After Newtown, focus of U.S. gun control battle shifts to states [View all]

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A Bushmaster rifle belonging to Sandy Hook Elementary school gunman Adam Lanza in Newtown, Connecticut is seen after its recovery at the school in this police evidence photo released by the state's attorney's office November 25, 2013.

(Reuters) - In the year since the massacre of 26 schoolchildren and adults in Newtown, Connecticut, efforts to pass gun legislation have stalled in the U.S. Congress but shifted to the states, helped by the deep pockets of outgoing New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

In scores of statehouse battles, both gun-control and gun-rights advocates have notched wins since a mentally unstable gunman killed 20 first-graders and six adults at Newtown's Sandy Hook Elementary School on December 14, 2012.

Electoral and legislative fights since Newtown - including the election last month of a Democratic gun-control supporter, Terry McAuliffe, as governor of Virginia, the home state of the powerful National Rifle Association gun lobby - are likely a foretaste of battles to come next year in federal and state elections.

"We're in this for the long haul," said Mark Glaze, executive director of Mayors Against Illegal Guns, a coalition founded by Bloomberg. "This issue is like a cruise ship that's been going in the wrong direction for a long time, directly toward the iceberg, and it's going to take a while to turn around."

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/12/09/us-usa-shooting-connecticut-guncontrol-idUSBRE9B80E820131209