This is in response to the recent letter by Jeff Bishop. There are three points I want to make.
First, it is not the case that those who question the wisdom of allowing military style weapons to be largely available are confused by terminology. Few people think of the AR-15 as an assault rifle just because of the letters AR. This is irrelevant. Whether it is an AR or an AK, the point is the same.
Bishop goes on to assert that the only difference between the AR and other weapons is looks. Not true, and I’m sure he knows it. A bolt action rifle that holds three rounds cannot take out fifty people in a matter of seconds. But an AR or AK or similar weapon with a thirty round detachable magazine that can quickly be changed is capable of doing just that. This is an important distinction
Guns were invented to kill people or animals. Automobiles , etc. were not invented or intended for the express purpose of killing.
Bishop says that many people use ARs for varmint hunting. So what? What is that compared to the lives of children? Is his desire to shoot rats or prairie dogs for pleasure more important than the lives of kids in school?
And I wonder – if Bishop has kids or grand kids in school, would he rather have an attacker show up with a blunt object or an AR?
As for the second amendment, Bishop exhibits a complete lack of understanding. The second amendment was about national security. The founders were worried that a professional standing army would be a threat to liberty. Thus, “a well-regulated militia” was seen as “necessary to the security of a free people.” The British were still a threat, as were other potential adversaries. Further, Shay’s Rebellion was fresh in mind, and a militia was needed to put down possible future insurrections, including possible slave revolts. The second amendment was never about citizens fighting against the government. That is a myth.
Also, the Supreme Court never recognized an individual right to own firearms until the 2006 D.C. v. Heller decision. But even in the majority opinion, Justice Scalia, hardly an opponent of gun ownership, stated that certain regulations on firearms were legitimate.
Lastly, Bishop asserts that if assault weapons are banned, it is just an incremental move toward banning all guns. This has no basis in fact. We had an assault weapon ban for 10 years, after all. And there is no political will in either major political party to do anything remotely close to banning all guns.
Jacqueline Dowell
Grand Rapids
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while there is much that I can point out I will limit this to your myth assertion. No less of an authority than Thomas Jefferson made it clear in his writings that he did not consider your position to be the case in his December 20, 1787 letter to James Madison, Jefferson wrote “What country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance. Let them take arms.” while Alexander Hamilton said in Federalist #28 "if the persons intrusted with supreme power become usurpers, the different parcels, subdivisions, or districts of which it consists, having no distinct government in each, can take no regular measures for defense. The citizens must rush tumultuously to arms, without concert, without system, without resource; except in their courage and despair.” there is much written on this subject should you care to research it .
"Saving Your Neighborhood Children Takes Five Minutes"
Dear school board member, (Dear state legislator,)
I was lied to. We were promised that students would be safer once we made it illegal for honest adults to carry guns on, or near, a school campus. Well that promise sure didn’t work. The US Department of Justice reports that almost all the active shooter incidents took place in “gun-free” zones. A quarter of those incidents took place in our schools.
That is unacceptable.
It is a nice letter, but it is meaningless without you. You can make it powerful. It takes one letter and a week, but you can change lives. Here is what you do with five minutes a day.
I offer you the words, but your actions make it politically powerful.
Go save lives.
https://slowfacts.wordpress.com/2016/08/14/save-the-children-in-your-neighborhood-with-five-minutes-a-day/
a site of moderation.... must be listed
*The Second Amendment was not inserted into our Bill of Rights for the purpose of hunting or target shooting. It was put there for the purpose of the people being able to defend themselves from criminals AND from oppressive governments.
Re: "Guns were invented to kill people or animals"...
While guns may have been "invented to kill", that is not how they are always used. They have 4 uses - deterrence, intimidation, control and lethal force and only the latter causes injury or death which is likely to be acknowledged and documented. In the other 3 uses, many occurrences probably are never reported. This is substantiated by a government sponsored CDC study commissioned by the Obama administration after the Sandy Cook killings in an unsuccessful attempt to justify more gun restrictions. On page 16 of the study “Priorities for Research to Reduce the Threat of Firearm-related Violence” it estimates the defensive gun uses at somewhere between 108,000 to 3 million per year” in contrast to about 14000 gun homicides per year which includes those that are accidental or justified. The bottom line is for a legal gun owner, shooting someone is a last resort because every bullet has a lawyer attached to it. Criminals, of course, don’t care
Re: "Justice Scalia, hardly an opponent of gun ownership, stated that certain regulations on firearms were legitimate"....
Anti-gunners interpret Scalia's statement to be a green light to ban any firearms they don’t like. Another interpretation, which is codified in existing laws, is that if you misuse a firearm or kill someone illegally you can be denied your right to own any firearms and be incarcerated or executed
Re: "Lastly, Bishop asserts that if assault weapons are banned, it is just an incremental move toward banning all guns. This has no basis in fact".....
