he help of a suppressing number of Democratic gun control opponents. Currently, three quarters of the House Republicans vote the NRA way and another 50 or so Democratic NRA loyalists have the ability to kill a gun control bill. Democrats like Bart Stupak (D-MI) believe in the American tradition of owning guns. Similarly, constituencies to the south and mid-west seem to be more supportive of gun ownership and sportsmanship, regardless of their opinions on other issues. Representative David Obey from Wisconsins dear country demonstrates this contradiction in beliefs by being both a card holding NRA member and a Democrat. Many democrats acknowledge that they may very well lose their seat entirely if they were to support gun control but vote right down the democratic line on everything else. There are also many interest groups lobbying Congress on the issue of gun control. Hand Gun Control Inc. has nearly 430,000 members nationwide and is the largest gun control group lobbying Congress. Led by Sarah Brady, wife of Jim Brady, Handgun Control has recruited trial lawyers to sue gun manufacturers as they make little progress in Congress. They are also continually trying to raise more money for their anemic PAC (Richie, p.2) which barely raises 2 million dollars per election cycle. The American Bar Association also supports certain gun control regulation especially the enactment of measures to prevent easy access to firearms via unregulated sales. Other Senate provisions backed by the ABA would prohibit minors possession of military assault weapons, ban imports of high capacity ammunition clips, and child safety locks. However neither of these groups are as influential or as well financed as the NRA.The NRA is perhaps the prevailing force in the gun control debate. The NRA has over three million dedicated members and an annual budget of $137 million. These statistics make the NRA one of th...
