WHY THE SECOND AMENDMENT SHOULD BE REPEALED
By Clark Moeller
January 5, 2016
Since 2008, the Second Amendment has become a lethal threat to Americans. It prevents our
federal, state, and local governments from enacting effective gun-control regulations to reduce
gun violence in America. Repealing the Second Amendment should be the top priority in all
discussions about gun safety.
On the Web at:
How to End Gun Violence
www.repeal2ndamendment.org
Table of Contents
1. Synopsis .............................................................................................................. 1
1.1
The Root of the Problem
1.2
Rethink Your Skepticism
2. Historical Overview ...................................................................................... 3
2.1
The Second Amendment
2.2
Legislation
2.3
Culture
3. Gun Mayhem ................................................................................................. 6
3.1
International Comparisons
3.2
States in the USA
3.3
The Mentally Ill
3.4
Guns in the Home
3.5
Every day in the USA
4. The Business of Guns ..................................................................................... 10
4.1
The Market
4.2
Business Plan
4.3
NRA’s Narrative
5. Amending the Constitution ............................................................................ 16
5.1
Backdoor Amendments
5.2
Heller Decision
5.3
The Public Interest
6.
The Tide is Turning ...................................................................................... 20
6.1
NRA is Out of Touch
6.2
The General Public
6.3
U.S. Senate
7.
Gun Control Challenge ................................................................................ 21
7.1
Fragmentation
72
Common Goal
7.3
A Problem
8. Taking Stock ................................................................................................... 22
8.1
Times are Changing
8.2
The Icon
8.3
The Second Amendment is Central
9.
Recommendations ........................................................................................ 24
Appendices ............................................................................................................... 26
A: Joe Nocera’s “Weekend Gun Report,” ................................ 26
B: “Banished for Questioning...” ............................................... 31
C: “Mass killings Proliferate...” ................................................. 32
Endnotes .................................................................................................................. 33 - 54
1. Synopsis:
The Second Amendment should be repealed by Congress. The Second Amendment
has not served our national defense for over 150 years. Since 2008, it has blocked effective gun
regulations from being enforced and reasonable gun-control bills from being passed. The United
States now has a gun-related homicide rate that is 3 to 10 times higher than that of similar
democracies which have sensible gun regulations. In 2012, the direct and indirect costs of gunrelated homicides and injuries were in excess of $229 billion.
Annually, Americans are shooting and killing 30,000 other Americans and injuring
another 70,000. Since 2000, over 450,000 citizens and 500 police have been shot to death. In the
next 10 years we can expect more than a million Americans will die or be wounded in gun-related
shootings unless we take a new approach to stopping this senseless mayhem.
The original purpose of the Second Amendment was to arm a “well regulated militia” for
the common interest of defending the new nation against the British men-of-wars prowling our
Atlantic coast, threatening once more to land Red Coats on these shores. Subsequently, the
“Militia” became obsolete during the 1800s as the U.S. Army and Navy evolved to ensure the
“security” of the United States. As a nation we have moved beyond the time in 1881when
Deputy Sheriff Wyatt Earp’s blazing six gun at the OK Corral was the only law in town. He has
been replaced with professionally trained police at the local, state, and national levels who are
better equipped to secure domestic peace and security than individually armed citizens.
However, a robust gun culture has continued. It is rooted in the mythology of the
American frontier experience, funded by an $11 million gun industry which is actively supported
by the legislative lobbying of the National Rifle Association that has a membership of only
0.016% of Americans over the age of 18 years. The tail is waging the dog.
In 2008, for the first time in the United States’ history, the Supreme Court decided a
citizen had the right to own a gun for self defense in their 5 to 4 decision in District of Columbia
v. Heller. Two years later, the Court decided in McDonald, that their 2008 Heller decision
applied to all states. In reaction to the Supreme Court’s 2008 and 2010 decisions, the failure of
Congress to pass gun-control legislation after the Newtown massacre, and the nation’s on-going
gun mayhem, editorials calling for the repeal of the Second Amendment have appeared in the
Chicago Tribune, The Economist, America, The National Catholic Review, and scores of articles
in other national publications such as the New York Times, and Vanity Fair.
1.1
The Root of the Problem
The Second Amendment should be repealed by Congress or overturned by the Supreme
Court for the following reasons.
The 2008 Supreme Court decision in Heller granted citizens the right to own a gun for
self defense for the first time in U.S. history. As a result, it is now almost impossible for
our federal, state, and local governments to adopt effective gun-control regulations for
handguns and other weapons.
é
Hand guns can be carried as concealed weapons in all 50 states now and handguns were
used in 90% of all murders between 2009 and 2014 according to the FBI.
é
Over 100,000 Americans are killed and injured in gun-related shootings each year that
cost our nation $229 billion in direct and indirect expenses.
é
2
é
the Second Amendment has made the job of law enforcement more dangerous.
The majority of Americans want effective gun control in order to have a safer society in
which to live and raise children.
