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Gun politics is an especially contentious topic in the United States. The degree to which firearms can or should be regulated has long been debated, and disagreements range from the practical — does gun ownership cause or prevent crime? — to the constitutional — how should one interpret the Second Amendment? — to the ethical — is self-defense a basic individual right to weapons, and does the Government have the right to regulate these weapons?

Those concerned about high levels of gun violence in the United States in comparison to other developed countries look to restrictions on gun ownership as a way to stem the violence. Those supportive of long-standing rights to keep and bear arms point to the Second Amendment of the Constitution, which some interpret as specifically preventing infringement of the "right of the people to keep and bear arms," independent of serving in a militia.

Overview

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The two sides of the debate are whether or not private ownership and/or possession of firearms should be restricted by the government at any level.

The spectrum of debate ranges from complete prohibition of private ownership to no regulation of ownership.

A primary factor influencing those who support private ownership of firearms is a belief that individuals are ultimately responsible for their own safety against crime. A subset of supporters of firearms ownership are those who consider it likely that it will be necessary one day to take arms against a tyrannical government.

In recent decades, the debate has centered around the meaning of the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution and also the right to bear arms clauses in individual State Constitutions.

The United States Second Amendment, as passed by the House and Senate and later ratified by the States, 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 hand-written copy of the Bill of Rights that hangs in the National Archives had slightly different capitalization and punctuation inserted by William Lambert, the scribe who prepared it. This copy 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."'

Both versions are commonly used by "official" Government publications.

The meaning of this text remains fiercely debated with some saying that the amendment refers only to official federal entities, such as the Army or National Guard while others say that the amendment always guarantees the right of individuals to own firearms.

"The conclusion is thus inescapable that the history, concept, and wording of the 2nd amendment to the Constitution of the United States, as well as its interpretation by every major commentator and court in the first half-century after its ratification, indicates that what is protected is an individual right of a private citizen to own and carry firearms in a peaceful manner."—Report of the Subcommittee on the Constitution of the Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate, 97th Congress, Second Session, 2/82

"The plain meaning of the right of the people to keep arms is that it is an individual, rather than a collective, right and is not limited to keeping arms while engaged in active military service or as a member of a select militia such as the National Guard."—U.S. vs. Emerson, 5th Circuit Federal Court, published October 16, 2001

Opponents of a restrictive interpretation of the Second Amendment point out that United States Code states precisely that the militia is all male citizens and resident aliens at least 17 up to 45 with or without military service experience, and including additionally those under 64 having former military service experience, as well as including female citizens who are members of the National Guard. (Note: previously, only female citizens who were officers of the National Guard were included in this definition; this was changed to include all female citizens in 1993.) . However, this position ignores the fact that this reference to federal entities, specifically the National Guard, does not appear in U.S. Federal Code until 1903 and thus cannot be said to be concurrent with the original intent of Second Amendment. Some people argue about even the number of commas in the amendment. Also, there is considerable disagreement about the organized militia and the unorganized militia and their relationship to the Second Amendment. Does the right pertain to only organized, well-regulated militias or all citizens?

There is a wide range of views regarding the Second Amendment. Some gun rights advocates argue that the right to arms for self-preservation pre-dates the U.S. Constitution, is one of the unenumerated rights codified by the Ninth Amendment, and is protected by the Second Amendment; such gun rights advocates argue that the Second Amendment does not grant the right to arms, but simply protects the right to arms. Some gun control advocates argue that the Second Amendment does not cover individual gun ownership; others argue that the right to own firearms rests on other grounds which render it subject to the full force of the state's police powers, while others argue for outright repeal of the Amendment. , . A wide range of views exists regarding the Second Amendment among gun control supporters.

While a range of views may be found among proponents of gun rights, most believe that the Second Amendment protects the right to own guns for individual self defense, hunting, target shooting and, in extreme cases, believe this also includes a right of revolution. Gun rights supporters argue that the phrase "the people" applies to all individuals rather than an organized collective, and point out that the word "people" means the same individuals in the 1st, 2nd, 4th, 9th, and 10th Amendments. They also cite the fact that the Second Amendment resides in the Bill of Rights and argue that the Bill of Rights, by its very nature, defines individual rights of the citizenry. Many proponents of gun rights also read the Second Amendment to state that because of the need of a formal military, the people have a right to "keep and bear arms" as a protection from the government.

