Guns For Self Defense: The Armed Citizen

One of the principal focal points of the gun control debate relates to the ownership and use of guns for self-protection, particularly in urban areas, There are good reasons for this. The guns that are owned for self-defense in cities are mainly handguns. At the same time, the handgun is the criminal's primary firearm, and handguns have become the pivotal issue in the current debate about gun control. Prior to the National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence of 1968, no proposals for a policy of national handgun scarcity had been made since the I930s. In the years after the commission's report, focus of the handgun debate has shifted almost entirely too restrictive licens-ing, handgun "bans " and other strategies to prohibit law-abiding citizens from acquiring handguns except under special circumstances. The commission's rejection of middle-of-the-road proposals of the sort endorsed by earlier national commissions sharpened the debate at the same time that it intensified opposition to handgun control among anti-control groups. This opposition is understandable when the most common reason for owning a handgun is for household self-defense against home-invading robbers or burglars. Some years ago, a national sample of people with some shooting experience was asked what were good reasons for owning guns. Seven-one percent of the shooters mentioned self-defense as a good reason for owning a handgun--far more than gave one other good reason. Only 16 percent gave hunting as a good reason for owning a handgun. The responses showing the "good reasons " given for owning differen