é
The Second Amendment has been used to fabricate a myth that citizens have a right to
use their guns to rebel against our government. No such constitutional right exists.
é
Repealing the Second Amendment will change the gun narrative in this nation. Until then,
comprehensive, effective federal gun-control laws will not be enacted if our history is a guide.
Since the 1880s, Congress has failed to enact comprehensive and effective gun control laws. The
failure of Congress to pass a gun-control regulation after the Newtown massacre of 20 school
children and six teachers in December 2012, is the most recent example.
This congressional irresponsibility is aided and abetted by the National Rifle Association
(NRA) which exploits our nation’s murder rate by claiming our government and police can’t
protect you so you’d better buy a gun, the more the better, concealed is best. In this way the NRA
has eroded our communities’ safety. But owning a gun is a matter of freedom, argues the NRA,
it’s a right. A right that results in the indiscriminate killing of family and friends is not the
concept of freedom on which this nation was founded.
1.2
Rethink Your Skepticism
Those who scoff "repealing the Second Amendment will never happen" should rethink
their skepticism. The Constitution was first amended in 1791, just 4 years after it was ratified. It
has been amended 17 times since 1791, about once every 13 years. It was amended to end slavery
in 1865, granted women the right to vote in 1920, repealed prohibition in 1933, and changed the
age for voting to 18 years old for national elections in 1971. The Supreme Court has often
changed what the words in the Constitution mean without changing the written text. For example,
the Supreme Court changed the purpose of the Second Amendment in 2008 from one of national
defense to an individual’s self interest. The meaning of “speech” in the First Amendment was
changed in 2010 to included corporate ‘speech,’ not just the speech of naturally born people. In
2015, the Supreme Court determined that gay marriage was on an equal legal footing with
heterosexual marriage throughout the nation. The Supreme Court has reversed or revised its
previous decisions on statutes and amendments in the Constitution 95 times, 36 times in the last
25 years.
Removing the Second Amendment from the Constitution is critical to changing the
national narrative about gun rights so effective gun control laws can be passed. These laws are
what the vast majority of Americans want so we can stop the senseless, gun-related mayhem in
our country.
You can help reduce gun violence by making use of one of the simplest and more
powerful tools you already have: the multiplying, amplifying power of networking, of talking to
and sharing information with your friends and family who talk to their friends and families. Start
by sharing this website “How to Reduce Gun Violence,” www.repeal2ndAmendment.org . Go to
the Take Action feature of this website and send its letter to your Senate and House
representatives in Washington.
3
02 Historical Overview
When American hostilities with Britain started on April 19, 1775, the Continental
Congress had no standing army, no stores of weapons and munitions, no navy, no naval ships.
The Continental Congress rallied volunteers to join the fight against the British. Farmers and
tradesmen carrying their own muskets formed a militia along the road from Boston to Concord,
Massachusetts, fired the first shot of the Revolution, and fought again on Bunker Hill in
Charlestown on June 17.
Subsequently, the Constitution of the United States was adopted in 1787 on the condition
that a Bill of Rights would be added. The first Ten Amendments to the Constitution, including
the Second Amendment, were ratified by Congress on December 15, 1791. The Second
Amendment states:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the
people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
The language and adoption of the Second Amendment reflected Congress’s experience of
the militia’s defense against the British under the leadership of George Washington that secured
the independence of the United States. Militias were used again to some degree on the AmericanCanadian frontier during the War of 1812.1
Since then, the United States has been involved in over 350 domestic and international
military operations.2 Except in the very early years, few of these operations depended on the
assistance of privately owned guns of a “well regulated militia.’ However, the term “militia’
remains familiar because it is embedded in the Second Amendment.
The quality and availability of firearms increased slowly during the 1800s. Large scale
manufacturing of lower cost rifles with interchangeable parts began by Colt and Smith & Wesson
before the Civil War.3
Today, the United States is exceptional among nations: it has the largest standing, best
equipped, professional army in the world. We have military boots on the ground in 75% of the
world’s countries.4
The United States is also exceptional for another reason. There are over 300 million guns
in private hands in the United States, far more per capita than in any other nation.5
2.1
The Second Amendment: The Constitution of the United States designates the Supreme
Court of the United States (SCOTUS) as the final authority for interpreting the meaning of our
Constitution and whether state and local laws and government actions are consistent with the
Constitution.6
Before 2007, SCOTUS handed down two defining Second Amendment decisions. In
United States v. Miller (1938) SCOTUS affirmed (9 - 0) that the Second Amendment,
...as originally adopted granted to the Congress power- 'To provide for calling forth the
Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions; To
provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the Militia, and for governing such Part
of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States
respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia
4
according to the discipline prescribed by Congress.' U.S.C.A.Const. art. 1, 8. With
obvious purpose to assure the continuation and render possible the effectiveness of such
forces the declaration and guarantee of the Second Amendment were made. It must be
interpreted and applied with that end in view.
