Gun Control Explained

Part 1

Gun control what is it?

“Gun control” is a broad term that covers any sort of restriction on what kinds of firearms can be sold and bought, who can possess or sell them, where and how they can be stored or carried, what duties a seller has to vet a buyer, and what obligations both the buyer and the seller have to report transactions to the government.

                                  

Sometimes, the term is also used to cover related matters, like limits on types of ammunition and magazines, or technology, like the type that allows guns to fire only when gripped by their owners.

In recent years, gun control debates have focused primarily on background checks for buyers, allowing people to carry weapons in public, and whether to allow the possession of assault rifles.

What is the state of gun control today?

Federal law prohibits certain people from owning firearms: those with certain kinds of criminal records or mental illness; drug addicts; immigrants without legal status; veterans who left the military with a dishonourable discharge; anyone with a permanent restraining order keeping them from a partner or a partner’s children. And there are others barred as well; a full list of the prohibitions can be found here.

Federal law requires that licensed gun dealers conduct a background check, through a database run by the F.B.I., to see if the customer is among those prohibited from owning a gun.

But the system has major holes in it, among them incomplete listings of criminal cases. Perhaps the biggest hole is that small-scale sellers, including many who do business at gun shows, are not required to do background checks – the so-called gun show loophole.

The law’s provision on the mentally ill is extremely porous, too. It prohibits gun possession by a person “adjudicated as a mental defective” by a court or other authority. Most people with serious mental illness never receive such adjudication, and those who do can petition courts to have it reversed. Many mass shootings have been carried out by people who were recognized by those around them as being deeply disturbed, yet were able to own guns legally.

From 1994 to 2004, federal law also banned the sale of many types of assault rifles and high-capacity magazines, but the law expired and has not been renewed. A few states have assault weapon bans of their own that remain in place.

In fact, most gun controls exist at the state level, with New York, California, New Jersey, Maryland, Hawaii, Rhode Island, Illinois and Massachusetts being the most restrictive.

Some states have more stringent background check systems than the federal one, for example, and some require checks before private sales like those at gun shows. Some states require a license or permit to own a gun, but most do not.

Laws on carrying weapons vary enormously. Most states allow anyone who legally owns a gun to carry it openly, in public, without requiring a license or permit. A few states also have no permit requirement to carry a concealed gun. Concealed carry requires a permit in most states, but the majority of those states grant the permits automatically to any legal gun owners who want them. States also vary in their rules on gun possession in specific settings, like campuses and houses of worship.

For example, in Rhode Island, any person with a concealed carry permit can bring a gun onto the grounds of a public school, but next door in Massachusetts, written permission from school officials is required – and rarely given.

What do law enforcement authorities say about gun control?

There is no consensus. In fact, law enforcement officials have the same kinds of cultural and regional divides as everyone else.

In general, big-city police chiefs are more likely to support gun control, and small-town chiefs and sheriffs are more likely to oppose it. Those in the Northeast are more likely than those in the South and West to favour it.

The Major Cities Chiefs Association endorses closing the gun show loophole, strengthening the background check system, reinstating the assault weapons ban and other measures. The Major County Sheriffs’ Association disagrees on assault weapons but agrees on strengthening background checks.

The National Sheriffs Association, which includes more sparsely populated areas, has stated that it “does not support any laws that deprive any citizen of the rights provided” by the Second Amendment. And some rural sheriffs have simply refused to enforce new controls.

Where does the American public stand?

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Over the past 25 years, Americans’ support for stricter gun control laws has been generally declining even as the number of mass shootings is on the rise. While some high-profile shootings have resulted in calls for increased restrictions, that support has proved fleeting thus far. Gun control is one of the most sharply divisive issues in the U.S. today.
This chart, compiled by the Roper Center, provides a summary of public opinion on the issue since 1989. The most recent reading was taken in mid-September by Quinnipiac University, and found Americans were evenly divided. Several polls in the last several months have shown a similar divide with majorities of Democrats and those without a gun in their households favoring more restrictions on guns and majorities of Republicans and gun owners voicing opposition. 
The results, however, also depend in part on how you ask the question. Surveys that ask broadly whether people favor stricter gun laws show the public roughly evenly divided but when surveys ask people about specific gun restrictions, the picture becomes much more pro-control.
Overwhelming majorities support universal background checks, and steps to keep guns out of the hands of mentally ill people. Those changes have vast support among Republicans and Democrats, and gun owners and non-owners alike. (In 2013, The New York Times profiled several people from across the country who had intimate experiences with firearms, including gun enthusiasts who fell on both sides of the gun control debate.) Majorities also favor the creation of a federal database to track all gun sales, and an assault weapons ban, though answers to those questions show more of a partisan divide.