Data in gun piece disputed

Marjorie Cortez's opinion piece is filled with errors ("Legislature should look again at gun law, Sept. 12). My data on right-to-carry laws have been examined by academics at more than 100 universities worldwide.

Dozens of studies have been published using this data set and the conclusion is clear: Not one single referred journal publication examining the national data has claimed that right-to-carry laws increase violent crime. While there are some papers that claim that right-to-carry laws do not affect crime, even more find evidence that right-to-carry laws reduce violent crime (for those interested, a partial list can be found here: johnrlott.tripod.com/postsbyday/RTCResearch.html). It is hard to think of academic data that have been as closely examined by as many different academics as this has been. Cortez isn't even able to accurately state the number of books that I have written on gun control.

Despite Cortez's other claims to the contrary, the vast majority of right-to-carry states, such as Utah, had adopted before my research was done and before it received any attention. The most telling response, though, is that 40 states now have right-to-carry laws and no state has moved to rescind them. On the safety issue she raises, only hundredths or thousandths of 1 percent of permit holders nationally lose their permits for any firearms-related violation, and there is not one published academic study that finds right-to-carry laws increase firearms accidents.

John R. Lott Jr.
dean's visiting professor
Department of Economics
State University of New York
Binghamton, N.Y.