For a more detailed discussion of the historical debates on the Second Amendment, see Second Amendment to the United States Constitution.

Practical questions

Within the gun politics debate, gun control advocates and gun rights advocates disagree on more practical questions as well. There is an ongoing debate over the role that guns play in crime. Gun-rights groups say that a well-armed citizenry prevents crime and that making civilian ownership of firearms illegal would increase the crime rate by making law-abiding citizens vulnerable to those who choose to disregard the law, while gun control organizations claim that increased gun ownership leads to higher levels of crime, suicide, and other negative outcomes. Questions of regulatory policy includethe low of the crime that the person did coulb be agued with a judge..

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• Types of firearm: Should some types of firearms be regulated differently from others?
• Criteria of eligibility: Are there criteria that disqualify a person from owning firearms? (Possible criteria include age, mental competence, firearm training, and criminal convictions)
• Background checks: Should there be background checks made to verify eligibility to own a firearm? Who should make them, and should there be a waiting period before a firearm can be sold?
• Registration: Should all firearms and firearm owners be registered? If so, how may the registration information be used, and who should have access to it?
• Concealed weapons: Should carrying concealed weapons be regulated? If so, should concealed carry be regulated separately from ownership, and if so, how?
• Enforcement: Can gun-control laws be feasibly enforced? Should executive policy be to strictly enforce gun laws?
• Storing: Should there be any regulations on how guns are kept? Should the state mandate the dismantling, unloading or locking of guns in storage?

Advocates on both sides generally agree that the gun rights lobby is among the most effective and organized single-issue political groups in the United States with the most prominent example being the National Rifle Association.

Lower crime rates and gun ownership—evidence for the connection

There is an open debate regarding the relationship between gun control, and violence and other crimes. The numbers of lives saved or lost by gun ownership is debated by criminologists. Research difficulties include the difficulty of accounting accurately for confrontations in which no shots are fired, and jurisdictional differences in the definition of "crime".

Some scholars, such as John Lott, author of More Guns, Less Crime, say they have discovered a positive correlation between gun control legislation and crimes in which criminals victimize law-abiding citizens. Lott asserts that criminals ignore gun control laws and are effectively deterred only by armed intended victims just as higher penalties deter crime. Lott's work has been challenged by a number of scholars, and some of them hold that concealed carry laws do not reduce crime. His work involved comparison and analysis from data collected from all the counties in the United States.

Another researcher, Dr. Gary Kleck, a criminologist at Florida State University, estimated that approximately 2.5 million people used their gun in self-defense or to prevent crime each year, often by merely displaying a weapon. The incidents that Kleck studied generally did not involve the firing of the gun and he estimates that as many as 1.9 million of those instances involved a handgun. Kleck's research has been challenged by scholars such as David Hemenway who argue that these estimates of crimes prevented by gun ownership are too high.

Proponents of gun control frequently argue that carrying a concealed pistol would be of no practical use for personal self-defense, and gun rights advocates answer that if that were true, law enforcement would have no use for their guns.

The National Rifle Association regularly reprints locally-published stories of ordinary citizens whose lives were saved by their guns. A sample can be seen here:.

Homicide rates as a whole, especially homicides as a result of firearms use, are not always significantly lower in many other developed countries. This is apparent in the UK and Japan, which have very strict gun control, while Israel, Canada, and Switzerland at the same time have low homicide rates and high rates of gun distribution. Although Dr Kleck has stated, "...cross-national comparisons do not provide a sound basis for assessing the impact of gun ownership levels on crime rates." (Kleck, Point Blank, 191)

In the New England Journal of Medicine article "Gun Ownership as a Risk Factor for Homicide in the Home" , the researchers found that people who keep a gun at home increase their risk of homicide.

