and have never seen one blow up or be destroyed when using factory ammunition” (San Diego Union Tribune 1997). Wolberg further pointed out that “all U.S. firearm manufacturers, including those who make so-called Saturday night specials, adhere to chamber-pressure standards set by the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers’ Institute. All manufacturers also test-fire their pistols using specified bullet loads and loads significantly above these levels to check construction strength.” Safety to the user, however, is not really a consideration in banning these guns. The preamble to laws concerning these guns usually mentions crime or criminal activity; banning the guns will, implicitly, reduce crime. The other major criterion in these laws is concealability. The smaller the firearm, the more concealable it is. This may well affect usefulness both for a criminal act and for self-defense. In fact, the more concealable the gun, the more likely a person will carry it, and therefore the more likely it will be used in self-defense. Of course, the shorter the barrel, the less accurate it will be (and the less velocity the bullet will have). Since most self-defense uses are at very close range, typically six feet or less, accuracy is much less important than it would be for target shooting at much greater distances, typically fifty feet as a minimum; hitting a precise target is much less important in selfdefense than it is in competition. In fact, most self-defense uses involve a threat to shoot rather than an actual shooting, which

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implies even less need for accuracy. Of course, this is also true for criminals, who generally prefer to threaten and thereby gain compliance without shooting. A large number of the handguns referred to as Saturday night specials formerly were produced by several firms in Southern California, often called the “Ring of Fire” (probably deliberately confounded with the real Ring of Fire, which is the area around the Pacific Ocean that is subject to volcanic action and earthquakes because of the movement of tectonic plates). Most are often named are AMT, Bryco, Davis, Lorcin, and Raven. Most of the guns produced by these companies ranged from .22 to .380 caliber, primarily because they appeal to buyers who cannot afford more powerful and more expensive guns. Police, by way of comparison, have often switched in recent years from .38-caliber revolvers to larger 9-mm semiautomatics. (Though a .380caliber gun shoots a bullet of the same diameter as the 9-mm, the latter is longer and the shell contains more powder.) These companies have consolidated and been replaced by other companies, but there is still a demand for the lower-priced defensive weapons. Prices for the small-caliber guns made by each of these companies tend to range between $150 and $170. Reviews of the guns typically indicate that the quality is poor but that they qualify for shooters who only “plink.” They are not particularly dangerous to the shooter but may fail to fire reliably. Used prices for higher-quality guns in the same calibers from other manufacturers, such as Smith & Wesson, Glock, Walther, and Beretta, typically range from $300 to $600. A Mitchell Arms .22 or a Smith & Wesson .22 designed for competition would cost between $650 and $750 used.

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In 1998, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms reported there were 1,284,755 handguns (pistols and revolvers) made in the United States. Of these, 223,182 were made by Lorcin, Bryco, Davis, and Phoenix Arms, making up 17.4 percent of the total (American Firearms Magazine 2000). In 2018, Phoenix Arms, Jiminez, Cobra, and Charco appear to be the main producers in the low-price market. (Some of these are the successors to the prior listed firms.) They produced 92,018 of the total market of 4,545,993 pistols (semiautomatics) and revolvers or about 2 percent of the overall output. In short, there is a market for these types of less expensive guns. However, the low-price market is declining relative to the overall market. In fact, the number of the lower-priced guns has remained static while that for the higher-quality handguns continues to increase. If the average laborer made $630 per week in 2020, the cost of even a used highquality handgun may well have been beyond his or her means. The poorer the person or family, the more likely this is to be the case. Also, the poorer the family, the more likely that family is to live in a high-crime area. Thus, it is more likely that family will be a crime victim, despite the family’s lack of wealth. Several methods of self-protection are available to a person. First, one can choose to live in a lower-crime area. That is not usually an option available to the poorer person. Second, one can invest in security systems or private guards, an option also generally unavailable to the lower-income family. Third, one can improve door and window locks, but this has limited effect on a determined criminal. Fourth, one can carry only small amounts of cash or other valuables, although this may not deter the assailant who does not know in advance

how much the victim has on hand. Also, the poorer person is less likely to have banking services available and may therefore carry more cash. Fifth, one can have (and know how to use) an appropriate weapon, the most threatening of which to a criminal is a gun. If the inexpensive Saturday night specials are legislated out of existence, a potential victim has a more difficult choice. Some will choose to go without a weapon. Since fewer potential victims will be carrying guns, criminals such as robbers will feel safer and will actually be safer in committing crimes. Consequently, we should expect to see more robberies in the poorer areas of the cities. On the other hand, because people of higher incomes would already have made the choice to have a better-quality gun, the elimination of Saturday night specials would make no direct difference to them in terms of choosing to be armed. Thus, the higher-income people will become more threatening to robbers relative to the threat posed by the lowerincome people. Then, we should expect the robbers to turn their attention, at least to some extent, away from the higher-income people to the lower-income people. The result is that the elimination of the Saturday night special makes the higher-income people safer and the lower-income people less safe. On the other side, there is the choice by the robber of whether to be armed. This is a business choice; does the added expense, including the risk of extra incarceration attributable to using a gun in a crime, add sufficiently to the yield to be justifiable? Elimination of the lower-priced guns will probably move some criminals to the choice of not using a gun. However, if they view the gun as a necessary tool of the trade, presumably they will gravitate to the higher-priced guns. As many guns possessed by criminals



are stolen and the threat value is the most important use for the criminal, the quality does not really matter. Thus, the prices paid for stolen guns will probably not be much affected by the quality. One result of eliminating the Saturday night specials would be to raise the average quality of guns used by criminals. The net effect of these choices by the criminal and the potential victim is uncertain. However, most of the empirical evidence is that the effect is more pronounced on the victim, so the end result is likely to be more crime. Lawrence Southwick Jr. See also: Association of Firearm and Tool Mark Examiners (AFTE); Black Codes; Gun Control Act of 1968; Handguns; NAACP and Gun Control; Racism and Gun Control; Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers’ Institute (SAAMI)

Further Reading Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives. Firearms Commerce in the United States: Annual Statistical Update, 2020. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 2018. https://www.atf.gov/firearms /docs/report/2020-firearms-commerce -report/download (accessed July 5, 2021). Cook, Philip J. “The ‘Saturday Night Special’: An Assessment of Alternative Definitions from a Policy Perspective.” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 72 (1981): 1735–45. “Firearm Import, Export and Production Facts.” American Firearms Magazine, September 21, 2000. Funk, T. Markus. “Gun Control and Economic Discrimination: The Melting-Point Case-in-Point.” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 85, no. 3 (1995): 764– 806. https://scholarlycommons.law.northwes tern.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article= 68 28&context=jclc (accessed July 5, 2021).

Sawed-Off Shotguns | 761 “Saturday Night Special Myth.” San Diego Union-Tribune, June 22, 1997. Stevens, Susan M. “Kelley v. R. G. Industries: When Hard Cases Make Good Law.” Maryland Law Review 46 (1987): 486–500. Tonso, William R. “Gun Control: White Man’s Law.” Reason 17 (1985): 22–23. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. “May 2020 National Occupational Employment and Wage Estimates: United States.” May 2020. http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes _nat.htm (accessed July 5, 2021). U.S. Census Bureau. Historical Statistics of the United States: Colonial Times to 1970. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Commerce, 1975. U.S. Census Bureau. Statistical Abstract of the United States 2000. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Commerce, 2001.

Sawed-Off Shotguns Under the U.S. National Firearms Act of 1934, a sawed-off shotgun is shotgun with a barrel length of less than eighteen inches and an overall length of less than twenty-six inches. Other countries and individual states employ slightly different length definitions. The guns can be altered weapons or ones manufactured with shorter barrels. A sawed-off produces less muzzle velocity, so it has a shorter range and wider spread of the shot. These weapons have been used in a variety of ways over the years—for example, by the Confederacy during the Civil War; police wanting a wide shot as they enter a house; criminals; and citizens for self-protection (especially of the home). The National Firearms Act of 1934 and the Gun Control Act of 1968 prohibit individual ownership unless citizens have a taxstamped permit from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), which, prior to December 1, 1968,

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required a background check and a $200 fee; however, since that date, sawed-off shotguns can no longer be registered, and nonregistered ones are considered “contraband” and must be forfeited to the ATF (see Office of the Inspector General 2007). There are many state and local laws that further restrict or prohibit ownership or sale. In countries with restrictive handgun laws, sawing off an available shotgun has an added attraction. In the United States, sawed-off shotguns often have appealed to criminals and others seeking a “cool” weapon—one that is often seen in action movies. A law-abiding citizen might prefer a sawed-off to protect their home or to hunt with the view that its wider spread requires less accuracy; however, they can be difficult to handle, increase the chance of collateral damage, and put multiple holes in any targeted game. For criminals, the major advantage of a sawed-off is its ease of concealment, which is a major reason it has been legally restricted. Sawed-off guns were used in the Columbine shootings, and an investigation of Randy Weaver’s selling of two illegally altered shotguns to federal agents ultimately led to the siege at Ruby Ridge, Idaho. Some gun rights activists contend that regulations on sawed-offs violate the Second Amendment and represent a step toward greater restrictions on all types of guns. G. Edward Richards and John W. Dietrich See also: Columbine High School Shooting; Gun Control Act of 1968; National Firearms Act of 1934; Ruby Ridge; Second Amendment

Further Reading Halbrook, Stephen P. Firearms Law Deskbook. [Annual] Minneapolis, MN: Thomson West, 2021–22.

Scenario Training. See Tactical Training School Marshal and Guardian Programs School marshal and guardian programs are designed to put firearms into the hands of teachers and other school employees in order to proactively deter active shooters in K–12 schools (Rostron 2013). Legislative as well as popular interest in these kinds of programs was galvanized by the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting on December 14, 2012. Public outrage was immense in the weeks and months following the incident, and lawmakers across the United States were quick to respond by passing (or attempting to pass) versions of these programs. South Dakota acted first, and in 2013, their legislature authorized “sentinels” in schools, who could be school employees or outside personnel hired specifically for the role. Tennessee’s state legislature followed suit thereafter, authorizing school employees to carry guns on campus. However, Tennessee departed from the strategy in South Dakota by including a provision that only school employees with previous law enforcement experience would be eligible to carry firearms on campus (Rostron 2013). Alabama tried to enact legislation that would allow for the hiring of “emergency security forces” consisting of current and former school employees and other community members. However, then-Governor Robert Bentley vetoed the measure. Instead, Alabama passed statewide legislation allowing for the hiring of additional armed school resource officers. The school guardian program in the state of Texas predates the Sandy Hook shooting,



having been authorized in 2007 with the intention of empowering school employees to respond specifically to active shooters (Texas School Safety Certification 2019). However, Sandy Hook did prompt thenGovernor Rick Perry to authorize a separate school marshal program in 2013. The marshal program created an alternative to the guardian program by taking the added step of empowering school employees with a broader law enforcement mandate and allowing them to serve as “pseudo peace officers” (Texas School Safety Certification 2019). Comparing the two Texas programs can illustrate the differences between school guardian and school marshal programs, as despite having similar objectives the requirements for each diverge. The older guardian program is more popular in Texas and allows for an unlimited number of employees to carry firearms if they undergo a (typical) twenty-hour regimen of firearm training. The required training time can vary in the guardian program, however, because of the stipulation that individual school boards have the power to determine training requirements for employees wishing to serve as guardians (Samuels 2018). Conversely, the Texas school marshal program incepted in the wake of Sandy Hook seeks to grant school employees law enforcement responsibilities and requires that they be licensed by the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement after undergoing a mandatory 80 hours of training. Also, Texas school marshals are not permitted to carry guns around students and are required to keep their weapons in a lockbox until they are needed (Samuels 2018). The marshal program initially stipulated that only one marshal was permissible for every four hundred students in a school, but this limit was rescinded after the Santa Fe High

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School shooting on May 18, 2018. This limit revocation contributed to an increase in Texas school marshals of over 500 percent following the Santa Fe shooting (Zelinski 2019). Versions of school marshal and guardian programs exist in many states, including Colorado, Indiana, Kansas, Ohio, Utah, and Wyoming (in addition to the states mentioned earlier). However, despite this proliferation, the idea of arming teachers to prevent violence remains contentious. Proponents of arming school personnel argue in favor of the deterrent effect that doing so might provide, suggesting that potential school shooters would be discouraged from implementing their plans if they knew that they would quickly meet armed resistance. Further, there is an argument that armed personnel can effectively reduce response times to active shooter incidents, thereby possibly saving lives (Drake 2018). Critics point to concerns about racial biases in program implementation, fearing schools and districts in minority communities will be the ones most likely to feature armed educators (Minshew 2018). Guncontrol advocates have also objected to guardian and marshal programs over worries that firearms may be incompatible with educational goals because feelings of fear and/or aggression might affect students if they know that their teachers are carrying guns. Furthermore, the prospect of unintended consequences such as unintentionally discharged weapons is feared to potentially counteract any gains in safety that these programs might provide (Zelinski 2019). Americans are famously conflicted about the role of guns in society, which has led to robust debate regarding the appropriate role of firearms in schools as well. Proponents of deterrence often stress the utility of the

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“good guy with a gun,” whereas critics fear that more guns in schools will do more harm than good. Two competing trends, legislatively, are between gun-friendliness and gun control, and some scholars suggest that this tension is what will lead us to adopt the most effective laws and policies for preventing school shootings (Rostron 2016). Whether such optimism is justified or not, the fact is that the only federal law governing guns in schools remains the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990, which puts the decision about who can carry a gun on campus into the hands of the states (Minshew 2018). Marcus Tyler Carey See also: Armed Teacher Policies; Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting; Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting

Further Reading Drake, Jordan. “Why We Should Arm Teachers.” University Star, March 6, 2018. https:// universitystar.com/23526/opinions/why -we-should-arm-teachers/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Minshew, Lana M. “From the Editorial Board: On Arming K–12 Teachers.” High School Journal 101, no. 3 (2018): 129–33. Rostron, Allen. “School Shootings and the Legislative Push to Arm Teachers.” University of Toledo Law Review 45 (2013): 439–55. Rostron, Allen. “A New State Ice Age for Gun Policy.” Harvard Law & Policy Review 10 (2016): 327–60. Samuels, Alex. “Texas Schools That Want to Arm Their Employees Have Two Choices.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, July 14, 2018. htt ps://w w w.star-telegram.com /news /state/texas/article214896935.html (accessed May 18, 2022). Texas School Safety Certification. “Marshal vs. Guardian.” School Safety Certification, 2019. https://www.schoolsafetycertification.com

/marshal-vs-guardian (accessed December 9, 2019). Zelinski, Andrea. “Texas Ready to Arm More Teachers with law Lifting Caps on School Marshals.” Houston Chronicle, June 6, 2019. https://www.houstonchronicle.com /news/houston-texas/houston/article/Texas -lifts-cap-on-school-marshal-program-that -13950669.php (accessed May 18, 2022).

School Shootings Prevalence of School Shootings in the United States There is much debate to what counts as a school shooting in the United States. The underlying details, such as how many individuals were killed or injured, if the shooting was intentional or unintentional, and if the shooting occurred during school hours all must be considered when defining a school shooting. Given that there is no central database that tracks their occurrence, many data sources have defined school shootings in their own way, making it difficult to determine the true prevalence of school shootings in the United States. For example, the Naval Postgraduate School’s Center for Homeland Defense and Security (CHDS) has developed their “K–12 School Shooting Database Project,” in which they define a school shooting as “a gun is brandished, is fired, or a bullet hits school property for any reason, regardless of the number of victims (including zero), time, day of the week, or reason” (Riedman and O’Neill 2020). This database includes 1,669 shootings since 1999. Alternatively, the Washington Post excludes “shootings at after-hours events, accidental discharges that caused no injuries to anyone other than the person handling the gun, and suicides that occurred privately or posed no threat to other children” (Cox et al. 2020). This



exclusion results in only 238 school shootings since 1999. An even tighter definition might only include mass shootings that have occurred in schools: where four or more individuals are intentionally killed. In this case, one might only consider thirteen incidents to be school shootings since 1999 (Katsiyannis, Whitford, and Ennis 2018). This means that there is considerable variation in cases depending on definition— ranging from as little as 13 to 1,669—and researchers and policy makers studying the subject need to be specific on which definition they are using until a consensus, or a central database, is created. But regardless how they are defined, school shootings are still very rare events in the United States, and there is currently no evidence that schools are high-risk places for multiple casualty homicides (Nekvasil, Cornell, and Huang 2015). However, there is no number of school shootings that is acceptable in a civilized society. Schools should be sanctuaries of learning, where no child or adolescent needs to worry about their safety. Though rare, school shootings are also not inevitable anomalies that we should accept; in fact, the United States has orders of magnitude more school shootings than other developed countries (Grabow and Rose 2018). And unfortunately, there is evidence that school shootings are not only increasing in frequency in recent years but also becoming deadlier. In fact, 2018 was the deadliest year on record for school shootings (Cave 2019). There is, therefore, something unique about the United States that seems to foster school shootings, but there is considerable debate as to what is the underlying cause.

Notable School Shootings Twelve students and a teacher were killed on April 20, 1999, at Columbine High

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School in Littleton, Colorado. This tragedy is often falsely referenced as the “first” school shooting in the United States (Shapiro 2019). Though some of the aforementioned school shooting databases, such as the one created by the Washington Post, begin with Columbine, there is record of school shootings occurring throughout the twentieth century (Katsiyannis, Whitford, and Ennis 2018). Indeed, the Thurston High School shooting in Springfield, Oregon, where two were killed and twenty-five were injured, occurred just a year before Columbine. Regardless of its status as the “first” school shooting, Columbine does represent a pivotal moment where a school shooting captured the nation’s attention and led to significant changes in the way Americans thought about school safety and security. Many of the changes in school security are a direct consequence of the Columbine school shooting (Shapiro 2019). Twenty children—between six and seven years old—and six adults were killed in a school shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School on December 14, 2012, in Newtown, Connecticut (Klarevas 2016). This was the fourth-deadliest mass shooting in the United States. Though this rampage lasted six minutes, the terror of the event resonated throughout the country, and many groups demanded action to prevent this from occurring again. Shortly after the Sandy Hook school shooting, then-President Obama gave a now-famous televised speech calling for meaningful action by Congress to avoid future tragedies like that at Sandy Hook, and a petition was signed by over 350,000 Americans demanding gun control legislation be introduced in Congress—the second most popular petition at the time on the We The People website (“Now Is the Time to Do Something about Gun Violence” 2013).

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Simultaneously, Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, which now consists of over six million supporters, was conceived. And today, more than 4.6 million people have signed the Sandy Hook Promise to protect students and children from gun violence in communities, schools, and homes. Fourteen students and three staff members were killed, and an additional seventeen injured, in a school shooting at the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Parkland, Florida on February 14, 2018. Lasting six minutes, the shooting, like Sandy Hook, resulted in a national reckoning of how to prevent gun violence in the United States. Surviving student victims formed Never Again MSD, a political action committee with a mission to “to harness the power of young people across the country to fight for sensible gun violence prevention policies that save lives” (“Mission and Story” 2019). Through their advocacy, the March for Our Lives demonstration was created, and over one million people—many of them students themselves—participated in a march for gun reform across the country, with ongoing protests to this day.

Mental and Emotional Trauma from School Shootings Although these tragic events are rare compared to other forms of injury and death by firearm, approximately 240,000 students have attended a school where a school shooting has occurred since Columbine (Cox et al. 2020). When a school shooting occurs, the harm radiates beyond those shot and can cause mental and emotional trauma even in those who avoided being psychically victimized. A review of psychological outcomes among individuals who were exposed to mass shootings, including school shootings, found that even when an individual avoided direct exposure to an incident,

short-term and long-term distress can occur (Lowe and Galea 2017). Children were also found to be more likely to develop certain psychological disorders, such as posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), than adults (Lowe and Galea 2017). Even beyond the individuals who are present during the shooting, family members of students, future students at the school, and community members can also be affected mentally and emotionally by school shootings. Proposed interventions and response must therefore consider the emotional, developmental, and educational needs of students and others in the community.

Potential and Applied Interventions Beyond the occurrence of school shootings, there is reason to believe that interventions to prevent school violence are needed. According to the CDC, 7.8 percent of students report being in a fight, 5.6 percent reported not going to school in the last thirty days because they felt unsafe, and 6.0 percent reported being threatened at least once by a weapon on school property in the last year (“Understanding School Violence: Fact Sheet” 2016). Unfortunately, many of the proposed and applied interventions to prevent school shootings have not yet been formally evaluated, and they also may have their own unanticipated negative consequences on child and adolescent development and learning (Reeping et al. 2021). Since Columbine, there has been an increase in “school hardening” interventions, which includes the use of armed guards, metal detectors, security cameras, and zero tolerance policies. However, a review in 2019 found that there was no evidence that any of these interventions were effective. Instead, these policies may detrimental to effects related to academic outcomes (Price and Khubchandani 2019).



Furthermore, school hardening can contribute to the school-to-prison-pipeline, as these methods are implemented disproportionally in schools that have a higher minority population or a higher poverty rate (Farmer 2010). For example, zero tolerance policies, which typically mandate severe consequences to offenses, resulted in vast increases in the number of students suspended and students referred to law enforcement. These policies are also enacted inequitably, with Black students 2.6 times more likely to be suspended than white students (Wald and Losen 2003). Therefore, school hardening interventions are not only unevaluated for their effectiveness but also discriminatory in their application. More recently, arming teachers has gained prominence during the Trump administration, particularly in the aftermath of the Parkland shooting. The belief is that the arming of teachers would deter school shootings, and if one occurs, the teachers would be able to properly defend themselves and their students. Unfortunately, there is no evidence that has evaluated the effectiveness of arming teachers; however, the act could increase levels of anxiety among students and staff (Rajan and Branas 2018). It also opens the door to accidental shootings and deaths in the classroom. This is exacerbated by the minimal or absence of training that laws related to arming teachers require (Rajan and Branas 2018). Until this is further evaluated, the arming of teachers is a prime example of an intervention that might produce unnecessary mental and emotional harm to students. Lockdown/school shooter drills, where schools simulate scenarios of an active shooter to help prepare students and staff in case of a real attack, have been instituted nearly universally across the United States in schools since Columbine. Yet their

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effectiveness has only begun to be evaluated, and they remain controversial because some believe that they expose often young children to violent themes and may eliminate the presumption of school being a safe place. However, new evidence has shown that lockdowns result in improvement of several metrics of school emergency readiness and perceptions of safety when the lockdown drills are properly implemented (Schildkraut and Nickerson 2020). One condition that must be met for a perpetrator to commit a school shooting is to have access to a gun. Given that the average age of school shooting perpetrators is sixteen (Cox et al. 2020), the gun in many incidents cannot be bought by the shooter themselves. Therefore, implementing Child Access Prevention/Safe storage laws or other gun laws that help to keep guns out of the hands of children and adolescents may be an important contributor to preventing these incidents (Reeping et al. 2021). Indeed, studies have shown that easier access to firearms at home has been shown to increase violent offending by juveniles (Ruback, Shaffer, and Clark 2011). However, the passing of firearm legislation is difficult in many places in the United States, so these interventions are not always easily attainable. At the individual level, there is no case definition of an individual who has perpetrated a school shooting, but there are some commonalities—including social conflict in the school environment, peer rejection, conflicts with teachers, and, to a lesser extent, bullying—although these are not universal (Sommer, Leuschner, and Scheithauer 2014). It is therefore difficult to intervene on specific potential perpetrators, because they typically do not “show any sudden or highly emotional warning signs” (Meloy et al. 2001). However, as a group, there are some

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interventions that will not only help to prevent school shootings but also foster the emotional and mental health of students. For example, engaging parents in the school community, creating an inclusive school climate, and social emotional learning are all low-risk interventions that could help prevent these tragedies (Rajan and Branas 2020) without contributing to the school-toprison-pipeline or requiring the passing of state or federal legislation. Paul Reeping See also: Armed Teacher Policies; Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws; Columbine High School Shooting; March for Our Lives Movement; Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting; Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting; School Marshal and Guardian Programs

Further Reading Cave, Anthony. “Multiple-Victim School Shootings Are Rare. But They Are Becoming More Common and More Deadly.” Guns and America, 2019. https://gunsan damerica.org/story/19/02/11/multiple-vic tim-school-shootings-are-rare-but-they -are-becoming-more-common-and-more -deadly/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Cox, John W., Steven Rich, Allyson Chiu, John Muyskens, and Monica Ulmanu. “More Than 240,000 Students Have Experienced Gun Violence at School since Columbine.” Washington Post, 2020. https:// w w w.wa sh i ng t onp ost .c om /g r aph ics /2018/local/school-shootings-database/ (accessed July 6, 2021). Farmer, Sarah. “Criminality of Black Youth in Inner-City Schools: ‘Moral Panic,’ Moral Imagination, and Moral Formation.” Race Ethnicity and Education 13, no. 3 (2010): 367–81. https://doi.org/10.1080/136 13324.2010.500845. Grabow, Chip, and Lisa Rose. “The U.S. Has Had 57 Times as Many School Shootings

as the Other Major Industrialized Nations Combined.” CNN, 2018. https://www.cnn .com/2018/05/21/us/school-shooting-us -versus-world-trnd/index.html (accessed July 6, 2021). Katsiyannis, Antonis, Denise K. Whitford, and Robin Parks Ennis. 2018. “Historical Examination of United States Intentional Mass School Shootings in the 20 Th and 21 St Centuries: Implications for Students, Schools, and Society.” Journal of Child and Family Studies 27, no. 8 (2018): 2562–73. Klarevas, Louis. Rampage Nation. Amherst, NY: Promethus Books, 2016. Lowe, Sarah R., and Sandro Galea. “The Mental Health Consequences of Mass Shootings.” Trauma, Violence & Abuse 18, no. 1 (2017): 62–82. https://doi.org/10.1177 /1524838015591572. Meloy, J. Reid, Anthony G. Hempel, Kris Mohandie, Andrew A. Shiva, and B. Thomas Gray. “Offender and Offense Characteristics of a Nonrandom Sample of Adolescent Mass Murderers.” Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry 40, no. 6 (2001): 719–28. https://doi.org/10.1097/00004583-20010 6000-00018. “Mission and Story.” March for Our Lives. 2019. https://marchforourlives.com/mission -story/. Nekvasil, Erin K., Dewey G. Cornell, and Francis L. Huang. “Prevalence and Offense Characteristics of Multiple Casualty Homicides: Are Schools at Higher Risk than Other Locations?” Psychology of Violence 5, no. 3 (2015): 236–45. “Now Is the Time to Do Something about Gun Violence.” The Obama White House Archive. 2013. https://obamawhitehouse .archives.gov/issues/preventing-gun-vio lence (accessed July 6, 2021). Price, James H, and Jagdish Khubchandani. “School Firearm Violence Prevention Practices and Policies: Functional or Folly?” Violence and Gender 6, no. 3 (2019): 154–67.

Rajan, Sonali, and Charles C Branas. “Arming Schoolteachers: What Do We Know? Where Do We Go From Here?” American Journal of Public Health 108, no. 7 (2018): 860–62. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2018 .304464. Rajan, Sonali, and Charlie Branas. “As We Reimagine Schooling, Let’s Reimagine Gun Violence Prevention, Too.” The Hechinger Report, 2020. https://hechingerreport .org/as-we-reimagine-schooling-lets-rei magine-gun-violence-prevention-too / (accessed July 6, 2021). Reeping, P. M., A. Gobaud, C. C. Branas, and S. Rajan. “K–12 School Shootings: Implications for Policy, Prevention, and Child Well-Being.” Pediatric Clinics of North America 68, no. 2 (2021): 413–26. https:// doi.org/10.1016/j.pcl.2020.12.005. Riedman, David, and Desmond O’Neill. “K-12 School Shooting Database: Research Methodology.” Center for Homeland Defense and Security at the Naval Postgraduate Schoolity, 2020. https://www .chds.us/ssdb/methods/ (accessed July 6, 2021). Ruback, R. Barry, Jennifer N. Shaffer, and Valerie A. Clark. “Easy Access to Firearms: Juveniles’ Risks for Violent Offending and Violent Victimization.” Journal of Interpersonal Violence 26, no. 10 (2011): 2111–38. Schildkraut, Jaclyn, and Amanda B. Nickerson. “Ready to Respond: Effects of Lockdown Drills and Training on School Emergency Preparedness.” Victims & Offenders 15, no. 5 (2020): 619-638. Shapiro, Emily. “20 Years after Columbine, What’s Changed -- and What Hasn’t -- for School Shootings in America.” ABC News, 2019. https://abcnews.go.com/US/20-years -columbine-changed-school-shootings -america/story?id=62248885 (accessed May 18, 2022). Sommer, Friederike, Vincenz Leuschner, and Herbert Scheithauer. “Bullying, Romantic Rejection, and Conflicts with Teachers: The Crucial Role of Social Dynamics in

Schumer, Charles E. | 769 the Development of School Shootings—A Systematic Review.” International Journal of Developmental Science 8, no. 1–2 (2014): 3–24. “Understanding School Violence: Fact Sheet.” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 2016. https://www.cdc.gov/violencepre vention/pdf/school_violence_fact_sheet-a .pdf (accessed May 18, 2022). Wald, Johanna, and Daniel J Losen. “Defining and Redirecting a School-to-Prison Pipeline.” New Directions for Youth Development 99 (2003): 9–15.

Schumer, Charles E.(1950–) Charles E. Schumer served for many years as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives and was elected in 1998 to the U.S. Senate. In 2016, he was elected Senate Minority Leader, and he became Majority Leader when the Democrats won control of the chamber in 2020. During his tenure on Capitol Hill, Schumer has been an ardent supporter of gun control. Schumer worked together with Sen. Howard Metzenbaum (D-OH) to draft the successful version of the Brady Bill, which passed in 1993, and was instrumental in the passage of the Assault Weapons Ban of 1994. He was one of only fourteen senators to vote against an amendment that would have outlawed confiscating legally owned firearms during a disaster. In 2018, he was a cosigner on a letter to President Donald Trump urging him to back a measure to close the gun show loophole. In January 2019, he was one of the cosponsors on a bill to require background checks on private gun sales, with a few limited exceptions. Schumer received his law degree from Harvard University in 1974 and was elected to the New York State Assembly the next year. He served in the assembly until 1980,

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Charles “Chuck” Schumer has been a U.S. senator since November 1998. A former state assemblyman and U.S. representative representing New York, Schumer has been one of Congress’s leading gun control advocates, helping pass both the Brady Bill and the Assault Weapons Ban of 1994. (U.S. Senate)

when he was elected to the House of Representatives representing Brooklyn (his birthplace and where he grew up). He served in the House until 1998, when he successfully challenged Republican Alfonse D’Amato for his Senate seat. In the House, Schumer has a strong liberal record, with high ratings from labor, environmentalists, and Americans for Democratic Action. He currently chairs the Senate Rules and Administration Committee, which has jurisdiction over federal elections, voting rights, campaign finance, and the operation of the Senate complex, and as an ex-office member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. He formerly was a member of the Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, an

important constituency committee for New York; the Judiciary Committee and the Joint Committee on the Library. He is prolific fundraiser for Democratic candidates and party committees. Schumer is best known for his energetic engagement across a wide range of issues and a reliance on his intellect and good work ethic. He was a key player in legislation to end the savings and loan crisis in 1989, after fighting earlier for legislation intended to head off the problem. He continues to be an active player on financial regulation, foreign policy, farming, disaster relief, and a wide range of other issues. On criminal law, Schumer is tough on both crime and guns. One of the few liberal Democrats to favor the death penalty, Schumer also worked to reduce auto theft, pass tougher sentencing laws, and hire more police. He helped sponsor hate-crimes legislation and antiterrorist bills. He sponsored legislation on violence against women and for protecting abortion clinics. Schumer has made gun control a top priority, prompting the National Rifle Association (NRA) once to call him “the criminal’s best friend,” to which the senator responded, “I wear this like a badge of honor” (Koszczuk and Angle 2007, 680). Schumer won an NRA marksmanship award at age fourteen but has stated that he owns no guns. He was cosponsor of the Brady Bill, coauthor of the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban, and coauthor of an amendment to ban certain bullets commonly referred to as “cop-killers.” He supported Project Exile, which set stiff penalties for violations of gun laws. In the 2000s, Schumer sponsored or cosponsored a number of legislative pieces related to gun control, including the Anti-Gun Trafficking Penalties Enhancement Act and the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) Improvement Act, whose eventual



bipartisan passage in the Senate was brokered by Schumer in 2007. Schumer has also been a vocal advocate of renewing the Assault Weapons Ban, which expired in 2004. More than introducing legislative activity, Schumer, along with Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), also called on Walmart and the nation’s other top gun retailers to stop the sale of assault weapons. Schumer continues to advocate for the need to improve background check data sharing among various state and federal agencies. Against the looming federal budget battle of the 112th Congress, Schumer spoke out against the planned cuts in NICS Improvement Act’s funding in the GOP’s proposed budget. However, Schumer also has been a supporter of hunters and has sponsored bills to allow grants to property owners who opened their lands to hunting and fishing and offering tax deductions to hunters who donate venison to charities. Field and Stream magazine awarded him a “Hero Award” in 2008. Clyde Wilcox and Christine Kim See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Feinstein, Dianne; NICS Improvement Act; Project Exile

Further Reading Barone, Michael, and Grant Ujifusa. The Almanac of American Politics 2000. Washington, DC: National Journal Group, 1999. Carter, Gregg Lee. The Gun Control Movement. New York: Twayne, 1997. Duncan, Philip D., and Christine C. Lawrence. Congressional Quarterly’s Politics in America 1998: The 105th Congress. Washington, DC: Congressional Quarterly Press, 1997. Koszczuk, Jackie, and Martha Angle. “Schumer, Charles E., D-N.Y.” In CQ’s Politics in America 2008, 679–80. Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2007.

Second Amendment | 771 Senator Charles E. Schumer (website). http:// schumer.senate.gov/ (accessed June 29, 2021). Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. New York: Routledge, 2021. Toobin, Jeffrey. “The Senator and the Street.” New Yorker, August 2, 2010, 51. http:// www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/08 /02/100802fa_fact_toobin (accessed Octo ber 28, 2011).

Second Amendment 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.” The amendment’s meaning became a subject of political and legal controversy in the second half of the twentieth century as governments at all levels—city, state, and national—responded to rising levels of crime and violence with greater regulation of guns. These regulations led to articulation of several competing interpretations of the amendment, some favoring the rights of gun owners, others favoring the power of government to regulate guns. The controversy turned on the relation between the amendment’s prefatory reference to a “well regulated Militia” and its substantive guarantee of a “right . . . to keep and bear Arms.”

Three Theories of the Amendment’s Meaning For most of the period between the 1960s and the early twenty-first century, two theories were prominently offered. One, usually labeled the “individual right” theory, focused on the substantive clause to support the argument that the amendment guaranteed individuals the right to own guns subject to only limited regulation. This theory drew

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upon experience in the founding era in several ways. According to advocates of this theory, the founding generation believed that individuals had the right to own weapons for self-protection on an unstable frontier, for hunting, and, importantly, to be in a position to resist governments that turned tyrannical. The amendment’s reference to a “militia” explained one reason for guaranteeing a right to keep and bear arms, but it did not limit the right to the militia setting, particularly because the founding generation understood the term “militia” to refer, among other things, to an “unorganized” militia consisting of all able-bodied male citizens. An alternative theory, usually labeled the “collective right” theory, focused on the amendment’s prefatory phrase. Its proponents argued that the amendment guaranteed a right to own weapons only in connection with membership in a publicly organized militia, and specifically the militias organized by the states. For them, the right to resist tyranny had been transformed once democratic governments were created. State-organized militias might be needed to resist an overreaching national government, and the amendment ensured that the national government would be unable to disarm resistance from the states. But, according to the “collective rights” view, the amendment had nothing to do with individual ownership of weapons outside the militia setting. A third view, held by a minority of scholars but increasingly influential in the early 2000s, treated the amendment as referring to a “public” or “civic” right. Like jury duty, weapons ownership was a civic obligation for all citizens in a republican government. This theory differed from both the “individual right” and “collective right” theories by placing emphasis on the term “well-regulated.”

Most scholars in the field leaned to accepting the “collective right” interpretation as the best account of the most widespread understanding of the amendment’s meaning at the time of its adoption, but substantial numbers of serious scholars argued that the “individual right” view better captured the original understanding. There is substantial support for all three views in the materials available from the founding era. Historians can be satisfied with outlining the complexity of the statements made at the time. The historical materials pose a problem for legal scholars and judges who believe that constitutional interpretation must identify the single point of view that best describes what people at the time of the amendment’s adoption understood its meaning to be. Probably the most accurate statement is that many people at the time understood the amendment to protect an individual right, and many others understood it to protect a collective right or a civic duty. Originalist judges, unfortunately, need more than that.

The Supreme Court’s Interpretation of the Second Amendment Until 2008, the Supreme Court had addressed the Second Amendment’s meaning in only a handful of decisions. The most important was United States v. Miller (1939), which upheld a federal statute making it illegal to carry a sawed-off shotgun across state lines. In a rather casual opinion, the court observed that if the Second Amendment protected an individual right to own weapons, it did so only with respect to weapons suitable for use in a militia. In 2008, the Supreme Court offered its first extended discussion of the amendment’s meaning in District of Columbia v. Heller. In striking down a District of Columbia ordinance prohibiting the



possession of handguns in the home, the court held that the amendment protects at least the right to possess in one’s home weapons suitable for self-protection, although it asserted in dictum that its opinion did not mean to question what it described as long-standing and wellaccepted regulations of gun possession, such as prohibitions on the possession of weapons by people previously convicted of a felony. The court was sharply divided. The majority opinion by Justice Antonin Scalia for five justices adopted an exclusively originalist interpretive approach, and concluded that the materials from the founding era provided overwhelming support for the “individual right” view. A dissenting opinion by Justice John Paul Stevens examined the same materials and found that they provided equally unequivocal support for the “collective right” view. (Another dissenting opinion, by Justice Stephen Breyer, departed from originalism and concluded that the city’s regulation was constitutionally permissible because courts should defer to legislative judgments about what gunrelated policies best promoted the overall social good.) The Heller decision dealt with a regulation that fell directly under the Second Amendment’s coverage because District of Columbia ordinances are, as a formal legal matter, statutes attributable to the national government. Two years later, the Court extended its ruling by holding that the Fourteenth Amendment “incorporated” the Second Amendment and thereby made its guarantees applicable against city and state regulations (McDonald v. City of Chicago [2010]). The legal theory supporting incorporation was complex. Scholars who studied the period when the Fourteenth Amendment was adopted provided substantial evidence

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that its drafters and ratifiers understood that the right to keep and bear arms was protected by the Fourteenth Amendment’s guarantee of “privileges or immunities” of U.S. citizens. But, several members of the court’s majority—the same justices who had been the majority in Heller—found it unacceptable to rely on that clause, in part because an expansive interpretation of the clause had been rejected in 1873, and in part because its open-ended language threatened to involve the courts in extended inquiries into a wide range of regulatory statutes well beyond the gun-regulation context. They relied instead on a well-established approach to using the Fourteenth Amendment’s “due process” clause to identify fundamental rights protected against state infringement, despite the fact that several of the justices in the majority had previously criticized the court’s use of the due process clause to protect substantive rights rather than merely procedural ones. Criticism of the Heller decision largely tracked scholars’ prior positions. Those who had supported the “individual right” view believed that the court’s majority had handled the originalist materials well, and those who supported the other views believed that the majority had handled the materials badly. The best criticism, perhaps, is less of the justices’ performance as historians than of the demands placed on them by originalist methods, which make it difficult if not impossible to acknowledge the complexity and, more important, the ambiguity of the materials on which originalist interpreters necessarily rely. Lower courts have struggled to understand Heller and McDonald. They have faced numerous challenges to regulations of gun possession and ownership, with few being definitively resolved. The courts,

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however, were beginning to settle on a general approach to assessing the constitutionality of such regulations. According to most of the courts that dealt with these challenges, regulations had to satisfy what they called “intermediate scrutiny.” This meant that that it was not enough that the government have some reason to think that the regulation was a good way of promoting the public good. Rather, to satisfy intermediate scrutiny, a regulation had to advance a reasonably important government policy and, probably more important, had to do a reasonably good job, though not a perfect one, of actually promoting that goal. In the coming decades, the courts will undoubtedly flesh out what this means as they uphold most and invalidate some existing regulations of gun possession and use. Mark Tushnet and Keith Rollin Eakins See also: District of Columbia v. Heller; Gun Control; McDonald v. City of Chicago; United States Constitution and Gun Rights

Further Reading Cornell, Saul. A Well-Regulated Militia: The Founding Fathers and the Origins of Gun Control in America. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006. Cottrol, Robert J. Gun Control and the Constitution: Sources and Explanations on the Second Amendment. New York: Garland Publishing, 1994. Lund, Nelson, and Adam Winkler. “Interpretation: The Second Amendment.” National Constitution Center. https://constitutioncenter .org/interactive-constitution/interpretation /amendment-ii/interps/99 (accessed December 23, 2021). Spitzer, Robert J. “Gun Law History in the United States and Second Amendment Rights.” Law and Contemporary Problems 80, no. 2 (2017): 55–83. Spitzer, Robert J. The Politics of Gun Control. 8th ed. London: Routledge, 2021.

Tushnet, Mark. Out of Range: Why the Constitution Can’t End the Battle Over Guns. New York: Oxford University Press, 2007. Volokh, Eugene. “The Commonplace Second Amendment.” New York University Law Review 73 (1998): 793–811. Winkler, Adam. “Scrutinizing the Second Amendment.” Michigan Law Review 105 (2007): 683–733.

Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF), founded in 1974 by Alan Merril Gottlieb, is a nonprofit organization that supports gun rights. The SAF produces public education materials, sponsors conferences, and provides media-outreach services. It has increasingly taken on a leading role in sponsoring lawsuits, including the high-profile McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010) case. The SAF cosponsors many of its activities with the more lobbying-oriented Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA), also founded by Gottlieb. Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership (DRGO) is now a project of SAF. The SAF is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization with a seven-member board of trustees. It describes its mission as “promoting a better understanding about our Constitutional heritage to privately own and possess firearms. To that end, we carry on many educational and legal action programs designed to better inform the public about the gun control debate.” Joseph P. Tartaro was president of the SAF until he passed away in June 2020. Gottlieb served as vice president while his wife, Julianne Versnel, served as operations director. The SAF’s main office is in Bellevue, Washington, a somewhat politically conservative



community east of Seattle. The SAF’s tollfree telephone number also serves as a gun rights attorney referral service. Suggested membership donations range from $15 to $1,000. Logos from major sponsoring organizations are featured prominently on its website and there is a clear link to its most recent IRS Form 990. Annual revenues have continued to average about $4 million annually, with about onefourth devoted to legal activities. It appears that SAF also benefits from pro bono legal services. The SAF has contracted annually for mail and marketing services with Merril Associates, and in 2009, it bought out part of Gottlieb’s ownership of radio station KBNP for 80 percent of the assessed value. The SAF had been known for its print publications, which had included Gun Week, Gun News Digest, Women & Guns, SAF Reporter, the Gottlieb-Tartaro Report, and the Journal on Firearms and Public Policy. The SAF also has published a number of pamphlets, books, and student-reference packets. With the decline in the magazine industry, the number of regular publications has declined and/or moved to digital formats. SAF actively promotes its TheGunMag.com site (www.gunmag.com) for gun rights news. Since 1986, the SAF has cosponsored an annual Gun Rights Policy Conference, generally held in September in a major American city. The conference program typically includes updates on current issues, strategyplanning sessions, and presentations by gun rights leaders. The SAF also cosponsors Leadership Training Conferences for the training of grassroots activists and keeps a listing of academics willing to be contacted by the media on gun rights issues. The SAF has filed lawsuits and amicus curiae briefs seeking to overturn gun restrictions. The SAF takes credit for overturning several local handgun bans and increasing

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the concealed weapon permits issued by the Los Angeles Police Department. The SAF also helped fund an ultimately unsuccessful appeal of California’s assault weapons ban (the Roberti-Roos Assault Weapons Control Act of 1989). The organization served as the main sponsor, with the Illinois State Rifle Association, in the McDonald v. City of Chicago (561 U.S. 742) case that overturned Chicago’s handgun ban. The case was decided in 2010 by the U.S. Supreme Court, with Alan Gura serving as lead counsel. His firm had previously argued the District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) case as independent counsel. Although the National Rifle Association (NRA) was also involved with petitioning the Supreme Court in the McDonald case, the case greatly increased the SAF’s reputation, visibility, and involvement in legal activities. Marcia L. Godwin See also: AK-47; Assault Weapons; Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA); Gottlieb, Alan Merril; Gun Rights Policy Conference; Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; McDonald v. City of Chicago; Product Liability Lawsuits; RobertiRoos Assault Weapons Control Act of 1989; School Shootings; Semiautomatic Weapons

Further Reading ChicagoGunCase.com. http://www.chicago guncase.com/ (accessed August 29, 2020). NBC Chicago. “City Writes $399,950 Check to Gun Rights Group.” February 8, 2012. https://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local /city-writes-399950-check-to-gun-rights -group/1949012/ (accessed August 29, 2020) Second Amendment Foundation. http://www .saf.org/ (accessed August 29, 2020). Utter, Glenn H. Encyclopedia of Gun Control and Gun Rights. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2000.

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Self-Defense, Legal Issues Generally speaking, the use of a firearm for self-defense is allowed when no lesser force will suffice to protect an innocent from death, rape, or other grave bodily harm. Traditionally, Anglo-American common law recognized a right to self-defense and a related right to use firearms for self-defense. William Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England (1765–1769) explained that the people had “primary” rights, including “the free enjoyment of personal security, of personal liberty, and of private property.” To protect primary rights, auxiliary rights existed, including “the right of having and using arms for self-preservation and defence.” The elements of lawful self-defense are also factors that should govern prudent decision-making in acts of self-defense, especially with a gun. The discussion that follows in no way represents itself as legal advice, which should be sought, in any instant case and jurisdiction, from competent attorneys at law. The range of circumstances in which one may legally use nondeadly force is, of course, broader than the occasions for justifiable deadly force. Deadly force is that degree of force likely or intended to result in death or grave bodily harm. The use of the feet, shod feet, fists—like the use of a knife, bludgeon, or gun—can constitute deadly force, depending upon the circumstances and the intention of an assailant or a defender. Firing a gun would almost always be considered the use of deadly force. The reader should also be aware that the laws of self-defense for individual states are often in flux or subject to changes/revisions. While this entry sets forth the basic doctrinaire considerations that have largely been stable and accepted over time, it would

nevertheless be prudent for the reader to check the latest developments in his or her state or jurisdiction of interest as well. A good state-by-state survey (which is periodically updated) for the reader to check on recent changes to the laws is American Jurisprudence Proof of Facts (2011). This resource is available on the Westlaw and Lexis legal databases, as well as located in many law libraries. Grave bodily harm is crippling injury or injury requiring treatment beyond simple first aid—such as broken bones, cuts requiring stitches, internal injuries, blindness, serious permanent disfigurement, kidnapping, and forcible rape (which, irrespective of resultant bodily injury, are taken to constitute a threat of such grave bodily harm as can justify deadly force in self-defense). The threat of death is not necessary to justify deadly defensive force. In U.S. law, the threat of grave bodily harm can be sufficient. The possible uses of a gun in self-defense run a gamut in the use of force. How gun use might be judged at law is reflected in the criminal charges the use of a gun might incur if used improperly: (1) assault or assault with a deadly weapon (simply drawing or pointing a gun, whether it is loaded or not); (2) reckless endangerment, aggravated assault, or attempted murder (firing a gun, or firing a gun in the direction of a person, whether as a warning shot or not); (3) aggravated assault, assault with a deadly weapon, or attempted murder (firing at a person or wounding a person); and (4) manslaughter or murder (shooting and fatally wounding a person). Thus, there is a spectrum in the use of force with a gun, intended as self-defense or otherwise: verbally and threateningly referring to a gun to which one has access; drawing or presenting the gun; pointing the gun at a person; firing the gun astray as a



warning shot; firing at a person. The law holds one accountable for all of these actions, even if undertaken in self-defense, all of which are potentially liable to criminal charges. In most states, self-defense is a justification defense (the defendant did the right thing) as opposed to an excuse defense (the defendant did the wrong thing, but should not be blamed for it; insanity and duress are both excuse defenses). Imperfect self-defense involves circumstances in which the defendant is not blameless, but nevertheless the level of his offense may be mitigated. Suppose, for example, that one man starts a fight in a bar by punching another man in the face, and the second man escalates by trying to stab the first man to death; the first man then kills the second man. Since the first man originally intended only to trade punches, and not to fight to the death, some states would allow him to raise the issue of imperfect self-defense. As a result, instead of being convicted of murder, he might be convicted of the lesser offense of manslaughter. The rule of thumb is that deadly force, such as shooting a gun, is justified only against an imminent and otherwise unavoidable threat of death or grave bodily harm to an innocent person. More specifically, the use of deadly force is justifiable if and only if the defender honestly and reasonably believes that an innocent person is in imminent danger of death or grave bodily harm and that the threat is otherwise unavoidable. The elements of the defense can be parsed as they relate to (1) the defender in question, (2) the threat in question, (3) the force used by the defender, and (4) the honesty and reasonableness of the defender’s belief respecting the first three factors. The defender in question must be innocent of provoking the occasion for the act of

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self-defense (that is, he or she must not have done anything wrongful to instigate the threat). For example, a battered wife may not start a fight with her abuser to provoke him to attack her again, then shoot him mid-attack and plead self-defense. The threat defended against must be (1) intended or likely to cause death or grave bodily injury and (2) imminent or immediate (the language varies in different jurisdictions). A popular mnemonic regarding what constitutes an imminent and deadly threat is administration of justice, whose acronym (AOJ) refers to three situational elements: ability on the part of the aggressor(s) to deliver on a threat of grave bodily harm; opportunity to deliver on the threat; and jeopardy (evident intent to act upon the ability and opportunity that poses imminent threat of grave bodily harm). An example of a scenario that could satisfy the AOJ conditions is that of a knifewielding aggressor who is “all the way across the street” and begins to charge the defender. Defensive tactical research and doctrine hold that an assailant who “only has a knife” but charges a person from, say, seven yards away (“all the way across the street”) poses a deadly and imminent threat because an assailant can deal the victim a lethal blow before she can draw and fire her sidearm. Contrary to the notion that an assailant armed only with a contact weapon could not meet the AOJ criteria at greater than contact distances, empirically tested doctrine holds that a defender might justifiably shoot such an assailant (Covey 1995b). Such doctrine illustrates the importance of understanding the tactical realities and dynamics regarding AOJ. Of course, it is the totality of the particular circumstances that will either provide or obviate evidence of AOJ should the defender become a defendant at trial.

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The force used by the defender in selfdefense must be proportional to the threat posed and necessary to obviate the threat: the threat must be otherwise unavoidable such that nonlethal options are precluded. When the aggressor attacks or threatens with deadly force, by the rule of proportionality, the defender may use deadly force also. But, further, deadly force must be necessary, and the threat posed must be otherwise unavoidable. However, this necessity and preclusion requirement is subject to qualification under the rule of retreat. One way in which an imminent deadly threat might be otherwise avoidable and the defender’s use of deadly force, therefore, not necessary would be in case the defender both had and saw an opportunity to retreat. The law on the duty to retreat (Brown 1991) holds, roughly, as follows. In most U.S. jurisdictions, a defender has no duty to retreat from his or her own premises (a home or business, or those of another where he or she is permitted to be). However, in public places, it is generally, but not always, held that a defender has a duty to retreat, but only if the individual knows that he or she can escape with complete safety to himself or herself and to others. The defender’s belief regarding the above elements must be honest. The defender must actually hold this belief and not merely feign it. For example, if a police officer knew that he or she could make a case for justifiable self-defense, that he or she could “get away with” shooting an assailant, but also could avoid it, he or she would lack the requisite honest belief (as well as the requisite intent for self-defense). If the police officer nonetheless decided to kill out of anger or revenge, or to punish, or to “save the taxpayers some money,” and then shot an assailant, this act would be neither selfdefense nor justifiable.

The defender’s belief must also be reasonable. An honest but unreasonable belief would not enable a self-defense justification, although it might support a defense plea or jury finding of imperfect selfdefense. Standards of reasonableness can vary by jurisdiction. They run a gamut along a spectrum from strictly objective to hybrids that include subjective agentrelative factors. Even by strict objective standards, a belief found to be mistaken after the fact by “20/20 hindsight” can still be accounted reasonable in the instant circumstances. The exigencies of real-time judgment are acknowledged by Supreme Court justice Oliver Wendell Holmes’s famous line: “Detached reflection cannot be demanded in the presence of an uplifted knife” (Brown v. United States, 256 U.S. 335, 343 [1921]). Or as a more recent Supreme Court case put it: “The calculus of reasonableness must embody allowance for . . . split-second judgments—in circumstances that are tense, uncertain, and rapidly evolving—about the amount of force that is necessary in a particular situation” (Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386, 396–397 [1989]). Objective standards require the viewpoint of an ordinary “reasonable and prudent” person who is situated in the defender’s physical circumstances. There is the issue of what subjective factors beyond the objective physical circumstances may be taken into account: what the defender knew at the time (beyond the ken of an ordinary person in the defender’s circumstances), what the defender had reason to believe (even if the belief was mistaken), what the defender honestly believed (even if the belief was both mistaken and unreasonable), the defender’s peculiar past experience as it affected his or her perceptions of the threat or of the necessity of deadly force.



For example, a police officer’s training and street experience is typically taken to constitute privileged knowledge or expertise, such as in the case of a furtive movement defense (Covey 1995a), in which the officer claims it was reasonable for him or her to believe that the individual who was shot was going for a gun because the suspect’s movements and other behaviors were consistent, in the officer’s experience, with other suspects who ended up pulling and firing guns. Case in point: an officer drew his gun on a man who refused all commands to stop approaching, to show the officer empty hands, and to put his open hands on his head. Instead, the man kept coming at the officer, agitatedly, while trying to get something out of his back pocket. As he brought a black object out of his pocket, the officer fired, killing the suspect. The object turned out to be a wallet holding a card on which was printed, “I am a deaf mute.” The officer’s belief was tragically mistaken, but held to be reasonable respecting AOJ and the necessity to shoot. Similarly, a battered woman who appears to have shot and killed her abuser prematurely while he was still sitting in a chair, might be found justified by virtue of her special ability to perceive the subtle signs of an imminent explosive attack. Her past experience, like that of a police officer, is peculiar and beyond the ken of ordinary reasonable and prudent persons. But past experiences with her abuser’s tendency to explode out of his chair and lay hands on her in an instant might justify her belief that the threat was again imminent. Finally, three very practical questions on the legal defensibility of self-defense with a gun illustrate its domain. May we shoot to kill, or must we shoot only to wound, or only after firing a warning shot first? The relevant intent in

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shooting another person in self-defense is to stop an imminent and otherwise unavoidable threat of death or grave bodily harm. Shooting to stop is justifiable, provided the elements discussed above, even if it results in the death of the assailant. Shooting an alleged assailant merely to wound is not justifiable unless any resultant fatality would itself be justifiable. Shooting merely to wound is not prudent, legally or tactically. Nor is firing a warning shot, legally or tactically. Unless firing a gun is justifiable in the event that it proves fatal, it could be reckoned criminal, at minimum reckless endangerment or manslaughter, especially in the event that it wounds or kills some person other than the alleged assailant. In short, shooting a gun at an assailant allegedly in self-defense is not prudent, legally or tactically, unless the defender would be justified in killing the assailant. Can it ever be justifiable to shoot an unarmed person? Possibly, if that person were shown to have been reasonably believed by the shooter to have posed an imminent and otherwise unavoidable deadly threat. For example, an unarmed batterer might have the ability, opportunity, and evident intent to murder, maim, or rape a victim. Can it ever be legally justifiable to shoot or kill a would-be assailant preemptively? In particular, might a battered woman be justified in killing her abuser preemptively? Perhaps. But, again, it depends. Justifiable shooting in self-defense does not require the defender to wait for an assailant to actually attack (Stell 1991). The law allows a defender to react with deadly force to a deadly threat that signals imminent attack. Ipso facto, it allows a preemptive strike within limits. It does not allow a preemptive strike against a threat of attack that is not imminent, however predictable or even

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inevitable an attack might be at some future time. This goes to the issue of what the temporal scope of necessity should be. For example, a battered woman’s years of experience with an abuser might substantiate reasonable belief in the imminence not of a threat, but of the necessity of deadly force, now, to prevent her inevitable death later (Kelman 1991; Stell 1991). Preston K. Covey and James A. Beckman See also: Defensive Gun Use (DGU); National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS); Right to Self-Defense, Philosophical Bases; SelfDefense, Reasons for Gun Use; Victimization from Gun Violence; Women and Guns

Further Reading American Jurisprudence Proof of Facts. 3rd ed. Minneapolis: Thomson West, 2011 (updated periodically). Branca, Andrew F. The Law of Self-Defense: A Guide for the Armed Citizen. Acton, MA: Operon Security, 1988. Brown, Richard Maxwell. No Duty to Retreat: Violence and Values in American History and Society. New York: Oxford University Press, 1991. Covey, Preston K. “The Furtive Movement Defense.” In The Standards and Practices Reference Guide for Law Enforcement Firearms Instructors, edited by Preston K. Covey, 302. Laconia, NH: International Association of Law Enforcement Firearms Instructors, 1995a. Covey, Preston K. “The Tueller Drill.” In The Standards and Practices Reference Guide for Law Enforcement Firearms Instructors, edited by Preston K. Covey, 305–10. Laconia, NH: International Association of Law Enforcement Firearms Instructors, 1995b. Gillespie, Cynthia K. Justifiable Homicide: Battered Women, Self-Defense, and the Law. Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1989.

Kelman, Mark. “Reasonable Evidence of Reasonableness.” Critical Inquiry 17 (1991): 798–817. Stell, Lance. “The Legitimization of Female Violence.” In Justice, Law, and Violence, edited by James B. Brady and Newton Garver, 241–59. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1991. Uniacke, Suzanne. Permissible Killing: The Self-Defense Justification of Homicide. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994.

Self-Defense, Reasons for Gun Use An act of self-defense with a gun can take several forms, from merely brandishing the gun to a fatal shooting. Guns can offer clear benefits for self-defense, as the National Rifle Association’s Armed Citizen anecdotal reports regularly confirm (e.g., NRA-ILA 2020). However, systematic research on the usefulness of guns for self-protection reveals that they generally create more problems than they solve. Guns can equalize disparities in force, as reflected by the inscription said to be placed on early Winchester rifles and Colt Peacemaker revolvers: “Be not afraid of any man / No matter what his size / When danger threatens, call on me / And I will equalize.” This factor is especially important for weaker victims of criminal assailants. Often, criminal predators enjoy superiority in build, bare-handed strength, fighting skill, or numbers (such as a gang). The Colt Peacemaker revolver was called “the Great Equalizer” because firearms can negate these differences. It is difficult to calculate one’s individual risk of victimization, but according to one analysis of the National Crime Victimization Survey, the long-term actuarial risk is not



small: After the age of twelve, at some point in their lifetimes, 83 percent of Americans will become victims of violent crime (Kopel 1987). Risk has two dimensions: the likelihood of a given harm occurring and the magnitude of the harm in question. It is rational to take seriously risks with low probability but a high magnitude of harm, and to take precautions accordingly. This is why it is often sensible to carry insurance of various sorts—not because we expect disasters to befall us (crippling injuries, debilitating illnesses, terminal diseases, horrible car accidents, our home burning down), but rather, “just in case.” “Insurance” may be applied metaphorically to spare tires, first aid kits, fire extinguishers, and other tools of first response or self-help. Their rationale is the same: just in case. So also with guns kept or carried for self-defense. If one expected both invasion and attack by a home intruder, it might be sensible to call the police or to leave home. If one expected to be lethally assaulted upon leaving home, it might be sensible to stay home. But even if one has no appreciable expectation of such events, it might seem sensible to have and carry a gun as insurance, just in case. One pays some premium for any insurance, so the insurance value might not seem worth the burden (monetary, psychological, moral, or social). But it could still be perfectly sensible to carry insurance—hardly irrational. So also with guns, whose theoretically comparative insurance value is a function of their defensive and compliance effects. Indeed, this logic for possessing a gun is borne out by a 2017 Pew Research Foundation survey: at the top of the list that gun owners cite for possessing a firearm is “protection” (67%), with the distant second and third reasons being the recreational use of guns for hunting (38%) and target shooting (30%; Gramlich and Schaeffer 2019).

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Despite the theoretically plausible justification that many gun owners give for having acquired their guns—that is, that guns will make them safer—the public health evidence paints a very different picture. Indeed, this evidence shows that gun possession significantly increases the chances of becoming a victim of violence. Important examples of this evidence include: (1) The state-level rate of firearm deaths from homicides, suicides, and unintentional shootings correlates positively and strongly with the percentage of households having a gun (Carter 2017). (2) The risk of homicide is 1.9 times greater when a firearm is in or around a home (e.g., the firearm is kept in a garage, outdoor storage area, truck, or car) than when no firearm is present (Dahlberg, Ikeda, and Kresnow 2004, 933). The risk is even higher for women: compared with women living in homes with no guns, women in homes with guns are 2.7 times more likely to be the victims of homicide (Wiebe 2003, 711). “The presence of a gun makes quarrels, disputes, assaults, and robberies more deadly. Many murders are committed in a moment of rage . . . over matters such as love, money, and domestic problems, involving acquaintances, neighbors, lovers, and family members. . . . Only a small minority of homicides appear to be the carefully planned acts of individuals with a single-minded intention to kill” (Hemenway 2011, 505). (3) Women in domestic violence situations are significantly more likely to be killed when a firearm is in the home; for example, a study published in the American Journal of Public Health reveals that abused women are five

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times more like to be killed when their abusive domestic partners have access to a firearm; the same study concluded that there is “no clear evidence of protective effects” of a woman owning a gun (Campbell et al. 2003, 1092). (4) A comprehensive review of the relevant research concludes that “the evidence linking suicide to gun availability is compelling” (Hemenway 2011, 505). Importantly, “individuals have especially high risks of suicide if they live in homes with loaded guns and unlocked guns. Having any gun in the home is a risk factor for suicide for everyone in the home—the gun owner, the gun owner’s spouse, and the gun owner’s children. Although most suicide decedents have some history of mental illness or substance abuse, a gun in the home increases the risk of suicide even for household members without these problems” (Hemenway 2011, 504). (5) Regarding home intruders, the evidence does not support the theory that a gun is a good means of self-defense or of reducing harm to the individuals living there; indeed, a gun kept at home is much more likely to be used in a homicide, suicide, or accidental shooting than for self-defense. In a study of home shootings during a period of five years in King County, Washington (which includes Seattle), researchers found that of the 398 gun deaths occurring at home, nine were self-protection homicides (but only two of these were intruders); and for every self-defense homicide involving a gun kept at home, there were (a) 1.3 accidental deaths; (b) 4.6 criminal homicides; and (c) thirty-seven firearm suicides (Kellerman and Reay 1986). A follow-up study of 626 home

shootings during a twelve-month period in Galveston (TX) and an eighteenmonth period in Memphis (TN) and Seattle (WA) examined both fatal and nonfatal gunshot injuries and found that when compared to their use in injuring or killing an assailant in self-defense, home guns were (a) four times more likely to be involved in an accident; (b) seven times more likely to be used in criminal assault and homicide; and (c) eleven times more likely to be used in an attempted or completed suicide (Kellerman et al. 1998). In short, this research confirms the proposition that a gun in the home is much more likely to be used by residents to kill or injury themselves or others living in the home than to fend off an intruder. (6) Since 1993, the percentage of nonfatal violent victimizations involving firearms used in self-defense has been relatively stable—at under 2 percent according the to the National Criminal Victimization Survey (Planty and Truman 2013, 12, which would put the absolute numbers in the forty to fifty thousand range in recent years; the actual number of these events reported to the police is much lower, for example, in 2014 it was fewer than 1,600 [DeFilippis and Hughes 2015]). Hemenway and Solnick’s (2015) analyses of the 2007–2011 NCV Surveys reveal that the typical incident of defensive gun use involves a rural male away from home—against another male who has a gun. Importantly, the data do not indicate any special benefit beyond other protective actions (such as yelling, running, hiding, hitting, kicking, or using a less lethal weapon). When any protective action was taken, 4.2 percent of the victims were injured;

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when a gun was used defensively (most usually involving simply brandishing it), 4.1 percent of victims were injured. DeFilippis and Hughes (2015) conclude that the alleged benefits of defensive gun use constitute a “tragic myth”: “Despite having nearly no academic support in public health literature, this myth is the single largest motivation behind gun ownership.” Indeed, when individuals actually do fire a weapon in what they think are acts of self-defense, they “are far more likely to end up . . . accidently shooting an innocent person or seeing their weapons harm a family member, than be heroes warding off criminals.” Moreover, DeFilippis and Hughes contend the myth of the benefit of defensive gun use is compounded because most people assume that “defensive gun uses [are] good.” On the contrary, Hemenway, Azrael, and Miller (2000, 263) found that most “most self-reported self-defense gun uses may well be illegal and against the interests of society.” In sum, having access to a gun for selfdefense is certainly far from a guarantee of success and, indeed, is much more likely to end in harm to oneself or innocent bystanders. But part of the gun rights philosophy is that having the option or choice of armed defense, of having a “fighting chance,” can be valued in and of itself—regardless of the findings detailed above. The interest a person might vest in the option or choice of armed self-defense might contribute to the psychological value (comfort, sense of security, fear reduction) in having access to a gun. In a similar vein of reasoning, another form of residual value, irrespective of expected costs or benefits, derives from

one’s interests in self-respect, dignity, personal autonomy, or self-determination— more precious commodities to some than feelings of comfort or security (Snyder 2001). This value includes the right of having options—choice—in defending oneself against subjugation by the threat of imminent bodily harm. The best option, as the above public health research findings clearly demonstrate, is not a gun. But, from a gun rights perspective, one can philosophically argue these findings are irrelevant to the residual value of this option for standing up to violent threats. Gregg Lee Carter, Preston K. Covey, and James A. Beckman See also: Concealed Weapons Laws; Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Guns in the Home; National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS); Right to Self-Defense, Philosophical Bases; Self-Defense, Legal Issues; Suicide, Guns and; Victimization from Gun Violence

Further Reading Campbell, Jacquelyn C., Webster, Daniel J., Koziol-McLain, Jane, Block, Carolyn, Campbell, Doris, Curry, Mary Ann, Gary, Faye, Glass, Nancy, McFarlane, Judith, and Carolyn Sachs, et al. “Risk Factors for Femicide in Abusive Relationships: Results from a Multi-site Case Control Study.” American Journal of Public Health 93 (2003): 1089–97. https://www.ncbi .nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1447915/ (accessed July 23, 2020). Carter, Gregg Lee. Gun Control in the United States: A Reference Handbook, 2nd ed. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2017. Dahlberg, Linda L., Robin M. Ikeda, and Marcie-jo Kresnow. “Guns in the Home and Risk of a Violent Death in the Home: Findings from a National Study.” American Journal of Epidemiology 160 (2004): 929–36.

784 | Semiautomatic Weapons DeFilippis, Evan, and Devin Hughes. “The Myth Behind Defensive Gun Ownership: Guns Are More Likely to Do Harm Than Good.” Politico, January 14, 2015. http:// www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/01 /defensive-gun-ownership-myth-114262 _full.html (accessed July 23, 2020). Edwards, Cam. “TX Woman in Her 60s Takes Down 19-Year Old Home Invader.” Bearing Arms, April 13, 2020. https://bearing arms.com/cam-e/2020/04/13/tx-woman -in-her-60s-takes-down-19-year-old-home -invader/ (accessed July 24, 2020). Gramlich, John, and Katherine Schaeffer. “7 Facts about Guns in the U.S.” Pew Research Center, 2019. https://www.pewresearch .org/fact-tank /2019/10 /22/facts-about -guns-in-united-states/ (accessed July 22, 2020). Hemenway, David. “Risks and Benefits of a Gun in the Home.” American Journal of Lifestyle Medicine 10 (2011): 1–10. Hemenway, David, Deborah Azrael, and Matthew Miller. “Gun Use in the United States: Results from Two National Surveys.” Injury Prevention 6, no. 4 (2000): 263–67. Hemenway, David, and Sara J. Solnick. “The Epidemiology of Self-Defense Gun Use: Evidence from the National Crime Victimization Surveys 2007–2011.” Preventive Medicine 79 (2015): 22–27. Kellermann, Arthur L., and Donald T. Reay. “Protection or Peril? An Analysis of Firearm Related Deaths in the Home.” New England Journal of Medicine 45 (1986): 1557–60. Kellermann, Arthur L., Grant Somes, Frederick P. Rivara, R. K. Lee, and Joyce G. Banton. “Injuries and Deaths Due to Firearms in the Home.” Journal of Trauma 45 (1998): 263–67. Kopel, Herbert. Lifetime Likelihood of Victimization. Washington, DC: Bureau of Justice Statistics, 1987. https://www.ncjrs.gov /pdffiles1/bjs/104274.pdf (accessed July 23, 2020). NRA-ILA. Armed Citizen© Stories, 2020. https://www.nraila.org/gun-laws/armed -citizen/ (accessed July 23, 2020).

Planty, Michael, and Jennifer L. Truman. Firearm Violence, 1993–2011. Washington, DC: Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2013. NCJ241730. http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf /fv9311.pdf (accessed July 23, 2020). Snyder, Jeff. Nation of Cowards: Essays on the Ethics of Gun Control. St. Louis, MO: Accurate Press, 2001. Wiebe, Douglas J. “Homicide and Suicide Risks Associated with Firearms in the Home: A National Case-Control Study.” Annals of Emergency Medicine 41 (2003): 771–82.

Semiautomatic Weapons Semiautomatic weapons fire a bullet with each pull of the trigger without manual rechambering. Each shot causes a new round to be automatically inserted into the chamber after the spent shell is automatically ejected. Semiautomatic weapons may be either long-barreled rifles or short-barreled pistols. Semiautomatic weapons allow for an increased rate of fire because bullets are fired as fast as the trigger is pulled; that is, when the empty bullet case is automatically ejected after firing, a new bullet automatically enters the chamber, so that the operator does not have to manually rechamber the gun—with a bolt, pump, lever, or other device—with a bullet after each shot. They are also more accurate than fully automatic weapons because the shooter can re-aim after each shot. The French first made wide use of a semiautomatic rifle during World War I. After the war, many European countries developed such weapons. American inventor John Garand developed the M1, which, in several versions, became the mainstay of the U.S. military during World War II. Semiautomatic pistols (as distinct from revolvers, which fire bullets from a revolving chamber)

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were developed around the turn of the twentieth century. Leading this development was John Browning, whose Browning automatic pistol was first manufactured in the United States by Colt. Semiautomatic handguns usually store additional rounds in a clip found in the handgun’s handle. Each time the gun is fired, a new cartridge automatically moves into the firing chamber. Pistols that operate in fully automatic mode—that is, fire multiple shots while the trigger is depressed—are referred to as machine pistols. Semiautomatic assault weapons were regulated by the Assault Weapons Ban of 1994, which barred for ten years the possession of nineteen named types of assault weapons that fired in semiautomatic fashion. Congress failed to reenact the law in 2004. These weapons were singled out because their military configuration (lighter weight, smaller size, ability to operate with one hand, greater ease of concealability) made them more convenient for uses that did not pertain to legitimate purposes, such as hunting or sporting. In particular, a series of mass killings in the late 1980s and 1990s by individuals using such weapons fanned public outrage over their availability. Many traditional hunting rifles also fire in semiautomatic fashion, but they were specifically exempted from regulation. Robert J. Spitzer See also: Assault Weapons; Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Automatic Weapons Laws

Further Reading Avery, Derek. Firearms. Ware, UK: Wordsworth Editions, 1995. Diaz, Tom. Making a Killing: The Business of Guns in America. New York: New Press, 1999. Foster, Michael A. Federal Firearms Laws: Overview and Selected Legal Issues.

Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, 2019. https://crsreports.congress .gov/product/pdf/R/R45629 (accessed January 27, 2022). Vizzard, William J. Shots in the Dark: The Policy, Politics, and Symbolism of Gun Control. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2000. Weinstein, Adam. “A Non–Gun Owner’s Guide to Guns.” Mother Jones, December 21, 2012. https://www.motherjones.com/poli tics/2012/12/semi-automatic-gun-assault -weapon-definitions/ (accessed January 28, 2022).

Sentence Enhancement Laws. See Firearm Sentence Enhancement (FSE) Laws Shall-Issue Laws. See Concealed Weapons Laws Shooting Ranges Shooting ranges are the places where many young Americans get their first exposure to firearms and are introduced to the shooting sports. Both the Boy Scouts and the YMCA have provided at least rudimentary ranges where gun safety and marksmanship are taught, sometimes under the auspices of the National Rifle Association (NRA). The NRA’s gun safety, hunter safety, and marksmanship programs for youth are generally well respected—especially when shorn of political content or subtext. Other introductory venues where shooting ranges are found are boot camps for the armed forces. Many urban enlistees and draftees got their first exposure to firearms training at ranges of this type. The firearms industry is currently advocating building more ranges to encourage recruitment into the gun-owning fraternity.

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Part of this effort is aimed at making the public more aware of these facilities and making them more “shooter friendly.” The latter effort is important because well-run ranges are very strict about safety and not particularly welcoming. That notwithstanding, the NRA, in conjunction with the National Shooting Sports Foundation, is advocating holding more “fun events” at ranges. However, ranges are inherently serious places where concentration and improvement of marksmanship, not fun, are the key aim. Ranges have other serious issues. Outdoor ranges are noisy. Even in the rural South, residents are not anxious to have the banging of high-powered weapons intrude upon their weekends, mornings, or evenings. Indeed, concerted efforts by concerned residents who are not antigun, per se, have stopped the construction of ranges in various locales. No one wants incessant blasting in their backyard. Some unsupervised ranges may be unsafe. Gun accidents happen, as the holes in the tin roofs above the shooters will indicate. Fortunately, in almost all accidents, the guns are aimed downrange, or up, and no one is hurt. Many shooters have had minor accidents at ranges, but fatalities are, thankfully, almost unknown in this context. Well-run, supervised ranges almost never have accidents of this kind, but the regimentation at these places is intense and perhaps off-putting to neophyte gun owners. However, as one might suspect, insurance liability issues are discouraging for operators and would-be operators. Several universities have closed ranges due to this issue, as well as to the desire to be more environmentally friendly; ranges are mostly indoors, and lead-containing fumes have not traditionally been exhausted in an environmentally responsible manner. According to a 2014 Seattle Times investigative report,

in fact, lead poisoning is an underrecognized public health threat at many gun ranges: “[A] hidden risk lies within almost all of America’s estimated 10,000 gun ranges. When shooters fire guns with leadbased ammunition, they spread lead vapor and dust, insidious toxins” (Willmsen et al. 2014–2015). Thousands of people, including workers, shooters, and their family members, have been contaminated at shooting ranges due to poor ventilation and contact with lead-coated surfaces, Additionally, at isolated, unsupervised ranges in national forests and state parks, there is substantial vandalism. Some shooters, many of whom have been fueled by alcohol, use guns of inappropriate calibers and wreak havoc on target frames and supports just for fun. Furthermore, the agencies who built the facilities simply cannot afford to staff them. Reports of frequent serious accidents and murders at such facilities are, however, overstated. Despite the problems noted above, if well managed, shooting ranges are excellent venues in which to teach responsible gun handling and hunter safety and marksmanship. Getting access to public ranges (many are private clubs or businesses) is increasingly problematic, however. Civil authorities should require responsible range management and encourage owners or club members to offer safety courses to new gun owners and supervised youth groups. Outdoor ranges should not be built where neighbors would find them objectionable. Francis Frederick Hawley See also: National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF); Recreational Uses of Guns

Further Reading Diaz, Tom. Making a Killing: The Business of Guns in America. New York: New Press, 1999.

WhereToShoot.org. http://www.wheretoshoot. org/ (accessed January 28, 2022). Willmsen, Christine, Lewis Kamb, and Justin Mayo. “Loaded with Lead: A Seattle Times Investigation.” Seattle Times, October 17, 2014–April 13, 2015. https://projects .seattletimes.com/2014/loaded-with-lead /1/ (accessed January 28, 2022).

Shooting, Hunting, and Outdoor Trades Show (SHOT Show). See Gun Rights Policy Conference (GRPC) Shotgun. See Long Gun Shotgun News. See Periodicals, Guns ShotSpotter Technology. See Gunshot Detection Technologies (GDTs) SHUSH Act Gun silencers are subject to the registration and licensing requirements of the National Firearms Act (NFA) of 1934 and the background check requirement per the Gun Control Act of 1968. As such, silencers are treated in a similar fashion to shotguns and rifles in terms of federal registration. The aim of the law in 1934 was to reduce the use of these items for criminal activity. A $200 tax on silencers in 1934 was very prohibitive at the time it was levied, though this tax amount has not increased since. The SHUSH Act, which stands for Silencers Help Us Save Hearing Act, is a bill designed to treat portable firearm suppressers, legally called “silencers” or “gun mufflers,” like any other firearm accessory emitting deadly force. The bill, if passed, would thus remove

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firearm suppressors from being subject to gun regulations associated with the possession, sale, and transfer of firearms. Specifically, the SHUSH Act would override local and state laws regulating silencers, remove the $200 transfer tax for silencers, remove the mandatory minimum sentence enhancement for use of a silencer during the commission of a drug or violent crime, and allow active and qualified retired law enforcement to carry a firearm with a silencer. The SHUSH Act (S. 1505) first went through the 115th Congress of 2017. Its sponsor was Michael Lee (R-UT), with nine cosponsors: Michael Crapo (R-ID), James Risch (R-ID), Ron Johnson (R-WI), Rand Paul (R-KY), John Cornyn (R-TX), Ted Cruz (R-TX), Orrin Hatch (R-UT), Luther Strange (R-AL), and David Perdue (R-GA). Failing to pass in the 115th Congress, in 2019, Michael Lee (R-UT) reintroduced it as S. 202. This time with only five Republican cosponsors: Michael Crapo, Ted Cruz, John Cornyn, James Risch, and Rand Paul. Notably, SilencerCo, the largest silencer manufacturer in the United States, which is located in Utah, Lee’s home state, supported the Act’s passage. The bill also had the backing of the National Association for Gun Rights. In the House, January 2019, Steve King (R-IA) sponsored a companion bill to the SHUSH Act, H.R. 775. Mass shootings occurring in 2019, including back-to-back lethal attacks in El Paso, TX and Dayton, OH, slowed momentum to pass these laws, with both bills showing just a 2 percent chance of passage as of July 2020. Relatedly, another attempt at deregulating silencers introduced during the 2019 legislative session came by way of the Hearing Protection Act (H.R. 155; S. 817), introduced by Representative Jeff Duncan (R-SC) and Senator Michael Crapo in their respective chambers of Congress. These

788 | Silencers

were previously proposed in 2017 (as H.R. 367 and S. 59). These efforts were to remove silencers from being included in the National Firearms Act and thus the need to have silencers registered and licensed. They were more concerted efforts than SHUSH to adjust the related tax code to make accessing silencers a less cumbersome process. The Senate version included an effort to also destroy government records indicating the ownership of silencers. The most recent version of the SHUSH Act, however, was referred to Ways and Means Committee in January 2019. Thereafter, the Judiciary Committee moved it to the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security in March 2019. It was not enacted. Senator Steve King, arguing for SHUSH, contended on his personal Congressional website in a July 11, 2017, news release that silencers are used by law-abiding citizens to improve accuracy, safety while hunting and engaging in other gun sports. Further, he said that silencers reduce recoil. King and other supporters of the SHUSH Act claim that the bill is to make silencers more accessible to law-abiding persons. Without the bill, they claim that the process to access silencers is too expensive and time-consuming. At present, the process for accessing a silencer involves going through the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, which reportedly takes approximately nine months. After deciding on the appropriate silencer, a person must then buy a tax stamp, then file for the silencer. This involves answering a series of questions on intended use of the device and who will have access to it. Next fingerprints, demographic details, and a passport-style photograph must be submitted. The ATF’s review of these items is what can take months, apparently due in part to a shortage in personnel.

Opponents argue that the SHUSH Act is simply to benefit gun manufacturers seeking accessories’ profits and would simply make silencers easier for criminals to access. Groups such as the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence and Americans for Responsible Solutions, state that more silencers in circulation would make life more dangerous for law enforcement. They further contend that the best way to protect hearing is not with silencers, but the use of ear protection equipment designed for that specific purpose. Regardless, it appears likely that the push for silencers to be more accessible will continue in some form. Camille Gibson See also: National Firearms Act of 1934; Silencers

Further Reading Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. February 14, 2019. https://www .atf.gov/rules-and-regulations/national-fire arms-act (accessed March 2, 2020). Burr, Thomas. “Utah Sen. Mike Lee Again Pushes Bill to end Restrictions on Firearm Silencers. A Big Silencer Company Is Based in West valley City.” Salt Lake Tribune, January 29, 2019. https://www.sltrib.com/news /politics/2019/01/29/sen-lee-again-pushes -bill/ (accessed March 2, 2020). King, Steve. “Congressman Steve King Representing the 4th District of Iowa.” July 11, 2017. https://steveking.house.gov/media -center/press-releases/congressman-king -and-senator-lee-introduce-pro-second -amendment (accessed March 2, 2020).

Silencers A silencer is a device attached to the muzzle of a handgun or rifle to reduce the sound when fired. Silencers, by name, are misnomers; the loud sounds emitted by firearms

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when discharged are not fully silenced, only suppressed to a degree. The general principle behind silencers is simple. Think of an inflated balloon that has been tied off at the bottom. If you stick a needle into the balloon, it will pop. Now think of an inflated balloon that has not been tied off at the bottom. If you place a needle in the balloon, it will not pop. Rather, the air escaping from the bottom will offset the new hole created by the needle prick. Silencers function by offsetting the sudden flow of gases created by the discharge of a firearm. The noise created when a firearm is discharged is tied to the blasts and of the muzzle and of the bullet. The muzzle blast is the result of gas expansion produced by the propellant in the cartridge. Once this expanding gas merges with the surrounding air, the blast occurs. The bullet blast concerns the speed of the bullet as it pushes the gas out of the barrel, also known as the bullet shock wave. A bullet traveling at supersonic speed (1,100 ft/sec) produces the blast. The sound associated with a supersonic bullet cannot be muted. Therefore, silencers focus on suppressing the muzzle blast. There are two ways to suppress this blast. The first places a large expansion chamber over the muzzle of a firearm where gases expand; these gases are then distributed to several smaller chambers where they are dispersed, lessening the energy. The longer the expansion chamber and the greater the number of micro chambers, the better the gas dispersal and the greater the sound suppression. The second design uses moving parts in which the gases are diverted through funnels in a movable chamber. Two springs cause the chamber to create a suction effect, pulling the gases backward. This type of design, in effect, “de-energizes” the gases.

The history of the silencer is rooted in sport shooting and war. Hiram P. Maxim introduced the first commercially marketed silencer in 1909. His design was popular with sport shooters living near urbanized areas because people could now shoot without disturbing neighbors. However, silencers fell into disuse in the 1930s after passage of the National Firearms Act—which put tax and registration requirements on them to keep them out of the hands of criminals. During World War II, the military recognized the usefulness of firearms that were rendered mostly quiet, especially for commando and special forces units. The war saw the wide use of silencers from all sides—including by the Americans, Germans, and Russians. The military use of silencers was broadened during the Vietnam War. New and improved silencers were popular in the jungle settings where most of the fighting took place. After the war, sport shooting manufacturers continued with improvements in the technology and design, which continues to the present day. Although silencers are tightly controlled under current federal law, they are still legal in thirty-four states. In these states, an owner must be at least twenty-one years of age, a U.S. citizen, have no conviction for a felony, and undergo a stringent background check. Despite their reputation as a tool of criminals and “hit men,” silencers have at least two legitimate uses. First, they reduce sound for ear protection and can thus prevent hearing loss in recreational shooters. And second, they allow for shooting ranges near urban areas, as the otherwise disturbing noise of gunfire is all but muted. Indeed, several European countries, including Finland and Sweden, have actually legalized silencers for this very reason. Sean Maddan

790 | Slippery Slope Argument See also: National Firearms Act of 1934

Further Reading Huebner, Siegfried F. Silencers for Hand Firearms. Newfoundland, NJ: Haessner Publications, 1976. Paulson, Alan C., N. R. Parker, and Peter G. Kokalis. Silencer: History and Performance. Vols. 1 and 2. Boulder, CO: Paladin Press, 2002.

