We as American citizens should have the right to possess firearms

The issue as I see it is about the relationship between limits to the accessibility of deadly firearms and public safety rather than an issue of glib ideological notions of 'God given rights' from a bygone era. The U.S. Second Amendment, which makes reference to the rights of a "well regulated Militia", was drafted during the early stages of US nationhood after the US War of Independence. Scholars suggest the amendment was created at the time, in part to enable the citizenry to defend themselves against a tyrannical government, as well as foreign powers, particularly the British Empire. The available firearms at the time were single shot barrel loaded muskets. They were not 30 bullet magazine weapons enabling citizens to kill large numbers of their own citizens in a short period of time. There is no evidence that the legislators drafting the original passage for the amendment, foresaw the availability of powerful high calibre high round magazine weapons, and the havoc of citizens arbitrarily using the weapons on eachother. The law was drafted in a bygone revolutionary era, when there were threats to US nationhood, threats which do not apply today, when the US has the largest most powerful military in the world. The Second Amendment should not be an immutable eternal law but should change and be reinterpreted with a changing society and with changing threats. The threat today being the threat to public safety from the havoc caused by citizens using high powered high calibre weapons on each other. In any case, the Second Amendment with its reference to a "well regulated Militia" implies that limits can be placed on the right to bear arms. With no limits on the right to bear arms, one could argue that you should be allowed nuclear weapons to defend yourself. Fortunately most of us quickly realise the catastrophe that would occur if we allowed the circulation of nuclear weapons in the general population. The limits to the availability of deadly firearms in the cause of public safety is the issue at hand. The argument is that a better, safer and less violent society can be created through setting limits on the availability of deadly firearms. Using Australia and other comparable nations as a test case, the following facts point out the strong circumstantial evidence on the effectiveness of gun control in creating a safer and less violent society: -There were 13 mass shootings (defined as the shooting of 4 or more people in a short period of time) in Australia during the period 1979-96, and there have been none since the introduction of gun buyback and control laws in 1996. -The withdrawal of 3500 guns per 100,000 individuals from the the Gun laws introduced in Australia in 1996, reduced the firearm suicide rate in Australia by close to 80 per cent, and had no statistically significant effect on non-firearm death rates (source Leigh paper). Similar dramatic declines were also exhibited in the gun homicide rate. - States in Australia that had a larger uptake of gun buyback (where the government bought guns off firearm owners) saw a larger reduction in the suicide and homicide rate (source Leigh paper). This point indicates that there is a causal relationship between the reduction in guns and gun related violence. This piece of evidence indicates that the drastic reduction in gun violence and mass shootings is not just a coincidence with the introduction of gun control laws in Australia (source Leigh) -Murder rates in Australia are close to 1 per 100,000 whilst the murder rate in the US is closer to 3.8 per 100,000, despite the much lower rates of gun ownership, invalidating your assertion that higher rates of gun ownership leads to a reduction in violent crime through deterrence; -France, Italy, Germany, U.K, each have stringent gun control laws and have much lower rates of mass shootings and gun homicides (all have rates of around 1 per 100,000 source below) - There were 133 mass shootings in America within the past 7 years. Researchers counted 23 mass shootings in 13 European nations in addition to Russia from 2000 to 2014, with 203 deaths. During that time, the U.S. saw 133 shootings and 487 dead. - It should also be noted the 12,000 gun related deaths and 51,000 gun incidences in 2014 in the United States. The Second Amendment implies that limits can be placed on your 'God given rights'. Limits to the access of guns, particularly of high powered high magazine weapons, into the hands of the mentally or criminally defective is just sensible policy. If you want an argument based on evidence then it should be compelling that limiting gun accessibility will probably lead to fewer mass shootings and gun related deaths. I could accept an argument that you simply just like and enjoy guns based on the way they make you feel when firing them and how cool and fun they are to fire. However, I can't accept an argument that guns promote public safety or that they reduce the level of gun violence. The evidence from around the world simply shows this not to be the case. Sources http://ftp.iza.org... http://www.wsj.com... https://en.m.wikipedia.org... http://www.gunviolencearchive.org... http://www.gizmodo.com.au...