Campus Gun Control Works Boston Review httpbostonrevi.docx

Campus Gun Control Works
Boston Review
http://bostonreview.net/us/evan-defilippis-guns-schools-nra-
ucsb
Evan DeFilippis
June 06, 2014
After his son Christopher was gunned down near the campus of
the University of California,
Santa Barbara on May 23, Richard Martinez sounded what has
become a famous plea.
“Why did Chris die?” he asked, choking back tears. “Chris died
because of craven, irresponsible
politicians and the [National Rifle Association]. They talk about
gun rights. What about Chris’s
right to live?” He went on, “When will this insanity stop? . . .
We don’t have to live like this.”
In response to Martinez’s impassioned appeal for gun control,
the cavalcade of bumper-sticker
slogans rolled in—“guns don’t kill people, people kill people,”
“control criminals, not guns,”
“don’t punish law abiding citizens,” and so on.

The NRA has been silent on the shooting, as is its usual media
strategy following high-profile
gun violence. But we know its position: the solution to gun
violence is always more guns.
Thus the express goal of the NRA and other pro-gun groups is
to promote the concealed carrying
of firearms on college campuses. As the NRA puts it, “Colleges
rely on colorful ‘no gun’ signs,
foolishly expecting compliance from psychopaths.”
To this end, the NRA and state legislators are pushing guns at
every level of schooling. The
lobby backed a new Indiana law that allows guns on school
property, so long as they are
contained within parked cars.“Teachers have to leave their 2nd
Amendment rights at the front
door when they go to work,” said Indiana Senator Brent Steele,
explaining why he supported the
measure, in spite of the fact that the courts have never wavered
on the constitutionality of gun
bans on school property. A bill in Nebraska, if passed, would
allow teachers and school
employees to carry concealed handguns in schools. In Idaho
Governor Butch Otter recently

signed a law that allows residents with “enhanced concealed-
carry permits” to keep firearms on
college campuses. A similar bill passed a Florida Senate panel
but ultimately was voted down.
The consistent refrain from conservative lawmakers and the gun
lobby has been that such
legislation will enhance security in schools. The logic is that if
students and teachers are armed,
or at least protected by armed guards, shootings such as those at
Columbine High School in
1999, Virginia Tech in 2007, Sandy Hook Elementary School in
2012, UCSB, and, yesterday,
Seattle Pacific University, either will not occur or will be less
deadly.
Yet the evidence points in the opposite direction. Schools,
including college campuses,
exemplify the success of gun control. Though our schools are
far deadlier than those of other
http://bostonreview.net/us/evan-defilippis-guns-schools-nra-
ucsb
http://bostonreview.net/author/evan-defilippis
http://www.conservative-daily.com/2014/05/25/proof-gun-
control-doesnt-work/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/josh-sugarmann/the-nras-post-
massacre-sc_b_47043.html
http://www.nraila.org/news-issues/in-the-news/2012/10/allow-
concealed-carry-on-campus.aspx

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/03/13/ind-
lawmakers-ok-guns-in-school-parking-lots-/6398679/
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/feb/28/bill-to-
allow-guns-in-neb-schools-draws-concerns/?page=all
http://www.idahostatesman.com/2014/03/12/3076771/otter-
signs-campus-guns-bill-into.html
http://www.idahostatesman.com/2014/03/12/3076771/otter-
signs-campus-guns-bill-into.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-
nation/wp/2014/06/05/shooting-at-seattle-pacific-
university/?tid=sm_fb
countries with stricter gun control policies, they are safer than
other corners of America that lack
stringent constraints on guns.
How Safe Is School?
Despite the fact that the United States compares favorably to
other high-income nations in terms
of school bullying rates, we are the exception in terms of lethal
school violence. The most
comprehensive study of school shootings to date—
encompassing thirty-eight countries between
1764 and 2009—found that the United States had one less mass
shooting than all the other
countries combined.
The disparity in lethal school violence between the United
States and other countries is almost

entirely a function of firearm prevalence. It is not a coincidence
that, in the United States, the
vast majority of mass killings are carried out with a firearm,
while in China, which had the
second highest rate of mass killings in the dataset, not a single
one was carried out with a gun.
But while Americanschools may be less safe than their
international counterparts, they are still
among the safest places in the United States.
Schools are safer than other corners of America that lack
stringent constraints on guns.
Among school-age children, less than 1 percent of homicides
occur either on school grounds or
on the way to school, even though far more than 1 percent of
students’ time is spent in school
and en route. A Justice Department study showed that, between
1995 and 2002, college students
between the ages of eighteen and twenty-four experienced 24
percent less violence than non-
college students in the same age group. When college students
experienced violence, it occurred
off-campus 93 percent of the time.
These sanguine statistics are a reflection of the near universal

prohibition of firearms by
academic institutions. At least thirty-eight states ban firearms
on school grounds, and sixteen
explicitly prohibit concealed carry on campus. Such policies
enjoy massive public support:
according to one survey carried out by researchers at the
Harvard School of Public Health, 94
percent of Americans feel less safe when fellow citizens “bring
their guns into restaurants,
college campuses, sports stadiums, bars, hospitals, or
government buildings” and
“overwhelmingly, the public believes that in many venues gun
carrying should be prohibited.”
So just what sort of effect would guns on school grounds have?
For starters, we can be confident
they would not decrease school violence.
Public Carrying Doesn’t Reduce Crime
One of the intellectual touchstones behind the pro-gun
movement’s support for extending
concealed carry permits to schools is John R. Lott’s book More
Guns, Less Crime, first released
in 1998 and since updated twice. In response to the book’s
claims, a sixteen-member panel of the
National Research Council convened in 2004 and again in 2010

to address the relationship
between right-to-carry laws and crime rates and both times
found that, at best, concealed carry
http://archive.aciajj.org/the-acia-archive/datasets-available-for-
analysis/shooting-incidents-in-educational-
settings/?_ga=1.84752922.2054412121.1398243848
http://archive.aciajj.org/the-acia-archive/datasets-available-for-
analysis/shooting-incidents-in-educational-
settings/?_ga=1.84752922.2054412121.1398243848
http://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/youthviolence/schoolvio
lence/savd.html
http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/vvcs00.pdf
http://www.pewstates.org/projects/stateline/headlines/va-tech-
tragedy-revives-gun-controversy-85899386882
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11770652
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1632599
laws have a negligible effect on crime rates. At worst,
concealed carrying increases rates of
aggravated assault. Two legal scholars, Ian Ayres and John
Donohue, further reviewed Lott’s
findings and discovered that his data contain numerous coding
and econometric errors that, when
corrected, yield the opposite conclusion: right-to-carry laws
increase crime. This was the second
time Lott presented findings with “convenient” coding errors,
and, when confronted by Ayres

and Donohue’s research, he removed his name from a paper that
claimed to confirm his results.
One of the largest and most recent studies on gun violence in
America concludes that widespread
gun ownership is the driving force behind violence. The study
compiles data from all fifty states
between 1981 and 2010 to examine the relationship between gun
ownership and homicide. After
accounting for national trends in violent crime as well as
eighteen control variables, the study
concludes, “For each percentage point increase in gun
ownership the firearm homicide rate
increased by 0.9%.” This research is consistent with evidence
showing that even in “gun utopias”
such as Israel and Switzerland, more guns means more violence.
Another large study compared 91 case workplaces with 205
control workplaces and found that
workers whose job sites allow guns are about five times more
likely to be killed on the job than
are those whose workplaces prohibit all firearms.
Given the weight of evidence demonstrating the danger of
carrying guns in public settings, it is
extremely unlikely that more guns would make schools safer.

Why Allowing Guns on Campus is an Especially Bad Idea
In a recent editorial in the Chronicle of Higher Education,
former Idaho State University Provost
Gary Olson spoke to the realities of firearms on campus, their
limited potential to improve
safety, and the near certainty that they would have the opposite
effect. “There is no recorded
incident in which a victim—or spectator—of a violent crime on
a campus has prevented that
crime by brandishing a weapon,” Olson wrote. “In fact, campus
police officers report that
increasing the number of guns on a campus would increase
police problems exponentially,
especially in ‘active shooter’ situations.” Ninety-five percent of
university presidents share his
opposition to concealed carrying on campus.
If we take a sober assessment—one that will be sorely lacking
at college keggers—it is not
difficult to imagine the ramifications of widespread gun
ownership at colleges. Alcohol abuse,
bullying and hazing, high population density, and academic
stressors are all predictive of
violence—and all are ubiquitous on college campuses.

