GUN CONTROL FACT-SHEET (2004) - Gun Owners Of America. 1. Highlights * Guns are used 2.5 million times a year in self-defense. Law-abiding citizens use guns to defend themselves against criminals as many as 2.5 million times every year—or about 6,850 times a day.(1) This means that each year, firearms are used more than 80 times more often to protect the lives of honest citizens than to take lives.(2) * Even anti-gun Clinton researchers concede that guns are used 1.5 million times annually for self-defense. According to the Clinton Justice Department, there are as many as 1.5 million cases of self-defense with a firearm every year. The National Institute of Justice published this figure in 1997 as part of "Guns in America"—a study which was authored by noted anti-gun criminologists Philip Cook and Jens Ludwig.(3) * Concealed carry laws have reduced murder and crime rates in the states that have enacted them.
. * Anti-gun journal pronounces the failure of the Brady law. . * More guns, less crime. . * Gun-free England not such a utopia after all. 2. Colorado shootings: House leaders open to gun law debate - 2chambers. Posted at 01:50 PM ET, 07/26/2012 Jul 26, 2012 05:50 PM EDT TheWashingtonPost (Police say a suspect in the Aurora Mall shooting is in custody. | AP) Leaders of the House of Representatives signaled support Thursday for a broader discussion on gun rights a day after President Obama waded into the issue more extensively than ever before.
But the issue still appears to be a nonstarter in the Senate. Speaking at a meeting of the National Urban League in New Orleans Wednesday night, Obama called last week’s massacre in Aurora, Colo. an “extraordinarily heartbreaking tragedy.” The comments echoed the sentiments of lawmakers and the president’s own aides, who said this week that Obama is unlikely to push for new gun legislation because of strong opposition in Congress. But House Speaker John A. “If the president has proposals on other ways that we can address criminals owning guns, I’ll be happy to look at them,” Boehner said. “I don’t know. In the Senate, Majority Leader Harry M. Related stories: Patrick J. Charles: The Tale of Two Second Amendments. If you think the gun rights-gun control debate is not a serious issue in this year's election, you are mistaken. Look no further than this year's Republican and Democrat platforms and one can see that Second Amendment politics is an issue of serious disagreement.
For Republicans, the Second Amendment is not limited to the holdings of the Supreme Court decisions District of Columbia v. Heller and McDonald v. City of Chicago, where 5-4 majorities only held that armed self-defense in the home, with a hand gun, is a fundamental right of law-abiding citizens. Allegedly, the right to keep and bear arms also "includes the right to obtain and store ammunition without registration," a right to self-defense "wherever a law-abiding citizen has a legal right to be," the ability to purchase and maintain unlimited ammo clips, and the ability to purchase and maintain assault rifles. What makes this political divide interesting is the manner the political parties are touting the Second Amendment. Federal Gun Control Legislation - Timeline. Throughout American history, high-profile gun violence has focused the national spotlight on gun control. The Dec. 14, 2012 tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School and other mass shootings—like the deadliest school shooting to date at Virginia Polytechnic Institute—are always followed by a public debate of gun safety and gun owners' rights in America.
But despite these debates there has been little response from Congress in the form of new federal gun control legislation. The last significant federal gun law was 1994's Assault Weapons Ban, passed five years before Columbine, which expired in 2004. On Jan. 16, 2012, President Obama held a press conference to announce his plan for changing the face of gun control in this country. Some of the measures outlined in his speech the president intends to achieve through 23 executive actions, while he called on Congress to do its part to enact stricter gun control legislation. Obama vs romney: gun control.