One Nation Under Guns: How Gun Culture Distorts Our History and Threatens Our Democracy

by Dominic Erdozain

This “brilliant and gut-wrenching” (The New York Times Book Review, Editors’ Choice) takedown of American gun culture argues that the nation’s founders did not intend the Second Amendment to guarantee an individual right to bear arms—and that this distortion of the record is an urgent threat to democracy.

“At once eye-opening and enraging, One Nation Under Guns is that rare book that can help change the way we live in this country.”—Eddie S. Glaude Jr., bestselling author of Begin Again

More than a hundred lives are lost to firearms every day in America. The cost is more than the numbers—it is the fear, the anxiety, the dread of public spaces that an armed society has created under the tortured rubric of freedom. But the norms of today are not the norms of American history or the values of its founders. They are the product of a gun culture that has imposed its vision on a sleeping nation.

Historian Dominic Erdozain argues that we have wrongly ceded the big-picture argument on As we parse legislation on background checks and automatic-weapons bans, we fail to ask what place guns should have in a functioning democracy. Taking readers on a brilliant historical journey, Erdozain shows how the founders feared the tyranny of individuals as much as the tyranny of kings—the idea that any person had a right to walk around armed was anathema to their notion of freedom and the peaceful republic they hoped to build. They wrote these ideas into the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, ideas that were subsequently affirmed by two centuries of jurisprudence.

And yet the twin scourges of racism and nationalism would combine to create a darker American vision—a rogue and reckless freedom based on birth and blood. It was this freedom, not the liberty promised by the Constitution, that generated our modern gun culture, with its mystic conceptions of good guys and bad guys, innocence and guilt. By the time the U.S. Supreme Court reinvented the Second Amendment in 2008’s District of Columbia v. Heller, an opinion that Erdozain convincingly eviscerates, many Americans had already acceded to the the unfreedom of an armed society. To save our democracy, he argues, we must fight for the founders’ true idea of what it means to be free.

Genres: Nonfiction, Politics, History, Audiobook, Sociology, American History, Social Issues

278 pages, Kindle Edition

Published January 30, 2024

Reviews

[William Cooper · Rating 4 out of 5]

Erdozain focuses on the right place: gun culture. It's a dark culture that breeds irrational beliefs. Indeed, perhaps the most disturbing widespread political belief in America today is that owning a gun is essential to maintaining individual liberty. As the book explains, Second Amendment enthusiasts think their liberty depends on their guns—the weapons they can use to protect themselves from the government.

The view is totally incoherent.

Then-Republican presidential candidate (and now Donald Trump and Elon Musk ally) Vivek Ramaswamy articulated this view in an August 2023 speech to the National Rifle Association (NRA), the principal American gun-rights lobby. According to Ramaswamy, “The Second Amendment is what made the Bill of Rights an American reality, not just an American dream.”

This is wrong. A huge population of gun-free Americans fully enjoy the Bill of Rights’ protections. Ramaswamy’s reasoning is as tortured as it is shameless: there’s no logic or evidence suggesting a modern-day connection between gun ownership and political freedom.

Erdozain agrees. According to him, "Gun rights are claimed as an American birthright and clothed in the dignity of the Constitution, but this is a false and fabricated history. To believe in the gun, you have to subscribe to a series of fantasies about the American past. You have to believe Theodore Roosevelt when he says that guns civilized the West and that the men who died 'generally' deserved their fate. You have to believe Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas when he writes that firearms brought 'possibilities of salvation' to African Americans after the Civil War. You would have to believe that, for two hundred years, every court in the land got the Second Amendment wrong, until Antonin Scalia rode in with his dictionaries in 2008.”

What's true is that there is iron-clad causation between the Second Amendment’s broad protection of gun rights and gun violence. America’s gun violence is worse than any other major democratic nation. The data are striking. Take a 2018 study of 195 countries and territories by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington. It showed that in 2016 America’s gun death rate far surpassed that of other developed democracies:

• America: 10.6 per 100,000 people
• Canada: 2.1
• Australia: 1.0
• France: 2.7
• Germany: 0.9
• Spain: 0.6

More than five Americans die from guns for every one Canadian killed by a gun. More than ten for every German. This travesty flows from the Second Amendment’s legal and cultural power.

