http://www.angus-reid.com/polls/view/30744/most_americans_oppose_banning_handguns
Most Americans Oppose Banning Handguns
May 21, 2008
Many adults in the United States believe handguns should not be
banned, according to a poll by the Pew Research Center for the People
and the Press. 59 per cent of respondents would oppose a law that
would prohibit the sale of these weapons, up four points since last
year.
The U.S. Constitution’s Second Amendment guarantees Americans the
right "to keep and bear arms." Some American states have enacted their
own gun control regulations, independent of existing federal
legislation.
Earlier this month, Illinois senator Barack Obama—who is seeking the
Democratic Party’s presidential nomination—discussed his views on
guns, saying, "What I believe is that there is a Second Amendment
right. I think it is an individual right. I think people have the
right to lawfully bear arms. I do believe that there is nothing
inconsistent with also saying that we can institute some common-sense
gun laws so that we don’t have kids being shot on the streets of
cities like Chicago, that we can institute strong background checks,
that we can trace guns back to potential unscrupulous gun dealers who
have pedaled them to people that shouldn’t be getting them."