Florida State University professor Gary Kleck disagrees with the journal authors' interpretation of the evidence and he argues that there is no evidence that the guns involved in the home homicides studied by Kellerman, et. al. were kept in the victim's home. Similarly, Dave Kopel, writing in the National Review criticized Kellerman's study in an article entitled An Army of Gun Lies, April 17, 2000. Kellerman responded to similar criticisms of the data behind his study in a letter to the New England Journal of Medicine Finally, another argument cited by academics researching gun violence points to the positive correlation between guns in the home and an already violent neighborhood. These points assert that Professor Kleck's causal story is in fact backwards and that violent neighborhoods cause homeowners to purchase guns and it is the neighborhood that determines the probability of homicide, not the presence of a gun.

David Hemenway's recent book, Private Guns, Public Health, makes the argument in favor of gun control and he provides evidence for the more guns, more gun violence and suicide hypothesis. Rather than compare America to countries with radically different cultures and historical experiences, he focuses on Canada, New Zealand and Australia and concludes that the case for gun control is a strong one based on the relationship he finds between lower crime rates and gun control. Other information from countries such as South Africa, Russia, and several other countries which forbid almost all individual firearms and have low rates of gun ownership, have much higher murder rates than the US, usually committed with simple knives, explosives, or improvised blunt-force weapons.

Firearms are also the most common method of suicide, accounting for 53.7% of all suicides committed in the United States in 2003.

Security against tyranny and invasion arguments

A position taken by some personal gun rights advocates is that an armed citizenry is the population's last line of defense against tyranny by their own government, as some believe was one of the main intents of the Second Amendment. This belief was also held by some of the authors of the Constitution. For example, Thomas Jefferson stated that "the Tree of Liberty must be watered from time to time with the blood of Tyrants and Patriots both". The Declaration of Independence itself says when discussing abusive government (Despotism): "...it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government..."

A contrary position is that the intent of the Second Amendment was the need to avoid a standing army by ensuring the viability of people's militias, and that the concept of rebellious private citizens or rogue militias as a check on governmental tyranny was clearly not part of the Second Amendment. As historian Don Higginbotham notes, the well-regulated militia protected by the Second Amendment was more likely to put down rebellions than participate in them.

Critics of the 'security against tyranny' argument argue also that replacing elected officials by voting is sufficient to keep the government in check, although there are numerous examples in history of elected officials assuming absolute power, with little regard to laws. Personal gun right advocates put forward the Battle of Athens in August 2, 1946 as an example of citizens in desperate circumstances using firearms where all other democratic options have failed. Pro-gun groups argue that the only way to enforce democracy is through having the means of resistance.

There is some historical evidence that an armed populace is a strong deterrent against a foreign invasion. Personal gun rights advocates frequently cite tyrants who feared invading countries where the citizenry was heavily armed or when these tyrants needed to disarm their own populace to be effective. For example, Adolf Hitler said (as quoted in his Tischgespräche im Führerhauptquartier, April 11, 1942): "The most foolish mistake we could possibly make would be to permit the conquered Eastern peoples to have arms. History teaches that all conquerors who have allowed their subject races to carry arms have prepared their own downfall by doing so."

Historical evidence cited by these supporters of gun rights includes the fact that during the Pacific War, Japan rejected the idea of invading the West Coast of the United States due to the prevalence of armed civilians. As noted after the war by one Japanese Admiral, "We knew that your country actually had state championships for private citizens shooting military rifles. We were not fools to set foot in such quicksand."

The Civilian Marksmanship Program oversees some of these shooting competitions, it was created by the 1903 War Department Appropriations Act to promote rifle practice and firearms safety training for all qualified U.S. Citizens. Chartered by the Congress, its primary purpose is to encourage marksmanship skills among civilians with an emphasis on youth. It administers shooting competitions and the sale of surplus U.S. Army rifles, most frequently the M1 Garand.

The Afghanistani Mujahideen countered well-equipped Soviet Armed Forces with ancient bolt action rifles. As noted by Major Keith J. Stalder, USMC, in 1985, "... the Lee Enfield-armed Afghans can often hit at 800 meters or longer range while the Kalashnikov-armed motorized riflemen are ineffective beyond 300 meters...". As Boston T. Party has phrased it, 60,000 dead Soviets cannot all be wrong. Ultimately, the Soviets left in defeat, losing against mostly WW I and WW II bolt action rifles, while they themselves were armed with the latest weapons. Of course, the Mujahideen did have significant support from the West with Stinger missiles, but their bolt-action weapons were still essentially indigenous.

