In response to a comment by jeff house, Stormy said of the US:

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They need to get rid of the 20,000 gun laws on the books!

CCW is the only law required!

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To which I replied:

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As is true of most of the gun lobby's greatest hits, this sound bite is rubbish.

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Stormy replied:

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You expect me to belive some group called JOIN TOGETHER!!

LOL!

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Well, Stormy, in a way you're right. You don't have to believe Join Together.

However...

The Brookings Institution study says:

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The reference to 20,000 gun laws, which is often quoted by opponents of gun regulation, first appeared in Congressional testimony in 1965, but no source was given. The number, however, has taken hold in the public consciousness. In 1981, 11 weeks after being shot, President Reagan rejected a call for additional gun legislation, saying "there are today more than 20,000 gun control laws in effect -- federal, state and local -- in the United States." The study notes a search of an electronic news database for "20,000 gun laws" or "20,000 gun control laws" that yielded more than 200 such citations in the last five years.

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So: I've found a carefully sourced study claiming there's no basis for the number 20,000. If you insist that the number is factual, provide a source.

Not, I repeat not just a website repeating the claim. A reference to a study of actually-existing US laws -- local, state, and federal. The reference must include, at the very least:

• the study title;
• name(s) and qualifications of the author(s);
• publication date and publication details (i.e., who published it);
• a summary of methods; and
• a summary of conclusions.

I can always use $50 worth of ammo!!

However....where is YOUR report to the contrary?

Do you have any evidence other than a google search?

Regardless.....there are in fact thousands of gun laws in the USA that are ignored. Only the RIGHT seem to want them to be enforced.

Cheers

[ 16 February 2004: Message edited by: Stormy ]

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Do you have any evidence other than a google search?

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It's true I found the reference to the Brookings Institution study through a google search. I'm perfectly willing to download it, or send for a hard copy through the mail.

However, it's me who's challenging you to prove your claim. If you like, we can agree on someone to arbitrate the question of whether you've met my conditions. Or, we could each pick someone who together will agree on a third person. That way it'll be decided by majority vote, out of your hands and mine.

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Only the RIGHT seem to want them to be enforced.

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You'd better make up your mind. Over on the other thread you said you wanted them all repealed.

But the idea that there are 20,000 guns laws in the US means nothing. That would mean that on average, each state has 4000 such laws.

No US state has 4000 entities with jurisdiction to pass gun laws.

And since the right, funded by the gun manufacturers, is the source for the idiotic idea that the US Consititution gives everyone the "right to bear arms" (which would negate any gun laws impinging upon that right), it is pretty silly to say that the American Right wants to enforce gun laws.

I think you mean 400 there, jeff house.

< /pendantry >

Otherwise: I agree. I don't really expect to have to pay out, here. But I will, if Stormy can convince me that any such study as I've described exists, and that I could, in principle, lay my hands on it.

jeff house, please to check your PM.

However this is very interesting..

However at the moment they are not being enforced yet the gunowners are paying the price in terms of restrictions on their freedoms..

I have found a very interesting link...

http://www.uh.edu/~dbarclay/rm/stats.htm

Kwon, Ik-Whan G., Scott, Bradley, Safranski, Scott R., & Bae, Muen. (1997). The Effectiveness of Gun Control Laws: Multivariate Statistical Analysis. American Journal of Economics and Sociology 56 (1) 41-50.
Statistical highlights from "The Effectiveness of Gun Control Laws:"

In 1992, there were nearly 40,000 deaths from guns in the U.S.

In the U.S, there are about 20,000 laws or regulations which attempt to control guns in some way.

In 1990, 24 states had no gun-control laws.

In the 26 states with gun-control laws, there were 19.6 gun-related deaths per 100,000 persons.

The journal only has issues back to 1998!!

I will try and contact one of the authors....

I am heading out to a conference so it might take me some time

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THIS IS FUN!!

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In 1992, there were nearly 40,000 deaths from guns in the U.S.

In the U.S, there are about 20,000 laws or regulations which attempt to control guns in some way.

In 1990, 24 states had no gun-control laws.

In the 26 states with gun-control laws, there were 19.6 gun-related deaths per 100,000 persons.

In the 24 states with no gun-control laws in 1990, there were 24.4 gun related deaths per 100,000.

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Originally posted by Stormy:
However....where is YOUR report to the contrary?

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Regulations, by definition, deal with minute aspects of the law which the Legislature has not specified.

So, you may have a Regulation which specifies that an approved holster must be of a certain thickness;
or that there be a safety strap over the butt when it is in the holster, or that the safety strap be able to be snapped shut, or that it require a specified effort to open the strap,or that a person being given a gun permit must provide a residential address, rather than a post office box. A lot of these are to insure the gun doesn't fall out, or be grabbed by someone else.

These things regulate gun ownership and use. So if we are talking, not about laws, but about Regulations, Stormtrooper may be right in the usual meaningless-but-propagandistically-useful sense.

[ 17 February 2004: Message edited by: jeff house ]

[ 17 February 2004: Message edited by: jeff house ]

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Originally posted by Michelle:

You were the one who made the claim that there are 20,000 gun laws. It's stupid to ask someone to prove a negative. That's just Logic 101. You made the claim; you support it.

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Oh I have taken up the gauntlet....and I think I have a technical victory. However it is the hoplophobes of Canada who decry the lack of "LAWS" in the USA....when in fact there are laws.

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Oh I have taken up the gauntlet....and I think I have a technical victory.

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On the basis of what you've posted above, I don't think so. I see no evidence those people made any sort of count (that was what I meant by "a summary of methods"). They just seem to have assumed the 20,000 figure on the way to arguing something else.

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...hoplophobes of Canada...

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Hoplophobes. Now gun lobbyists, thinking it'll help them be taken seriously, are coining words for non-existent psychological syndromes. Hilarious!

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Originally posted by Hinterland:
I really want to call someone a hoplophobic feminazi.

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