Nationally, gun-rights advocates have been on the defensive since the early '90s. But in the states, where the fight against crime is won or lost, they're winning the debate. That's because they have the facts on their side. But federal courts have ruled that police aren't obliged to protect individuals from crime. That means citizens are ultimately responsible for their own defense.
Criminals commit ten million violent crimes a year.
Florida State University criminologist Gary Kleck found that victims use handguns about 1.9 million times in self-defense. Criminals weigh the cost of the crime against the benefits. You don't have to be a criminal mastermind to know that the possibility of a concealed weapon tilts the odds in the victim's favor. Research shows that robbery and rape victims who resist with a gun are only half as likely to be injured as those who don't. A recent study by John Lott and David Mustard of the University of Chicago published in the Journal of Legal Studies bears this out.