Gun control

Macro-historical Evidence:
From the Middle Ages to the 20th Century The Middle Ages were a time of notoriously brutal and endemic warfare. They also experienced rates of ordinary murder almost double the highest recorded U.S. murder rate. But Middle Age homicide "cannot be explained in terms of the availability of firearms, which had not yet been invented. The invention provides some test of the mantra. If it is true that more guns equal more murder and fewer guns equal less death, murder should have risen with the invention, increased efficiency, and greater availability of firearms across the population. Yet, using England as an example, murder rates seem to have fallen sharply as guns became progressively more efficient and widely owned during the five centuries after the invention of firearms. During much of this period, because the entire adult male population of England was deemed to constitute a militia, every military age male was required to possess arms for use in militia training and service

Thus over the immediate post-Civil War years "the country was awash with military pistols" and rifles of the most modern design. The final three decades of the century saw the
introduction and marketing of the "two dollar pistol," which were very cheap handguns manufactured largely out of pot metal. In addition to being sold locally, such "suicide spe-
cials" were marketed nationwide through Montgomery Ward catalogs starting in 1872 and by Sears from 1886. They were priced as low as $1.69, and were marketed under names like the "Little Giant" and the "Tramp's Terror."Thus, the period between 1866 and 1900 saw a vast diffusion of commercial and military surplus revolvers and lever
action rifles throughout the American populace. Yet, far from rising, homicide seems to have fallen off sharply during these thirty years.

A. Demographic Patterns

Contrary to what should be the case if more guns equal more death, there are no "consistent indications of a link between gun ownership and criminal or violent behavior by owners;" infact, gun ownership is "higher among whites than among blacks, higher among middle-aged people than among young people, higher among married than among unmarried people, higher among richer people than poor"-all "patterns that are
the reverse of the way in which criminal behavior is distributed.These conclusions are reinforced by focusing on patterns of African-American homicide. Per capita, African-American murder rates are much higher than the murder rate for whites. If more guns equal more death, and fewer guns equal less, one might assume gun ownership is higher among African Americans than among whites, but in fact African American gun ownership is markedly lower than white gun ownership.

Contrary to what should be the case if more guns equal more death, there are no "consistent indications of a link between gun ownership and criminal or violent behavior by owners;" infact, gun ownership is "higher among whites than among blacks, higher among middle-aged people than among young people, higher among married than among unmarried people, higher among richer people than poor"-all "patterns that are the reverse of the way in which criminal behavior is distributed.These conclusions are reinforced by focusing on patterns of African-American homicide. Per capita, African-American murder rates are much higher than the murder rate for whites. If more guns equal more death, and fewer guns equal less, one might assume gun ownership is higher among African Americans than among whites, but in fact African American gun ownership is markedly lower than white gun ownership.

Particularly corrosive to the mantra are the facts as to rural African-Americans gun ownership. Per capita, rural African Americans are much more likely to own firearms than are urban African-Americans. Yet, despite their greater access to guns, the firearm murder rate of young rural black males is a small fraction of the firearm murder rate of young urban black males. These facts are only anomalous in relation to the mantra that more guns equal more death and fewer guns equal less death. In contrast, these facts accord with the earlier point regarding the aberrance of murderers. Whatever their race, ordinary people simply do not murder. Thus preventing law-abiding, responsible African-Americans from owning guns does nothing at all to reduce murderers, because they are not the ones who are doing the killing. The murderers are a small minority of extreme antisocial aberrants who manage to obtain guns whatever the level of gun ownership in the African American community. Indeed, murderers generally fall into a group some criminologists have called "violent predators," sharply differentiating them not only from the overall population but from other criminals as well. Surveys of imprisoned felons indicate that when not imprisoned the ordinary felon averages perhaps 12 crimes per year. In contrast, "violent predators" spend much or most of their time committing crimes, averaging at least 5 assaults, 63 robberies, and 172 burglaries annually. A National Institute of Justice survey of 2,000 felons in 10 state prisons, which focused on gun crime, said of these types of respondents