The National Rifle Association came to the University of New Hampshire Thursday to educate students on the Second Amendment and gun control. The meeting was held in the Wildcat Den on the first floor of the Memorial Union Building, where about twenty people were present – a quarter of them women.
The presentation started with a brief historical introduction of the NRA. Headquartered in Fairfax, Virginia, the NRA started a program entitled, “NRA U” about five years ago. The sole purpose of NRA-U was to educate college students around the country about the benefits the NRA provides its members.
Founded in 1871 in New York after the Civil War, the original purpose of the NRA was to provide a scientific study of marksmanship. It became the oldest sportsmen and civil rights organization established in the United States. Presently, the NRA’s focus has shifted to protect every American’s Second Amendment right to bear arms. Four million due-paying members make up the association.
The NRA, supposedly nonpartisan, cannot function with standardized gun control laws, and tends to favor Republican candidates who strictly back up the Second Amendment. The seminar evoked how gun control does not necessarily minimize crime, which may be biased with incidences of unreported violence involving guns. However, just as freedom of speech and freedom of religion are granted to Americans in the Bill of Rights, so is the right to bear arms. Therefore, the Second Amendment must be respected and followed on its own just as the other amendments.
According to the NRA, instead of “banning” guns, or enforcing stricter gun laws that infringe upon constitutional rights, their plan is to educate gun-owners and youth about firearms. The association also upholds existing laws to control crime with effective law enforcement strategies, and punishes criminals with harsher sentences instead of the average citizen.
However, as recent gun U.S. gun tragedies have climbed, from the Virginia Tech massacre of 2007, to the most recent Colorado shooting during a screening of The Dark Knight Rises this past summer, a debate about guns is still hot-to-the-touch.
Concealed gun laws vary in all states, and the state of New Hampshire, where one needs a permit to carry a concealed weapon, recently passed a law in January to cease public institutions, such as university campuses and sporting venues, from banning firearms. Gov. John Lynch vetoed the bill for obvious safety reasons.
College students take the gun control debate and the Second Amendment quite seriously. Steven Pampreen, a business administration major, has a somewhat neutral view of the subject. “I think that the intent of the [Second] Amendment was to allow people to individually protect themselves without relying on the state,” Pampreen said. “I think that is still a worthy goal.” Pampreen explains how inequality is the problem, not firearms themselves, since some states, such as New York, make it extremely difficult to buy guns, even though it is still legal to do so.
Coty Donohue, 21 of Somersworth, thinks it is important for any country to protect its citizens, never mind a country that is supposed to be a world leader. “When there is almost one firearm per American, 105,000 gun injuries occurring a year, and roughly 50 percent of those injuries being accidental, I think it’s clear that a lack of gun regulation is a lack of protection.”
Samantha Spaeth, 20, of Manchester thinks gun control is a double-edged sword. “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people,” Spaeth said. She brings forth the argument that even if guns are made illegal, there is still a black market, so guns will never go away. Instead, firearms may become a specialized things like drugs. “I think you should be able to have a gun, but I don’t think you should be able to walk around with it. If you have one in your house, that’s a complete different circumstance.”
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