As Supreme Court justice Steven Breyer wrote in his dissent from the court’s 2022 opinion, striking down a New York gun law that dared to regulate gun possession outside the home: “The dangers posed by firearms can take many forms. Newspapers report mass shootings occurring at an entertainment district in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (3 dead and 11 injured); an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas (21 dead); a supermarket in Buffalo, New York (10 dead and 3 injured); a series of spas in Atlanta, Georgia (8 dead); a busy street in an entertainment district of Dayton, Ohio (9 dead and 17 injured); a nightclub in Orlando, Florida (50 dead and 53 injured); a church in Charleston, South Carolina (9 dead); a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado (12 dead and 50 injured); an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut (26 dead); and many, many more.” He continued: “[M]ass shootings are just one part of the problem. Easy access to firearms can also make many other aspects of American life more dangerous. Consider, for example, the effect of guns on road rage.”

Unlike the Constitution's Three-Fifths and Slave Trade Clauses (addressed by the Civil-War amendments) and woman’s suffrage (addressed by 19th amendment), the Second Amendment’s broad right to bear arms is still law. And it’s not going away any time soon.

One of the Constitution’s biggest flaws is how hard it is to amend. There have been only 27 Constitutional amendments since 1787.

When it comes to the Second Amendment, America’s founders blew it. And it was a mistake that would stick. The right to “keep and bear arms” is an unfortunate, and enduring, blight in America’s Constitutional constellation. Erdozain's book shines important light on this subject.

[Scott Rhee · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Remember, all men would be tyrants if they could.”—-Abigail Adams

I don’t like guns. I do not own any guns, I refuse to have guns in my home, and I wish I could live in a world where I wouldn’t have to worry whether the person standing next to me in line or the person driving the car behind me on the highway is packing heat and having a bad day.

I am for stricter gun laws, and I am also for gun bans, especially guns that serve no useful purpose other than killing the most amount of people in as short amount of time. I realize that saying those words aloud will automatically piss off some people and, not ironically, make them want to shoot me.

It wasn’t always like this. Or maybe it was, and maybe we’re just deceiving ourselves. Maybe a majority of us are just violent brutes who have always lusted after bloodshed and have this deep desire to watch the world bleed from gunshot wounds. I feel, though, deep down in my soul, that it wasn’t always like this.

Historian Dominic Erdozain’s book “One Nation Under Guns” puts the issues of gun violence and gun control in their proper historical context, starting with what our Founding Fathers actually meant when they wrote the Second Amendment (spoiler: it absolutely did NOT condone ownership of guns by private citizens) and ending with the ridiculously out-of-control pro-gun lobby led by the NRA that has created a gun culture which literally threatens the health and safety of every American.

Erdozain illustrates an American culture that was founded on violence and a machismo in which men were only real men if they used brute force. It is a culture that has been bolstered by violent TV shows and movies that created a fairy tale portrait of the Old West full of gunslingers and outlaws and savage Indians that never actually existed. It is a culture that has been perverted by a political system, backed by the gun lobby, that was once a system that promoted gun safety and is now a system that promotes gun worship. It is a culture that not only ignores scientific evidence that overwhelmingly proves that cities and states that have lots of guns and fewer gun laws have rates of higher gun violence and gun death, but it also works to keep researchers from conducting further studies of gun violence and deaths.

This nation has a gun to its head, but Erdozain manages to remain somewhat hopeful, because history—-American history—-has shown that we do, occasionally, do the right thing.

[Stan Yan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I think I'm going to ask my elected representatives to read this book. Erdozain makes the case for how the misinterpretation of the 2nd Amendment has gotten America to the place we are at today with gun violence. Here are some of my favorite quotes from this book:

"Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel." ~Samuel Johnson 1774

"Can it be right that the juris prudence of slavery is guiding the legalities of gun ownership in the 21st century?"

