What Has Congress Done About Gun Control
Recent mass shootings at three spas in Atlanta, Georgia and a supermarket in Boulder, Colorado accept renewed calls for new gun legislation.
The U.S. has been here earlier – after shootings in Tucson, Aurora, Newtown, Charleston, Roseburg, San Bernardino, Orlando, Las Vegas, Parkland, El Paso and other communities across the United States.
Congress has declined to pass significant new gun legislation subsequently dozens of shootings, including shootings that occurred during periods similar this one, with Democrats controlling the Firm of Representatives, Senate and presidency.
This response may seem puzzling given that national opinion polls reveal extensive support for several gun control policies, including expanding background checks and banning assault weapons.
But polls do not determine policy. Stricter gun laws are more pop among Democrats than Republicans, and major new legislation would probable need votes from at least 10 Republican senators. Many of these senators represent constituencies opposed to gun control. Despite national polls showing majority support for an set on weapons ban, not one of the 30 states with a Republican-controlled legislature has such a policy. The absence of strict control policies in Republican-controlled states shows that senators crossing political party lines to back up gun command would be out of pace with the views of voters whose support they need to win elections.
But, a lack of action from Congress doesn't hateful gun laws are brackish later mass shootings.
I am a professor of strategy at UCLA and have researched gun policy. With my co-authors at Harvard University, I've studied how gun laws change following mass shootings.
Our inquiry on this topic finds at that place is legislative action post-obit these tragedies, but at the state level.
Restrictions loosened
To examine how policy changes, we assembled data on shootings and gun legislation in the 50 states between 1990 and 2014. Overall, we identified more than xx,000 firearm bills and well-nigh 3,200 enacted laws. Some of these loosened gun restrictions; others tightened them; and still others did neither or both – that is, tightened in some dimensions but loosened in others.
We then compared gun laws before and afterwards mass shootings in states where mass shootings occurred, relative to all other states.
Contrary to the view that nothing changes, state legislatures consider xv% more firearm bills the year after a mass shooting. Deadlier shootings – which receive more media attention – have larger effects.
In fact, mass shootings have a greater influence on lawmakers than other homicides even though they account for less than 1% of gun deaths in the United States.
Every bit impressive every bit this 15% increment in gun bills may sound, gun legislation tin reduce gun violence only if information technology becomes law. And when it comes to enacting these bills into law, our research institute that mass shootings do not regularly cause lawmakers to tighten gun restrictions.
In fact, nosotros found the contrary; Republican land legislatures pass significantly more gun laws that loosen restrictions on firearms after mass shootings.
That's not to say Democrats never tighten gun laws – there are prominent examples of Democratic-controlled states passing new legislation following mass shootings.
California, for case, enacted several new gun laws following a 2015 mass shooting in San Bernardino. Our enquiry shows, however, that Democrats don't tighten gun laws more than usual post-obit mass shootings.
Credo governs response
The contrasting response from Democrats and Republicans is indicative of different philosophies regarding the causes of gun violence and the best ways to reduce deaths.
While Democrats tend to view environmental factors every bit contributing to violence, Republicans are more probable to blame the private shooters. Politicians favoring looser restrictions on guns following mass shootings oft argue that more than people carrying guns would allow law-abiding citizens to stop perpetrators.
In fact, gun sales often surge afterward mass shootings, in part because people fear being victimized.
Democrats, in contrast, typically focus more than on trying to solve policy and societal bug that contribute to gun violence.
For both sides, mass shootings are an opportunity to propose bills consistent with their ideology.
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Since we wrote our written report of gun legislation following mass shootings, which covered the period through 2014, several additional tragedies have energized the gun control move that emerged following the December 2012 shooting at Sandy Hook Simple School in Connecticut. Pupil activism following the 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High Schoolhouse in Parkland, Florida, did non result in congressional action merely led several states to pass new gun command laws.
With more funding and better system, this new motility is better positioned than prior gun command movements to abet for stricter gun policies following mass shootings. Only with states historically more agile than Congress on the issue of guns, both advocates and opponents of new restrictions should look beyond Washington, D.C., for action on gun policy.
What Has Congress Done About Gun Control,
Source: https://theconversation.com/gun-control-fails-quickly-in-congress-after-each-mass-shooting-but-states-often-act-including-to-loosen-gun-laws-157746
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