Photographs by Kyle Cassidy
The Second Amendment tells us that 'a well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.' Two hundred years later, in 1999, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives estimated that there are about 215 million guns in America--at least one firearm in half the households in the country. The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, however, puts that number at 192 million guns, owned by 39 percent of the population. Either way, that's a lot of firepower. Photographer Kyle Cassidy wanted to find out who these people were, what they looked like and how they lived. So he traveled 15,000 miles over the course of two years taking pictures of people with their weapons and asking them one question: 'Why do you own a gun?' His new book, 'Armed America,' is the culmination of that project. Keep clicking for Cassidy's portraits of Americans at home with their six-shooters and 12 gauges.
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