Joshua Baltazar

Dear future President,

More Americans have died from guns in the United States than on all battlefields of all the wars in American history, so one issue to consider is getting more gun control laws. Over the past 50 years there have been a total of 372 mass shootings in the United States killing 475 people and wounding 1,870 others, according to nytimes.com. “There are 20,000 gun laws in the United States but Brookings Institution Center on Urban and Metropolitan Policy counts only 300 relevant federal and state laws regarding the manufacture, design, sale, purchase, or possession of guns.” We need stronger gun control laws that are actually relevant.

The causes of this issue are that guns are too easy to access, as well as guns falling into the wrong hands. “In 1994 Americans owned around 192 million guns, according to the U.S. Justice Department’s National Institute of Justice. Today that figure is somewhere between 245-328 million guns.” Americans have more guns than police officers. Americans have the right to own guns but they don't need more guns then the police, because that's what the police are there for. There are many dangerous guns, and some American citizens make the argument it's for self defense, but do you really need an assault rifle to defend yourself? Dangerous guns like the assault rifle are used in most shootings to cause more harm than good. It's not just the gun but the person who is behind the gun that uses them to cause shootings.

Not enough gun control laws affects families or innocent people who are killed by guns and the careless people who use them. “With 33,000 Americans dying every year, Democrats believe that we must finally take sensible action to address gun violence. While responsible gun ownership is part of the fabric of many communities, too many families in America have suffered from gun violence.” It tears apart the nation to hear about all the shootings that are happening as well as making people scared of going places where there have been shootings.

Varying perspectives are that guns are used for self defense and to protect their families or themselves, and how the second amendment gives them this right. It is fine to have a handgun with a permit for self defense. But you don’t need an assault rifle to protect yourself. “The primary cause of death to police officers from intentional assaults is guns.” Police officers are doing their job to protect citizens and when citizens have more firepower than necessary it makes police officers jobs harder than it already is and puts their lives even more at risk.

What can be done about this issue is to get better gun control, according to research “Two other measures the new ban on high capacity magazines and prohibition of enabling the easy conversion of lawful guns into assault weapons represents additional moves in the right direction.” A fundamental principle is that civilians should have no more fire power than is demonstrably needed for lawful purposes. A solution is to not ban all guns, American citizens have a right to own guns but not very dangerous types of guns. Another solution is to have background checks to make guns harder to get, especially to people who have criminal records.

In conclusion, not all guns should be banned but dangerous assault rifles that are used most commonly in mass shootings. And we should have stronger background checks. These are key elements to having stronger gun control and making America even safer.