By Saul Cornell

A proper understanding of the founding era concept of police is essential to the future of Second Amendment jurisprudence. District of Columbia v. Heller never addresses the police power and its centrality to early American rights theory or antebellum jurisprudence. The omission is striking because Heller does devote considerable attention to antebellum southern cases addressing the issue of public carry, and this body of law was strongly influenced by police power jurisprudence. A genuinely historical treatment of founding era rights theory — including the right to keep and bear arms — provides scant support for Heller’s dismissal of the right of the people to regulate their internal police in the case of firearms. Nor does the antebellum southern case law that Heller highlights as the key to unlocking the meaning of the Second Amendment support such a claim. Reconstruction did not change these basic facts. If one applies Heller’s professed originalist methodology neutrally, and Justice Scalia is correct that rights are entrenched with the scope that they had when constitutionalized, then the right of the people to regulate their own police, including firearms, must be treated with the same originalist reverence. Judges, including originalist judges, must recognize the awesome power of the people: including the right to regulate arms.

New York: Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law, 2021. 17p.

By Nelson Alusala

This policy brief reviews the state of physical security and stockpile management (PSSM) in Central and Southern Africa as at 2022. Africa’s most progressive legally binding instruments for controlling small arms and light weapons can be found in these regions. The Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS) Convention became legal in 2017 and the Southern African Development Community Protocol was revised in 2020. However, compliance with these instruments requires commitment from all stakeholders, including civil society. Key findings ∙ The region’s long-term stability depends on good principles of physical security and stockpile management (PSSM). Until ECCAS members enforce policy and implement steps to improve the PSSM of arms and ammunition in government possession, leakage and diversion to non-state actors will continue undeterred. ∙ Implementation should be next. The Kinshasa Convention, like the Arms Trade Treaty and UN Agenda 2030, are considered some of the latest instruments on disarmament, human security and development. The review of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Firearms Protocol in 2020 aligned the SADC region with the latest developments, and the African Union (AU) vision for silencing the guns by 2030. ∙ A review of other regional instruments is required. This is vital, especially for the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Convention on Small Arms and Light Weapons, their Ammunition and other Related Materials, and the Nairobi Protocol for the Prevention, Control and Reduction of Small Arms and Light Weapons in the Great Lakes Region, the Horn of Africa and Bordering States.

ENACT Africa, 2022. 11p.

By Julia P. Schleimer, Christopher D. McCort, Aaron B. Shev, Veronica A. Pear, Elizabeth Tomsich, Alaina De Biasi, Shani Buggs, Hannah S. Laqueur & Garen J. Wintemute

Background: Firearm violence is a significant public health problem in the United States. A surge in firearm purchasing following the onset of the coronavirus pandemic may have contributed to an increase in firearm violence. We sought to estimate the state-level association between firearm purchasing and interpersonal firearm violence during the pandemic. Methods: Cross-sectional study of the 48 contiguous states and the District of Columbia from January 2018 through July 2020. Data were obtained from the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (a proxy for firearm purchasing) and the Gun Violence Archive. Using negative binomial regression models, we estimated the association between cumulative excess firearm purchases in March through July 2020 (measured as the difference between observed rates and those expected from autoregressive integrated moving average models) and injuries (including nonfatal and fatal) from intentional, interpersonal firearm violence (non-domestic and domestic violence). Results: We estimated that there were 4.3 million excess firearm purchases nationally from March through July 2020 and a total of 4075 more firearm injuries than expected from April through July. We found no relationship between state-level excess purchasing and non-domestic firearm violence, e.g., each excess purchase per 100 population was associated with a rate ratio (RR) of firearm injury from non-domestic violence of 0.76 (95% CI: 0.50– 1.02) in April; 0.99 (95% CI: 0.72–1.25) in May; 1.10 (95% CI: 0.93–1.32) in June; and 0.98 (95% CI: 0.85–1.12) in July. Excess firearm purchasing within states was associated with an increase in firearm injuries from domestic violence in April (RR: 2.60; 95% CI: 1.32–5.93) and May (RR: 1.79; 95% CI: 1.19–2.91), though estimates were sensitive to model specification. Conclusions: Nationwide, firearm purchasing and firearm violence increased substantially during the first months of the coronavirus pandemic. At the state level, the magnitude of the increase in purchasing was not associated with the magnitude of the increase in firearm violence. Increases in purchasing may have contributed to additional firearm injuries from domestic violence in April and May. Results suggest much of the rise in firearm violence during our study period was attributable to other factors, indicating a need for additional research.

