See Zimring, F.E., “Is Gun Control Likely to Reduce Violent Killings?” University of Chicago Law Review 35 (1968):721–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

See Zimring, R.E. Hawlins, G., Crime Is Not The Problem: Lethal Violence in America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997). “Putting social stigma on the instruments of lethal violence [irrespective who uses them, is key because] The rhetorical high ground in violence prevention may leave little room for distinguishing between types of violence” p.208. By “distinguishing between types of violence,” Zimring means the currently-made distinction between unlawful offensive violence and lawful defensive violence.Google Scholar

See Zimring, F.E. Hawkins, G. G., The Citizen’s Guide to Gun Control (New York: Macmillan Press, 1989): 205.Google Scholar

Urging “thoughtful consideration” of gun policy changes may be as oxymoronic politically as commending “thoughtful consideration” of changes in abortion policy.Google Scholar

A “back of the envelope,” county-based calculation indicates that, in the 2000 Presidential Election, counties going for Al Gore had a homicide rate of 13.2, while counties going for Bush had a homicide rate of 1.2. Our current fascination with red v. blue states and or counties underwrites effective political strategy but is potentially very harmful to the country as a whole.Google Scholar

In Crime Is Not The Problem, he additionally supports it by noting that the homicide rates in the G7 countries are markedly lower than that in the United States despite their having assault rates similar to the United States’. See especially Chapter 7, 106–110.Google Scholar

See Kates, D.B. Schaffer, H.E. Lattimer, J.K. Murray, G.B. Cassem, E.H., “Guns and Public Health: Epidemic of Violence or Pandemic of Propaganda?” Tennessee Law Review 62 (1995): 513–596 at 563. The problem of differential suicide-attempt rates remains. Since many developed countries have suicide rates higher than the United States’, it would seem that their attempt-rates must be higher too, since every suicide presupposes a (successful) attempt. The number of failed attempts is largely unknowable, for a host of obvious reasons.Google Scholar

The graph of the nation’s homicide rate is available at the Bureau of Justice Statistics Website. It should be noted that at the beginning of the 20th Century, several states known or suspected of having comparatively high homicide rates did not report their homicide data to the federal government. This suggests that the nation’s homicide rate must have been higher than the reported national estimate during those years. Professor Kleck has pointed out to me in a personal communication that “The data for 1903–1932 are not actually national data, but rather merely cover the changing subsets of the U.S. that were included in the ‘Death Registration Area’ (DRA), which consisted of those states that have achieved relatively complete coverage of deaths in their vital statistics systems. Most the apparently enormous increase in homicide rates from 1903–1920, and part of the 1921–1933 increase, is a statistical mirage, attributable to new, mostly high homicide, states being added to the DRA. Only a minority of the U.S. was covered by the 1903 DRA, predominantly low-homicide Northeast states, while all of it was covered by 1933. Unfortunately, there was a systematic pattern to which states got added to the DRA latest — generally the states that were the last to get their statistical systems up to speed and join the DRA also tended to be the homicide states, mostly from the South and Southwest. E.g., the very last state to join was Texas, a huge contributor to the national homicide rate both because of its high rate and its large population. In reality, the increase in the U.S. homicide rate was much milder than your chart indicates, up until Prohibition went into effect in 1920, at which point homicide really did jump up, though not as much as the DRA-based data seems to indicate.”.Google Scholar

See Brearley, , cited in Kleck, G., Point Blank Guns and Violence in America (New York: Aldine deGruyter,1991): 20.Google Scholar

FBI data cited in Kleck, supra note 9:20.Google Scholar

Firearms and Crime Statistics, at <http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/guns.htm> (last checked February 29, 2004).+(last+checked+February+29,+2004).>Google Scholar

Supra note 2:199–202.Google Scholar

For a further, critical discussion of the comparative merits of perpetrator theories and instrumentality theories, see Palsy, D.D. Kats, D.B., “American Homicide Exceptionalism” University of Colorado Law Review 69, no. 4 (1998): 969–1008.Google Scholar

See Kleck, G., Targeting Guns: Firearms and their Control (New York: Aldine de Gruyter,1997): 227–230.Google Scholar

Zimring, F.E., “Firearms, Violence and Public Policy,” Scientific American 265 (1991): 48–58, at 49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

See Wilson, H. Sherman, R, “Civilian Penetrating Wounds of the Abdomen,” Annals of Surgery 153, no. 5 (1961): 639–649.Google Scholar

See Wilson, J.Q. Herrnstein, R.J., Crime and Human Nature: The Definitive Study of the Causes of Crime (New York: Simon & Schuster,1985), especially chapter 2.Google Scholar

Supra note 13, esp. 992–999.Google Scholar

See Athens, L.H., The Creation of Dangerous Violent Criminals (Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1992). Also See Rhodes, R., Why They Kill: The Discoveries of a Maverick Criminologist.(New York: Knopf Publishers, 1999).Google Scholar

See, esp. Supra note 2: 75ff.Google Scholar

Figure 5. Homicide Victimization by Race 1976–2000.Google Scholar

By federal law, every firearm produced by American gun manufacturers must bear a serial number. Each firearm imported must also bear a serial number. Domestic production totals, imports and exports must be reported annually to the Bureau of Alcohol, Firearms and Tobacco. The trade publication Shooting Industry also publishes annually, based on BATF-provided data, the number of firearms produced over a running 20 year period. These data include BATF totals by handgun type (revolvers and pistols) and by caliber. They enable an objective basis for evaluating market trends and for estimating and updating the number of civilian-owned guns. Using BATF figures to establish a 1945 baseline, Gary Kleck has developed a production-based model that cumulates annual domestic production, adds imports and subtracts exports. From 1945–1994, the American civilian gun total rose from an estimated 46,909,183 guns to an estimated 235,604,001 guns, an increase of 502.25%. Over that period, the number of privately-owned handguns increased from an estimated 12,657,618 to an estimated 84,665,690, a gain of 668.9%. From 1945–1994, Americans bought handguns at a higher rate than they bought long guns. The whole-period handgun growth rate was 151% of the whole period long gun growth rate (a total handgun increase of 668.9% vs. a total long gun increase of 440.7%).Between 1993–1999 the industry produced approximately 28.6 million firearms, including 12.5 million handguns. Allowing for imports and subtracting for exports, we may reasonably estimate that the current gun total approximates the size of the U.S. population, including approximately 95–100 million handguns. Figured on a per capita basis, American civilians probably own guns at a rate between 969 and 1016 per 1,000 adults, including a rate between 365 and 388 handguns per 1000 adults.Google Scholar

See Lott, J.R., More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun Control Laws (2d Edition) (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000).Google Scholar

See supra note 14, ch.5 for a comprehensive review.Google Scholar

See Lafollette, H., “Gun Control, “Ethics 266 (2000): 110 for an otherwise sophisticated discussion that ignores the ethical implications of the “public service” doctrine of State immunity.Google Scholar

See Wheeler, S., “Self-Defense and Coerced Risk-Acceptance,” Public Affairs Quarterly 11 (1997): 431.Google Scholar

Machiavelli, N., The Prince (New York: Penguin Books, 1981): 88.Google Scholar

See Wheeler, S., “Arms as Insurance,” Public Affairs Quarterly 13 (1999): 111.Google Scholar