In 1976 a gentleman by the name of Nelson Shields said the following "The first problem is to slow down the increasing number of handguns being produced and sold in this country. The second is to get handguns registered. And the final problem is to make the possession of all handguns and all handgun ammunition - except for the military, policemen, licensed security guards, licensed sporting clubs, and licensed gun collectors - totally illegal." Nelson Shields was one of the founders of Handgun Control Inc which is better known under their current “re-branded” name as The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. In 1987 another gentleman by the name of Josh Sugarmann said regarding so called assault weapons “The weapons' menacing looks, coupled with the public's confusion over fully automatic machine guns versus semi-automatic assault weapons—anything that looks like a machine gun is assumed to be a machine gun—can only increase the chance of public support for restrictions on these weapons.” In a Jan/Feb 1994 interview in Mother Jones Magazine he said, “To end the crisis [gun violence], we have to regulate- or, in the case of handguns and assault weapons, completely ban- the product…. We are far past the where registration, licensing, safety training, background checks, or waiting periods will have much effect on firearms violence."
In 1988 in response to an NRA comment about criminals always being able to get handguns Sugarmann also said “The NRA is Right: But We Still Need to Ban Handguns”. On 11/4/99 he said in a NYT interview “A gun-control movement worthy of the name would insist that President Clinton move beyond his proposals for controls -- such as expanding background checks at gun shows and stopping the import of high-capacity magazines -- and immediately call on Congress to pass far-reaching industry regulation like the Firearms Safety and Consumer Protection Act introduced by Senator Robert Torricelli, Democrat of New Jersey, and Representative Patrick Kennedy, Democrat of Rhode Island. Their measure would give the Treasury Department health and safety authority over the gun industry, and any rational regulator with that authority would ban handguns. Real gun control will take courage. In the long run, half-measures and compromises only sacrifice lives.” Josh Sugarmann is currently the head and founder of the Violence policy Center and was one of the founders of The Coalition to Ban Handguns which is better known under their current “re-branded” name as The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence. While the names and tactics of these organizations may have changed, the goals and a lot of the personnel remain the same.
Re: "Bishop says that many people use ARs for varmint hunting. So what? What is that compared to the lives of children?"...
According to the CDC in 2016 there were about 14415 people murdered with firearms in the US which works out to about 39 people per day. These are the “word doctored” figures the news media and anti-gun folks like to publicize because people relate to the magnitude of those numbers and it sounds like a lot of people until you realize this is out of a population of 326 million Americans. In that context, it works out to about 1 person out of every 23,000 people being murdered by a firearm and about 1 person out of every 923,000 (FBI data) being murdered with a rifle which includes so called "assault rifles". Dwell on the magnitude of your individual significance next time you are in a stadium with 23,000 or 923,000 people and you will realize these events are rare. It is also estimated there are about 109 million gun owners and 20 million "assault style" weapon owners in the US which means on any given day 108,999,961 gun owners didn’t murder anyone nor did 19,999,961 "assault style" weapon owners - yet because the news media magnifies these relatively isolated and infrequent events to the level of an epidemic, the anti-gun folks answer is to restrict or take the guns away from people who harmed no one. The number of homicides with a firearm will never be zero - so if you think 1 person out of 23,000 or 923,000 is unacceptable then given the fact that deranged individuals and murderers are an intrinsic part of the human race and we currently live in a free society, what number of illegal firearm homicides would ever be acceptable to you to the point you would say “we don’t need any more restrictions on the private ownership of firearms”?
Re: "there is no political will in either major political party to do anything remotely close to banning all guns"....
The progressive philosophy is more subtle, insidious, and incremental than immediate confiscation. You can see examples of the philosophy reflected in laws that have been implemented by like minded individuals at the state level where they don’t confiscate firearms, ammunition or magazines, they just pass laws that say you can’t keep, sell, transfer, get them repaired, purchase ammunition, loan, share, inherit or shoot them. The Colorado magazine ban is a good example where the “owner” can keep them but not share or transfer them to anyone he is living with like his/her children, spouse, roommates, significant others, domestic partners, employees, house guests, or other acquaintances you have known for years. Another example is the CA SKS Sporter ban in 2000 which required owners to dispose of any SKS Sporters they owned (there was no grandfathering). Other states (NY,NJ,CA,MA,MD) have banned certain types of so called "assault rifles" but grandfathered those currently owned if the owners registered them. However the owner cannot sell or transfer them to anyone within the state or let their kids inherit them - the only options are to surrender them to the police, take them out of state or sell them to a licensed dealer. These states also prohibit anyone moving into the state from bringing and registering any of the "banned" firearms so they have in effect "confiscated" them by forcing them to dispose of them.
So in a disingenuous sense - you’re correct - the police didn’t show up at your door to take your guns or magazines away - at least not yet - they just make it onerous, legally hazardous, and nearly impossible to own them which is the way the anti-gun folks implement their incremental strategy that will allow them to smugly claim things like "there is no political will in either major political party to do anything remotely close to banning all guns”.
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