Injury Epidemiology (2021) 8:43

By Ari Davis, Rose Kim, Cassandra Crifasi

Gun violence is an ongoing public health crisis in the United States that impacts the health and wellbeing of all of us. In 2020, during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. experienced an unprecedented spike in gun homicides. Many believed that this spike would be short-lived; levels of gun violence would subside as institutions effectively responded to the pandemic and people returned to their daily routines. This, unfortunately, was not the case. In 2021, for the second straight year, gun deaths reached the highest number ever recorded. Nearly 49,000 people died from gun violence in the U.S. in 2021. Each day, an average of 134 people died from gun violence—one death every 11 minutes. Gun homicides continued to rise in 2021, increasing 7.6% over the previous year. Gun suicides reached record levels, increasing 8.3%, the largest one-year increase recorded in over four decades. Guns, once again, were the leading cause of death among children and teens in 2021 accounting for more deaths than COVID-19, car crashes, or cancers. Coincident with the rise in gun-related deaths were record gun sales. Millions of first-time purchasers, including Black and Hispanic/Latino people, and women of all races and ethnicities, bought guns during the pandemic at unprecedented levels. Many of these purchasers were motivated by gun industry marketing claims that guns make you safer. Yet, this is far from the truth; gun ownership greatly increases the risk of dying by suicide and homicide. While it is too early to tell whether this surge in gun purchases contributed directly to the rise in gun violence the country is experiencing, we know that over the long run this influx of guns will only exacerbate the public health crisis of gun violence and worsen health disparities

Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions. Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health 2023. 45p.

Sarah Moshary, Bradley Shapiro & Sara Drango

This paper estimates consumer demand for firearms with the aim of predicting the likely impacts of firearm regulations on the number and types of guns in circulation. We first conduct a stated-choice-based conjoint analysis and estimate an individual-level demand model for firearms. We validate our estimates using aggregate moments from observational data. Next, we use our estimates to simulate changes in the number and types of guns in circulation under alternative regulations. Importantly, we find that bans or restrictions that specifically target “assault weapons” increase demand for handguns, which are associated with the vast majority of firearm-related violence. We provide distributions of consumer surplus under counterfactuals and discuss how those distributions could be useful for crafting policy.

Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), 2023. 

by Sierra Smucker, Max Griswold, Amanda Charbonneau, Rose Kerber, Terry L. Schell, Andrew R. Morral

Among researchers, policymakers, and advocates, momentum is growing to better understand the impact of firearm laws on a variety of outcomes (e.g., suicide, crime, defensive gun use, homicide). There is also a growing interest in data that can shed light on these relationships. One source of these data is the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). This system includes information used in background checks, the number and type of background checks processed, and details on the number of and reason for denials when NICS finds that an individual is prohibited from purchasing a firearm. In this tool, researchers provide detailed information about data associated with NICS and discuss the data's strengths and weaknesses for various gun policy evaluation objectives. The researchers also outline the substantial limitations to interpreting these data to assist researchers in this field. Finally, they provide these data to researchers to encourage further exploration and evaluation of how NICS data might be used for policy analysis.

Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 2022. 65p.

