Gun Rights in the United States (remade)

I apologize for the very long wait, I was caught up with school and off-season football practice. I thank TheParadox for accepting my debate, but I will get on with it. 1. I assume that my opponent claims that gun rights "impede" on other rights in violation of the pursuit of happiness and right to life as stated in the Preamble of our Constitution. While a fairly logical analysis, this is false. My opponent claims the 2nd Amendment cannot be exercised because it "threatens" the safety and pursuit of happiness of others. This would be true if, in fact, the 2nd Amendment stated something along the lines of "A well regulated militia reserves the right to murder." While nothing in the Constitution directly prohibits murder, murder is prohibited in all 50 states, supported by the fact murder is prohibited in most (if for any reason not all) countries. This is rather part of a tradition, predominantly the 10 Commandments Moses received, especially since this prohibition of murder comes from England, which was predominantly Catholic at the time of the Revolution. My opponent is correct when he states that the right to life (people's safety) and pursuit of happiness should be placed above all other rights, however, it is not "violated" by the 2nd Amendment. Rather, the abuse and violation of the laws prohibiting murder from state to state is what violate's the people's safety. The 2nd Amendment in no way advocates murder, rather, it states "A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to bear arms shall not be infringed." This states that people may bear arms as a right that cannot be infringed, and may gather as a militia to defend the state should the situation ever arise as it did during the Revolution. My opponent also claims the pursuit of happiness may "pertain to a select few who want to possess firearms." This "select few" includes over 90,000,000 "applicants" which could be safely deemed as gun owners according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics. [1] Since there is no registration system to tally these votes, I have seen numbers ranging between 50-120 million. However, 90,000,000 seems to be the most consistent number. The NRA's own research approximates 70,000,000-80,000,000 owners [2] My opponent also explains that ideas such as slavery are now considered archaic, anachronistic, and simply obsolete today. I beg to differ as the right to bear arms is not archaic, and has evolved accordingly to modern technology. The first humans used sticks and stones, which were developed into spears and arrows, then metals were used to make swords, maces, axes, etc., then the idea of gunpowder was introduced that eventually lead to the invention of pistols and muskets we know were widespread in the 17th and 18th centuries, that evolved into the modern firearms we know of today during the industrial revolution. My opponent makes an excellent point that the Constitution does not defy the effects of time, but I will explain below why it will not best serve the need of our current generation to remove the 2nd Amendment. 2. My opponent asks how many lives are saved by guns. According to Gary Kleck, Ph.D criminologist at Florida State University with his parter, Mark Gertz, conclude that defensive gun uses are made about 2.5 million times a year. [3a] and [3b]. The National Institute of Justice suggests this number is even higher at 3.1 million in comparison to Kleck's studies [3c]. Now, according to the Statemaster [4] and the Center for Disease Control [5] suggest a number between 30,000-40,000 people are killed a year. Of these, 12,983 times guns in homicide in 2007 (the last year I could find) [5]. Bear in mind that homicide includes both murder and self defense, but I am unable to find any information on the specific numbers between those 2 factors. The number of unintentional deaths was 613, which is caused mainly by plain stupidity or curiousity, and this could be prevented by simple safety education or secure storage. The number of suicides by firearm was a 17,532, but the intent rather falls on other issues such as bullying, depression, etc. Suicide could be achieved with countless other methods, and banning guns would simply lead these people to move on to other methods of suicide such as hanging, falling, etc. The above numbers add up to 31, 244 deaths in 2007. Let's tally these numbers then: Number of gun owners: 90,000,000 (Approx) Number of defensive uses by guns/a year: 2,500,000 Number of conceal carry licenses issued: 3,000,000 [6] People killed by guns a year: 35,000 (approx) As summarized above, the number of gun uses for defense highly outweighs how many times they are used to take lives. Using the above information, in contrast to 2.5 million times a year in defense, the number of people killed by guns is proportionally and exponentially outnumbered by those saved. It should be noted the gun does not need to be fired to thwart a criminal. I leave the floor to my opponent. [1] http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov... [2] http://www.nraila.org... [3a] http://www.wnd.com... [3b] http://www.saf.org... [3c] http://www.ncjrs.gov... - Page 8 [4] http://www.statemaster.com... [5] http://webappa.cdc.gov... (Under "Intent" select the various options, and under cause select firearm, and set year 2007-2007) [6] http://blogostuff.blogspot.com...