Gun violence

“ Between 1985 and 1992, the number of juvenile homicides not involving guns increased by 20 percent, while the number involving guns jumped by 300 percent. Because guns are easily available, routine fights among young people often turn into gun battles. Then, as the tragic cycle of violence repeats itself, more and more young people, fearing for their safety, arm themselves. The resulting escalation of gun violence and death threatens the Nation's most precious resource for the future-our young people. ”

“ These organizations all have a critical role to play.
Gun violence may not be in the headlines today or right now, but gun violence continues to fracture American communities and American families every single day. Last year, we saw a historic spike in homicides across America. And we know gun violence in our cities disproportionately affects black and brown individuals. ”

“ Gun violence not only impacts its victims, but also their families, friends, colleagues, first responders, and local communities. These brave voices—along with the majority of gun-owners who support commonsense measures to keep our communities safe—are speaking up and speaking out for public policy that will put a stop to the violence. ”

“ Engaging in Public Health Research on the Causes and Prevention of Gun Violence
In addition to being a law enforcement challenge, gun violence is also a serious public health issue that affects thousands of individuals, families, and communities across the Nation. Each year in the United States there are approximately 30,000 firearm-related deaths, and approximately 11,000 of those deaths result from homicides. ”

“ The President has spent his entire career working to address gun violence, and his determination to act has been redoubled by senseless killings we’ve seen — both in mass shootings, like this, and in the lives lost to the epidemic of gun violence every single day in communities across our country. ”

“ Significant strides can be made by assessing the causes of gun violence and the successful efforts in place for preventing the misuse of firearms. Taking these steps will improve our understanding of the gun violence epidemic and will aid in the continued development of gun violence prevention strategies. ”

“ Last night, as I was coming to the Oval office, I got the word that, in South Carolina, a physician with his wife, two grandchildren, and a person working at his house was gunned down — all five. So many people — so many of the people sitting here today know that well, unfortunately. You know, they know what it’s like when the seconds change your life forever. ”

“ They’re exempt.
I know that the conversation about guns in this country can be a difficult one. But even here, there’s much more common ground than we — anyone would believe. There’s much more common ground. ”

“ Those at the front strove madly to retreat from the fire-spitting guns in their very faces, and those in the rear pressed as madly forward to the attack. The bullets from the big 45:90's drove through half a dozen men at a shot, and the passageway, gorged with surging, helpless men, became a shambles. The rifles, pumped without aim into the mass, withered it away like a machine gun, and against that steady stream of death no man could advance. ”

“ The number of duels each gun was in was carefully counted, every scar got in battle was treasured, and the men around their camp-fires, at their scanty messes, or on the march, bragged of them among themselves and avouched them as witnesses. New recruits coming in to fill the gaps made by the killed and disabled, readily fell in with the common mood and caught the spirit like a contagion. It was not an uncommon thing for a wheel to be smashed in by a shell, but if it happened to one gun oftener than to another there was envy. ”

“ We had left our cast-iron beak in the side of the Cumberland. Like the wasp, we could sting but once, leaving it in the wound.
Our smoke-stack was riddled, our flag was shot down several times, and was finally secured to a rent in the stack. On our gun-deck the men were fighting like demons. There was no thought or time for the wounded and dying as they tugged away at their guns, training and sighting their pieces while the orders rang out, "Sponge, load, fire!"
"The muzzle of our gun has been shot away," cried one of the gunners. ”

“ They had seen man after man struck down at the gun, they could hear the hiss and whitt of the bullets over their heads, the constant cracker-like smacks of others that hit the parapet, and—they hung back. ”

“ When a person is ordered to be blown from a gun, he is taken to the one which is fired daily to announce the hour of midday, and is fixed on a small hill close to the Sherpur cantonment. He is there tied to the gun in such a manner that his back is against the muzzle, and on the explosion of the charge the greater part of his body is blown into pieces. Blowing from guns is a punishment intended to strike terror into the hearts of others, but it is no doubt a preferable death to other forms of execution, inasmuch as it is sudden. ”

