I am responding to your newspaper’s Jan 19th editorial, “Gun control making more sense to Americans.”

According to your editorial, “a majority of Americans already support gun control.” As a consequence, you “urge Congress to pass commonsense laws to keep guns out of the hands of people who would use them to commit mass murder and other crimes.”

What Americans are you talking about?

I read your editorial and parts of it make sense — except the parts that say we should compromise on our right to protect ourselves. You said, “The Associated Press and GfK, the international data research and analysis firm, reports an overwhelming 84 percent of Americans support stringent background checks for potential gun-owners.”

That is not gun control, that is verifying that the person making the purchase is not mentally unstable, is not a felon, or is prevented by some other legal reason from owning a firearm. Even I support background checks before allowing the purchase of a gun, and I support record-keeping, minimizing the likelihood that a person is a straw buyer for the illegal sale of guns in other states to persons who cannot get them legally.

The responses to recent mass murders has reawakened the anti-gun lobbyists again. They have been coming out of the woodwork every chance they get. Why do they always want to take away other people’s right to protect themselves? And why do they always want to control other people and not let the general public control themselves?

I went to the Internet to check your findings and this is what I found at http://www.newsmax.com/Surveys:

Q: Should the federal government regulate guns of any type?

A: Yes, 28 percent; No, 71 percent.

Q: Should Congress ban semi-automatic weapons?

A: Yes, 22 percent; No, 77 percent.

Q: If Congress does not act, should President Obama use an executive order to ban or strictly control the sale of semi-automatic weapons?

A: Yes 20 percent; No, 79 percent.

Q: Do you agree that the Second Amendment gives citizens the right to own and bear guns without infringement?

A: Yes, 81 percent; No, 18 percent.

I provide the basis for my argument and could not find yours.

WILLIAM STINSON

Edenton

Editor’s Note: The data source cited in our editorial is the non-partisan international firm of GfK and reported by The Associated Press. The source cited by the writer is NewsMax.com a conservative website, referred to by Forbes Magazine as the “great right hope” of the Republican Party. Also, a 2010 study released by Nielsen reported that Newsmax.com was the number one site for conservatives in the U.S.