"Real freedom must always rest on peace of mind." Friedrich Nietzsche

[Kenzie · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 ⭐️ “Nobody is less free than the man who sleeps by his sword.” Good! Well researched! Informative! I appreciated the thorough dive the author takes into the history and language of the 2nd amendment, which felt like a more productive conversation than the typical arguments posed about this issue.

[Rebecca · Rating 4 out of 5]

I truly enjoyed reading this book even though I disagree with the author's underlining, that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to arms for militias, and not to individuals. Erdozain did tons of research for the book, and I was able to learn so much history while reading his book.

[Harmony Soto · Rating 5 out of 5]

I knew this book was going to be a banger as soon as I picked it up and it did not disappoint in the slightest.

[Meagan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bet you didn’t think Richard Nixon would be the good guy in this one

[Nick · Rating 5 out of 5]

In "One Nation Under Guns", Dominic Erdozain takes apart a fair amount of received opinion about the Second Amendment, its roots, its adoption, its early life, and the unfettered monster it has become. Those points--persuasive, at least to me--deserve a point by point review.
I had always read that there wasn't much in the way of documentation about what the founders intended. On the contrary--Erdozain quotes Madison's first draft: "The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed; a well armed and we regulated militia being the best security of a free country; but no person religiously scrupulous of bearing arms shall be compelled to render military service in person." The bit specifically referencing military service was dropped, clouding the issue, but Erdozain assembles a fair amount of evidence that the purpose of the Second Amendment was to serve a nation with a deep antipathy to a permanent military on an as-needed basis, not to wander the streets with a lethal weapon.
Despite the South's greater propensity to violence, with Erdozain links to its peculiar institution. Still, in Erdozain's review of the legal cases, even antebellum Southern courts held against interpreting an individual right in the Second Amendment. Of course, Antonin Scalia found the exception written by a slaveholder judge and enshrined it as constitutional. Justice Scalia once again turns out to be a true originalist, not in his oft-stated adherence to what the Founders thought and wrote, but in his devotion to the ahistorical edited Constitution that was his invention. Erdozain makes the case that to re-interpret the Second Amendment as an original right ignores the meaning of "people" and historical shifts in the meaning of "keep and bear" arms, as well as willfully distorting the grammar of the text.
One wonders how we got here, from calling upon the citizens to protect the nation from, say, the British invaders of 1812 to open carry. Erdozain examines some of the distortion of the nation's history in the reinvention of the West, from wars carried out by the Army to clear the land of its native inhabitants to the solitary hero gunslinger of the Clint Eastwood movie. (What follows immediately is me--Erdozain is blameless about its faults. The persistence of the lone hero myth--in the sense of the word as both a commonly believed lie and as the tale told to justify a culture--endures although the targets shift, to the crime- and sin-filled city (the Charles Bronson movie), to protecting the family (the Liam Neeson movie), to foreigners (the Sylvester Stallone/Chuck Norris movie), to any historical enemy that comes in handy (the Mel Gibson movie). All this from a nation that derived its pre-eminence from a plentitude of natural resources (taken from its previous owners), stolen labor (slavery), and a lack of nearby powerful enemies that allowed it to tip the balance in two major conflagrations.
If you ever review gun magazines, they are full of scenarios by which the owner of a particular gun saves his family (so often the young daughter, which is creepy). But that doesn't happen. No one has ever had the courage to remark that the people who buy most into this myth of lone savior are the ones who shoot up African-American churches in the hope of starting a race war to save whites, or a Walmart on the border to keep foreigners out, or a synagogue, or an Orlando nightclub because of the decadence of the West, or a military installation because of American Middle East policy. And that is the insanity of the cultural confusion over guns: by focusing on the right of the individual to act, instead of on the community to organize and arrive at a consensus we communicate to people who are upset about how things are that they can change things with a gun. And they can't. There are no Liam Neesons in real life. There are just people who think that if they kill a lot of people, they'll get psychic relief and cause some political change.
Back to Erdozain--he's a master at quoting the classics of American politics, even de Tocqueville, and figuring out what they really said. But my favorite quotes come from John Adams, of all people. As Erdozain writes, partially quoting Adams, "We are, he once remarked, 'all of the same clay.' Adams once remarked complained to Benjamin Rush that he had been abused dfor this opinion many times, but nothing had convinced him of its error. When we fancy ourselves special, when we draw God into our quarrels, we draw ourselves into tyranny. 'We may boast that we are the Chosen People," he sighed in another letter, "We may even thank God that we are not like other Men. But after all it will be but flattery, and the delusion, the Self-deceit of the Pharisee.'"