Guns and Alcohol Don’t Mix
Thirty-one percent of college students meet the DSM-IV criteria
for alcohol abuse, and alcohol is
used in 95 percent of violent crimes, 90 percent of rapes, and 66
percent of suicides among
college students. Alcohol consumption renders police officers,
people trained to use firearms,
unfit for duty, so what should we expect from students who lack
the preparation and discipline of
police officers?
http://islandia.law.yale.edu/ayers/ayres_donohue_article.pdf
http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2003/04/25/0426/
http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2003/04/25/0426/
http://johnrlott.tripod.com/Plassmann_Whitley.pdf
http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/pdf/10.2105/AJPH.2013.30
1409
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1449263/
http://chronicle.com/article/Campuses-Under-Fire/132223/
http://cms.bsu.edu/news/articles/2014/6/study-most-college-
and-university-presidents-dont-want-guns-on-campus
http://cms.bsu.edu/news/articles/2014/6/study-most-college-
and-university-presidents-dont-want-guns-on-campus
http://archive.sph.harvard.edu/cas/Documents/dependence_0602
/

The most recent survey of firearm ownership on college
campuses found that gun-owning
students are more likely than non–gun owning students to
engage in dangerous behavior such as
binge drinking and, when inebriated, participate in activities
that increase the risk of life-
threatening injury to themselves and others. These include
drunk driving, vandalism, and
physical violence.
Given excessive consumption of drugs and alcohol on campus,
the best a college can do is take
precautionary measures to minimize the chance that lapses in
judgment and drug- or alcohol-
induced impulsivity will become lethal in the presence of a
firearm. The only way to do this is to
prohibit or at least strictly control guns on campus. It is simply
not possible for campus police to
monitor every party to ensure that those possessing guns are
sober enough to do so. In any case,
gun control is practically required in light of court rulings that
force universities to provide safe
premises to residents and visitors. Universities can be held
liable for criminal assault on school

grounds and for negligence in connection with social life on
campus.
It should be obvious that the combination of alcohol abuse and
firearms increases the potential
for serious violence. After all, the archetypical “rational actor”
is painfully sober. On a typical
weekend, the average college student hardly fits the profile of a
“good guy with a gun” advanced
by gun advocates.
Accidents Happen
Even without the presence of alcohol, accidents happen much
more often than gun advocates
would like to admit. And when accidents happen with guns, they
are often deadly. Individuals in
households with firearms, for example, are four times more
likely to die of accidental death than
those in households without firearms.
The NRA supports bills that permit guns to be carried in
vehicles on school grounds, arguing that
firearm owners should not be punished for accidentally leaving
a gun in their car. Curiously,
there seems to be little concern for what happens if the same
careless owner accidentally forgets

to lock his car, accidentally fails to put the safety on, or
accidently pulls the trigger, ad infinitum.
It seems clear that there are many more ways to accidentally go
wrong with a gun than there are
ways to go right, and this is especially true in a densely
populated, anxiety-ridden, alcohol-
saturated, hormone-fueled school environment.
Guns and Suicide
While suicide is the second leading cause of death among
college students, the rate of about 6.5
to 7.5 per 100,000 is roughly half that of a matched non-student
population. The difference in
suicide ratesbetween student and non-student populations is
explained almost completely by the
reduced access to firearms on college campuses. Consider that
suicides committed with firearms
represent only five percent of suicide attempts but more than
half of suicide fatalities. About
1,100 college students commit suicide each year, and another
24,000 attempt to do so. Given that
suicide attempts with a firearm are successful 90 percent of the
time, each one of these more than
25,000 attempts would almost certainly result in death if carried
out with a firearm.

On a typical weekend, the average college student hardly fits
the profile of a 'good guy with a
gun' advanced by gun advocates.
http://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ566409
http://www.childrensdefense.org/child-research-data-
publications/data/state-data-repository/protect-children-not-
guns-key-facts-2013.pdf
http://www.sprc.org/sites/sprc.org/files/library/college_sp_whit
epaper.pdf
http://www.nabita.org/documents/NewDataonNatureofSuicidalC
risis.pdf
risis.pdf
risis.pdf
The best studies to date show that the majority of suicides are
impulsive,with little deliberation
prior to the act. We also know that youths between the ages of
eighteen and twenty-five
experience the highest rates of mental illness in the general
population. These factors, combined
with high rates of alcohol and drug abuse, provide a compelling
reason to believe that the
nation’s suicide rate will increase if firearms are allowed on

college campuses.
Gun Theft
According to a Department of Justice report, between 2005 and
2010, an average of 232,000
firearms were stolen each year, primarily in residential
burglaries. In a survey of incarcerated
felons, about one-third of respondents report having stolen their
most recently acquired handgun.
Adorm room is one of the least secure places to store a firearm.
School dormitories are small,
cramped, shared spaces, and they receive a large number of
visitors. It would be difficult to
conceal the fact that a dorm resident owns a firearm; more
likely, the student would flaunt this
fact. This means it is a lot easier for a thief to identify potential
targets and successfully steal a
firearm. And once a gun is stolen, it is much more likely to be
used in a crime than if it were in
possession of its rightful owner.
Armed Students Are Unlikely To Stop Shooters
Even if a student or professor were to confront a shooter, their
chances of stopping a bad guy
with a gun would be slim. This should be self-evident given that

New York City Police, for
instance, only hit their target in 18 percent of cases. The
average student or professor would
likely have a substantially lower hit rate, thereby increasing the
threat to innocent bystanders.
A 20/20 segment, “If I Only Had a Gun,” showed just how
hopeless the average person is in
reacting effectively to high-stress situations. In the segment,
students with varying levels of
firearm experience were given hands-on police training
exceeding the level required by half the
states in order to obtain a concealed carry permit. Each of these
students was subsequently
exposed to a manufactured but realistic scenario in which,
unbeknownst to them, a man entered
their classroom and begin firing fake bullets at the lecturer and
students.
In each one of the cases, the reaction by the good guy with a
gun was abysmal. The first
participant, who had significant firing experience, couldn’t even
get the gun out of his holster.
The second participant exposed her body to the assailant and
was shot in the head. The third,
paralyzed with fear, couldn’t draw his weapon and was shot by

the assailant almost immediately.
The final participant, who had hundreds of hours of experience
with firearms, was unable to
draw his weapon and was shot at point blank range.
Stand Your Ground
A recent New York Times article, in brilliant tongue-and-cheek,
exposes some harrowing
prospects that could result from arming college campuses. The
author satirically asks if students
using laser-pointers in class or arguing over coffee is sufficient
cause to fire away. While this
may sound absurd, lax gun laws have created shooting scenarios
just like this. In recent years,
people have been shot over skittles, popcorn, and their choice of
music. It is easy to think up a
whole laundry list of relatively common occurrences that could
provide legal justification to
shoot at a student.
http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/fshbopc0510.pdf
https://www.ncjrs.gov/txtfiles/165476.txt
https://litigation-
essentials.lexisnexis.com/webcd/app?action=DocumentDisplay
&crawlid=1&doctype=cite&docid=47+Case+W.+Res.+979&srct
ype=smi&srcid=3B15&key=e1ed578c40bb3a431a2cd1e4446fad
1e

http://swampland.time.com/2013/01/16/your-brain-in-a-
shootout-guns-fear-and-flawed-instincts/
http://abcnews.go.com/2020/video/defend-gun-7312540
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/28/opinion/when-may-i-shoot-
a-student.html?_r=0
Heightening the risk of needless bloodshed, the states most
likely to push for guns on campuses
often have stand-your-ground laws as well. As Judge Debra
Nelson told jurors in the trial of
George Zimmerman for the killing of Trayvon Martin,
Zimmerman “had the right to stand his
ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he
reasonably believed that it was
necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm to
himself or another or to prevent the
commission of a forcible felony.”In other words, in a stand-
your-ground state, authority to end
another person’s life rests with one’s own perceptions and
convictions, with all their attendant
biases. In a high-stress environment such as college, where
rationality can be sorely lacking in
dangerous moments, the presence of a gun can only make the
situation worse, and stand-your-
ground laws provide ample room to shoot first and justify later.

Back to School
You are in college. You show up at a fraternity party late one
weekend. You don’t know much
about those attending, except that some may be carrying a
firearm due to a new policy permitting
concealed carry on campus. Do you feel more or less safe
knowing that some of the party
attendees may be armed and intoxicated?
If you are like 94 percent of Americans, you feel less safe
knowing that people in your
community carry guns into public spaces such as colleges. But
we need not rely only on the
public’s expressed preferences when it comes to gun control in
schools. The evidence is clear.
While gun advocates complain that control measures don’t
work, the case of our schools—and
workplaces—stands as a sharp rebuke: where guns are carefully
controlled, there is less gun
violence. And where young people are most vulnerable to heavy
drug and alcohol use, accidents,
theft, poor judgment, and impulsive behavior, more guns won’t
mean less crime but more
mayhem.

Article Citation:
DeFilippis, Evan. "Campus Gun Control Works." The Boston
Review. 6 June 2014. Web. 09 July 2015.
Ready, Fire, Aim: The College Campus Gun Fight
by Robert Birnbaum
Change: The Magazine of Higher Learning
September/October 2013
One side views guns as essential to personal freedom, while the
other side insists they are instruments for mayhem
and violence. … Every gun control proposal is an occasion for
pitched battles, with the stakes portrayed as nothing
less than the future of life, liberty and justice.
(Winkler, 2011b)
Twenty years ago, any discussion about permitting guns on
college campuses would have provoked as much

laughter as shock. Yet by 2012, guns were allowed on 200
public campuses in six states. That number appears
certain to increase; in 2011 alone, bills to permit guns on
campus were introduced in 23 state legislatures. Although
most of these bills failed, some were carried over to the
following legislative term.
Their proponents tend to be persistent, and we can expect bills
similar to these to be re-introduced in future years.
Guns may be coming soon to a campus near you—perhaps to
your own.
Two Perspectives
The question of whether guns should be permitted on college
and university campuses in the United States reflects
the tension between two competing perspectives. America has
both a robust gun culture and an equally robust (if
less well-known) gun-control culture.
The gun culture is as American as apple pie: There may be as
many as 300 million civilian guns in the US, or about
one for every person (Winkler, 2011a). The gun-control culture
also has a long history here; one of America's iconic
events, the 1881 gunfight at the OK corral, occurred when the
Earps and Doc Holliday tried to enforce a Tombstone
municipal ordinance banning guns in town.