Slippery Slope Argument A slippery slope argument says an initial and seemingly minor event will inevitably lead to a more extreme and undesirable second event. The metaphor of a slippery slope conveys that the first event takes one down a path that is so slick it is impossible to keep from sliding to the end. Moral, ethical, and legal debates offer numerous examples of slippery slope arguments. One common example is debate regarding free speech. Free speech advocates worry that restricting speech that some might find hateful leads down a slippery slope whereby speech that is merely unpopular would be censored. Banning racist speech today, the argument goes, will lead the majority to ban other forms of speech they simply do not like. Conversely, opponents of hate speech believe allowing it fosters intolerance, and will lead down a slippery slope to discriminatory and violent actions. Allowing homophobic speech today, they argue, will lead to violent hate crimes tomorrow. Slippery slope arguments are commonly used in the gun debate, primarily by opponents of gun control, because their position is one that is more likely to defend the status quo. Gun rights proponents frequently argue that allowing partial restrictions on some guns will inevitably lead to complete

restrictions of all firearms. The National Rifle Association (NRA) often uses slippery slope arguments to rally its members in opposition to proposed gun control legislation. NRA executive vice president Wayne LaPierre has stated that gun control advocates’ support for waiting periods to purchase firearms presages the confiscation of all firearms. After a nationwide waiting period does not lower the crime rate, LaPierre argued, the next step will be a federal licensing and registration program, which will inevitably lead to the confiscation of all registered firearms (Melzer 2009). Likewise, NRA leaders and other gun rights advocates have argued that any piece of gun control legislation must be opposed because it leads down a slippery slope to the confiscation of guns, elimination of all gun rights, and ultimately the elimination of all individual rights and freedoms. In other words, comparably modest gun control laws, such as restricting the number of firearms citizens can purchase each month or allowing businesses to prevent employees from bringing guns to work, are labeled as the first acts by governments seeking to regulate and restrict freedom, thereby taking us down a slippery slope toward totalitarianism. Scott Melzer See also: LaPierre, Wayne R., Jr.; National Rifle Association (NRA)

Further Reading Melzer, Scott. Gun Crusaders: The NRA’s Culture War. New York: New York University Press, 2009. Walton, Douglas. Slippery Slope Arguments. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1992.

Small Arms Review. See Periodicals, Guns



Smart Guns “Smart gun” is a slang term for a hypothetical firearm that incorporates computer or other technology so that the gun can only be fired by the authorized user. To date, no gun manufacturer has brought such a gun to market, although several have conducted research on prototypes. Originally conceived for law enforcement use, smart guns have encountered very heavy resistance from police, who insist that their gun be more reliable than their computer. Hoping to reduce accidents, some gun control groups have proposed laws that would forbid the sale of all guns except for smart guns. The O. F. Mossberg & Sons shotgun company has trademarked the term “SmartGun,” and therefore the phrase should not be applied to products from other companies. “Personalized gun technology” is the preferred term. Some people use the term “safe gun” or “childproof gun,” although this sort of language may dangerously overestimate how safe a gun can actually be. Personalized guns have proven much more difficult to build than to imagine. As explained in a New York Times article, the core design problem is the “meshing of a complicated nineteenth-century mechanical device, the gun, with delicate and sophisticated computer engineering. With the footprint of an existing gun—with controlled explosions, heavy percussions and vibrations, dirty residues and high temperatures—electronics that would have to withstand this high stress would be imbedded. It is like putting a laptop computer into a gun and then having the computer decide when the gun will work, and when it will not” (Wayne 1999, A24). The ideas discussed for personalization technology include the following:

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• Radio Frequency Identification Device (RFID): This equips a gun with an antenna to receive radio waves. The waves are transmitted from a ring, wristband, or handheld transmitter. The RFID has been promoted by the Colt firearm company, which has received federal grants for research. Although Colt announced in November 1998 that an RFID gun would be on the market by 2001, there is no evidence that the gun will be available at any certain future date, and Colt’s website no longer promotes the RFID gun. Like all radio-based devices, RFID guns could be disabled by jamming equipment. If the user forgot to wear the ring or wristband, the gun would be useless. Like all personalized-gun technologies, the RFID is also vulnerable to battery failure. The battery problem may be more acute for citizen guns, which (unlike police-duty guns) are usually not checked for readiness every day. • Bar-Code Readers: These could be inserted in guns, requiring the user to swipe a special magnetic card or other device for the gun to be activated. Skeptics note that supermarket bar-code readers sometimes require multiple swipes and sometimes do not work at all. The time to execute multiple swipes might make a firearm useless in an emergency. • Touch Memory: This is somewhat similar to the radio frequency device. The gun is activated by a ring or some other item that touches a particular spot on the gun. Besides being vulnerable to battery failure, a touch-memory device could be impaired by a user’s gloves as well as by dirt, blood, sweat, or oil on the hand or on the gun. • Biometric Technologies: These would activate a gun by reading a voice, a fingerprint, a hand shape, or some other

792 | Smart Guns

personal characteristic of the user. The key vulnerabilities are battery failure and slow operation. • Trigger Locks: Proposals to mandate that ordinary combination or key locks be built into guns are sometimes called smart-gun or personalized-gun proposals, but they really are not. Combination or key locks have been around for many decades. There is nothing high-tech, new, or unusually “smart” about them. (From a policy standpoint, lock mandates have many of the same advantages and disadvantages as personalized-gun mandates; one important difference is that locks take significantly longer to open than do personalized guns under ideal conditions.) A significant fraction of police officers who are killed in the line of duty are shot with their own weapons or with weapons taken from a fellow officer. By personalizing the guns officers use, the U.S. Department of Justice’s National Institute of Justice sought a solution. The Justice Department asked the U.S. Defense Department’s Sandia National Laboratories to evaluate “Smart Gun Technologies.” The final Sandia report stated that reliability was police officers’ main concern. “[T]he firearm must work because the officer’s or another person’s life is at stake.” Sandia concluded that an acceptable personalized gun must take no longer than a quarter-second to recognize the authorized user—a limit consistent with the fact that the average gunfight lasts only 2.7 seconds. Sandia did not find any currently available technology that would be acceptable to police. For the civilian market, some manufacturers (such as Glock) are not investing in personalized-gun technology because they

are skeptical that it can ever work reliably enough. Other manufacturers, though, are hoping that by bringing a personalized gun to the market, they will be able to charge premium prices—especially to affluent males who want to own a gun, but whose wives are afraid that an ordinary gun might cause a home accident. Presumably, some of these potential buyers would be happier to have a 99 percent reliable gun that their spouse will allow, as opposed to a 100 percent reliable gun that the spouse will not allow in the house. These manufacturers are spurred by polling data suggesting that about a third of the public that does not currently own guns would be interested in purchasing a personalized gun. Manufacturers also look forward to selling a new type of firearm to some of the existing base of gun owners who might enjoy a gun with a brand-new gadget. For gun owners who have strong concerns about family and home defense, however, reliability concerns are nearly as significant an impediment as they are in the police market. The first state to enact “smart gun” laws was New Jersey in 2002. The model legislation for personalizedgun mandates comes from the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research. Critics of the model legislation point out that it exempts police guns—thus tacitly acknowledging that personalized guns are not reliable enough to use for personal protection. Both sides of the debate observe that a personalized-gun mandate would serve as a slightly incomplete form of gun prohibition in which the entire existing supply of guns would become illegal to sell, and (at least initially) only a few models of personalized guns would be available. Another effort to mandate personalized guns comes from the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence. The group orchestrated



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A man demonstrates how to use a LodeStar 9mm smart gun. Smart guns are built to work only for a designated user to help prevent theft, accidental shootings, or other activities by individuals not authorized to use the weapon. (Reuters/Alamy Stock Photo)

over two dozen government lawsuits against gun manufacturers, with many of these lawsuits claiming that gun manufacturers were legally liable for having failed to invent and sell only personalized guns. A key point of division on personalizedgun mandates is whether nongovernment use of firearms for protection is legitimate. Leaders of the Brady Center, including James and Sarah Brady, have affirmed that citizens should not be allowed to own guns for protection. For example, Sarah Brady states, “To me, the only reason for guns in civilian hands is for sporting purposes.” If gun ownership is only for sports, then reliability issues are much less significant. Although the original purpose of the Department of Justice study of personalized guns was to protect police from gun takeaways, political efforts to ban the sale of

nonpersonalized guns (except to government purchasers) are predicated on reducing gun accidents by unauthorized users, especially children. Some opponents of personalizedgun mandates argue that the mandates would actually cause an increase in gun accidents. They point out that firearm safety instructors train students to treat all guns as if they were loaded and never to rely upon someone else’s assertion that the gun is unloaded. Even after the students check the weapons themselves and are certain that the guns are empty, they must still treat the guns as if they were loaded. The proper and safe way to handle a gun is to always point the gun in a safe direction, check to make sure there is no round in the chamber, and never place a finger on the trigger until the shooter is ready to fire. Personalized-gun mandates, it is suggested, might encourage people to violate

794 | Smith & Wesson (S&W)

these safety rules, as people might rely on the gun’s technology instead. For example, if a person were not wearing the special gun ring, he or she might feel free to point a gun at someone for a joke and press the trigger, as the gun would not fire without the ring. Safety advocates argue that people who rely on gun-personalization technology might use their habits of unsafe gunplay even when they encounter guns without personalization technology. The Violence Policy Center (VPC), a firearm-prohibition group, offers a related critique. The VPC worries that smart guns will encourage inexperienced people who do not currently own guns to become gun owners. The VPC is concerned that these neophytes might be especially prone to handle guns unsafely. The VPC also argues that the proliferation of personalized guns would encourage people to leave loaded guns within easy reach of small children—as the personalization technology would, theoretically, prevent the child from using the gun. Further, the VPC predicts that to the extent that current gun owners replace existing guns with personalized guns, the common pattern would be to replace a six-shot revolver with a tenshot self-loading pistol, thus increasing firepower in the home. The VPC also points out that most gun misuse (such as suicides, homicides, and hunting accidents) involves an authorized user of the gun and that fatal accidents involving children under fifteen are a very small part of total gun fatalities. For stolen guns, a thief could eventually defeat the personalization technology— such as by destroying the computer chip by baking the gun in an oven. “Chip twigglies” is the name that gun manufacturers give to gun owner efforts to defeat personalization. Chip twigglies could be perpetrated not only by thieves but also (in the case of a ban on all guns except personalized guns) by

legitimate consumers who were concerned that the personalized gun would not be quick and reliable in an emergency. The greater the efforts that manufacturers undertake to prevent chip twigglies, the less acceptable the gun becomes to police, who (according to Sandia) insist that the gun be usable in case the personalization technology malfunctions or breaks. In sum, the smart-gun issue is couched in terms of cutting-edge technology, but the debate really involves two of the oldest issues in the gun control debate: the desirability of gun prohibition and the legitimacy of defensive gun ownership. David B. Kopel See also: Brady Legal; Brady: United against Gun Violence; Center for Gun Policy and Research; Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; Trigger Locks; Violence Policy Center (VPC)

Further Reading Leonardatos, Cynthia, Paul H. Blackman, and David B. Kopel. “Smart Guns/Foolish Legislators.” Connecticut Law Review 34 (2002): 157–219. Robinson, Krista D., Stephen P. Teret, Jon S. Vernick, and Daniel W. Webster. Personalized Guns: Reducing Gun Deaths through Design Changes. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, September 1998. Wayne, Leslie. “‘Smart’ Guns Prove to be No Quick Fix for Firearm Violence.” New York Times, June 15, 1999, A24. Weiss, Douglas R. Smart Gun Technology Project: Final Report. Washington, DC: National Institute of Justice, 1996.

Smith & Wesson (S&W) Smith & Wesson (S&W) is one of the largest handgun manufacturers in the world and



the largest in the United States. Founded in the midnineteenth century in the “Gun Valley” of western Massachusetts and Connecticut, S&W is one of the best known of the more-established American firearm manufacturers. S&W has produced many innovative and well-known weapons, including the .38 Military and Police revolver, the K-22 Outdoorsman for competitive target shooting, the .357 and .44 Magnum revolvers, and the first Americanmade 9-mm semiautomatic pistol. The company was purchased by Saf-T-Hammer in 2001 and changed its name to Smith & Wesson Holding Corporation in 2002. On March 17, 2000, S&W reached an important settlement agreement with the federal government, Connecticut and New York, and several cities and counties. The agreement required important changes in the design and distribution of S&W firearms in return for settling lawsuits against the company. After its purchase by the American firearm-safety-and-security corporation Saf-T-Hammer in May 2001, and under heavy pressure from gun rights groups and other gun manufacturers, S&W withdrew from the settlement, except for one with Boston. Ownership of S&W has changed hands at least five times, but in light of the settlement agreement, the Saf-T-Hammer purchase was especially noteworthy. Saf-THammer, which bought S&W from the British firm Tomkins PLC, which had owned it since 1987, produces safety devices that prevent unauthorized gun use and unintentional firearm accidents and planned to incorporate their products into S&W handguns. Gun laws have significantly affected the company and its products. The 1994 Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act banned pistol magazines that held more than 10 rounds. This led to increased sales of S&W revolvers, and the company created

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new 7- and 10-shot revolvers to meet increasing demand for higher-capacity revolvers. As more states passed laws allowing people to carry concealed firearms, S&W responded to that trend by coming out with new compact handguns. Of course, S&W was not the only firm making smaller, more concealable, yet very powerful “pocket rocket” handguns. The origins of S&W date back to 1852, when Horace Smith, Daniel B. Wesson, and Courtlandt Palmer formed a partnership. The partners acquired and improved a patent for a repeating rifle and began manufacturing the Volcanic Rifle and Volcanic Pistol in Norwich, Connecticut. However, this company did not endure. The three partners soon sold the company to a group of investors headed by Oliver Fisher Winchester. In 1857, Winchester took complete control of the company, called the Volcanic Repeating Arms Company, and moved it to New Haven and renamed it the New Haven Arms Company. The firm ultimately became the famous Winchester Repeating Arms Company. After selling the company, Smith returned to his hometown of Springfield, Massachusetts. Wesson stayed on to work for Winchester at the Volcanic Repeating Arms Company. While working at that company, Wesson designed a small revolver that fired a cartridge that he and Smith had patented in 1854. They reformed their partnership in 1856 as the Smith and Wesson Arms Company. According to the company, “their ideas moved firearm manufacturing out of the muzzle loading era that dominated the industry since the invention of the hand cannon in the 14th century” (Smith & Wesson 2002). S&W set up their manufacturing facility in Springfield to produce the new rimfire cartridge and the new revolver. The cartridge, originally called the Number One Cartridge,

796 | Smith & Wesson Settlement Agreement

and the revolver, the Model 1, became popular and sold well. By 1859, S&W had to build a new factory to accommodate the increasing demand for their products. They also continued to improve their line of weapons and, in 1861, introduced the Model 2 revolver. The Model 1 had fired a .22-caliber rimfire cartridge, but the larger Model 2 fired a .32 rimfire cartridge. The company prospered because of the heightened demand for its weapons in the Civil War. When S&W went through difficult times in the postwar depression, the company began to look toward Europe for sales of its weapons. S&W introduced a new, larger .44 revolver called the Model 3, which was extremely popular. In 1871, the Russian government ordered 20,000 of the weapons. Also in 1871, Smith sold his share of the company to Daniel Wesson. In the 1880s, the company kept growing and brought out its first double-action revolvers. The .38 Military and Police revolver, which the company sees as its most famous weapon, came out in 1899, and in 1908, S&W followed up with a new, large revolver, the .44 S&W Special. World Wars I and II also led to boom times for the company. Between the wars, the company introduced the K-22 Outdoorsman and .357 Magnum firearms. The Model 29 .44 Magnum, famous from television shows and movies, was introduced in the 1950s. S&W continued to introduce innovative weapons while changing ownership several times. Although S&W’s reputation for quality suffered during the 1980s, that began to turn around after Tomkins purchased it in 1987 and continued to improve after the purchase by Saf-T-Hammer. Walter F. Carroll See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and

Explosives (ATF); Civil War and Small Arms; Colt, Samuel; Concealed Weapons Laws; Consumer Product Safety Laws; Firearms Industry; Handguns; Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; Miniguns; Product Liability Lawsuits; Ruger, William Batterman; Smart Guns; Smith & Wesson Settlement Agreement; Winchester, Oliver Fisher

Further Reading Diaz, Tom. Making a Killing: The Business of Guns in America. New York: New Press, 1999. Jinks, Roy G. History of Smith and Wesson: No Thing of Importance Will Come without Effort. North Hollywood, CA: Beinfeld Publishing, 1977. Smith & Wesson. “Smith and Wesson History.” https://www.smith-wesson.com/our story (accessed December 1, 2021).

Smith v. Bryco Arms. See Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers Smith & Wesson Settlement Agreement On March 17, 2000, President Bill Clinton announced that a settlement agreement had been reached between leading gun manufacturer Smith & Wesson, the federal government, the states of New York and Connecticut, and several large cities and counties. Under this agreement, Smith & Wesson would implement important changes in the design and distribution of its guns in return for the dismissal of lawsuits brought by the settling municipalities and protection from future lawsuits by the federal government and the signatory states. Though the settlement was heralded as a landmark in the effort to reform gun industry practices, it faced fierce opposition by



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the National Rifle Association (NRA) and other gun manufacturers and sellers. As a result, the agreement’s terms were never implemented and Smith & Wesson remained a defendant in all but one of the municipal lawsuits. By agreeing to implement specific safety features in their guns, however, Smith & Wesson undercut the gun industry’s traditional position that gun manufacturers have neither the ability nor the responsibility to design guns to reduce the risk of misuse by children or irresponsible adults. The promised design changes included: (1) all Smith & Wesson guns would have internal locking systems within two years of the agreement; (2) all new gun designs would incorporate authorized-user technology within three years of the agreement, with Smith & Wesson agreeing to spend 2 percent of its revenues to develop the technology; (3) all pistols would have chamber-loaded indicators within one year of the agreement; (4) within one year, all guns would have child safety devices so they cannot be fired by a young child; (5) second “hidden” serial numbers must be used on all guns to prevent criminals from obliterating serial numbers to prevent detection; and (6) stringent new warnings about the danger of improper storage and handling must accompany all guns within six months. By agreeing to reform its distribution methods, Smith & Wesson also undercut previous gun industry arguments that manufacturers have neither the ability nor the responsibility to alter their sales and distribution practices to prevent criminals, juveniles, and other high-risk persons from obtaining guns. In the agreement, the company promised to sell its guns only through authorized dealers and distributors who, in turn, will abide by a host of new restrictions

that go beyond current legal requirements. The new restrictions include the following: (1) dealers would make no sales at gun shows unless all sales at a gun show are accompanied by a background check, regardless of how long it takes to complete the check; (2) dealers would make no sales to anyone who has not passed a certified firearm safety course or exam; (3) employees of Smith & Wesson dealers must first attend annual training and pass a comprehensive exam on how to recognize suspect sales and promote safe handling and storage; (4) dealers will be terminated if they sell a disproportionate number of guns used in crime; and (5) dealers will implement minimum security procedures to prevent gun thefts. The agreement also contemplated creation of an Oversight Commission to enforce its terms, consisting of representatives of the municipalities, the states, the manufacturers, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. It also provided that the parties would enter the agreement as an enforceable consent decree in various courts in which lawsuits were pending. Gun manufacturers, the industry trade association, and the NRA reacted to the agreement with outrage, denouncing it as a betrayal of Second Amendment rights and a surrender to those pursuing legal action against the industry. A boycott of Smith & Wesson hurt the company’s sales and profits. Shortly after this adverse reaction was reported in the press, several states and the Federal Trade Commission began an investigation into possible antitrust violations arising from the boycott activity. Whereas the agreement contemplated other manufacturer signatories, none joined. Boston was the only city to have entered a consent decree with Smith & Wesson and dismissed the company from its lawsuit.

798 | Soto et al. v. Bushmaster Firearms International, LLC et al.

The dismissal was based on a separate December 2000 agreement between Boston and the company that modified some of the more stringent terms of the March 17 agreement. Because Smith & Wesson did not finalize consent decrees with any other signatories to the original agreement, it remained a defendant in every other city and county lawsuit. Although the Smith & Wesson agreement was never implemented as originally drafted, it stands as a model of what responsible gun manufacturers can do, beyond the dictates of the law, to curb gun violence. Dennis A. Henigan See also: Gun Control; Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; Legal Action Project (LAP)

Further Reading Henigan, Dennis A. Lethal Logic: Exploding the Myths that Paralyze American Gun Policy. Dulles, VA: Potomac Books, 2009. Snyder, Jeff. “What No One Bothered to Tell You about the Smith & Wesson Settlement.” American Handgunner (July–August 2000): 23–27.

Soldier of Fortune. See Periodicals, Guns

Soto et al. v. Bushmaster Firearms International, LLC et al. (2019) Soto et al. v. Bushmaster Firearms International, LLC et al. is a significant legal decision because it provides a possible avenue for suing gun manufacturers despite the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA) (Barbaro 2019; Frieman and Langer 2019). The PLCAA is a federal statute passed in 2005 in response to a civil suit from survivors of the D.C. Sniper incident.

It protects gun manufacturers from civil liability in cases where a crime is committed using one of their firearms. However, there are a few exceptions, and Soto takes advantage of those exceptions. In Soto, the parents of children killed at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut, on December 14, 2012, sued Bushmaster and the store that sold the firearm used in the shooting, an AR-15. The parents brought two claims under Connecticut’s wrongfuldeath statute: negligent entrustment (that is, the defendants negligently entrusted the shooter with an AR-15) and predicate exemption. The Connecticut Supreme Court struck down the negligent entrustment claim but upheld predicate exemption. Predicate exemption allows an individual to sue a gun manufacturer if the sale of a firearm violated any law in the state in which it was sold (Barbaro 2019). In this case, the parents argued that Bushmaster used marketing strategies that violated the Connecticut Unfair Trade Practices Act (CUTPA), which allows “any person who suffers a measurable loss of money or property as a result of an unfair or deceptive act prohibited by CUTPA may bring an action to recover that loss” (Conn. Dep’t of Consumer Prot.; Frieman and Langer 2019). The parents alleged that Bushmaster used marketing strategies that painted the AR-15 in an overly militaristic light, rather than for self-defense, hunting, or other legitimate uses of firearms for citizens. This decision puts gun control laws into a state of flux by creating an opening in the otherwise impenetrable PLCAA. Remington submitted a writ of certiorari to the U.S. Supreme Court seeking relief from the Connecticut Supreme Court’s decision (Remington v. Soto), which was subsequently denied in November 2019. In February 2022, the Sandy Hook families settled with



Remington for an unprecedented $73 million, though the firearms manufacturer admitted no liability under the agreement. Legal scholars suggest that the case’s outcome can pave the way for future litigation against the PLCAA (Spitzer 2022). Osvaldo Rodriguez See also: Assault Weapons; SAFE Act of 2013; Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting; Sandy Hook Promise; Semiautomatic Weapons

Further Reading Barbaro, Michael. “Can Gun Makers Be Held Accountable for Mass Shootings?” New York Times, July 12, 2019. https://www .nytimes.com/2019/07/12/podcasts/the-daily /sandy-hook-gun-lawsuit-nra.html?show Transcript=1 (accessed August 5, 2019). Connecticut State Department of Consumer Protection. https://portal.ct.gov/DCP/Trade -Practices-Division/About-the-Connecti cut-Unfair-Trade-Practices-Act-CUTPA (accessed September 30, 2019). Feldman, Heidi Li. “Why the Latest Ruling in the Sandy Hook Shooting Litigation Matters.” Harvard Law Review (Blog), March 18, 2019. https://blog.harvardlawreview .org/why-the-latest-ruling-in-the-sandy-hook -shooting-litigation-matters/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Langer, Bob and Jonathan Freiman. “‘Soto v. Bushmaster’ Ruling Has Deeper Implications for CT Trade Law.” 2019. https:// www.law.com/ctlawtribune/2019/03/20 /soto-v-bushmaster-ruling-has-deeper -implications-on-ct-trade-law/ (accessed August 5, 2019). Rojas, Rick and Kristin Hussey. “How Sandy Hook Families Hope to Pierce the Gun Industry’s Legal Shield.” New York Times, April 8, 2019. https://www.nytimes.com /2019/04/08/nyregion/sandy-hook-gun-law suit.html (accessed August 5, 2019). Spitzer, Robert. The Sandy Hook-Remington Settlement: Consequences for Gun Policy.

South (U.S.) and Gun Violence | 799 Albany, NY: Regional Gun Violence Research Consortium and Rockefeller Institute of Government, 2022. https:// rockinst.org/blog/the-sandy-hook-reming ton-settlement-consequences-for-gun-pol icy/ (accessed June 14, 2022).

South (U.S.) and Gun Violence The linkage of southerners, especially white southerners, to violence and guns is well established in both elite and popular culture. Before the Civil War, critics of dueling, the Mexican War, and slavery all focused on southern violence as a serious component of these issues. While the war was in progress and during Reconstruction, purported and real atrocities were cited for political purposes and were prominently featured in the media of the victorious North. During the 1960s and early 1970s, some scholars created the “Southern violence construct” that indicted the South as a particularly violent region. To the present, scholars, popular culture sources, and the news media continue to portray the South as an unusually violent milieu. In particular, the continuing affirmation—and, indeed, occasional celebration—of Confederate heritage by many southern whites is especially baffling and problematic to northern academics, intellectuals, and media observers. When linked with unapologetic gun ownership and carriage, southern “exceptionalism” may be even more troubling to many outside the region. Historically, more southerners than northeasterners have owned and carried guns; and southern carriage rates are also higher than rates in the Midwest and Far West (Smith 2001). As guns and gun owners have been stigmatized in media accounts of American life, the South, as a region of

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high gun ownership that possesses other problematic emblems of ethnic identity (e.g., the Confederate flag, memorial statuary, state holidays), has found itself labeled as a region of enemy deviance, the locus of a particularly violent regional “gun culture.” This concept is not without its critics, some of whom point out that high gunownership patterns found among a given group or subculture does not make members of that group predisposed to violence. Most guns in the South are rifles or shotguns used for hunting or other sports. In addition, historically, many gun owners in the South live in small towns and rural areas, whereas most gun violence is an urban product. Critics of the traditional antisouthern view point to the highly politicized subtext that underlies the southern violence construct: that the victors, in wars both violent and symbolic, write the history. Among the many stereotypically violent tableaux of the South is one that places dueling pistols frequently in the hands of the southern elite. Though formal dueling was not unknown in southern life in the antebellum period, it was not widely practiced and almost entirely disappeared shortly following the Civil War. The fact that the most infamous duel in U.S. history took place in New Jersey and was fought among two New Yorkers, Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton, is hardly acknowledged due to the currency of the southern violence construct. In the contemporary South, many gun owners carry small arms for protection, and more liberalized handgun-carry laws have formalized this arrangement. (All eleven states of the former Confederacy have liberal handgun right-to-carry laws, as do many other nonsouthern states.) Handguns are increasingly found in purses, briefcases, and in the glove compartments and trunks

of many cars and trucks in the South—and elsewhere. Ownership and legal carrying is higher among white male professionals (though ownership and carrying is growing among females), but this seems highly localized within pockets in the region. Smallerbore weapons carried in the early part of the 1900s have given way to largerdiameter rounds or larger-capacity magazines: the 9 mm pistol is especially popular. For many southerners, firearms serve as critical signifiers of southern identity and as symbols of group membership. These individuals often display and revere family weapons reputed to be relics of “the War.” These weapons serve in a very real sense as totemic linkages to a rural idyll, the mythic past of “moonlight and magnolias.” The weapons are also reminders of the chaos, violence, and hand-to-mouth existence that marked the post–Civil War era. Traditionally, a certain progression in firearm ownership and use found among rural males in the United States has been especially marked in the South: a BB gun early on, a .22 in late childhood, a shotgun in early adolescence, and a deer rifle as a symbol of accession to adult status. The fact that firearms figure prominently in informal rites of passage for rurally oriented male southerners explains much of the underlying rationale for the fierce resistance to gun control demonstrated by many within the region. Francis Frederick Hawley See also: Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime; Dueling; Gun Culture; Gun Ownership; Hunting

Further Reading Hackney, Sheldon. “Southern Violence.” American Historical Review 74 (1969): 906–25.



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Hawley, Fred. “Guns.” In The Encyclopedia of Southern Culture, edited by C. R. Wilson and W. Ferris, 1480–82. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1989. Horwitz, Tony. Confederates in the Attic: Dispatches from the Unfinished Civil War. New York: Vintage, 1999. Smith, Tom W. 2001 National Gun Policy Survey of the National Opinion Research Center: Research Findings. Chicago: National Opinion Research Center, 2001. Yamane, David. “The Sociology of U.S. Gun Culture.” Sociology Compass 2017 https:// doi.org/10.1111/soc4.12497.

Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers’ Institute (SAAMI) The Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers’ Institute (SAAMI—pronounced “Sammie”) is a trade association of America’s leading firearms and ammunition manufacturers. SAAMI creates voluntary industry standards for firearm, ammunition, and accessory quality. SAAMI was founded in 1926 at the suggestion of the U.S. government. The military, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and state and local law enforcement often mandate that firearm or ammunition procurement contracts must comply with SAAMI standards. Among the hundreds of standards that SAAMI has developed are industry testmethods (to ensure that firearms and their parts will perform properly) and ammunitionperformance standards. A gunpowder performance standard might specify that a particular grade of gunpowder would burn within a certain temperature range under certain conditions and would not ignite under other conditions. The American National Standards Institute (ANSI) oversees standards development

in a wide variety of industries. The ANSI has selected SAAMI as an accredited standards developer for firearm products. Hence, SAAMI’s standards are reviewed by the ANSI. As required by the ANSI, SAAMI standards are developed by consensus. A proposed standard would typically be circulated to SAAMI members, firearm companies that do not belong to SAAMI, government agencies such as the FBI or the U.S. Customs Service, and scientific groups such as the National Institute of Standards and Technology. After receiving input from the various organizations, SAAMI’s Technical Committee determines the proper standard. In cases of disagreement, a party can appeal to the ANSI. Every five years, all standards are reviewed and revised when appropriate. SAAMI works with the Commission Internationale Permanente (CIP) in Europe to make U.S. and European standards more compatible. SAAMI’s Logistics and Regulatory Affairs Committee (SLARAC) works with government agencies such as the Departments of Commerce, State, Transportation, Labor, Homeland Security, and Justice (which includes the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives); their foreign counterparts; and the United Nations Committee of Experts on the Transportation of Dangerous Goods. With these groups, SLARAC helps develop standards for the safe transportation and distribution of firearms, ammunition, and gunpowder. Other SAAMI programs include online publication of product manuals from firearms manufacturers as well as publications and video on safety issues. A Legal and Legislative Affairs Committee monitors federal and state legislation and regulation, particularly in regard to firearms and ammunition design and safety.

802 | Sporting Purposes Test (SPT)

SAAMI has been accredited by the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) as a nongovernmental organization (NGO) with consultative status. As such, SAAMI participates in UN discussions on firearms policy and provides technical information. SAAMI currently has twenty-eight voting and associate members, including ammunition manufacturers, gunpowder manufacturers, handgun manufacturers, and long gun manufacturers. SAAMI is affiliated with the National Shooting Sports Foundation. David B. Kopel See also: Firearms Industry

Further Reading Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufac­ turers’ Institute. http://www.saami.org/ (accessed August 25, 2020).

Sporting Purposes Test (SPT) The sporting purposes test (SPT) in American gun law aims to distinguish firearms that are “particularly suitable” for sporting purposes from those that are not. The salient purpose of this discrimination has been to ban or otherwise impose special restrictions on guns that do not pass the SPT. As Harvard University’s Deborah Prothrow-Stith put it, “If I had my way, guns for sport would be registered, and all other guns would be banned” (as quoted in Kates, Schaffer, and Waters 1997). The SPT has been especially relevant to laws regarding so-called Saturday night specials, military rifles, and semiautomatic assault weapons. In the United States, the rationale is found in the legislative history of the test. Zelman and Stevens (2001) document what the SPT

and its rationale derive from European models. Sporting purpose first became a factor in gun control policy following World War I in Europe when governments prohibited civilian ownership of military firearms in both Weimar and Nazi Germany and other European regimes. Following the Bolshevik Revolution and World War I, one impetus for restricting civilian access to military firearms was to ensure a government monopoly on effective armed force to oppose emergent and potentially violent dissidents (Munday 1992). But even in the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany, hunting rifles and shotguns were allowed to approved civilians. The ostensible rationale for the privileged exemption of sporting arms even in these totalitarian regimes was to accommodate certain political constituencies and economic interests, namely hunters and sport shooters, and the economic enterprises that depended on them (Phillips 1993). More recently, when the European Union (EU) debated bans on civilian firearms and cross-border firearm transport, sporting guns were spared to protect the economic interest of multibillion-dollar commerce. Arms manufacturers in Europe employ tens of thousands of people; for millions within the EU, shooting is a major recreation. Even in Britain, shooting (targets or game) is the most popular participatory sport after fishing (Phillips 1993). Hunting is also popular in the United States and raises significant monies for government and local economies. For example, the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation (2021) notes that hunters inject more than $55 billion into the national economy each year. Hunting also helps to create more than 850,000 jobs annually. According to the 1994 federal Public Safety and Recreational Firearms Use Protection



Act, “assault weapons” are semiautomatic pistols, rifles, and shotguns that have two or more items from a list of certain external features (e.g., a bayonet lug, a folding stock, a grip on a certain part of a rifle) and which can accept detachable ammunition magazines. The act prohibits the future manufacture (but not possession or sale) of about 200 models of firearms. An appendix of the act specifically lists about 800 types of firearms (consisting only of rifles and shotguns, not handguns) that are not banned. (Thousands of other types of firearms are neither specifically protected in the appendix, nor banned by the statutory language.) The definition does not involve the gun’s rate of fire or the power of its ammunition. Some guns that are banned by the act are identical in firepower (and nearly identical in internal operation) to guns that are specifically listed as “sporting” guns. Thus, the sporting purposes “test” in the 1994 federal Assault Weapons Ban is more of a conclusory label than an actual test. Another federal application of the SPT is in the National Firearms Act (NFA) of 1934, which imposes a restrictive registration and taxation system on certain unusual weapons, mainly machine guns. The NFA also applies to “destructive devices” that are defined to include weapons with a bore wider than half an inch—but not “sporting” weapons: “The term ‘destructive device’ means . . . any type of weapon (other than a shotgun or a shotgun shell which the Secretary finds is generally recognized as particularly suitable for sporting purposes) . . . which will . . . expel a projectile by the action of an explosive or other propellant, and which has any barrel with a bore of more than one-half inch in diameter.” In 1994, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) reclassified revolver-action shotguns

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(which hold 12 rounds in their cylinders) as NFA-restricted “destructive devices.” The most important application of the SPT, however, is in the federal Gun Control Act (GCA) of 1968, which bans (with some minor exceptions) the import for civilian sale of firearms that do not meet the SPT: “The Secretary [of the Treasury] shall authorize a firearm or ammunition to be imported or brought into the United States or any possession thereof if the firearm or ammunition . . . (3) is of a type that . . . is generally recognized as particularly suitable for or readily adaptable to sporting purposes” (18 U.S.C. § 925(d)). The GCA’s phrase “or readily adaptable to sporting purposes” was added by the Firearms Owners’ Protection Act of 1986. The “readily adaptable to” element tends to be ignored by gun-law enforcers and gun control advocates, since almost every firearm can pass under this standard. Thus, the basic terms of the sporting purposes test are three: (1) generally recognized as (2) particularly suitable for (3) sporting purposes. The terms of the test were deliberately left vague in the GCA to give broad discretion to the secretary of the treasury regarding what foreign-made firearms the ATF could ban or allow for import (Black 1989). In 1989, the Bush administration pressured the ATF to ban the import of various semiautomatic firearms (so-called semiautomatic assault weapons), and in 1997, the Clinton administration pressured the ATF to expand this ban. A problem arose for the SPT in this context insofar as “sporting purposes” included hunting and target shooting. Semiautomatic assault weapons (SAWs), as well as semiautomatic rifles and shotguns functionally equivalent to SAWs, are used in hunting. The gun owner simply uses a small-capacity

804 | Sporting Purposes Test (SPT)

magazine (typically, three or five rounds) to comply with state hunting laws. The guns may be “sporterized” by the addition of scopes or other hunting paraphernalia. The sport of target shooting includes competitions such as combat skeet (using shotguns that are classified as SAWs). The venerable National Championship Matches at Camp Perry—the apex of world-class target shooting—include contests in which the use of military rifles has been mandated by Congress since the turn of the century. (This is similar to the shooting festivals, or Schuetzenfesten, of the Swiss citizen militia that mandate the use of actual military automatic assault rifles.) Semiautomatic pistols are used in almost every form of target shooting—including a wide variety of “practical” or “tactical” competitions organized under the auspices of the International Defensive Pistol Association, the United States Practical Shooting Association, the International Practical Shooting Confederation, and the National Tactical Invitational. These competitions in what is generically called combat weaponcraft (Covey 1994) are devised to test and improve defensive shooting skills, decisionmaking skills (such as when not to shoot), and other tactical threat-management skills in which marksmanship is only one element and in which firearms particularly suitable for combat are de rigueur. These more dynamic and tactically demanding competitions go beyond static precision marksmanship. Interestingly, combat-relevant shooting competitions using military- and combat-suitable firearms are the historical progenitors of (and therefore enjoy a longer tradition than) “pure” target shooting in both Europe and the United States (Munday 1988). SAWs, therefore, appear to satisfy the three basic terms of the sporting purposes

test. Because they are particularly suitable for defensive combat purposes, they are particularly suitable for the sporting purposes described above, and they are generally recognized as such by virtue of the popularity and governance of these sports under well-established national and international organizations. This problem was expressly addressed in the legislative and regulatory history of the sporting purposes test. The report of the ATF’s 1989 Working Group on the Importability of Certain Semiautomatic Rifles sought to explicate the legislative intent behind the spare and vague statutory language of the SPT in the GCA: The mere fact that a military firearm may be used in a sporting event does not make it a sporting firearm. . . . While the legislative history suggests that the term “sporting purposes” refers to the traditional sports of target shooting, trap and skeet shooting, and hunting, the statute itself provides no criteria beyond the “generally recognized” language of section 925(d)(3). . . . The broadest interpretation could take in virtually any lawful activity or competition which any person or groups of persons might undertake. Under this interpretation, any rifle could meet the “sporting purposes” test. A narrower interpretation which focuses on the traditional sports of hunting and organized marksmanship competition would result in a more selective importation process. . . . A broad interpretation which permits virtually any firearm to be imported because someone may wish to use it in some lawful shooting activity would render the statute meaningless. (Black 1989, 10; emphasis added)

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In particular, the ATF Working Group cited an early application of the SPT; the 1968 Firearms Evaluation Panel decided that the GCA’s SPT did not include the recreation of plinking—which was defined as “shooting at randomly selected targets such as bottles and cans.” The 1989 ATF report explained: “It was the Panel’s view that ‘while many persons participated in this type of activity and much ammunition was expended in such endeavors, it was primarily a pastime and could not be considered a sport for the purposes of importation” (Black 1989, 10; emphasis added). The ATF Working Group also cited the Congressional Record to refine the qualifiers “particularly suitable” for “sporting purposes” according to legislative intent: Although a firearm might be recognized as “suitable” for use in traditional sports, it would not meet the statutory criteria unless it were recognized as particularly suitable for such use. Indeed, Senator [Thomas] Dodd [the principal drafter of the GCA] made clear that the intent of the legislation was to “[regulate] the importation of firearms by excluding surplus military handguns; and rifles and shotguns that are not truly suitable for sporting purposes.” Mr. HANSEN: If I understand the Senator correctly, he said that despite the fact that a military weapon may be used in a sporting event, it did not, by that action become a sporting rifle. Is that correct? Mr. DODD: That would seem right to me. . . . As I said previously the language says [sic] no firearms will be admitted into this country unless they are genuine sporting weapons. . . . I think the Senator and I know what a genuine sporting gun is.” (114 Cong. Rec. 27461–62 [1968]; emphasis added)

In other words, Senator Dodd felt that he knew what a sporting gun was, even though he could not define it. The ATF thus imposed additional qualifications for sporting purposes and sporting firearms, namely: the traditional (as distinct from merely lawful, popular, and organized) shooting sports of target shooting, trapshooting and skeet, and hunting; and genuine sporting guns, which were those “truly suitable” for just these sports. The final factor in the ATF’s appraisal of particular suitability for the traditional sports of hunting and marksmanship competition was whether a gun was “generally recognized” as such by firearm sports and industry experts. The ATF decided, in effect, that a potentially banned gun had to be considered superior for sporting purposes, with no good substitutes: “[One] editor stated that semiautomatic rifles had certain advantages over conventional [boltand lever-action] sporting rifles especially for the physically disabled and left-handed shooters. While this may be true, there appears to be no advantage to using a semiautomatic assault rifle as opposed to a semiautomatic sporting rifle” (Black 1989, 13–14; emphasis added). The Congressional Research Service report “Assault Weapons”: Military-Style Semiautomatic Firearms Facts and Issues found the ATF interpretation of the SPT arguably too narrow: The assertion by ATF that “some evidence” of lawful use should not control the decision to import is arguable. According to the only court ruling that directly addressed the import ban, the statute’s use of the phrase “generally recognized” suggests a community standard which may change over time even though the firearm remains the same. [Note:

806 | Sporting Purposes Test (SPT)

This is a reference to Gun South, Inc. v. Brady (877 F.2d 866, (11th Cir. 1989)).] While this [1989 import ban] ruling, and the ATF findings on the particular unsuitability of these firearms for lawful purposes, appears to control at present, the development of a different “community standard” could arguably provide grounds for general acceptance of these firearms in the future. (Bea 1992, 14) For example, general recognition by both experts and the shooting public of the particular suitability of handguns for various sporting purposes grew markedly in the mid-1970s. Before the 1970s, no magazines were devoted to handguns, but now there are many such magazines, as diverse handgun sports have gained in popularity and organization. These include the traditional sports of hunting and organized marksmanship competition, and the aforementioned competitions in combat weaponry under the auspices of national and international organizations. Given that virtually all the guns that the ATF wanted to restrict had well-known sporting uses, the ATF and other advocates of bans on SAWs resorted to the term “legitimate sporting purposes”—implying, for example, that some forms of organized target competition were “legitimate” (e.g., with bolt-action rifles), but others were not (e.g., with semiautomatic rifles). A crucial difficulty for the concept of “legitimate” sporting purposes is that the GCA of 1968 provides no grounds for privileging the sports favored by its drafters over newer combat-relevant competitions that have long since become both popular and highly organized. Both the new rhetoric of “legitimate” sporting purposes and the GCA’s legislative intent beg the question of justification: What justifies privileging firearms particularly

suitable for certain sports while discriminating against others? Training or competition in combat weaponry (by oneself or with others) is a sport in any common sense of the term in which any other martial art—or fishing, hunting, and target shooting (pursued by oneself or with others)—are sports. It is a “legitimate” sport, as legitimate as hunting or pure target shooting, insofar as it is well institutionalized and pursued safely and lawfully. Purposes served by hunting include the pleasures it affords, its bounty, and sometimes basic sustenance. Purposes served by pure target shooting include the pleasures it affords and enhancement of marksmanship skills, sometimes for their own sake, sometimes for the further purpose of hunting. The purposes served by combat-weaponry training and competition include the pleasures they afford and the enhancement of a panoply of skills requisite to the safe, effective, and lawful defense of innocent life. Preston K. Covey See also: Assault Weapons; Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Crime and Gun Use; Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Gun Control Act of 1968; Gun Ownership; Hunting; Lethality Effect of Guns; Recreational Uses of Guns; RobertiRoos Assault Weapons Control Act of 1989; Saturday Night Specials; Substitution Effects; Tactical Training; Target Shooting

Further Reading Bea, Keith. “Assault Weapons”: MilitaryStyle Semiautomatic Firearms Facts and Issues. Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, 1992. Black, Daniel R. Report and Recommendation of the ATF Working Group on the Importability of Certain Semiautomatic Rifles. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of the Treasury, 1989.

