Top 10 States With The Most Guns

5 months ago

The West has more trigger-happy states than others.

This year alone hundreds of young black men in Chicago have been gunned down during outbreaks of gang violence. While the Windy City has made international headlines in 2012 related to gun violence, the state of Illinois isn’t one of the 10 states that lead the nation in gun ownership. Florida, the state that provoked protests with its controversial “Stand Your Ground” law, also isn’t on the list. So which states made the cut? Most of them are located in the West and in the South, according to the Deseret News. The Utah paper compiled a list of the most gun-laden states using criminal background check data from the FBI. Whenever cashiers ring up gun sales, they must contact the FBI or another agency to see if the customer has a criminal record or is ineligible to buy firearms for another reason. Below are the states with the highest amount of such background checks per 100,000 residents.

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10. Arkansas doesn’t require permits for rifles, shotguns and handguns.

9. Oklahoma passed a law in October 2012 allowing residents to carry guns in plain sight.

8. South Dakota in 2011 proposed a law that required every resident to be armed.

7. North Dakota grants permits for concealed weapons to 18 year olds. In many other the states the minimum age to do so is 21.

6. Wyoming passed a law in 2011 that allows residents to walk around with concealed weapons sans permits.

5. Alaska is a pro-gun state that doesn’t require permits for a variety of firearms or for the weapons to be registered.

4. West Virginia is a “stand your ground” state. It permits open carry as well.

3. Montana sparked controversy in 2009 with its Firearms Freedom Act that challenged the federal government’s authority to regulate guns there.

2. Utah made headlines in 2000 when a small town called Virgin made it mandatory for all households to own guns, so residents could defend themselves against aggressors. In 2007, the state also permitted concealed weapons to be carried at public universities.

1. Kentucky not only leads the nation in gun owners, it also has some of the least restrictive gun ownership laws in the nation, according to the New York Times.

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