Gun Violence in the United States

Background Information Gun violence is associated with a high rate of fatalities in the United States; it is an intensely debated political issue in the United States. Gun-related violence is most common in poor urban areas and frequently associated with gang violence, often involving male juveniles or young adult males. High-profile mass shootings have fueled debate over gun policies. In 2010 there were 358 deaths involving rifles. Deaths involving the use of pistols in the US that same year totaled 6,009 including suicides. High-profile assassinations such as those of John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, and the Beltway sniper attacks involved the use of rifles, usually with telescopic sights, from concealed locations.

Background Information Hand guns figured in the murders of George Moscone, Harvey Milk, John Lennon, the Virginia Tech shootings, the Binghamton massacre, the Fort Hood massacre, the Oikos University shooting, and the 2011 Tucson shooting. Heavily armed assailants with multiple semi-automatic weapons committed the Aurora theater shooting, the Columbine High School massacre, and the Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting. In all but one of these cases, the assailants were male, less than 40 years of age (in one case the assailant was 41 years old), and often described as socially maladjusted or mentally ill.

Background Information In 2009, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, 66.9% of all homicides in the United States were perpetrated using a firearm. There were 52,447 deliberate and 23,237 accidental non- fatal gunshot injuries in the United States during Just over half of all gun-related deaths in the United States are suicides, with 17,352 (55.6%) of the total 31,224 firearm- related deaths in 2007 suicide deaths, and 12,632 (40.5%) homicide deaths. Some suicides are committed after the perpetrator has committed one or more murders. Policies at the federal, state, and local levels have attempted to address gun violence through a variety of methods, including restricting firearms purchases by youths and other "at-risk" populations, setting waiting periods for firearm purchases, establishing gun "buy-back" programs, law enforcement and policing strategies, stiff sentencing of gun law violators, education programs for parents and children, and community-outreach programs.

Background Information Research has found some policies, such as gun "buy-back" programs and assault-style weapons bans are particularly ineffective, while Boston's Operation Ceasefire, a gang violence intervention strategy, has been effective in reducing gun violence. Gun policies are influenced by interpretations since the late twentieth century of the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution, which guaranteed citizens the right to own and carry firearms for protection, as protecting individual gun ownership. In 2008 the U.S. Supreme Court took a position for the first time in District of Columbia v. Heller, holding that the second amendment secured an individual's right to own firearms.

Some research has shown an association between household firearm ownership and gun suicide rates. During the 1980s and early 1990s, there was a strong upward trend in adolescent suicides with guns as well as a sharp overall increase in suicides among those age 75 and over. In the United States, firearms remain the most common method of suicide, accounting for 50.7% of all suicides committed in 2006.

Even Our Leaders Aren’t Safe… At least eleven assassination attempts with firearms have been made on U.S. presidents (over one-fifth of all presidents); four were successful, three with handguns and one with a rifle. Abraham Lincoln survived an earlier attack, but was killed by a.44-caliber pistol round fired by John Wilkes Booth. James A. Garfield was killed by Charles J. Guiteau using a.44-caliber pistol September 19, William McKinley was killed by two rounds fired from a.32-caliber revolver September 14, John F. Kennedy was assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald with a bolt- action rifle November 22, Andrew Jackson, Harry S. Truman, and Gerald Ford (two attempts) survived assassination attempts unharmed. Ronald Reagan survived after being shot by John Hinckley, Jr. with a.22-caliber revolver. Former president Theodore Roosevelt was shot and wounded during the 1912 presidential campaign. On February 15, 1933, Giuseppe Zangara attempted to assassinate president-elect Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who was giving a speech in Miami, Florida. Response to these events has resulted in federal legislation to regulate the public possession of firearms. For example, the Kennedy assassination (along with others) resulted in the Gun Control Act of The GCA is a federal law signed by President Lyndon Johnson that broadly regulates the firearms industry and firearms owners.