The issue of guns on college campuses is presently a subject of
vigorous debate, stimulated by newspaper and on-
line headlines such as the following:
16 April 2007 – AT LEAST 33 KILLED IN VA. TECH
MASSACRE. (CBSNews.com, http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-
201_162-2686709.html)
14 February 2008 – 5 SHOT DEAD, INCLUDING GUNMAN,
AT NORTHERN ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY.
(CNN.com,
http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/02/14/university.shooting/)
11 February 2009 – FOUR DEAD IN UNIV. OF ARIZONA
SHOOTING. (CBSNews.com,
http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-201_162-527308.html)
12 February 2010 – PROFESSOR SAID TO BE CHARGED
AFTER 3 ARE KILLED IN ALABAMA. (The New York
Times,
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/13/us/13alabama.html?_r=0)
10 May 2011 – 3 DEAD IN SHOOTING AT SAN JOSE STATE
UNIVERSITY. (Los Angeles Times,
http://www.latimes.com/news/ktla-san-jose-state-shooting-
deaths,0,6943832.story)
Such headlines give the impression that the American college
campus is an increasingly dangerous place in which

neither students nor faculty are safe. In response, two
competing policy narratives have developed. One is that
campus violence could be prevented by increasing the number
of armed individuals on campus (I will call this
http://cbsnews.com/
http://cbsnews.com/
http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-201_162-2686709.html
http://cnn.com/
http://cnn.com/
http://cbsnews.com/
http://cbsnews.com/
http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-201_162-527308.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/13/us/13alabama.html?_r=0
http://www.latimes.com/news/ktla-san-jose-state-shooting-
deaths,0,6943832.story
position MoreGuns); the other is that campus violence would be
reduced by a total ban on weapons on campus (I
will call this position BanGuns).
The MoreGuns and BanGuns policy camps paint pictures of
starkly different futures, as reported by the American
Association of State Colleges and Universities in 2008:
Gun-rights advocates argue that easing gun restrictions could
enhance both individual and collective security on
campus and may deter violence. In contrast, the vast majority of
college administrators, law enforcement personnel
and students maintain that allowing concealed weapons on

campus will pose increased risks for students and
faculty, will not deter future attacks and will lead to confusion
during emergency situations.
The basic philosophical premise for MoreGuns is that self-
defense is an inherent right that should not be
compromised just because someone happens to be on a college
campus. MoreGuns advocates argue that college
students and faculty should be able to carry weapons for their
own protection, particularly since history has shown
that colleges can't protect them from assailants. They claim that
criminals would be less likely to use guns or commit
violent crimes if they had reason to believe that targeted
citizens, or others around them, might also be armed and
able to defend themselves. The alternative of establishing “gun-
free” zones doesn't work, they say: stickers on
campus saying “no guns allowed” just announce to criminals
and psychopaths the absence of defensive weapons.
The two philosophical bases for BanGuns are academic freedom
and academic autonomy. The Brady Center to
Prevent Gun Violence, in making the academic-freedom
argument, says that permitting students to have firearms
will
likely breed fear and paranoia among fellow students since no
one will know whether the other person can simply

retrieve or pull a gun out if a dispute arises. Such fear and
paranoia is antithetical to creating the kind of climate
where free and open academic debate and learning thrive.
(2007)
Academic-autonomy advocates believe that each institution
should have the responsibility for establishing policies
that promote both learning and campus security. Allowing
students and faculty to carry guns, if contrary to the
wishes of institutional trustees, could make campus security a
matter determined by untrained individuals who have
no legal responsibility for it.
Does either the MoreGuns or the BanGuns position improve
public safety? Two major national studies have used
similar data to examine the relationship between gun ownership
and degree of criminal activity—and they reached
diametrically opposed conclusions. One found that “allowing
citizens without criminal records or histories of
significant mental illness to carry concealed handguns deters
violent crimes” (Lott & Mustard, 1997). The other
concluded that “statistical evidence that these [concealed-carry]
laws have reduced crime is limited, sporadic, and
extraordinarily fragile,” and it suggested that making it easier to
get a firearms permit is associated with higher

levels of crime (Ayres & Donohue III, 2003).
The Campus Scene
Deadly violence on college campuses is not a new phenomenon.
A study jointly conducted by the Secret Service,
the Office of Education, and the FBI (Drysdale, Modzeleski &
Simons, 2010) analyzed 272 incidents of targeted
violence on college campuses that occurred between 1900 and
2008. Guns were used in 54 percent of the reported
cases, and almost 60 percent of fatal violent incidents were
instigated against someone previously known to the
assailant. The chances of being the random victim of a fatal
attack by a stranger or unknown person on a college
campus have been, and remain, exceptionally small.
The act of a single mentally disturbed student at Virginia Tech
in 2007 was a watershed event in the guns-on-
campus debate. A 2008 report by the Midwestern Higher
Education Compact noted that “ubiquitous and relentless
nationwide media coverage…exerts a powerful impact on the
psyche and basic instincts of students, parents and
policymakers, and the general public, leading to the
understandable questioning of the relative safety of a specific
campus or of educational facilities in general.” It called for

making campuses as safe as possible, while at the same
time acknowledging that “no amount of money, technology, and
human resources can guarantee members of a
university community that they will never fall victim to crime.”
What the press called the “Virginia Tech Massacre” changed the
narrative of, and participants in, the national guns-
on-campus debate. One of its consequences was to unleash a
torrent of proposed state legislation that, if enacted,
would permit more guns on campus in the belief that an armed
community would serve as a deterrent to violent
crime.
The Policy Arena
Any successful proposal to either permit or restrict the presence
of guns on campus must be consistent with both the
US Constitution and the constitutions and laws of the states.
The controlling language that serves as the foundation
for discussing guns on campus is in the Second Amendment to
the United States Constitution (1791), which in its
entirety reads: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the
security of a free State, the right of the people to
keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” Over time, these
27 words (and their three controversial commas) have
been interpreted differently.

Until recently, a legal consensus had developed in the US that
the amendment simply protected the ability of states
to maintain armed militias. Then, in District of Columbia v
Heller (2008), the Supreme Court held that the purpose
of the Second Amendment was to protect an individual's right to
possess a firearm for traditional lawful purposes
such as self-defense.
The Court went on to say that “like most rights, the Second
Amendment right is not unlimited. It is not a right to
keep and carry any weapon whatsoever and for whatever
purpose.” It also wrote that prohibitions against gun
ownership by felons, the mentally ill, aliens, minors, and others
in specified categories were acceptable. In other
words, gun-licensing laws and reasonable restrictions on
possession that are uniformly applied are permissible, but
total handgun bans or other requirements that make it
impossible for citizens to use arms for self-protection violate
the Second Amendment and therefore are unconstitutional.
The Court said that its opinion “should not be taken to cast
doubt on…laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in
sensitive places such as schools or government buildings.” But
it did not define “sensitive places” or clarify the
meaning of “schools and government buildings,” leaving that

task to the state and local agencies that must
administer the law.
Two years later, in McDonald v. City of Chicago, the Court held
that Second Amendment rights were equally
applicable, via the Fourteenth Amendment, to state and local
laws. The two cases did not directly consider the issue
of guns on college campuses, but they established the legal
framework within which both past and future gun laws
by the states, or policies by campus trustees, would now be
judged.
Every state has a constitution that enumerates the rights of its
citizens, and 43 of the 50 specifically allow
individuals to own guns. In many states they can also carry
them in permitted places, as long as the weapon is
clearly visible.
Federal provisions apply to all public institutions, but
differences among the constitutions, laws, and regulations of
the 50 states have created a hodge-podge of policies that affect
the legality of carrying guns on campus. Some states
and institutions bar firearms altogether; others permit them
anywhere on campus, anywhere on campus except in
buildings or arenas, or in automobiles in parking lots but not
elsewhere; and some states prohibit institutions from

banning weapons on campus. Some state laws (particularly
those that completely bar handguns from college
campuses) may not at present be fully consistent with Heller,
and we can expect that bringing these laws into
compliance will be on the future agendas of many state
legislatures and judiciaries.
Even more contentious than open carry, however, is whether
and where citizens are entitled to carry concealed
weapons. State laws usually stipulate that carrying a concealed
weapon requires a permit, but obtaining one has
become easier in many states.
Recent growth in the number of permissive concealed-carry
laws has increased permit holders from 5 million in
2008 to 7 million in 2011, and data indicate that many more
people carry concealed weapons without a permit
(National Opinion Research Center, 2001). The reality is that
almost anyone in the US who wants a gun can get one.
Concealed carry with or without a permit is increasingly a part
of US culture.
States that allow concealed carry may have regulations about
where weapons are permitted—for example, on the
street but not in courthouses or legislative offices. Many states
prohibit the carrying of concealed weapons in