Benjamin L. Cavataro

This article argues that the status quo is unacceptable, and proposes a clear, workable solution. Congress should empower the Commission to regulate the safety of guns as products, without granting the Commission authority over "gun control" as traditionally understood. This approach resolves the inadequacies of industry self-regulation, tort, and state consumer law; appropriately leverages the existing Consumer Product Safety Act framework; and is consistent with the Commission’s longstanding oversight of holsters, gun locks, and gun safes. Under this approach, the firearms industry would be obligated to report safety defects, recall dangerously defective firearms, and offer remedies to consumers. The Commission could also consider adopting common-sense product safety standards (such as regulations to ensure that new firearms have functional safety devices, and do not discharge without a trigger pull), just as the Commission adopts safety standards for many other consumer products. But the Commission would be precluded from regulating guns to curtail gun violence or suicide, or to reduce guns’ prevalence.

This approach is fully compatible with the Second Amendment in light of New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen (2022). And lifting the firearms industry’s immunity from product safety law—thereby regulating guns as products—has helpful implications for broader debates on gun law and policy. By establishing that Commission regulation could simultaneously protect the public from harm and facilitate the right to lawful self-defense, this Article’s proposal demonstrates that some gun regulations can concurrently respect gun rights, uphold consumers’ rights, and protect lives—and, in doing so, reveals fissures between the interests of the gun industry and gun owners.

 Forthcoming in George Washington Law Review, Vol. 92 (2024),

By Joel Negin, Philip Alpers and Rebecca Peters   

The Australian experience with firearm regulation provides important lessons for other jurisdictions with high rates of gun violence. This example demonstrates that taking a public health approach to firearm injury prevention by reducing access, strengthening regulation, and engaging the community can reduce gun deaths. Along with emerging evidence in New Zealand after the Christchurch mosque massacre, it also shows that a mass shooting incident can be a galvanising event for a country to improve policies on a wide scale.. Australia’s sweeping policy change used a substantial amount of the political capital of the relatively new, right-leaning Prime Minister. The support of many conservatives was crucial and was secured by overwhelming pro-firearm regulation opinion polls and media pressure. Gun policy reforms were supported by all major political parties, whereas conservative parties in many other countries staunchly oppose such reforms. The success of firearm regulation has since become a source of pride for many Australians. Mass shootings account for a small proportion of firearm-related deaths, but they tend to receive a substantial amount of media coverage and can focus the attention of the public and politicians on gun violence more broadly. Although preventing gun deaths is essential, focusing on deaths obscures another tragic reality of firearm violence. Beyond the people killed with firearms, a larger number are injured and have life-changing pain, disability, and psychological distress, which leads to substantial expenses related to medical care, mental health care, and rehabilitation. Australian firearm policy now focuses more than it did in the mid-1990s on domestic and family violence, which often involves additional victims besides intimate partners, including children. While firearm injury prevention has been a notable public health success in Australia, the field of firearm injury prevention is remarkably under-researched and poorly understood. This public policy gap undermines gun control successes. Data on firearms and firearm violence in Australia is patchy, inconsistent, and incomplete. Most studies are based only on deaths and ignore injuries completely. Eight jurisdictions store widely variable data, often in obsolete and inaccurate firearm registers. In order to support the policy response, strong data collection and data use, as well as data-sharing across jurisdictions, are required. This can allow the monitoring of trends and impacts as well as the analysis of the impact of policy changes over time    

Halifax, NS: The Joint Federal/Provincial Commission into the April 2020 Nova Scotia Mass Casualty, 2022. 49p.

By Meenakshi Balakrishna and Kenneth C. Wilbur

How well do firearm markets comply with firearm restrictions? The Massachusetts Attorney General issued an Enforcement Notice in 2016 to announce a new interpretation of the key phrase “copies and duplicates” in the state’s assault weapons ban. The Enforcement Notice increased assault rifle sales by 1,349 (+560%) within five days, followed by a reduction of 211 (- 58%) over the next three weeks. Assault rifle sales were 64-66% lower in 2017 than in comparable earlier periods, suggesting that the Enforcement Notice reduced assault weapon sales but also that many banned weapons continued to be sold.

Unpublished paper, University of California, San Diego, 2021. 50p.

