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'''Gun control''' is the regulation by governments of [[gun]] ownership and the right to carry, conceal, or use [[firearm]]s. Such measures can range from a total prohibition on civilian ownership and possession of firearms and ammunition to specific restrictions on certain firearm features, "waiting periods" for gun purchases, licensing of gun owners, registration of firearms, etc. Increased "gun control" is generally promoted by pacifists and [[liberals]] as a remedy to [[crime]]. In fact, whether or not guns are officially controlled by the government, criminals will commit crimes, and a black market will exist to provide them with firearms. For instance, despite the prohibition of handgun ownership in the [[United Kingdom]], an island nation without any neighboring "gun culture" nations, handgun crime has been steadily increasing there for many years. As of 2005/06, the total deaths by shooting in the UK had increased to 50.<ref>http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs07/hosb0207.pdf</ref>. Comparably, the United States suffered 11,350 gun deaths in 2005.<ref>http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/05cius/data/table_01.html</ref>However, it should be noted that the USA has a population approximately 5 times greater than the UK, <ref>http://www.factmonster.com/ipka/A0004997.html</ref> and the number of murders by shooting is approximately 200 times higher.
'''Gun control''' is the regulation by governments of [[gun]] ownership and the right to carry, conceal, or use [[firearm]]s.
Such measures can range from a total prohibition on civilian ownership and possession of firearms and ammunition to specific restrictions on certain firearm features, "waiting periods" for gun purchases, licensing of gun owners, registration of firearms, etc. Increased "gun control" is generally promoted by pacifists and [[liberals]] as a remedy to [[crime]]. In fact, whether or not guns are officially controlled by the government, criminals will commit crimes, and a black market will exist to provide them with firearms. For instance, despite the prohibition of handgun ownership in the [[United Kingdom]], an island nation without any neighboring "gun culture" nations, handgun crime has been steadily increasing there for many years. As of 2005/06, the total deaths by shooting in the UK had increased to 50.<ref>http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs07/hosb0207.pdf</ref>. Comparably, the United States suffered 11,350 gun deaths in 2005.<ref>http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/05cius/data/table_01.html</ref>However, it should be noted that the USA has a population approximately 5 times greater than the UK, <ref>http://www.factmonster.com/ipka/A0004997.html</ref> and the number of murders by shooting is approximately 200 times higher.
Gun control laws have been enacted at the federal, state, and local level with the intent of placing restrictions on the right of individual private citizens to own [[firearms]].
Gun control laws have been enacted at the federal, state, and local level with the intent of placing restrictions on the right of individual private citizens to own [[firearms]].
Most constitutional scholars agree that since the amendment refers to "the right of the People" instead of the right of the militia, it protects an individual right to own guns. The extent of that right has been debated.
Most constitutional scholars agree that since the amendment refers to "the right of the People" instead of the right of the militia, it protects an individual right to own guns. The extent of that right has been debated.
==Racism of gun control==
In the [[United States of America]], gun control has a strong racist origin and reasoning. Before the Civil War ended, State "Slave Codes" prohibited slaves from owning guns. After President [[Abraham Lincoln]] issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, and after the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution abolishing slavery was adopted and the Civil War ended in 1865, States persisted in prohibiting blacks, now freemen, from owning guns under laws renamed "Black Codes." They did so on the basis that blacks were not citizens, and thus did not have the same rights, including the right to keep and bear arms protected in the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, as whites. This view was specifically articulated by the [[U.S. Supreme Court]] in its infamous 1857 decision in ''Dred Scott v. Sandford'' to uphold slavery.
The United States Congress overrode most portions of the Black Codes by passing the Civil Rights Act of 1866. The legislative histories of both the Civil Rights Act and the Fourteenth Amendment, as well as The Special Report of the Anti-Slavery Conference of 1867, are replete with denunciations of those particular statutes that denied blacks equal access to firearms. [Kates, "Handgun Prohibition and the Original Meaning of the Second Amendment," 82 Mich. L. Rev. 204, 256 (1983)] However, facially neutral disarming through economic means laws remain in effect.
After the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1878, most States turned to "facially neutral" business or transaction taxes on handgun purchases. However, the intention of these laws was not neutral. An article in Virginia's official university law review called for a "prohibitive tax...on the privilege" of selling handguns as a way of disarming "the son of Ham," whose "cowardly practice of 'toting' guns has been one of the most fruitful sources of crime.... Let a negro board a railroad train with a quart of mean whiskey and a pistol in his grip and the chances are that there will be a murder, or at least a row, before he alights." [Comment, Carrying Concealed Weapons, 15 Va L. Reg. 391, 391-92 (1909); George Mason University Civil Rights Law Journal (GMU CR LJ), Vol. 2, No. 1, "Gun Control and Racism," Stefan Tahmassebi, 1991, p. 75] Thus, many Southern States imposed high taxes or banned inexpensive guns so as to price blacks and poor whites out of the gun market.
Today, "gun control" laws continue to be enacted so as to have a racist effect if not intent:
* Police-issued license and permit laws, unless drafted to require issuance to those not prohibited by law from owning guns, are routinely used to prevent lawful gun ownership among "unpopular" populations.
* Public housing residents, approximately 3 million Americans, are singled out for gun bans.
* "Gun sweeps" by police in "high crime neighborhoods" whereby vehicles and "pedestrians who meet a specific profile that might indicate they are carrying a weapon" are searched are becoming popular, and are being studied by the U.S. Department of Justice as "Operation Ceasefire."
* Some U.S. cities with high minority populations, such as Washington, D.C., are singled out for gun bans.
* "Project Exile" began in the U.S. city of Richmond, Virginia and mandated that people arrested for technical firearms violations (note: not for violent crimes committed with a firearm, but for technical violations of the law) be tried in federal court where they would be subject to lengthy mandatory minimum sentences rather than in state court under the more lenient Virginia laws. As with many other restrictions this was aimed primarily at the city's Black residents. It has since been copied in many other cities.
==Other terms==
Other terms sometimes used by those who are opposed to gun control include:
* Rights restriction
* Victim disarmament
==External Links==
==External Links==