[Jenn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Historian Dominic Erdozain presents the case that the Second Amendment does not give every American the right have a gun. He also very convincingly argues that our current gun crisis can be laid at the feet of the twin problems of racism and nationalism. An idea that struck me when reading this that kept coming up in my mind was this: They're all honest, law-abiding citizens. Until they're not. One Nation Under Guns lays out clearly how our gun problem came about and what a precarious position we find ourselves in today.

I don't often read nonfiction. I generally find it extremely dry and hard to get through. And some of this was a little more detailed than I wanted. But overall, I enjoyed this one, even while being horrified at the facts.

[Kathy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Should be required reading. An illuminating history of the parsing of words often in the furtherance of white supremacy and distortion of good over evil but eventually in propping up support of the NRA and political gain. Scalia’s reinterpretation of the words in the Second Amendment remind me of when a person who doesn’t speak a language tries to define a phrase by directly translating word for word in a dictionary. This dilution of meaning out of context has left us where we are today. Truly astounding.

[Alex Pulliam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent and concise summary of gun control in the USA. A little overwritten in the beginning but the prose really hits its stride at the end.

CW: racism, gun violence, sexism, mentions of SA

Disclaimer: I received this book for free from the publisher as part of a Goodreads Giveaway. A review was requested but not required and the content and rating were all my own. The version I read was an Advanced Reader Copy and may differ from the final published edition.

[Winona · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a distressing read. Especially in the current political climate of the United States. Fear is a terrible way to govern your fellow citizens.

[Elizabeth☮ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Erdozain walks us through U.S. History to show how gun rights have become paramount to American identity. There are so many takeaways here, but some that stood out are:

- Arguments made by Scalia in the most recent decision by the Supreme Court to uphold individual rights to carry are based on misreads or cherry picking of documents cited. There are documents that any group can submit for the Supreme Court to reference called amicus briefs. The problem with amicus briefs is there is not a vetting process. Any group can submit a report and there is no fact checking. These briefs have been documented in Supreme Court decisions!

- The initial arguments that called for a right to arm oneself came from a known white surpremecist.

- The country, prior to the 1960's, viewed carrying a hand gun as something that should only be given to military or police officers.

- The right to carry largely focuses on the idea that good citizens know how to safely use a gun and will always so do. Trust us.

- The NRA made arguments for gun rights based on known biased reports.

- Part of the agreement for the banning of AR style weapons hinged on the government not tracking gun violence in America.

This is just a few of the things I can recall off the top of my head. The book is based on historical documents and has many citations. It can get a bit bogged down, but I think the topic is extremely worth the time.

I've also read The Second Amendment which is an excellent overview. I also recommend: Columbine 25th Anniversary Memorial Edition, Sandy Hook and A Mother's Reckoning: Living in the Aftermath of Tragedy.

[Alexis · Rating 4 out of 5]

I did not enjoy reading this, but I do feel like I have a better understanding of how America came to be in the position it is in regarding guns. This made me think of the Second Amendment differently and opened my eyes to how long the fight for gun regulations has lasted. I felt like screaming more than once. I'm glad to have read it and glad to be done reading it.

