Majority of Americans Favor Gun Control Laws, Poll Shows A majority of Americans support stricter gun-control measures, including a ban on high-capacity ammunition clips, according to a poll released today following the murder of 26 people, including 20 children, in Newtown, Connecticut. The ABC News/Washington Post survey showed 54 percent of respondents backing new limits on gun rights, with 43 percent opposed. When asked about banning ammunition clips that contain more than 10 bullets, 59 percent supported the idea, while 38 percent opposed it. In addition, 52 percent backed a ban on semiautomatic handguns, with 44 percent in opposition. A Pew Research Center poll also released today showed 47 percent of respondents said the killing rampage reflected problems in U.S. society, while 44 percent said it was an isolated act by one person. Asked about the July shootings in a Colorado movie theater that killed 12 people, 67 percent viewed it as an isolated act and 24 percent said it was a societal problem. The suspect in the Dec. 14 Connecticut killings, Adam Lanza, brought handguns and an assault rifle to Sandy Hook Elementary School before embarking on the second-deadliest U.S. school shooting. He killed himself at the scene, police said. In 2007, 33 people including shooter Seung-Hui Cho died at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, popularly known as Virginia Tech, in Blacksburg. In the July 20 shootings in Aurora, Colorado, James Holmes is facing charges of first-degree murder. Assault Weapons Ban Majorities have consistently supported gun-control measures going back to 1993, when 60 percent were in favor of stronger laws, according to surveys. Congress banned certain assault weapons in 1994, though 10 years later then-President George W. Bush and the Republican-controlled Congress didnât renew the prohibition when it expired. Senator Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat, said she would introduce legislation next month to reinstate the assault- weapons ban. Forty-nine percent of respondents in the ABC/Post poll said the best way to reduce gun violence was by enforcing existing laws, compared with 32 percent who called for new legislation. In January 2011, 57 percent called for enforcing existing measures while 29 percent said new laws were needed. The survey of 602 adults was conducted Dec. 14-16 and had a margin of error of plus or minus 4.5 percentage points. The Pew poll of 746 adults was taken Dec. 14-16 and had an error margin of plus or minus 4.3 percentage points. To contact the reporter on this story: Jonathan D. Salant in Washington at jsalant@bloomberg.net. To contact the editor responsible for this story: Jeanne Cummings at jcummings21@bloomberg.net.
Mass shooting prompts modest shift on gun control Poll shows 49% favor limits on gun ownership; 42% put the emphasis on the right to possess firearms. Support for gun control remains far below the peak seen at the turn of the century despite last weekâs mass shooting at an elementary school in Connecticut, according to a poll released Thursday. The poll by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, taken after the killing of 20 children and seven adults in Newtown, reflects only a modest change in attitudes, Pew said. In 2000, Pew found that two-thirds of Americans supported new restrictions. But in this weekâs survey, just 49 percent of respondents believed itâs more important to control gun ownership than to protect Americansâ right to own guns, while 42 percent placed a higher priority on the right to possess firearms. âThere is only a modest tilt toward gun control following Newtown, not a sea change,â Michael Dimock, associate research director for Pew, said in an email. âLevels of support for gun control still fall far short of where they were as recently as 2008.â Still, even those who want to own guns think there will be some tightening of regulations. The surge in gun sales that started after the massacre is continuing, with buyers saying they fear assault-style weapons will be banned. Some gun shops and retailers reported they were sold out of assault-style rifles or facing short supplies. Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2012/12/20/3976119/mass-shooting-prompts-modest-shift.html#storylink=cpy
Two small polls taken right after the shootings where the "majorities" in those polls were barely outside the margins of error...
No . I accept the fact that this is a majority rules country though,makes life much easier then getting angry over policies I don't agree with
Majority rule does not allow the govt to just ignore constitutional rights. Also if the gun ban crowd wants to infringe on the rights of gun owners, then they better expect a fight. They seem to want to take a couple of polls then hold them up and say "see the majority of the american people agree with us...so let us start banning firearms that we do not like". They seem to want the NRA just to simply concede defeat based on some questionable polls that they have. "See we surveyed 1200 respondents and 60% of them think that semiautos should be banned...so go ahead and turn them in." Their real problem with the gun lobby is the fact that they have fought back so effectively in the past and those polls have not amounted to crap. They just cannot stand the fact that one dedicated NRA member who writes letters to their congressman, sends in money to NRA-ILA and votes to protect their rights...is worth 10 people sitting on their ass getting polled.
Don't want to rock the boat for you, but they already ban firearms and weapons, full automatic weapons, explosives, etc. If you guys are going to bitch and moan get serious and demand some real fire power. If not being able to have a 30 round clip is hurting your constitutional rights then banning fully automatic weapons is castrating your 2nd amendment rights.
I've taken the idea that "guns don't kill, people do" and expanded on it. I always thought it was a fairly bogus saying but nowadays I'm seeing that it leads to solution. I studied psychopaths, and expanded it to the whole spectrum of people that fail to connect to their emotions in early childhood. I'm reading the accounts of these various shootings and seeing that if that certain immature swath of humanity were removed from the equation we wouldn't have ANY of these attacks. I can't think of a way to implement that other than some draconian measures applied to the psychos. At least if we did that measures would not need to be applied to mature citizens. Diagnosing/databasing before they ever commit a crime and not allowing guns [or drivers licenses] to be in their possession might be one way to do it. If we got them identified before they did serious crimes it would be a big step up in quality of life for the rest of us. I don't think that most people realize what a big step that would be. I've written here before about my observations of the psychopaths and the ripple effect they have on the rest of humanity's feelings of happiness and wellbeing. It's a rather large effect that just one out of fifty has on us when they do half of all the serious crimes. They do lots of things that don't get them arrested that drag the rest of us down as well. Read Dr. Hare's literature on the subject. He terms them "intraspecies predators" and my observations bear that out, there isn't better terminology for what they are. Allowing an intraspecies predator access to a weapon such as a handgun that is designed to kill the very species they prey on is REALLY STUPID..