Universal Background Checks Against Gun Control Research

Violence and crimes are growing in number and affecting American society. By reinforcing background checks we could reduce crimes and limit easy gun access to mentally ill people. The National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) is a database where the names of people that have committed a misdemeanor, are mentally ill or drug abusers is kept to prevent them from attaining guns. Most criminals buy guns from unlicensed sellers at gun shows that don’t do properly background checks through the NICS, making it easier from criminals to purchase firearms. Another problem is missing records or information that was not reported to the background check system. Better background checks could reduce crime and gun violence in America.

Therefore, this caused Dylan Roof to buy a gun which he used to kill nine people at a historically black church in South Carolina. In addition, Roof had previously faced drug charges which should refuse his attempt to gun purchase. However, the information was unavailable at the background check system (2015, para. 1). Ressler (2015, para. 4) also states that the current three days’ standard background check time is not enough to process a cross check information between federal databases and states. Furthermore, the author Ferris (2014, para. 3) indicates in his article “Gun Purchase Background Checks: Casting a Wide Net with Many Holes” that NICS has not the complete records, and states have not incentive to report records of people who have prior criminal records and should not own guns. In addition, according to the research in 2012, there is a big part of mental health records from the last two decades can not be found in the NICS. Therefore, the system loophole results in people with criminal records escape the background checks and have access to guns is a significant cause of gun violence (2014, para. 14).

Viettes,Vernick, and Webter include in their journal that, “ Despite the magnitude of the problem, US gun policy rarely considers appropriate criteria for disqualifying someone from lawfully possessing a firearm,” concluding that there are laws for potential gun owners, but they are what they state as least stringent. They also stated that nearly three of ten gun offenders (73 of 253 or 28.9%) were legal gun possessors but would have been prohibited from purchasing or possessing firearms when committing their most recent offense if their states had stricter prohibitions. Offenders who were already prohibited under current law acquired their gun from a licensed dealer, where a background check is required, five times less often than offenders who were not prohibited. Their conclusion from their results states that “Stricter gun ownership laws would have made firearm possession illegal for many state prison inmates who used a gun to commit a crime. Requiring all gun sales to be subject to a background check would make it more difficult for these offenders to obtain guns.” Laws that are current now for gun laws are Federal law disqualifies certain groups of high-risk individuals from owning guns, including felons, fugitives, unlawful users of or those addicted to controlled substances, those who have been ‘adjudicated as a mental defective’ or committed to a mental institution, individuals who have been dishonourably discharged from the armed forces, persons subject to certain domestic violence restraining orders, persons less than the age of 18 years (for handguns) and domestic violence misdemeanants. Federal law does not set a minimum age requirement for the legal possession of long guns. Some ways we could help our gun laws rather than take them away

Although the Second Amendment prevents the federal government from completely banning guns in America, limited restrictions are allowed on the distribution and possession of firearms. Certain groups of people such as criminals, the mentally unstable, and soldiers dishonorably discharged from the military are prohibited from possessing or interacting with firearms (Flynn). These restrictions are enforced by background checks in some states on both a state and federal level. However, gun laws vary from state to state and are often not thorough enough; the background checks are flawed due to lack of information and misinformation, and guns can easily end up in the hands of criminals and malevolent individuals. The ease of

Mass shootings have been at the top of the headlines recently in the United States. These shootings are causing a major impact on those who reside in America. Something must be done immediately to bring down the frequency of these shootings so that one can be safe anywhere. There are many ways to stop this devastation that is bringing America to tears, but the most effective is to have stricter gun laws in the country. Control laws must be more harsh in order for there to be a decrease in mass shootings across the country.

In recent years since 2011, mass shootings have tripled in number (Gius 8). With the huge increase in shooting our nation has been relentlessly searching for an answer on how to stop all these mass shootings. Inside the political system people of high rankings believe that the answer is to put in place laws that would limit certain aspects in the either purchasing or carrying or a gun. With the victims of shooting vocalizing their beliefs that gun control will be the answer for our question is slowly persuading the few who have not dug deeper into the subject. “Everyone in this issue wants the same thing; we all want major gun violence and crime rates to go down. In order for this to happen for us as a nation we must take action as and unite

The three year-anniversary of the Sandy Hook shooting just passed. The San Bernardino shootings occurred in November 2015. That was why many people are focused on what can be done to prevent things like this from occurring in the future. Many people believe that stricter gun control laws will prevent mass shootings. However, it is important to note that these ideas have been discussed for several decades.