[Alicia Haider · Rating 3 out of 5]

listened to this on audiobook and really liked it. learned a lot about the history of the second amendment, the NRA in the 80s, the mexican american war in 1864, and critical scotus opinions in the early 2000s

[Alexandra · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really educational in terms of how the second amendment has not always been interpreted the way we currently interpret it. A little discouraging in that it seems like we’re moving backwards.

[Farrah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hmmmm. Probably better to read this than listen to it. I just got distracted and bored and it wasn’t compelling to listen to.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well researched, thoughtful, and at times a little heady but I am glad I listened. To take it all in paper would be a better choice. I would argue that all Americans should read this.

[Brannen Dickson · Rating 4 out of 5]

What I love is that Erdozain takes a deep and analytical look at how America's gun culture came to be, both from a legal and historical perspective. It was shocking to me that even as recent as a few decades ago, most Americans were opposed to the idea of people owning handguns. How things have changed!

I also like how he interprets the writing of the Second Amendment. I think the Second Amendment is one of the most poorly written amendments. It reads more like a collection of run-on sentences than anything else, which gives people the leeway to mold it to their own agendas as they see fit (see: Antonin Scalia).

One interesting point he did make is the understanding of the word "people" in this context. It's fascinating how the 2 sides have construed it differently. "The people", as Erdozain argues, is a collective term, referring to all people as a unit within American society. Through his interpretation, he argues that the Second Amendment laid out provisions where civilians should arm themselves in a group militia, only during times of conflict or danger. He further argues that gun ownership is not a personal liberty for an individual, but rather a necessity for the militia to uphold the safety of the public. 

He proceeds to give a historical background on the definitions of freedom and liberty, and how they vastly differ from what is meant by those terms today in this country. For Erdozain, freedom and liberty are the ability of a society to safeguard itself, and provide its people with the ability to enjoy a protected and decent life. 

I think another point Erdozain asserts is that the Founding Fathers wanted the opposite of what we see with today's pervasive gun ownership. He writes that they were against the tyranny of a standing army and militarized society, because it harkened back to the pre-revolutionary British monarchy. 

I think Erdozain has a really good understanding of the pro-gun movement as well, and how they have successfully achieved their influential standing in American politics. From his point of view, he makes the case that the pro-gun camp has grouped people who wield guns into 2 groups: (1) responsible gun owners who protect the general public, and (2) lawless criminals who have no business owning a gun. With the "othering" that they employ, it is very easy to defend against attacks on gun ownership. If someone commits an act of gun violence, one can simply throw them into that second bucket. Responsible gun owners don't commit gun violence; only criminals do. 

At times, there are historical or legal references that are new to me, so I am not familiar with everything that Erdozain writes about. However, I was happy that I knew about DC v. Heller, since I have skimmed that case. Overall, it's a very thorough and moving call for sweeping changes.

[emily gielshire · Rating 5 out of 5]

Devoured this - an absolutely must read for US residents of all beliefs about guns. Such a compelling, well documented case explanation of a loud minority’s attempt to normalize firearms as such a cornerstone of modern American society, despite having absolutely zero support from the Founders, Constitution, or any Supreme Court judgment until Scalia intentionally misread the second amendment in Heller. Highly, highly recommend.

[Ray Timmerman · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the best book I've read on the history of gun control and the 2nd Amendment.

Every American should read this book. Then read it again, and then again.

There are many leaders both in government and in other high places, some of whom I've trusted with my votes and my faith in them, who have not been truthful about this history.

We all need to do our homework on this vital topic.

Veritas Vos Liberabit

[Anna · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am so glad I picked up this book. The author did a nice job of detailing the history of the second amendment, the roots behind the changes in its interpretation and the rise of gun ownership, and how we arrived at our current state of affairs.

I read via ebook with my library app, but I think it would have been better to have had a print copy, as the last chapters were dense and needed my full focus.

[Brendan Malloy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really got a streak going with these 5-star books. I learned so much from this. This book focused mainly on the history of the Second Amendment and the how it’s been subjected to anachronistic interpretations. It was a short, but very dense and well researched book, and it made me extremely angry.

