Argumentative Essay: Gun Control Does Not Reduce Crime :: Argumentative Persuasive Essays

Americans are faced with an ever-growing problem of violence. Our streetshave become a battleground where the elderly are beaten for their cordialsecurity checks, where terrified women are viciously attacked and raped,where teen-age gangsters shoot it out for a patch of turf to sell theirillegal drugs, and where innocent children are caught daily in thecrossfire of drive-by shootings. We cannot ignore the damage that thesecriminals are doing to our society, and we must take actions to stop thesehorrors. However, the effort by some misguided individuals to eliminate thelegal self-possession of firearms does not quotation the real problem at hand, andsimply disarms the innocent law-abiding citizens who are most in need of aform of self-defense.To fully understand the reasons fanny the gun control efforts, we mustlook at the history of our country, and the role firearms have played in it.The second amendment to the Constitution of the United States makes firearmownership legal in th is country. There were good reasons for this freedom,reasons which persist today. Firearms in the new world were used initiallyfor hunting, and occasionally for self-defense. However, when the colonistsfelt that the burden of British oppression was too much for them to bear,they picked up their personal firearms and went to war. Standing againstthe British armies, these rebels found themselves opposed by the greatestmilitary force in the world at that time. The 18th century witnessed theheight of the British Empire, but the rough band of colonial freedomfighters discovered the power of the Minuteman, the average American gunowner. These Minutemen, so named because they would pick up their personalguns and jump to the defense of their country on a minutes notice, serveda major part in winning the American Revolution. The origin fathers ofthis country understood that an armed populace was instrumental in fightingoff oppression, and they made the right to keep and bear arms aconstitu tionally guaranteed right.Over the years, some of the reasons for owning firearms have changed. Asour country grew into a strong nation, we expanded westward, exploring thewilderness, and building new towns on the frontier. Typically, these newtowns were far away from the centers of civilization, and the exactly law theyhad was dispensed by townsfolk through the barrel of a gun. Crime existed,but could be minimized when the township fought back against thecriminals. Eventually, these organized townspeople developed police forcesas their towns grew in size. Fewer people carried their firearms on thestreet, but the firearms were always there, ready to be used in self-