Criminal law theorists did not take a serious interest in firearms for most of the 20th century because scholars and students of criminal law focus most of their attention on the individual offenses believed the most serious, on the mental states associated with criminal actions, and the emphasis on individual actions. The growing interest in firearms and violence relates to the apparent sources of interest in other academic fields such as public health and criminology. Life-threatening violence is now a clear priority in public concern about crime and its control. The 1995 literature focuses on a variety of significant questions that connect to the relationship between firearms and violence. However, for many reasons, existing data do not point unambiguously to particular firearms control policies. Nevertheless, ample data support the conclusion that gun use is an important contributing cause to the high lethality produced by violence in the United States and that real problems do not mean easy solutions. Footnotes