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National Rifle Association
National Rifle Association of America Roles and Functions
National Rifles Association of America (NRA) is an advocacy group that promotes gun
rights in the USA. When it was founded in 1871, its primary function was to promote rifle
marksmanship (National Rifle Association). However, in recent decades it has mainly been
involved in efforts to protect gun rights against stricter gun control legislations and policies. Its
other current roles and functions include teaching members firearm competency and safety,
issuing training and credentials to firearm instructors, and providing platform where arms
manufacturers can exhibit their products (National Rifle Association).
Organization membership
NRA has over five million members in the United States (National Rifle Association).
Membership is purely voluntary. However, the organization often conducts aggressive media
campaigns to recruit members. To become a member, all one needs to do is to pay membership
fees which has to be renewed regularly. The renewal can be done after a year, two years, or five
years depending on one’s membership plan.
Services members receive from NRA
NRA members benefit from various services offered by the organization. They include
gun safety training, voter information on positions of various political candidates on gun
policies, free subscription to one of the organization’s magazines, and gun owner liability
protection policy (National Rifles Association). The NRA is, therefore, more than just an
advocacy group, it is provides numerous educational materials to its members.

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Public policy NRA advances
NRA primarily seeks to protect gun rights. It supports policies that support increased gun
ownership while working against policies that seek to put more regulations on gun ownership
and usage. One of the methods that it uses to achieve these goals is lobbying. It lobbies
legislators to pass gun-friendly policies while rejecting policies that seek to place stricter controls
on gun ownership and usage (National Rifle Association). It also conducts litigation against
unfavorable policies passes by federal, state, and local governments.
Agenda of a past conference
The NRA usually conducts annual meetings where it discusses various gun policy issues
across the country. The most significant of NRA’s recent conferences was its 147 th annual
conference held in Dallas, Texas, in 2018. The conference, attended by, among other top
politicians and government officials, the president and vice president of the United States, sought
to find a way of managing mounting pressure to have stricter gun control policies (Willingham,
2018). This pressure was a result of multiple mass shootings in many parts of the country that
left many Americans dead. Due to these shootings and deaths, public opinion was slowly shifting
towards stricter gun control policies (Willingham, 2018). The resolution from the conference was
for the organization to continue opposing any more regulations on gun ownership and to spread
the message that guns promote safety and freedom, and not the other way round.
NRA’s watchdog functions
NRA closely monitors and keeps records of how legislators vote on gun-related
legislations at all levels of government. It uses these records to mobilize its members and

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supporters either for or against various political candidates (National Rifle Association). It also
uses these records to make contributions to campaigns of pro-gun rights candidates.
Draw for NRA membership
NRA members are mostly gun owners who are against policies or legislations that may
limit the type of guns they can own and public places that they can carry them. The NRA,
therefore, pushes for less regulations on gun ownership and usage.

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References

National Rifle Association. About the NRA. Retrieved on March 18, 2020 from
https://home.nra.org/about-the-nra/
Willingham, A. (2018). At its first meeting after Parkland, the NRA draws attention to mass
shootings. CNN Politics. Retrieved on March 18, 2020 from
https://edition.cnn.com/interactive/2018/05/politics/nra-convention-trnd-cnnphotos/