schools, and some either have specific prohibitions against them
on college campuses or delegate to the trustees of
public institutions the right to determine what institutional
policies shall be.
Although the data change as legislatures come and go,
according to one recent analysis, “twenty-four states
completely prohibit concealed weapons on college campuses,
even for those who have a concealed handgun license”
(Meloy, 2011, p. 12). Whether such state policies can continue
and what public university trustees can do may not
be known until individual cases have moved through the state
court system.
As they do so, much may depend on whether current state laws
are found to meet federal Constitutional muster,
whether institutions of higher education have been designated
as “sensitive” places, and whether public college
facilities are considered to be “school or public buildings.”
Campuses and the General Population: Comparative Data
Since the ostensible purpose of campus firearms policies is to
improve campus safety, describing the actual
incidence of crime on campus might help clarify the issues over
which the MoreGuns/BanGuns camps are
contending. Such data are available because the Student Right

to Know and Campus Security Act of 1990 authorizes
the Department of Education to collect and analyze incidents of
crime on every US college campus.
This law, known as the Clery Act, requires each institution to
annually report and disclose, among other things, the
number of alleged campus incidents of criminal activity
reported to the campus or local police agencies. This is the
source of the numbers reported here, even though Clery Act
data have been criticized because institutions may differ
in their interpretations of the self-reporting requirements and
may fail to report some offenses in order to protect
their reputations. In addition, students may be reluctant to
report crimes, and campus counseling centers may
withhold information based on confidentiality concerns.
The data reported in this article are based on all reported on-
campus incidents in US degree-granting, not-for-profit
campuses. Three analyses are presented below. The first is the
incidence of specific types of campus crime in 2010;
the second, comparative rates of violent criminal behavior on
campuses and in the general population; and the third,
campus and general-population data related to the two violent
crimes of murder and manslaughter.
Campus Crime in 2010

Annual Clery data provide a snapshot of crime on campus. The
categories of crime and their prevalence on college
campuses in 2010 are shown in Table 1.
Table 1 Number and Percentage of Clery-Reported Crimes on
College Campuses, 2010
Violent crimes (N=6,705, 20.8% of total)
Non-violent or property crimes
(N=25,469, 79.2% of total)
Murder Manslaughter Forcible Robbery Aggravated Non-
Burlary Motor Arson
Number of
offenses
(N=32,174)
Sex
Offenses
Assault forcible
Sex

Offenses
Vehicle
Theft
15 1 2,897 1,482 2,310 32 21,358 3,347 732
Percent of
total offenses
(100.00%)
0.05% 0.00% 9.00% 4.61% 7.18% 0.10% 66.38% 10.40% 2.28%
Campus murder and manslaughter constitute only 0.05 percent
of all reported campus crimes; 79.16 percent of
campus crimes are non-violent in nature. Burglary (in the non-
violent category) constitutes about two-thirds of all
reported campus crime. Forcible sexual offenses (9.00 percent)
and aggravated assault (7.18 percent) are the most
frequently reported violent campus crimes.
Campus and US Population Violent-Crime Rates
Of the categories of crime included in Clery data, five (murder,
manslaughter, forcible sexual offenses, robbery,
aggravated assault) are considered violent; it is the summed
total of these categories that are reported here. The FBI
uses these same categories in its reports of criminal activity in

the US, making it possible to compare campus
violent-crime rates with rates in the general population.
In order to make the comparison, both campus and general-
population violent-crime rates in Table 2 are reported per
100,000 FTE students/citizens.
Table: Table 2 Comparative Violent-Crime Rates, 1997-2010
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007
2008 2009 2010
Violent
crimes/
100,000
FTE
students
68.6 70.3 66.5 65.0 61.9 60.9 60.3 58.0 59.1 58.3 55.8 52.2 46.8
47.3
Violent
crimes/
100,000
of US

populatio
n
611.0 567.6 523.0 506.5 504.4 494.4 475.8 463.2 469.0 473.6
466.9 457.5 431.9 403.6
College
rate as a
percent of
US
populatio
n rate
11.2
%
12.4
%
12.7
%
12.8
%

12.3
%
12.3
%
12.7
%
12.5
%
12.6
%
12.3
%
12.0
%
11.4
%
10.8
%

11.7
%
The data in Table 2 indicate that rates of violent campus crime
have been only between 10.8 and 12.8 percent of the
general-population rates in every year during the 14-year period
shown. This is true even though a large proportion
of college students are at the ages most prone to engage in
violence, while a significant portion of the US population
consists of groups, including the young and the elderly, that are
the least likely to engage in violence.
Even a casual look at the data in Table 2 reveals two trends that
may surprise some observers. First, the violent-
crime rate per 100,000 in the general population is not
increasing but has been steadily decreasing. Second, the
violent campus crime rate per 100,000 FTE students has been
steadily declining at a rate similar to that seen in the
general population (from 68.6 in 1997 to 47.3 in 2010).
Murder and Manslaughter
The number on which the public is most likely to fixate is the
rate of murder and manslaughter in colleges and
universities compared to that rate in the nation as a whole. This

number is also the most reliable, since murder and
manslaughter are the crimes least likely to go unreported.
The data in Table 3 show that from 1997 to 2010, the annual
murder/manslaughter rate for the US ranged from 6.8
to 4.8 per 100,000 persons. During the same period, murder and
homicide rates on college campuses ranged from a
high of 0.37 per 100,000 FTE students (in 2007, the year of the
Virginia Tech shootings) to a low of 0.06 per
100,000 FTE students. Aside from 2007, when the murder and
manslaughter rate in colleges and universities was
6.6 percent of the rate in the general population, college and
university rates ranged between 1.1 percent and 3.5
percent of the general-population rates.
Table: Table 3 Comparative Murder and Manslaughter Rates,
1997–2010
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007
2008 2009 2010
Murder and
manslaughter rate per
100,000 FTE students
0.17 0.22 0.10 0.17 0.15 0.19 0.08 0.12 0.11 0.06 0.37 0.11 0.12
0.11

Murder and
manslaughter rate per
100,000 US population
6.8 6.3 5.7 5.5 5.6 5.6 5.7 5.5 5.6 5.7 5.6 5.4 5.0 4.8
Campus rate as a
percent of US
population rate
2.5% 3.5% 1.8% 3.1% 2.7% 3.4% 1.4% 2.2% 2.0% 1.1% 6.6%
2.0% 2.4% 2.3%
So on the one hand, the campus is not an ivory tower free of
criminal activity. On the other hand, even those
concerned with campus crime acknowledge that “college
campuses do not appear to be ‘hot-spots’ for predatory
offenses, as portrayed by the media, that they are not ‘armed
camps’ in which heinous crimes are a regular
occurrence” (Fisher et al., 1998).
The reality is that America's colleges and universities are
unusually safe places. The chance of being a homicide
victim on campus in 2010 was about one in 875,000,
approximately the same chance that the average US citizen

faces of being struck by lightning.
This suggests that the guns-on-campus debate is about a
manufactured rather than a real crisis. Both the MoreGuns
and the BanGuns arguments appear to be ideological solutions
in search of a problem.
Prospects for the Future
Although colleges and universities exhibit exceptionally low
crime rates by general-population standards, the fight
between MoreGuns and BanGuns is likely to continue unabated
because guns on campus is a wicked problem, the
arguments of both groups are based on motivated reasoning,
both positions are self-validating, and the polar
positions they advocate are oversimplified.
Wicked Problems
Problems are called wicked when they are ill-defined, can't be
solved permanently, and don't yield to traditional
management or problem-solving practices. Instead they rely on
political judgments to reach a temporary resolution.
Guns on campus is a wicked problem that can never be
satisfactorily resolved until the underlying ideologies are
surfaced and reconciled.

Motivated Reasoning
MoreGuns and BanGuns groups are entrenched in their positions
because each processes information to promote
different goals. MoreGuns advocates view data and arguments
through the lens of legal values; BanGuns proponents
do the same through the lens of academic values.
Such motivated reasoning leads actors to seek out information
that supports their position, to discount information
that does not, and to increase the certainty with which they hold
their views. The resultant policy recommendations
are not based on empirical evidence; rather, evidence is
selectively collected and interpreted by both sides to support
their a priori commitments to a policy view.
Self-Validation
Both the MoreGuns and BanGuns views are self-validating. The
ideological arguments for both positions are
reinforced by interpretations of events. If a student is killed by
a gun, it can be argued that the shooting would not
have happened if other people present had also had guns as
easily as it can that it would not have taken place if the
campus had banned guns. A low violent-crime rate can be used
as evidence to support either position. In fact, all
data (or lack of data) can be used to support a proponent's

preconceived ideology.
Oversimplification
Presenting only two positions in the MoreGuns/BanGuns debate
oversimplifies, and therefore distorts, the available
alternatives, thus lessening opportunities for agreement or
compromise. But the nature of the problem itself can
change upon closer inspection, and even obvious and stark
alternatives can become multi-dimensional and therefore
negotiable when they are seen in depth.
For example, the public and the media at different times
attributed the Virginia Tech killings to deficient
university/local police relations, faulty intra-campus
communications systems, an overly long response time by the
university, loose gun-purchase laws, insufficient attention to
disturbed students, and/or deficiencies in provisions for
background checks of gun purchasers. Different narratives lead
to different proposed solutions, only some of which
reflect the simple dichotomy of the MoreGuns/BanGuns
argument.
Moreover, the MoreGuns/BanGuns dichotomy pays scant
attention to the likelihood that regardless of institutional
policies, some guns will be present on campus. For example, a
1997 survey of students in four-year colleges