Gun rights supporters also argue that an armed citizenry can prevent genocide. In the 2003 documentary Innocents Betrayed, Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership advanced the claim that gun control laws have been a critical part of all genocides in the twentieth century. The documentary referred to laws restricting gun ownership to government officials passed in Nazi Germany by Hitler, the USSR by Stalin, and elsewhere. The documentary observes that in many cases, a leader with plans of dictatorship will often ban guns from the area he wishes to control, thus preventing any uprising that could ever threaten his reign. The evidence for this claim has been challenged by scholars who have pointed out that Nazi gun laws were less restrictive than those of the democratic Weimar government (albeit not for Jews, Gypsies, and those who the Nazis were to kill en masse later on).

This is not to say that there was no resistance against the Nazis. Several situations of armed resistance occurred, though they were in the minority of the time. A good example would be the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.

Then Sen. John F. Kennedy recognized both the "security against tyranny" and the "security against invasion" arguments when he stated in Know Your Lawmakers, Guns, April 1960, p. 4 (1960),

"By calling attention to 'a well regulated militia,' the 'security' of the nation, and the right of each citizen 'to keep and bear arms,' our founding fathers recognized the essentially civilian nature of our economy. Although it is extremely unlikely that the fears of governmental tyranny which gave rise to the Second Amendment will ever be a major danger to our nation, the Amendment still remains an important declaration of our basic civilian-military relationships, in which every citizen must be ready to participate in the defense of his country. For that reason I believe the Second Amendment will always be important."

Pro-gun rights groups rarely believe in the plausibility of an "instant" rebellion's success through traditional warfare. Those who believe that arms allow for successful rebellions against tyranny hold that Guerrilla Warfare is the method in which liberty could be once again (or even for the first time) be achieved.

Non crime related

Non-defensive uses of guns, such as hunting, vermin control, and recreational target shooting, often receive little attention despite arguably being the most common uses of privately owned firearms.

Political battle

Originally formed in 1871, after the American Civil War, to promote marksmanship skills among the general population, the NRA was mainly a shooting-sports association that rose to prominence from its nationwide promotion of firearms safety, training courses and certifications it offered local shooting clubs and their members. It became a powerful lobbying force after the passage of the Gun Control Act of 1968, which made gun control a national issue.

Other national gun rights groups generally take a much harder line than the NRA. These groups criticize the NRA's history of support for various gun control legislation such as the Gun Control Act of 1968, the ban on armor-piercing projectiles and the point-of-purchase background checks (NICS). The Second Amendment Sisters, Second Amendment Foundation, Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership, The Pink Pistols and Gun Owners of America are among the groups in this category.

While gun control is not strictly a partisan issue, there is more support for gun control in the Democratic Party than in the Republican Party. The Libertarian Party and the Constitution Party are the largest parties that completely support gun rights. Traditionally, regional differences are greater than partisan ones on this issue. Southern and Western states are predominantly pro-gun while coastal states like California, Massachusetts, and New York favor gun control. Other areas, including the Midwest, are mixed. Two states, Vermont and Alaska, require absolutely no licensing in order to carry a concealed weapon, forbid gun registrations or bans, and disallow local government pre-emption.

Notable individuals

The field of political research regarding firearms suffers from the same contention as the issue of the effect of firearm ownership on crime levels. Some influential individuals in the debate include (in alphabetical order):

• James Brady, who was shot and disabled in an assassination attempt on President Reagan while working as his assistant. He and his wife Sarah Brady later became founders of the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence.
• Arthur Kellermann, who moved into anti-gun advocacy and academia after assisting many gun crime victims as an emergency room doctor. He has published many studies examining the relationship between gun control.
• Gary Kleck, a leading academic expert in the connection between gun control laws and violence.
• John Lott, author of More Guns, Less Crime and The Bias Against Guns
• David Hemenway, author of Private Guns, Public Health
• Donna Dees-Thomases Founder of the Million Moms March

Supreme Court decisions

Firearm case law decisions are numerous in the history of the United States. While many deal with Second Amendment issues, many others deal with other issues of the constitution. The Second Amendment to the United States Constitution is part of the Bill of Rights.

