Harvard Study: Gun Control Does Not Reduce Murder Rates

Warner Todd Huston

August 26, 2013

• http://www.mrconservative.com/2013/08/23443-harvard-study-gun-control-does-not-reduce-murder-rates/

Here is something that won’t surprise any Second Amendment supporter: A study found that gun control does not reduce murder rates.
(See also: Los Angeles Colleges Banned From Teaching NRA Courses – Told To Promote Gun Control Instead)
The study was overlooked when it first came out in 2007, but it was recently re-discovered and while the findings may not surprise right-to-protection supporters, the place where the study was undertaken is a bit surprising. The study came from the Harvard Journal of Law, that bastion of extreme, Ivy League liberalism.
The study, written by Don B. Kates and Gary Mauser and titled, “Would Banning Firearms Reduce Murder and Suicide?,” found some surprising things.
One thing in the study seems to show that more guns means less crime.

The same pattern appears when comparisons of violence to gun ownership are made within nations. Indeed, “data on firearms ownership by constabulary area in England,” like data from the United States, show “a negative correlation,” that is, “where firearms are most dense violent crime rates are lowest, and where guns are least dense violent crime rates are highest.”11 Many different data sets from various kinds of sources are summarized as follows by the leading text:

[T]here is no consistent significant positive association between gun ownership levels and violence rates: across (1) time within the United States, (2) U.S. cities, (3) counties within Illinois, (4) country‐sized areas like England, U.S. states, (5) regions of the United States, (6) nations, or (7) population subgroups . . . .

(See also: Student Says Gun Free Zone Laws Left Him Defenseless During Mass Stabbing)
This study finds that the number of guns does not correlate to the number of murders. Therefore, it’s easy to realize that banning guns will do nothing to impact murder and suicide rates.
And as gun owners across America reading this right now will be head to say: “Well, duh!”
(See also: What I’d like to tell public school teachers who promote gun control in their classrooms)