In the year 2016 alone, there have been 145 mass shootings around the United States, while there have been only 173 days in the years so far. In order to prevent these atrocities from occurring so frequently gun ownership should be regulated by both the federal and state governments through a background check for all sales of firearms. The National Instant Criminal Background Check System has prevented more than two million convicted felons and other prohibited purchasers from buying guns. The law also has a deterrent effect since the prohibited purchasers are less likely to try to buy guns when they know comprehensive background check requirements are in place. However, currently the federal law requires criminal background checks only for guns sold through licensed firearm dealers, which counts for only sixty percent of the total gun sales. The U.S. Congress needs to regulate the obtainment of guns with a background check for all sales of firearms in order to protect the lives of citizens in this country while not violating the Second Amendment and the rights of the state.

First, guns are way too easy to buy in America. Private gun sellers, such as gun shows, are not required to conduct background checks even though they make up over 20% of all firearm sales as stated in a 2017 National Survey done by the Annals of Internal Medicine. The background checks themselves are not reliable either. In 2005, Seung Hui Cho was declared mentally ill by a judge. Two years later, Cho shot and killed 32 people in the Virginia Tech massacre. Cho was able to legally obtain a gun and pass a background check due to an absence of records in the NICS, or National Crime Information Center, system. As of

According to “Closing Illegal Gun Markets”, “Forty percent of all annual firearm sales are through secondary or informal markets which involves felons, friends, and family and do not go through licensed retailers.” That number is almost half of all gun sales and of the half that go through licensed retailers. It is unknown how many people are purchasing guns for people who could not buy one legally. The problem with illegal gun purchases lies in the national background check system that is used, when someone purchases a gun at a licensed retailer. When these people go into buy a weapon, we have no idea what their intentions are. If they can pass the background check they are able to walk out with any guns they chose, from there these guns can end up in anyone’s hands. Background checks are not sufficient to stop gun violence due to back doors in the system and lack of punishment for offenders.

The movement has called for two changes to the current gun law: universal background checks for buyers and ban on the sale of assault-type firearms and large-capacity ammunitions (Szekely, 2018). The system of background checks is meant to ensure that all gun owners have the right capacity to handle firearms. Past incidences have shown that the system was ineffective because the state governments did not submit relevant information to the central database. For example, in one of the recent shooting incidences, the shooter had a known history of mental problems but had been able to purchase an assault rifle and high capacity ammunition. The changes in the background system would make it easier for gun dealers to identify people who are not qualified to own a gun. The restrictions on the sale of assault weapons and ammunition are crucial steps in reducing the number of deaths and injuries in case of a shooting incident. The shooter would not be able to inflict a lot of harm because of inefficiencies of the weapon at disposal.

Many innocent lives each year are taken away because most states do not have laws particularly dealing with private dealers administering background checks. Background checks are needed to make sure that clients who are purchasing firearms will not use the gun to endanger themselves or others. However, even in the states where background checks are administered the laws still consist of many loopholes; some of these include, not checking for mental illnesses that the client might have , not following up on the client after they purchased the gun, and how private sellers and many states are not administrating strict and complete background checks., “Researchers confirm that universal background checks laws effectively improve public safety and

America is currently experiencing a frightening crisis of internal terrorism. In 2015 alone, there have been nearly 13000 deaths in America due to gun violence. Mass shootings have become regular occurrences on the news channels. After every single mass shooting, politicians, celebrities and regular people all over the country express their uttermost grief and regret for the lost victims. Consistently, there is a subsequent call for more gun control. In some cases, new bills may be proposed. It has become a routine of some sort. However, these efforts have amounted to a negligible amount of progress. Even with all the outrage and mourning from the public after each mass shooting, nothing seems to change. The initial passion and vigor regarding

On July 20th, 2012, at the screening of the film The Dark knight Rise, a armed man walked into the theater and shot at the audience with multiple weapon, which caused the result of 12 people died, 70 others injured; On January 8th, 2011, a 22 years old young man assaulted the American senator Gabrielle Giffords and other 18 people with a pistol. As a result, six bystanders died including a girl only 9 years old; On April 16th, 2007, a student in Virginia took away 32 people’s life (including himself) with two pistols (Global Shooting). As can be seen, these are massacres happened within last 5 years, and obviously, these tragedies are all indicate a issue need to be discussed: gun control.

The first of these new proposals is the requirement of universal background checks for anyone who wants to purchase a firearm. This will hopefully close some loopholes in the National Instant Criminal Background Check System and prevent criminals and people with a history of mental illness from obtaining firearms (Remarks). As the background check system stands now, people who buy guns from gun shows and other unlicensed sellers do not have to complete a background check (Stopping). For the Columbine massacre on April 20th, 1999, the killers purchased their guns at a gun show from an unlicensed seller, so no background check was performed. On April 16th, 2007 was the shooting at Virginia Tech and this shooter obtained a gun from a licensed gun dealer which he should have been prohibited from buying. He was able to purchase this weapon because his records were never reported to the FBI’s gun background check system. Again in Tucson on January 8th, 2001, a killer acted with guns he should have been prohibited from buying because his records also were not in the database. These considerable loopholes in our current