Coincidentally, the popularity of carrying a concealed weapon continues to trend upward. The number of concealed handgun licenses issued to residents in Butler, Warren and Hamilton counties fell in 2010 compared to a record year in 2009, but statistics show they could increase this year.
Background checks are one of the best measures of gun sales because federally licensed gun-sellers are required to perform them during a sale. Not all checks lead to purchases, but most do.
At Freedom Firearms in Fairfield Twp., gun sales have steadily increased since the store opened two years ago. The most popular weapons are smaller handguns that are easy to conceal, said Manager Arland Mills.
“Since we opened it has been nonstop handgun sales,” Mills said. “I would say business is good right now.”
The store has completed 1,637 background checks to date. Only four of those checks ended in denials, and several approvals resulted in the purchase of multiple guns, Mills said.
Andrew M. Molchan, director of the Professional Gun Retailers Association, said gun sales have steadily increased nationwide in the last six years following the U.S. Supreme Court overturning gun bans in major cities, such as Chicago and Washington, D.C., on the grounds they violated the Second Amendment.
Nationally, FBI background checks for gun sales increased to 14.4 million in 2010 from 8.5 million in 2003, according to the FBI reporting system.
But Molchan said gun sales have also significantly increased in recent years because of widespread apprehension about issues including the country’s financial and political turmoil.
“Since late 2007, there has been growing apprehension that’s still there,” he said. “If it’s there, firearm sales go up.”
Gun-rights advocates said the election of President Barack Obama alarmed a lot of people because they believe the Democratic party is committed to restricting the rights of gun owners. In November 2008, the month Obama won the presidential election, the FBI performed 53,256 background checks for Ohio gun sellers, almost double the number from November 2007. That month set the record for background checks in the state and the nation.
Jim Irvine, chairman of the Buckeye Firearms Association, said Obama’s hostility toward gun rights has helped boost sales, but the country’s economic troubles also have many people worried that violence similar to the riots in England could erupt stateside.
“Unemployment is very high, underemployment is very high, job stagnation and salaries are issues, and you look around the world — Greece, Italy and England for the last couple of weeks — there is always turmoil going on, and there is a growing feeling that we are going to have civil unrest in this country,” Irvine said. “People want to be prepared.”
Mills said while fears about Obama implementing new gun restrictions may have originally led to a surge in sales, the uncertain economy has added to the boom.
“I think people are scared because the crime is up because people don’t have jobs to make ends meet and the people who have jobs feel like they need to have a gun to protect themselves,” Mills said.
That uncertainly hasn’t waned despite some improvements economically, he said.
“When it all does hit the fan people feel they will need a gun to protect themselves,” Mills said.
In 2010, the state issued 5,278 concealed handgun licenses to residents in Montgomery, Miami, Greene, Butler and Warren counties, according to the Ohio Attorney General’s office.
Although the licenses issued last year were down 24 percent from 2009, 2010 still had the second highest number of licenses issued since the concealed carry law took effect in 2004, according to the Attorney General.
Numbers are poised to hold steady and or increase this year. In the first six months of 2011, 680 conceal-carry licenses were issued in Butler County; 669 were issue in Warren County; and 1,175 were issued in Hamilton County, according to the Attorney General.
“If you look at the concealed carry licensure over the seven-year period since (licenses have) been available in Ohio, it’s been a straight line up,” said Philip Mulivor, coordinator for Ohioans for Concealed Carry. “I think the availability of concealed carry accounts for a significant number of handgun purchases.”
Butler County Sheriff’s Deputy J.D. Smith, who issues CCW permits, said a variety of factors lead people to seek a permit.
“It could be the economy. It could be with any number of things,” he said. “It’s all based on opinion.”
Gun-control supporters said an increase in gun sales does not mean more people are buying guns, but instead, existing gun owners are simply buying more guns.
“After being sold a lot of rhetoric and fear from the gun lobby about government taking their guns away and the need for carrying guns in public places, current gun owners must be making the purchases because overall gun purchases are declining,” said Toby Hoover, executive director of the Ohio Coalition Against Gun Violence.
The percentage of households that own a gun was 32.3 percent in 2010, down from 34.3 percent in 2000 and 45.8 percent in 1990, according to the Violence Policy Center, a gun-control group based in Washington, D.C.
About the Author