Subscribe to one of our news e-mail lists . Gore backs new measures, Bush better enforcement.
Polls show Texas governor has the edge.
When the Million Mom March descends on Washington Sunday, its goal is to make gun control appear as all-American as, well, motherhood. But, in fact, the country's attitudes toward gun control remain complex, contradictory and ambivalent. Polls consistently show that large majorities of Americans support almost any new gun-control measure short of confiscation, from mandating trigger locks to licensing handgun owners. Yet the same surveys show that much of the public remains dubious that such measures will have much effect on crime and violence. This year's presidential election will measure the strength of these competing impulses.