NCJ Number
183545
Date Published
March 1998
Length
40 pages
Annotation
This document presents advertisements, copies of media articles, and statements by representatives of the National Rifle Association (NRA) and other organizations in support of juvenile gun use, together with State-by-state statistics on firearms deaths among children.
Abstract
The media materials and quotations focus on the role of the gun lobby in targeting youth. The advertisements depict children and adolescents with guns. NRA advertisements urge members to enroll their children as junior members and recommend an NRA endowment as a way of investing in freedom for future generations. An article in the NRA magazine, "American Rifleman" says the right to keep and bear arms is the one right that allows rights to exist at all. Another magazine article suggests ways to help school children develop an interest in the gun industry. The quotations state that some children are ready to start using a gun at age 10, that gun ownership is intrinsically good and intrinsically innocent, and that children for more than one generation have been brainwashed into believing that the Second Amendment is criminal in origin. The statistics list the firearms homicides, suicides, and unintentional firearm deaths among children and youth less than 18 years old in 1995 and note that 3,026 juvenile firearms deaths occurred that year. Photographs