Talk:Gun law in the United States/Archive 2

Article title
Hello. You have renamed this article, from "Gun law in the United States" to "Gun law of the United States". Can you please explain why? Renaming a longstanding article with an extensive edit history can sometimes be seen as a significant change, so it might have been better to discuss this first, but, let's talk about it now. — Mudwater (Talk) 10:28, 24 July 2019 (UTC)
 * My thinking was this would be consistent with the name of the article: Law of the United States. Lmatt (talk) 15:07, 24 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Could you please hold off on renaming any more gun law articles? There's not a consensus for these renames.  In particular the ones for U.S. states and territories should probably not be renamed, because they are about the gun laws (not the gun law) of those states and territories.  — Mudwater (Talk) 22:41, 24 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Thank you for changing back the name of this article. I have also un-re-named "Gun laws in Puerto Rico" and "Gun laws in the United States Virgin Islands".  As far as all the articles about gun laws in other countries, I don't have a strong opinion about those. — Mudwater (Talk) 10:00, 25 July 2019 (UTC)
 * You are right, Gun laws in Puerto Rico and Gun laws in the United States Virgin Islands are indeed about the laws not the law. I have moved these two to Guns laws of X.
 * For all of the U.S. states and territories, the articles are titled "Gun laws in [x]", not "Gun laws of [x}". In my opinion those longstanding article titles should be kept the way they are.  That's why I renamed the articles for Puerto Rico and the United States Virgin Islands back the way they were originally.  So in my view they should be put back again, to "in", not "of". — Mudwater (Talk) 10:22, 26 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Note also that U.S. states (and territories) have local gun laws as well as state (and territory) gun laws, and those articles also cover the local laws. So they are in fact about "Gun laws in [x]", and not "Gun laws of [x]". — Mudwater (Talk) 11:28, 26 July 2019 (UTC)
 * With all that in mind, I have un-renamed those two articles again, to "Gun laws in Puerto Rico" and "Gun laws in the United States Virgin Islands". — Mudwater (Talk) 16:25, 27 July 2019 (UTC)

Should this article be renamed to federal gun law in the United States or United States Gun law?
IMHO the current title of this article which is "about federal gun laws" only is misleading ("in the United States" implies that state/local law should also be addressed). Apokrif (talk) 02:49, 31 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Endorse Federal gun law in the United States. – S. Rich (talk) 01:26, 1 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Comment: I've been pondering this, and I'm not sure what to think. The hatnote makes it quite clear what this article is about, and what it's not about.  On the other hand, "Federal gun law in the United States" might be a more accurate title. — Mudwater (Talk) 23:35, 3 September 2019 (UTC)

Illegal alien
I don't think it's really a matter of compromise. The cited ATF link says"illegal alien" link.Terrorist96 (talk) 02:59, 12 December 2019 (UTC)


 * The law uses the term "illegal alien", but some of our readers might not know what that means. The term "undocumented immigrant" is now in common use.  That's why I think it makes sense for the article to use both terms, like this -- an illegal alien (i.e. an undocumented immigrant). — Mudwater (Talk) 04:33, 12 December 2019 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 28 January 2019 and 25 May 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Michaelw911, Mnmarkland.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 22:51, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 15 January 2019 and 2 May 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Peer reviewers: B4brady.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 22:02, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Second Amendment section
I'm going to restore the Second Amendment section to this version, from eight months ago. At that time there had been a lot of editing of that section by several editors, and that version was the consensus (or compromise) that was reached. It's about half as long as the current version of the section. The Second Amendment is critical to an understanding of gun law in the United States, but this is not the article about the Second Amendment. (That's here.) There's a tendency for editors to periodically show up and expand this section, partly because it's a controversial topic. But we don't want the Second Amendment text to keep expanding and "take over" this article. What the article really needs is a more thorough explanation of the major federal gun laws. — Mudwater (Talk) 11:39, 16 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Again, there was a previous consensus to limit the length of the Second Amendment section of this article, and a long discussion about how to balance it. So, let's continue to limit the "Second Amendment creep" here.  But feel free to edit the main Second Amendment article.  That's where a lot of the hot action is anyway. — Mudwater (Talk) 00:29, 7 March 2018 (UTC)
 * Could you please point me to these past discussions? K.e.coffman (talk) 02:15, 8 March 2018 (UTC)


 * The past discussions can be seen, or rather partly seen, in two places. (1) On this talk page, above, in these sections: "Inadequate lead", "Meaning of "well-regulated"", and "Second Amendment / Lead".  (2) Take a look at the history of edits on the article itself, especially the edits done from April 2015 to October 2017.  A lot of those were back and forth editing of the "Second Amendment" section, with the discussion taking place in the form of edit summaries, and by implication in the actual updates to the article. A lot of the edits done before March 12, 2015 were also about the Second Amendment, but those have all been hidden.  I'm pretty sure that was done to remove a copyright violation from public visibility.   — Mudwater (Talk) 02:37, 8 March 2018 (UTC)
 * How should this article address relevant constitutional rights? I see the second amendment is addressed in the article but in general the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness is not adequately protected when gun-related deaths are considered as a public health crisis. Is there a place here for the discussion of constitutional rights that are violated by inaction on the part of the government to protect citizens from fire-arm access as a public health threat? Why or why not? Bcapdevi (talk) 22:11, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

actually the Second A article has been pretty stable WRT calls for repeal. But please see the new discussion where I argue that calls for repeal are better presented in this article. Basically I am saying the 2nd A article is best focused on the history and laws directly concerning the 2nd A. And that the emotional, news-headline talk advocating repeal is off-topic. Thanks. – S. Rich (talk) 06:00, 11 April 2018 (UTC)


 * The Second Amendment section of this article is already plenty long, without expanding it with hypothetical scenarios. Hypothetical in the sense that repealing the amendment hasn't happened, and therefore the discussion has had no actual affect on gun laws in the U.S.  It would be better to expand the rest of the article instead, going into more detail about the various federal laws.  Perhaps repeal discussions would be a better fit for the Gun politics in the United States article. — Mudwater (Talk) 09:26, 11 April 2018 (UTC)
 * This article has 4 basic sections and 19kB. 2nd A has 10 sections and 225kB. Gun politics as 4 sections and 145kB. If anything, 2nd A is the one with a WP:CHOKING problem. Accordingly, this article can actually benefit from some expansion by discussing the latest hot topic in gun law. Your point about hypothetical scenarios is especially pertinent to the 2nd A article. (Thanks.) – S. Rich (talk) 17:57, 11 April 2018 (UTC)


 * In my view this article should present a balanced overview of federal gun laws. The Second Amendment is an important topic, but it shouldn't be given undue weight either.  What's happened a number of times with this article is that someone comes along and expands the Second Amendment section to include some topic that they find interesting or relevant.  After a while the Second Amendment section gets longer and longer, till it "takes over" the article.  This is just the latest example.  And in this case, it's about something that hasn't even happened.  I really think the main Second Amendment article, and/or the Gun politics in the United States article, are better places for this.  But, what do other editors think?  — Mudwater (Talk) 21:44, 11 April 2018 (UTC)