Before that, in Presser v. Illinois (1885), SCOTUS voted 9 to 0 to “...sustained an Illinois
statute prohibiting parading with arms by groups other than the organized militia.”
Commentators noted that SCOTUS was not interested in encouraging the development of separate
militia outside the control of government.7
Based on those decisions by SCOTUS, policy #47 of the American Civil Liberties Union
states,
that the individual’s right to bear arms applies only to the preservation or efficiency of a
well-regulated militia. ... there is no constitutional impediment to the regulation of
firearms.8
The American Bar Association agreed. The ABA, which represents more than 400,000
lawyers, stated in 1999,
The argument the Second Amendment prohibits all State and Federal regulations of
citizens’ ownership of firearms has no validity whatsoever.9
Both the 1885 and 1939 decisions of SCOTUS contradict those who claim Americans
have had a ‘right’ to own guns. The purpose of the Second Amendment, as interpreted by the
SCOTUS in 1885 and 1939, became obsolete during the 1800s as the U.S.’s armed forces became
more fully established.
2.2
Legislation: The history of gun regulations in America extends from the 1600s to the
present. Some colonies criminalized selling guns to slaves, indentured servants, Catholics, and
vagrants. In the 1700s and 1800s, some states and the federal government conducted a census of
privately owned guns, and in some cases guns were required to be kept in central locations for
community defense. In the 1900s, many western towns had strict gun control laws.10
Between 1880 and 1968, there were numerous efforts by Congress to regulate privately
owned guns, according to the study of gun laws in 1975 by Franklin Zimring, Professor of Law
and Co-Director of the Center for Studies in Criminal Law, University of Chicago.11 Most of the
legislation that was passed in 1927, 1934, 1938, and 1968 was rendered largely ineffective
because of the loopholes and congressional lack of understanding of how regulations work in
practice. For example, in 1927 Congress prohibited using the United States Postal Service to
transport ‘concealable firearms’ in order to stop “mail order murder.” However, interstate
commerce of guns continued unrestrained via commercial transport. “In the mid-1960s it was
estimated that 87% of all firearms used in Massachusetts crime had been purchased in other
states.”12 Record keeping requirements essential to monitoring the effectiveness of laws were not
included in various Acts. Funding sufficient to staff government agencies was not appropriated.
Waiting periods, such as 48 hours required to purchase a gun, were too short in the era before
computerized data bases. Proposed provisions such as handgun registration were deleted before
5
bills were passed. The focus on classes of people for regulation such as “machine-gun-toting
interstate gangsters” like John Dillinger created legislative tunnel vision that missed the big
picture. Similarly, the mentally ill are wrongly blamed for today’s gun mayhem.13 After reviewing
Congress’s failed efforts at gun control Professor Zimring noted,
If Congress is supposed to be the policy-setting institution, the Gun Control Act of 1968
may stand as an example of the blind leading the halt.14
That incompetence has continued. After the Newtown massacre of 20 children and 6
teachers in 2012, Congress again failed to enact the most basic gun-control law; it failed to restrict
military type assault weapons, a restriction which the majority of Americans supported. State gun
laws vary a great deal;15 the current legislative trend is toward expanding, not restricting, the right
to carry a gun.16
This legislative pattern has a very high price. In 2012, the direct and indirect costs of gunrelated homicides and injuries was in excess of $229 billion. In addition to the death and injury
related medical costs, direct costs to tax payers include $8 billion for those sent to prison. Indirect
costs suffered by the victims of shootings include $49 billion from lost wages. Every time you
read about a person who has been shot keep in mind that you as a tax payer will be paying all or
part of the related direct and indirect costs incurred by the shooter and his or her victim. On
average this will be about $700 annually for every man, woman, and child in our country. If you
live in Alabama which has the highest homicide rate, the cost is about $1,300 per person. If you
live in Wyoming with the smallest population, the cost is about $1,400 per person.17 Although the
majority of citizens do not own guns, they are underwriting the bill for a very expensive gun
culture.
2.3
Culture: The lack of effective gun-control laws is also a reflection, in part, of the
mythology about gun ownership in America that was born in the struggles of the Pilgrims to
survive using their flintlocks, the patriots’ first shots in Lexington in 1775, and the westward
expansion of settlers such as Davy Crockett and his storied rifle. The romance of the frontier gun
has been featured in scores of cowboy movies and in films of the take-no-prisoner loners who are
judge and jury of the bad guy like Dirty Harry who barks “Make my Day!” as he kills the villain
with his Smith and Wesson .44 magnum.18 Guns are featured every evening on TV, and in a score
of glossy gun magazines.19
However, the United States is no longer the wild west of 1881, when the impulse to
survive glued your finger to the trigger. For many today packing a gun is a fashion statement and
has little to do with real threats. Guns that are actually important to survival are carefully
managed and stored which is not the case in many American homes today.
