Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

In a given year, approximately 4-5% of adults living in the United States experienced physical violence within their intimate relationships (Black et al. 2011), and such relationships have serious consequences for individual health, including mortality (Black and Breiding 2008; Coker et al. 2002). Significantly, the presence of a firearm in the home increases the likelihood that the worst incidences of intimate partner violence will result in a fatality (Campbell et al. 2003; Saltzman et al. 1992). This serious danger posed by firearms in households with domestic violence provides the rationale for an array of firearm legislation. Despite the presence of federal legislation such as the Domestic Violence Offenders Gun Ban (“The Lautenberg Amendment”), specific firearm legislation varies widely across states, which is notable given that state-level legislation strongly influences local-level action (Vigdor and Mercy 2003; Zeoli and Frattaroli 2013). Many states have laws preventing firearm access among individuals convicted of domestic violence or who are under domestic-violence restraining orders, either by removing firearms from the home or by prohibiting firearm ownership or purchases. The length of such prohibitions also vary, spanning from temporary periods to permanent restrictions (Vigdor and Mercy 2006). This state-level variation provides a natural experiment to assess the efficacy of domestic violence-specific firearm laws in shaping firearm ownership among at-risk families.

To address this issue, this study examines whether state-level laws that prohibit firearm ownership among families with a history of domestic violence is associated with rates of firearm ownership in this at- group. With data from a nationally-representative sample of families with young children (Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Birth cohort; ECLS-B, n = 5,350), we examine whether the presence of state-level laws that prohibit firearm ownership among families with a history of domestic violence are associated with decreased odds of firearm ownership. Preliminary results from mixed effects logistic regression models find that living in a state with laws that prohibited firearm ownership for offenders convicted of MCDV decreased the likelihood of firearm ownership among high-conflict families by 62%. Moreover, the strength of the MCDV laws was correlated with incremental decreases in firearm ownership in such families, with the probability of firearm ownership among high-conflict families decreasing from 30% in states with no MCDV laws restricting access to firearms among domestic violence offenders to 12% in states with permanent prohibition on firearm ownership.

Determining whether state-level laws that prohibit domestic violence abusers’ access to firearms actually translates into lower firearm ownership rates among families with histories of domestic violence has implications for public policy. We go beyond prior studies that have focused on the link between these laws and rates of firearm-related domestic violence-related homicide by examining the behavior the laws directly target (i.e., firearm ownership), which, importantly, has implications for other measures of women’s health and wellbeing, such as depression, victimization, and injuries.