united states gun control pros cons

The Second Amendment to the Constitution states, “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,” (United States Constitution). Because few contemporary gun owners would describe themselves as being part of a “well regulated militia,” the relevance of the Second Amendment becomes increasingly spurious.

Mass shootings, firearm accidents, and other gun-related deaths are disproportionately high in the United States, but assessing causality remains one of the greatest policy challenges of the last century. Gun control advocates claim that revising the Second Amendment would help to reduce the number, frequency, and severity of violent deaths and especially curb instances of mass shootings.

On the other hand, gun control detractors claim that guns themselves are not the problem; that existing legislation already controls firearm ownership, and that the Second Amendment must remain sacrosanct in order to protect public safety. Why Not Gun Control? Because of the Second Amendment, the burden of proof in the gun control debate remains legally placed on gun control advocates. After all, the default status is that of legal but regulated personal firearm ownership.

Therefore, gun control advocates have an uphill battle to climb, one that comes up against constitutional values and law. Gun control would result in costly, lengthy, and potentially futile legal battles that could actually preclude research into broader sociological and psychological causes of gun-related violence. Another argument against gun control is that restricting legal access to firearms would potentially impede the ability of the average American to engage in self-defence or even to create the “well regulated militia” the Constitution allows.

Gun control detractors also claim that no amount of legislation can prevent the illegal firearms trade from flourishing, and that legal gun ownership would effectively allow individuals and communities to protect themselves from would-be terrorists or armed criminals. Some gun advocates also herald the underlying values of freedom and liberty that undergird the Second Amendment: which places actual physical power into the hands of the people rather than in the hands of elected officials with the potential to abuse their positions of power.

Finally, gun advocates claim that statistics related to gun deaths have been either manipulated or overblown, advocating for improved gun safety education and awareness (“Should More Gun Control Laws Be Enacted?” n.d.). The Benefits of Gun Control Gun control seems like a sensible solution to the obvious problem of gun violence.

Just as the government has the right to control drugs in the name of public safety without infringing on the right of patients to acquire medications they need, the government also possesses the right—and the responsibility—to protect the public from unnecessary harm related to firearms.

The vast majority—75%--of mass shootings were perpetrated by people with legal firearms, a statistic that does indicate that restricting access to gun ownership would in fact help reduce the number of fatalities in mass shootings (“10 Advantages and Disadvantages of Gun Control,” n.d.).

Extensive empirical research also points to the efficacy of gun control; one cross-sectional study showed that universal, federal-level controls including more strident background checks and methods of firearm tracking could “substantially reduce firearm mortality in the USA,” (Kalesan, Mobily, Keiser, et al., 2016). It is certainly possible to implement federal gun control provisions while retaining the core provisions of the Second Amendment and without infringing on the rights and liberties of Americans.

Gun-related deaths are preventable, and guns do not effectively protect people to the degree that gun advocates claim given that “Americans are more likely to die from gun violence than the combined risks of drowning, fire and smoke, stabbing, choking on food, airplane crashes, animal attacks, and natural disasters,” (Mosher & Gould, 2018, p. 1). Current gun laws vary considerably from.