Strict Gun Control Laws

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Not Needed: Strict Gun Control Laws Many people today think we need to have stricter laws about gun control, and although many crimes are committed in the United States every day, they are committed by using various instruments to carry out these wrongdoings. One such weapon is the firearm, and laws have been enacted to reduce the sale of such weapons to the scofflaws, and protect the law-abiding citizen for some time. Some people believe the laws in effect now don’t do enough to keep the guns out of criminal’s hands. The problem is these people don’t follow the law, so they go behind the scenes to purchase these weapons, and then use them against the law-abiding citizens these laws were passed to protect. The gun control laws in this country…show more content…
“Proponents of firearm restrictions have advocated policy changes on specific types of firearms or components that appear to be useful primarily for criminal purposes or that pose unusual risks to the public. Fully automatic firearms (i. e., machine guns) and short-barreled rifles and shotguns have been subject to strict regulation since 1934. Fully automatic firearms have been banned from private possession since 1986, except for those legally owned and registered with the Secretary of the Treasury on May 19, 1986. More recently, "Saturday night specials" (loosely defined as inexpensive, small handguns), "assault weapons," ammunition feeding devices with capacities for more than seven rounds, and certain ammunition have been the focus of control efforts.” (Krause, 2002, para.…show more content…
According to Callie Marie Rennison, some of this research was done by the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) conducted by the Bureau of the Census and published by the Bureau of Justice Statistics. The NCVS database provides some information on the weapons used by offenders, based on victims' reports. Based on data provided by survey respondents in calendar year 1999, BJS estimated that, nationwide, there were 6.3 million violent crimes (rape or sexual assault, robbery, aggravated assault, and simple assault). Weapons were used in about 1.6 million of these criminal incidents. Firearms were used by offenders in about 533,000 of these incidents, or roughly 8%. (Krause, 2002, para. 16) There are a lot of thoughts on gun control. Enacting stiffer laws does nothing to protect the average citizen from the criminals who will get these weapons, and most violent crime does not even involve a
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