GUN CONTROL

Essay by UCOBASEBALLHigh School, 12th grade April 2004

download word file, 7 pages 5.0 1 reviews

The Second Amendment of the United States Constitution states,

"A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the

right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed"(Witkin). A

question that might be asked upon this would be, does it mean that all people

should have the ability to possess whatever arms they wish?

Since the age of the Civil War weapons that are being produced

have become more deadly. In the late 1700's there really were not any

deadly weapons such as handguns, but they did use muskets, which, were

not very deadly. The crime rate has been rising, which is causing some

issues for the people who use guns often, but do not use them in a

criminal way. Firearms have been a part of the American tradition as

protection and also they have been used for hunting. However, the use of guns

has changed significantly, and that is one of the reasons gun control

is becoming a very large issue.

People cannot decide whether or not

certain laws should be passed regarding guns or not (Kellermann).

Some people believe that it should be absolute, and any and all

arms should be legal. Some pro-gunners draw what seem to be obvious

limitations. For instance, the owning of a nuclear weapon or other

weapon of mass destruction should be illegal. Some of the people go as

far as even declaring that heavy military equipment such as tanks and

bazookas should be illegal. Then some people are to believe that

reasonable controls on items such as automatic machine guns are all

right. Therefore, from all of this you can see that there is obviously

much disagreement about the limitations of the Second Amendment. There

are moral and legal arguments on the issue...