reported that 3.5 percent of the respondents had a working
firearm with them at college (Miller, Hemenway &
Wechsler, 1999).
Another proposal that overly simplifies the problem is to
evaluate “persons of concern” on campus and intervene
before they can act on their intention to harm others. But
campus murder and manslaughter are what Nassim Taleb
(2009) calls black swans—events so unlikely that there is no
way of predicting them.
A good part of that unpredictability stems from the fact that
these incidents often involve an assailant with a mental
disorder. Every experienced dean knows that many students and
faculty on college campuses have such disorders—
enough to make attending to each one both impractical and cost-
ineffective, because the number of the mentally
disturbed who commit violent events is vanishingly small.
Further Research
We know very little about how either gun violence or the
presence of guns on campus affect student attitudes and
behaviors (LaPoint, 2009–2010). What have been the responses
of faculty, students and administration to dramatic
gun-related events? How might various groups respond to the

knowledge that some in their communities are
carrying concealed weapons? What effect might this knowledge
have on relationships among students or between
students and faculty?
Would either banning or encouraging guns on campus lead
people to feel more threatened or more secure? If
campuses were to declare that concealed weapons may be
carried, how many students and faculty would be likely to
carry them (in addition to those who may already carry them
despite institutional bans)?
Scholars might inform the debate by maintaining, updating, and
disseminating the Clery data in more usable
formats, by preparing and updating an authoritative and current
list of institutions that have adopted a gun policy,
and by tracking violent incidents occurring on matched
institutions with differing firearms policies. Data such as
these are unlikely by themselves to change hearts and minds,
but they may prove useful if the BanGuns and
MoreGuns groups decide to move past unilateral
pronouncements and consider sensible compromises that might
end
the gun fight. Academics can also challenge participants in the
debate to present the evidence that supports the
claims they are making.

If the present cultural conflict has any redeeming social value,
some states' adoption of the MoreGuns position while
others maintain a BanGuns policy might establish a quasi-
experiment in which the consequences of both positions
can be compared.
Of course, since the present conflict between groups is basically
unrelated to data, still more data may still not have
much bearing on their positions. Unfortunately, policymakers
are more likely to be swayed by good stories than by
good data, and one improbable hypothetical can be worth a
thousand statistical tables.
The rational sequence on the firing range is ready, aim, fire. But
the interpretive sequence in the college campus
gunfight is ready (have an ideology), fire (attack using the
ideology), and then aim (construct a narrative that relates
the incident to the ideology). Neither MoreGuns nor BanGuns
advocates evaluate the results of their activities in
accordance with the ostensible goal of reducing campus
violence. Instead, they give examples not of what has
happened but of what might happen if their positions do not
prevail.
Given Heller, it appears unlikely that absolute campus bans on
firearms, at least at public institutions, can continue

to exist. The question then becomes not whether but rather what
kinds of firearms, carried by whom, where, under
what circumstances, and with what restrictions regarding
purchasing and permits.
A discussion at the 2011 meeting of the National Association of
College and University Attorneys concerned what
kinds of gun restrictions institutions could develop if they
wished to restrict weapons, in light of the Supreme Court
rulings and state-level statutes or constitutions that permit
concealed carry. The answer was that they should prepare
arguments that identify their institutions as “sensitive places,”
avoid absolute gun bans, and create policies that
apply to places where people congregate (Keller, 2011).
We would all like to believe that making the campus safe is a
matter of developing better policies and procedures
and that we could accomplish this if we had the will to do so.
But the truth may be that campuses are actually
attending to the problem of murders and manslaughter and
expending the maximum resources that they should to
address it.
If this is true, we may already be at a threshold level of
homicidal violence that must be accepted, because attempts

to lower it still further may negatively influence the social
benefits for which these institutions exist.
Rather than trying to further protect a campus from the already
low possibility of homicides, resources might better
be allocated to reduce more prevalent forms of campus violence
such as forcible sex offenses and aggravated
assault.
Solution
s to these problems might be more amenable to campus-based
policy interventions and may have
the added advantage of reducing the focus on the
MoreGuns/BanGuns debate.
The country is filled with guns, guns exist on college campuses,
and there doesn't appear to be much that can be
done to completely eradicate them. But it may be that, under
most circumstances, institutions can live with them.
Resources

1. American Association of State Colleges and Universities
(2008) Concealed weapons on state college campuses:
In pursuit of individual liberty and collective security, Author,
Washington, DC.
2. Ayres, I. and Donohue III, J. J. (2003, August) Shooting
down the ‘more guns, less crime’ hypothesis.. Stanford
Law Review 55, pp. 1193-1312.
3. Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence (2007) No gun left
behind: The gun lobby's campaign to push guns into
colleges and schools, Author, Washington, DC.
4. (2008, 26 June) District of Columbia et al. v. Heller,
Supreme Court of the United States
5. Drysdale, D., Modzeleski, D. and Simons, A. (2010) Campus
attacks: Targeted violence affecting institutions of
higher education, US Secret Service, US Department of
Homeland Security, Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools,

US Department of Education, and Federal Bureau of
Investigation, US Department of Justice, Washington, DC.
Retrieved from http://www.fbigov/stats-
services/publications/campus-attack
6. Fisher, B. S., Sloan, J. J. and Lu, C. (1998, August) Crime in
the ivory tower: The level and sources of student
victimization.. Criminology 36:3, pp. 671-710.
7. (2012, March) Guns on campus: Overview., Retrieved from
the National Council of State Legislatures:
http://www.ncsl.org/issues-research/educ/guns-on-campus-
overview.aspx
8. Keller, J. (2011, 26 June) Colleges get advice on crafting
weapons policies that will hold up in court.. Chronicle
of Higher Education.,
9. LaPoint, L. A. (2009–2010) The up and down battle for
concealed carry at public universities.. Colorado State

University Journal of Student Affairs 19, pp. 16-21.
10. Lott, J. R. J. and Mustard, D. B. (1997, January) Crime,
deterrence, and right-to-carry concealed handguns..
Journal of Legal Studies 26:1, pp. 1-68.
11. Meloy, A. (2011, Winter) Guns on campus: What are the
limits?. The Presidency 14:1, pp. 12.
12. Midwestern Higher Education Compact (2008) The ripple
effect of Virginia Tech: Assessing the nationwide
impact on campus safety and security policy and practice,
Author, Minneapolis, MN.
13. Miller, M., Hemenway, D. and Wechsler, H. (1999, July)
Guns at college.. Journal of American College Health
48:1, pp. 12-14.
http://www.fbigov/stats-services/publications/campus-attack
http://www.ncsl.org/issues-research/educ/guns-on-campus-
overview.aspx

14. Miller, M., Hemenway, D. and Wechsler, H. (2002,
September) Guns and gun threats at college.. Journal of
American College Health 51, pp. 57-65.
15. Siebel, B. J. (2008, Spring) The case against guns on
campus.. Civil Rights Law Journal 18:2, pp. 319-336.
16. Taleb, N. N. (2007) The black swan: The impact of the
highly improbable, Random House, New York, NY.
17. Winkler, A. (2011a) Gunfight: The battle over the right to
bear arms in America, W. W. Norton, New York,
NY.
18. Winkler, A. (2011b, 15 April) The guns of academe.. New
York Times A, pp. 27.
Robert Birnbaum ([email protected]), currently a professor of
higher education emeritus at the University of
Maryland, College Park, has served as vice chancellor at the

City University of New York and the New Jersey
Department of Higher Education and as chancellor at the
University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh. His teaching
appointments include a decade each at Teachers College,
Columbia University, and the University of Maryland. He
has written books and articles on university organization,
leadership, and academic policy.
Article Citation:
Birnbaum, Robert. "Ready, Fire, Aim: The College Campus Gun
Fight" Change: The Magazine of Higher
Learning. Taylor and Francis Group, Sept.-Oct. 2013. Web. 09
July 2015.
mailto:[email protected]
A Bid for Guns on Campuses to Deter Rape

As lawmakers in 10 states push for so-called campus carry laws,
an argument is taking shape:
Arming female students will help reduce sexual assault.
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/02/19/us/in-bid-to-allow-guns-
on-campus-weapons-are-
linked-to-fighting-sexual-assault.html
By ALAN SCHWARZ
February 18, 2015
As gun rights advocates push to legalize firearms on college
campuses, an argument is taking
shape: Arming female students will help reduce sexual assaults.
Support for so-called campus carry laws had been hard to
muster despite efforts by proponents to
argue that armed students and faculty members could prevent
mass shootings like the one at

Virginia Tech in 2007. The carrying of concealed firearms on
college campuses is banned in 41
states by law or by university policy. Carrying guns openly is
generally not permitted.
But this year, lawmakers in 10 states who are pushing bills that
would permit the carrying of
firearms on campus are hoping that the national spotlight on
sexual assault will help them win
passage of their measures.
“If you’ve got a person that’s raped because you wouldn’t let
them carry a firearm to defend
themselves, I think you’re responsible,” State Representative
Dennis K. Baxley of Florida said
during debate in a House subcommittee last month. The bill
passed.
The sponsor of a bill in Nevada, Assemblywoman Michele

Fiore, said in a telephone interview:
“If these young, hot little girls on campus have a firearm, I
wonder how many men will want to
assault them. The sexual assaults that are occurring would go
down once these sexual predators
get a bullet in their head.”
In addition to those in Florida and Nevada, bills that would
allow guns on campus have been
introduced in Indiana, Montana, Oklahoma, South Carolina,
South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas
and Wyoming.
Opponents contend that university campuses should remain
havens from the gun-related risks
that exist elsewhere, and that college students, with high rates
of binge drinking and other
recklessness, would be particularly prone to gun accidents.