[Nick Timmerman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great history of the 2nd amendment in US History

[Stephanie · Rating 5 out of 5]

"When I see a handgun, I do not see freedom. I do not see possibilities of salvation. I see an open wound. I see the hole in the American promise. I see a failure of imagination."

Constitutional Law was probably one of my least favorite courses in law school and undergrad, yet I find myself drawn to works that discuss the interpretations (or lack thereof) of the text of our Constitution more often than not.

This was a short read that gives a lot of insight into the concept of gun culture we have adopted in the US. The author analyzes our country's history from its inception to present times in an effort to try to make sense of (some) American's obsession with guns. I don't know if there is much else I can say about the book, but I will leave you with some of my favorite quotes below.

"The [Supreme C]ourt failed on so many levels, but to neglect the principles behind the [Second] amendment, and to play with dictionary entries a a substitute for that work, seems nothing less than scandalous ... The gun culture won, in the highest court in the land. The real casualty is not the Constitution: it is the lives that are sacrificed to the myth."

"Nothing could be more patriotic than gun control. Nothing could be more foreign to the founders' vision of democracy than unregulated force."

and, finally

"If [Martin Luther King, Jr.] whose house was bombed can [renounce firearms], so can we."

[Jose Acevedo · Rating 3 out of 5]

Decided to read it since a friend read it and it looked interesting/up my ally. Greate read but it's definitely not going to change any minds unfortunately since the beginning is, while very accurate, not very flattering to the history of gun ownership in America. The book touts gun reform instead of an outright ban but I feel some that readers come to the conclusion "They are trying to take my guns".

Separate to the book here is my own opinion:
As a firearms owner and one who regularly goes skeet shooting I support strict gun regulation. I for one think it shouldn't be easier to get a gun then a driver's license (which it is in every state). You can legally get guns in Canada, Europe, Australia, and even Japan. Is it harder to get yes but it's not impossible and in doing so gun related crimes are incredibly low.

[Laura B · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very persuasive argument on how the Second Amendment has become distorted over history and how this distortion played into the gun culture that we have today.

The author makes a compelling argument noting that t pro-gun enthusiasts often mention “right to bear arms” is often quoted but often leaves of the accompany phrase “a well regulated militia” which suggests the founding fathers meant for this phrase to go hand in hand and was told to be for the defense of a whole rather than an individuals right to defend themself.

He then explores how this misconception has carried itself throughout American history. It’s a tough topic to compel individuals to reconsider the facts and history, as the debate has become so fiercely divided. This probably speaks to why the author struggled to come up with a more robust solution.

[Kevinw2614 · Rating 2 out of 5]

Solid introduction to the statistics showing how proponents of firearm ownership misunderstand the magnitude of unintentional gun deaths and the comparatively rare frequency by which "bad" people are stopped by "good" armed civilians.

Two critiques: First, the author's tone and voice is overly biting and will turn away those favorable to gun rights--who should be his target audience--within a couple of pages.

Second, his analysis of Bruen and Second Amendment legal doctrine is extremely bare bones. I get that the book is for non-lawyers, but the discussion is so perfunctory that I think those new to the modern Second Amendment are better off reading Bruen's Wikipedia page than this book's sections on the case.

[Ellie · Rating 4 out of 5]

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! The NRA is evil, racism is evil, the supreme court is evil and guns are fucking evil! It was especially infuriating and heart wrenching to read this in the wake of another school shooting, although I guess we’re now always in the wake of a school shooting. This book was a little dry at times but was a great look at the history of gun culture and its roots (spoiler: the roots are always racism) and how the 2nd amendment has been so far removed from its original intention.

[Carey · Rating 5 out of 5]

A scathing criticism of US gun cultural and the bastardization of the Second Amendment by the NRA, politicians, and the Supreme Court. it’s sad how such a small minority of gun advocates can hold a nation hostage to their twisted interpretation of the Constitution and belief that guns in the hands of “good guys” save lives. Simply put, guns are made for killing, and more guns mean more deaths no matter whose hands they are in.