March 27, 2008

Gallup : 73% Support Individual Right to Arms

This is good news, though, as AllahPundit notes, an April, 2007 poll found that nearly two-thirds of "the public" feels that it's more important to "control gun ownership" than to "protect gun owners' rights." Fortunately, that's a nearly meaningless statistic by itself. One person asked that question might be thinking of whether he wants the mentally-challenged convicted felon next door to own a legal machine gun. Another person might be thinking of whether he wants terrorists being free to carry guns onto airplanes. Who knows what images dance through the head of a non-gun-owner when asked about restrictions on ownership and use of firearms? Despite whatever fantastical thoughts may dance in my yankee grandma's head, where the rubber actually meets the road, the public has been broadly supportive of actual liberalization of gun control laws in the real world. This trend squares with piles of other polling data showing that, in general, the American public is decidedly pro-gun.

In general, the only way pollsters can get a decidedly negative reaction from poll respondents is to work the word "automatic" into the question, usually as part of the word "semi-automatic." Thus, a question about "semi-automatic pistols" almost always gets a different result than a question about "revolvers." A meaningful poll would actually present various guns to the poll respondents and ask, "would you support banning this gun?" I'm guessing the answer would generally be "no," even for semi-automatics, though some of the guns considered "scary-looking"--particularly the AK-47 variants--might draw majority support for a ban. After all, how many people have ever seen a semi-auto AK variant being fired from a bench rest in a controlled manner, one round at a time? Very few. How many people have seen dozens--if not hundreds--of AK variants in action movies, wildly spraying bullets in full auto? Close to 100%. The general public simply doesn't comprehend the difference, and this fact shows up in the poll numbers.

In practice, the recent trend in this country, especially in the South, has been been to liberalize, rather than constrict, gun ownership. Twenty years ago, states with "shall issue" laws for concealed carry were the exception. These days, they're the rule. Texas recently changed its penal code to allow pretty much all law-abiding citizens to carry handguns in their cars with no need for a permit or license. Other than the standard list of hippie bed-wetters, there's been no meaningful outcry or backlash against these pro-gun changes in the law. Similar patterns have shown up in other states of the Union.