A Call to Reform: Reducing Gun Homicides in the US

In the US, various bills have been proposed to address gun homicides, but unfortunately, none of them have come into action. In contrast, Australia has seen a significant decrease in gun homicides since implementing stricter gun laws and a buyback program. The Australian government's efforts have led to a 57% reduction in gun deaths, with the states where the buyback price was higher observing a more significant decline. The study suggests that the US should consider similar reforms to reduce its own gun homicide rate. Additionally, the article highlights the importance of implementing stricter laws nationwide, rather than just in one state or city, citing Chicago as an example where strict laws have not led to a decrease in murders and suicides due to easy access to guns in neighboring states.

Introduction
The debates about the gun control in US have been conducted since years and thus there is no
significant improvement. The mass shootings by gunmen became a bigger problem for the
country and there is no proper solution for this. The incident which brought the prominence for
this issue was killing of twenty children in Connecticut. But the legislation that has brought to
ban the semiautomatic assault weapons was defeated in the Senate despite having huge support
from most of the citizens. In the year 2017, the mass shooting at a festival of music conducted in
Las Vegas, at a church near San Antonio and the death of 17 children in Stoneman Douglas High
School in Parkland Florida again triggered the discussion about gun control. Various debates
were conducted yet the progress that has been observed is very less.
Literature Review
The second amendment of the constitution gives a clear report about the gun control in US. The
second amendment goes as follows “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a
free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms cannot be infringed” (McGinty et al.
2013). The meaning of this amendment is that the citizen have a right to keep the arms for the
purpose of security but it is a fact that there are some restrictions decided by the court. The US
Supreme court has upheld some of the restrictions on these arms. There is a ban on the concealed
weapons and also about the possession of weapons which are of certain type, and also the
prohibition against the sales of guns for a specific category of people. The 1968 gun control act
prohibits a person under eighteen years of age, the mentally disabled, the convicted criminals,
dishonorably charged military personnel and various other sections of people from purchasing
the fire arms. In the year of 1993, the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention act had made it

mandatory to check the background of the people before selling them guns. And the guns sold to
unlicensed people are recovered and the guns must be purchased from only authorized dealers.
On the other hand the Supreme Court keep on rolling down some of the laws related to the
handguns and the ban of handguns at Washington DC was struck down by the court(Andrés and
Hempstead, 2011). When compared to various other cities the gun ownership rates in America is
higher which is a commendable situation. The sad part here is the gun homicides are also more in
US only. The Federal laws provide only basic rules for the guns and the states and cities can
impose any further restrictions. Some states like Alaska, Idaho and Kansas have passed different
laws trying to nullify the federal gun legislature but according to the legal analysts these laws are
unconstitutional.
In the year of 2016, January the then president of America, Barak Obama has implemented
several actions to reduce the gun violence which includes a measure where dealers of the fire
arms check the background of the buyer before providing them with the gun (Kleck and
Patterson, 2013). He even organized gun shows to just make it sure that everything related to the
guns are done legally. Till 2017 there was no federal laws which supported the ban on the fire
arms, semi automatic assault weapons, handguns, .50 caliber rifles, military style or on large
capacity magazines. In between 1994 to the year 2004 the Congress allowed these restrictions to
expire. After the mass shooting in Las Vegas some of the legal analysts and law makers
expressed their support towards the federal prohibition of the fire stocks and the devices that
allow the semi automatic guns to fire at the rate approaching that of the automatic weapons
(Killias, 2013).

The United States have a population of less than 5 percent of the entire world’s population but
the fire arms in this country are 30-35 percent of the world’s civilian owned guns. This has been
proved by the report provided by the Switzerland based Small Arms Survey. US ranks number
one in the per capita of firearms. As stated earlier the homicide rate is also higher in United
States only among the world’s most developed nations. The homicide rate has been decreased a
lot since 1990s but there is a requirement of lot more progression in this rate than what it is at
present.
The implementation of new reforms is very important to control this gun homicide in US. There
is a situation that has happened in Australia where a gun homicide killed 35 people in a
restaurant, after this incident the Australian law makers implemented legislation immediately and
banned the semi automatic rifles and hand guns on a serious note. The government of Australia
confiscated 650,000 guns on immediate buyback program and purchased the guns from all the
gun buyers. A registry has been established in the country and requirement for the permit of new
fire arms has been brought into implementation. But the scenario is different in US. Various bills
are proposed but it is sad to say that none of those bills comes into action. Because of these
immediate reforms the gun homicides in Australia has been decreased to 57 percent (Killias,
2013).
The gun buyback program and other legal changes has made a big impact on the homicides of
Australia. The government brought the guns in order to motivate the people to sell it rather than
taking it for free. This buyback program cost them a fortune but the results or outcomes of this
program is very commendable. The gun deaths in Australia have decreased. The states where the
buyback price was higher have observed a significant change in the deaths by gun. A study
stated that buyback program of 3500 guns from 10,000 people has decreased the homicides by