In 1886, in the case of Presser v. Illinois, the Supreme Court affirmed the right of private citizens to keep and bear arms stating that:

"It is undoubtedly true that all citizens capable of bearing arms constitute the reserved military force or reserve militia of the United States as well as of the states, and, in view of this prerogative of the general government, as well as of its general powers, the states cannot, even laying the constitutional provision in question out of view, prohibit the people from keeping and bearing arms, so as to deprive the United States of their rightful resource for maintaining the public security, and disable the people from performing their duty to the general government"

Likewise, as to militias, the high court ruled in Presser v. Illinois, 116 U.S. 252 (1886)), that the State could regulate militias, with no violation of the Second Amendment, for

"To deny the power would be to deny the right of the State to disperse assemblages organized for sedition and treason, and the right to suppress armed mobs bent on riot and rapine."

Otherwise, the modern Supreme Court has left gun control largely to state and local jurisdictions. Some jurisdictions have elected to provide very broad rights to personal firearms, whereas other jurisdictions have chosen to regulate strictly, or even to ban certain types of firearms.

Likewise, other rulings by the Supreme Court (e.g., Griswold v. Connecticut (1965)), have made a slightly stronger case that an individual, unenumerated, right to firearms likely is protected by the Ninth Amendment's protection of pre-existing rights. The issue of whether the personal right to firearms is protected for "the people" at the State level by incorporation through the Fourteenth Amendment is not clearly established although in the decision for Griswold, Justice Goldberg wrote a concurring opinion that,

"While the Ninth Amendment - and indeed the entire Bill of Rights - originally concerned restrictions upon federal power, the subsequently enacted Fourteenth Amendment prohibits the States as well from abridging fundamental personal liberties. And, the Ninth Amendment, in indicating that not all such liberties are specifically mentioned in the first eight amendments, is surely relevant in showing the existence of other fundamental personal rights, now protected from state, as well as federal, infringement."

Gun rights activists and others in recent decades have often taken this opinion to mean that the fundamental right to firearms predates the U.S. Constitution and is due solely to the Ninth Amendment; the Constitution protects a pre-existing right to arms. For example, the late and former Libertarian Presidential Candidate Harry Browne stated "the Second Amendment is only an additional safeguard. Beyond the Second Amendment, "the Ninth Amendment would clearly protect an individual's right to defend himself -- because nothing in the Constitution has taken that right away."

A felon may have his individual right to keep and bear arms restored, "the disability may be removed by a qualifying pardon."

Gun control laws

A patchwork of regulatory gun control laws exists at state and local levels, with the state of Illinois, Washington, DC, and the city of New York having among the more restrictive limits; New York's Sullivan Act was passed in 1911. Many states implemented criminal background checks or "waiting periods" for handgun (pistol and revolver) purchasers in response to the gun control lobby in the 1980s. See also: Gun laws in the United States (by state).

Fully automatic weapons have been restricted in the United States since the National Firearms Act of 1934. The only automatic firearms available to civilians are those manufactured before May 19, 1986. Private owners must obtain permission from both the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (BATF) and the local county sheriff or local chief of police, pass an extensive background check to include submitting a photograph and finger prints, fully register the firearm, continually update the owner's address and location of the firearm, receive ATF written permission before moving the firearm across state lines, and pay a $200 transfer tax. This process takes approximately 6 months to complete. Additionally, the firearm can never be handled or transported by any other private individual unless the firearm's registered owner is present. Some states require state permission as well, and some states prohibit any sort of possession under any terms. Otherwise, automatic firearms are available to only police or military personnel.

The Clinton administration BATF study of illegal firearms in the black market estimated that as many as 4 million illegal fully automatic firearms had either been illegally smuggled into the USA or illegally constructed within the USA. No new legal full-autos have been manufactured for the civilian population since 1986, causing the economic rules of supply and demand to drive the prices of existing automatic weapons well above the cost of manufacturing and distributing them, making it impractical for most Americans to afford a legal automatic firearm even if they legally qualify for it.