Habluetzel, Spencer. “Is Your Shotgun Sporting?” Oklahoma City University Law Review 38, no. 3 (2013): 395–432. “Hunting Is Conservation—The Economy of Wild Game.” Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, September 30, 2021. https://www .rmef.org/elk-network/hunting-is-conser vat ion - t h e - e c onomy- of-w i ld -g a me / (accessed May 18, 2022). Kates, Don B., Jr., Henry E. Schaffer, and William C. Waters IV. “How the CDC Succumbed to the Gun ‘Epidemic.’” Reason (April 1997): 24–29. http://reason.com /archives/1997/04/01/public-health-pot -shots (accessed July 25, 2011). Munday, Richard A. I. “Civilian Possession of Military Firearms.” Salisbury Review (March 1988): 45–49. Munday, Richard A. I. “The Monopoly of Power.” Small Arms World Report, June 1992. Phillips, Derek. “Frontiers and Firearms: The Drafting of a European Directive.” CJ Europe: A Criminal Justice Newsletter 3 (1993): 7–14. Springfield, Inc. v. Buckles. 116 F.Supp. 2d 85 (D.D.C. 2000), affirmed by federal D.C. Circuit on June 14, 2002, 292 F.3d 813. Zelman, Aaron S., and Richard Stevens. “Gun Control”: Gateway to Tyranny. Hartford, WI: JPFO Publishing, 2001.

Stand Your Ground Laws. See Castle Doctrine States’ Rights. See Tenth Amendment States United to Prevent Gun Violence States United to Prevent Gun Violence (SUPGV) is a national, nonprofit organization focused on reducing gun deaths and injuries in the United States. Created in 1999 by existing state-level gun violence

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prevention groups, SUPGV’s mission focuses on building the capacity of these state organizations and helping to expand the movement by supporting the creation of additional groups in all fifty states. As a relatively new actor in the gun policy arena, SUPGV has received less public recognition than other national gun control organizations, such as the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, but it shares the same general policy goals. These goals include more extensive background checks for all gun purchases; increased information regarding the dangers of guns, particularly for families with guns in the home; and more comprehensive rules limiting the carrying of firearms in public. SUPGV also argues that the same federal consumer protection safety standards applied to other consumer products should be applied to guns, that the design and distribution of firearms should be federally regulated, and that gun injuries and deaths should be comprehensively tracked. Additionally, SUPGV supports more stringent regulations on gun sellers, banning civilian ownership of military weapons, and limiting handgun purchases to one per month. SUPGV’s primary attention, however, is focused on growing the membership of affiliated states (thirty-three state chapters as of 2022), distributing information on gun control issues, and raising awareness of the policy debates and legislative proposals specific to their respective states. As a statelevel support association, SUPGV has received national media exposure only on rare occasions. After the shooting of Representative Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ, Eighth District) and eighteen others in Tucson, Arizona, on January 8, 2011, SUPGV publically supported the proposed Fix Gun Checks Act of 2011, introduced in the Senate by Charles Schumer (D-NY), and its corresponding bill

808 | Stop Handgun Violence (SHV)

in the House of Representatives introduced by Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY, Fourth District). SUPGV also received national attention for its June 2011 letter to the White House, written with four other gun violence prevention organizations—the Brady Campaign, Violence Policy Center, Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, and Legal Community against Violence—which urged President Barack Obama to focus on strengthening federal gun laws. The impetus for this letter was an internet video from Al-Qaeda encouraging followers to exploit lax gun control laws and use accessible firearms in the United States to conduct terrorist attacks. In an embarrassing episode, the organization received national press coverage in 2008 when it was revealed that SUPGV’s legislative director and board member, Mary Lou McFate, was a spy who had been working for the National Rifle Association (NRA) for over ten years. In this role, McFate gathered information regarding the tactics that SUPGV and other gun violence prevention organizations were using to oppose efforts by President George W. Bush and the NRA to loosen gun laws. Prior to her work for the national organization, McFate was a board member of CeaseFire Pennsylvania, one of SUPGV’s state affiliates. In 2010, States United merged with Freedom States Alliance to form a States United to Prevent Gun Violence 501(c)(3) nonprofit. The States United to Prevent Gun Violence Action Fund, a 501(c)(4) advocacy organization, incorporated in 2014. The two organizations maintain separate boards of directors (although some individuals have served on both boards simultaneously). States United to Prevent Gun Violence continues to be supported through foundation grants, affiliate member dues, and individual donations. Richard Holtzman and Drew Green

See also: Background Checks; Brady: United against Gun Violence; Bush, George W.; Cease Fire, Inc.; Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV); Concealed Weapons Laws; Consumer Product Safety Laws; Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence; Guns in the Home; McCarthy, Carolyn; National Rifle Association (NRA); Obama, Barack; Schumer, Charles E.; Tucson, Arizona, Shooting

Further Reading Johnson, Jenna. “Informant Might Have Stood among Gun Safety Advocates.” Washington Post, September 28, 2008, C1. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn /content/article/2008/09/27/AR200809270 2662.html (accessed January 31, 2022). States United to Prevent Gun Violence. http:// supgv.org/ (accessed January 31, 2022). Violence Policy Center. “Gun Violence Prevention Organizations Call on President Obama to Act to Prevent Terrorist Attacks with Guns in Wake of New Al Qaeda Video Urging Supporters to Exploit Weak U.S. Gun Laws.” June 7, 2011. https://vpc .org/press/press-release-archive/gun-violence -prevention-organizations-call-on-president -obama-to-act-to-prevent-terrorist-attacks -with-guns-in-wake-of-new-al-qaeda-video -urging-supporters-to-exploit-weak-u-s -gun-laws/ (accessed January 31, 2022).

Stolen Guns. See Black Market for Firearms; Felons and Gun Control Stop Handgun Violence (SHV) Stop Handgun Violence (SHV) is a nonprofit, 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to preventing gun violence. The organization aims to prevent gun violence through education, raising public awareness, and encouraging



effective law enforcement and what they see as commonsense gun laws. In 1995, a group of businesspeople, headed by developer John Rosenthal and Robert Kennedy’s son Michael, founded Stop Handgun Violence (SHV) to reduce and prevent gun violence. The founders of the nonprofit, tax-exempt organization included both gun owners and gun violence survivors. They do not argue for banning handguns but take a two-pronged approach to increasing responsibility and accountability among gun owners, dealers, manufacturers, and law enforcement professionals. First, SHV emphasizes education programs to increase public awareness about gun violence. Second, the organization advocates and works to pass legislation to reduce gun violence (Stop Handgun Violence 2011). Headquartered in Newton, Massachusetts, SHV emphasizes the cost of gun violence in the United States, especially among children. On its website, the organization presents a variety of stories and research findings on the costs of gun violence. To increase public awareness of the extent of handgun violence, SHV has developed media and public education campaigns focusing on stories of children who have been handgun victims. The organization’s first public awareness project was a huge tribute wall facing the Massachusetts Turnpike in Boston. This 252-by-20-foot wall, billed by SHV as the world’s largest billboard, represented the children killed by handguns in the United States every day. In addition to photographs of children killed, the wall read: “The cost of handguns keeps going up. 15 kids killed every day.” SHV notes that thanks to the efforts of numerous organizations and agencies—including SHV—the number of children killed daily by handguns had dropped to ten. The billboard is updated periodically. One 2007 update included a fake ransom demand:

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“We have your President and Congress— NRA.” A second education and awareness campaign involved erecting 1,000 billboards around the United States. These billboards also picture children killed by handguns. In addition, SHV has distributed over 7,000 trigger locks to gun owners and is developing gun-violence-prevention curricula for Massachusetts schools. SHV was instrumental in passing the Massachusetts Gun Control Act of 1998. SHV worked with a coalition that included state senator Cheryl Jacques, the Massachusetts Medical Society, the Massachusetts Public Health Association, the Massachusetts Chiefs of Police Association, the mayor of Boston, the attorney general, the Boston Bar Association, and the League of Women Voters to pass the most comprehensive gun-violence-prevention law in the United States. The law requires safe storage, manufacturing standards, background checks by gun dealers, safety training, and effective gun registration. The law also bans assault weapons and cheap “junk guns.” SHV estimates that the law has been instrumental in reducing gun injuries in the state by 50 percent, gun homicide by 56 percent, and gun accidents by 58 percent. SHV holds up the Gun Control Act of 1998 as a model law for other states and works to promote other state and federal legislation to reduce access to guns on the part of children and criminals. SHV founder John Rosenthal is also a founder and the president of the American Hunters and Shooters Association, which supports some restrictions on owning and using guns. He also cofounded Common Sense about Kids and Guns. Walter F. Carroll See also: Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws; Gun Violence as a Public Health

810 | Student Pledge against Gun Violence Problem; Massachusetts Gun Law; Student Pledge against Gun Violence; Youth and Guns

Further Reading Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. Gun Violence: The Real Costs. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Stop Handgun Violence. http://www.stophand gunviolence.org/ (accessed March 14, 2011).

Straw Purchases. See Black Market for Firearms; Felons and Gun Control Student Pledge against Gun Violence The Student Pledge against Gun Violence is linked with the Day of National Concern about Young People and Gun Violence, which was begun in July 1996 by a U.S. Senate resolution. The resolution was sponsored by Bill Bradley (D-NJ), Arlen Specter (R-PA), Paul Wellstone (D-MN), and eighty-one other senators. The pledge reads: “I will never bring a gun to school; I will never use a gun to settle a dispute; I will use my influence with my friends to keep them from using guns to settle disputes. My individual choices and actions, when multiplied by those of young people throughout the country, will make a difference. Together, by honoring this pledge, we can reverse the violence and grow up in safety.” Another wording is available for elementaryage children: “If I see a gun, I won’t touch it. I will remember that any gun I see might be loaded. I know how important it is to keep myself safe.” The wording clearly indicates the circumstances that have brought this pledge to be. The pledge movement has grown in response to widely publicized shooting

incidents involving children and teenagers. The pledge organization claims that 4,000 young people under age nineteen fall victim to gun violence annually. The organizers use gun violence survivors and relatives of shooting victims as spokespeople for the movement. The movement also works with powerful sponsors from the school world, including the American Federation of Teachers, the National Association of Student Councils, and the national PTA. Further supporters include religious, women’s, and medical organizations. The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence has also offered support for the pledge movement. The goal is not only to prevent future acts of gun violence but also to empower students to think about an end to gun violence in their own communities through communal commitment. The pledge is designed not only to make the issue more intimate for each individual through a personal commitment but also to enforce a feeling of togetherness with others around the country giving the same pledge. The pledge is said to have been signed by as many as ten million students since 1996. Tiia Rajala See also: Brady: United against Gun Violence; School Shootings; Youth and Guns

Further Reading Student Pledge against Gun Violence. http:// www.pledge.org/ (accessed January 24, 2022).

Students for Concealed Carry on Campus Established in 2007 after the Virginia Tech shootings the Students for Concealed Carry on Campus (SCCC) is a national organization, which promotes the right under the



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Second Amendment to carry concealed firearms on college and university campuses. The SCCC’s website states that it composed of over 43,000 members. Though its membership is largely student based, it is also open to professors, employees, and all others who are associated with the college/ university culture. The SCCC publicizes that the organization has two main functions. “The first function is to dispel the common myths and misconceptions about concealed carry on college campuses, by making the public aware of the facts” (Students for Concealed Carry on Campus 2020). For example, the organization states that there is a common misconception among the general public that guns allowed on a campus would “lead to an escalation in violent crime.” They provide the statistics that of the colleges which have affirmatively allowed guns to be possessed on campus by licensed gun owners, over the course of one hundred semesters, not a single report of any gun-related violence has been reported. “The second function (of the SCCC) is to push state legislators and school administrators to grant concealed handgun holders the same rights on college campuses that those licensees currently enjoy in most other unsecured locations” (Students for Concealed Carry on Campus 2020). The organization’s efforts to support concealed carry has been met with success as it claims that there is a shift in campus concealed carry as approximately eleven states expressly permit licensed carry on campuses, twenty-three states permit the schools to make their own rules, and sixteen make it a criminal act for anyone, even permitted holders, to possess a firearm on campuses. The SCCC suggests that they have been a part of the legal challenges raised in Ohio and Kentucky to allow permitted

holders to keep their guns in their locked cars. Currently in the United States, handgun licensing is under the jurisdiction of the individual states. As a result, these licensing laws vary greatly from state to state. Some states statutorily ban the possession of guns on the grounds of any educational institution, whereas others defer to the individual education institution to establish its own policies. In most cases the institutions have proactively established policies limiting or completely banning the possession of guns on their grounds. The SCCC’s most notable act has been its “Empty Holster Protest” whereby its members wear empty gun holsters in a coordinated attempt to protest gun licensing bans and to raise awareness. These protests have occurred throughout the United States (Kopel 2009). The SCCC is a largely amateur grassroots organization that is neither affiliated with the NRA nor aligned with any political body (Students for Concealed Carry on Campus 2020). Ron Washburn See also: Colleges and Gun Violence; Virginia Tech Shooting

Further Reading Kopel, David B. “Pretend ‘Gun-Free’ School Zones: A Deadly Legal Fiction.” Connecticut Law Review 42 (2009): 515–84. https:// opencommons.uconn.edu /cgi/viewcon tent.cgi?article=1051&context=law_review (accessed June 16, 2020) Students for Concealed Carry on Campus. 2020. https://concealedcampus.org/ (accessed June 16, 2020).

Sturm, Ruger & Co. v. City of Atlanta. See Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers

812 | Substitution Effects

Submachine Guns. See Automatic Weapons Laws Substitution Effects The so-called substitution effect in the gun control debate is used to justify handgun possession and carrying by those on the pro-gun side of the debate. Most commonly, the issue addressed is the relative benefit to society when one form of human activity is substituted with another form. For example, the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence contends that homicide rates would fall if handgun possession and carrying were severely restricted because weapon users (e.g., criminals) would substitute knives for handguns; as knives are less deadly than handguns, the substitution effect of replacing handguns with knives would be beneficial to society. However, gun rights scholars and writers observe that severe restriction on handguns would motivate weapon users to use long guns (rifles and shotguns), which are more lethal than handguns; thus, the real effect of restricting handguns would be their substitution by long guns that, in the long run, would produce greater harm to society (Kleck 1997). A second use of the concept of substitution effects centers on allowing law-abiding individuals to carry handguns without restriction. Gun rights writers contend that criminals fear a gun-owning/gun-carrying public and thus will substitute criminal activities such as robbery, assault, and homicide—that is, activities that involve interpersonal contact—with such criminal activities as burglary, larceny, and auto theft—that is, crimes that do not involve confrontations with victims. An increase in the risk of an action tends to make people substitute alternative actions that entail

lower risks. It would seem, then, that “shallissue” (or right-to-carry) laws would constitute a policy that deters violent crime, thus saving lives and preventing human misery. However, as discussed below, the net effect of allowing the public to carry concealed firearms remains ambiguous. Conceptually, there are two sides to this version of the substitution effect: those who are protected by shall-issue laws and those who are penalized by them. Advocates for allowing concealed firearms argue that the benefits of such weapons are not limited to those who use them in self-defense. Due to the nature of concealed weapons, the inability of criminals to predict whether potential victims are carrying them may discourage criminals from committing crimes that involve direct contact with victims. Therefore, based on this notion, when a group of people are generally known to be armed, members belonging to the group are more likely to be protected even if any one particular individual is not armed. In the field of economics, such an effect is also known as an external benefit. External benefits of this type will be stronger with the introduction of concealed weapons, as it is harder to identify individuals who carry concealed weapons than it is to identify those who openly carry handguns. Proponents of shall-issue laws argue that allowing the law-abiding public to legally carry concealed weapons will be the most cost-effective way to reduce violent crimes (Lott 2010). Opponents of such laws contend that such laws will increase gun violence (including accidents, suicides, murders, and spur-of-the-moment shootings). The evidence does not clearly support either side. Statistical evidence is also ambiguous, given the complicated nature of variables used in the empirical analyses. The research



of Lott and Mustard (1997) indicates that the aggregation of crime categories (e.g., property and violent) makes it difficult to separate out which crimes might be deterred from increased handgun ownership and consequently identify crimes that may be on the rise as a result of the substitution effect. Using cross-sectional time-series data for U.S. counties from 1977 to 1992, Lott and Mustard found that allowing citizens to carry concealed weapons deters violent crimes; moreover, they failed to find an increase in accidental deaths. On the other hand, consistent with the notion of criminals responding to incentives, they found that criminals are substituting violent crimes with property crimes involving a type of stealth, because the probability of contact between the criminal and the victim is minimal. The largely populated counties where the deterrence effect on violent crimes is greatest are where the substitution effect regarding property crimes is the highest. Lott and Mustard empirically found that the introduction of shall-issue laws resulted in significant reductions in the violent crimes of murder, rape, aggravated assault, and robbery, but it witnessed increases in such property crimes as burglary, larceny, and auto theft. The latter increase is attributed to a substitution effect, suggesting that potential criminals will (at the margin) switch from violent crimes, which have now become more risky to them, to property crimes, in which the probability of encountering an armed victim is much lower (Bartley and Cohen 1998). Comparing these two effects (coupled with a slight increase in accidental gunshots from individuals owning concealed handguns), Lott and Mustard conclude that the social benefits of these laws exceed their costs. However, Dezhbakhsh and Rubin (1998) found that the crime-deterrence effects of

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concealed weapon laws are much smaller than suggested by Lott and Mustard. Moreover, Black and Nagin (1998) reexamined the same data, choosing different sets of controls, and their findings suggest that Lott and Mustard overstated the effects of the right-to-carry laws. In a similar vein, after estimating nearly 20,000 regressions that vary the modeling choices made by Lott and Mustard, Bartley and Cohen failed to find much support for a substitution of property crimes for violent crimes. Rubin and Dezhbakhsh (2003) pointed out that Lott and Mustard (1997) inappropriately modeled the effect of the law using a dummy variable and used an alternative procedure to estimate the effect of concealed handgun laws in 1992 for states that had not yet adopted such laws. Their results show that the expected effect of the law on crime varies across the counties and states and depends on county-specific characteristics in a meaningful way. Such effects appear to be much smaller and mixed than Lott and Mustard suggest and are not crime reducing in most cases. Kovandzic and Marvell (2003) used panel data for fiftyeight Florida counties from 1980 to 2000 to examine the effects on violent crime from increases in the number of people with concealed carry permits, rather than beforeafter dummy and time-trend variables used in prior research. They also find little evidence that increases in the number of citizens with concealed handgun permits reduce or increase rates of violent crime. Although Cook and Ludwig (2000) estimate that gun violence costs the United States approximately $100 billion annually, the extrapolation of the costs and benefits of all forms of gun laws remains controversial. Indeed, the seemingly simple question, “Is the gun/violence relationship causal?”— which lies at the heart of the controversy between the advocates and opponents of gun

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control—cannot be answered with a consensus (Carter 1997). Kovandzic, Marvell, and Vieraitis (2005) use panel data for all U.S. cities with a 1990 population of at least 100,000 for 1980 to 2000 to examine the impact of “shall-issue” concealed handgun laws on violent crime rates. After addressing many of the methodological problems in previous studies, they found no evidence that the laws reduce or increase violent crime. Using state-level data and data for the District of Columbia, Moorhouse and Wanner (2006) estimated both the impact of gun control on crime rates and the influence of crime rates on gun control. Their empirical analysis provides no support for the contention that gun control reduces crime rates. In contrast, the article provides empirical support for the idea that high-crime rates generate political support for tie adoption on more stringent gun controls. Ayres and Donohue (2009) extended the state panel data through 2006. Their findings suggest that right-tocarry laws at the very least increase aggregate assault. More recently, Siegel and colleagues (2019) utilized data for 1991 through 2016 from the Centers for Disease Control on suicide and homicide mortality and the State Firearm Law Database to estimate the relationship between firearm deaths and state laws. Their findings indicated that shall-issue laws were associated with a 9 percent increase in homicide rates. This reflects the complexities of statistical analysis purporting to show substitution effects, and it demonstrates the possibility that inclusion or exclusion of relevant variables, coupled with differing estimation techniques, may generate dramatically differing results. Jongsung Kim See also: Concealed Weapons Laws; Defensive Gun Use (DGU); Gun Control; Hemenway,

David; Intervention Effects; Kleck, Gary; Lott, John R., Jr.; More Guns, Less Crime Thesis; Self-Defense, Reasons for Gun Use

Further Reading Ayres, Ian, and John Donohue III. “More Guns, Less Crime Fails Again: The Latest Evidence from 1977–2006.” Econ Journal Watch 6 (2009): 218–38. http://econjwatch .org/articles/more-guns-less-crime-fails -again-the-latest-evidence-from-1977-2006 (accessed December 23, 2021). Bartley, William Alan, and Mark A. Cohen. “The Effect of Concealed Weapons Laws: An Extreme Bound Analysis.” Economic Inquiry 36 (1998): 258–65. Black, Dan A., and Daniel S. Nagin. “Do Right-to-Carry Laws Deter Violent Crime?” Journal of Legal Studies 27 (1998): 209–19. Carter, Gregg Lee. The Gun Control Movement. New York: Twayne, 1997. Cook, Philip J., and Jens Ludwig. Gun Violence: The Real Costs. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Dezhbakhsh, Hashem, and Paul H. Rubin. “Lives Saved or Lives Lost? The Effects of Concealed-Handgun Laws on Crime.” American Economic Review Papers and Proceedings 88 (1998): 468–74. Kleck, Gary. Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter, 1997. Kovandzic, Tomislav Victor, and Thomas B. Marvell. “Right-to-Carry Concealed Handguns and Violent Crime: Crime Control through Gun Decontrol.” Criminology and Public Policy 2 (2003): 363–96. Kovandzic, Tomislav Victor, Thomas B. Marvell, and Lynne M. Vieraitis. “The Impact of ‘Shall-Issue’ Concealed Handgun Laws on Violent Crime Rates: Evidence from Panel Data for Large Urban Cities.” Homicide Studies 9 (2005): 292–323. Lott, John R., Jr. More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws. 3rd ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2010.

Lott, John R., Jr., and David B. Mustard. “Crime, Deterrence, and Right-to-Carry Concealed Handguns.” Journal of Legal Studies 26 (1997): 1–68. Moorhouse, John, and Brent Wanner. “Does Gun Control Reduce Crime or Does Crime Increase Gun Control?” Cato Journal 26 (2006): 103–24. https://ciaotest.cc.columbia .edu/olj/cato/v26n1/v26n1f.pdf (accessed July 1, 2022). Rubin, Paul, and Hashem Dezhbakhsh. “The Effect of Concealed Handgun Laws on Crime: Beyond the Dummy Variables.” International Review of Law and Economics 23 (2003): 199–216. Siegel, Michael, Molly Pahn, Ziming Xuan, Eric Fleeger, and David Hemenway. “The Impact of State Firearm Laws on Homicide and Suicide Deaths in the USA, 1991–2016: A Panel Study.” Journal of General Internal Medicine 34 (2019): 2021–28.

Suicide, Guns and Suicides are a major public health problem in the United States, and there is a strong association between the availability of firearms and the rate of suicide. Every year in the United States, there are more suicides than homicides, and more gun suicides than gun homicides. While only a very small percentage of suicide attempters use guns, more people actually kill themselves with guns than with all other methods combined. From 2000 to 2018, over 350,000 Americans completed suicide with a firearm. White males are at especially high risk for suicide and for gun suicide. From 2000 to 2018, guns have accounted for 57 percent of male suicides and over 31 percent of female suicides. Firearms are one of the most lethal methods of suicide. In 2015, there were 5.6 firearm suicides per 100,000 population among those aged fifteen to twenty-four in the United States.

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These rates were over ten times higher than firearm suicide rates among those aged fifteen to twenty-four in other high-income countries. Overall, the firearm suicide rate in the United States is 9.8 times higher than the firearm suicide rate in other highincome countries. There are geographic disparities in firearm suicides among adults and adolescents. In 2018, the age-adjusted firearm suicide rate in nonmetro areas among adults aged eighteen years and older was 14.4 per 100,000, whereas the age-adjusted firearm suicide rate was 8.5 per 100,000 in metro areas. All studies have found that U.S. regions, states, cities, and counties with higher levels of firearm ownership have significantly higher rates of firearm suicide, and the large majority of studies find that these locales also have significantly higher rates of overall suicide. There does not seem to be any relationship between household gun ownership levels and nonfirearm suicide. Many suicides appear to be impulsive acts. Individuals who take their own lives often do so when confronting a severe but temporary crisis. One study found that for almost half of those who survived a suicide attempt, ten or fewer minutes passed between the initial thought of suicide and the attempt (Deisenhammer et al. 2009). Studies that follow serious suicide attempters over time find that fewer than 10 percent ever go on to die from suicide. Studies show that a gun in the home is a risk factor for suicide among adults and children. Well over a dozen case-control studies have examined the relationship between gun ownership and suicide in the United States and find that firearms in the home are associated with substantially and significantly higher rates of suicide. A metaanalysis of these studies concluded that people who had access to firearms had more

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than three times the odds of suicide, all else being equal (Anglemyer, Horvath, and Rutherford 2014). Firearm availability is affected by how quickly a purchaser can obtain a firearm. Waiting periods (mandated wait times between buying a firearm and receiving a firearm) have been associated with reductions in firearm-related and overall suicides. It has been argued that gun owners may have high suicide rates simply because they are more suicidal than nonowners. Studies have examined this issue, and the evidence does not support the claim. For example, the evidence indicates that gun owners are not more likely than nonowners to be depressed, to have suicide ideation, or to attempt suicide. They have markedly higher rates of completed suicide because they often attempt with firearms. Suicidal individuals are generally ambivalent about killing themselves, and for most, the risk period is transient: most suicidal people do not want death; they want the pain to stop. Psychiatric and penal institutions have long recognized the importance of restricting access to lethal means of suicide for newly admitted and potentially suicidal inmates. The evidence that means restriction could reduce suicide is considered compelling, as is evident by the American Association of Suicidology’s policy statement: “The American Association of Suicidology recognizes that firearm access and storing firearms unlocked and loaded are risk factors for death by suicide.” Similarly, the American Academy of Pediatrics’ policy statement “affirms that the most effective measure to prevent suicide, homicide, and unintentional firearm-related injuries to children and adolescents is the absence of guns from homes and communities.” Many studies have found a significant relationship between gun control laws and

suicide at the state level. A limitation of these studies is that it has been difficult to disentangle the effects of levels of household gun ownership and laws—states with strong gun laws typically have relatively few gun owners, whereas states with weaker laws typically have a much higher percentage of households with guns. In recent years, there have been attempts to engage gun stores, gun ranges, gun trainers, and the physician community in trying to reduce firearm suicide. Though there has been engagement and activity, there is not yet compelling evidence that the activity has actually reduced firearm suicide. And although virtually all suicide experts understand that a gun in the home increases the risk of suicide for the gun owner and the entire family, only 15 percent of the U.S. public and a somewhat lower percentage of gun owners believes that to be the case (Conner, Azrael, and Miller 2018). David Hemenway and Erin Grinshteyn See also: Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Guns in the Home; Suicide, International Comparisons; Victimization from Gun Violence

Further Reading Anglemyer, Andrew, Tara Horvath, and George Rutherford. “The Accessibility of Firearms and Risk for Suicide and Homicide Victimization among Household Members: A Systematic Review and MetaAnalysis.” Annals of Internal Medicine 160, no. 2 (2014): 101–10. Barber, Catherine W., and Matthew J. Miller. “Reducing a Suicidal Person’s Access to Lethal Means of Suicide: A Research Agenda.” American Journal of Preventive Medicine 47, no. 3 (2014): S264–S272. Betz, Marian E., Matthew Miller, Catherine Barber, Ivan Miller, Ashley F. Sullivan, Carlos A. Camargo Jr, Edwin D. Boudreaux,

and ED–SAFE Investigators. “Lethal Means Restriction for Suicide Prevention: Beliefs and Behaviors of Emergency Department Providers.” Depression and Anxiety 30, no. 10 (2013): 1013–20. Briggs, Justin Thomas, and Alexander Tabarrok. “Firearms and Suicides in U.S. States.” International Review of Law and Economics 37 (2014): 180–88. Deisenhammer, Eberhard A., Chy-Meng Ing, Robert Strauss, Georg Kemmler, Hartmann Hinterhuber, and Elisabeth M. Weiss. “The Duration of the Suicidal Process: How Much Time Is Left for Intervention between Consideration and Accomplishment of a Suicide Attempt?” Journal of Clinical Psychiatry 70, no. 1 (2009): 19. Grinshteyn, Erin, and David Hemenway. “Violent Death Rates in the U.S. Compared to Those of the Other High-Income Countries, 2015.” Preventive Medicine 123 (2019): 20–26. Hemenway, David. Private Guns, Public Health. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2017. Henn, Morissa, Catherine Barber, and David Hemenway. “Involving Firearm Stakeholders in Community-Based Suicide Prevention Efforts.” Current Epidemiology Reports 6, no. 2 (2019): 231–37. Miller, Matthew, Molly Warren, David Hemenway, and Deborah Azrael. “Firearms and Suicide in U.S. Cities.” Injury Prevention 21, no. e1 (2015): e116–e119. Miller, M., S. A. Swanson, and D. Azrael. “Are We Missing Something Pertinent? A Bias Analysis of Unmeasured Confounding in the Firearm-Suicide Literature.” Epidemiologic Reviews 38, no. 1 (2016): 62–69. Siegel, Michael, and Emily F. Rothman. “Firearm Ownership and Suicide Rates among US Men and Women, 1981–2013.” American Journal of Public Health 106, no. 7 (2016): 1316–22. Wintemute, Garen J., Marian E. Betz, and Megan L. Ranney. “Yes, You Can: Physicians, Patients, and Firearms.” Annals of Internal Medicine 165, no. 3 (2016): 205–13.

Suicide, International Comparisons | 817 Yip, Paul S. F., Eric Caine, Saman Yousuf, Shu-Sen Chang, Kevin Chien-Chang Wu, and Ying-Yeh Chen. “Means Restriction for Suicide Prevention.” Lancet 379, no. 9834 (2012): 2393–99.

Suicide, International Comparisons Suicide is a leading cause of death worldwide, making the top ten list in the majority of countries in central Asia, Europe, North America, southern Latin America, and the South Pacific. Suicide is considered a tragedy in all societies, but because it is stigmatized more by some social groups than others, it is generally underreported. Underreporting is also an issue when drug overdoses, agricultural pesticides, or accidents are involved, as these can be deliberately or unintendedly categorized as unintentional deaths. After complex statistical techniques were applied to make corrections for this underreporting, the best available data indicate that approximately 817,000 suicides occurred globally in 2016, representing 1.5 percent of all deaths (Naghavi 2019). These same data reveal that, in most nations, men are more likely to be victims than women, though the ratio of male to female suicide rates is much smaller in the belt of societies extending from southern India to China (in part, reflecting severe gender inequities). Globally, older individuals are much more likely to die by suicide than their younger counterparts, though the rates are higher for those under the age of thirty in south Asia (46.0% of all suicide deaths), Latin America and the Caribbean (38.7%), and North Africa and the Middle East (38.6%); these higher rates reflect the age structure of these populations, which are skewed heavily toward the young. In Western nations, mental illness is a strong

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predictor of suicide, but much less so in Asia. Finally, the data indicate global suicide rates have been falling since 2000, most likely due to reductions in poverty and subsequent improvements in health, as well as to the prevention efforts of nonprofit and government-sponsored groups like the World Health Organization. The United States has bucked this trend, however, as its age-adjusted suicide rate rose from 10.7 per 100,000 population in 2001 to 14.2 in 2018 (CDC 2020). In recent decades, over half of all U.S. suicides have been completed with a firearm. For example, out of 48,344 suicides in 2018, 24,432 were carried out by gun (50.5 percent). Moreover, compared to its economically developed peer nations, the firearm suicide rate of the United States is ten times higher (7.0 per 100,000 population in the United States versus an average of 0.7 per 100,000 in Australia, Canada, Japan, Korea, and the nations of Europe). In other developed countries, the most common method of suicide is hanging. Hanging is also common in developing nations, but pesticide poisoning is also a major method in the less developed areas of Latin America and Asia. Given the high prevalence of guns in the United States (at least five times higher than its average peer nation), coupled with its accompanying high gun suicide rate, a reasonable assumption is that stronger gun control laws might realize a reduction in suicide. But it would also be reasonable to assume that this reduction might be just temporary, with the rate rebounding when those attempting suicide began substituting other means. Indeed, this is what happened when Australia and Canada enacted stricter gun laws. However, public health research reveals that the substitution effect does not always occur.

Many suicides are impulsive acts, especially for younger individuals, and are also often committed under the influence of alcohol and drugs. Moreover, many survivors of attempted suicide are glad to be alive when interviewed months and even years later. In other words, many individuals who attempt suicide do not have an “unbreakable determination” to kill themselves (Hemenway 2017). Falling suicide rates in the United Kingdom illustrate this point. In the 1950s, about half of its suicides were accomplished using carbon monoxide gas from coal-burning stoves. When households replaced coal with detoxified gas in the 1960s and 1970s, suicide by gas was eliminated—but there was not an offsetting increase by nongas methods. As a result, the suicide rate fell by 30 percent (Miller 2012). In short, access to the means to kill oneself, as well as what the means are, matter. Firearms are the most lethal method. Although lethality estimates vary by research design, they are generally consistent with a major case fatality study that found 83 percent of suicide attempts with a gun ended in death. This effectiveness rate significantly exceeded that found for all other common means: 66 percent for drowning, 61 percent for hanging, 42 percent for gas poisoning, 35 percent for jumping, 2 percent for drug overdosing, and just 1 percent for cutting (Harvard School of Public Health 2020a). Firearms are also a relatively easy method for self-harm, generally not requiring the planning and skill it takes to hang oneself. As a result, there is a positive correlation between gun availability and suicide. When guns are more available—in the home, in the neighborhood, in the community— suicide rates are significantly higher. Thus, because of their extreme lethality,



combined with their ease of accessibility, public health researchers contend that the U.S. rate would be considerably lower if it reduced firearm availability—especially to youth and the mentally distraught. These same researchers observe that there are at least two generally acceptable and feasible methods for accomplishing this. First is via the universal adoption of child-access prevention (CAP) laws. More specifically, some U.S. states require firearms be stored unloaded and locked in a secure space, such as a heavy metal cabinet. States that have these laws experience lower suicide rates than states that do not. Second is the universal adoption of “red flag” laws (also known as extreme risk protection orders); these laws allow family members and law enforcement to petition a court to have guns temporarily removed from a home where there is a highly distraught individual expressing suicidal or other violence-prone thoughts and behaviors. Those states that have adopted these laws have subsequently experienced lower rates of suicide. However, as of 2020, all legislative attempts to enact CAP and red flag laws at the federal level have failed. Gregg Lee Carter See also: Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws; Extreme Risk Protection Orders; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Suicide, Guns and; Victimization from Gun Violence

Further Reading Ajdacic-Gross, Vladeta, Mitchell G. Weiss, Mariann Ring, Urs Hepp, Matthias Bopp, Felix Gutzwiller, and Wulf Rössler. “Methods of Suicide: International Suicide Patterns Derived from the WHO Mortality Database.” Bulletin of the World Health Organization 86 (2008): 726–32. http://www.who .int/bulletin/volumes/86/9/07-043489.pdf (accessed June 29, 2020).

Suicide, International Comparisons | 819 Carter, Gregg Lee. Gun Control in the United States: A Reference Handbook. 2nd ed. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2017. CDC (Centers for Disease Control). WISQARS: Fatal Injury Data, 2018, Suicide. 2008. https://wisqars-viz.cdc.gov:8006 /explore-data/home (accessed June 29, 2020). Grinshteyn, Erin, and David Hemenway. “Violent Death Rates in the U.S. Compared to Those of the Other High-Income Countries, 2015.” Preventative Medicine 123 (2019): 20–26. Harvard School of Public Health. Lethality of Suicide Methods. 2020a. https://www.hsph .harvard.edu/means-matter/means-matter /case-fatality/ (accessed June 30, 2020). Harvard School of Public Health. Firearm Access Is a Risk Factor for Suicide. 2020b. https:// www.hsph.harvard.edu/means-matter/means -matter/risk/ (accessed June 29, 2020). Hemenway, David. Private Guns, Public Health. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2017. Miller, Matthew. “Preventing Suicide by Preventing Lethal Injury: The Need to Act on What We Already Know.” American Journal of Public Health 102, no. Supplement 1 (2012): e1–e3. Miller, Matthew, Deborah Azrael, David Hemenway, and Mary Vriniotis. “Firearm Storage Practices and Rates of Unintentional Firearm Deaths in the United States.” Accident Analysis & Prevention 37 (2005): 661–67. Naghavi, Mohsen. “Global, Regional, and National Burden of Suicide Mortality 1990 to 2016: Systematic Analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2016.” BMJ 364 (2019): 194. https://www.bmj.com/content /364/bmj.l94 (accessed June 14, 2022). Saadi, Altaf, Kristen R. Choi, Sae Takada, and Fred J. Zimmerman. “The Impact of Gun Violence Restraining Order Laws in the U.S. and Firearm Suicide among Older Adults: A Longitudinal State-Level Analysis, 2012–2016.” 2020. https://bmc-

820 | Sullivan Law publichealth.biomedcentral.com/track/pdf /10.1186/s12889-020-08462-6 (accessed June 30, 2020). World Health Organization. Suicide Prevention. 2020. https://www.who.int/health -topics/suicide#tab=tab_1 (accessed June 30, 2020).

Sullivan Law Often described as one of the earliest examples of a strict gun control law in the United States, the Sullivan Law (named after its legislative sponsor, allegedly corrupt Tammany Hall politician and state senator Timothy Sullivan) was promulgated by New York State in 1911 to protect the public from the influx of handguns and perceived violence by newly arrived immigrant groups. New York’s Sullivan Law required a license for both the purchasing and carrying of a handgun. Possession of a firearm without said license was a misdemeanor offense, and carrying or concealing firearms without a license was a felony. Furthermore, unlike modern right to carry laws, the permit process made licenses generally difficult to obtain. That is, the law was an example of a “may-issue” right to carry law (as opposed to “shall-issue”)—meaning that the police have wide discretion to issue (or not issue) a permit, as opposed to the police being mandated (“shall-issue”) to issue a permit if the applicant satisfies the specific legal criteria (background check, gun safety training, etc.). Finally, the law flatly prohibited the carrying of a variety of other nonfirearmrelated weapons such as a “dangerous knife,” a dagger, or bludgeons. Sponsors of New York’s Sullivan Law argued that homicides and violent crimes would decline significantly. However, scholars have reported that violent crimes actually increased, and the New York Times reported that criminals

were “as well armed as ever” (1913, 12). The constitutionality of the law is also in question after the Supreme Court’s recent rulings in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) and McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010). Whatever the actual level of violence and influx of handguns into New York at the turn of the century, scholars have argued that the Sullivan Law was prompted by xenophobic fears within the mainstream white Anglo-Saxon leadership of New York and specifically targeted at Italian immigrants. It is worth noting that the first person convicted under the Sullivan Law was an Italian immigrant (Giuseppe Costabile), and it has been reported that up to 70 percent of those arrested during the first three years after the law was enacted were of Italian descent (Funk 1995). Though the Sullivan Law was a statewide law, it was specifically aimed at New York City, where it was perceived that the large foreign population was turbulent and had an alleged propensity for criminal activities. Due to the alleged xenophobic impetus originally behind the promulgation of the Sullivan Law, some critics point to this law as an example of gun control being used to control perceived undesirables in society. Furthermore, critics of the law argued that the permits are doled out primarily to the wealthy, upper-class residents of New York. For example, Faherty (2007) reported that only 2,516 residents (of an estimated population of 8.4 million) received a permit to carry a concealed pistol in 2007. A spokesman for the National Rifle Association (NRA) characterized these statistics as “a reflection of the city’s penchant for giving only wealthy New Yorkers gun permits.” James A. Beckman See also: Concealed Weapons Laws; District of Columbia v. Heller; Gun Control;

McDonald v. City of Chicago; National Rifle Association (NRA); Racism and Gun Control

Further Reading “A Change in the Pistol Law.” New York Times, May 24, 1913, 12. Cottrol, Robert J., and Raymond T. Diamond. “Never Intended to Be Applied to the White Population: Firearms Regulation and Racial Disparity—The Redeemed South’s Legacy to a National Jurisprudence?” ChicagoKent Law Review 70 (1995): 1307–35. Faherty, Christopher. “Concealed Pistols Permits Drop in City.” New York Sun, August 29, 2007. Funk, T. Markus. “Gun Control and Economic Discrimination: The Melting-Point Case-in-Point.” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 85 (1995): 764–806. Herz, Andrew. “Gun Crazy: Constitutional False Consciousness and Dereliction of Dialogic Responsibility.” Boston University Law Review 75 (1995): 57–153. Novak, Suzanne. “Why the New York State System for Obtaining a License to Carry a Concealed Weapon Is Unconstitutional.” Fordham Urban Law Journal 26 (1998): 121–70. Olson, Joseph E., and David B. Kopel. “All the Way Down the Slippery Slope: Gun Prohibition in England and Some Lessons for Civil Liberties in America.” Hamline Law Review 22 (1999): 399–465.

