National Rifle Association Lobbying Efforts

The study will include consideration of the National Rifle Association itself, the relationship of the National Rifle Association with the Congress, how the National Rifle Association influences the decisions of the United States Congress with respect to gun-related and Second Amendment issues, the lobbying practices of the National Rifle Association, the role of the pressure of National Rifle Association constituents in influencing Congress in such issues, and past successes and possible loss of National Rifle Association power due to the inflexible positions taken by the Association in its efforts to "enforce" the provisions of the Second Amendment.

The National Rifle Association is clearly the most powerful pro-gun voice in the United States, and it is one of the most powerful lobbying forces in the history of the country with respect to any issue. As Elaine Landau writes in Armed America: The Status of Gun Control, the National Rifle Association, "comprised largely of hunters, sportsmen, and gun owners, stands firm in its belief that Americans have a constitutional right to own arms as guaranteed by the Second Amendment. The NRA's President is Joe Foss, a former governor of South Dakota and a highly decorated World War II hero. He described the group's convictions this way: 'I say all guns are good guns. There are no bad

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against gun control and, again in the NRA's words, works 'to defeat politicians who disregard the rights of law-abiding firearms owners'" (Dolan, 1982, p. 43). The groups which offer alternative arguments to those presented by the National Rifle Association, such as The Committee for Handgun Control, the People Versus Handguns Committee, and Citizens to Save Lives, simply do not have anywhere near the political, organizational or financial clout possessed and exercised by the National Rifle Association. One sign of the power of the NRA in Congress and elsewhere was seen when President Ronald Reagan suffered an assassin's bullet. While the gun control advocates throughout the nation protested the ease with which the would-be assassin bought a gun and the particularly fatal exploding bullets used in that gun, the target of the assassin --- President Reagan himself (a member of the NRA) offered no such protest and generally accepted the basic argument of the national Rifle Association that "Guns don't kill people; people kill people." The current President of the United States, George Bush, holds to the same basic NRA philosophy. As we read in Dolan, "the newly elected President (Reagan) was not a strong pro-control man. Mr.
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 4684
Approximate Pages = 19 (250 words per page)

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