The US Supreme Court has declined to put a temporary hold on an Illinois law that bans the sale of assault-style weapons and a variety of other guns and accessories.
The law will require existing owners of the restricted items to register them by 1 January.
A gun rights group and the owner of a gun shop have sued to stop the implementation of the law.
Their case has consistently been rebuffed by lower courts.
The legislation took effect in January and sales of the restricted guns were stopped immediately.
So like should we define them based on theoretical murders per minute they could achieve!
Possibly. The gun used in Las Vegas was a “semiautomatic”. Fitted with a bump stock it shoots like a fully automatic. So the fire rate could be a useful tool.
Maybe we could compare them to other deadly things like a car or a knife?
Cars and knives have many uses. As far as I can tell, guns have four and half of those involve either killing or threatening to kill someone. The other two are target shooting and hunting, both of which have resulted in people being killed.
Not exactly comparable to cars and knives.
Maybe swords then?
That would certainly be a fairer comparison, although I am guessing the number of people killed by swords in this country is far lower than the number killed by guns.