Surplus Arms Military surplus arms formed a large portion of civilian arms in the nineteenth- and twentieth-century United States. At the turn of the century, many civilians acquired surplus Civil War and Indian Wars weapons— ranging from pistols to cannons—through distributors such as Bannerman’s mail-order house. In the early twentieth century, the replacement of the Krag with the 1903

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Springfield made millions of Krag rifles and carbines available to the sportsman and hunter. To promote civilian marksmanship, the U.S. Army converted Krags to civilian form, with shortened barrels and stocks, and sold these for as little as $1.50. Civilian gunsmiths created a near-infinite series of variations on the Krag, converting it to other calibers (such as the high-velocity .219 Zipper), inventing new sights, and otherwise changing it. One particularly imaginative conversion turned it from a repeater into a single shot, which, instead of ejecting spent cartridges, dropped them into what had been its magazine so that they could be easily collected for reloading. Surplus arms first became controversial in the late 1950s. By then, armies worldwide were changing over to semiautomatic arms and selling off enormous stores of bolt-action rifles, which were available through mail-order houses for $20 to $40. For modest sums, gunsmiths could change calibers, mount peep or telescopic sights, and otherwise convert these into presentable hunting and target arms. Domestic manufacturers of hunting rifles could not compete with these prices and began to call for import bans. In 1958, a rider to the Mutual Security Act attempted to ban all surplus importations; the Senate, conscious of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, limited the ban to reimportation of exported American arms. The manufacturers then appealed to Sen. Thomas Dodd (D-CT), whose state was home to much of the domestic firearms industry. Dodd drafted and introduced what would ultimately became the Gun Control Act of 1968, which banned importation of military surplus arms and outlawed mail-order sales. In Senate hearings, a representative of the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers’ Institute supported the provisions,

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testifying, “This country has in recent years been flooded with millions of cheap surplus military firearms.” The ban on importation of military surplus was partially rescinded by an amendment in the 1980s that permits importation of surplus firearms on the Curios and Relics list, a list that included many bolt-action military guns, although the 1958 ban on reimportation of exported American arms remains on the books. David T. Hardy See also: Gun Control Act of 1968; Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers’ Institute (SAAMI)

Further Reading Hardy, David T. “The Firearm Owners’ Protection Act: A Historical and Legal Perspective.” Cumberland Law Review 17 (1986): 595–97. Miller, Al. “The Civilizer: .30-40 Krag.” Rifle (July–August 1971): 22. Winkler, Adam. Gunfight: The Battle Over the Right to Bear Arms in America. New York: W. W. Norton, 2011.

Sutherland Springs Church Shooting On the morning of November 5, 2017, worshippers gathered for Sunday service at the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas. Just after 11:00 a.m., twenty-six-yearold Devin Kelley arrived at the church, armed with three firearms and wearing tactical and ballistics gear. At 11:20 a.m., he took one of the guns, a Ruger AR-556 semiautomatic rifle purchased from a San Antonio sporting goods store, and approached the church. He opened fire outside before moving his rampage inside. After approximately

eleven minutes, twenty-six people had been killed and twenty others injured. Outside of the church, the perpetrator killed two people and continued to shoot the building as he made his way toward one of its entrances. Once inside, he moved up the center aisle of the church, shooting at the parishioners sitting in the pews. He continued shooting, pausing only to reload his gun with additional thirty-round magazines; over the eleven-minute attack, about 700 rounds were fired. The entire attack was caught on a camera that had been set up at the back of the church to record the service to be uploaded online at a later time. When the perpetrator exited the building, he was engaged by Stephen Willeford, a local resident and former NRA firearms instructor. Willeford also was armed with a semiautomatic rifle (an AR-15) and had taken cover behind his truck across the street when he heard the shooting. The two exchanged gunfire, and the perpetrator was struck twice, once in the leg and once in his torso. He then fled the scene in his vehicle, in which he had two handguns. He used one of them to shoot back at Willeford as he drove away; Willeford also fired at the fleeing vehicle. Willeford got into a nearby vehicle with Johnnie Langendorff, and the pair pursued the perpetrator at high rates of speed as he fled the area. During the chase, a call was placed to 911 by Langendorff, advising them of the pursuit and the location of both vehicles. The perpetrator also placed a call during the chase to his family, advising his wife and parents that he had just committed the shooting and was injured. After approximately five to seven minutes, the perpetrator lost control of his vehicle and subsequently came to a stop in a field after hitting a road sign and crossing



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Investigators work at the scene of a mass shooting at the First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, on November 5, 2017. The shooting left 26 dead and 20 others injured. (Tribune Content Agency LLC/Alamy Stock Photo)

through a ditch. The pair that was pursuing him stopped as well and noticed that he was not moving when they approached the vehicle. Police soon arrived on scene and determined that the perpetrator had committed suicide with a gunshot to the head. Among the victims of the shooting was Annabella Pomeroy, daughter of the church’s pastor, who was not at the church during the attack. Delivering the sermon in his place was Bryan Holcombe, a visiting pastor who was killed in the shooting alongside eight of his family members: his wife Karla, son Danny, granddaughter Noah (Danny’s daughter), daughter-in-law Crystal (married to his son John), and three of Crystal’s children—Megan, Emily, and Greg. Crystal also was pregnant, and the baby was killed. Joann Ward, another attendee, was killed alongside her two

young daughters, Emily and Brooke. Also killed in the attack were Keith Braden, Haley Krueger, Tara McNulty, Robert and Shani Corrigan, Dennis (a church elder) and Sara Johnson, Robert and Karen Marshall, Therese and Ricardo Rodriguez, Peggy Warden, and Lula White.

A Systems Failure Investigation into the Sutherland Springs shooting revealed a glaring systems failure that had made it easier for the perpetrator to acquire the weapons used in the shooting. Specifically, the perpetrator’s purchases of firearms leading up to the attack were unlawful under the Gun Control Act (GCA) of 1968 and the Lautenberg Amendment. Because, however, the disqualifying criteria were not reported into any one of the three systems queried by the National Incident Criminal

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Background Check System (NICS), all purchases were allowed to proceed. Under the GCA, individuals meeting one of several different criteria are prohibited from purchasing or possessing firearms. Among these are being indicted or convicted of a crime punishable by one year or more in prison and being dishonorably discharged from the Armed Forces. In 1996, the Lautenberg Amendment expanded the GCA to prohibit individuals convicted of domestic violence from acquiring firearms. In early 2012, the perpetrator’s first wife, Tessa, reported ongoing domestic abuse against herself and her young son (his stepson), who had been placed in foster care nine months earlier amid ongoing concerns over child abuse. After the initiation of an investigation into the allegations, the perpetrator continued his abusive behavior, even threatening Tessa with a firearm on multiple occasions. He also admitted to her that he had physically abused her son on multiple occasions prior to his removal from the home, a confession which Tessa was able to get on video and turn over to the Air Force’s Office of Special Investigations. Four months after the initial report, the perpetrator was placed into pretrial confinement and, a month and a half later, was formally charged with assault against Tessa and her son. A month later, the charges were referred for court-martial, and the process began that November. At the trial, the perpetrator pleaded guilty and was sentenced to a rank reduction, confinement for twelve months, and a bad conduct discharge from the Air Force. He was released from imprisonment on March 13, 2013, as a result of credit for time served during his pretrial detention and formally separated from the Air Force on May 9, 2014. On four separate occasions after his discharge was finalized, the perpetrator

purchased firearms. In each instance, he completed the required ATF Form 4473. In each instance, he certified that he had never been convicted of a crime that could result in a sentence of one year or more in prison, despite that the maximum sentence associated with the assaults was five and a half years. Additionally, in each instance, checks performed by NICS indicated that the sales could proceed. A review of the events leading up to the shooting indicated that despite the perpetrator effectively being prohibited from purchasing or possessing firearms under the GCA and its expansion to domestic violence under the Lautenberg Amendment, the Air Force had failed to submit disqualifying information, including the perpetrator’s fingerprints, to the FBI as required under the Department of Defense’s criminal history data submission and the Air Force’s fingerprint and final disposition policies. In fact, an investigation by the Department of Defense’s Office of the Inspector General identified four separate occasions where the perpetrator’s fingerprints should have been submitted to the FBI, as well as two additional opportunities to report the courtmartial’s final disposition. Had such records been submitted as required, it would have resulted in a denial by NICS to the firearms dealers, thereby making it impossible for the perpetrator to acquire his weapons lawfully. This issue, however, was not unique to the Sutherland Springs case—a similar problem of failed reporting to the NICS system had been identified ten years earlier after the 2007 shooting at Virginia Tech. Although efforts had been made in the period between the two attacks and since the Sutherland Springs shooting to improve reporting and increase the number of records in NICS that could be used to ensure firearms did not



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lawfully fall into the hands of prohibited persons, estimates suggest that millions of records are still missing from the system. Jaclyn Schildkraut

November 8, 2017. https://www.nytimes .com/2017/11/08/us/texas-shooting-video -devin-kelley.html (accessed June 21, 2021). Schildkraut, Jaclyn, and Collin M. Carr. “Mass Shootings, Legislative Responses, and Public Policy: An Endless Cycle of Inaction.” Emory Law Journal 69 (2020): 1043–76. U.S. Department of Defense, Office of the Inspector General. Report of Investigation into the United States Air Force’s Failure to Submit Devin Kelley’s Criminal History Information to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Report No. DODIG-2019-030. Alexandria, VA: U.S. Department of Defense, Office of the Inspector General, 2018. https:// m e d i a . d e f e n s e . g o v / 2 0 18 / D e c / 0 7 /2002070069/-1/-1/1/DODIG-2019-030 _REDACTED.PDF (accessed June 21, 2021).

See also: Gun Control Act of 1968; Virginia Tech Shooting

Further Reading Everytown for Gun Safety. Fatal Gaps: How the Virginia Tech Shooting Prompted Changes in State Mental Health Records Reporting. New York: Everytown for Gun Safety, 2018. https://everytownresearch.org /report/fatal-gaps/ (accessed June 21, 2021). Goldman, Adam, Richard Pérez-Peña, and Manny Fernandez. “Texas Church Shooting Video Shows Gunman’s Methodical Attack, Official Says.” New York Times,

T Tactical Training

vary in intensity with “shoot” and “no shoot” decision branches. Such techniques, however, did not have the student face a live opponent in threedimensional realistic environments. Thus, firearm simulation techniques were developed—and are still being developed—that vary in verisimilitude. These training techniques are now referred to as Force-onForce (FOF) or Reality-Based Practice— indicating a live opponent. A decisive event in the training world was the start of the National Tactical Invitational matches in 1991. The matches involve a high degree of realism and include police, military, academic, and civilian participants. Its protocols have led to similar experiences being offered to civilians in commercial venues across the country. Various scenarios are staged and can involve nonfiring plastic imitations of real firearms, paintball guns, or real guns that have been modified to shoot nonlethal ammunition (“simunition”). Nonfiring guns lack realism but are safe. Paintball guns fire rounds that hurt, but the firearms lack realism as compared to real service guns. Simunition-capable weapons or realistic “airsoft” guns are preferred. Simunitions are nonlethal marking rounds developed in the 1980s that are fired from specially converted firearms to maintain realism. They do hurt and are only sold to certified users and not the general public. Airsoft guns fire small plastic pellets, which sting and are very realistic and readily available. Trainers emphasize that all projectile-firing weapons

Tactical training emphasizes realism in firearms training. Police, for example, sometime train using wax bullets powered only by primers. Realism can inoculate the shooter to stressful situations and thus improve the value of the training. The need for realism was recognized during the Vietnam War, when it was deemed that kill ratios of U.S. fighters to North Vietnamese jets were not as impressive as expected. Pilots had little training in dealing with the actual air combat environment found in Southeast Asia. Training was unrealistic in that there was little dogfighting and no exposure to the type of aircraft flown by opponents. Thus, the U.S. Air Force and U.S. Navy started the Red Flag exercises and founded the U.S. Navy Fighter Weapons School (“Topgun”). The firearms training world responded to similar problems as it was found that static range marksmanship training did not predict real-world performance. To enhance realism, various techniques are used. One set of training milieus use automated systems that are responsive to student actions and present realistic targets. Most widely known is the FATS (Firearms Training Systems, Inc.), based in part on work of the Firearms Division of the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center. Similar commercial, computer-based systems have been offered since the early 1990s. The technology allows students to use live fire against projected targets, and the system then evaluates successes and failures. Scenarios can

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have some degree of danger and usage should be well supervised. Live ammunition has sometimes been accidentally used in a scenario with tragic results. On balance, however, it is felt that the sting of simunitions and airsoft projectiles are necessary for realism and being able to appreciate one’s errors. Airsoft guns are the preferred usage in civilian training, as pioneered by Karl Rehn of KRTraining. Experts in FOF training emphasize several points: All scenarios must be carefully plotted and supervised. They cannot become childish or paintball-like shootouts. They must have a purpose and point to the learning experience, and there must be a debriefing afterward. The training serves several purposes. First, techniques are practiced in a more realistic venue to see how they work and how they are executed. Second, the exercises emphasize situational awareness. Third, they provide stress inoculation. Studies of fear and freezing in emergencies in many critical situations (aviation, marine, fire, medicine, etc.) indicate that simulation training aids in reducing stress and thus leads to practitioner confidence. It is also becoming clear that law enforcement needs to demonstrate realistic training procedures to avoid legal difficulties over officers firing their weapons. Research has shown that police with such training perform better. With the current explosion of concealed carry laws in the United States, such opportunities are becoming available to civilians. It has been suggested that training may also aid the civilian in court for a defensive shooting. Glenn E. Meyer See also: Concealed Weapons Laws; Defensive Gun Use (DGU)

Further Reading Avery, Ron. “Using Force-on-Force Training to Improve Office Performance.” PoliceOne.com, January 28, 2014. https://www .police1.com/firearms-training/articles /using-force-on-force-drills-to-improve -officer-performance-wjTTv3UnyBKKbsk1/ (accessed January 31, 2022). Fairburn, Richard. “Repeat Your Force-onForce Training Scenarios.” PoliceOne. com, November 16, 2009. http://www.police one.com/patrol-issues/articles/1965143 -Repeat-your-force-on-force-training-sce narios/ (accessed January 31, 2022). Howard, Jennifer. “Force-on-Force Training Keeps Police Sharp.” PoliceOne.com, April 9, 2003. http://www.policeone.com/training /articles/61720-Force-on-Force-Training -Keeps-Police-Sharp/ (accessed January 31, 2022). James, Frank. Effective Handgun Defense. Iola, WI: Gun Digest Press, 2004. Mroz, Ralph. “The New Models in Firearms Training.” PoliceOne.com, May 3, 2006. http://www.policeone.com/police-products /firearms/articles/127288-The-new-models -in-firearms-training/ (accessed January 31, 2022). Oudejans, Raoul. “Reality-Based Practice Under Pressure Improves Handgun Shooting Performance of Police Officers.” Ergonomics 51 (2008): 261–73. Rehn, Karl. “Airsoft Guns: Economical Force on Force Training.” S.W.A.T. (2003): 65–67. http://www.krtraining.com/KRTraining /Archive/SWAT-Karl1.pdf (accessed January 31, 2022). Ripley, Amanda. The Unthinkable: Who Survives When Disaster Strikes and Why. New York: Crown Publishing, 2008. Saus, Evelyn-Rose, Bjørn Helge Johnsen, Jarle Eid, Per Ketil Riisem, Rune Andersen, and Julian F. Thayer. “The Effect of Brief Situational Awareness Training in a Police Shooting Simulator: An Experimental Study.” Military Psychology 18 (2006): S3–S21.

Steele, Lisa J. “Defending the Self-Defense Case.” Champion (2007): 34. Wise, Jeff. Extreme Fear: The Science of Your Mind in Danger. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009.

Target Shooting Target shooting has increased in popularity in the United States in the twenty-first century. For example, in 2001, 15.9 million Americans (5.6% of the total population) reported regularly spending money and time participating in target shooting, which rose to 20.4 million by 2018 (6.2% of the population). When adding in family members, friends, and others who sometimes accompany regular target shooters, as many as 50 million Americans were shooting targets at some point during 2018 (National Shooting Sports Foundation 2019). Target shooting is the third most common reason adults report for owning a gun (30% citing this reason), after self-protection (67%) and hunting (38%) (Pew Research Center 2017). Although many target shooters use multiple types of firearms, the most popular are handguns (35% of target shooters primarily use handguns), followed by rifles (31%), shotguns (25%), and muzzle-loading weapons (8%) (National Shooting Sports Foundation 2019). Many organizations sponsor formal target shooting, including the International Sport Shooting Federation, the National Rifle Association, 4-H youth clubs, and numerous local gun clubs. The most common variety of formal target shooting is bull’s-eye shooting. Shooters attempt to hit the center of a paper target that is marked with concentric circles, the innermost of which is called the bull’s-eye. Both handguns and rifles are used for

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bull’s-eye shooting. Much competitive handgun target shooting is done with .22and .45-caliber semiautomatics or singleshot pistols that are purpose-built or customized for competition. The most common bull’s-eye pistol match is known as the “2700,” which is a perfect score in this game. At least two guns are required for this game, as one session must be shot using a .22 and one using a .45. A third session is shot using a center-fire handgun of .32 caliber or greater, although most participants choose .45. Competitors fire ten rounds per target at twenty-seven targets placed at a distance of either twentyfive or fifty yards. Depending on the phase of the match, participants conduct slow fire, allowing ten minutes to fire ten rounds; timed fire, allowing twenty seconds to fire five rounds; or rapid fire, allowing 10 seconds to fire 5 rounds. The targets are a standard bull’s-eye type with concentric circles less than four inches in diameter. Other shooting activities involving inanimate targets include silhouette shooting, pin shooting, cowboy action shooting, practical shooting, and various shotgun games. Many target-shooting events are designed to make the activity more exciting than punching holes in paper targets at distances too far away to see the holes. In silhouette shooting games, participants attempt to strike and knock down metal silhouettes of animals (chickens, pigs, turkeys, and sheep) at ranges up to 200 meters for handguns, 100 meters for small-bore (.22 caliber) rifles, or 500 meters for high-power (often .308 Winchester) rifles. Pin shooting is a target-shooting game in which players attempt to shoot several bowling pins off a table in the shortest possible time. In Cowboy Action Shooting, participants wear Old West costumes and shoot such Old West

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firearms as single-action revolvers and lever-action rifles manufactured in the nineteenth century, or reproductions thereof. Competitions are scored for speed and accuracy in a course of fire consisting of both steel and cardboard targets. Defensive or “practical” pistol shooting (as conducted by the International Defensive Pistol Association and the U.S. Practical Shooting Association) is conducted with servicegrade handguns, usually of 9-mm or larger caliber. These competitions are intended to simulate real-world scenarios in which handguns might be used, and they blur the line between recreation and combat training. Several common shotgun games simulate bird hunting, including trapshooting and skeet. Twelve-gauge shotguns are normally used. In American trapshooting, five shooting positions are spaced at three-yard intervals in an arc sixteen yards from the trap

house. Clay targets, simulating birds, are tossed from the trap house at unpredictable angles (the name “trap” comes from the game’s original form, in which live birds were released from traps; now 4.25-inch clay disks are used). In the standard sixteenyard event, shooters take five shots from each of the firing positions, for a total of twenty-five shots. In handicap shooting, skilled shooters fire from behind the sixteenyard points at distances up to twenty-seven yards from the trap. In doubles, two targets are tossed at the same time, requiring shooters to make two shots in rapid succession. In the international version of trapshooting, which is more difficult, targets are thrown at greater velocity, to a wider range of angles, and two shots are allowed at each target. Skeet is similar to trapshooting in that shotgunners fire at clay targets. A skeet field has two trap houses, however. Seven shooting positions are arrayed in an arc extending

Men target shoot using clay pigeons. Target shooting is a popular activity among firearms enthusiasts and can help individuals improve their shooting accuracy and speed. (Debbie Woods/iStockphoto.com)



from one house to the other, with an eighth position between the two houses. As shooters move from station to station, they shoot both singles and doubles. Skeet provides a greater variety of shooting conditions than trapshooting. Other clay-target shotgun games include crazy quail, rabbit run, and sporting clays. Crazy quail is a trap game in which targets are launched in any direction from a single trap sixteen yards in front of the shooter. In rabbit run, the shooter stands on top of a trap house and targets are launched nearly horizontally, simulating a small animal running along the ground. Sporting clays presents a variety of shots, such as close and fast targets or high, receding ones, and several traps are used. Matthew DeBell and Gregg Lee Carter See also: Gun Culture; National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF); Recreational Uses of Guns

Further Reading National Rifle Association. “Competitive Shooting Programs.” 2020. https://competitions.nra.org/ (accessed June 24, 2020). National Shooting Sports Foundation. “Target Shooting in America: An Economic Force for Conservation.” 2019. https://www.nssf .org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Target -Shooting-in-America-Economic-Impact-re port-2018zip.pdf (accessed June 24, 2020). National Shooting Sports Foundation. “Handgun Sports.” 2020. https://www.nssf.org /shooting/handgun/ (accessed June 24, 2020). National Shooting Sports Foundation. “Rifle Sports.” 2020. https://www.nssf.org/shooting/rifle/ (accessed June 24, 2020). National Shooting Sports Foundation. “Shotgun Sports.” 2020. https://www.nssf.org /shooting/shotgun/ (accessed June 24, 2020).

Tartaro, Joseph P. | 831 Pew Research Center. “America’s Complex Relationship with Guns.” 2017. https://www .pewsocialtrends.org/2017/06/22/the-demo graphics-of-gun-ownership/ (accessed June 23, 2020).

Tartaro, Joseph P.(1931–2020) Joseph P. Tartaro was one of the more prominent individuals active in the area of gun rights. He appeared regularly on national television and radio shows, and his editorials were widely distributed. He has participated in and led many events and conferences promoting gun rights, including the annual Gun Rights Policy Conference. He was also a prolific writer; in addition to his magazine and web articles and editorials, he authored Revolt at Cincinnati (detailing the internal battle between those wanting more versus those wanting less involvement of the National Rifle Association in politics) and The Great Assault Weapons Hoax, in which he maintained that assault weapons pose no real threats to the general public. Tartaro served as the president of the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF), an organization supporting the Second Amendment and the right of individuals to keep and bear firearms. Its focus is to publish research and provide educational materials on the Second Amendment. He was on the board of directors of the Journal of Firearms and Public Policy and worked with Alan Merril Gottlieb to produce the monthly Gottlieb-Tartaro Report newsletter—both of which are SAF publications. Tartaro also served the executive editor of the New Gun Week magazine until 2019, when he retired from the position. The publication dates back to 1966 and is an important informational source for gun owners, the firearms industry, and gun rights

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activists. The magazine regularly covers firearms-related legislation, court decisions, products, conferences, and swap meets (“gun shows”). Tartaro’s editorials were a prominent feature. He consistently argued that gun control laws impede the rights of gun owners while being ineffective in fighting crime. As do many strong gun rights proponents, he argued for the better enforcement of current laws and harsher punishments for criminals who use guns in the commission of crimes. He viewed the media as biased toward the gun control side in national debate over guns. In 2018, Tartaro received the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Gun Rights Policy Conference, which he cofounded with Gottlieb, for his work on gun legislation and Second Amendment rights. Tartaro passed away on June 13, 2020, following a brief battle with cancer, at the age of eighty-nine. He was still serving as the president of SAF at the time of his death. Sean Maddan and Lauren Jekowsky See also: Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA); Gottlieb, Alan Merril; Gun Rights Policy Conference (GRPC); National Rifle Association (NRA); Periodicals, Guns; Second Amendment; Second Amendment Foundation (SAF)

Further Reading Carter, Gregg Lee. Gun Control in the United States: A Reference Handbook. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2006. Gun Week. http://www.gunweek.com/ (accessed July 5, 2021). Riehl, Fredy. “Second Amendment Foundation President Joseph Tartaro Passes.” Ammoland, June 15, 2020. https://www.am moland.com/2020/06/second-amendment -foundation-president-joseph-tartaro-passes /#axzz6zmFin3UD (accessed May 18, 2022).

Second Amendment Foundation. http://www .saf.org/ (accessed July 5, 2021). Tartaro, Joseph P. The Great Assault Weapons Hoax. Bellevue, WA: Second Amendment Foundation, 1993. Tartaro, Joseph P. Revolt at Cincinnati. Buffalo, NY: Hawkeye Publishing, 1981.

Techno-Polymers The term techno-polymer is a broad descriptor used to classify a type of plastic materials. Specifically, it refers to a plastic used to fabricate or replicate a type of metal. The material a popular substitute for metal within various fields. For example, it is frequently utilized in engineering, the manufacturing of vehicles, and to design medical equipment. Another common use for technopolymers is within the design of firearm parts. The use of these plastic materials, as opposed to metals, allow products to be lightweight while still remaining durable. The use of techno-polymers within firearm manufacturing has many benefits as well as some concerns.

History The term polymer refers to the molecular structure of a material. Specifically, polymers are substances that are composed of long, repeating molecular chains. Polymers can be naturally occurring, such as in silk or proteins, as well as produced synthetically. Documented use of synthetic polymers dates back to the 1800s, with the development of the oil “Styrol” (Rasmussen 2018). Techno-polymers are a specific type of polymer, specifically used to describe a type of polymer used to replicate a metal. Techno-polymers were first introduced during World War II (1939–1945). Because of the war, many countries experienced a

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shortage of raw materials. Scientists and manufacturers explored alternative resources by replacing the metals necessary for producing various products. During this period, the production of plastics increased by 300 percent in the United States alone (Nicholson and Leighton 1942). More durable plastics, such as techno-polymers, also saw a rise in use and quickly became a valuable tool in the manufacturing of wartime materials. After the conclusion of the war, there was a continued focus on new ways of utilizing plastics and techno-polymers. Within the manufacturing of firearms and firearm parts, techno-polymers have remained a valuable tool in production. By 1981, Glock became the first to successfully market a techno-polymer frame worldwide (Paoli 2015). The success of the product led other companies to follow suit. Increases in polymers and plastics within firearm production have also encouraged other technological advancements. This includes progress in the 3D printing of handguns, as well as general improvements to products, such as additions to comfort.

Characteristics While the need for techno-polymers as a substitute for metal declined after World War II, the use of them continued because of the perceived benefits of the product. For example, techno-polymers have a number of physical attributes that make them useful in arms manufacturing. A few properties that make them appealing is their strength, elasticity, and resistance. Other types of materials, such as glass and carbon, can reinforce techno-polymers, making them more durable. This means that the materials can endure a lot of stress without becoming deformed. The added reinforcement from other materials can also increase the resistance to extreme temperatures. These

physical qualities of techno-polymers make them well suited for use in firearm manufacturing. In addition to the physical qualities, techno-polymers can also produce a cost savings that is appealing to weapons manufacturers. Techno-polymer parts are generally created through an injection-molding process, which is done by filling a casted mold with the liquified polymer and allowing it to harden. While there may be higher initial startup expenses (such as the cost to develop the molds), over time, using less metal results in cost savings. On average, the use of techno-polymers allows for a 40 percent reduction in cost on individual firearm parts. Since most firearms only utilize polymers for a portion of the gun, this can result in an average savings of 10–20 percent per gun (Paoli 2015). Techno-polymers can also be advantageous from the perspective of firearm users. One of the noticeable contrasts between all-metal guns and ones that use technopolymers is the difference in weight. Techno-polymers are lighter in weight than their metal counterparts, which result in lighter firearms. Gun frames made from techno-polymers can weigh up to 85 percent less than the average metal version (Paoli 2015). This difference can lead to an up to 40 percent overall reduction in weight, meaning that the weight of a fully loaded techno-polymer handgun would be similar in weight to a metal handgun with no magazine (Paoli 2015). This weight reduction does vary based on the extent to which polymers are used, as well as what materials are supplementing the polymer base. One of the primary benefits to using lower-weight guns is that they are easier to carry. This can be particularly beneficial to people who carry their guns with them for extended periods, such as police officers

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and individuals with concealed carry permits. The reduction in weight also makes the firearms feel less bulky to users. In addition to techno-polymer frames being lighter than traditional metal ones, they also serve to reduce the recoil felt with firing the gun (Paoli 2015). One difference between the use of metal and technopolymers is that techno-polymers are more capable of compressing when fired. In terms of firearms, metal frames have little ability to compress when subjected to significant pressure. Therefore, when the gun is fired, the slide contacts the frame, and a recoil is felt. However, with techno-polymer frames, when the slide makes contact, it is able to compress due to the material’s elasticity and absorb some of the recoil. Other distinct features of techno-polymers, compared to steel or other metals, also highlight their suitability for gun manufacturing. For example, an additional advantage to techno-polymer frames is that the material is resistant to corrosion. With traditional metal guns, if left in high-moisture areas, rust can develop on the gun and corrode the metal. This can eventually cause significant damage to the firearm. Technopolymer frames are resistant to developing this rust. In addition, techno-polymers are resistant to various chemicals and lubricants. This can make polymer guns easier to maintain. Techno-polymers can also ease other maintenance-related issues. Compared to traditional firearms, techno-polymer frames are easier to remove and clean. If issues do arise with techno-polymer frames, however, many frames can be replaced if they become damaged. This requires gun owners to replace only a portion of the firearm rather than the whole thing. Finally, users can benefit from design improvements made possible by

techno-polymers. The use of alternatives to metal allow for the improved comfort of firearms. For example, new designs with these materials include the addition of extra grooves to improve the grip as well as a design that can more easily accommodate both right- and left-handed individuals. While these changes result in improvements in comfort for the user, they also permit increased accuracy. This is because the added grooves and general design modifications increase the amount of contact that users have with the gun.

Concerns with the Use of Polymers Despite the numerous benefits that technopolymers bring to both manufacturers and consumers, there are also some concerns with its use. One of the primary concerns with the use of techno-polymers orients around the marking and identification of firearms. Specifically, new technologies in manufacturing guns has led to issues with compliance with the International Tracing Instrument (ITI) (Paoli 2015). According to the ITI, “A unique marking should be applied to an essential or structural component of the weapon where the component’s destruction would render the weapon permanently inoperable” (UNGA 2005). However, techno-polymers have created concerns because they cannot be marked the same way as metal. In traditional, metal firearms, unique markings are impressed into the metal. This leaves the identifying numbers molded into the gun itself. While these markings are not invulnerable to tampering, improvements in modern technology have allowed professionals some ability in reconstructing these tampered identifiers. The marking system for techno-polymer gun parts, however, is slightly different. To develop these parts, polymer plastics are



poured into a reusable mold. Since the same molds are used to make identical gun parts, unique serial numbers cannot be imbedded into the guns the same way that they can on metal units. Instead, many companies insert a tag with this identifier into the frame itself. There is some debate as to whether this adheres to the ITI guidelines due to the ability for these tags to be removed without critically damaging the firearm. In summary, the defacement of steel gun serial numbers still leaves a trace on the weapon, whereas on polymer frames, there is a risk that these numbers could be removed all together. Jenna L. Borseth See also: Handguns; 3D Gun Printing

Further Reading Nicholson, Joseph L., and George R. Leighton. “Plastics Come of Age.” Harper’s Magazine, August 1942. Paoli, Giacomo P. “I. Techno-Polymers in Firearms Manufacturing: Challenges and Implications for Marking, Record-Keeping, and Tracing.” Behind the Curve (2015): 5–22. Rasmussen, Seth C. “Revisiting the Early History of Synthetic Polymers: Critiques and New Insights.” Ambix 65, no. 4 (2018): 356–72. United Nations General Assembly (UNGA). “International Instrument to Enable States to Identify and Trace, in a Timely and Reliable Manner, Illicit Small Arms and Light Weapons (‘International Tracing Instrument/ITI’).” June 2005. Utracki, L. A. “History of Commercial Polymer Alloys and Blends (From a Perspective of the Patent Literature).” Polymer Engineering and Science 35, no. 1 (1995): 2–17.

Tenth Amendment The Tenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution reads: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor

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prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people” (1791). The language itself suggests a tripartite sovereignty, with the people having the ultimate power and sovereignty. The majority and minority opinions of the U.S. Supreme Court in U.S. Term Limits, Inc. v. Thornton (1995) agreed that the Tenth Amendment recognized trilateral sovereignty. If anything, the Fourteenth Amendment enhances the sovereignty of the people. During the 1787–1788 debate on the ratification of the Constitution, the Anti-Federalists were concerned that the central government would annihilate the states. Of the nine state conventions ratifying or rejecting the Constitution and offering amendments, all nine of them submitted a version of what became the Tenth Amendment. The intent of those who adopted the Tenth Amendment, as with all amendments contained in the Bill of Rights, was not to include any structural changes in the Constitution. Rather, the Bill of Rights was adopted to confirm the structure already established by the body of the Constitution—that is to say, the Constitution as it existed before the adoption of the Bill of Rights. The structure of the Constitution was definitively illuminated by Alexander Hamilton and James Madison—as well as, to a lesser extent, John Jay—in their essays published in The Federalist Papers (The Federalist). This structure included a basic foundation: tripartite sovereignty among the federal government, the states, and the people—the people being the ultimate power and sovereign. Hamilton expressed this idea in Federalist no. 28: “Power being almost always the rival of power, the general government will at all times stand ready to check the usurpation of the state governments, and these will have the same disposition toward the general government.

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The [armed] people, by throwing themselves into either scale, will infallibly make it preponderate” (179). Subsequently, Hamilton and Madison fleshed out this concept of an armed populace. The “people at large [will always be] properly armed and equipped [with ammunition]” (Hamilton 1788, 184). Thereby the people will always have “the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation” (Madison 1788, 321). In this way, the Federalists assured the Anti-Federalists that the people, by their sheer weight of armed numbers, would be better able to well regulate the militia by making a significant contribution to its tyranny-deterring and tyranny-fighting effectiveness. The Magna Carta (1215), with which both the Federalists and the Anti-Federalists had intimate familiarity, contained a codification of “the right to control the sovereign by force [which] was merely an application of the general right of revolution under any government” (Adams 1912, 174). In this way, the armed people could rally to duly constituted authority—a majority of the committee of twenty-five barons that the Magna Carta established—to compel the government to obey the rule of law and restore the constitution, written or unwritten. By direct analogy to the Magna Carta, it would take the concurrence of a majority of the state governments to mobilize their armed populations and conduct a lawful insurrection against the federal government for this purpose. The Supreme Court’s decision in Presser v. Illinois (1886) confirmed this constitutional structure. While reiterating that Congress could not infringe on the individual right to keep arms, the court held that the Second Amendment does not prohibit a state from regulating armed protest

marches. Nevertheless, in referring to the Second Amendment, the Court cautioned that “the States cannot, even laying the constitutional provision out of view, prohibit the people from keeping and bearing arms” (Presser v. Illinois, 116 U.S. at 265 (1886)). This view, that the Second Amendment grants the people as individuals (not just as collectives, i.e., the states) the right to bear and possess arms, was ultimately upheld in the celebrated Supreme Court decisions of District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) and McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010). The Tenth Amendment’s inherent idea of trilateral sovereignty translates into a modern constitutional structure that takes into account the National Guard. For example, by always being armed, the people at large will be better able to exercise their option of (1) joining state National Guard units “headed and directed by the state governments” (Hamilton 1788, 404) and obeying the orders of the state governors “who will be supported by the people” (Madison 1788, 322), to deter and stop any federal tyranny; or (2) joining the National Guard of the United States and obeying the orders of the president, to deter and stop any state tyranny. Conversely, unless the people have the right, and perhaps the duty, to keep arms, the militia cannot be well regulated by the people: the ultimate power and sovereign. In the late 2010s and early 2020s several states took up consideration of legislation to invalidate federal gun laws, and in June 2021 Republican Missouri Governor Mike Parson signed a bill from the state’s Republican-led legislature that claims to nullify all federal gun laws in the state— and prohibits Missouri officials from cooperating with efforts to enforce such laws, citing Tenth Amendment protections. The



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law was immediately challenged in court, and many legal experts expect that its nullification provisions will eventually be struck down as unconstitutional. David I. Caplan and Gregg Lee Carter See also: District of Columbia v. Heller; Fourteenth Amendment; McDonald v. City of Chicago; Second Amendment

Further Reading Adams, George B. The Origin of the English Constitution. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1912. Boehm, Jessica, and Robby Korth. “State Lawmakers Take Aim at Federal Gun Control.” Center for Public Integrity, August 21, 2014. https://publicintegrity.org/politics/state -lawmakers-take-aim-at-federal-gun-control / (accessed January 31, 2022). The Federalist. Edited by Jacob E. Cooke. Hanover, NH: Wesleyan University Press, 1961. Wamsley, Laurel. “Missouri Has Declared Federal Gun Laws Illegal. Can It Do That?” National Public Radio, June 17, 2021. https://www.npr.org/2021/06/17/1007690138 /can-missouri-declare-federal-gun-laws -invalid (accessed January 31, 2022).

Terrorist Screening Database and Firearms In the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the United States responded with enhanced security measures to prevent acts of terrorism. These measures included Homeland Security Presidential Security Directive 6 (HSPD-6) (Homeland Security Presidential Security Directive 6 2003), which was an effort by the U.S. government to “consolidate and expand its use of watchlists to better screen for known or suspected terrorists at

consular offices and international ports of entry, and to better track them if they manage to enter the United States” (Krouse 2013, 8). As a result, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)-administered Terrorist Screening Center (TSC) maintains the Terrorist Screening Database (TSDB), which is the federal government’s consolidated watch list of known and suspected terrorists, both international and domestic. Records from the TSBD are tailored and shared “downstream” with screening agencies for specific applications, consistent with laws and policies under which the screening agencies operate. For example, the TSA administers the No-Fly List, which prohibits persons on the list from boarding a commercial aircraft for travel within, into or from the United States. Another use of the TSDB involves the FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) (Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act 2012). The purpose of NICS is to determine the eligibility for transfer and possession of a firearm for a private person who seeks to acquire a firearm from a federally licensed gun dealer. When a person attempts to purchase a firearm from a federally licensed firearms dealer, the person’s name is checked against the FBI’s NICS database to determine if the person meets any of a number of statutorily prescribed criteria; however, a person’s status as a known or suspected terrorist is not a disqualifying factor for firearms transfer and possession eligibility. Individuals whose names are included in the TSDB may legally purchase firearms (Sullivan 2017). In February 2004, the FBI began to conduct terrorist watch list queries during NICS record checks. Despite a person’s designation as a known or suspected terrorist not being a disqualifying factor, FBI

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personnel are apprised of NICS “hits” involving the TSDB and conduct investigations to determine whether the person seeking to acquire a weapon may be disqualified for a reason other than that the person is in the TSDB. Thus, there remains what has been called the “terror gap,” because known or suspected terrorists may legally purchase firearms, despite being on the TSDB. Attempts to close the “terror gap” through legislation have failed, in large measure, due to the constitutional protection provided by the Second Amendment. The meaning of the Second Amendment has been the subject of debate for years, and the Supreme Court had not decided a Second Amendment case since 1939. Gun control advocates have contended the Second Amendment is a collective right. For the first time, in 2008, the U.S. Supreme Court addressed the question of whether possession of a firearm was a collective or individual right. In District of Columbia v. Heller, 254 U.S. 570 (2008), the court determined that the possession of a firearm was a personal right protected by the Constitution. Heller shifted the securityliberty balance in determining whether governmental action is lawful with respect to the regulation of firearms. Persons are nominated for inclusion in the TSDB by federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies under criteria developed by the Director of National Intelligence, in consultation with the Secretary of Homeland Security, Secretary of State, and the Attorney General and must report these criteria to Congress (Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act 2004). The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Privacy Office explained that the criteria could not be disclosed to the public without compromising intelligence and security or allowing persons seeking to avoid detection to avoid being identified as a threat (U.S.

Department of Homeland Security Privacy Office 2006). Congress has been concerned about reports of misidentifications and erroneous watch list entries, so legislation was enacted to establish appeals procedures for aggrieved persons (Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act 2004; Implementing Provisions of the 9/11 Commission Act 2007). The use of the various U.S. watch lists, however, has been challenged on the grounds that the “nation’s watch listing system is error-prone and unreliable because it uses vague and overbroad criteria and secret evidence to place individuals on blacklists without a meaningful process to correct government error and clear their names” (Johanson and Anders 2016, 2). On the one hand, the United States has an interest in keeping firearms out of the hands of known and suspected terrorists. On the other hand, much of the legislation proposed to close the “terror gap” could deny a citizen an enumerated constitutional right without meaningful due process and based on mere suspicion (Titus 2010). A Government Accountability Office report concluded the FBI and the intelligence community were using standards that “inherently involve some subjectivity” for watch listing persons (U.S. Government Accountability Office 2007, 9). These nominations and administrative adjudications concerning the TSDB are made exclusively by Executive Branch employees without any justification to, or approval by, the judiciary a key due process and separation of powers concept when constitutional rights are involved. The “terror gap” remains unresolved, as the securityliberty balance regarding firearms continues. Leslie G. Wiser Jr. and Hayden Smith See also: Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); District of Columbia v.