In the U.S., the major federal gun control legislation is the 1968 Gun Control Act, passed shortly after the assassinations of Presidential candidate Robert Kennedy and civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King. This was modeled on the 1930s German gun control law, from a translation given to Senator Dodd of Rhode Island, which had the ideas of dealer licensing and a list of types of prohibited persons the dealers could not sell to, although the United States' list was very different from the German list. The act required that guns carry serial numbers and implemented a tracking system to determine the purchaser of a gun whose make, model, and serial number are known. It also prohibited gun ownership by convicted felons and certain other individuals. The Act was updated in the 1990s, mainly to add a mechanism for the criminal history of gun purchasers to be checked at the point of sale, and in 1996 with the Domestic Violence Offender Gun Ban to prohibit ownership and use of guns by individuals convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence.

Concealed carry, licenses, and open carry

Recent changes in the political landscape have brought about legislative initiatives to make it legal for citizens to carry concealed guns with them for defense. Most states have various requirements for training and licensing for concealed carry. The notable exceptions are Vermont, which has never had any such restrictions in its history, and Alaska. Several other states have liberalized concealed carry regulations, allowing almost all law-abiding adult citizens with appropriate training to obtain carry permits. The trend toward liberalizing concealed carry regulations, however, did not begin in earnest until 1987. In that year, Florida became the first major state to liberalize its concealed carry regulation. Many other states have followed, for a total of 37 states having such laws on the books as of April 2004. Notably, no state that has passed a shall-issue law has yet repealed it legislatively. However, Minnesota's shall-issue law was invalidated by a state appeals court in 2005 on grounds that the law was passed in violation of a provision in the state constitution that prohibited multi-issue legislation. The ruling was on appeal to the Minnesota Supreme Court but became moot in May of that year when a new standalone shall-issue bill, virtually identical to the invalidated legislation, was passed by the legislature and signed into law.

Like Vermont, Alaska has no requirement for a license or permit for any lawful gun owner to carry concealed handguns in public. However, unlike Vermont, Alaska has issued such permits to its residents in the past, and continues to issue new permits. There are three main reasons for this policy. Firstly, several other states honor Alaska's permits, while no state (apart from Vermont and now Alaska) recognizes the concealed carry rights of non-residents without permits even if carrying without a permit is allowed in the person's home state. Secondly, all concealed carry permits in the United States, as long as they require a criminal background check, make their holders exempt from most prosecutions under the much disputed federal Gun Free School Zones Act. Finally, Alaska's permit is one of a small number of state permits that meet the federal criteria to exempt their holders from federal background checks to purchase firearms.

Historically, states have not regulated the open carry of handguns as closely as the concealed carry of handguns; moreover, a state's laws regarding open carry cannot generally be inferred from its laws regarding concealed carry. Only 6 states ban the open carry of handguns: Texas, Florida, Oklahoma, Arkansas, South carolina, and New York. A slim majority of states, for instance Arizona, Virginia, and Washington do not require any license to open carry handguns even though a license is required to conceal carry handguns. The rest of the states, for instance Utah, Indiana, and Georgia, require a license to open carry; their licenses allow both concealed and open carry. OpenCarry.org depicts open carry laws by state on an interactive map linked to a database. And at OpenCarry.org's "Travelers' Map" tab, state laws regarding the unlicensed carry of loaded handguns inside vehicle passenger compartments is also tracked in detail - a bare majority of states (e.g., Florida, Texas, and New Mexico) do not prohibit at least some form of loaded handgun possession inside vehicles without any license).

A license to carry a concealed weapon is not necessarily a license to carry one anywhere. As an example, in Montana, even holders of concealed weapon licenses cannot carry firearms into banks, schools, Federal government buildings, or any establishment that sells alcoholic beverages. Opponents of gun control claim that since many criminals are able to obtain both legal and illegal weapons without a license, laws that entirely ban any type of gun may halt the use of guns only as a means of self-defense while criminals continue to ignore the laws and abuse the guns. However, it has been suggested by many gun control supporters that laws be enacted that allow background checks to be performed on those wishing to sell or purchase a gun. Because this method still allows law-abiding citizens to own and carry a gun, it has been accepted by many as a constitutional and possibly effective method of gun control. This method of gun control has also been widely accepted by citizens who share the belief that people and not guns kill people. Beliefs such as this often call for restrictions to be made on people, rather than the guns themselves.

