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History News Network

History News Network puts current events into historical perspective. Subscribe to our newsletter for new perspectives on the ways history continues to resonate in the present. Explore our archive of thousands of original op-eds and curated stories from around the web. Join us to learn more about the past, now.

HNN Hot Topics: Gun Violence

Click HERE for our most recent articles on guns and gun violence.

Click HERE for historians commenting on the Pittsburgh shooting. 

Click HERE for historians commenting on the Parkland shooting. 

“Since 1970, more Americans have died from guns than died in all U.S. wars going back to the American Revolution.” — NYT Columnist Nicholas Kristof 

Commentary & News

  • Joe Nocera:  2nd Amendment:  What Did the Framers Really Mean?
  • Jack Rakove: Scalia's selective history
  • Jim Castagnera: The Firearms Dilemma
  • Sanford Levinson: DC v. Heller ... A Dismaying Performance By The Supreme Court
  • David E. Young: Why DC's Gun Law Is Unconstitutional
  • Historians file brief in SCOTUS in support of DC gun law
  • Saul Cornell: The Second Amendment Goes to Court
  • Adam Freedman: The comma and the 2nd Amendment
  • Saul Cornell: The Right to Bear Bazookas: A New Take on the Second Amendment
  • Robert Spitzer: Working Hard to Misconstrue the 2nd Amendment
  • Saul Cornell: It's Time for Gun Control Proponents to Reclaim the Constitutional High Ground
  • Don B. Kates: Shouldn't People Who Favor Gun Control Favor War in Iraq?
  • Don B. Kates: Do Guns Cause Crime?
  • P.M. Carpenter: Did You Think John Ashcroft Wasn't Serious About Guns?
  • Keith Miller: The West:"With a Draw From Either Hand" ... Gunslingers of the Old West
  • Robert Spitzer: Review of Alexander DeConde's Gun Violence in America: The Struggle for Control
  • Michael Bellesiles Scandal

  • How the Bellesiles Story Developed
  • Daniel Justin Herman: Review of Michael A. Bellesiles's Arming America
  • Glenn Harlan Reynolds: Do the People Who Favorably Reviewed the Bellesiles Book Owe Readers an Apology?
  • Don Williams: Could Bellesiles's Problems Undermine Gun Control?
  • Ronald Radosh: Michael Bellesiles Is PC