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Heller; Extreme Risk Protection Orders; National Instant Criminal Background Check System

Further Reading Bush, George W. “Directive on Integration and Use of Screening Information to Protect against Terrorism.” September 16, 2003. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg /PPP-2003-book2/pdf/PPP-2003-book2 -doc-pg1174.pdf (accessed April 14, 2019). Federal Bureau of Investigation. “2017 NICS Operation Report.” https://www.fbi.gov /f ile-repositor y/2017-nics-operations -report.pdf/view (accessed April 9, 2019). Implementing Provisions of the 9/11 Commission Act of 2007 (P.L.110-53) 49 U.S.C. §§44903 (j)(2)(C)(iii), 44909 (c)(6)(B), and 44926. Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 (P.L. 108-458) (118 Stat. 3718) (2004), §4012(c). Johanson, K., and C. Anders. Karin Johanson and Christopher Anders to U.S. Senate, June 20, 2016. https://www.aclu.org/sites /default/files/field_document/2016_06_20 _aclu_vote_recommendation_on_feinste in_and_cornyn_amendments_to_h.r._2578 _updated.pdf (accessed April 12, 2019). Krouse, William J. “Terrorist Watchlist Screening and Background Checks for Firearms.” Congressional Research Service, May 1, 2013. Sullivan, Elizabeth M. “Beware the ‘Terror Gap’: Closing the Loophole between the U.S. Terrorist Watchlist and the Right to bear Arms.” Cornell Law Review 103 (2017): 205. Titus, Aaron. “Terrorists and Guns: The Nature of the Threat and Proposed Reforms: Hearing Before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs.” 111th Congress, May 5, 2010. https://www. hsgac.senate.gov/hearings/terrorists-andguns-the-nature-of-the-threat-and-proposed-reforms (accessed April 12, 2019). U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Privacy Office. “Assessing the Impact of the

Automatic Selectee and No Fly Lists on Privacy and Civil Liberties.” April 27, 2006. U.S. Government Accountability Office. “Terrorist Watch List Screening, Opportunities Exist to Enhance Management Oversight, Reduce Vulnerabilities in Agency Screening Processes, and Expand the Use of the List.” October 2007. https://www .gao.gov/new.items/d08110.pdf (accessed April 10, 2019).

Thompson, General John T. See Tommy Gun 3D Gun Printing The concept of 3D printing was introduced in 1977, when Wyn Kelly Swainson filed the first patent for an early 3D printer model. It was not until 2005 that the first at-home 3D printers were available to the public, and since that time, the variety of materials that can be used to print has expanded to include plastic, nylon, glass, epoxy resins, silver, titanium, steel, wax, photopolymers, polycarbonate, food, ceramic, and gold (McCue 2019; Education Department at the Museum of Arts and Design 2013). A 3D printer works by using a plan or blueprint to turn an object into thousands of minute slices and then compounding those slices from the bottom up. The layers stick together to form a solid object. As each layer can be very complex, 3D printers can create moving parts like hinges and wheels. The blueprints or plans are created on a computer or downloaded from the internet. In 2012, Cody Wilson, a University of Texas law student, created a 3D printable pistol christened “The Liberator.” A year later, Wilson left the university and founded a company, Defense Distributed, to make

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This 3D printed pistol, known as “The Liberator,” was created in 2012 by a law student at the University of Texas. His company, Defense Distributed, and others, publish open-source designs for others to print their own 3D guns. (Bob Daemmrich/Alamy Stock Photo)

the designs for the weapon available online. By 2018, Defense Distributed had grown to provide access to ten files on Defcad.com— one containing the 3D printer designs for the Liberator, and nine blueprints for guns that could only be built with machine-shop equipment. These guns, when assembled, are primarily made of plastic but are still capable of firing standard handgun rounds. A litany of lawsuits have been filed in response to the plans for The Liberator being made available on the internet. On May 8, 2013, the U.S. State Department attempted to stop public access to these files, citing international arms control law. Defense Distributed, along with the Second Amendment Foundation, filed a lawsuit in 2015 against the State Department for a violation of First Amendment rights. In response to the federal government’s insistence that the handgun blueprints violated the munitions export rules of the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (which restrict and control the export of defense and military related technologies in the interest of national security and foreign

policy objectives), Defense Distributed and the Second Amendment Foundation argued that the distribution of the files was covered by the First Amendment’s protection of free speech. The duo argued that since the files are comprised of computer code, they constitute speech, the censorship of which is unconstitutional under the First Amendment. In July 2018, the State Department settled the lawsuit with Defense Distributed and the Second Amendment Foundation that allowed the company to disseminate the plans online. Nineteen U.S. states and the District of Columbia then sued the Donald Trump administration to end that settlement. That lawsuit sought to block the distribution of the files, citing public safety concerns. In August 2018, a federal court barred the company from posting the designs online for free by issuing a temporary restraining order on the distribution of the blueprints. Defense Distributed subsequently began selling the designs for any amount of money to U.S. customers on its website after finding that there was a loophole in the ruling



that allowed the designs to be sold and emailed rather than downloaded. Shortly thereafter, the DEFCAD website removed the links to download blueprints when a federal judge in Seattle granted a preliminary injunction until the case could be resolved in court. From July 27, 2018, when the plans were posted on Defcad.com, to July 31, 2018, when the temporary nationwide restraining order was granted, counters on the website suggested the gun plans had been downloaded over 20,000 times (Benz and Hollister 2018). The concerns with 3D printed guns for law enforcement are that they are easy to conceal and are untraceable, as there is no requirement for them to have serial numbers. In the blueprints available online, pistols require a six-ounce steel nail to serve as a firing pin in order to trigger metal detectors. This suggests the weapons will abide by the U.S. Undetectable Firearms Act, which requires firearms to be spotted by a metal detector—meaning they must contain at least 3.7 ounces of steel. Theoretically, however, if the firing pin were to be removed, a metal detector would not pick up on the presence of a plastic 3D printed weapon such as The Liberator. In 2013, Congress renewed the Undetectable Firearms Act until 2023. Although efforts to modernize it have been introduced in Congress, namely by Representative Madeleine Dean (D-PA), the law does not currently specify which part of the gun needs to be metal. U.S. Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL) and Representative Ted Deutch (D-FL) filed bills during the 115th session of Congress (2017–2019) that sought to make it illegal to intentionally publish a digital file online that programs a 3D printer to automatically manufacture a firearm. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) and David Cicilline (D-RI) introduced bills during this

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same session that would have required all firearms to be traceable via a serial number. These initiatives were called the 3D Printed Gun Safety Act and the Untraceable Firearms Act, respectively, and all died in the 115th session of Congress. In the 116th session of Congress (2019–2021), similar legislation was proposed by Senator Edward Markey (D-MA) and Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) that would also require all guns to have at least one nonremovable main component, such as the frame or the barrel, that is made of metal. Representative Deutch also reintroduced the 3D Printed Gun Safety Act in this session. The states that sued the Trump administration say that the federal government has infringed on their states’ exercise of police power and enforcement of public safety laws by letting people prohibited from owning a firearm—including minors, felons, and the mentally ill—have access to the blueprints for firearms. Download counts, according to defdist.org, climbed into the “millions” in 2013, before being shut down by the U.S. Department of State. As these guns do not have serial numbers, people do not need to complete a background check to obtain one, as they would to buy a commercial firearm. Additionally, there are concerns that criminals could destroy evidence in the aftermath of a crime because the plastic is easier to destroy than metal. Although the DEFCAD website was shut down after Defense Distributed was served an injunction, the company launched Ghost Gunner in 2014. Ghost Gunner is a fully programmable device that facilitates the creation of frames for AR-15s, AR-308s, 1911s, and Polymer80s, all of which are semiautomatic weapons, through 3D printing. Although Defense Distributed has been the face of this controversy over 3D printed firearms, in 2012, MakerBot’s Thingiverse

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website also hosted 3D blueprints that could be used to produce the lower receiver component of an AR-15 semiautomatic rifle. These receivers can then be paired with store-bought parts to create a nontraceable semiautomatic weapon. Thingiverse later removed AR-15 and other weapon component designs from its 3D printing file library. Officials at both the state and federal levels have voiced concerns that once these plans are made available online, it is difficult for them to be removed entirely, regardless of subsequent legislation that may be passed. In Canada, the Ministry of Public Safety has stated that citizens who make their own 3D printed guns without a license will face mandatory jail time, even though the manufacturing of homemade firearms for personal use is said to predate 3D printing in the country. These homemade firearms are legal in Canada so long as they are not for resale and the individuals are licensed to own them. Aside from fears for public safety, lawmakers and others have also expressed fears over the safety of those who try to make and use these weapons. Those who have examined the manufacturing quality control of 3D printed guns suggest that, at best, they may only fire a few shots before malfunctioning and potentially exploding in the shooter’s hand. At worst, the products with a design or printing defect might come apart before firing a single bullet. Researchers explain that the problem is not with the concept of 3D printing but rather the process followed via plan or blueprint to create a specific item. The 3D printers available to consumers may not produce a high-quality product, and consumers themselves are unlikely to perform quality assurance testing before 3D printing a firearm. In 2013, agents from the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol,

Tobacco, and Firearms and Explosives (ATF) tested 3D printed guns and determined that the quality of the materials used to print as well as the manufacturing would govern the success of the gun in firing one or more rounds. One gun made with a plastic called ABS-M30 successfully fired a .380-caliber bullet all eight times it was tested, whereas another pistol made from a plastic called VisiJet exploded into a dozen plastic shards the first time it was fired. The rounds from the ABS-M30 firearm traveled eight to eleven inches into gelatin that had been molded to simulate human soft tissue; by comparison, a round from a commercially available .380 pistol traveled eighteen inches into the same mold. According to the ATF, printing a 3D weapon that is of a higher quality, and therefore more lethal to victims, is usually cost-prohibitive for the general public. When the cost for material(s) and the 3D printer itself is factored in, it sometimes becomes less expensive to buy a gun off the black or gray markets in the United States. As the plans for these weapons are available on and downloaded from the internet, there is also the risk that the design files could be tampered with, either via an intentionally defective design or a virus that interferes with the operation of the 3D printer itself. Although advances are being made in the realm of 3D printing, they are largely “being developed and tested in research laboratories, not incorporated into mass-produced 3D printers” (Straub 2019, 3). Thus, 3D printed firearms will likely not be reliable enough to use safely for some time, until consumer-available printers are more sophisticated. There have already been arrests and indictments on firearms charges for individuals in possession of 3D printed firearms. One individual had been prohibited

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from purchasing a federally licensed weapon because he had a prior protective order against him for domestic assault. Nonetheless, he was able to purchase a 3D printer and create a lower receiver, the part of an AR-15 that contains the firing mechanism, with no serial number. He was then able to buy the other parts of the gun such as the barrel, stock, sight, and trigger without a background check and build the gun himself. He was sentenced to eight years jail time and three years of supervised release. There have been other arrests for the possession of 3D printed firearms in Australia, Japan, and the United Kingdom. A number of U.S. states, meanwhile, have considered or passed legislation that would regulate or ban 3D printed firearms and “ghost guns,” or untraceable firearms, including Connecticut, Florida, New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Texas, Virginia, and Washington. Researchers have also determined that 3D guns may be traceable by identifying polymers used to print the guns using mass spectrometry (Koslow 2019). In addition to the lawsuit filed by the nineteen states and the District of Columbia, twenty-one different attorneys general from various states have sent a letter to the U.S. State Department and the Department of Justice, asking for an injunction on sharing 3D printed guns. Jessica Trapassi Migliaccio See also: Availability of Guns, Effects on Crime; Handguns; Plastic Guns

Further Reading Benz, Kaitlin, and Sean Hollister. “3D Printed Guns: 19 States Sue, Nationwide Restraining Order Granted.” CNET, August 3, 2018. https://www.cnet.com/news/3d-printed -guns-19-states-sue-nationwide-restraining -order-granted/ (accessed June 14, 2019).

Cullinane, Susannah, and Doug Criss. “All Your Questions about 3D Guns Answered.” CNN, August 2, 2018. https://www .cnn.com/2018/07/31/us/3d-printed-plastic -guns/index.html (accessed June 14, 2019). Education Department at the Museum of Arts and Design. “3D Printing Timeline.” 2018. https://madmuseum.org/sites/default/files /static/ed/3D%20Printed%20Timeline%20 Resource.pdf (accessed June 14, 2019). Koslow, Tyler. “3D Printed Gun Digest— Everything You Need to Know in 2019.” All3DP, June 26, 2019. https://all3dp.com /3d-printed-gun-firearm-weapon-parts/ (accessed June 14, 2019). McCue, T. J. “Tech Specs on 3D Printing Materials.” Lifewire, March 28, 2019. https://www.lifewire.com/specs-on-3d -printing-materials-2232 (accessed June 14, 2019). Straub, Jeremy. “3D-Printing Guns at Home Is Dangerous—Mostly for the Person Shooting It.” FastCompany.com, January 10, 2019. https://www.fastcompany.com /90290217/3d-printing-guns-at-home-is -dangerous-mostly-for-the-person-shoot ing-it (accessed June 14, 2019). Zhou, Marrian. “3D-Printed Gun Controversy: Everything You Need to Know.” CNET, September 25, 2018. https://www .c net .c om / news /t he -3d - pr i nt e d -g u n -controversy-ever y thing-you-need-to -know/ (accessed June 14, 2019).

Tiahrt Amendment. See Background Checks Tommy Gun The Thompson submachine gun—universally known as the Tommy gun—marked an important advance in weapons design. Perhaps as importantly, the Tommy gun achieved iconic status in American culture. A Thompson equipped with its drum

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magazine evokes the Roaring Twenties and swaggering gangsters. Then, the same Thompson, equipped with the stick magazine and a shoulder strap, references elite troops and commandos of World War II. The Thompson submachine gun was the brainchild of Gen. John T. Thompson (1860–1940), a career army officer committed to giving U.S. troops automatic weapons. With World War I looming, his frustration with the army’s sluggish weapons procurement led him to retire in 1914 to form the Auto-Ordnance Company specifically for the purpose of developing automatic weapons. U.S. involvement in the war led Thompson back to the U.S. Army in 1917, but as he left Auto-Ordnance, he gave engineers a clear set of design requirements for his automatic rifle: light and small enough for one man. More importantly, it was to fire standard-issue rifle ammunition. Finally, the weapon had to be designed around a modified “blowback” principle embodied in the patented Blish-Lock technology Thompson had licensed. Automatic weapon designers in this period had a choice of three technologies: recoil, gas actuated, or blowback. Both recoil and gas-actuated approaches were unsuitable for the light, portable weapons Thompson wanted. The Blish-Lock was a free-floating breechblock simply held in place by a spring. The Blish-Lock never actually “locked.” Gases propelling the projectile out the barrel also pushed the breechblock back to eject the shell casing and chamber the next round. Blowback showed promise, but reduction to practice proved challenging. Controlling the Blish-Lock proved extremely difficult with rifle cartridges. It jammed regularly. The Army’s .45-caliber ACP (pistol rounds) provided the only

ammunition Thompson’s engineering team could get to work with the Blish-Lock. The engineers thought they had failed, but Thompson was delighted to use such readily available ammunition. He promptly nicknamed the small, handheld machine gun the “Trench Broom.” He envisioned rapid deployment on the western front. To distinguish his weapon from larger machine guns, Thompson coined the term “submachine gun”—thus adding to the vocabulary of weaponry. Unfortunately for Thompson and AutoOrdnance, their first prototypes were only ready for field testing in November 1918. The moment was lost. The gun was clearly a military weapon. With the end of hostilities, the world was awash in unnecessary weapons: governments (at least among the victorious powers) had full arsenals and surpluses sufficient to meet any conceivable need for infantry weapons through the next twenty years. Thompson managed a few military trials, but military sales during the interwar years simply couldn’t keep the company alive. The Auto-Ordnance Company remained at risk of failure until the late 1930s. Much of the time, the company was just a shell without full-time personnel. The venture remained alive through the 1920s and into the 1930s only by the steady financial backing of a tobacco tycoon named Thomas Fortune Ryan. Ryan’s cash kept the company afloat, but Ryan’s backing also posed problems. Ryan was rumored to be a major backer for the Irish Republican Army (IRA). In 1921, when customs officials in New York harbor seized an untraceable shipment of 500 Thompsons headed for Ireland and the IRA, the resulting scandal and criminal investigation cast a pall over Auto-Ordnance. No connection was ever proven between the company and the IRA shipment, but the



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A soldier of the First Marine Division aims his Tommy gun at a Japanese sniper as his companion ducks for cover during the Battle of Okinawa in 1945. (National Archives)

episode did lasting damage. The impounded Thompsons were eventually released and made their way to Ireland. Indeed, Thompsons were in evidence with the IRA well into the twentieth century. Reportedly, some were still with the IRA as late as the 1990s. The idea of criminal associations appalled Thompson. He wanted his guns sold only to law enforcement and security interests, but he had little success on his own. Ironically, a few gangsters with Tommy guns probably did more for law enforcement sales than anything Thompson did. As the Tommy gun gained notoriety as the “Chicago typewriter,” arming police and security forces became a matter of public policy. Before 1925, Auto-Ordnance had sold fewer than 3,000 units, and the initial production run of 15,000 firing mechanisms from 1921 met production needs through the late 1930s. Any success Auto-Ordnance had in the 1920s and 1930s seemed to follow from the

notoriety of the Tommy gun. Somehow, the gun seemed to attract unsavory publicity. When strikebreakers in Colorado touted the Tommy gun, Chicago gangsters took notice. Then, the link to gangland crime was forged in 1925 when a Chicago gang used Thompsons to gun down rivals. With that, the Tommy gun became a Chicago gangster’s trademark—at least in the popular imagination. In fact, the Tommy gun proved itself useful only as a very specialized weapon even among gangsters. Expensive, difficult to control, and dangerous, the Tommy gun required skilled handling. It emptied its hundredround drum magazine in just four seconds. Moreover, the Tommy gun proved dangerous to friends as well as foes. Still, the Tommy gun did become a prestige weapon for the era’s gangsters, most notably Al Capone. Capone even formed a squad of trained professionals to handle his Thompsons. In 1929,

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his squad made their mark on Chicago’s gangland history with the St. Valentine’s Day Shooting. The popularity of the Tommy Gun among criminals did stimulate law enforcement sales. As maritime smugglers of the prohibition era were armed, the Coast Guard and the navy adopted Thompsons for their patrol boats. When postal robberies became a matter of national concern, the Marine Corps got the job of guarding the mail. As they took up that duty, the Post Office Department provided 250 Thompsons to the soldiers. Overall, however, law enforcement markets produced little, with sales usually foundering on the realization that a submachine gun might do as much damage to bystanders as it could do to any criminals. The police saw scant value in submachine guns. As late as 1929—the year of the St. Valentine’s Day Shooting—the Chicago police force owned just five Thompsons. As long as the Thompsons remained confined to the Beer Wars in Chicago, they produced little public concern. With the Great Depression, however, a new kind of criminal emerged and began turning his weapon on bank guards, police officers, and bystanders. These Depression-era criminals changed public opinion and generated support for the National Firearms Act of 1934, the first federal regulation of firearms in the United States. Early sales did produce some follow-on business for Auto-Ordnance. In 1927, as the U.S. Marines went to Nicaragua, they took along their Post Office Thompsons and even ordered 200 additional Thompsons. In the 1930s, the U.S. Army began buying Thompsons for its tank crews. When war broke out in Europe in 1939, things changed. The French and the British immediately began placing large orders at

$250 per gun. At the time, the Thompson submachine gun was virtually the only automatic weapon on the open market. Soon, the British had placed thirteen orders for a total of just over 100,000 units. Even the U.S. Army finally ordered 20,000 units, and by 1942, the U.S. army would order more than 300,000. With this wartime surge, Auto-Ordnance needed a production partner, and it found the Savage Arms Company. By 1944 when production shut down, Savage and AutoOrdnance had produced more than two million units. Over that time, the unit cost dropped from $250 to $45. Still, by 1944 the Thompson was considered obsolete and overpriced. It was still produced mostly because it was available and because of enormous popularity with the troops. Even as the British continued to purchase Thompsons, they launched a program developing less expensive alternatives. The result was the British STEN gun, a stamped and welded gun with a unit cost of about $10. With that, Britain opened a new era in the development of submachine guns. Effectively, the STEN gun was a disposable item, one that could even be air-dropped in massive quantities to partisans. The U.S. military also launched a cost-savings program that produced the World War II “grease gun” (U.S. M3). When the M3 became available in 1943, it was produced at a $20 unit cost. Production ceased in 1944, but the Thompson submachine gun saw action in both Korea and Vietnam. Many have called the Thompson submachine gun the most beloved weapon of World War II. Certainly, it elicited strong loyalties among many who used it. Even in the twenty-first century, there is still a strong market among collectors. David S. Lux See also: National Firearms Act of 1934



Further Reading Auto-Ordnance Corporation. “Thompson.” http://www.auto-ordnance.com/ (accessed June 28, 2011). Ellis, John. The Social History of the Machine Gun. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986. Goddard, Calvin. “The Valentine Massacre: A Study in Ammunition Tracing.” American Journal of Police Science 1 (1930): 60–78. http://firearmsid.com/Feature%20 Articles/stvalentine/index.htm (accessed June 28, 2011). Helmer, William J. The Gun That Made the Twenties Roar. New York: Macmillan, 1969. James, Gary. “The Unofficial Tommy Gun Page: The Story of the Thompson Submachine Gun.” n.d. http://www.nfatoys.com /tsmg/default.htm (accessed June 28, 2011). “Thompson for Sale.” Thompson for Sale at GunAuction.com, n.d. www.gunauction. com/shop/thompson (accessed May 18, 2022).

Toy Guns Makeshift toy guns, in the form of a stick or a thumb-and-forefinger gesture, have been around since the first appearance of firearms in the midfourteenth century. The actual manufacturing of toy guns began after the Civil War ended in 1865, when weapons factories began producing cap guns as a way to maintain profits. Cap guns contain small discs of explosive compounds and create a loud gunshot sound and puff of smoke when fired. In 1886, the first BB gun was created. This air rifle shoots ball bearings of 0.18 inches, a size between B and BBB, known as “BB.” When Plymouth, Michigan, inventor Clarence Hamilton introduced the metal BB gun to Lewis Cass Hough, the president of the struggling Plymouth Iron Windmill Company, he exclaimed in the slang of the

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time, “Boy, that’s a daisy!” Soon the company began, including a BB gun as a premium with each farmer’s iron windmill order. Eventually, the demand for BB guns was greater than for windmills, and in 1895, the company suspended windmill production and reincorporated as the Daisy Manufacturing Company. The 1880s also witnessed the popularity of cheap, nonfunctional replicas known as penny guns. In the 1930s and 1940s, Hollywood cowboys and comic strips inspired many toy gun models. Daisy’s Buck Rogers Rocket Pistol (1933), Buck Rogers Disintegrator Pistol (1934), and the Liquid Helium Pistol (1935) were all best sellers. In 1940, Daisy launched the Red Ryder BB gun, as a tie-in to a popular western comic strip hero, and more than a million sold in 1949. The Red Ryder BB gun was also featured in the 1983 American Christmas comedy film, A Christmas Story. The “Golden Age” of toy guns was the 1950s, when children sought to emulate their heroes from television and motion picture westerns. Television cowboys like Roy Rogers, Gene Autry, Hopalong Cassidy, and the Lone Ranger all had their names on realistic-looking toy guns. During this time, the Mattel Toy Company launched a cap gun called the “burp gun” that was successfully advertised on The Mickey Mouse Club. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, toy gun manufacturers continued to develop tie-ins with popular television icons, who were now crime stoppers and special agents. Mattel released cutting-edge Dick Tracy cap gun revolvers, as well as a Dick Tracy Water Jet Gun that was fashioned after a police pump-action shotgun and could shoot water and caps. James Bond inspired many secret agent weapons, such as pistols disguised as cameras and radios and attaché cases that concealed firearms.

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As westerns and detective shows began to fall out of favor, the popularity of toy guns also diminished. Toy companies responded with innovative products that used the latest manufacturing technology. Topper Toys’ Johnny Seven One Man Army (OMA) was released in 1964 and was a best-selling boy’s toy that year. This highly sought-after, three-foot-long weapon offered the novelty of multiple guns in one unit: a machine gun, grenade launcher, rocket launcher, tripod-mounted rifle, and pistol. Assassinations of public and political figures in the 1960s increased parental anxiety about toy guns. Dr. Spock’s 1968 edition of Baby and Child Care advised parents to discourage toy gun play, and Sears and Bloomingdales suspended the sale of toy guns during the 1968 Christmas season. Ultimately, toy guns continued to be manufactured and sold, and in the 1970s, Kenner Toys produced the popular Star Wars rayguns. In 1991, Larami Limited released the Super Soaker, a water blaster that uses manually pressurized air to shoot water long distances. The Nintendo Wii Zapper gun attracted some controversy in 2007 because it provides video gamers with a realistic shooting experience. This futuristic device is a gun shell peripheral for the Nintendo Wii remote that accompanies the Wii video game console. Toy guns have been used to commit crimes, and many people have been injured and killed as a result of police mistaking toy guns for actual firearms. The earliest federal toy gun legislation came on the heels of an incident in 1987, when Gary Stollman, a mentally disturbed man, burst onto the set of KNBC-TV in Burbank, California. Stollman held a gun to the back of “Fight Back” consumer reporter David Horowitz and

demanded that he read a rambling statement. The realistic-looking pistol turned out to be an unloaded pellet gun, and the ordeal led Horowitz to launch a campaign to outlaw realistic toy guns. The first federal toy gun law was subsumed by the Federal Energy Management Improvement Act of 1988. The statute was titled “Penalties for Entering into Commerce of Imitation Firearms,” and it specified that no person could manufacture, transport, or receive any toy or look-alike firearm unless it contained a marking approved by the secretary of commerce. It mandated that a blaze-orange plug be permanently inserted in the visible end of the gun barrel. The Department of Commerce Technology Administration ultimately set forth a rule in the Code of Federal Regulations that required realistic toy guns to have one of the following: a blaze-orange plug recessed within six millimeters of the end of the barrel; a blaze-orange stripe around the barrel; a transparent construction that reveals the gun’s contents; a brightly colored exterior in red, orange, yellow, green, or blue; or a mostly white exterior with a design or accent in a bright color (Wood 2008–2009). Thus, current legislation allows toy manufacturers to make realistic toy guns as long as the markings conform to regulations. Toy guns are widely accessible, and problems arise when criminals simply paint over orange plugs and brightcolored exteriors to make the toy gun look as realistic as possible (Wood 2008–2009). The National Institute of Justice studied the effectiveness of the blaze-orange markings. Results indicate that police officers are not trained to distinguish between real and toy weapons; they are instructed to assume that all suspects’ guns are real and lifethreatening. The Bureau of Justice Statistics

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conducted a study of the use of realistic toy guns in criminal acts and reported that within four and a half years, 5,654 robberies and 8,128 assaults were committed with look-alike toy guns (Wood 2008–2009, 278). In November 2014, toy guns again made headlines when police shot and killed twelve-year-old Tamir Rice in a Cleveland, Ohio, park. Officers had been dispatched to the park to further investigate reports of a Black male pointing a “probably fake” pistol at other people in the park (Stone and Socia 2019). Dispatchers, however, had not informed the responding officers that the caller believed the gun was a fake (Dewan and Oppel 2015). Within seconds of arriving on scene, one of the officers had shot Rice. Investigation into the incident revealed that Rice actually had a BB gun that belonged to a friend, from which the orange safety marker had been removed. Through the years, some parents and politicians have called for a complete ban on the manufacturing of realistic toy guns. One fear is that youth who play with toy guns will grow into violent adults who fire real guns at other people. Though little to no research exists on the long-term effects of toy gun play, Watson and Peng’s (1992) observational study of preschoolers reported that amount of toy gun play strongly predicted boys’ aggression in play settings. Allison G. Butler and Abbie Finnerty See also: Violent Video Games and Gun Violence

Further Reading Daisy Airgun Museum. “Daisy History.” n.d. https://www.daisymuseum.com/history .aspx (accessed June 12, 2022). Dewan, Shaila, and Richard A. Oppel Jr. “In Tamir Rice Case, Many Errors by Cleveland Police, Then a Fatal One.” New York

Times, January 22, 2015. https://www .nytimes.com/2015/01/23/us/in-tamir-rice -shooting-in-cleveland-many-errors-by -police-then-a-fatal-one.html (accessed July 1, 2021). Hesse, Monica. “Little Bang Theory of Violence: It All Begins with a Toy Gun.” Washington Post, November 11, 2007. http:// www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content /article/2007/11/09/AR2007110900598.html (accessed January 31, 2021). Stone, Rebecca, and Kelly M. Socia. “Boy with Toy or Black Male with Gun: An Analysis of Online News Articles Covering the Shooting of Tamir Rice.” Race and Justice 9, no. 3 (2019): 330–58. Watson, Malcolm W., and Ying Peng. “The Relation between Toy Gun Play and Children’s Aggressive Behavior.” Early Education and Development 3 (1992): 370–89. Wood, Robert H. “Toy Guns Don’t Kill People—People Kill People Who Play with Toy Guns: Federal Attempts to Regulate Imitation Firearms in the Face of Toy Industry Opposition.” New York City Law Review 12 (2008–2009): 263–81.

Tracing Crime Guns. See National Tracing Center (NTC) Trap Shooting. See Target Shooting Trigger Locks Trigger locks are devices designed to prevent the accidental discharge of a firearm. Generally, the device has a rigid cylinder that sits behind the trigger so it cannot be pulled. The lock is released with a combination or key. There are also cable locks that block the chamber and prevent a cartridge from being fired. Locks are widely available

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for $5–$35, depending on the model. Trigger locks are sometimes referred to as “child safety locks” by supporters. They are also one option included in legislation requiring a “secure gun storage or safety device,” so, at times, these laws are gunreferred to as trigger lock laws, despite including other locking options such as lock boxes. Supporters of trigger locks argue that they are a low cost, “commonsense” safety measure that helps prevent accidental shootings and injuries, especially of children. Opponents argue they add to the costs, inconvenience, and regulation of gun ownership while potentially saving only a very few lives. Issues of encouraging or mandating the sale of, or use of, trigger locks have played out in the marketplace, in state law, and in federal law (Peters 2013). In 2000, the authors of an American Journal of Public Health study found that 43 percent of U.S. homes with firearms and children had at least one unlocked firearm. From this national survey, they extrapolated that more than 8.3 million U.S. children lived in a home with an unlocked firearm. Other studies have reported similar numbers with a slight trend to greater use of safe storage methods in recent years. Supporters of locks argue that reducing these figures would reduce the number of children killed or wounded by accidental firearms use or by suicide. A 2005 study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that better gun storage practices did provide some protective effect against child injury and suicide. Trigger locks alone, though, did not produce a statistically significant protective effect, but the finding may have been affected by a small sample size. Overall, it is difficult to isolate the true impact of trigger locks. Juvenile firearms injuries have decreased in recent years, but multiple variables are likely at play.

Additionally, people who report use of trigger locks often also report taking other safety steps such as keeping guns unloaded and using a lock box. Opponents of mandatory trigger lock sales argue that they add an unnecessary cost for gun owners who have no children or who take other gun safety steps. They further argue that requirements to use locks again add an inconvenience for all to protect only some. Additionally, they believe locks might actually increase the number of injuries and deaths by giving gun owners a false sense of security and leading to overall less careful storage and monitoring of their weapons. They feel it is wiser to educate children on appropriate gun usage than to rely on a mechanical device. This argument has become particularly forceful as numerous locks have been recalled for safety reasons. Several types of locks have been opened by using paper clips or wire cutters, or by smashing the locks. Opponents of use also argue that storing guns with locks reduces their utility for selfdefense, thereby possibly increasing crime or injuries from criminals. This has led to the crucial argument that mandatory-use laws are a possible violation of the Second Amendment. Furthermore, opponents argue that any gains in safety from locks are minimal, as locks are designed for use only on an unloaded firearm and carry warnings that use on a loaded gun may result in an accidental discharge. Therefore, in many cases, they are redundantly reinforcing the safety of an unloaded weapon. However, if a youth was determined to use a firearm to commit suicide or for another purpose, they could break the lock with relative ease. Supporters argue that even if trigger locks save only one life, they are worth the cost. Gun control advocates such as the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence



and those involved in the Million Mom March, some public health leaders, and certain government officials have argued forcefully for the use of locks. Some studies have shown that counseling about locks from physicians and community groups does not cause a significant shift in gun owners’ behavior, but one study published in the Journal of Applied Communication Research found that radio public service announcements about trigger locks did significantly increase knowledge of gun safety issues and led approximately 17 percent of gun-owning households exposed to the message to call for a free trigger lock. Free locks have also been distributed through programs sponsored by the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) and funded in part by a grant from the U.S. Department of Justice. The project has distributed more than 35 million safety kits in all fifty states and also has led community efforts to educate children on safe gun practices. The project suffered a setback in 2001 when the Consumer Product Safety Commission and the NSSF announced a voluntary recall of 400,000 defective locks. Trigger lock advocates have also attempted to put pressure on gun manufacturers. Using tobacco litigation as a model, numerous lawsuits were filed against gun manufacturers, arguing that they were liable for damages caused by their products and should have to reimburse the government for any Medicare or other money spent treating gunshot victims. Further pressure was added by government announcements that police departments would buy guns only from companies that adopted new gun safety rules. In 1997, eight major manufacturers, trying to limit their financial and public relations losses and bowing to increasing pressure from the Clinton administration and Congress, agreed to begin

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installing locking devices on their weapons. In 2000, Smith & Wesson went even further by agreeing to a host of new provisions, including equipping all future guns with smart gun technology that makes the gun inoperable until the lock is released by a signal from a special ring or bracelet worn by the owner, or until the owner’s fingerprint is matched. The effectiveness of the 1997 agreement was somewhat limited by slow implementation by some manufacturers and industry views that the government was meddling in their private business decisions with what they considered a form of extortion. Many terms of the sweeping 2000 agreement proved controversial and led to a boycott of Smith & Wesson. Ironically, Smith & Wesson was purchased in 2001 by Saf-T-Hammer, a manufacturer of gun locks and other firearm safety products. To provide added pressure on manufacturers, dealers, and gun owners, trigger lock advocates have worked at the state level to encourage passage of child access prevention (CAP) laws. The terms of CAP laws vary, but some make sale or use of trigger locks mandatory, and the strongest laws impose criminal liability when a minor gains access to a negligently secured weapon. By 2010, CAP laws had been passed in over twenty-five states. Additionally, some states are now using consumer protection laws in an attempt to force the adoption of new safety measures. In Congress, Sen. Herb Kohl (D-WI) and others repeatedly sponsored amendments and separate bills supporting trigger locks. In 1999, Congress passed an omnibus appropriations bill that included a provision that all federal firearms licensees must offer gun storage and safety devices for sale. In the years that followed, a couple of attempts to require trigger locks on each purchase had support in the Senate and relatively

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little opposition from the NRA and other gun rights supporters, but the underlying legislation did not pass. In 2005, Kohl again raised the issue as an amendment to the gun liability bill. With only mild opposition led by Sen. Larry Craig (R-ID), the amendment passed 70–30. There were some senators who voted for the amendment even though they opposed the underlying bill, some who opposed the amendment but supported the bill, and some who supported both. The amendment makes it unlawful for any importer, manufacturer, or dealer to sell or deliver any handgun to any buyer, except law enforcement officials, unless a secure gun storage or safety device is provided. The liability bill with the secure gun storage clause was then passed by the Senate and House and signed into law by President Bush. Almost as soon as the law went into effect, however, renewed opposition appeared. In June 2006, the House passed an amendment, offered by Rep. Marilyn Musgrave (R-CO), to an appropriations bill that would have blocked funding to enforce the new lock requirement. The Musgrave amendment subsequently drew sharp criticism in many newspaper editorials, blogs, and other discussions in part because of its supporters’ arguments downplaying the dangers of guns compared to other household items, and in part because defunding its own law would make Congress look indecisive. The Senate let the bill and the Musgrave amendment die without action. The trigger lock issue reemerged dramatically in June 2008 as part of the Supreme Court’s landmark ruling in District of Columbia v. Heller. The District’s law limited handguns and required that all shotguns and rifles be kept unloaded and either disassembled or bound by a trigger lock. The court ruled that the storage section violated

the Second Amendment’s purpose of guaranteeing immediate self-defense. It remains to be fully clarified if laws that require trigger locks, but make exceptions for keeping weapons at home for self-defense, will be upheld. In 2010, the Massachusetts Supreme Court did unanimously hold that a state trigger lock law with a self-defense exception was constitutional, but it seems almost certain that there will be further judicial review in the federal courts. John W. Dietrich See also: Brady: United against Gun Violence; Child Access Prevention (CAP) Laws; District of Columbia v. Heller; Gun Control; Million Mom March; Motor Vehicle Laws as a Model for Gun Laws; Smart Guns; Smith & Wesson Settlement Agreement

Further Reading Bell, Dawson. “Trigger Locks May Not Be the Solution to Gun Problems.” Detroit Free Press, March 29, 2000. Grossman, David C., Beth A. Mueller, Christine Riedy, M. Denise Dowd, Andres Villaveces, Janice Prodzinski, Jon Nakagawara, John Howard, Norman Thiersch, and Richard Harruff. “Gun Storage Practices and Risk of Youth Suicide and Unintentional Firearm Injuries.” Journal of the American Medical Association 293 (2005): 707–14. Peters, Justin. “Trigger Locks: The Dubiously Effective Safety Measure that Gun Control Advocates Love.” Slate.com, July 18, 2013. https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2013/07 /trigger-locks-the-dubiously-effective-saf ety-measure-that-gun-control-advocates -love.html (accessed February 1, 2022). Roberto, Anthony J., Gary Meyer, Amy Janan Johnson, Charles Atkin, and Patricia Smith. “Promoting Gun Trigger-Lock Use: Insights and Implications from a RadioBased Health Communication Intervention.” Journal of Applied Communication Research 30 (2002): 210–30.

Schuster, Mark A., Todd M. Franke, Amy M. Bastian, Sinaroth Sor, and Neal Halfon. “Firearm Storage Patterns in US Homes with Children.” American Journal of Public Health 90 (2000): 588–94.

Trump, Donald J.(1946–) Donald J. Trump was elected the forty-fifth President of the United States on November 8, 2016. Since at least the early 2000s, Trump has made numerous public statements concerning his views on gun control, many of which could be called contradictory. Before running for president, Trump stated that he favored the ban military-style weapons, such as the AR-15. However, during the 2016 campaign, Trump stated that he was firmly for gun rights and that he opposed any form of gun bans. Following Trump’s inauguration on January 20, 2017, the United States experienced thirty-three documented mass shootings (Follman, Aronsen, and Pan 2020). Several of these have been high-profile— and highly lethal—events, including the shootings at Route 91 Harvest Festival on October 1, 2017, in Las Vegas, NV and Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on February 14, 2018, in Parkland, Florida. These mass shooting events led to Trump making numerous statements concerning gun rights. In some cases, Trump indicated he favored strict gun control, such as confiscation without due process. In other cases, Trump indicated that any restriction on gun rights is an assault on liberty. Furthermore, Trump has signaled his inconsistent beliefs to both sides of the gun debate through some of his federal appointments, which include Supreme Court Justices who favor gun rights and an Attorney General who favors strict gun regulation. On Tuesday, November 3, 2020, Donald Trump lost his

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reelection bid to Joe Biden. During this election, Trump earned over 74 million votes, which was 46.8 percent of the votes cast (Carson, Spencer, and Hitefield 2020).

Trump on Firearms Even before running for office, Trump made comments related to gun control. In his 2000 book, The America We Deserve, Trump claimed that while he was not in favor of all gun control, he supported the assault weapons ban as well as longer waiting periods for background checks. Trump stated in 2012 that he held a concealed carry license and that he owned two handguns. Moreover, Trump stated in 2016 that he always carried a firearm with him. In 2017, Paul Dean, a former police lieutenant with the New York Police Department, was arrested on charges of providing difficult to obtain gun permits in exchange for special favors. Dean accused Trump of being one of the recipients of this quid-pro-quo agreement; however, police commissioner James P. O’Neill denied these allegations, claiming that the Internal Affairs Board had already investigated these charges and found no evidence to support them (Southall 2019). Despite these earlier comments that supported some forms of gun control, Trump ran for president on a platform that staunchly defended gun rights. In January 2015, following the shooting at the offices of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris, Trump echoed the National Rifle Association (NRA) rhetoric by saying that the attack was proof that “when guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns” (Hawkins 2015a). On April 11, 2015, Trump told Brietbart that “the Second Amendment must be maintained in its strongest form” (Hawkins 2015b). He argued during that

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interview that having more armed citizens during the mass shootings at Aurora, Colorado, which occurred on July 20, 2012 and at Charlie Hebdo would have reduced causalities (Hawkins 2015b). He repeated this rhetoric at the sixth Republican Presidential Primary Debate held on January 14, 2016. However, throughout the primaries, Trump also expressed contradictory viewpoints related to gun rights that have continued into his presidency. On January 4, 2016, Trump told reporters at CNN that he was not in favor of expanding background checks using executive orders (Krieg 2016). Then on January 7, 2016, Trump announced that he would eliminate all gun-free zones in schools and military bases during a rally in Vermont (Campbell 2016). On May 20, 2016, the NRA endorsed Trump for president. The NRA spent approximately $30 million on advertising for his campaign (Johnson 2019). Approximately $11.4

million of this money was spent on advertising in favor of Trump and the remaining $19 million was spent on advertising against eventual-Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton (Center for Responsive Politics 2020). After receiving this endorsement, Trump attacked Clinton as being “the most anti-gun candidate ever” (Santucci and Keneally 2016). This led to pushback on May 21, 2016, from Clinton, who attacked Trump for his earlier statement about eliminating gun-free zones. Clinton claimed that the elimination of gunfree zones in schools would be dangerous and further pointed out that Trump did not allow guns in many of his hotels, including Mar-aLago (Kreutz 2016; Schulberg 2016). Trump responded by saying that he was not in favor of having guns in schools (Schulberg 2016). He later clarified this statement on May 23, 2016, by saying that he would only want resource officers or trained teachers having access to firearms in schools (Diamond 2016).