Between December 2012 and December 2013, at least 100 children were killed in
unintentional shootings .... 65 percent took place in a home or vehicle that belonged to the
victim’s family, most often with guns that were legal but not secured.20
Even some professionally trained Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms agents aren’t mindful about
their guns.
The newly released ATF reports show that between 2009 and 2013, agents lost their guns
6
or had them stolen in at least 45 incidents ... . In June 11, 2012, an [ATF] agent was
dropping off his children at a soccer game in Plainfield, Ill., when he put his
government-issued Smith & Wesson revolver on his car's roof, forgot about it and drove
away, ... The gun was found [by someone, but not the agent] on an off-ramp of I-55.21
3 Gun Mayhem
The murder and suicide rate in the United States is 3 to 10 times higher than in other
democratic industrialized nations.22 Comparisons among countries show there is a
consistent correlation between gun ownership per 100 population23 and the number of gunrelated murders and suicides: the more guns the more murders and suicides.24
3.1
International Comparisons:
The data below illustrate that gun-related deaths are lower in countries with gun-control
laws, where fewer individuals per capita own guns, and where a lower percentage of households
contain guns.
U.S
France
Canada
Germany
Norway
Sweden
Australia
Israel
England &
Wales
Influence of Gun Control Laws & Gun Ownership
on Gun-Related Deaths
Gun Control Laws
+
Gun Ownership
Safe
Hand Gun
Percentage of
Gun
Storage Ownership
Gun
Households
Licensing Gun
Permitted for Ownership
with
Laws26 Protection27 Per 100 pop.28 Guns29
Laws25
48.0
NO
NO
YES
89.031
Yes
31.2
25.0
Yes
Yes
No
30.0
26.0
Yes
Yes
Yes
30.0
9.0
Yes
Yes
Yes
30.0
31.0
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
No
15.0
16.0
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
No
6.2
4.0
Correlation
Gun-Related
Deaths per
100,000
Population30
10.3
3.01
2.28
1.24
1.78
1.47
0.04
1.87
0.25
The above table shows that the United States is an anomaly among other industrial democracies.
In the last column in the table, the “10.3" is the statistical expression of our nation’s gun
pathology. In contrast, the rates of non-gun- related violence such as rape, assault, domestic
violence, and robbery are similar among U.S., Canada, France, Denmark, Germany, Iceland,
Norway, Sweden, and Israel. This suggests that the citizens of the United States are not
intrinsically more violent than people in these other countries. But the United States is the outlier
in gun violence because it has more guns.32
7
3.2
States in the USA: The correlation between the rates of gun ownership and gun-related
murders and suicides found internationally is also found within the United States when our 50
states were compared.33
A ... study, [2013] covering 30 years (1981-2010) in all 50 states, found a ‘robust
correlation’ between estimated levels of gun ownership and actual gun homicides at the
state level, even when controlling for factors typically associated with homicides. For
each 1 percentage point increase in the prevalence of gun ownership, the state firearm
homicide rate increases by 0.9 percent,....34
According to the research conducted in Missouri in 2008 and 2015, by the Johns Hopkins
Center for Gun Policy and Research (JHCGPR), there is a strong association between gun laws
and gun-related violence rates and the extent of police engagement. These studies documented
that between 1996 and 2006, the gun homicide rate in Missouri was 13.8% higher than the
national rate. Then Missouri repealed its laws requiring background checks and licenses for
handguns in 2007.
! From 2008 to 2014, the state’s homicide rate grew from 13.8% to be 47% higher than
the national rate.
! There was also a 23% increase in gun-related murders, 55 to 63, between 2008 and 2012.
! The share of guns that were linked to crimes soon after they were bought doubled in
Missouri from 2006 to 2010.
! In addition, the portion of guns confiscated by the police in Missouri also increased from
56% in 2007, to 74% after 2007.35
Although statistical associations do not prove cause and effect, the JHCGPR Missouri
studies suggests that there is a predictable relationship between the incidents of crime and existing
gun laws that were included in the JHCGPR studies.
According to the Mayors Against Illegal Guns,
... [T]here is a strong association between a state’s gun laws and that state’s propensity to
export crime guns. There is also a strong association between a state’s gun laws and that
state’s propensity to be a source of short TTC [time to crime] crime guns. ... Every year,
tens of thousands of guns make their way into the hands of criminals through illegal
trafficking channels. These firearms contribute to the more than 12,000 gun murders in
the United States each year.36
The National Rifle Association’s website instructs its members on how to transport guns
across state lines without having their guns discovered during legitimate police stops such as for
driving infractions.37
3.3
The Mentally Ill: In an effort to explain away the high gun-related killings in the United
States, there has been a blame-the-mentally-ill reaction. Blaming the mentally ill is an excuse to
avoid the overwhelming statistical evidence that the number of guns and the lack of gun
regulations in the United States are the problems. Countries with low gun violence also have their
8
share of mentally ill citizens.38 In the big picture, the mentally ill as a group are not the problem
in gun-related violence.39
é [O]nly 3%-5% of violent acts are attributable to serious mental illness, and most do not
involve guns.40
We have no way to identify who among those suspected of being mentally ill might be the next
mass murderer. Therefore, declaring that all we have to do is “keep guns out of the wrong hands”
without data-based criteria for reliably determining which “hands” those might be is a prescription
for rudimentary unfairness, civil rights violations, and an unproductive path for ending gun
violence. The term ‘wrong hands’ should refer to individuals convicted of violent crimes.