By Chelsea Parsons and Eugenio Weigend

From the earliest days of his presidential campaign, a constant refrain from Donald Trump has been the need to protect the United States from foreign threats, particularly violent crime that he falsely asserts is committed at high rates by immigrants to this country. The Trump administration’s protectionist, isolationist, nativist, and racist immigration policy is founded on the scurrilous notion that the United States needs to close the borders and restrict immigration to the country as a way to protect against the entry of violent crime. However, often overlooked in this debate is the degree to which exportation of violence goes in the other direction—that is to say, from the United States to other countries—and, in particular, the substantial U.S. role in providing guns that are used in lethal violence in other nations. From 2014 to 2016, across 15 countries in North America, Central America, and the Caribbean, 50,133 guns that originated in the United States were recovered as part of criminal investigations. Put another way, during this span, U.S.- sourced guns were used to commit crimes in nearby countries approximately once every 31 minutes. Certainly, many of these U.S.-sourced crime guns were legally exported and were not diverted for criminal use until they crossed the border. The United States is a major manufacturer and a leading exporter of firearms, legally exporting an average of 298,000 guns each year. However, many of the same gaps and weaknesses in U.S. gun laws that contribute to illegal gun trafficking domestically likewise contribute to the illegal trafficking of guns from the United States to nearby nations. This report discusses the scope of the problem of U.S. guns being trafficked abroad and used in the commission of violent crimes in other nations. For example, in 2015, a trafficking ring bought more than 100 guns via straw purchases in the Rio Grande Valley of the United States and smuggled them to Mexico. At least 14 of these firearms were recovered in Mexico.

Washington, DC: Center for American Progress, 2018. 24p.

By Jenni Irish-Qhobosheane

The assassination of a South African police detective investigating a guns-to-gangs syndicate has brought into sharp focus the links between corrupt elements of the police and the criminal underworld, and the fraudulent channels through which police-issue firearms are sold to criminals.

It has also reinforced how systemic corruption at the firearms registry has been an ongoing problem that has subverted the aims of South Africa’s Firearms Control Act – legislation designed to prevent the dissemination of firearms in the country, and which, ironically, is implemented by the registry.

This paper examines how the entity responsible for controlling civilian access to firearms became so embroiled in corruption that criminal syndicates have been able to infiltrate the registry and acquire firearm licences.

Geneva, SWIT: Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, 2020. 22p.

By Kenneth J. Novak and William R. King

This report presents the findings and methodology of an evaluation of the implementation and impact of the Kansas City Crime Gun Intelligence Center (CGIC) for the years 2017 and 2020, a multi-agency approach for collecting, managing, analyzing, and using information or intelligence derived from or associated with firearms. The CGIC business model involves collaborative partnerships among local agencies in addressing gun-related crime. CGIC activities include the comprehensive collection of ballistic evidence, timely entry and correlation, crime-gun tracing, ATF analysis, identification of NIBIN leads, collaboration between local and federal law enforcement agencies, and prosecution of offenders who commit gun crimes.

Washington, DC: National Gun Crime Intelligence Center Initiative Bureau of Justice Assistance, U.S. Department of Justice 2020. 100p.

By Craig Uchida, Marc L. Swatt, Allison Q. Land, Kyle Anderson and Samantha Hock

Denver’s CGIC was conceived as a program that would “focus on gun violence” -- emphasizing shooters and those who commit gun-related crimes (J. Russell, personal communication October 2020). Using data- and forensic-driven approaches, an interagency collaboration was developed between ATF and DPD. Relying on research on gun violence and crime lab forensics, ATF and DPD leveraged the ATF’s National Integrated Ballistics Information Network (NIBIN) to identify critical links between gun casings, gun-related incidents, and those using firearms. NIBIN information and eTrace were used to link ballistics evidence recovered from firearms and casings to other shooting incidents. They showed the ability to identify heretofore unknown perpetrators and generate forensic evidence leading to the arrest and convictions of gun-crime offenders.

Los Angeles: Justice & Security Strategies, Inc., 2020. 102p.