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Gun Control Research Paper

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The tradition of guns Goes way back before the United States was ever discovered. Historians believe firepower originated in about A.D. 300 in ancient China (Mackey 9). Chinese inventors wrote about the discovery of a powder that exploded when exposed to flame (9). Eventually others caught on to the new substance called “gun powder” and it was soon to be all over the world. Recipes for making the powder eventually migrated to Europe during trading expeditions (9). This led to new ideas and on how the substance could be used. In the mid – 1200’s Europeans experimented with new ways to use the explosive powder, and by the 1340’s the cannon had become a potent weapon (9). Cannons had become standard wartime weapons in the middle ages, but their size and weight limited their usefulness (10). There …show more content…

The amendments in the U.S reduced a direct control of individuals’ gun control rights by bringing the ideology of self-defense as a constitutional right. In 1926 American Bar Association commission, with NRA support, adapts model state legislation regulating the concealed carry and sale of handguns (Mantel). Then in 1934 came the National Firearm act. First federal gun control law levies a $200 tax on the manufacture or sale of machine guns and sawed of shotguns (Mantel). In 1968 President John F. Kennedy is assassinated and the age to purchase guns from a federally licensed dealer is raised to 21 and expands dealer-licensing requirements (Mantel). In 1993 President Bill Clinton signs Brady Handgun Violence act requiring licensed gun dealers to conduct backround checks of buyers; unlicensed private sellers exempt (Mantel). Many gun ownership rights were reversed and the activist in favor of and against the gun control laws started mobilizing campaigns. Due to the incidence of many school shootings in the last 15 years, gun control has been taken to be a serious legislative issue than

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