One child or teen dies from a gun every 3 hours and 28 minutes. Gun violence saturates our children’s lives and remain the second leading cause of death for children and teens ages 1-19. More children and teens die from guns every three days than died in the Newtown massacre. The number of children under five killed by guns in 2014 was higher than the number of law enforcement officers killed in the line of duty that same year.
We can do better. Join us in our campaign to stand up, speak out, and organize with urgency and persistence until the President, members of Congress, governors, and state legislators protect children instead of guns. Every child’s life is sacred, and it is long past time that we pass common-sense gun safety regulations to protect all our children.
Campaign Toolkit
Help us spread the message by asking local publications for donated space. Download our toolkit of posters, print ads, and digital banners. Download Toolkit
If we’re going to win the fight to protect children, not guns, it is going to take mothers and fathers, grandparents, faith leaders and congregations, gun violence witnesses and survivors, military and law enforcement officers, elected officials and child advocates, and everyone who believes that our children’s right to live, learn and grow up safely must be protected before guns. We must not stop marching, calling, writing, and visiting and holding all of our political leaders accountable. We must hold them accountable for not ending the preventable and immoral loss of child and human lives and not honoring what most Americans want and our children need.
Spread the Truth
Distribute fact sheets and information about the truth about guns and sensible gun safety legislation and policy opportunities in your state and in Congress to protect children, address their unmet mental health needs, and reduce gun violence. Partner with grassroots movements like Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, which has nearly 100 chapters in 40 states to engage lawmakers on the national, state, and local level online and in person.
Raise Awareness
Organize a Child Watch Site Visitation Program to raise awareness of the epidemic of gun violence in your community. To highlight the problems of violence, choose sites like morgues, emergency rooms, or juvenile detention centers. To highlight healthy development and violence prevention, choose sites like schools with conflict resolution and/or restorative justice programs, community mental health centers that provide prevention and 24-hour crisis response services for children and families, and early care and education programs that offer mental health consultation services.
Plan a Community March
Partner with as many local organizations as possible to organize a community march and vigil. Gather the names of children and teens lost to gun violence in your community. Choose a community location that highlights the toll of gun violence on children. Then remember each one lost to gun violence with poems, prayers and song.
Join the Children’s Defense Fund for the Proctor Institute in July
Come to the Samuel DeWitt Proctor Institute on Child Advocacy Ministry at CDF Haley Farm in Clinton, Tennessee and learn with clergy, seminarians, and concerned people of faith how to work more effectively to end the violence of guns and child poverty in your community. Great preachers and great teachers will help you hone your skills at workshops. Learn more and register today.
Host a Children’s Sabbath Service in October
Each year in October, thousands of Houses of Worship of all faiths lift up children’s needs by hosting a National Observance of Children’s Sabbaths® celebration. This year’s theme is: Beating Swords into Plowshares: Ending the Violence of Guns and Child Poverty. Hold a “Turn Off Violence and Turn In Guns” Day as part of your Children’s Sabbath weekend activities. Check out the resources including a step-by-step guide on organizing a Children’s Sabbath weekend.
Partners
The following selected organizations are working hard to prevent gun violence:
Boston TenPoint Coalition:
An ecumenical group of Christian clergy and lay leaders working to mobilize the Boston community around issues affecting Black and Latino youth to end violence. http://bptc.org
Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence:
An affiliate of the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence that works to create an America free from gun violence, where all Americans are safe at home, at school, at work, and in their communities. It works to pass and enforce sensible federal and state gun laws, regulations, and public policies. http://www.bradycampaign.org
Coalition to Stop Gun Violence:
A coalition, with 48 national organizational members, that seeks to secure freedom from gun violence through research, strategic engagement, and effective policy advocacy. http://www.csgv.org
Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence:
A public interest law center dedicated to providing legal assistance in support of gun violence prevention at the state and local level, and which provides free legal assistance to advocates, other community leaders, government officials and law enforcement seeking legislative and regulatory solutions to gun violence. smartgunlaws.org
Mayors Against Illegal Guns:
A coalition of more that 600 mayors from large and small cities across the country, co-chaired by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg of New York City and Mayor Thomas M. Menino of Boston, with the goal of protecting their residents, especially children, from harm by stopping the threat of illegal guns and preventing criminals from getting guns illegally. http://www.demandaplan.org
Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America:
A grassroots effort formed in the wake of the devastating mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School to build support for common-sense gun legislation. This nonpartisan organization has tens of thousands of members in more than 80 chapters across the United States. http://momsdemandaction.org
States United to Prevent Gun Violence:
An organization representing gun violence prevention groups in 24 states that is focused on reducing gun violence in states across the country. http://supgv.org
Violence Policy Center:
A national organization working to stop gun deaths and injury through research, advocacy, education, and collaboration, and which maintains a Concealed Carry Killers online resource that tracks incidents involving private citizens legally allowed to carry concealed handguns. http://www.vpc.org
Sources
SOURCES
CDF calculations based on National Shooting Sports Foundation and U.S. Census data.
CDF calculations based on Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data.
Small Arms Survey and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives data.
CDF calculations based on Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Department of Defense, and Defense Casualty Analysis System data.
CDF calculations based on Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Federal Bureau of Investigation data.
CDF calculations based on Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data.
