Regulating Gun Sales: An Excerpt from Reducing Gun Violence in America, Informing Policy with Evidence and Analysis

Regulating Gun Sales

Daniel W. Webster, Jon S. Vernick,

Emma E. McGinty, and Ted Alcorn

AN EXCERPT FROM

Reducing Gun Violence in America

Informing Policy with Evidence and Analysis

EDITED BY Daniel W. Webster, ScD, MPH

and Jon S. Vernick, JD, MPH

Center for Gun Policy and Research

Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health

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© 2013 The Johns Hopkins University Press

All rights reserved. Published 2013

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ISBN 13: 978-1-4214-1172-9

ISBN 10: 1-4214-1172-5

Regulating Gun Sales originally appeared as chapter 8, Preventing the Diversion of Guns to Criminals through Effective Firearm Sales Laws, in Reducing Gun Violence in America: Informing Policy with Evidence and Analysis.

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Contents

Introduction

Michael R. Bloomberg

Regulating Gun Sales

Daniel W. Webster, Jon S. Vernick, Emma E. McGinty, and Ted Alcorn

Consensus Recommendations for Reforms to Federal Gun Policies

Introduction

Michael R. Bloomberg

On December 14, 2012, a deranged young man pulled into the parking lot of the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, and then shot his way into the building with a high-capacity semi-automatic rifle. The slaughter of 6 adults and 20 children really broke the country’s heart, and for many Americans this is the straw that has broken the camel’s back.

Since the Sandy Hook massacre, more than 100 mayors from across the country have joined the bipartisan coalition Mayors Against Illegal Guns. The total number of mayors involved is now more than 800. As of January 14, 2013, roughly one million Americans have signed on to the coalition’s I Demand a Plan campaign against gun violence. Vice President Joe Biden will announce his recommendations for action to President Barack Obama this week. The vice president knows that as horrific as Sandy Hook has been, as have all the other seemingly endless episodes of mass violence, we experience that level of carnage, or worse, every single day across our country, because every day of the year, an average of 33 Americans are murdered with guns.

Michael R. Bloomberg is the 108th