Gun Control on Trial : Inside the Supreme Court Battle over the Second Amendment by
In June 2008, the Supreme Court had its first opportunity in seven decades to decide a question at the heart of one of America’s most impassioned debates: Do Americans have a right to possess guns? Gun Control on Trial tells the full story of the Court’s decision in District of Columbia v. Heller, which ended the District’s gun ban. With exclusive behind-the-scenes access throughout the process, author Brian Doherty is uniquely positioned to delve into the issues of this monumental case and provides compelling looks at the inside stories, including the plaintiffs’ fight for the right to protect their lives, the activist lawyers who worked to affirm that right, and the forces who fought to stop the case.
Guns : conceal and carry by
Nowhere is the gun control debate more heated than in the United States. Gun control advocates argue for tighter restrictions on purchasing and licensing in the hopes of reducing incidents of shootings. Gun owners fear that their guns will be taken away, eliminating their ability to protect their families. Carrying a concealed handgun is legal in every state, and polls shows that the majority of Americans support conceal and carry. The viewpoints in this volume attempt to answer tough questions, such as Do concealed handguns deter or increase crime? and Do the protections stipulated in the Second Amendment cover today s gun owners? Full-Color Photographs, Bibliography, Detailed Table of Contents, Further Information Section, Index, Primary Sources, Websites.
Guns in America
A national debate continues to rage in regard to 2nd amendment rights in contemporary society. This collection will deal with concerns about domestic violence committed by guns, the ramifications of a widely armed citizenry, the government's failure to pass comprehensive gun legislation, as well as police brutality, strong gun lobbies, open carry laws, home-grown terrorism, the recent rise of fatal shootings of black men by police, and the Orlando massacre. From domestic terrorism to the Black Lives Matter movement articles in this title reflect differences in policy views on the subject in the longstanding debate around gun rights and gun control.
How America Got Its Guns : A History of the Gun Violence Crisis by
In the United States more than thirty thousand deaths each year can be attributed to firearms. This book on the history of guns in America examines the Second Amendment and the laws and court cases it has spawned. The author’s thorough and objective account shows the complexities of the issue, which are so often reduced to bumper-sticker slogans, and suggests ways in which gun violence in this country can be reduced. Briggs profiles not only protagonists in the national gun debate but also ordinary people, showing the ways guns have become part of the lives of many Americans. Among them are gays and lesbians, women, competitive trapshooters, people in the gun-rights and gun-control trenches, the NRA’s first female president, and the most successful gunsmith in American history. Balanced and painstakingly unbiased, Briggs’s account provides the background needed to follow gun politics in America and to understand the gun culture in which we are likely to live for the foreseeable future.
Is Gun Ownership a Right? by 
The Last Gun: How Changes in the Gun Industry Are Killing Americans and What It Will Take to Stop It by 
Living with Guns : a liberal's case for the Second Amendment by
America's war over gun control has raged since the 1960s. In 2008, the Supreme Court startled the left by concluding that with the Second Amendment the founders elevated "above all other interests" the right to bear arms "in defense of hearth and home." Liberals feared the NRA would succeed in rolling back regulations nationwide. Discussion about guns in America has been stalemated, shortcircuited, and dominated by rigidly and mutually intolerant ideologies. Yet we may be closer to a solution than either side may imagine. In Living With Guns, veteran New York Times editor Craig Whitney carefully reexamines America's relationship with guns, showing how guns are an important part of American culture. The earliest colonists needed them to survive. We have nearly 300 million of them today. Trying to restrict gun ownership doesn't effectively deter crime--we need to get serious about what actually works. Whitney shows that, if we focus on controlling violence rather than guns themselves, the Second Amendment may not be so lethal as the left would like to think.
Out of Range : why the Constitution can't end the battle over guns by
Few constitutional disputes maintain as powerful a grip on the public mind as the battle over the Second Amendment. The National Rifle Association and gun-control groups struggle unceasingly over a piece of the political landscape that no candidate for the presidency--and few for Congress--canafford to ignore. But who's right? Will it ever be possible to settle the argument?In Out of Range, one of the nation's leading legal scholars takes a calm, objective look at this bitter debate. Mark V. Tushnet brings to this book a deep expertise in the Constitution, the Supreme Court, and the role of the law in American life. He breaks down the different positions on the SecondAmendment, showing that it is a mistake to stereotype them. Tushnet's exploration is honest and nuanced; he finds the constitutional arguments finely balanced, which is one reason the debate has raged for so long. Along the way, he examines various experiments in public policy, from both sides, andfinds little clear evidence for the practical effectiveness of any approach to gun safety and prosecution. Of course, he notes, most advocates of the right to keep and bear arms agree that it should be subject to reasonable regulation. Ultimately, Tushnet argues, our view of the Second Amendmentreflects our sense of ourselves as a people. The answer to the debate will not be found in any holy writ, but in our values and our vision of the nation.This compact, incisive examination offers an honest and thoughtful guide to both sides of the argument, pointing the way to solutions that could calm, if not settle, this bitter dispute.
The Second Amendment: a biography by 
The Second Amendment on Trial : Critical Essays on District of Columbia v. Heller by
On the final day of its 2008 term, a sharply divided U.S. Supreme Court issued a 5-to-4 decision striking down the District of Columbia's stringent gun control laws as a violation of the Second Amendment. Reversing almost seventy years of settled precedent, the high court reinterpreted the meaning of the "right of the people to keep and bear arms" to affirm an individual right to own a gun in the home for purposes of self-defense. The landmark ruling not only opened a new chapter in the contentious history of gun rights and gun control but also revealed both the strengths and problems of originalist constitutional theory and jurisprudence. This volume brings together some of the best scholarship on the Heller case, with essays by legal scholars and historians representing a range of ideological viewpoints and applying different interpretive frameworks. Following the editors' introduction, which describes the issues involved and the arguments on each side, the essays are organized into four sections. The first includes two of the most important historical briefs filed in the case, while the second offers different views of the role of originalist theory. Section three presents opposing interpretations of the ruling and its relationship to modern constitutional doctrine. The final section explores historical research post-Heller, including new findings on patterns of gun ownership in colonial and Revolutionary America. In addition to the editors, contributors include Nelson Lund, Joyce Lee Malcolm, Jack Rakove, Reva B. Siegel, Cass R. Sunstein, Kevin M. Sweeney, and J. Harvie Wilkinson III.
Showdown in the Show-Me State : The Fight over Conceal-and-Carry Gun Laws in Missouri by 
A Well-Regulated Militia: the founding fathers and the origins of gun control in America by