Donald Trump, 45th president of the United States, speaks during the annual meeting of the National Rifle Association on May 4, 2018, in Dallas, Texas. Although contradictory at times, Trump often espoused gun rights views. (ZUMA Press, Inc./Alamy Stock Photo)



However, following the shooting in Parkland, Florida, Trump stated that if Congress refused to pass meaningful legislation to curb mass shootings, he would use executive actions to do so himself (Orr 2019). He advocated for removing guns from individuals who were mentally ill or potential threats to the public without due process (Gillman 2018). Trump made the statement, “I don’t want mentally ill people to be having guns. Take the guns first, go through due process second” (Gillman 2018). This statement was not well received by lawmakers when he made it, and even Vice President Mike Pence attempted to steer Trump away from this line of thought. However, Trump reiterated this by saying that law enforcement should “take the firearms first and then go to court” (Gillman 2018). He pointed out that law enforcement in Parkland, Florida, were aware that the perpetrator experienced mental health issues and that law enforcement should have taken his firearms regardless of whether the law allowed them to do that or not (Gillman 2018). In late February 2018, Trump advocated for other legislation meant to reduce gun violence. He suggested raising the age limits for purchasing all guns to twenty-one, strengthening and expanding background checks to include mental health issues, and possibly banning assault rifles. Trump also appeared to be open to bipartisan solutions to the issue of gun violence. He praised a background check bill being promoted by Sens. Pat Toomey (R-PA) and Joe Manchin (D-WV) on Twitter. However, he then met with NRA officials on March 1, 2018. Following that meeting, Chris Cox, the executive director of the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action, tweeted that he had met with both the president and the vice president and said that the president strongly supported due process and did not want any gun control. On March 2, 2018, Trump

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appeared to have reversed all of his stances concerning gun control, saying he was no longer open to the expanded background checks, the increased age limit, the confiscation of guns without due process, or the banning of any type of weapons (Collins 2018). Trump also used an executive order to ban the sale of bump stocks in response to the Las Vegas shooting (Orr 2019). Of the NRA, Trump said that legislators were afraid of them and that sometimes “you have to fight them” (Mason 2018). Following several mass shootings in August 2019, Trump again reiterated that he would consider using executive orders to curb gun violence in America. However, other than the bump stock ban, Trump has yet to deliver any other meaningful gun control through executive orders. Following the back-to-back mass shootings in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, in August 2019, Trump again called for stricter gun control. He stated that he supported stronger background checks and that he would consider red flag laws that allow law enforcement to remove firearms from individuals deemed dangerous. Trump was encouraged by both his daughter Ivanka and Attorney General William Barr to do something about gun violence, such as expand background checks (Dawsey 2019). As he did in the wake of Parkland, Trump again suggested that he would use executive orders for gun control if Congress would not pass legislation to curb violence (Orr 2019). Additionally, Trump stated that he would be meeting with social media companies in order to develop software that could identify individuals who pose potential threats to the safety of Americans (Orr 2019). However, within a few weeks, Trump had backed off from these proposals for fear of harming his reelection and in the wake of the impeachment proceedings being held in

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the House of Representatives (Dawsey 2019). He also began to echo NRA talking points about background checks by referring to them as “slippery slopes” (Rupar 2019).

Trump Appointments The nominations and subsequent appointments of Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh to the U.S. Supreme Court were seen as a victory by gun rights enthusiasts. Following both appointments, Chris Cox praised Trump’s hard work in ensuring gun rights for years to come on the NRA’s official website. Both Gorusch and Kavanaugh previously demonstrated that they lean in favor of expanding gun rights in court cases that they were hearing. In 2011, Kavanaugh wrote a fifty-two-page dissent for a case that upheld gun bans in Washington, DC, in which he equated such regulations with bans on free speech (Totenberg 2018). In 2012, Gorsuch sided with a felon who had been found in possession of a firearm. While federal law prevents felons from owning a gun, Gorsuch argued that if the defendant in question was unaware that he was unable to possess a firearm, then he cannot be convicted of this crime (Gaudiano 2017). Many legal scholars believed that the appointment of these justices will lead to the eventual broadening of gun rights in the United States. In April 2020, SCOTUS ruled on NY State Rifle & Pistol Association Inc. v. City of New York, NY (NYSRPA v. NYC), which is the first major Second Amendment case to be heard since McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010). NYSRPA v. NYC concerned whether gun ownership laws that restrict the transport of a licensed firearm out of one’s home interefere with Second Amendment rights, the Commerce

Clause, and the fundamental right to travel (Legal Information Institute 2019). New York City subsequently changed the laws to allow licensed owners to transport their firearms outside of their home; in a per curiam opinion, the Supreme Court rendered the case moot, remanding it back down to the lower courts for further determination of damage claims. In contrast, William Barr’s nomination to the position of Attorney General in December 2018 was seen as a blow to gun rights (Orr 2019). Barr previously made several public comments on the need for stricter gun laws, which led to gun advocacy groups protesting his appointment by claiming that Barr “would be a disaster for the Second Amendment” (Orr 2019). These fears may not have been hyperbole since Barr allegedly lobbied Trump in August 2019 to consider passing executive orders strengthening background checks on gun purchases. Benjamin Dowd-Arrow See also: Bump Stocks; Las Vegas Shooting; Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting; National Rifle Association (NRA); Republican Party and Gun Control

Further Reading Campbell, Colin. “TRUMP: ‘I Will Get Rid of Gun-Free Zones on Schools’ My First Day in the White House.” Business Insider, January 7, 2016. https://www.businessinsider .com /dona ld - t r u m p -g u n -f r e e -z one s -schools-2016-1 (accessed August 12, 2019). Carson, Jamie L., Spencer Hardin, and Aaron A. Hitefield. “You’re Fired! Donald Trump and the 2020 Congressional Elections.” Forum 18, no. 4 (2020): 627–50. https:// doi-org.proxy.lib.fsu.edu/10.1515/for-2020 -2103 (accessed May 18, 2022). Center for Responsive Politics. “Federal Election Spending/National Rifle Assn

Recipients, 2016.” OpenSecrets.org. ht t ps://w w w.opensecrets.org /outside spending/fes_summ.php (accessed February 28, 2020). Collins, Eliza. “After NRA Meeting, Trump Appears to Soften Gun Control Stance, Which Worries Democrats.” USA Today, March 2, 2018. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news /politics/2018/03/02/after-nra-meeting -trump-appears-soften-gun-control-stance -which-worries-democrats/388766002/ (accessed August 12, 2019). Dawsey, Josh. “Trump Abandons Proposing Ideas to Curb Gun Violence after Saying He Would Following Mass Shootings.” Washington Post, October 31, 2019. https://www .washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-quietly -abandons-proposing-ideas-to-curb-gun -violence-after-saying-he-would-following -mass-shootings /2019/10/31/8bca030c -fa6e-11e9-9534-e0dbcc9f5683_story.html (accessed November 3, 2019). Diamond, Jeremy. “Donald Trump Clarifies Position on Guns in Schools.” CNN, May 23, 2016. https://www.cnn.com/2016/05/23 /politics/donald-trump-guns/ (accessed August 12, 2019). Follman, Mark, Gavin Aronsen, and Deanna Pan. “U.S. Mass Shootings, 1982–2020: Data from Mother Jones’ Investigation.” Mother Jones, July 17, 2022. https://www .motherjones.com/politics/2012/12/mass - sho ot i ng s - mot h e r-jo n e s -f u l l- d a t a / (accessed October 31, 2019). Gaudiano, Nicole. “2012 Case Highlights Supreme Court Nominee Neil Gorsuch’s ‘ProGun’ Record.” USA Today, February 3, 2017. https://www.usatoday.com /story/news /2017/02/03/2012-case-highlights-supreme -court-nominee-neil-gorsuchs-pro-gun -record/97353700/ (accessed August 12, 2019). Gillman, Todd J. “Trump Says ‘Take The Guns First’ from Mentally Ill with ‘Due Process’ Later, Tells Lawmakers Not to Fear NRA.” Dallas Morning News, February 28, 2018. https://www.dallasnews.com /news /politics /2018/02/28/trump-says

Trump, Donald J. | 857 -take-the-guns-first-from-mentally-ill -with-due-process-later-tells-lawmakers -not-to-fear-nra/ (accessed August 12, 2019). Graham, David A. “The Lie of Trump’s ‘SelfFunding’ Campaign.” The Atlantic, May 13, 2016. https://www.theatlantic.com/politics /archive /2016/05/trumps-self-funding -lie/482691/ (accessed August 12, 2019). Hawkins, Awr. “Trump: Paris Proves ‘When Guns Are Outlawed, Only Outlaws Will Have Guns.’” Breitbart, January 8, 2015a. https://www.breitbart.com/national-security /2015/01/08/trump-paris-proves-when -guns-are-outlawed-only-outlaws-will -have-guns/ (accessed August 12, 2019). Hawkins, Awr. “EXCLUSIVE—Donald Trump: We Must Maintain 2nd Amendment ‘In Its Strongest Form.’” Breitbart, April 11, 2015b. https://www.breitbart.com/politics /2015/04/11/exclusive-donald-trump-we -must-maintain-2nd-amendment-in-its -strongest-form/ (accessed June 12, 2019). Johnson, Luke. “NRA’s 2016 Donation to Trump’s Campaign Pays Off.” Fortune, August 21, 2019. https://fortune.com/2019/08/21/how -much-did-nra-contribute-trump-campaign/ (accessed February 28, 2020). Kreutz, Liz. “Hillary Clinton Fires Back at Donald Trump for NRA Remarks.” ABC News, May 21, 2016. https://abcnews.go .com/Politics/hillary-clinton-fires-back -donald-t r u mp-n ra-remarks /stor y?id =39280417 Krieg, Gregory. “Donald Trump Predicts ‘You Won’t Be Able to Get Guns.’” CNN Politics, January 4, 2016. https://www.cnn .com/2016/01/04/politics/donald-trump -guns-obama-executive-action/index.html. Legal Information Institute. “New York State Rifle & Pistol Association Inc. v. City of New York, New York.” Cornell Law School, 2019. https://www.law.cornell.edu /supct/cert/18-280. Mason, Jeff. “Trump Back in Step with NRA after Doubts over Parkland Shooting.” Reuters, May 4, 2018. https://www.reuters. om /ar ticle /us-usa-guns-tr ump /tr ump

858 | Tucson, Arizona, Shooting -back-in-step-with-nra-after-doubts-over -parkland-shooting-idUSK BN1I50ZR (accessed August 12, 2019). Orr, Gabby. “Trump Explores Executive Action on Guns.” Politico, August 5, 2018. https://www.politico.com/story/2019/08 /05/trump-executive-action-guns-1448612 (accessed October 31, 2019). Rupar, Aaron. “Trump Echoes NRA Talking Points, Showing That “Background Checks” Talk Was All a Charade.” Vox, August 21, 2019. https://www.vox.com /2019/8/21/20826511/trump-background -checks-nra-el-paso-dayton-shootings (accessed October 31, 2019). Santucci, John, and Meghan Keneally. “NRA Endorses Donald Trump for President.” ABC News, May 20, 2016. https://abcnews .go.com/Politics/nra-endorse-donald-trump -president/story?id=39253893 (accessed August 12, 2019). Schrock, Douglas, Benjamin Dowd-Arrow, Kristen Erichsen, Haley Gentile, and Pierce Dignam. “The Emotional Politics of Making America Great Again: Trump’s Working Class Appeals.” Journal of Working Class Studies 2, no. 1 (2017): 5–22. Schulberg, Jessica. “Donald Trump Doesn’t Want Guns In Classrooms, Except When He Does.” Huffington Post, May 22, 2016. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/donald -trump-guns-classrooms_n_5741b615e4b0 613b512a88de (accessed August 12, 2019). Southall, Ashley. “Trump and Cohen Received Gun Licenses in Exchange for Favors, Former Police Official Alleges.” New York Times, 2019. https://www.nytimes.com/2019 /01/24/nyregion/trump-cohen-gun-license .html (accessed October 31, 2019). Tampa Bay Times. “Transcript: Trump’s ‘Winning, Winning, Winning’ Speech.” Tampa Bay Times, February 24, 2016. https://www .tampabay.com/opinion/columns/transcript -trumps-winning-winning-winning-speech /2266681/ (accessed August 12, 2019). Totenberg, Nina. “Kavanaugh Could Tip Supreme Court against Gun Control Laws.” NPR, July 23, 2018. https://www.npr.org

/2018/07/23/630286216/kavanaugh-could -tip-supreme-court-against-gun-control -laws (accessed August 12, 2019). Trump, Donald J., and David Shiflett. The America We Deserve. New York: Renaissance Books, 2000.

Tucson, Arizona, Shooting On January 8, 2011, Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) held a “Constituents on Your Corner” meeting in the parking lot of a Safeway supermarket in Casas Adobes, Arizona, located just outside of Tucson. Just after 10:00 a.m. local time, twenty-twoyear-old Jared Loughner, who was in attendance, drew his Glock 19 semiautomatic pistol and shot Giffords in the head before turning the gun on the crowd. By the time the shooting subsided, six people had been killed, and thirteen others (including Giffords) were injured. At the time of the shooting, there were approximately thirty people in attendance for the constituents’ meeting. As the shooting unfolded, Chief Judge John Roll, U.S. District Court of Arizona; Gabriel Zimmerman, a staffer for Representative Giffords; and Christina Taylor-Green, a nine-year-old girl born on September 11, 2001, each were killed. Three local retirees—Dorothy Morris, Phyllis Schneck, and Dorwan Stoddard—also died in the attack. During an attempt to reload, the perpetrator was tackled by several people in the crowd, including a retired U.S. Army colonel who had been wounded in the attack, and held until law enforcement arrived and took him into custody. The firearm used in the shooting was purchased on November 30, 2020, from a local retailer. His criminal record contained only two relatively minor offenses,



including one drug possession charge, and he was able to successfully pass a federal background check. Other red flags also predated the shooting. In 2008, the perpetrator was rejected when he tried to enlist in the U.S. Army for failing a drug test, which subsequently disqualified him from service. In October 2010, he was suspended from Pima Community College (PCC), where was enrolled as a student, due to his increasingly erratic behavior. Officials at PCC advised the perpetrator that he could return to the institution if he provided them with a doctor’s note assuring them that he was not a danger to himself or others; he voluntarily withdrew from the school instead. The perpetrator was initially charged by federal prosecutors with one count of attempted assassination of a member of Congress, two counts of murder of a federal

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employee (for Roll and Zimmerman), and two counts of attempted murder for two of Giffords’ other aides who were injured in the shooting. On January 19, 2011, an initial indictment was handed down for three of the counts. Five days after initial charges were filed, the perpetrator plead not guilty. On March 3, 2011, an additional indictment was handed down, bringing the number of total charges to forty-nine. On March 9, 2011, the perpetrator pled not guilty to all charges. At central issue to the case was the mental status of the perpetrator. On May 25, 2011, the judge presiding over the case declared that the perpetrator was not competent to stand trial after two medical evaluations returned a diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia. As part of the treatment he received in the psychiatric wing of a federal prison, the

A heavy police presence was on scene at a Tucson, Arizona, supermarket following a mass shooting on January 8, 2011. The shooting left six dead and thirteen others, including Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, injured. (Reuters/Alamy Stock Photo)

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perpetrator was forcibly medicated with antipsychotic drugs based upon a ruling from the judge on June 26, 2011. Although a federal appellate court ruled that the perpetrator had the right to refuse the medication approximately two weeks later, prison medical authorities resumed forcible treatment, citing that the he presented a danger to himself and others. The lawfulness of the treatment again came under scrutiny, but a federal appeals court denied the motion by the perpetrator’s attorneys to halt forced medication in March 2012. On August 7, 2012, the perpetrator was finally deemed competent to stand trial. He pled guilty to nineteen of the counts in exchange for the removal of the death penalty as a possible sanction. On November 8, 2012, he was sentenced to seven consecutive life terms plus an additional 140 years without the possibility of parole. He also was ordered to pay $19 million in restitution. Although prosecutors for Pima County, Arizona, where the shooting occurred, originally filed homicide charges on behalf of the victims who were not federal employees, they decided not to move forward with the state-level trial after the federal sentencing was completed in order to let the victims and their families continue their healing process. As of July 2020, the perpetrator was housed at an administrative security federal medical facility located in Rochester, Minnesota.

Giffords’s Recovery Immediately after she was shot, one of Giffords’s interns began rendering first aid; she soon was evacuated to University Medical Center of Tucson, the area’s only Level 1 trauma center, where she was listed in critical care. Emergency surgery was performed to extract fragments of her skull and tissue around her brain broken off by the bullet as it

passed through. A portion of her skull also was removed to accommodate brain swelling. She subsequently was placed in a medically induced coma to allow time for healing. Over the next several weeks, Giffords continued to improve; her sedation was decreased a week after the shooting, and she began some physical therapy and conditioning. On January 21, 2011, she was transferred to Memorial Hermann Medical Center in Houston, Texas, where she was placed in their Institute for Rehabilitation and Research to undergo a program combining physical, speech, and occupational therapies. Although she continued to improve, Giffords struggled with her speech and lost approximately 50 percent of vision in both of her eyes. On May 18, 2011, she underwent surgery to have the piece of her skull cap replaced, and on June 15, 2011, was released from the hospital to return home, though she continued her recovery through outpatient treatments. In January 2012, just over a year after the shooting, Giffords announced that she would not seek reelection so that she could continue to focus on her recovery. On January 8, 2013, the two-year anniversary of the shooting and just weeks after the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School, Giffords and her husband, former astronaut Mark Kelly, founded Americans for Responsible Solutions (ARS). ARS was a nonprofit organization and super PAC that promoted gun control efforts that prevented firearm violence while protecting responsible ownership. In 2016, ARS merged with the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, forming what is known today as the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. Jaclyn Schildkraut See also: Background Checks; Giffords, Gabrielle; Giffords Law Center to Prevent

Gun Violence; Mass Murder (Shootings); Obama, Barack

Further Reading “Arizona Shooting.” New York Times, 2020. http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference /timestopics/subjects/a/arizona_shooting _2011/index.html (accessed July 9, 2020). CNN Research. “Arizona Safeway Shootings Fast Facts.” CNN, June 10, 2013. https:// www.cnn.com /2013/ 06/10 /us /arizona -safeway-shootings-fast-facts/index.html (accessed July 9, 2020).

Tucson, Arizona, Shooting | 861 Giffords, Gabrielle, and Mark Kelly. Gabby: A Story of Courage and Hope. New York: Scribner, 2012. Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Giffords Law Center To Prevent Gun Violence.” 2020. https://lawcenter .giffords.org/ (accessed July 9, 2020). U.S. District Court. “USDC Criminal Complaint against Jared Loughner.” January 9, 2011. http://documents.nytimes.com/crim inal-complaint-against-jared-lee-loughner (accessed July 9, 2020).

U Undetectable Firearms Act of 1988. See Plastic Guns

UCR data are reported in the two broad categories of “Offenses Known to Law Enforcement” and “Persons Arrested.” The first category includes the Index Offenses— all offenses considered Part I offenses by the FBI—homicide, rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, larceny/theft, motor vehicle theft, and arson. Persons Arrested compiles information regarding twentyeight offenses, including index offense and others ranging from simple assault to animal cruelty and embezzlement. Part I offenses are grouped by city, county, state, region, and the nation to create a violent crime rate and a property crime rate. Crime statistics are usually reported as a rate; that is, the number of offenses that occurred in a given area for every 100,000 residents in that area. This allows readers to compare crime data, for example, from city to city and state to state. The UCR reporting form requests the weapon used in several specific offenses grouped under murder, sex offenses, robbery, and aggravated assault. For example, in 2018 offenders used firearms in 73 percent of reported murders, 37 percent of robberies, and 25 percent of aggravated assaults. While there are fluctuations from year to year, the past decade has seen a relatively stable violent crime rate following a decline of more than 20 percent in the first decade of the 2000s. Congress authorized the FBI to begin collecting the data in 1930, largely in response to a demand for national crime data. The reports were initially issued monthly, then

Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) The Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) are crime data published by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) since 1930 based on information provided voluntarily by more than 18,000 police departments throughout the United States. The FBI provides standardized forms and a handbook for recording the data. Discrepancies may result because of reporting practices of various jurisdictions and different definitions of crimes. The FBI is transitioning to make the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) the standard by January 2021 in an effort to make more detailed data regarding crime accessible more rapidly. The UCR program includes the NIBRS, the Summary Reporting System (SRS), the Law Enforcement Officers Killed and Assaulted (LEOKA) program, and the Hate Crime Statistics program. Annual reports are published for each program and data may also be accessed through the FBI’s Crime Data Explorer tool. Crime in the United States, the main publication of the UCR, is the only source of information from which to deduce trends in crime in the United States nationally and in specific localities. It is the primary source of crime statistics for elected officials, criminal justice agencies, administrators, and other policymakers as well as the news media and the general public.

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quarterly until 1941, semiannually until 1957, and annually since 1958. Although the reporting of crime statistics to the FBI is voluntary, more than 95 percent of the country’s population is covered by the reports. Still, the reports are not without their problems or their critics. Crime is very difficult to measure for two major reasons. Some crimes are not reported to police by victims, and police may not report all crimes. As a result, it is generally accepted that the UCR underestimates the number of crimes that are actually committed. Underreporting varies by crime. Most homicides, for example, are reported, because most deaths are investigated in some fashion. All other crimes, though, are underreported in the UCR. This is particularly true for less serious crimes. Sex crimes were severely underreported for many years, but reporting has increased in the past decade or more, leading to what may be a spurious increase in the rate of sexual assaults. Victims may not be aware that the behavior was indeed criminal or may not want to see the offender prosecuted. In some cases, the victim may also be a criminal and may not report a crime for fear of discovery of their own activities. Likewise, police may decide that a reported incident did not constitute a crime or may not want to take the time to file a report on a minor incident. In the most serious and rare instances, police and other law enforcement officials may intentionally underreport crime to make it appear they are doing a better job in fighting crime. For these reasons, many experts believe that victimization research in the form of the National Crime Victimization Survey provides a more accurate measure of crime in the United States. Still, the UCR remains the most commonly cited source for crime statistics. Harry L. Wilson

See also: Crime and Gun Use; Methodologies for Studying Gun Violence; National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS); Victimization from Gun Violence; Violent Crime Rate

Further Reading Cole, George F., and Christopher E. Smith. The American System of Criminal Justice. 16th ed. Boston: Cengage, 2019. Criminal Justice Information Services. “Services.” https://www.fbi.gov/services/cjis/ ucr/ (accessed May 4, 2020). Federal Bureau of Investigation. “The Nation’s Two Crime Measures.” https://www.ucrdata tool.gov/twomeasures.cfm (accessed May 18, 2022). Federal Bureau of Investigation. “2018 Crime in the United States.” https://ucr.fbi.gov /crime-in-the-u.s/2018/crime-in-the-u.s.-2018 /home (accessed May 4, 2020). Federal Bureau of Investigation. “Uniform Crime Reporting.” fbi.gov/services/cjis/ucr (accessed May 4, 2020). Gove, Walter R., Michael Hughes, and Michael Geerken. “Are Uniform Crime Reports a Valid Indicator of the Index Crimes? An Affirmative Answer with Minor Qualifications.” Criminology 23 (1985): 451–502. Hagan, Frank E. Research Methods in Criminal Justice and Criminology. 10th ed. Boston: Pearson, 2018. Maxfield, Michael G., and Earl Babbie. Research Methods for Criminal Justice and Criminology. 8th ed. Boston: Cengage, 2018.

United Nations (UN) The United Nations (UN) and the United States have deep divisions over the issue of gun ownership and the manufacture and sale of firearms. Though the UN has endeavored to develop limitations on the proliferation of small arms and light weapons, the United States remains the world’s



largest producer of small arms and the world’s leading exporter of weapons in general. The United States has also actively worked to block international agreements on the trade in small arms. In addition, the efforts of the UN have led right-wing groups in the United States to assert that the world body seeks to overturn the Second Amendment and substitute international rules for domestic law as part of the first step toward a “world government.” The United States was the main nation behind the creation of the UN. In 1944, representatives from the United States, Great Britain, China, and the Soviet Union met at Dumbarton Oaks in Georgetown, Washington, D.C., to develop plans for a world body. The actual charter and organization of the UN was finalized at a conference in San Francisco in 1945. The UN is divided structurally into two broad bodies: the more powerful Security Council and the General Assembly. There are five permanent members of the Security Council: the United States, Great Britain, France, China, and Russia. Each has veto power over resolutions. In the General Assembly, each nation has one vote, but resolutions of the assembly are nonbinding. For most of the early history of the UN, the United States and its allies dominated the actions of the organization. However, beginning in the late 1960s and early 1970s, newly independent and developing nations came to control more of the agenda of the UN. Issues such as human rights and arms proliferation rose to the forefront of the deliberations of the organization. As early as 1962, the General Assembly began to debate the issue of arms proliferation. However, the 1960s marked the height of the Cold War, and both the United States and the Soviet Union used arms transfers as a means to maintain or expand geopolitical

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support. As such, both nations resisted efforts to limit the spread of small arms and light weapons. As a result, the UN confined its efforts at gun control to areas where there were broad peacekeeping operations underway. UN peacekeeping troops oversaw a number of programs designed to remove weapons from regions where conflicts were ongoing. Examples of such operations included missions to the Congo and Cyprus, both in the 1960s. With the end of the Cold War, resistance to gun control efforts was initially ameliorated. In 1992, U.S. president George H. W. Bush called upon the UN to develop a voluntary code to regulate the international small-arms trade. However, this initiative was blocked by China, whose domestic firearms industry was experiencing dramatic growth. The international effort to control the proliferation of small arms and light weapons was revived in 1998. Momentum began to build for an international convention to limit the small-arms trade. Regional organizations, such as the European Union and the Organization of American States, endorsed or implemented proposals to establish codes of conduct for arms sales and transfers. Concurrently, the UN supported a variety of regional initiatives to curtail the use and acquisition of firearms. For instance, the UN has sponsored programs in Asia, Africa, and the Balkans to collect surplus weapons in conflict-ridden areas, including Cambodia, Sierra Leone, and Albania. International conferences in Brussels and Oslo in 1998 called for a UN conference to develop an international treaty on the manufacture, sale, and transfer of small arms and light weapons. In December 1999, the General Assembly and the Security Council approved a resolution to hold such a conference in July 2001. The UN Conference on

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A sculpture of a gun with its barrel tied sits outside of the United Nations building in New York City. (Alex Castella)

the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in All Its Aspects attempted to develop a broad agreement to limit both the licit and illicit trade in firearms. However, because of concerns over the domestic reaction, the U.S. delegation to the conference actively worked to limit the scope of any agreement. The United States specifically opposed restrictions on the transfer of small arms to rebel groups. The George W. Bush administration asserted that such transfers are a necessary tool to support prodemocracy movements in totalitarian nations. The administration also opposed restrictions on private gun ownership, contending that these ran counter to domestic Second Amendment rights and American gun rights. As a result, the conference produced an agreement that called for a nonbinding program to place

special markings on arms to better trace their origins and aid in small-arms control efforts. The agreement also listed suggestions to better monitor the transfer of weapons and called upon countries to destroy stockpiles of surplus arms. It further suggested that nations not transfer weapons to regions in the midst of conflict. The main concession of the United States was to agree to another conference prior to 2006. Meanwhile, in 2005, the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution on international tracing instruments, through which member states committed to undertake a variety of steps to make it easier to identify and trace the point of manufacture of weapons. The effort was designed to curb the illegal sale and transfer of small arms and light weapons. By 2010, only forty-three nations were active in the program.



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In October 2009, the administration of President Barack Obama reversed previous U.S. policy and agreed to participate in negotiations on a global treaty to regulate the sale and transfer of small arms. The UN set 2012 as a target date to finalize a draft of the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT), but a final accord was not adopted by the UN General Assembly until April 2, 2013. The Obama administration signed the treaty on September 25, 2013. The ATT came into force on December 24, 2014, following its ratification by fifty nations. The United States did not ratify the accord. For some in the United States, the efforts of the UN reinforced a perception that the world body was engaged in a broad effort to disarm Americans by circumventing the Second Amendment. Groups such as the John Birch Society and various militia groups joined with more mainstream organizations, including the National Rifle Association, in opposing the UN initiative. Many of the more extreme groups have seized upon the UN as the embodiment of an international conspiracy against the American people. These groups continued to advocate for U.S. withdrawal from the UN. U.S. president Donald Trump withdrew the U.S. signature to the ATT on April 29, 2019. Tom Lansford See also: International Firearms Laws; National Rifle Association (NRA)

Further Reading Faltas, Sami, Glenn McDonald, and Camilla Waszink. Removing Small Arms from Society: A Review of Weapons Collection and Destruction Programmes. Geneva: Small Arms Survey, 2001. Idris, Kamil, and Michael Bartolo. A Better United Nations for the New Millennium: The United Nations System, How It Is Now

and How It Should Be in the Future. Boston: Kluwer Law International, 2000. Kimball, Daryl G. “The Arms Trade Treaty at a Glance. Facts Sheets and Briefs.” Arms Control Association, August 2017. https:// www.armscontrol.org/factsheets /arms _trade_treaty (accessed June 8, 2020). LaPierre, Wayne. The Global War on Your Guns: Inside the UN Plan to Destroy the Bill of Rights. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2006. United Nations. http://www.un.org/en/ (accessed June 8, 2020).

United States Concealed Carry Association (USCCA) The United States Concealed Carry Association’s (USCCA) primary aim is to provide the public with information on concealed carry laws and on other topics related to the carrying of concealed firearms. It has a strong gun rights stance and fully agrees with the notion that the Second Amendment protects an individual’s right to possess and bear arms (as reflected in the landmark U.S. Supreme Court case District of Columbia v. Heller). The USSCA provides up-to-date news and information on issues and laws pertaining to concealed carry. On its website (http://www.usconcealedcarry.com/), the organization posts articles on how to conceal guns, clothing for various body types, finding instructors, weather, options for legal defense should a member be involved in a shooting, and interacting with law enforcement if this ever happens. The USCCA website also has special links for beginners, the more advanced, women, and seniors. Broadly, the USSCA focuses on three key areas of preparedness—education, training, and legal protection—that are

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interwoven within all facets of the organization and its resources. Tim Schmidt founded the USCCA in 2004. He was motivated because of his inability to find a group like the one he founded—a group that could be a comprehensive source for answering the many questions surrounding concealed carry. By 2020, Schmidt’s organization had grown to more than 300,000 members and employs 300 people. USCCA publishes Concealed Carry Magazine, which regularly features articles on the equipment, training, laws, politics, and related topics on the carrying of concealed weapons. Sean Maddan See also: Castle Doctrine; Concealed Weapons Laws; Defensive Gun Use (DGU); District of Columbia v. Heller; More Guns, Less Crime Thesis; Right to Self-Defense, Philosophical Bases; Self-Defense, Legal Issues; Self-Defense, Reasons for Gun Use

Further Reading Hess, Corrine. “The U.S. Concealed Carry Association Woos NRA Members with a Focus on Family.” NPR, December 13, 2019. https://www.npr.org/2019/12/13/787507138 /the-u-s-concealed-carry-association-woos -nra-members-with-a-focus-on-family (accessed July 8, 2020). United States Concealed Carry Association. http://www.usconcealedcarry.com (accessed July 8, 2020).

United States Conference of Mayors The United States Conference of Mayors has, since the mid-1970s, supported a ban on private ownership and possession of handguns in the United States. It was an

early member of the National Coalition to Ban Handguns (in 1989, the group became known as the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence). The conference lent its support to the Brady Bill, the Assault Weapons Ban, and the crime bill during the 1990s. It actively supported the more than thirty lawsuits brought by cities against gun manufacturers in the late 1990s and early 2000s and filed amicus curiae briefs in a number of cases involved challenges to state and local gun laws. Due to settlements, state laws prohibiting cities from suing gun manufacturers, the federal Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005; and adverse procedural rulings, none of the lawsuits brought by cities against gun makers has been tried. In 1995, the conference joined with Handgun Control Inc. (most commonly known as the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence), to form the Campaign to Protect State Gun Laws. The campaign committed 108 national organizations (including the Conference) to “oppose the gun lobby’s efforts to repeal sensible gun laws such as the Brady Law and the assault weapons bans” (Carter 1997, 101). In 2006, the conference endorsed the Statement of Principles of Mayors against Illegal Guns, a coalition of more than 500 mayors that was founded by Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York and Mayor Thomas Menino of Boston. In April 2009, in the wake of a spike in gun violence in a number of urban areas, Mayor Manuel A. Diaz of Miami, the president of the conference, issued a statement calling for stronger gun laws. Reflecting a changing political and legal environment, the organization no longer advocates a ban on private gun ownership. It continues to support a ban on military-style



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assault weapons, limits on the number of guns that private individuals can purchase in a transaction or during a set time period, and closing the gun show loophole. In recent years, Mayors against Illegal Guns has become the more visible vehicle for mayors advocating stricter gun controls. On August 8, 2019, however, the conference sent a letter jointly to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer calling for the Senate to return to Washington, DC, and pass bipartisan-supported gun violence prevention legislation. The letter was cosigned by 279 mayors. Jeffrey Kraus See also: Assault Weapons Ban of 1994; Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); Brady: United against Gun Violence; District of Columbia v. Heller; Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005

Further Reading Bleich, Jeffrey L., David H. Fry, and Aimee Feinberg. “Brief of Amici Curiae, Major American Cities, the United States Conference of Mayors and Legal Community Against Violence in Support of Petitioners— District of Columbia and Mayor Adrian M. Fenty, Petitioners, v. Dick Anthony Heller, Respondent. In the Supreme Court of the United States, No. 07-290, 2008.” http:// www.lcav.org/publications-briefs/amicus _briefs/D_C_v_Heller_Amicus_Brief.pdf (accessed June 16, 2011). Carter, Gregg Lee. The Gun Control Movement. New York: Twayne, 1997. Legal Action Project, Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Docket of Past and Present Cases.” http://www.bradycenter.org/legal action/cases (accessed June 16, 2011). United States Conference of Mayors. Press Releases and Reports (2011). http://usmay ors.org/ (accessed June 16, 2011).

United Sates Conference of Mayors. Bipartisan Legislation to End Gun Violence Now. https://www.usmayors.org/gun-violence/ (accessed July 8, 2020).

United States Constitution and Gun Rights The most significant question about gun rights and the U.S. Constitution is whether the Constitution stands as a barrier to gun control. With a few important exceptions, federal courts have not treated it as one, but gun rights activists and some constitutional scholars have challenged this interpretation, claiming that the Constitution guarantees individuals a right to keep and bear arms that would invalidate many existing gun control laws. Among the general public, it is widely believed that the Constitution guarantees a right of gun ownership (Harding 1998). The primary constitutional focus of this issue is the Second Amendment, which 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.” Other parts of the Constitution bear upon gun rights and gun control as well, including the commerce clause and the Fifth, Ninth, Tenth, and Fourteenth Amendments. An important aspect of the Second Amendment’s historical origins is the desire on the part of the framers of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights to limit the power of the national government and to balance it against state power. Anti-Federalists, concerned that the national government authorized by the Constitution would have too much power, pressed for a Bill of Rights that would limit the powers of the national government, protecting both the states and the people. Having relied in no small measure

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upon the militia to fight in the American Revolution, the framers sought to protect this institution as a means of avoiding the predations of standing armies while promoting collective defense and security. The Second Amendment was, at minimum, intended to protect the viability of state militias by assuring that the national government would not disarm them. The question of whether the amendment accomplishes this by protecting a broad individual right to keep and bear arms for many purposes, by protecting a right solely in the context of militia service, or by protecting the prerogative of states to maintain militias is at the core of the legal debate over the constitution and gun rights. Two kinds of interpretations of the Second Amendment have competed for currency. The interpretation upheld by most U.S. courts until District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) and favored by most gun control supporters was that the amendment protects the power of states to maintain militias or protects a very limited right to bear arms in militia service. This interpretation is supported by the amendment’s reference to “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State,” which seems to establish a militia context for the right to keep and bear arms, as well as historical evidence demonstrating concern for issues of federalism and security in the debates over the Second Amendment’s drafting and ratification. Supporters of this position hold that the amendment does not protect any individual right to use private firearms and stands as little or no barrier to gun control. The opposing interpretation is that the amendment protects the right of individuals to own and possess firearms. This view is favored by gun control opponents, an increasing number of prominent liberal

constitutional scholars (e.g., Amar 1998; Levinson 1989; Tribe 2000; Van Alstyne 1994), and, authoritatively, by the U.S. Supreme Court in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008). This interpretation is supported by the amendment’s reference to “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” as well as historical evidence demonstrating that the amendment’s framers believed it was vital for citizens to possess arms. Both interpretations present difficulties. The collective-rights interpretation declares, with what opponents would call an Orwellian tinge, that where the amendment refers to “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms,” what it actually protects is something completely different; that is, either the power of states to maintain militias or the right of members of the select militia to bear arms during service. However, an interpretation that assigns little or no significance to the words “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State” would be unfaithful to the principle that legal texts must be interpreted to give meaning to each clause. Although the interpretation of the amendment is highly controversial, it is clear that any persuasive interpretation must account for the amendment’s militia-related origins as well as its explicit protection of “the right of the people”—a term that elsewhere in the Constitution is interpreted to embrace individual rights. The main Supreme Court cases bearing upon gun rights are United States v. Cruikshank (1876), Presser v. Illinois (1886), Miller v. Texas (1894), United States v. Miller (1939), District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), and McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010). The three nineteenth-century cases held that the Second Amendment does not apply to the states, but serves only as a limitation on the power of the national



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government. These decisions were consistent with the now-defunct doctrine, established in Barron v. Baltimore (1833), that the Bill of Rights limits the power of the national government but not state governments. Only after the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868 and the subsequent development of incorporation doctrine have parts of the Bill of Rights been applied against the states. In a series of decisions, beginning in 1897, almost all of the provisions in the Bill of Rights have been interpreted to protect rights from state government intrusion as well. The Supreme Court applied the Second Amendment to the states in McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010). The first case in which the Supreme Court directly interpreted the Second Amendment was United States v. Miller. This case concerned the regulation of sawed-off shotguns under the National Firearms Act of 1934. The Miller opinion declared, “In the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of ‘a shotgun having a barrel of less than eighteen inches in length’ at this time has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument.” Here, the court established that the right to keep and bear arms does not extend to nonmilitia weapons, but it did not elaborate on other aspects of the right or on the nature of militia weapons. Three years later, in Cases v. United States (1942), the First Circuit Court of Appeals interpreted this to mean that, to enjoy Second Amendment protection, a claimant must demonstrate that possession of a weapon is reasonably related to militia service. Other appeals courts used a similar approach. In District of Columbia v. Heller, the Supreme Court explicitly determined that

the Second Amendment protects an individual and not a collective right to keep and bear arms. This decision reversed a substantial body of contrary opinions from federal appeals courts and resolved a conflict between appeals courts in different areas of the country concerning the Second Amendment. Prior to Heller, federal appeals courts had usually rejected the individual-rights interpretation. In Quilici v. Village of Morton Grove (1982), the Seventh Circuit heard an appeal of a case challenging the prohibition of handguns in the Chicago suburb of Morton Grove. The court found that the Second Amendment did not apply to states, that it serves only to protect weapons used for militia service, and that a local prohibition of handguns impairs no constitutional right. In 1992, stating the general view represented in numerous circuit court opinions, the Eighth Circuit observed that “[t]he purpose of the Second Amendment is to restrain the federal government from regulating the possession of arms where such regulation would interfere with the preservation or efficiency of the militia. [Citations omitted.] Whether the ‘right to bear arms’ for militia purposes is ‘individual’ or ‘collective’ in nature is irrelevant where . . . the individual’s possession of arms is not related to the preservation or efficiency of a militia” (United States v. Hale, 978 F.2d 1016, 1020 [1992]). However, in United States v. Emerson (2001), the Fifth Circuit broke from its sister courts to hold that the Second Amendment “protects the right of individuals . . . to privately possess and bear their own firearms,” thus creating an inconsistency in federal law that only the Supreme Court could resolve. In 2008, the Supreme Court resolved this inconsistency by holding that the Second Amendment protects the rights of individuals to possess a firearm unconnected with

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militia service and to use a firearm for traditionally lawful purposes, including selfdefense at home. However, the court noted that the existence of such an individual right should not “cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.” As such, the decision’s effect may be limited to invalidating outright prohibition of firearms or other relatively draconian gun control measures, but appears unlikely to limit lesser forms of gun control. The court has yet to articulate a general standard of review for challenges to gun control laws. Other parts of the Constitution have occasionally been the foci of legal challenges to gun control. In Lewis v. United States (1980), the Supreme Court upheld the prohibition of firearm possession by convicted felons, rejecting a Fifth Amendment due process claim because Congress could rationally conclude that a felony conviction is a reasonable basis on which to prohibit firearm possession. Since the early twentieth century, the commerce clause has been interpreted broadly to allow Congress extensive regulatory powers in the domain of interstate commerce. In United States v. Lopez (1995), however, the Supreme Court narrowed its interpretation of the commerce clause by overturning part of the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990 that made it a federal crime to carry a gun within 1,000 feet of a school. Observing that the link between interstate commerce and the possession of guns near schools was tenuous, the court struck down the law, thereby curtailing one aspect of congressional power to regulate the use of firearms.

The 1993 Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act required local law enforcement officials to conduct criminal background checks of handgun buyers. This provision of the law was challenged on the ground that it violated the Tenth Amendment by inappropriately exercising powers reserved to the states. The Supreme Court agreed, and the challenged provision of the Brady Bill was struck down in Printz v. United States (1997). The court’s opinion, based in part on the Tenth Amendment, held that Congress may not direct states to implement federal programs. Matthew DeBell See also: Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Bill); District of Columbia v. Heller; Fourteenth Amendment; Gun-Free School Laws; McDonald v. City of Chicago; National Firearms Act of 1934; Second Amendment

Further Reading Amar, Akhil Reed. The Bill of Rights: Creation and Reconstruction. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1998. Blocher, Joseph, and Eric Ruben. “The Second Amendment Allows for More Gun Control than You Think.” Vox.com, June 14, 2018. https://www.vox.com/the-big-idea /2018/5/23/17383644/second-2nd-amend ment-gun-control-debate-santa-fe-park land-heller-an niversar y- constit ution (accessed February 1, 2022). Carter, Gregg Lee. The Gun Control Movement. New York: Twayne, 1997. Cottrol, Robert J. Gun Control and the Constitution: Sources and Explanations on the Second Amendment. New York: Garland, 1994. Feinzig, Joshua, and Joshua Zoffer. “A Constitutional Case for Gun Control.” The Atlantic, October 28, 2019. https://www .theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/10

/constitutional-case-gun-control/600694/ (accessed February 1, 2022). Foster, Michael A. Federal Firearms Laws: Overview and Selected Legal Issues. Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, 2019. https://crsreports.congress. gov/product/pdf/R/R45629 (accessed February 1, 2022, 2022). Halstead, T. J. District of Columbia v. Heller: The Supreme Court and the Second Amendment. CRS Report for Congress, RL34446. Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, 2008. Harding, David R., Jr. “Public Opinion and Gun Control: Appearance and Transparence in Support and Opposition.” In The Changing Politics of Gun Control, edited by John M. Bruce and Clyde Wilcox, 196– 223. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998. Herz, Andrew. “Gun Crazy: Constitutional False Consciousness and the Dereliction of Dialogic Responsibility.” Boston University Law Review 75 (1995): 57–153. Levinson, Sanford A. “The Embarrassing Second Amendment.” Yale Law Journal 99 (1989): 637–59. Tribe, Laurence. American Constitutional Law. Mineola, NY: Foundation Press, 2000. Van Alstyne, William W. “The Second Amendment and the Personal Right to Arms.” Duke Law Journal 43 (1994): 1236–55.

