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a display of guns on the wall of a gun shop — Photo by Gary Walker-Jones on Unsplash

The right to self-defense belongs to every moral agent created in God’s image. That right does not vanish because some misuse it; rather, justice demands that only those who violate others’ rights lose liberty through due process. A violent offender serving a sentence, or someone who is threatening or committing aggression, may be justly restrained. But outside those narrow circumstances, moral law grants no authority to preemptively disarm peaceful people.

The right to self-defense and property ownership includes the freedom to possess the means necessary for that defense. On principle, no firearm or “weapon of war” is unlawful or immoral for an individual to own. The objections to this view stem from misconceptions about legitimate use of violence, or from ignorance of the functionality of different weapons. The term “assault weapon,” for example, is a meaningless propaganda phrase (viz “assault”) designed to blur distinctions between civilian and military firearms. An AR-15 is simply a popular semi-automatic rifle—mechanically identical in function to countless hunting and sporting arms owned by millions of peaceful citizens. Any so-called “assault weapons ban” would inevitably amount to the mass confiscation of ordinary semi-automatic firearms. This is because laws have to define a thing by what it does, not what it looks like, thereby criminalizing responsible ownership without reducing crime.

The truth is even automatic weapons bans accomplish little because state-sponsored weapons sales, black markets, and illegal modifications make them easy to bypass. In truth, there is little evidence that gun control measures reduce overall violent crime rates in the states and countries that pass them. True public safety arises not from coercive disarmament, but from a society where individuals retain the moral and practical means to defend themselves and others from aggression.

Does that mean there should be no…