3.4
Guns in the Home: You or members of your family are far more likely to be shot than
those in families who have no guns in their home, according to an Emory University study that
documented:
é females living with a gun in the home were 2.7 times more likely to be murdered than
females with no gun at home.” [2005 study, University of Pennsylvania] ...
é For every instance in which a gun in the home was shot in self-defense, there were
seven criminal assaults or homicides, four accidental shootings, and 11 attempted or
successful suicides.
é “If a gun was kept in the home, the respondent [in a study of 417 women in 67 battered
women’s shelters] was asked whether she or her partner had used the gun(s) against each
other. Nearly two thirds, (64.5%) responded that the partner had used one of the guns to
scare, threaten, or harm her. When asked what happened during the incident, 71.4% of
these 98 women reported that the partner had threatened to shoot or kill her.” 41
é guns in the home greatly increase the risk of youth suicides. That is why the American
Academy of Pediatrics has long urged parents to remove guns from their homes. 42
é “there is no credible evidence of a deterrent effect of firearms or that a gun in the home
reduces the likelihood or severity of injury during an altercation or break-in.43
Statistically, the evidence proves that owning a gun or being in a home with a gun exposes
you and your family to an increased risk of being shot. The risks to small children are dramatically
documented in an NBC video accessible using the information in endnote.44 This video is also in
the Resource section of this website.
3.5
Everyday in the USA: Over 332,000 Americans died in gun-related deaths between
2000 and 2010. 45
46
é In the same decade, 511 police officers were shot dead.
é In 2010, alone, guns took the lives of 31,076 Americans in homicides, suicides and
unintentional shootings. This is the equivalent of more than 85 deaths each day and more
than three deaths each hour, according to Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. In
addition, LCPGV noted,
é 73,505 Americans were treated in hospitals for non-fatal gunshot wounds in 2010.
é An estimated 37,200 Americans were killed with guns in the 13 months following the
9
Newtown school shooting on Dec. 14, 2012, according to the Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention.47
To put this gun-related carnage in perspective,
é 58,000 American soldiers were killed in the Vietnam War in the 11 years between 1964
and 1975. That 58,000 is less than the number of civilians killed with guns in the United
States in an average 2 year period.
é Over 4,400 American soldiers were killed in the Iraq War in the first 7 years. However,
every 7 weeks on average about 4,000 civilians are gunned down in the United States. 48
é To read about gun carnage on a typical American weekend see Appendix A.
The massacres at Virginia Tech (32 killed, 17 injured), Columbine High School (13 killed,
17 injured), the movie theater in Aurora, Colorado (12 killed, 70 injured), and Newtown,
Connecticut (26 killed), are just the most publicized mass shootings. Less well known is that,
according to the FBI:
é “The rate at which these [mass killing*] events occurred went from approximately 1
every other month between 2000 and 2008 (5 per year) to more than 1 per month between
2009 and 2012 (almost 16 per year).49 (*defined by the FBI as 4 people killed per event.)
If shooting people in so-called self-defense, as in ‘stand-your-ground,’ provokes shooting
people in revenge as is now becoming more likely, you might find yourself in the line of fire
between the Hatfields and McCoys in Boston or any town on any given day:
é January 8, 2014 - Three shooting deaths within six hours late Sunday and early
Monday brought the total ... so far this year to nine. ...These episodes were followed
Monday ... by yet another shooting... . ‘Retaliatory gang violence has been happening for
the last 30 years,’ Rufus Faulk of the Boston TenPoint Coalition, said, “We’re still on the
same cycle ... this is a continuation of that pattern. 50 Then on January 9, at 11p.m one
person fatally shot on Rowe St. in Roslindale and on the 15th at 8 a.m one person fatally
shot on Esmond St. in Dorchester.
So, who is benefitting from this carnage?
4. The Business of Guns
The National Rifle Association (NRA) has developed a well earned reputation for
being largely responsible for the level of gun violence in our nation.
4.1
The Market:
The Second Amendment in conjunction with the narrative of our robust gun culture is the
arena within which the NRA has help created an 11 billion dollar gun industry for 465 domestic
firearms manufacturers.51 In 2010, over 8.7 million new guns 52 were added to the estimated 300
million guns already in private hands. Of these it is estimated that 114 million are handguns, 110
million are rifles, and 86 million are shotguns.53 Together these firearms constitute the highest per
10
capita gun ownership rate in the world.