Some experts in sexual assault said that college women were
typically assaulted by someone
they knew, sometimes a friend, so even if they had access to
their gun, they would rarely be
tempted to use it.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/16/us/16cnd-shooting.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/16/us/16cnd-shooting.html
http://www.myfloridahouse.gov/Sections/Representatives/detail
s.aspx?MemberId=4200
https://www.leg.state.nv.us/App/Legislator/A/Assembly/Current
/4
http://legis.sd.gov/Legislative_Session/Bills/Bill.aspx?Bill=120
6&Session=2012
https://legiscan.com/TX/text/HB308/2015
“It reflects a misunderstanding of sexual assaults in general,”
said John D. Foubert, an Oklahoma

State University professor and national president of One in
Four, which provides educational
programs on sexual assault to college campuses. “If you have a
rape situation, usually it starts
with some sort of consensual behavior, and by the time it
switches to nonconsensual, it would be
nearly impossible to run for a gun. Maybe if it’s someone who
raped you before and is coming
back, it theoretically could help them feel more secure.”
Other objectors to the bills say that advocates of the campus
carry laws, predominantly
Republicans with well-established pro-gun stances, are merely
exploiting a hot-button issue.
“The gun lobby has seized on this tactic, this subject of sexual
assault,” said Andy Pelosi, the
executive director of the Campaign to Keep Guns Off Campus.
“It resonates with lawmakers.”

Colorado, Wisconsin and seven other states allow people with
legal carry permits to take
concealed firearms to campus, some with restrictions. (For
example, Michigan does not allow
guns in dormitories or classrooms.) Many of those states once
had bans but lifted them in recent
legislative cycles, suggesting some momentum for efforts in
2015.
Past debates in Colorado, Michigan and Nevada have included
testimony in support of campus
carry laws from Amanda Collins, who in 2007 was raped on the
campus of the University of
Nevada, Reno; Ms. Collins has said that had she been carrying
her licensed gun, she would have
averted the attack. It is unclear whether Ms. Collins will testify
anywhere this year.

Some surveys have estimated that a vast majority of college
presidents and faculty members
oppose allowing firearms on campus. Support was somewhat
higher among students, but 67
percent of men and 86 percent of women still disliked the
concept.
Many students who support current legislation have joined the
lobbying group Students for
Concealed Carry. Crayle Vanest, an Indiana University senior
who recently became the first
woman on the group’s national board, said she should be able to
carry her licensed .38-caliber
Bersa Thunder pistol on campus, where she said she had walked
unarmed after her late-night
shifts at a library food court.
“Universities are under a ton of investigation for how they
handle sexual assaults — that shows

how safe campus maybe isn’t,” said Ms. Vanest, who is
lobbying Indiana lawmakers. “Our
female membership has increased massively. People who
weren’t listening before are listening
now.”
Some lawmakers said they expected that votes on the bills
would largely be along party lines.
Ms. Fiore of Nevada, for example, predicted the Republican-
controlled Legislature and
Republican governor would enact her bill. She added that
people who understood the extent of
sexual assaults on college campuses, perhaps female Democrats
who had been sexually assaulted
themselves, “need to call their legislators and say, ‘Represent us
today or lose your election
tomorrow.’ ”

http://oneinfourusa.org/
http://keepgunsoffcampus.org/
http://senate.michigan.gov/committees/files/2012-SCT-NAT_-
03-22-1-02.PDF
http://concealedcampus.org/
A South Carolina state senator, Brad Hutto, a Democrat who
will oppose a campus carry bill
when it is considered by the judiciary committee, said he
doubted that sexual assault would
swing his state’s debate but, “I know that that’s a card that’s
going to be used.”
The most interesting debate could occur in Florida, where
several story lines intersect. Florida
State University has had high-profile episodes involving sexual
assault — the star football player
Jameis Winston was accused of raping a fellow student in 2012

but did not face criminal charges
— as well as a shooting in November in which a 31-year-old
gunman opened fire at a campus
library, wounding two students and an employee before being
fatally shot by the police.
The university’s president, John Thrasher, is a former state
senator, former chairman of the
state’s Republican Party and a vocal gun rights supporter. But
he opposes guns on university
grounds, in part because of a 2011 death: Ashley Cowie, a
sophomore and the daughter of one of
Mr. Thrasher’s close friends, was shot and killed when another
student, showing off his rifle in a
fraternity house, did not realize the weapon was loaded.
“A college campus is not a place to be carrying guns around;
our campus police agree with that,

and so does law enforcement,” Mr. Thrasher said.
Mariana Prado, a sophomore at Stetson University in DeLand,
Fla., said: “I think it’s a terrible
idea. From what I’ve seen, sexual assault is often linked to
situations where people are drinking,
so it’s not a good idea to have concealed weapons around that.”
The next stop for the Florida bill will be a committee hearing in
March. Greg Steube, the original
sponsor of the bill, said he hoped that inviting Ms. Collins, the
former Nevada student who was
raped in 2007, to testify would help it reach the desk of Gov.
Rick Scott, a Republican, and
become law.
“It’s moving to hear from a young woman that had a concealed
carry and but for a university
policy, she was raped,” Mr. Steube said. “I don’t know if it can

get any more compelling than
that.”
Article Citation:
Schwarz, Alan. “A Bid for Guns on Campus to Deter Rape.” 18.
Feb. 2015. New York Times. Web. 8 July 2015.
http://www.scstatehouse.gov/member.php?code=0912499891
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/04/16/sports/errors-
in-inquiry-on-rape-allegations-against-fsu-jameis-winston.html
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/04/16/sports/errors-
in-inquiry-on-rape-allegations-against-fsu-jameis-winston.html
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2014/11/20/us/20reuters-usa-
florida-safety.html
http://president.fsu.edu/The-Presidents-of-FSU
http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizatio
ns/r/republican_party/index.html?inline=nyt-org
http://www.myfloridahouse.gov/Sections/Representatives/detail
s.aspx?MemberId=4509

Guns On Texas Campuses Won't Make Them Safer, University
Chancellor Says
Morning Edition, June 5, 2015
LISTEN AT: http://www.npr.org/2015/06/05/412177034/guns-
on-texas-campuses-wont-make-
them-safer-university-chancellor-says
SHAPIRO: Now we're going to hear from retired Navy Admiral
William McRaven. For years,
he ran U.S. Special Operations Command. He oversaw the raid
that killed Osama bin Laden.
Now McRaven is chancellor of the University of Texas System,
and he's been fighting a
different battle. The Texas state legislature just passed a law to
allow concealed handguns on
college campuses. McRaven vocally objected to that proposal,

and he joined us to discuss what
happens on campus now that the bill has passed. Chancellor
McRaven, welcome to the program.
MCRAVEN: Oh, thank you, Ari.
SHAPIRO: You oversaw Special Operations for so many years.
What have you got against
guns?
MCRAVEN: (Laughter) Well, actually, I like guns. I'm a big
Second Amendment guy. I've
probably got nine guns and six swords and two tomahawks, so
I'm all about weapons. My
concern has just been that in my new role as an educator, yeah,
I want to make sure that we make
our campuses as safe as possible. And the addition of concealed
weapons on campus just didn't
seem like a good idea to me.

SHAPIRO: You described some of your concerns in a letter to
the Texas state legislature. And
you said there's great concern that the presence of handguns,
even if limited to licensed
individuals aged 21 or older, will lead to an increase in both
accidental shootings and self-
inflicted wounds. Is that your main concern as opposed to
intentional acts of violence against
others?
MCRAVEN: Yeah, I think it's broader than that, Ari. I mean,
the fact of the matter is, you know,
any time you introduce guns into an environment that has high
stress, you know, you have a
number of concerns. Obviously, we do have concerns about
self-inflicted gun wounds and
accidental discharges, but it is also this kind of perception that's

out there that concerns me is that
people will believe that Texas campuses are less safe. And that
perception can, in fact, be a
reality. But it also can have kind of second and third order
effects in terms of difficulty recruiting
and just the belief that, again, we don't have the same academic
freedom that we might have had.
Having said all that, I will tell you that while I am a little
disappointed that the bill passed, I'm
also very appreciative that the state legislature has given us the
latitude to take a look at where
we allow guns on campus.
SHAPIRO: You say you're concerned there may be a perception
that University of Texas
campuses are less safe and that that perception could become a
reality. Are you willing to say

right now that under this law the campuses are, in fact - will be
when the law goes into effect -
less safe?
http://www.npr.org/2015/06/05/412177034/guns-on-texas-
campuses-wont-make-them-safer-university-chancellor-says
http://www.npr.org/2015/06/05/412177034/guns-on-texas-
campuses-wont-make-them-safer-university-chancellor-says
MCRAVEN: No, I'm not prepared to say that because, you
know, my time in the military has
always been one that taught me that, you know, you argue a
point up until a decision is made.
And the state legislature has made a decision - and presuming
that the governor signs the bill -
and it will go into effect. And then my job as the chancellor is
to make sure that we continue to
make the campuses as safe as possible, and we're going to do
that.