50 percent. This is the major reform that US have to consider if it is seriously aiming to reduce
the homicides in the country.
There is a counter for this situation stating that Chicago have stricter rules against the gun control
but the deaths and murders in this country haven’t decreased and there is no change at all. But
this statement is completely wrong. There are strict laws in Chicago as well as murders and
sucide rates are also at higher rates but this doesn’t mean that the gun control is not working. If
there are strict laws supporting the gun control in a city or state then the people can travel to the
other state or city in the same country and buy the guns, this is what has happened in Chicago.
There are several strict rules there and this is the reason why people are going out of the state to
buy the guns. The strict rules must be implemented all over the country in order to make them
succeed. Just implementing them in one state or city isn’t going to change anything. In Chicago,
a person should provide identification card, three day waiting period with a background check,
documentation for the firearm sales conducted by the dealer. Surpassing these rules for the
murderers isn’t easy so they just go to any other nearby state to get buy the guns. They can just
go to Indiana where there is no need of any such requirements and the guns can be given to the
person with criminal record also. There is no need of paperwork submission about the sale too. A
person can drive to other places buy the guns and sell them to other people or use them to exploit
the laws by themselves (O’Brien et al. 2013). This is illegal as per the federal law but because of
the easy laws and no proper paper work there is nothing that the court or police can do in such
issues. The result of this illegal trafficking lead to something disastrous, A report in 2014 has
stated that the 60 percent guns that have been recovered in the crime scenes from 2009 to the
year 2013 are brought from the states where there are lax laws against the gun control. These lax
gun laws were also named as the Iron Pipline.

There is disturbing news here and according to a report, the 74 percent of guns found in crime
scens in the Mexico where there are strict gun laws are from America where there are lax laws.
This proves the importance of strict laws for the betterment of the state and country (Tonry, M.,
1999.).
The stricter gun laws in New York, Chicago have very less effect and the trafficking is showing
very great effects. The root of the problem lies in the laws in all over the America and it is
essential to make those laws stricter to decrease the crimes in the country (Cook et al. 2011). The
only way these gun homicides can be stopped is by implementing the laws strictly by all the
states of the country.
The federal government should pass certain rule making the laws supporting the gun control
more strictly and in short all the countries should take an inspiration from Chicago and
implement certain laws all over the country.
America always pays attention to three points whenever there is an assault with the gun, they are
 Background checks on international basis
 Restrictions on the people with mental illness buying the firearms and
 Assault weapons ban
Even the politicians on the left don’t go further and implement any new laws other than these.
The laws must be very strict and including the confiscation isn’t going to do any harm. The gun
problem in US is very dire and it is important to get a solution for this problem as soon as
possible. The politicians and law makers should go further than these proposals and should make
some amendments which are going to show huge affect and decrease the gun homicides in the

country. It is not possible to completely decrease them but reducing them slowly also shows a
huge effect.
This is how the gun policy in US is working. There is a dire need to bring some new reforms and
legislations to decrease the gun homicides and suicides. The law makers and government should
take utmost care in changing these reforms (Godwin and Schroedel, 2010). If America wants to
get the gun death reports similar to European countries then there are many laws that it should
implement.

Reference List
McGinty, E.E., Webster, D.W. and Barry, C.L., 2013. Effects of news media messages about
mass shootings on attitudes toward persons with serious mental illness and public support for
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Kleck, G. and Patterson, E.B., 2013. The impact of gun control and gun ownership levels on
violence rates. Journal of Quantitative Criminology, 9(3), pp.249-287.
Killias, M., 2013. International correlations between gun ownership and rates of homicide and
suicide. CMAJ: Canadian Medical Association Journal, 148(10), p.1721.
O’Brien, K., Forrest, W., Lynott, D. and Daly, M., 2013. Racism, gun ownership and gun
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Tonry, M., 1999. Why are US incarceration rates so high?. Crime & Delinquency, 45(4), pp.419-
437.
Cook, P.J., Braga, A.A. and Moore, M.H., 2011. Gun control. Crime and public policy, pp.257-
292.
Godwin, M.L. and Schroedel, J.R., 2010. Policy diffusion and strategies for promoting policy
change: Evidence from California local gun control ordinances. Policy Studies Journal, 28(4),
pp.760-776.