The National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), the gun manufacturers’ trade
association, claims on the one hand that its ‘mission’ is “To promote, protect and preserve
hunting and the shooting sports, ...” However, this is a very small fraction of the gun market;
only 4.9% of our population were licensed hunters as of 2013,54 and many of these hunters are
likely part of the 11.4% of our population who claim they are involved in recreational sport
shooting.55
The leading market for gun sales are individuals who already own guns. Most of these
guns are concentrated in 33%56 of American households in which live 2.61 individuals on
average.57 Obviously, those who own guns often have many guns; which is, on average, about 4
guns per gun owner.58 But the upper end of the ownership rate can be high: “Mark Russo of
Middletown, CT, had 18 rifles and shotguns when he threatened to shoot his mother.” The New
York Times, Dec. 22, 201359
4.2
Business Plan:
To preserve this large gun market, the NSSF asserts it
...stands in defense of every segment of our [firearms] industry on Capitol Hill and in state
capitols nationwide. Over the past 10 years, the association has grown its
government-relations efforts immensely, resulting in many key legislative successes for
our industry.”60
These “successes” are the result of the NRA’s political campaigns61 which take credit for
defeating candidates who favor gun regulations. The NRA has also defeated proposed interstate
commerce laws that would protect states’ residents from the flow of illegal guns into their state
from other states62 such as
- background checks,
- gun registration,
- pre-licensing training,
- licensing,
- safe gun-storage requirements,
- gun identification numbers inscribed by manufacturers,
- reporting gun sales between private individuals, and controls on interstate
commerce of guns.
The NRA’s primary marketing message is that you need to own a gun for self defense.
That message is tightly linked to its business plan that has given that message credibility.
In order to prevent the public from getting up-to-date information on the growing threat of
guns to public health, the NRA successfully lobbied Congress in 1996 to prevent the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention from getting Federal research funds to study gun violence. As a
result, the CDC funding for these studies shrunk by 96%.63
The NRA promoted the Tiahrt Amendment that was adopted by Congress in 2003. This
restricts access of state and local law enforcement authority to:
11
- gun trace data which hinder municipal police departments' ability to
- track down sellers of illegal guns,
- investigate gun trafficking patterns, and
- make connections between individual gun-related crimes."
In addition, the Tiahrt Amendment requires that background check records be destroyed within 24
hours. According to Mayors Against Illegal Guns this makes it:
- harder for law enforcement authorities to catch law-breaking gun dealers who
falsify
their records and
- more difficult to identify and track down straw purchasers who buy guns on behalf of
criminals who wouldn't be able to pass a background check or prohibited purchasers who
buy firearms themselves due to errors in the background check process.
The Tiahrt Amendment denies the Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) the
authority to require dealer inventory checks to detect lost and stolen guns. Under current rules, the
Bureau of ATF can conduct a warrantless search of any licensed gun dealer only once per year.”
The Tiahrt Amendment forbids the ATF from releasing information from its firearm trace
database to anyone other than a law enforcement agency or prosecutor in connection with a
specific criminal investigation, and any data so released is deemed inadmissible in a civil lawsuit.
As a result, in part, the Remington Arms Co. decided to continue producing a rifle (model
700) for years when Remington knew it had a defective lock. This defect caused many shooting
deaths and injuries.64
Consistent with these marketing strategies, the gun manufacturers have blocked
publication about defects or design mistakes in the guns they sell. (See Appendix B)
These NRA’s initiatives have been a big success for gun manufacturers;65 few effective
gun controls exist, and gun violence is unchecked compared to that of other modern democracies.
As a result, many people feel insecure and buy a gun to feel safer. Many of our elected
representatives in state legislatures and in Congress support the NRA’s legislative agenda while
their constituents are being shot dead. See your state or congressional representative’s voting
record on gun-control bills at Vote Smart (www.votesmart.org).
4.3
NRA’s Narrative: The philosophy behind the NRA’s business strategy is driven by its
gun narrative and its experience:
- The NRA asserts that Americans have a ‘fundamental’ right to own guns.
- This right extends to using your gun to rebel against an overreaching government.
- Our government is not capable of protecting its citizens.
- Legislators can be bought.
The NRA’s philosophic position is that the Constitution is the fundamental law of the
land. Therefore the Second Amendment is also fundamental law because it is part of the
Constitution. Hence, the ‘right’ to keep guns is fundamental because it is granted by the Second
Amendment. This line of reasoning is flawed.66
Although the Constitution is the ultimate law of the land, not all parts of it have been
fundamental as is evident by the 17 constitutional amendments that have been repealed, revised,
amended, or reinterpreted since 1791, when the Second Amendment was ratified. Nor are all
12
aspects of the current Constitution of equal importance. For example, is the constitutionally
defined minium age of 35 to be president fundamental? That age could just as well be 34 or 40
years old.
Furthermore, if owning a gun has been a ‘fundamental’ constitutional right as argued by
the NRA, by now that right would be widely recognized as a cornerstone supporting the ideals the
founders expressed in the Declaration of Independence and the Preamble to the Constitution.