“ In former days, when daggers only were used, a man avoided a stronger foe, and waited for a chance to stab him in the back. But guns are now so common that any man with a grievance finds it easy to take the life of an enemy. Guns are seen everywhere. The shepherd guards his flock with a gun on his back; the travelling pedlar slings one over his shoulder; the driver of the diligence would as soon forget his whip as his gun. Small boys save up the odd coppers that they can earn or beg in the big towns, and carefully hoard them till they can afford to buy a gun, or at least a pistol. ”

“ He gave a scream of fear, and an unearthly screech answered him. The guard, with the exception of one man, turned tail and ran. One man stuck by his gun and poured a stream of bullets into the crack. The retreating men could hear the rattle of the gun for a few moments and then there was a choking scream, followed by silence. When the officer of the day got back with a patrol, there was a heavy smell of musk in the air, and a good deal of blood was splashed around. The machine-guns were both there, although one of them was twisted up until it looked like it had been through an explosion. ”

“ A recent study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention looking at 30 years of homicide data found that for every 1 percent increase in a State’s gun ownership rate, there is a nearly 1 percent increase in its firearm homicide rate. ”

“ And yet, we make absolutely no effort to keep deadly weapons out of dangerous hands. We do attempt to forbid their concealment. Practically this attempt is a failure and, in effect, we permit men to carry deadly weapons which may be successfully concealed until the very moment they are brought into use.
A great deal of the lurid literature has grown up around the pistol. The cowboy with his gun play has always been an attractive character in fiction. No doubt there is a time in the pioneer life of a community when there seems to be some excuse for the use of the revolver. ”

“ Its beautiful arrangement of locks, and springs, and catches, and bolts, and pins, and screws, its unaccountable perversities, its occasional fits of sulkiness, its lovely brown complexion, and its capacity both for kicking and for smoking, all prove that a gun is in reality a sentient being of a very high order of intelligence. You may be quite certain that if you abuse your gun, even when you may imagine it to be far out of earshot, comfortably cleaned and put to roost on its rack, your gun will resent it. Why are most sportsmen so silent, so distraits at breakfast? ”

“ The rising sound of the reports told plainly of the swinging muzzle, and officers and men dropped flat in the mud and waited till the sweeping bullets had passed over their heads. Men may work on and 'chance it' against rifle fire alone, but the sweep of a machine-gun is beyond chance, and very near to the certainty of sudden death to all in the circle of its swing. ”

“ And in the Klondike and this same British Yukon there is a Firearms Act which makes it against the law for any civilian to tote a gun. And that law is sure carried out. Fact is, there's no need for a gun. ”

“ Since 1992, the national violent crime rate has dropped by more than 20 percent; violent crimes committed with firearms have dropped by 35 percent; and the firearms homicide rate has fallen over 40 percent. We have achieved much of this progress by embracing a collaborative, community-based approach to gun crime prevention and reduction. ”

“ If a man should walk down the street here with a loaded revolver in his pocket he could be arrested and imprisoned, or fined, but in this State a man could walk down the street with a shot gun in his hands or any other weapon where it is exposed so people could see it. A law against carrying concealed weapons imposes no burden upon any law-abiding citizen. There are regulations, of course, permitting certain persons to carry weapons concealed, police officers, a sheriff, and other peace officers ”

“ THE FIRST QUESTION the Defendant raised through his final appeal was whether or not he murdered the Deceased torturously or cruelly, the Supreme Court entertained an opinion that: For a gun is destructively powerful by nature, it may be used to cause lethal danger to either human beings or animals. The facts that the Defendant shot the Deceased’s head―one of the most essential parts of the body―and that the bullet shot came into her left temple and went out of her right temple, indicated the Defendant’s intent to have her died immediately. ”

