{"id":14667,"date":"2022-05-25T12:00:23","date_gmt":"2022-05-25T10:00:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.historyextra.com\/?p=20722"},"modified":"2022-05-25T12:31:11","modified_gmt":"2022-05-25T10:31:11","slug":"the-historians-view-what-are-the-real-issues-in-the-us-gun-control-debate","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbchistory\/rss_feed\/the-historians-view-what-are-the-real-issues-in-the-us-gun-control-debate\/","title":{"rendered":"The historians\u2019 view: what are the real issues in the US gun control debate?"},"content":{"rendered":"

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By Matt Elton\n \t\t<\/p>

Published: Wednesday, 25 May 2022 at 12:00 am<\/p>

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In an article first published in December 2015 in the wake of a mass shooting in an Oregon college, historians Professor Joyce Lee Malcolm and Dr Emma Long explore the history of the US gun control debate\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cThe focus of legal debate has changed over time\u201d<\/h2>\n

American ideas of the right to bear arms, incorporated into the US Constitution and debated ever since, originated, in great part, from traditions of English law.<\/p>\n

The Second Amendment of the US Constitution, asserting the right of Americans to be armed, is a legacy of the right of Englishmen to \u201chave arms for their defence\u201d. That English right, enshrined in the English Bill of Rights of 1689, however, was limited to \u201cthe Subjects which are Protestants\u201d \u2013 at that time, some 90 per cent of the population \u2013 and to those weapons \u201csuitable to their Condition and as allowed by Law\u201d. Despite these qualifiers, the English right to keep and carry firearms was virtually unrestrained until the Firearms Act of 1920.<\/p>\n

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The US Supreme Court in Washington, DC. (Photo by Mark Wilson\/Getty Images)<\/em><\/span><\/figcaption><\/div>\n

The US Second Amendment, by contrast, has no religious, class or legislative limitation. It refers to the need for a citizen militia as one reason for the right, then declares: \u201cThe right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.\u201d This unqualified guarantee is entrenched in the nation\u2019s constitution. In two recent landmark decisions, the US Supreme Court affirmed that the amendment protects an individual\u2019s right to own guns for self-defence.<\/p>\n

However, the focus of legal debate has changed over time. We now tend to underplay the dual purpose of the right of individuals to be armed \u2013 self-defence and defence against a tyrannical government \u2013 stressing only self-defence. The great\u00a0English jurist William Blackstone, writing\u00a0in the late 18th century, described the right as \u201ca publick allowance under due restrictions, of the natural right of resistance and self preservation, when the sanctions of society and laws are found insufficient to restrain the violence of oppression\u201d.<\/p>\n