The Declaration of Independence (7/4/1776) states in part:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are
endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are
Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights,
Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the
consent of the governed,... (Emphasis added)
The Preamble (1787) states:
We the people of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union,
establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for a common Defense,
promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessing of Liberty to ourselves and
our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution of the United States of
America. (Emphasis added)
The Second Amendment has not been a cornerstone of the founders’ aspirations for our
country. The Second Amendment has NOT:
é advanced a “more perfect Union” as the Civil War and Congress’s current gridlock
demonstrate.
é “established Justice” in any discernable way. ‘Stand your ground’ and ‘right to carry
concealed weapons’ laws have made it more difficult to determine justice as the Trayvon
Martin murder case in Florida demonstrated.
é insured “domestic Tranquilty” as our rate of gun-related murders and suicides proves.
é promoted the “general Welfare” whether interpreted as the Second Amendment’s
impact on the nation’s budget in the 1800s, or the nation’s sense of security when four of
our presidents were shot dead and 13 were the targets of attempted assassinations.67
é provided for the “defense” of the nation for well over 150 years.
é secured people’s “right to life,” as more than 30,000 people are shot dead annually.
é secured many citizens’ “liberty” to live in safe communities, as entire sections of major
cities are now so dangerous that parents don’t let their kids out of their homes after school.
é contributed to citizens’ “happiness,” as thousands of friends have been shot dead.
é promoted the “consent of the governed” as reflected in national polls which indicate
most Americans want effective gun control in order to achieve a safer society.68
The NRA’s advocacy for gun ‘rights’ in order to promote gun sales has diminished the benefits of
our democracy as envisioned by the Founders.
Second, according to the NRA the right to own guns includes the right to use your gun to
rebel against an overreaching government. As a result of the NRA’s successful promotion of this
13
groundless argument, 65% of American adults assume that the Second Amendment gives them
the right to arm themselves for self defense against an oppressive government,69 a fear fanned by
the NRA.70 However, there is no legal ‘right’ to own guns for the purpose of fighting against our
governments at the national, state, or local level found in the Constitution, the Second
Amendment adopted in 1791, or as re-interpreted by SCOTUS in 2008. When the Southern states
tried to separate from the United States to create the Confederacy, starting with the bombardment
of Fort Sumpter, the United States raised an army and won the Civil War. The United States also
put down the Whiskey Rebellion of 1794,71 hung John Brown for his raid on Harpers Ferry in
1859, and at Ruby Ridge, Idaho, in 1992 federal agents killed Ruby Weaver’s wife, son, and dog,
and put Weaver in jail.72 In 1993, after a 51 day stand off with the Branch Davidians at their
compound in Waco, Texas, the United States government killed 76 men, women, and children
because they failed to surrender.73
The myth of a right to own guns to oppose an overreaching United States government may
stem from a misunderstanding of The Declaration of Independence, 1776, which said, “...
whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people
to alter or abolish it,... .” That was written for local consumption to justify the American
Revolution against Britain. The same individuals who signed The Declaration of Independence
approved the Constitution of the United States which, not surprisingly, included no justification
whatsoever for rebelling against the government ... which they created. Furthermore, The
Declaration of Independence was a personal promise between and among the signers that “...we
mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.” It never had any
legal authority that could have been enforced; it conferred no ‘right’ to take up arms against the
United States.
Third, the NRA’s narrative asserts that our form of government is not capable of
protecting our citizens from gun violence. “You’re on your own,” claims the NRA which
promotes a form of libertarianism that rejects a government role in protecting citizens. According
to Wayne LaPierre, Executive Vice President of the NRA,
We’re the millions of Americans from all walks of life who take responsibility for our own
safety and protection as a God-given, fundamental right.”74 LaPierre also claimed, “Our
founding Fathers understood that the guys with the guns make the rules ... and it’s no
different today. That’s why we own guns.75
Tony Soprano couldn’t have said it better in the TV series about the New Jersey mafia. The NRA
has become a sort of gun cult. It feeds off the drama of someone being shot dead. The more
random the shootings, the closer to home, the greater the assault on citizens’ sense of security.
Although LaPierre’s macho every-man-for-himself mantra may be intended to appeal to
his base, it also has the effect of undermining trust in our neighbors and in our communities; every
stranger is a potential threat because he might be packing a concealed weapon.
A handgun is the concealed weapon of choice. Handguns were used in 90% of the gunrelated murders between 2009 and 2013, according to the FBI. Promoting concealed weapons
laws by the NRA has been making our society less safe.76 Even libertarians who embrace
personal freedom as an important value aren’t lobbying to overturn state automobile licensing
14
laws so drivers can drive anyway they want, drunk or sober. They aren’t insisting that their own
medical doctors have the freedom to practice medicine without state licensing requirements.
Following the December 14th massacre in Newtown, CT, the NRA lobbied successfully to
defeat a congressional bill intended to require background checks on those seeking to buy a gun.
