guns

It’s been a busy few years for Sturm, Ruger…so much so, the company is looking to start another factory out-of-state. 

Stand your ground - the controversial gun law that passed last year removed the obligation that a person first consider retreating before using deadly force in a public place. Last week, the New Hampshire house narrowly voted to repeal the law, but this effort faces a steep challenge in the Senate, while the  national debate over gun laws continues.

Guests:

Our favorite content from the program, delivered in one sound-errific package.

This week, why robot interrogators might beat humans at getting to the truth. Mass shooter Amy Bishop's first victim...her brother, back in 1986. Why jury duty matters. The diverse cast of a New Hampshire production of "To Kill A Mockingbird." And the active social media lives of long-dead celebrities.

The N.H. House votes 211-151 to give gun owners immunity if their weapons are stolen and then used in a crime.

Patrick Radden Keefe's stunning investigation into mass shooter Amy Bishop's past has gone hyper-viral. The New Yorker writer joins us to talk about Bishop's 1986 shooting of her younger brother, and how family dynamics may have played into her 2010 murder of three colleagues at the University of Alabama.

After almost any act of violence, be it a suicide or a mass school shooting, people ask questions, which usually boil down these questions: How could we have prevented this from happening? How can we keep it from happening again?

Throughout this week’s series on guns, we’ve heard  from residents of rural New Hampshire who think of firearms as a tool.

That’s a perspective you’ll hear and see in the North Country town of Colebrook, where you can pick up a firearm and home improvement tools in the same store.

As part of NHPR’s series, A Loaded Issue, we take a historical look at our attitudes toward firearms that have shaped our laws then and now.  A libertarian streak, along with a rural hunting culture in the Live Free or Die state, has meant few restrictions on firearms.  But new arrivals have brought changing attitudes towards guns.

GUESTS:

Andy Smith- Director of UNH Survey Center and Associate Professor of Political Science.

As we heard earlier in this series, many rural residents of New Hampshire have a strong connection to guns. But that wasn’t always the case.

The number of machine guns still in circulation is small compared to handguns or rifles, but federal data shows that New Hampshire is home to more machine guns per capita than any other state – about 9800 registered machine guns in all, or 7.47 machine guns per 1000 people.

Women are a growing part of the debate over gun rights and potential new gun laws – partly because there are growing numbers of women who own and use guns. Erica Goode is a national correspondent on criminal justice issues for the New York Times; she wrote about the rising number of female gun owners this week, and she joins us as part of NHPR’s series on guns, “A Loaded Issue”.

In most cases, New Hampshire’s representatives in Congress have kept the state’s more open approach to gun ownership and gun rights during debates in Washington. There are exceptions, though, and they may tell us something about the state's role in today’s high profile national debate over gun violence.

No doubt you've being hearing a lot about guns in the news lately. For the uninitiated, the types and terminology can be overwhelming, and can make understanding what you're hearing - and knowing if it's accurate - a veritable chore. As part of our series, A Loaded Issue, NHPR is aiming to assist in demystifying the firearm, starting with this infographic that outlines a few of the basics (click on the image to view at full size):

Several hundred gun rights supporters, some carrying rifles and pistols, rallied Thursday outside the State House.

Rally organizers were collecting signatures for a petition telling Governor Hassan and New Hampshire  lawmakers to nullify federal gun control laws.

The petition is blunt: it says N.H. public officials are “duty bound” to declare void all federal gun limits that don’t comport with the constitution. Jerry Delemus organized the rally and leads the Rocheter 9/12 group.

We wrap up our three-day series on possible lessons from the Newtown shootings, with a look at some of the battles brewing over gun control and gun rights. President Obama has said he’ll do what it takes to curb gun violence. And lawmakers here in the Granite State are gearing up to take on such gun-related issues as the state’s Stand Your Ground law.

Guests: