80 million gun owners in the United States

Grassroots gun rights groups gain momentum

- Second Amendment Foundation
Thursday, April 7, 2011

Considering that there are an estimated 80 million gun owners in the United States, it should be no surprise that local organizations devoted to protecting and promoting gun rights - especially in the wake of the 2008 Heller ruling and the 2010 McDonald decision by the U.S. Supreme Court - have been springing up, growing in numbers and gaining political clout.

As founder of the Second Amendment Foundation, which brought the landmark case of McDonald v. City of Chicago to the high court with the cooperation of the Illinois State Rifle Association, I have witnessed this surge in gun rights interests with delight. Today, SAF is proudly involved in legal actions with several grassroots organizations, challenging onerous state and local gun laws.

For example, SAF is cooperating with Grass Roots North Carolina, a pro-gun-rights organization, in a challenge of North Carolina’s emergency powers statute that allows the governor or local officials to suspend Second Amendment rights outside of the home during a declared emergency.

In California, SAF has partnered with the CalGuns Foundation on several lawsuits to protect the rights of gun owners.

Our lawsuit against a discretionary - and essentially discriminatory - gun permit law in Maryland has gotten financial support from Maryland Shall Issue. Likewise, a SAF lawsuit against a similar law in New York’s Westchester County is being supported by Long Island Firearms and the Shooters Committee On Political Education (SCOPE).

Our newest legal challenges to anti-gun rights laws against the state of New Jersey and New York City were filed with local plaintiffs, the New Jersey Association of Rifle and Pistol Clubs and the New York Rifle and Pistol Association.

This emergence of pro-gun grassroots organizations evidently surprises the mainstream press, which has long believed that the National Rifle Association, and only the NRA, speaks for gun owners and lobbies on their behalf. While it is certainly true that the NRA effectively lobbies for gun owners on Capitol Hill and in state legislatures, it is also true that alternate gun rights groups including state-level concealed and open carry organizations, and groups fashioning themselves after the Virginia Citizens’ Defense League, Gun Owners’ Action League of Massachusetts, Ohioans for Concealed Carry and Buckeye Firearms Association, Arizona Citizens Defense League, the Montana Sport Shooting Association and Oregon Firearms Federation, have risen to handle their own affairs rather than depend entirely on a national association to do their bidding.

This presents no small dilemma for the media, and for gun prohibitionist groups that have long tried to demonize the so-called “gun lobbyâ€