Tilley 1

Tommy Tilley
Mrs.Grimaldi/Miss David
HELA 10
16 February 2016
Is Banning guns the safe choice?
When a law is passed the logical thing to do is to obey the law, yet some people find the
ethical reasoning valid to have rights to own guns however there are people who want to restrict
or even ban guns even if it puts their safety at risk. Gun rights have many more pros than cons,
and if theyre to be banned, innocent people would be in the line of danger. The rationale behind
putting a ban on guns is if the gun were to get into the wrong hands and hurt someone and that
brings in the emotional aspect.
A human right is something that belongs to every person, and one of the oldest rights in
England is the right to bear arms. In 1689, English parliament passed The Bill of Rights Act,
allowing Protestant citizens of England to "have arms for their defense suitable to their
conditions and as allowed by law. This then makes it illegal to infringe that human right (1688).
The United States Constitution and most other state Constitutions
include the right to bear arms as an inalienable right and not one shall overstep the boundaries
to take that away from the people without fair reasoning. For example, being a convicted felon or
being deemed mentally ill can restrict your gun rights. When Congress finally had to step in and
take a closer look into this issue, the concern was that gunswould get into the hands of the wrong
people causing something horrible to take place.

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However, Protection is the key reason to owning a gun. The United States has one of the
highest murder rates in the world with 4 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants (Murder Rates
Nationally). This proves that dangers of everyday life are imminent from outside forces and
without proper training or the fair right to a weapon, an everyday good Samaritan could become
a statistic. The events of terror the public dont hear about are the ones that are prevented. A good
way to prevent murders from happening is the right to bear arms, as exemplified by Switzerland
having a very low murder by firearm rate because the Swiss government requires at least one
gun per household with firearm training and safety courses for all citizens then preventing the
possibility by protection. (BBC).

Controlling guns only affect the

innocent gun users and enthusiasts who have a viable purpose to own one. The ban on guns will
only make the black market for guns grow because if a bad guy has the intentions of doing
something illegal with a firearm, it will not matter how the gun is acquired, whether it is illegal
or not. There is no rationale that if a gun ban is enforced that criminals will just turn in their
firearms. All it will do is make people more vulnerable if they are attacked by a gun.
What sparked the gun debate is the daily murders seen across the country and which are
becoming typical, and Congress feels the need to stop that by restricting the second amendment
and making background checks a necessity when applying for a gun permit. Congress hopes that
this will reduce the number of homicides by reducing the possibility and level of ease that the
firearm could get into the wrong hands. The Sandy Hook massacre in 2013 was caused by a
mentally ill man, Adam Lanza took his mothers legally owned guns and unloaded round after
round in Sandy Hook Elementary. Adam Lanza was deemed mentally ill and this caused an
uproar in gun control.

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In a Harvard study it was proven that stricter gun laws do reduce the annual murder rate.
(Homicide). Between 2007 and 2010 they kept records of homicide rates in areas with strict and
loose gun laws and consistently the area with strict laws on guns had less gun violence overall.
The founders of the United States based the Constitution on rights that the government
cannot take away and it has been like this since 1776. The Right to Bear Arms is what beat Great
Britain in the Revolutionary War to receive this land and that is what protects it from foreign
powers that could otherwise lead the United States to its demise as a country. Its impossible to
predict the future and a gun as protection may be the only way out and get to safety and if
firearms are banned, only the legal owners would be affected, which typically a legal gun owner
has no intentions of any crime and the standards of gun laws may not foresee a sudden change.

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Works Cited
"Bill of Rights [1688]." Bill of Rights [1688]. Web. 17 Feb. 2016.
<http://www.legislation.gov.uk/aep/WillandMarSess2/1/2/introduction>.
"Murder Rates Nationally and By State." Murder Rates Nationally and By State. Web. 17 Feb.
2016. <http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/murder-rates-nationally-and-state>.
"Homicide." Harvard Injury Control Research Center. Web. 17 Feb. 2016.
<http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/hicrc/firearms-research/guns-and-death/>.
BBC News. BBC, 2001. Web. 17 Feb. 2016. <http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/1566715.stm>.