United States Supreme Court Decisions on Gun Control. See Appendix 3—List of Judicial Developments Universal Background Checks Universal background checks are an expanded version of gun control policies that aim to restrict access to firearms by

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various classes of disqualified persons, including convicted felons, illegal aliens, domestic abusers, and drug addicts, among others. The rationale for these policies stems from the notion that these populations are at unacceptably high risk for committing gun crimes, including mass shootings and homicides. Thus, it is prudent to prevent them from obtaining firearms. If made universal, current background check protocols would be expanded to include all gun sales in the country regardless of seller status, and theoretically close what is often referred to as the “gun show loophole.” In the United States, a large proportion of background checks are processed via the National Criminal Instant Background Check system, also known as NICS, which went live on November 30, 1998. It was created to fulfill components of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act of 1993 (also known as the Brady Act or the Brady Bill). Specifically, the Brady Act stipulated that retail purchases of firearms must be attended by the successful completion of a criminal background check by the purchaser.

History Prior to 1968, federal law had little to say regarding who could purchase a firearm provided that the prospective buyer did not have a felony conviction (Miller 2019). Felons had been legally barred from buying guns since the passage of the Federal Firearms Act of 1938, which also required the sellers of firearms to obtain a Federal Firearms License (FFL). A major impetus toward the current emphasis on background checks came about as a response to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963, as Lee Harvey Oswald purchased his rifle from a mail-order catalog. Further, in the aftermath of the Kennedy assassination,

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many other assassinations occurred, including Malcolm X (February 21, 1965: Nation of Islam, shotgun and handguns), Martin Luther King, Jr. (April 4, 1968: James Earl Ray, rifle), and Robert F. Kennedy (June 5, 1968: Sirhan Sirhan, handgun). These killings resulted in the passage of the Gun Control Act of 1968, which stipulated that minors, drug users or addicts, and the “mentally incompetent” were restricted from buying guns. The acknowledgment of mental incompetence is of particular importance, as this was the first time that mental health had been introduced as a risk factor for violence within federal gun law. The Gun Control Act of 1968 was expanded twenty-five years later with the passage of the Brady Act in 1993. The Brady legislation, passed in response to the 1981 assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan, in which his press secretary, James Brady, was injured, did two important things with respect to criminal background checks. First, it expanded the categories of people who were not legally allowed to purchase firearms to include domestic abusers, fugitives, criminals who had been exposed to punishment of more than a year, “mental defectives” (referring to people who are deemed a threat to themselves or others, or who lack the capacity to manage their own affairs due to some mental impairment, illness, or insufficiency), undocumented immigrants, those who had received dishonorable discharges from the military, those who had renounced U.S. citizenship, and individuals who had been subject to restraining orders (Cox 2019). Second, the act required that FFLs conduct background checks for all sales in order to ensure that none of these prohibited people could purchase guns from them. Notably, this requirement did not apply to private

sellers of firearms, leading to what has become known as the “gun show loophole.”

The Gun Show Loophole (Private Sale Exemption) Federally mandated background checks for firearm purchases continue to proceed from the Brady legislation, which explicitly exempts private transactions from background check requirements. Though some states do mandate background checks within the private sector, no such requirement exists at the federal level, meaning that an array of transactions are possible that do not entail automatic background checks (Giffords Law Center 2018). Sales by family and friends to one another do not trigger a federal background check, and private sellers of any kind are free to sell to anyone they wish, provided that the seller does not know that the prospective buyer would fail a background check if one were administered (Verbruggen 2019). The gun show loophole earns its name because of the prevalence of such conventions, which are estimated to occur approximately 4,000 times per year in the United States, coupled with the proportion of private sellers among the vendors present at them (Miller 2019). Private sellers are active at gun shows, and since they are not required to conduct background checks on their clients, it is reasonable to believe that gun shows facilitate disqualified persons obtaining weapons that the Brady Act prevents them from legally buying. It is this loophole that universalizing background checks would theoretically close. The loophole is known to criminals and would-be criminals, including the Columbine shooters. In that case the shooters, while minors, obtained their weapons by having an adult



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friend purchase guns for them at a private gun show (Soraghan 2000).

that the appellant be fingerprinted (Miller 2019).

Background Check Process and Outcomes Were the United States to adopt a universal background check policy, it would likely involve applying existing background check processes to circumstances that are presently exempt. First, a prospective buyer must complete the Firearms Transaction Record (ATF Form 4473), which asks for their name, birthday, and address. Also, a state ID is required, as are the answers to questions about height and weight (Criminal Watch Dog 2020). Then, the seller either calls a toll-free number or uses online tools to input the information provided by the buyer. Once the information has been sent, decisions typically are immediately available, with an average decision time of under two minutes (Giffords Law Center 2018). Three decisions are possible in a NICS background check: approved, delayed, or denied. If approved, the sale is completed and the purchaser receives the firearm. If delayed, the FBI must investigate further to determine the status of the prospective buyer. However, this investigation must be concluded quickly in order to prevent the sale as, after three days, the seller is granted an automatic option to transact a “default proceed” sale to the buyer, effectively concluding business as though the buyer had been approved. Denials are relatively rare, only occurring in about 2 percent of applications, and the most frequent reasons for denial are felony convictions (Miller 2019). In the case of denial, would-be buyers must make a formal request to NICS to discover the reason for their decision. After that, appeals are possible by sending a Voluntary Appeal File to the FBI, which also requires

Criticism of Universal Background Checks Numerous flaws have been identified by critics of criminal background checks for gun sales, and these flaws contribute to staunch opposition to substantively expanding their use. First, there are varied objections to the implementation of background checks, including the potential for false positives, whereby people who should be approved are incorrectly flagged as ineligible (Miller 2019) and persistent failures to prosecute denied buyers for attempting to illegally purchase weapons (Good 2013). The information contained in the NICS is imperfect, and similar names between buyers and criminals can trigger false positives, potentially causing the recipient to have to navigate a complex bureaucracy to clear their name and, by extension, their right to purchase guns (Cox 2019). Further, attempting to buy a weapon as a disqualified person is itself illegal. However, of the 72,000 checks that resulted in denial in 2010, for example, only 62 were referred for prosecution, and only 13 of those resulted in a guilty plea or verdict (Good 2013). There are also worries about the design limitations of background checks with respect to what they can and cannot detect, and some have suggested broadening the range of disqualifying mental health disorders to account for these limitations (Silver et al. 2018). The scope of what triggers a denial is crucial, especially when considering that approximately half of all mass shooters are thought to suffer from some form of mental illness, but only 5 percent have a disorder that would register on a

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background check (Silver et al. 2018). However, the mental health issues that offenders suffer from are extremely common, such as anxiety and depression, and adoption of such affective disorders as disqualifying would affect too many people. Further, records of disqualifying factors are not always present within the NICS, undermining its effectiveness and resulting in false negatives, whereby people who should be disqualified are not because of inadequate records within the system. One prominent such failure was in the case of the Virginia Tech shooter, who had a conviction for domestic violence that was not flagged by NICS, and this failure allowed him to purchase his guns legally (Virginia Tech Review Panel 2007). Other implementation issues concern basic adherence to laws on the part of sellers, as well as barriers to effective record keeping. For example, in Washington, Colorado, and Delaware, new background check laws failed to increase the number of background checks conducted in those states, meaning that any hoped-for reduction in crime proceeding from more checks would have been impossible (Verbruggen 2019). Additionally, for background checks to be effective, there needs to be some record of their outcomes. This is extremely difficult, however, since the FBI is forbidden from compiling a searchable record of applicants and the decisions associated with them because doing so would create a de facto registry of gun owners, which is not legal in accordance with Title 18 of the United States Code and Title 28 Code of Federal Regulations (Verbruggen 2019). The concern over a national gun owner registry speaks to the second criticism of criminal background checks, which is overall suspicion of government. One form of this is worry that an expansion of

background checks might serve as the starting point of a slippery slope, which could culminate in gun confiscations (Verbruggen 2019). Such confiscations have indeed occurred in the UK, Canada, and Australia, and so this fear is not without cause. Mistrust of government also forms the basis of the most organized opposition to universal background checks: the National Rifle Association (NRA). The NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action has argued that background checks are inherently ineffective because criminals have no interest in complying with them. Accordingly, criminal buyers simply connect with criminal sellers on the black market, making background check laws irrelevant (Cox 2019). Such critics also point to the use of “straw purchases,” whereby a person who can pass a background check simply buys guns for a person who cannot (Miller 2019). The NRA’s contention, then, is that since background check protocols are so easily subverted, the most plausible reason for governmental interest in universal background checks is to deprive lawful gun owners of their property and rights.

Support for Universal Background Checks Despite the objections of the NRA’s lobbying arm, universal background checks remain overwhelmingly popular among the American public at large, with many polls and academic articles reporting approval rates of upward of 90 percent or greater (Miller, Hepburn, and Azrael 2017). This support also cuts across party lines in a way that gun control proposals seldom do, as research shows that majorities of both Democrats and Republicans favor the strategy, albeit at different rates (91% approval among Democrats and 68 percent among Republicans) (Ramsey 2020). Not only is



the base of public support politically diverse and reliable, it surges in the aftermath of tragedies. Following the Parkland shooting in 2018, for example, pollsters reported a 97 percent approval for universal background checks locally, with only 2 percent of respondents opposed (Manchester 2018). Perhaps more surprising even than the agreement across party lines is that gun owners, including NRA members, also tend to support universal background checks. While the lobbying efforts of the NRA are directed against background checks, the membership itself reportedly approves of them at a rate of 72 percent (Agbafe 2020). That rate increases among gun owners generally, with 83 percent of them favoring universal background checks. Despite this wide base of support, however, Universal Background Checks are not mandated by existing law at the federal level, and legislation that seeks to install them is reliably struck down (Lopez 2019).

Effectiveness of Universal Background Checks While high levels of popular support make universal background checks a more plausible policy alternative than many other gun control proposals, the most important justification needed for its adoption is evidence of its effectiveness, and such findings are often conflicting. First, it must be acknowledged that criminal background checks can indeed be circumvented in a variety of ways, not only via the private exceptions that exist within federal legislation but also through things like black markets and outright theft of guns (Cook 2018). Hence, there is clearly a ceiling beyond which background checks cannot be effective. Nevertheless, the intuitive appeal of background checks as a means of controlling gun crime is easy to understand, and

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empirical findings can help reveal where intuition meets limitation. Guis (2015) reports several things that encourage tempered expectations of what background checks can deliver. First, while there is no federal mandate to perform background checks in connection with private gun sales, many state laws do require them. However, in states requiring background checks for private gun sales, murder rates were higher than in states with no such requirements. The reason for this is not fully understood, though it is possible that the presence of large cities with higher crime rates in such states could be a factor, as could the impact of the interstate black market for firearms, the extent of which is mostly unknown (Guis 2015). Further, increases in background checks also correlated with higher rates of gun suicide (Lang 2013), though this is likely due to the fact that more background check applications reflect a higher number of guns at-large generally. In any case, it seems clear that criminal background checks for gun purchases are not the curatives that the public might hope for. Despite this, there is also reason for optimism with respect to the effectiveness of criminal background checks for gun sales. Many studies since 2000 have indicated that homicide rates are less within states that have robust background check laws (Gius 2015), and states with universal background check laws export 30 percent fewer guns used in crimes to other states (Giffords Law Center 2018). Along with homicides and suicides, the third major concern regarding gun violence is mass shootings, and it is with respect to these that we see ample evidence that background checks can be effective. While it is true that mass shooters may be have relatively stable histories prior to their attacks and are thus able to pass background checks (Silver et al. 2018), research

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shows that states that require background checks had 45 percent fewer school shootings than states who did not. Further, states that required background checks for ammunition in addition to guns were at 87 percent less risk (Kalesan et al. 2017).

Conclusion Universal background checks are intended to expand existing background check laws to apply to private gun sales as well as those conducted by sellers who have federal firearms licenses, thereby closing what many identify as a loophole through which illicit guns can be purchased by people who have no legal right to do so. As with all gun control measures, this one is a source of controversy, both politically and in terms of effectiveness. However, the idea remains extremely popular among the general public and is thus likely to exert a potent influence on gun policy discussions for the foreseeable future. Marcus Tyler Carey See also: Acquisition of Guns; Background Checks; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF); Gun Control; National Instant Criminal Background Check System

Further Reading Agbafe, Victor. “The Vast Majority of Americans Support Universal Background Checks. Why Doesn’t Congress?” Harvard Kennedy School, 2020. https://iop .harvard.edu/get-involved/harvard-political -review/vast-majority-americans-support -universal-background-checks (accessed May 18, 2022). “Background Checks for Guns: What Do You Need to Know?” Criminal Watch Dog, 2020. https://www.criminalwatchdog.com /faq/background-checks-for-guns (accessed May 18, 2022).

Cook, Philip J. “Gun Theft and Crime.” Journal of Urban Health: Bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine 95, no. 3 (2018): 305– 12. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11524-018-0253-7. Cox, Chris W. “What Lurks behind ‘Universal’ Background Checks.” National Rifle Association Institute for Legislative Action, February 22, 2019. https://www.nraila.org /articles/20190222/what-lurks-behind-uni versal-background-checks (accessed May 18, 2022). Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Universal Background Checks.” 2018. https://lawcenter.giffords.org/gun-laws /policy-areas/background-checks/universal -background-checks/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Gius, Mark. “The Effects of State and Federal Background Checks on State-Level GunRelated Murder Rates.” Applied Economics 47, no. 38 (2015): 4090. Good, Chris. “The Case against Gun Background Checks.” ABC News, April 10, 2013. https://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics /2013/04/the-case-against-gun-background -checks (accessed May 18, 2022). “Gun Control Act.” Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, January 23, 2020. https://www.atf.gov/rules-and -regulations/gun-control-act (accessed May 18, 2022). Kalesan, Bindu, Kinan Lagast, Marcos Villarreal, Elizabeth Pino, Jeffrey Fagan, and Sandro Galea. “School Shootings during 2013–2015 in the USA.” Injury prevention 23, no. 5 (2017): 321–27. Lang, Matthew. “Firearm Background Checks and Suicide.” Economic Journal 123, no. 573 (2013): 1085–99. Lopez, German. “House Passes Universal Background Check Bill.” Vox, February 27, 2019. https://www.vox.com/policy-and -politics/2019/2/27/18224727/house-uni versal-background-checks-gun-violence -congress (accessed May 18, 2022). Manchester, Julia. “Poll: 97 Percent Support Background Checks for All Gun Buyers.” The Hill, February 20, 2018. https://thehill

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.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/374692 -poll-97-percent-suppor t-background -checks-for-all-gun-buyers (accessed May 18, 2022). Miller, Brian. “This History of Gun Background Checks.” Foundation for Economic Education, May 30, 2019. https://fee.org /articles/the-history-of-gun-background -checks/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Miller, Matthew, Lisa Hepburn, and Deborah Azrael. 2017. “Firearm Acquisition without Background Checks: Results of a National Survey.” Annals of Internal Medicine 166, no. 4 (2017): 233–43. Mueller, David G., and Ronald Frandsen. “Trends in Firearm Background Check Applications and Denials.” Journal of Public Affairs 17, no. 3 (2017). https://doi.org /10.1002/pa.1616. Ramsey, Ross. “Support for Background Checks on All Gun Sales Remains High, UT/TT Poll Finds.” Texas Tribune, February 8, 2020. https://www.texastribune.org /2020/02/18/support-background-checks -all-gun-sales-high-uttt-poll-finds/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Silver, James, William Fisher, and John Horgan. “Public Mass Murderers and Federal Mental Health Background Checks.” Law & Policy 40, no. 2 (2018): 133–47. https:// doi.org/10.1111/lapo.12102. Soraghan, Mike. “Colorado after Columbine: The Gun Debate.” State Legislatures 26, no. 6 (2000): 14–21. Verbruggen, Robert. “The Promise and Pitfalls of Universal Background Checks.” National Review, August 13, 2019. https:// www.nationalreview.com/2019/08/universal-background-checks-promises-pitfalls/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Virginia Tech Review Panel. Mass Shootings at Virginia Tech April 16, 2007: Report of the Review Panel. Arlington, VA: Governor’s Office of the Commonwealth of Virginia, 2007. https://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ prevail/docs/VTReviewPanelReport.pdf (accessed May 18, 2022).

Unrestricted Jurisdiction. See Licensing Urbanism and Gun Violence Gun violence is inextricably linked to U.S. urban areas. By its very nature, urbanism, unfortunately, may connote fear, mistrust, alienation, street life, and hordes of strangers competing over contested space and resources. Cities are an economic, political, and cultural space that has as one of its major features, at least in our imaginations, guns and gun use. It is therefore not surprising that gun violence as an urban characteristic has become axiomatic. Our images of urban areas include gun violence, and the actual reality is not that far off. Ellis (2019) asserts that image is mostly true but urban gun violence is one problem of four problems, including suicide, domestic violence and mass shootings. Urban violence accounts for more deaths than any other category of crime and it disproportionately affects young men of color (Abt 2019). Abt also notes that in 2017, 70 percent of all homicides happened in cities with a population of 25,000 or more and 72 percent of all homicides were committed with a gun. The coupling of urbanism—the lifestyle associated with cities and urban areas—and gun violence is not unique to the United States, but it is especially pronounced in this nation. First, the United States is one of the most violent countries in the world. Second, gun violence is responsible for a lot of the overall amount of violence (firearms are involved in about a quarter to a third of reported assaults and robberies, and threequarters of all homicides; see Federal Bureau of Investigation 2020). Third, much of the violence takes place in urban areas, mostly because that is where most of the population resides and that is where illegal

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guns are most readily available. Fourth, gun access is greater in the United States than in most other countries. Linking urbanism and gun violence is then taken as a matter of fact, and the discourse of guns and U.S. cities has taken its place among the most popular discourses of our time. The United States is a highly urbanized society, with about 83 percent of the population in 2018 residing in urban areas (Center for Sustainable Systems 2021). Given the sheer number of people who inhabit urban areas, the rate of overall gun violence in the United States, and the easy availability of guns (through both legal and illegal means), the connection between gun violence and urbanism is now indisputable. Wiebe et al. (2009) found that a disproportionate number of federal firearms licensees, where guns travel into citizen hands in a legal manner for both legal and illegal use, are located in U.S. cities. Gun homicide and assault are concentrated in cities (Everytown for Gun Safety 2019). The most extreme violence, that involving life and death and guns, is concentrated in innercity sections of urban areas. There is no spinning away that fact. Yet, as noted above, urbanism and gun violence is much more complicated than it seems, and the complexity begins with the history of guns and cities. In the first two decades of the twenty-first century, the connection between urbanism and (potential) gun violence became both tighter and more vexing. The U.S. Supreme Court has recently reinforced this association. In District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), the court ruled that the Second Amendment to the Constitution protects an individual’s right to possess a firearm for legal purposes in federally defined districts (Washington, DC). In a similar landmark decision, McDonald v. City of Chicago

(2010), the court ruled that U.S. states and cities were included in Second Amendment protection and could not ban handguns. These two decisions, along with lower-court rulings in their wake, make the issue of urbanism and gun violence much more complicated than it had been, if that is even possible. Supreme Court watchers were somewhat surprised by the May 2020 decision in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. City of New York that was not decided in guns owners’ favor but signaled that the Court could soon hear other similar cases. In a juxtaposition of “homeland” with “hometown,” Kerlikowske (2008) argues that in the post-9/11 environment, urban hometowns have become more violent and more dangerous, not as a result of terrorism directly, but as a result of the lack of attention given to making the “hometown” secure. In a sense, U.S. policy is directed at homeland rather than hometown security. The process of eastern to western U.S. mass urbanization occurred around the same historical period as the introduction of guns as a means of individual protection and power and a more widespread use. The gun as a means of control and coercion seems to provoke a response in kind by the controlled. The fact that the rugged individual, long a part of the American ethos, carries a gun means that the rugged crime control person must also carry a gun. Certainly, however, gun violence has never been restricted to urban areas, and during some eras, such as the colonial period, increasing urbanization in some of the more settled areas of the east came with a reduction of gun ownership and carrying. Furthermore, levels of overall violence in the United States, especially homicide, have varied across time and place. For example, there is historical evidence suggesting that



at the turn of the century, homicide rates were much higher in several western locales than they were in several northeastern cities. Despite inconsistent patterns in earlier urbanism and gun violence, the enduring imagery of the western gunslinger and then the urban gangster arose from the confluence of the increasing settlement of the frontier and increasing urbanization. These images are not entirely disconnected; both are located in a particular type of space, the street; then enters the urban gang, with a bit of the gunslinger and a bit of the gangster among its individual members. The reality of legal gun ownership may be slightly inconsistent with the prevailing image of the urban gang and gangster using guns to protect himself—and it is mainly him, not her—and to ensure his position in the urban power hierarchies. According to the General Social Survey (National Opinion Research Center 2019), 35.2 percent of the people surveyed have a gun in their home. These numbers do not reflect the number of guns held illegally, which are the likely source for the connection between urbanism and gun violence and support the gangster and gang imagery. Gun-violence rates increased steadily until the mid-1990s and then decreased ever since, as did most street crime, in a slightly uneven manner. Many analyses identify a specific time period when urbanism and gun violence became linked: the mid-1980s growth of the crack drug industry (e.g., Carter 1997). This is perhaps what transformed gun violence into an urban phenomenon: most of the gun violence involves young males of color; a disproportionately high rate of young males of color live in urban areas; and the illegal drug industry is concentrated in urban areas. The illegal drug industry is decidedly more dangerous where there is a “niche market,” and cities are high-density

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places with a high proportion of people experiencing poverty and personal misery. These markets may encourage people of all ages, but especially young people, to use guns as a means of ensuring their power and position in the underground market. Gun violence and urbanism have always been linked to young men, particularly those individuals of color, so it is a both a gendered and racialized phenomenon. Young, violent Black men ruling city streets may be one of the most powerful, albeit inaccurate, cultural images of this country. Entire films and television series have this image as a main motif. Political and social practices of a society are reflected in the body and behavior of its citizens. One of the predominant discourses about the urban young in an overall violent society is that they too will reflect the larger social and political practices. Some young males in urban areas are arming themselves, mostly with firearms gained illegally. As powerful an image as that is, what may be taking over is the concomitant image of legitimate and illegitimate use of violence, force, and coercion by city police forces. Perhaps the enduring images of the spring and early summer of 2020—of the Covid-19 pandemic, the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officers (although not by gun), the police shooting of Tony McDade in Tallahassee, the shooting death by Louisville police of Breonna Taylor in her home, the white vigilantes killing Ahmaud Arbery while he was jogging, and the police shooting of Rayshard Brooks in Atlanta—have taken over the idea of the gangster imagery. The beginning of the summer of 2020 heard shouts of “defund the police” as law enforcement has become more militarized with gun weaponry that matches the military. Gun violence in cities, therefore, is clearly racialized. Furthermore, Black men make

882 | Urbanism and Gun Violence

up 52 percent of all gun homicide victims, despite constituting less than 7 percent of the U.S. population. Black Americans are ten times more likely than white Americans to die by gun homicide and fourteen times more likely than white Americans to be injured in a gun assault. Within cities, gun violence is clustered among racially segregated, economically disenfranchised neighborhoods. For example, in Boston, 53 percent of the city’s gun violence occurs in less than 3 percent of the city’s intersections and streets (Giffords Law Center 2018). The mere possibility of gun violence creates fear and a warping of the benefits that may accrue to urban living and visiting. That means that residents of some of our urban areas are afraid to walk outside their homes, and parents are afraid to let their children leave their homes. (Indeed, in the 2010 GSS, only one in four adults living in rural areas and small towns responded in the affirmative to the question “Is there any area right around here— that is, within a mile—where you would be afraid to walk alone at night?” compared to one in two adults living in cities.) Besides any real threat to safety, the potential for gun violence significantly affects the urban resident’s perceived quality of life and the urban visitor’s perceived quality of visit. Urban economies, of course, may realize significant costs because of these fears. Contemporary gun violence, however, is entrenched in a culture that includes lawlessness, poverty, racism, power, despair, and unprecedented gun availability in general and among urban youth culture in particular. Indeed, if one were to look at gun violence as a motif of urban areas, one might conclude, arguably, that this society is heading toward vulgar nihilism, with an increasing disarticulation between citizenship and

safety. But would that be close to the reality of urbanism? Perhaps, yes. Gun violence and its omnipresent potential is a form of injustice more heavily borne, it seems, by urban residents in our “hometowns” (Kerlikowske 2008). Guns provide power and a sense of justice to some urban residents. Urban areas as a public space are also contested spaces. Gun violence allows some of those who are on the margins, with significant disadvantages, to think that they have some power. Even though gun violence has decreased since the mid-1990s, cities continue to seek ways to decrease the violence even more. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, many cities responded to gun violence with lawsuits against gun manufacturers, using the same tactics that states used against the cigarette industry. However, with the 2005 passage of the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act—which allows gun and ammunition retailers, distributors, and manufacturers to be held harmless for any criminal misuse of their products—this tactic has faded from the scene. In its place may be what is commonly called “Stand Your Ground Laws” (a version of which exists in twenty-five states). A meaningful reduction may require what Kennedy (2011) calls a “paradigm shift,” which would bring all relevant groups together, including gun owners, to solve the problem together. Urbanism is much more about real connections made and ordinary lives lived than about disconnections and violence and death. Any policy or solution must be targeted to this strength and to the real problems of urban residents rather than to the ordinary stereotypes there for the taking. Any solution must also view gun violence as not just an urban phenomenon but as a public health crisis (HillsEvans and Sparks 2018). Judith McDonnell

See also: Black Market for Firearms; District of Columbia v. Heller; Gun Violence as a Public Health Problem; Lawsuits against Gun Manufacturers; McDonald v. City of Chicago; Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act of 2005; Youth and Guns

Further Reading Abt, Thomas. Bleeding Out: The Devastating Consequences of Urban Violence—And a Bold New Plan for Peace in the Streets. New York: Basic Books, 2019. Carter, Gregg Lee. “Guns.” In Boyhood in America: An Encyclopedia, edited by Priscilla Ferguson Clement and Jacqueline S. Reinier, 330–35. Santa Barbara, CA: ABCCLIO, 2001. Carter, Gregg Lee. The Gun Control Movement. New York: Twayne, 1997. Center for Sustainable Systems. “U.S. Cities Factsheet.” September 2021. https://css .umich.edu/factsheets/us-cities-factsheet (accessed May 18, 2022). Ellis, Glenn. “Addressing Urban Gun Violence.” New Pittsburg Courier, September 11, 2019. https://newpittsburghcourier.com /2019/09/11/addressing-urban-gun-violence/ (accessed May 18, 2022). Everytown for Gun Safety. “Everytown Research Fact Sheet: City Gun Violence.” April 2019. https://everytownresearch.org /wp-content/uploads/2019/04/City-Gun -Violence-FACT-SHEET-111219A.pdf (accessed May 18, 2022). Federal Bureau of Investigation. Crime in the United States: Violent, 2019. 2020. https:// ucr.f bi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2019/crime -in-the-u.s.-2019/topic-pages/violent-crime (accessed December 23, 2021). Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “Gun Violence Statistics.” 2018. https://lawcenter.giffords.org/facts/gun -violence-statistics/ Hills-Evans, J. Milton, and C. Sparks. “Stop Posturing and Start Problem Solving: A Call for Research to Prevent Gun Violence.”

Urbanism and Gun Violence | 883 AMA Journal of Ethics 20, no. 1 (2018): 77–83. Kennedy, David M. Don’t Shoot: One Man, a Street Fellowship and the End of Violence in Inner-City America. New York: Bloomsbury, 2011. Kerlikowske, R. Gil. “Safe at Home? Policing the U.S. Hometown in a Post 9/11 Environment.” Crime Law Social Change 50 (2008): 47–58. National Opinion Research Center. General Social Survey, 2011a. (“Do You Happen to Have in Your Home (or Garage) Any Guns or Revolvers?” If Yes, “Is It a Pistol, Shotgun, Rifle, or What?”) http://www.norc .uchicago.edu/GSS+Website/ (accessed July 6, 2011). National Opinion Research Center. General Social Survey, 2011b. (“Is There Any Area Right Around Here—That Is, within a Mile—Where You Would Be Afraid to Walk Alone at Night?”) http://www3.norc. org/GSS+Website/ (accessed December 30, 2011). National Opinion Research Center. General Social Survey, 2019. (“Do You Happen to Have in Your Home (IF HOUSE: Or Garage) Any Guns or Revolvers?”) https:// gssdataexplorer.norc.org/variables/vfilter (accessed June 12, 2022). Smith, Tom. 1999 National Gun Policy Survey of the National Opinion Research Center: Research Findings. Chicago: National Opinion Research Center, 2000. Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics. “Table 2.59.2010: Respondents Reporting Having a Gun in Their Home or on Property.” 2011. http://www.albany.edu/sourcebook/pdf/t2592010.pdf (accessed June 25, 2011). Wiebe, D., C. Koper, M. Nance, M. Elliott, and C. Branas. “Homicide and Geographic Access to Gun Dealers in the United States.” BMC Public Health 9 (2009): 199– 208. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/art icles/PMC2714509/pdf/1471-2458-9-199 .pdf (accessed June 24, 2011).

V Victimization from Gun Violence

experience long-term consequences, including physical disabilities (DiScala and Sege 2004) and mental health problems such as depression and symptoms of post-traumaticstress (Greenspan and Kellermann 2002). Exposure to such violence in schools and neighborhoods or learning that a family member or friend has experienced a firearm injury or death is also associated with an increased incidence of a range of negative mental health outcomes (Lowe, BlachmanForshay, and Koenen 2015; Lowe and Galea 2017). The economic impact of firearm violence is also substantial, costing the United States tens of billions of dollars each year in medical and lost productivity costs alone (CDC 2020).

Firearm violence is a serious public health problem in the United States. The human toll extends well beyond mass shootings, which are among the most visible forms of firearm violence in the country. Many Americans are nonfatally injured or die in acts involving a firearm each year. These include acts of interpersonal violence, self-directed violence, legal intervention (i.e., injuries inflicted by law enforcement in the course of duty), and unintentional injuries involving a firearm, and acts where the intent cannot be determined. In an average week, 764 Americans lose their lives to firearm violence and more than 2,000 are treated in an emergency department for a nonfatal firearm-related injury (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC] 2020). Firearm-related injuries are among the five leading causes of injury death for people under age sixty-five in the United States and account for 7.9 percent of premature death or years of potential life lost before the age of sixty-five (CDC 2020). Firearm homicides are the third leading cause of injury death among young people ten to thirty-four years of age, whereas firearm suicides are the fourth leading cause of injury death in this age group. For adults ages thirty-five and older, firearm suicides are the fourth leading cause of injury death, while firearm homicides are the eighth leading cause of injury death (CDC 2020). Many more people suffer nonfatal firearm-related injuries than die and often

By the Numbers In 2018, the latest year for which complete data are available, a total of 39,740 people in the United States died from a firearm-related injury, for an overall age-adjusted rate of 11.9 per 100,000 population. Approximately 62 percent of these deaths were suicides and 35 percent were homicides. The remaining 3 percent were legal intervention firearm deaths, unintentional firearm deaths, and firearm deaths of undetermined intent, each accounting for about 1 percent of the total. Overall, firearms are used in one out of every two suicides and approximately 74 percent of all homicides in the United States (CDC 2020). Firearms are also involved in unintentional shootings, with about one out of every forty-eight being fatal. While information on U.S. firearm deaths comes from death certificates, information 885

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on nonfatal injuries requiring medical treatment comes from a nationally representative sample of injuries treated in U.S. hospital emergency departments. These data indicate that, on average from 2015 to 2017, there were an estimated 108,946 cases of nonfatal firearm-related injuries treated each year in U.S. hospital emergency departments (age-adjusted rate of 34.2 per 100,000 population), including 81,833 cases of firearm-related assault (25.8 per 100,000 population) and 21,483 cases of unintentional injuries involving a firearm (6.6 per 100,000 population). The estimated number of intentionally self-inflicted nonfatal firearm-related injuries seen in hospital emergency departments each year is low (about 4,400 cases per year). This is largely due to the high case fatality rate associated with firearms used in attempts (i.e., the proportion of cases resulting in death). Most people who use a firearm in a suicide attempt die from their injury.

Populations at Risk Rates of fatal and nonfatal firearm-related injuries are not distributed equally in the population. Age, gender, and race/ethnicity are among some of the factors that distinguish population groups most at risk of a firearm-related injury. Fatal Firearm Injuries Young people aged twenty-five to thirty-four have the highest rate of fatal firearm injuries (17.7 per 100,000 population) of all age groups, followed closely by young people fifteen to twenty-four years of age (17.2 per 100,000 population). There are, however, different patterns of fatal firearm injuries by intent. Rates of firearm-related suicide increase with age and are highest among persons aged sixty-five years and older (12.2 per 100,000 population). Rates of

firearm-related homicide, on the other hand, are highest among adolescents and young adults aged fifteen to thirty-four years (9.5 per 100,000 population) and tend to decrease with age. Rates of unintentional firearmrelated deaths are similar across age groups (around 0.1 per 100,000 population), except for adolescents and young adults fifteen to twenty-four years of age. Rates of unintentional firearm deaths in this age group exceed those of other age groups threefold. Males disproportionately bear the burden of fatal firearm-related injury, accounting for 85 percent of all victims of firearm death. In 2018, firearms were used in 56 percent of all male suicides and 31 percent of all female suicides (CDC 2020). They were also used in 79 percent of all male homicides and 58 percent of all female homicides (CDC 2020). Overall, the ratio of the male firearm suicide rate to the female firearm suicide rate was 6.6 in 2018, while the ratio of male to female firearm homicide rate was 5.0. As with firearm-related homicides and suicides, most victims of unintentional firearm-related injuries are male. The male to female rate ratio for fatal unintentional firearm injuries was 8.3 in 2018. Non-Hispanic whites (9.2 per 100,000 population) and American Indians and Alaskan Natives (7.7 per 100,000 population) have the highest rates of firearmrelated suicide in the United States when compared to other groups. Rates of firearm homicide, on the other hand, are highest among African Americans (18.0 per 100,000 population). The racial/ethnic differences in firearm homicide rates are especially pronounced among the younger age groups. For instance, in 2018, African American youths aged fifteen to twentyfour years had a firearm homicide rate (41.0 per 100,000 population) that was nearly four times that of their American Indian/



Alaskan Native counterparts (10.7); more than five times that of their Hispanic counterparts (7.9); and seventeen times the rate of their white, non-Hispanic counterparts (2.4) (CDC 2020).

Nonfatal Firearm Injuries Like deaths, males bear the greatest burden of nonfatal firearm injuries medically treated in U.S. emergency departments, accounting for 88 percent of all firearm-related assault injuries, 88 percent of unintentional injuries involving a firearm, and 83 percent of firearm-related self-harm injuries. From 2015 to 2017, the average annual age-adjusted rate of nonfatal firearm injury was 59.3 for males and 8.6 per 100,000 population for females. For both firearm assaults and unintentional firearm injuries, rates for males were about seven times higher than those for females (44.7 vs. 6.4, for firearm-related assault injuries, and 11.6 vs. 1.7, for unintentional firearm injuries). About 70 percent of patients treated in emergency departments for a firearm-related injury are younger than thirty-four years of age. Many of these injuries are from a firearm-related assault. From 2015 to 2017, the average annual rate of nonfatal firearmrelated assault for persons fifteen to twentyfour years of age was 78.7 per 100,000 population, followed by a rate of 59.2 among young adults twenty-five to thirty-four years of age. The average annual rate of nonfatal firearm assault for persons fifteen to twentyfour years of age was more than double the rate for persons thirty-five to forty-four years of age (28.2), and fifty times higher than the rate for those sixty-five years and older (1.6). Region, State, and Level of Urbanization Rates of firearm-related death are not evenly distributed across the United States.

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They vary across regions in the country, by state, and level of urbanization. The Southern region of the United States has the highest rate of firearm-related death in the country, followed by the Midwest. The lowest rates of firearm-related death are in the Northeast region of the country. This regional pattern is the same regardless of the type of firearm death—homicide, suicide, or unintentional injuries involving a firearm. By state, the highest rates of firearmrelated death in the nation are found in Alabama, Alaska, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, New Mexico, and Wyoming (age-adjusted rate > 20.0 per 100,000 population) (CDC 2020). Several of these states (Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri) have rates of firearm-related death that are nearly twice the national rate of 11.9 per 100,000 population. The states of Connecticut, Hawaii, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, and Rhode Island have the lowest overall rates of firearmrelated death in the nation (age-adjusted rate < 4.9 per 100,000 population) (CDC 2020). Rates of firearm-related death across states also vary by intent. For example, the highest rates of firearm homicide (ageadjusted rate more than twice the national rate of 4.4 per 100,000 population) are found mostly in the South, including Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Washington, DC, followed closely by South Carolina, Tennessee, and Maryland (CDC 2020). The lowest rates of firearm homicide in the nation (age-adjusted rate < 1.5 per 100,000 population) are found in Iowa, Hawaii, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Utah (CDC 2020). The highest rates of firearm suicide in the nation (age-adjusted rate more than twice the national rate of 7.0 per 100,000

Fatal and Nonfatal Firearm Injuries and Rates by Demographic Characteristics—United States Fatal firearm injuries, 2018 All

Homicide

1

Number Rate

2

Total 39,740 Sex Male 33,955 Female 5,785 Age group 0–14 535 15–24 7,411 25–34 8,100 35–44 6,027 45–54 5,323 55–64 5,353 65+ 6,990 Race/Ethnicity Non-Hispanic 24,789 white Non-Hispanic 9,801 Black Hispanic 4,018 Non-Hispanic 427 AI/AK Native Non-Hispanic 618 Asian/Pacific Islander Unknown race/ 87 ethnicity Region Northeast 3,772 South 18,696 Midwest 8,665 West 8,607 Level of urbanization Metropolitan 32,443 areas Nonmetropolitan 7,297 areas

Suicide

Number Rate

2

Unintentional

Number Rate

2

Number Rate2

11.85

13,958

4.42

24,432

7.01

458

0.14

20.62 3.45

11,641 2,317

7.33 1.45

21,101 3,331

12.53 1.91

413 45

0.25 0.03

0.88 17.25 17.73 14.60 12.79 12.66 13.33

251 4,107 4,348 2,569 1,382 802 498

0.41 9.56 9.51 6.22 3.32 1.90 0.95

202* 0.97 2,995 6.97 3,429 7.50 3,222 7.81 3,787 9.10 4,421 10.46 6,375 12.16

54 129 79 46 45 51 54

0.09 0.30 0.17 0.11 0.11 0.12 0.10

11.34

3,346

1.75

20,680

9.19

286

0.14

22.17

7,989

18.00

1,524

3.52

103

0.23

6.60 15.66

2,191 177

3.45 6.52

1,601 211

2.79 7.70

49 13

0.08 2 --

2.84

224

1.03

363

1.67

7

2

--

--

31

--

53

--

7

2

--

2

2

2

6.43 14.68 12.56 10.71

1,358 6,991 3,164 2,445

2.52 5.81 4.90 3.18

2,313 11,095 5,265 5,759

3.72 8.38 7.30 7.01

34 255 84 85

0.06 0.20 0.13 0.11

11.27

12,357

4.50

19,048

6.39

307

0.11

15.37

1,601

3.47

5,384

10.82

151

0.33

Victimization from Gun Violence | 889



Fatal and Nonfatal Firearm Injuries and Rates by Demographic Characteristics—United States (continued) Average annual nonfatal firearm injuries, 2015–2017 All1

Assault

Self-harm

Unintentional

Number Rate2 Number Rate2 Number Rate2 Number Rate2 Total Sex Male Female Age group 0–14 15–24 25–34 35-44 45–54 55–64 65+

108,946

34.17

81,833 25.81

4,397

2

--

21,483

6.65

95,442 13,499

59.28 8.62

71,713 44.69 10,114 6.44

3,654 743

2

---

18,887 2,596

11.62 1.69

1,830 41,836 32,456 15,097 8,637 4,859 3,457

3.00 96.23 72.62 37.21 20.24 11.75 7.02

758 34,243 26,474 11,432 5,080 2,394 785

--2 -2 -2 -2 -2 --

1,023 6,542 4,741 2,700 2,677 1,922 1,854

1.68 15.05 10.61 6.65 6.27 4.65 3.77

1.24 78.77 59.24 28.17 11.90 2 -1.59

46* 807 773 709 767 504 760

2

2 2

Sources: National Center for Health Statistics Vital Statistics System for deaths; CDC and Consumer Product Safety Commission’s National Electronic Injury Surveillance System - Firearm Injury Surveillance Study (NEISS-FISS) for nonfatal firearm injuries. 1 In addition to the firearm-related deaths classified as homicide, suicide, and unintentional, the count for all firearmrelated deaths includes those deaths classified as "undetermined" and "legal intervention." For nonfatal firearm injuries, the count for "all" includes those cases classified as "legal intervention." Cases with "undetermined intent" are captured under unintentional. 2 Death rates are considered unstable when the rate is calculated with a numerator of 20 or less, or when the population denominator figure is unavailable, such as for persons of "not stated" or unknown racial/ethnic origin. For nonfatal injuries, estimates with coefficients of variation >30%, a weighted estimate of