“ I know guns have this power of projecting horrible emanations of themselves into the slumbers of sportsmen who have not treated them as they deserved. I have suffered from it myself. It was only last week that, having said something derogatory to the dignity of my second gun, I woke with a start at two o'clock in the morning, and found its wraith going through the most horrible antics in a patch of moonlight on my bed-room floor. I shot with that gun on the following day, and missed nearly everything I shot at. ”

“ I met a child whose mother was killed by an assault rifle. It was heartbreaking, and it was an outrage.
These kind of attacks happen too often. They shatter lives. They destroy families. And more and more, they kill children. Violent crime crowds our emergency rooms and drains our medical resources. And it is siphoning away our humanity. Gunshot wounds are now the major cause of death among teenage boys.
My visits with these victims yesterday made me more determined than ever to win passage of our crime bill. ”

“ Firearms are not often used in these encounters between the police and the populace, for such battles always take place in daylight, and although, when an eviction promises to be of more than usual danger, the police carry rifles, strict orders are given not to use them save in dire extremity, and a policeman will be beaten almost to death without resorting to the use of his gun. ”

“ Sometimes, when a line of men is crawling through the grass tracking an animal, the trigger of a gun will catch in the stalks, the gun will explode, there will be a scream of a man in the agony of death, and the scared owner of the gun will be charged with murder, for there are no accidents in native law. ”

“ The assailants were all trained shots, men who lived by their guns, and to whom a shaking hand or a dim eye meant poverty and hunger. Every slit and crack and loop-hole was marked, and a cap held above the stockade was blown in an instant from the gun barrel which supported it. ”

“ The bullet is the bold—fearless—and often cruel companion of the report of the gun, and loses in its velocity the farther it flies, being impeded and resisted by the air, and at last is left flattened and out of shape, a dead weight, while the report of the gun passes on very swiftly, and dies away in the distance to be heard no more. I have often heard the reports of guns very plainly that were fired at ducks on Detroit River, six or seven miles away. ”

“ That they were real simon-pure sportsmen could be seen at a glance, and yet, when the after-dinner speeches were made, the sentiments which received the most enthusiastic applause were those which DENOUNCED THE KILLING OF MAN OR BEAST. It could readily be seen that these men only used the gun when it was necessary to procure food or in self-defence. ”

“ He took his revolver and fired at it, aiming to hit it just in front and below the hammer, its most vulnerable part. Instead, the bullet hits the ground and ricocheting enters the breast of the dead man. He shudders as the body stirs from the force of the shot, although he knows that life has been gone for hours. Everything is plain to him now why his other shots had not taken effect. He was unnerved. How could a man with a hole through his body hope to hit anything. He had heard of men shot through the heart killing their assailants, and had often wondered if he could do it. ”

“ A pistol is the one weapon that has no legitimate use. An axe, a knife—even a rifle, has some lawful function. But a pistol is an appliance for killing human beings. It has no other purpose whatever. A man who is found with house-breaking tools in his possession is assumed to be a house-breaker. Surely a man who carries a pistol convicts himself of the intention to kill somebody.
"But perhaps the police had some reasonable plan. ”

“ Of course the boy was shot, but at the same time the man on the horse shot the deputy, and left town at a gallop.
A man who will receive a gun in this manner has no chance, even if sober, unless he is like lightning, because as his hand touches the butt the other man shoots. Not necessarily because he wishes to take any advantage of the other, but because he is all keyed up and shoots involuntarily the moment he sees the other man is armed: somewhat the same impulse that causes false starts in square racing. I saw a case in the Silver King Saloon in San Antonio one night. ”

“ Carelessness with fire-arms was then not so common a cause of serious accident, it seems, as at the present time, but one instance is recorded in August of this year, when a young German man-servant employed in one of the families of the village, with great recklessness, pointed a gun, not supposing it loaded, at a female servant, and discharging it, killed her instantly. ”