Each year in the United States guns are used three to five times as often for defensive purposes as for criminal purposes. (Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control, Gary Kleck, Aldine de Gruyter, 1997)

Forty-four states have guarantees of the Right to Keep and Bear Arms in their constitutions.

Three out of four violent crimes committed in the U.S. do not involve firearms. Since 1991, the number of privately owned firearms in the U.S. has increased between 65-70 million, and the nation’s murder rate has decreased 43%. (BATFE and FBI)

Two of every three defensive uses of firearms are carried out with handguns. Private citizens benefit from handguns for the same reason that the police do: handguns are easy to carry and they are effective defensive tools. (Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control, Gary Kleck, Aldine de Gruyter, 1997)

In 1903, Congress enacted and President Theodore Roosevelt signed a law to provide federal funding for a program intended to increase civilian proficiency with military service firearms for national defense purposes. The law established the Civilian Marksmanship Program.

According to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story (1833): “The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered, as the palladium of the liberties of the republic; since it offers a strong moral check against usurpation and arbitrary power of the rulers.”

The annual number of accidental gun deaths among children has declined 89% since 1975. Today, the odds against a child dying in a gun accident are a million to one. Seventy-eight times as many children die in accidents involving or due to motor vehicles, suffocation, drowning, fire, bicycles and falls. (National Center for Health Statistics)