Outside the Box: More Guns for Gun Control?

Outside the Box is a series of articles that proposes unconventional solutions to controversial topics. Their purpose is to attempt to reframe debates that have fallen into ideological ruts and dogmas.

Author’s note: I’m a gun owner, a hunter, and a firm supporter of the Second Amendment. I am also a human being, who deplores the needless death and suffering of children and their families. These should not be mutually incompatible positions.

Another article in the wake of another mass shooting: I feel like the Onion, publishing the same headline time after time and to no effect. But the Las Vegas massacre was spectacularly horrific: in just 9 minutes, the shooter managed to inflict carnage comparable to some small battles[1]. So here is another article discussing the need for gun control. Gun control advocates want to ban many types of weapons and accessories, but this approach to reduce the number of guns in private ownership has always been met by a solid wall of red state opposition, well-funded by the National Rifle Association. True to the unorthodox spirit of “Outside the Box”, I want to argue that gun control advocates have been going about it all wrong; the best way to achieve gun control goals might be to issue more guns. To follow this logic, we have to take a Bill & Ted’esque trip back to America’s post-colonial period.

At the time of the enactment of the Constitution, five of the original thirteen states already had provisions in their state constitutions for the right to…