1 – The Problem: The gun-show loophole. Essentially, guns that are sold on the secondary market (between private individuals) are not really subject to much of the regulation that gun sales usually are held to.
2 – Causes: “Causes” may not be the best way of describing this – it is easily addressable. But because of the lobbying power pro-gun organizations such as the NRA possess it is much more difficult than it should be.
3 – Policy: Some variation of Manchin-Toomey. Manchin-Toomey was once proposed (although it did not pass) and basically tries to utilize background checks and similar mechanisms to keep track/regulate the sale of firearms between private individuals. To compromise a little bit, this proposal did not do anything about the sale between family members. Therefore it could appeal to a wider range of citizens.
4 – Reasons: Obviously gun violence is a massive problem in this country. As of now, a large portion of gun sales are between private individuals and therefore are not subject to many regulations that they really should be.
5 – Oppose: Many people don’t think that it is the place of the government to infringe on what they see as a basic human right, the right to defend themselves.
Maybe under causes you could look into why someone would buy a gun privately from someone like this instead of using the normal means? Perhaps that would help out a little.
I think this is an interesting topic to address! Especially because people do unfortunately get their hands on weapons in a way they shouldn’t. I would definitely love to read your essay once it’s finished! And since you already know a good bit on the topic it’ll be right up your alley.