Right to Safety Amendment

Current Status

Existing Law

• Second Amendment protects right to keep and bear arms but provides limited guidance on regulation
• Federal and state firearm regulations vary widely with ongoing constitutional challenges

Current Authority

• No constitutional framework balancing public safety with individual liberty
• States possess varying authority to regulate firearms under police powers

Existing Limitations

• Current interpretation leaves accountability standards unclear
• Constitutional ambiguity creates patchwork regulations reducing effectiveness

Problem

Specific Harm

• ~45,000 annual gun deaths in U.S. (including ~6,000 preventable deaths from inadequate safety measures)
• ~800 children die annually from preventable firearm accidents

Who is Affected

• Victims of gun violence and their families
• Children in households with firearms
• Communities experiencing high rates of violence
• Law-abiding gun owners facing inconsistent regulations

Gaps in Current Law

• Constitutional ambiguity prevents evidence-based policy implementation
• No requirement for safety training or education standards
• Lack of uniform background check requirements
• No constitutional framework for crisis intervention with due process

Accountability Failures

• Individual liberty and public safety treated as opposing rather than complementary goals
• May-issue permit systems allow subjective discrimination
• No evidentiary standard requiring least restrictive means

Proposed Reform

Primary Policy Change

• Establish constitutional right to safety from criminal violence balanced with protection of lawful ownership
• Create framework requiring education, training, and accountability rather than prohibition
• Mandate use of least restrictive effective means for all safety measures

New Requirements

• Safety training and education for firearm ownership
• Shall-issue background check systems with objective criteria
• All laws must be supported by evidence of effectiveness
• Due process hearings within 72 hours for any temporary weapon removal during documented crisis
• Violence prevention and intervention programs

New Prohibitions

• Arbitrary denial of constitutional rights prohibited
• Prohibition of lawful ownership by law-abiding citizens banned
• Surveillance without individualized warrant prohibited
• May-issue permit systems based on subjective criteria prohibited
• Permanent loss of rights without criminal conviction prohibited

Enforcement

• Congress shall have power to enforce by appropriate legislation
• Evidentiary standard requiring least restrictive means necessary
• Objective criteria for all permit and background check decisions

What Changes

Before	After
Constitutional ambiguity enables both overreach and inadequate safety measures	Clear constitutional framework balancing safety and liberty
No framework balancing individual liberty with public safety	Specific authorization for evidence-based safety measures
Patchwork state regulations with varying effectiveness	Explicit prohibition on arbitrary rights denial
No constitutional requirement for evidence-based policy	Requirement for least restrictive means and evidence of effectiveness
Accountability standards unclear	Shall-issue standard preventing subjective discrimination

ROI

Federal Budget Impact (10-Year, Estimated)

Note: Constitutional amendments are not CBO-scoreable. Estimates based on comparable programs, research, and implementing legislation projections.

Costs:

Item	10-Year	Source
NICS Enhancement & Expansion	$1.5B	¹
Safety Training Infrastructure	$2.0B	²
ERPO/Crisis Intervention System	$1.5B	³
Violence Intervention Programs	$5.0B	⁴
Due Process Hearing Infrastructure	$1.0B	⁵
Enforcement/Oversight	$0.5B	⁵
Contingency (15%)	$1.7B
Total	$13.2B

Savings:

Item	Gross	Capture	Net	Source
Reduced Medical Costs (Taxpayer)	$15.7B	30%	$4.7B	⁶
Criminal Justice Savings	$8.0B	25%	$2.0B	⁷
Reduced ER/Hospital Costs	$10.0B	20%	$2.0B	⁸
Lost Productivity Averted	$50.0B	10%	$5.0B	⁹
Total	$83.7B		$13.7B

Result: Net +$0.5B (Estimated - Not CBO-Scoreable)

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Societal Benefits

Benefit	Annual	NPV (3%)	NPV (7%)	Source
Lives Saved (6,000 preventable deaths @ $13.1M VSL)	$78.6B	$670B	$552B	¹⁰
Quality-of-Life Improvements	$48.9B	$417B	$343B	¹¹
Reduced Economic Burden from Gun Violence	$55.7B	$475B	$391B	¹²
Community Violence Reduction	$12.0B	$102B	$84B	¹³
Total	$195.2B	$1,664B	$1,370B

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Summary

Category	10-Year	Notes
Federal Budget	+$0.5B	Estimated - Not CBO-scoreable
Societal	$1,370B - $1,664B	NPV at 3-7%

Confidence: MEDIUM

Estimation Basis: Harvard Medical School researchers found that gun violence costs the U.S. approximately $557 billion annually, or 2.6% of gross domestic product, according to a peer-reviewed study published in JAMA. Federal costs are derived from existing NICS operations, proposed CVI funding levels, and ERPO implementation grants. Everytown estimates that nearly 300,000 lives could be saved over the next 10 years if all states followed strong gun safety policy leads. Savings estimates use conservative capture rates (10-30%) recognizing implementation challenges and the inherent limitations of estimating behavioral change from constitutional frameworks.

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Key Research Findings

Gun Violence Economic Costs:

• Gun violence costs the United States' economy $557 billion annually, with each year costing taxpayers $12.62 billion.
• The price tag of directly measurable medical costs borne by taxpayers totals $1.57 billion annually.
• In America, gun violence costs an estimated $489.08 billion annually in lost quality-of-life.

Violence Intervention Effectiveness:

• The National Institute for Criminal Justice Reform estimates that each homicide incurs a direct cost of $1.2 million, and each violent injury incurs a direct cost of $625,000.
• A hospital-based violence intervention program operating out of a midsize city hospital's emergency department and serving 100 participants annually will cost just under $1.1 million for each of the first three years—averaging slightly less than $10,800 per participant.
• Hospital-based violence intervention programs at San Francisco General Hospital had ICERs ranging from $5,685 to $7,724 per QALY gained, well below the commonly accepted cost-effectiveness threshold of $100,000 or $150,000 per QALY.

ERPO/Red Flag Law Effectiveness:

• Research found that one potential suicide was likely prevented for every 17 times an order removed guns from people who showed a risk of harming themselves or others.
• A 2016 study found that Connecticut's ERPO law is estimated to have averted 1 suicide for every 10 to 20 guns seized, preventing 72 suicides from 1999-2013. Indiana's red flag law is associated with a 7.5% decrease in suicides from 2005-2015.

State Comparisons:

• States with strong gun laws see less gun violence. States that have failed to put basic protections into place have a rate of gun deaths two and a half times higher than states that are national gun safety leaders.
• If California's firearm mortality rate matched that of the rest of the U.S., California would have lost nearly 19,000 more people to fatal firearm injuries in a single decade. If the firearm mortality rate in the rest of the United States had matched California's between 2013-2022, there would have been nearly 140,000 fewer firearm-related deaths nationwide.

Background Check System:

• In the first complete month of NICS operation in 1998, a total of 892,840 firearm background checks were processed; in 2022, approximately 2.6 million checks were processed per month, for a total of 31.6 million processed in 2022.
• Since 1998, over 2.2 million people have been denied the purchase of a firearm. Over 222,513 fugitives, 265,998 domestic abusers, and 214,628 unlawful drug users have been denied.

Value of Statistical Life:

• HHS's current central estimate of the value per statistical life is $13.1 million.
• Based on DOT methodology, the current VSL estimate is $13.7 million for analyses using a base year of 2024.

References

Needs references - to be added in future update

Change Log

• 2025-12-13 - ROI Research: Added researched ROI estimates via Opus 4.5 batch process

  Date	Change	Source
  2025-12-08	Amendment standardization: ROI set to TBD pending CBO scoring; removed unsubstantiated figures	Batch processor
  2025-12-08	Standardized to legislation template format	Batch standardization