gun control

In the movie A Christmas Story, Ralphie had his sights set on just one gift: a Red Ryder BB gun. But many Americans this season clearly had heavier arms on their minds: Background checks on gun buyers hit a single-month record in December.

Jared Lee Loughner, the disturbed young man charged in this weekend's massacre in Tuscon, highlights the physical dangers that individuals with untreated mental illness pose to society. But the financial costs of mental illness are high too.

The key question Americans have to face is whether it makes sense to let the gun lobby hold more power than citizens who want to live without fear of a well-armed mad gunman going off in a crowd.

The Supreme Court is is in the headlines for more than just the Elena Kagan confirmation hearings. In the midst of that process, the Court has ruled against a decades-old handgun ban in Chicago, ruling it unconstitutional in a 5-4 decision on Monday. The ruling against the ban doesn't necessarily...

A deeply divided Supreme Court on Monday decided that the Constitution's Second Amendment gives all Americans the individual right to keep and bear arms.

Gun-rights advocates are holding meetings at Starbucks in San Francisco with their weapons in plain sight, which is legal. The coffee giant declined to remove them, because the "open-carry" activists aren't breaking any law. That logic is hard to argue with.

The Starbucks coffee chain will let customers carry guns where it's legal and said it doesn't want to be in the middle of a gun-control debate. Some gun owners have walked into Starbucks and other businesses to test state laws that allow them to carry weapons openly in public places. Gun control advocates have protested.

What would you think if I told you that because of the new CARD Act, which takes effect Feb. 22, visitors to national parks can now carry licensed guns? Strange, but true. Congress has a tendency to pass minor or unpopular legislation under the cover of supported changes. It's a bit of a...

In a move that has drawn criticism, confusion, and more than a few comments about strange bedfellows, the Senate recently voted 67-29 to add a gun-rights amendment to a consumer credit-card bill. The provision, which was authored by Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla), requires national parks to abide by...

Wall Street pundits often talk about the resiliency of stocks such as McDonald's Corp. (MCD) and Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT). Shares of Smith & Wesson Holding Corp. (SWHC) and Sturm, Ruger & Co. (RGR), the two publicly traded gunmakers, have vastly outperformed them both. Smith & Wesson,...