CONCORD, N.H. (AP) – Charleston. San Bernardino. Roseburg, Oregon. With each mass shooting in the United States in the past year, a debate raged about whether gun-control measures were overdue to make Americans safe.
But not in New Hampshire.
The gun culture is alive and well here, and with a population overwhelmingly familiar with and comfortable with firearms, gun-control issues that have resonated across the nation barely register among voters getting ready for Tuesday’s presidential primary.
“Most folks in New Hampshire, I don’t want to call them pro-gun but they’re comfortable with guns,” said Wayne Lesperance, a professor of political science at the University of New Hampshire. The state is legendary for its strong libertarian streak, famously boasting “Live Free or Die” on its license plates.
Consider Kirk McNeil, the owner of a bar in Concord, who grew up in the Carolinas, spent a chunk of his adulthood in Michigan and has called New Hampshire home for the past seven years. His grandfather taught him how to shoot as a youngster with a shotgun in the backyard. He’s carried on the tradition with his daughters, starting them with BB guns when they were in elementary school.