SHAPIRO: There may be people who read the letter you wrote
to the Texas legislature where
you say, quote, "I feel the presence of concealed weapons will
make a campus a less safe
environment" and hear what you're saying now and think that
you've just sort of changed your
talking points to adjust to the facts on the ground as they now
stand.
MCRAVEN: Well, the point is I did feel and I felt that the
introduction of weapons would make
the campuses less safe. Having said that, now that we have to
implement this, I'm going to take
every step possible to ensure the maximum safety.
SHAPIRO: Tell us more about the steps that you plan to take
now. Are there places that you
know concealed weapons will not be allowed? Are there places

that you think they will be
allowed? Will there be concealed weapons in the stands of the
University of Texas football
game?
MCRAVEN: Right, so what we will do is we're going to take a
very thoughtful and deliberate
approach over the next three to four months as I spend some
time with the presidents to make
sure I understand what their concerns are. And each campus is a
little bit different. Having said
that, you know, we're very sensitive to those areas where we
think that there would be, you
know, a high level of anxiety or emotion. So, certainly, we're
going to take a very hard look at
sporting events, and, intuitively, I would tell you that I'm
disinclined to have any sort of

concealed weapons at sporting events. But there are a lot of
other venues where emotions get
high, and we need to make sure that in those areas where that is
a possibility that we limit the
availability of concealed weapons.
SHAPIRO: Admiral William McRaven is former commander of
the U.S. Special Operations
Command. He's now chancellor of the University of Texas
System. Thanks very much for
joining us.
MCRAVEN: My pleasure, thank you.
Full Text: All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use
and permissions page at www.npr.org for further
information. NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by a
contractor for NPR, and accuracy and availability
may vary. This text may not be in its final form and may be

updated or revised in the future. Please be aware that
the authoritative record of NPR's programming is the audio.
Source Citation:
"Guns On Texas Campuses Won't Make Them Safer, University
Chancellor Says." Morning Edition 5 June 2015.
Opposing Viewpoints in Context. Web. 9 July 2015.
Instructions
The essay:
Will allowing guns on college campuses make them safer?
Why/why not?
· Support your position with evidence: you must cite from at
least FOUR of the assigned unit readings, INCLUDING at least
one point of view that differs from your own (Refutation). Cite
each quote/paraphrase in MLA format.
· Include a works cited.

· Remember, your essay must be focused, must have clear and
relevant details, must be well researched (with good, credible
sources and accurate documentation), and must be well
presented and persuasive. Your argument must also contain
a refutation.
I ALSO WANT AN OUTLINE
1. Develop a formal topic sentence outline. Include
the following in your outline:
a. Write the prompt at the top of the outline: Will allowing
guns on college campuses make them safer?
b. Provide a clear thesis statement that responds to the prompt.
c. Provide topic sentencesfor each body paragraph that offer
arguments that support the thesis (NOTE: you need at least
THREE body paragraphs)
d. Include an opposing argument (remember to develop a
rebuttal for this point in your essay)Include
supporting evidence under each topic sentence (in the form of a
quotation, paraphrase, or summary that you plan to use to
support the point you are making). Be sure to cite from at least
FOUR of the assigned sources. (See Purdue
University'sOnlineWriting Lab handout onQuoting,
Paraphrasing, and Summarizing if you need help.)

e. Include MLA-formatted in-text citations for each
quote/paraphrase.
f. Add your works cited page to the outline
It should look like this:
I. Introduction
B. Thesis: main argument
II. Body
A. Topic sentence: argument #1 that supports thesis
1. Supporting evidence, citation
B. Topic sentence: argument #2 that supports thesis
C. Topic sentence: argument #3 that supports thesis
1. Refutation.
III. Conclusion
A. Conclusion reached

IV. Works Cited
Guns on Campus: Overview
2/23/2015
http://www.ncsl.org/research/education/guns-on-campus-
overview.aspx
In the wake of several campus shootings, the most deadly being
the 2007 shooting at Virginia
Tech University, states are considering legislation about
whether or not to permit guns on college
campuses. For some, these events point to a need to ease
existing firearm regulations and allow
concealed weapons on campuses. Others see the solution in
tightening restrictions to keep guns

off campuses.
In 2013, at least 19 states introduced legislation to allow
concealed carry on campus in some
regard and in the 2014 legislative session, at least 14 states
introduced similar legislation. In
2013, two bills passed, one in Kansas that allows concelaed
carry generally and one in Arkansas
that allows faculty to carry. The Kansas legislation creates a
provision that colleges and
universities cannot prohibit concealed carry unless a building
has "adequate security measures,"
however, governing boards of the institutions may still request
an exemption to prohibit for up to
4 years. Arkansas' bill allows faculty to carry, unless the
governing board adopts a policy that
expressly disallows faculty to carry. In 2014, Idaho became the

most recent state to allow
concealed carry weapons on college campuses.
On the other hand, recent shootings also have encouraged some
legislators to strengthen existing
firearm regulations. In 2013, 5 states introduced legislation to
prohibit concealed carry weapons
on campus. None of these bills passed.
Concealed Carry Weapon Laws and College Campuses
In the United States, all 50 states allow citizens to carry
concealed weapons if they meet certain
state requirements. Currently, there are 20 states that ban
carrying a concealed weapon on a
college campus: California, Florida, Georgia, Illinois,
Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan,
Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New
York, North Carolina, North

Dakota, Ohio, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Wyoming.
In 23 states the decision to ban or allow concealed carry
weapons on campuses is made by each
college or university individually: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona,
Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware,
http://www.ncsl.org/research/education/guns-on-campus-
overview.aspx
http://www.kslegislature.org/li/b2013_14/measures/documents/h
b2052_enrolled.pdf
http://www.arkleg.state.ar.us/assembly/2013/2013R/Bills/HB12
43.pdf
Hawaii, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Minnesota,
Montana, New Hampshire,
Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Vermont,
Virginia, Washington, and
West Virginia.

Due to recent state legislation and court rulings, 7 states now
have provisions allowing the
carrying of concealed weapons on public postsecondary
campuses. These states are Colorado,
Idaho, Kansas, Mississippi, Oregon, Utah, and Wisconsin. In
March 2014, Idaho's legislature
passed a bill premitting concealed weapons on campus and
making it the 7th state to permit guns
on campus.
Utah remains the only state to have statute specifically naming
public colleges and universities as
public entities that do not have the authority to ban concealed
carry, and thus, all 10 public
institutions in Utah allow concealed weapons on their property.
Recently passed Kansas
legislation creates a provision that colleges and universities
cannot prohibit concealed carry

unless a building has "adequate security measures," however,
governing boards of the
institutions may still request an exemption to prohibit for up to
four years. Wisconsin legislation
creates a provision that colleges and universities must allow
concealed carry on campus grounds,
however, campuses can prohibit weapons from campus
buildings if signs are posted at every
entrance explicitly stating that weapons are prohibited. All
University of Wisconsin system
campuses and technical community college districts are said to
be putting this signage in
place. Legislation passed in Mississippi in 2011 creates an
exception to allow concealed carry on
college campuses for those who have taken a voluntary course
on safe handling and use of

firearms by a certified instructor.
Recent court cases have also overturned some long standing
system wide bans of concealed carry
on state college and university campuses. In March 2012, the
Colorado Supreme Court ruled
that the University of Colorado’s policy banning guns from
campus violates the state’s concealed
carry law, and in 2011 the Oregon Court of Appeals overturned
the Oregon University System’s
ban of guns on campuses, allowing those with permits to carry
concealed guns on the grounds of
these public colleges (Oregon's State Board of Higher Education
retained its authority to have
internal policies for certain areas of campus, and adopted a new
policy in 2012 that bans guns in
campus buildings). In both cases, it was ruled that state law
dictates only the legislature can

regulate the use, sale and possession of firearms, and therefore
these systems had overstepped
their authority in issuing the bans. See the "Guns on Campus:
Campus Action," page for more
information on these rulings, board policies and other campuses
that allow concealed carry on
their grounds.
For up-to-date information on legislation, see the Education Bill
Tracking Database. Search
under the topic "Postsecondary - Campus Safety."
We are the nation's most respected bipartisan organization
providing states support, ideas,
connections and a strong voice on Capitol Hill.
Article Citation:
"Guns on Campus: Overview." National Council of State

