Gun owner or not, Americans agree on many ways to limit gun violence

AGREE In a new survey, 83 percent of U.S. gun owners and 85 percent of nonowners said they support stricter safety-training standards for permits to carry a concealed weapon. Despite a public debate that grows more fractious with every school shooting — from Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Conn., to Parkland, Fla., and the latest deadly attack May 18 in Santa Fe, Texas — Americans actually agree on gun policy to a surprising extent. According to a new survey of more than 2,100 people, majorities of both gun owners and nonowners support 15 potential gun restrictions or regulations, researchers report online May 17 in the American Journal of Public Health. “There’s much more agreement than one would think given the rhetoric and the fighting,” says David Hemenway, an expert on violence prevention at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Two new questions in the survey, the third conducted by the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, give a glimpse into where Americans draw their battle lines. While more than 80 percent of gun owners and nonowners agreed on safe-handling tests for carrying concealed weapons, they disagreed on allowing those legally concealed guns onto school grounds. That idea got a thumbs-up from nearly 43 percent of gun owners but only 19 percent of nonowners. Of gun owners surveyed, 43 percent supported allowing legally concealed guns onto the grounds of schools for kindergarten through grade 12. Only 19 percent of nonowners agreed with them. Overall, the survey found […]

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