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Activists have placed 7,000 pairs of shoes in front of the United States Congress in protest against the number of children who fell victim to gun violence.

The shoes were organised neatly across the grass and are said to represent children who have died in the United States from gunshot wounds since the Newtown elementary school massacre in 2012.

The global advocacy group, Avaaz, has been collecting donated pairs of shoes for two weeks and early Tuesday morning, lined them up one by one, 18 inches apart, in roughly 80 rows on the Capitol lawn, as Congress continues to sort through a debate over gun violence and school safety.

"Shoes are individual. They're so personal. There are ballet slippers here and roller skates. These are kids," said Nell Greenberg, the campaign director for Avaaz.

The display featured 7,000 pairs of shoes. To arrive at that figure, the group cited a 2017 report from the American Academy of Paediatrics using data from the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention that found nearly 1,300 children die from gunshot wounds in the US every year.

Avaaz then tallied up the estimated number since the December 2012 shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School.

Organisers say shoes were donated from across the country and stored in a Washington, DC, warehouse until Tuesday.

Among those who donated were family members who had lost loved ones to gun violence, such as Tom Mauser, who lost his son in the Columbine school shooting and traveled from Colorado to hand deliver his son's shoes for the display.

"My son wore the same size shoes as me. I discovered that after he died and that became a big symbol for me, that I could walk in his shoes," said Mauser, who has since become an advocate for stricter gun control.

AFP