Legislatures. 23 Feb. 2015. Web. 9
July 2015.
http://le.utah.gov/~code/TITLE53/htm/53_05a010200.htm
b2052_enrolled.pdf
b2052_enrolled.pdf
https://docs.legis.wisconsin.gov/2011/proposals/sb93
http://billstatus.ls.state.ms.us/documents/2011/pdf/HB/0500-
0599/HB0506SG.pdf
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2012/03/06/state-supreme-
court-rules-colorado-regents-cant-ban-guns
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2012/03/06/state-supreme-
court-rules-colorado-regents-cant-ban-guns
http://www.oregonlive.com/education/index.ssf/2011/11/oregon
_university_system_will_1.html
_university_system_will_1.html
_state_board_of_higher_e_7.html
_state_board_of_higher_e_7.html
http://www.ncsl.org/default.aspx?TabId=21389

http://www.ncsl.org/?tabid=15506
Guns on University Campuses: The Colorado Experience
The Washington Post
By David Kopel April 20
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-
conspiracy/wp/2015/04/20/guns-on-university-
campuses-the-colorado-experience/
Texas appears poised to join the growing number of states
allowing licensed, trained adults to
carry concealed handguns for lawful protection on the campuses
of public universities and
colleges. In Texas, as elsewhere, opponents offer a parade of
horribles about the supposed

results: heated classroom discussion of Sophocles will result in
gunfights; students will threaten
to kill professors who gave them a bad grade, and so on. Since
Colorado has had licensed guns
on campus for over a decade, it may be helpful to look at the
experience there.
For most of Colorado’s history, firearms were legal on public
university campuses. That began to
change in 1970, due to concerns about campus violence by
terrorist organizations such as the
Weather Underground.
In 2003, the Colorado legislature enacted the Concealed Carry
Act. The statute was written by
County Sheriffs of Colorado, the organization which represents
all 62 of Colorado’s elected
Sheriffs. The Act passed with broad bipartisan support,
including all Republicans and almost

every Democrat except some from Denver and Boulder. The
National Rifle Association and the
Firearms Coalition of Colorado supported the Act.
According to the Concealed Carry Act, a carry permit is valid
“throughout the state,” with
certain exceptions. Private property owners can ban guns on
their property. (For example, the
Aurora movie theater that was attacked in July 2012 had
exercised its right to forbid licensed
carry.) At K-12 schools, guns may be in automobiles, but not
carried outside the automobile.
Government buildings can prohibit licensed carry, as long as
they make themselves into genuine
gun-free zones: public entrances to such buildings must have
security personnel with metal
detectors.

The bill has no special exemption for public institutions of
higher education; an amendment to
create such an exemption was proposed on the House floor, and
defeated. Of cousre since the
Concealed Carry Act requires that a permitee be at least 21
years old, most undergraduates were
not eligible for permits. When the Concealed Carry Act became
law on July 1, 2003, Colorado
State University (30,000 students; main campus in Fort
Collins) promptly complied. In 12 years
of licensed carry at CSU, there have never been any problems
caused by licensed carriers.
Things were different at the University of Colorado (30,000
students, main campus in Boulder).
Then-Attorney General Ken Salazar issued an non-binding
opinion stating that the University of

Colorado did not have to obey the Concealed Carry Act. The
University of Colorado is the only
institution of higher education specifically named in the
Colorado Constitution, and some cases
http://www.davekopel.org/
conspiracy/wp/2015/04/20/guns-on-university-campuses-the-
colorado-experience/
conspiracy/wp/2015/04/20/guns-on-university-campuses-the-
colorado-experience/
http://www.handgunlaw.us/states/colorado.pdf
have held that CU does not have to comply with some
generally-applicable statutes, unless the
statute specifically states that it covers CU.
CU enforced its gun prohibition vigorously, based on a 1994
Regents’ policy that guns are
“offensive” to the University’s “values.” So, for example,

getting from one side of Boulder to the
other often requires driving through a public street which cuts
through campus. University police
would arrest drivers on that street who had a licensed handgun
in their automobile.
Students for Concealed Carry on Campus brought a lawsuit a
few years later, represented by
attorney Jim Manley (a recent CU Law graduate) of the
Mountain States Legal Foundation.
SCCC was founded in 2008, on the night of the Virginia Tech
murders, and advocates for
campus safety for students.
SCCC lost in the state district court, won in the Court of the
Appeals, and the case went to the
Colorado Supreme Court. I filed an amicus brief presenting the
views of County Sheriffs of

Colorado. The Sheriffs argued that the right to carry firearms is
important for public safety,
because law enforcement officers cannot be everywhere at once.
Further, adults who are granted
permits by the Sheriffs to carry a handgun anywhere in the state
do not become a menace to
society when they set foot on campus.
As the brief explained, Colorado’s law, like the law of almost
every other state, provides an
objective process for issuing permits to responsible adults. In
Colorado, an applicant must be at
least 21 years old, pass a fingerprint-based background check,
and a safety-training class taught
by a nationally-certified instructor. Even if a person meets all
these conditions, the statute
instructs the Sheriff to deny the application “if the sheriff has a
reasonable belief that

documented previous behavior by the applicant makes it likely
the applicant will present a
danger to self or others.”
As a result, in Colorado, as in other states, persons with carry
permits, tend to be highly law-
abiding. For example, in the five-year period between 2009-13,
there were 154,434 concealed
handgun carry permits issued in Colorado. During this same
period, 1,390 permits were revoked.
931 of these permits were revoked following an arrest. Contrast
this with the arrests of over
200,000 Colorado adults in 2013 alone.
The Colorado Sheriffs’ support for defensive arms carrying is
confirmed by national data. For
example, the U.S. Census Bureau conducts in-person interviews
with several thousand persons

annually, for the National Crime Victimization Survey. In 1992-
2002, over 2,000 of the persons
interviewed disclosed they had been raped or sexually assaulted.
Of them, only 26 volunteered
that they used a weapon to resist. In none of those 26 cases was
the rape completed; in none of
the cases did the victim suffer additional injury after she
deployed her weapon.
Professor Gary Kleck, author of the above study, then
conducted a much broader examination of
NCVS data. Analyzing a data set of 27,595 attempted violent
crimes and 16 types of protective
actions, Kleck found that resisting with a gun greatly lowered
the risk of the victim being
injured, or of the crime being completed.

http://goldwaterinstitute.org/en/authors/jim-manley/
https://www.mountainstateslegal.org/
http://davekopel.org/Briefs/County-Sheriffs-of-Colo.pd
http://www.csoc.org/
http://www.csoc.org/
http://csoc.org/ccw_application.asp
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-
u.s/2013/crime-in-the-u.s.-2013/tables/table-
69/table_69_arrest_by_state_2013.xls
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-
u.s/2013/crime-in-the-u.s.-2013/tables/table-
69/table_69_arrest_by_state_2013.xls
https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/211201.pdf
https://www.ncjrs.gov/app/abstractdb/AbstractDBDetails.aspx?i
d=208339
In 2012 the Colorado Supreme Court ruled 7-0 that the
University of Colorado must obey the
Concealed Carry Act. This was consistent with precedent that
CU has no special exemption from
civil rights statutes.

But in 2013, a bill was introduced to outlaw licensed carry on
all campuses. Rape survivor
Amanda Collins testified before the Senate State Affairs
Committee about how a ban on campus
carry had affected her life. As a 21-year-old, Ms Collins had a
Nevada defensive handgun
license. But the University of Nevada at Reno did not allow
licensed firearms on campus. She
was raped in the parking garage of the campus police station,
which was closed for the night.
The crime took place just a few feet from an emergency call
box. “How does rendering me
defenseless protect you against a violent crime?” she asked the
Colorado Senators. State Senator
Evie Hudak told Collins that if Collins had been carrying a
gun, statistics showed that the gun

would have been taken from her. Actually, statistics show that
fewer than one percent of
defensive gun use results in the defender’s gun being taken.
“Respectfully senator, you weren’t there,” Collins responded.
“Had I been carrying concealed, he
wouldn’t have known I had my weapon; and I was there. I know
without a doubt in my mind at
some point I would’ve been able to stop my attack by using my
firearm. He already had a
weapon of his own; he didn’t need mine.”
Because the rapist was not stopped that night, he later raped two
more women and murdered one.
Senator Hudak resigned in December 2013, to avoid a recall
election.
The experience on Colorado campuses since 2003, and at the
University of Colorado since 2012,

shows that adult students or professors who are permitted by
their local Sheriff to carry a
concealed handgun for lawful protection do not perpetrate
unlawful aggression. There has been
one case in which an employee at CU’s dental school was
showing off her gun, and accidentally
fired it. She was immediately and properly fired.
Colleges should respect the rights of responsible persons, such
as Amanda Collins, to protect
themselves. As the Sheriffs told the Colorado Supreme Court,
law-abiding adults who have been
licensed to carry guns throughout the state should retain their
self-defense rights when they
attend or teach at a public institution of higher education.
David Kopel is Research Director, Independence Institute,
Denver, Colorado; Associate Policy Analyst, Cato

Institute, Washington, D.C; and Adjunct professor of advanced
constitutional law, Denver University, Sturm
College of Law. He is author of 15 books and 90 scholarly
journal articles.
Article Citation:
Kopel, David. "Guns on University Campuses: The Colorado
Experience." The Washington Post. 20 Apr.
2015. Web. 09 July 2015.
http://www.cobar.org/opinions/opinion.cfm?opinionid=8421
http://www.denverpost.com/ci_22721762/colorado-senators-
comments-rape-victim-drawing-criticism
http://www.amazon.com/Targeting-Guns-Firearms-Control-
Institutions/dp/0202305694/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTfhMUCApIA&feature=yo
utu.be

http://www.denverpost.com/ci_22002593/cu-staffer-gone-
charges-filed-accidental-shooting

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