The status of concealed carry laws in the USA has changed dramatically since 1986, as seen below:

• 1986: 8 shall-issue states, 20 may-issue, 21 no-issue, 1 unrestricted.
• 2006: 35 shall-issue states, 12 may-issue, 2 no-issue, 2 unrestricted. (Alaska falls into both the shall-issue and unrestricted categories.)

Concealed carry laws (state by state)

Unrestricted

No permit required for concealed carry.

• Alaska
• Vermont

Shall issue

Authorities are required to issue permits to all individuals who meet the state's issuance criteria. This category is generally interpreted to include also states where authorities have very limited discretion in permit issuance.

May issue

Authorities have broad discretion as to whether to issue a permit to a given individual. Some of these may-issue states or their local jurisdictions (notably New York City and the City and County of San Francisco) are accused of issuing permits only to the rich, famous, or well connected. Some require rigid documentation of death threats or that the applicant be required in their job to handle large sums of money. Issue policy in others varies with local (county or municipal) jurisdiction; generally with urban jurisdictions being more restrictive than rural ones. Hawaii is no-issue in practice; only one permit has been issued. New Jersey is similarly a de-facto "won't issue" state. Of a population of over 8 million inhabitants, there are only roughly 600 non work related carry permits in circulation any given year. Alabama and Connecticut, while may-issue by law, are effectively shall-issue in practice.

No-issue

Concealed carry is prohibited to the general public.

• Illinois
• Wisconsin
• Washington, D.C.

See also

• Coalition to Stop Gun Violence
• Firearm case law
• Gun (Firearm) laws in the United States (by state)
• Gun politics
• Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership (JPFO)
• Joyce Foundation
• National Rifle Association of America (NRA)
• Pink Pistols
• Second Amendment Foundation (SAF)
• Second Amendment Sisters
• Second Amendment to the United States Constitution
• Carrying concealed weapon

Notes

1. Krug, E.G, K.E. Powell, L.L. Dahlberg (1998). "Firearm-related deaths in the United States and 35 other high- and upper-middle income countries". International Journal of Epidemiology. 7: pp. 214-221. {{cite journal}}: |pages= has extra text (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
2. "The Seventh United Nations Survey on Crime Trends and the Operations of Criminal Justice Systems (1998 - 2000)". United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). Retrieved 2006-11-08.
3. "Gun Ownership as a Risk Factor for Homicide in the Home", Arthur L. Kellermann, 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
4. What Are the Risks and Benefits of Keeping a Gun in the Home?, Gary Kleck, Ph.D., JAMA. 1998;280:473-475, .
6. New England Journal of Medicine -- September 24, 1998 -- Volume 339, Number 13
7. Hemenway, David. Private Guns, Public Health. University of Michigan Press. ISBN.
8. The Federalized Militia Debate in Cornell's Whose Right to Bear Arms Did the Second Amendment Protect
9. Presser v. Illinois 116 U.S. 252 (1886)
10. 381 U.S. 479 (1965)

External links

• Disarming America: A review of above book The Bias Against Guns
• GunCite: Gun Control and Second Amendment Issues
• Guninformation.org: Information about Gun Control and the Second Amendment
• Tim Lambert's posting on Gun Control
• KeepAndBearArms.com

Organizations

• A Human Right
• Amendment II Democrats
• Armed Females of America
• Americans for Gun Safety
• The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence
• Buckeye Firearms Association
• Citizens' Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms
• Ohio CCW Tool
• Congress of Racial Equality
• Gun Owners of America
• High Road
• Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership
• Join Together
• Legal Community Against Violence
• Liberty Belles
• Michigan Gun Owners
• Oregon Firearms Federation
• National Rifle Association of America
• Ohioans For Concealed Carry
• OpenCarry.org
• Packing.org
• Pink Pistols
• Right to Keep and Bear Arms
• The Second Amendment Foundation
• SAFR (Michigan)
• Second Amendment Sisters
• Stonewall Shooting Sports of Utah
• Students for the Second Amendment
• Violence Policy Center
• Women Against Gun Control

• Gun politics
• American society