Gun Control

Actually, in my know-nothing humble opinion, gun control is in the hands of the one holding the gun.

But that's just me.

The United States of America's Constitution, 2nd Amendment, guarantees American citizens the right to bear arms. This right cannot be infringed by the federal government, period.

That's a given.

However, local, county, and state regulations are definitely permitted. Many places have many different levels of gun rules on their books.

We are a big nation.

As citizens we have the right to choose where we will live.

Being as there are so many options open to us, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that if you oppose gun control you live where there isn't any. If you support it you live where regulations are strict.

Let's see how things stack up.

On the one hand you've got folks saying that more gun control is safer.
On the other hand you've got folks saying that less gun control is safer.

To me, it doesn't really appear that gun control actually has a whole lot of impact one way or the other, at least not without more to go on than the below numbers.

Which means that there are other factors at play, factors that carry more weight than the level of gun control.

At the moment I've got other things to do than look up all of those possible factors.

Here are some links for your perusing pleasure: 

IF YOU WANT STRICT CONTROL

MOST LENIENT CONTROL

Those are the top ten in each category of 'most' or 'least' ... the other thirty states fall somewhere in between.  

HERE is a link to statistics for crimes by state, going WAY back, for you to wend your way through if you want.

HERE is a bit of a better breakdown 

Violent Crime Rate By State

Rank U.S. State Rate per 100K population
1 Alaska 635.8
2 Nevada 635.6
3 Tennessee 608.4
4 New Mexico 597.4
5 Florida 540.5
6 Louisiana 514.7
7 South Carolina 497.7
8 Delaware 489.1
9 Arkansas 480.1
10 Maryland 446.1
11 Missouri 442.9
12 Alabama 427.4
13 Michigan 427.3
14 Oklahoma 406.0
15 Texas 405.9
16 Arizona 399.9
17 California 396.1
18 Massachussetts 391.4
19 New York 381.8
20 Georgia 377.3
21 Illinois 370.0
22 Indiana 365.3
23 Kansas 348.6
24 North Carolina 329.5
25 South Dakota 326.5
26 Montana 323.7
27 Pennsylvania 314.1
28 Colorado 309.1
29 West Virginia 302.0
30 Wisconsin 290.3
31 Washington 285.2
32 Ohio 284.9
33 Nebraska 280.4
34 Mississippi 278.5
35 Iowa 273.5
36 North Dakota 265.1
37 New Jersey 261.2
38 Hawaii 259.2
39 Connecticut 236.9
40 Oregon 232.3
41 Minnesota 229.1
42 Rhode Island 219.2
43 Utah 215.6
44 Idaho 212.2
45 Kentucky 211.6
46 Virginia 196.2
47 New Hampshire 196.1
48 Wyoming 195.5
49 Maine 127.8
50 Vermont 99.3