Using this ‘victory’, LaPierre, claimed on December 21st, ‘the only thing that stops a bad guy
with a gun is a good guy with a gun.’ That claim is about 99.1% wrong.
In a 2015 study of 14,000 incidents of property theft when the victims were present, 127 of
those victims were armed for self defense. They only used their guns for self defense in 0.9% of
those 127 incidents.77
Another spurious NRA oneliner is “guns don’t kill people, people do.” This rhetorical
sleight-of-hand is intended to deflect your attention from the cause of gun injuries that can be
regulated. A shooting is the result of a chain of events that includes the thought or impulse of the
shooter. This is the ‘ultimate’ cause of the shooting. Pulling the trigger of the gun is the
‘intermediate’ cause, and the gun and its bullet are the ‘proximate’ causes of injury. The only
aspects of this chain of events that can be regulated beforehand are the ‘proximate’ causes such as
guns and their ammunition. Just thinking about shooting someone, potentially an ‘ultimate’ cause,
is protected by the First Amendment which guarantees you complete freedom of conscience and
thought.
Not surprisingly, preventative regulations focus on the guns, drugs, and automobiles that
predictably harm people. However, the NRA doesn’t want guns regulated so the NRA muddies
the water with its word games.
However, the NRA is not the only one that relies on catchy phrases. Some have claimed
“I am for gun control, and I believe in the Second Amendment.” This is an oxymoron from the
NRA’s perspective as well as for those who want effective gun control. This is a weak,
ineffective strategy that will not achieve a safer society as has been repeatedly demonstrated for
over a century of legislative failures at the national level to enact effective gun controls.
Fourth, the NRA buys legislators. The NRA’s legislative lobbying has frequently
demonstrated its claim that the government can’t protect its citizens from gun violence by
awarding legislators an A rating if they vote against gun control legislation, and the NRA also
helps fund those legislators’ campaigns.78 Behind those payoffs is the unspoken raw calculus of
the NRA: the electoral success of their A listed politicians is worth the collateral cost of 30,000
people being shot dead with the weapons the gun manufacturers pump into the market year after
year. And no one can lay a finger on the NRA’s A listed legislators: they haven’t killed anyone
personally, and haven’t broken the law.
This calculus is now so commonly understood that it was satirized by John Oliver in two
TV segments on Jon Stewart’s The DailyShow in April 2013. You can watch these using the
hyperlinks in endnote79. The same point was made in the Boston Globe’s editorial of Dec. 31,
2013. See Appendix C. What is the NRA’s reaction to 30,000 citizens shot to death every year?
Essentially, ‘mistakes were made, but not by us.’80
Politicians who embrace their NRA A designation should refer to it as their Arsenic award
for their role in voting against gun-control laws that has contributed to the annual gun-homicide
rate in the United States.
15
Furthermore, the NRA has apparently been illegally funneling millions of dollars it has
received from citizens into the bank accounts of Political Action Committees (PACs) to support
candidates without letting donors know how their donations were being used or reporting these
transactions to the IRS81
The social climate of gun violence stimulated by the NRA’s activities discourages people
including some elected officials from challenging the NRA’s strategy.
I think it would be a mistake .... to underestimate the kind of toxic effect that the NRA is
having,” said Congressman Nolan (D-MN). “... We’ve been getting a lot of not very thinly
veiled threats and calls into my office. You know, things like, ‘you tell Nolan he better
watch his back....’ NRA members are trying to use the fear that most members of congress
must have after the Gabby Gifford’s shooting to scare them away from gun control.
Deplorable and despicable behavior is nothing new for NRA, ...82 (sic)
In regard to the NRA’s baseless claims in the 1980s about the Second Amendment,
Supreme Court Justice Warren E. Burger stated on national TV, Dec. 16, 1991, that the NRA had
perpetrated
...one of the greatest pieces of fraud, I repeat the word fraud, on the American public by
special interest groups that I have ever seen in my life time. .......they have misled the
American people and I regret to say they have had far too much influence on the Congress
of the United States than as a citizen I would like to see ...”83
A powerful indictment of the hardball politics of the NRA is presented in the following
2015 Frontline video: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/gunned-down/
Finally, the NRA’s advocacy for uncontrolled gun rights is not that different from the
tactics used by many organizations which exploit a poorly worded contract or obsolete law. We
the people are guilty of allowing the 18th Century terminology of the Second Amendment to
continue unchanged into the 21st Century.84 We are not living in the same social and technological
world as the Founders.
Also, we are not the first people to have gun laws that are out of phase with modern life.
For example, in 1996, Australia was awash in guns. That year there was a massacre of 35 people
in Port Arthur, Tasmania, Australia. In 1997 Australia’s legislature voted for and initiated a
mandatory nationwide buy-back of civilian owned weapons that were considered the most to
frequently used in suicides and homicides. As a result, gun-related suicides dropped 65% and
homicide rates dropped 59%.85
If we want to end the gun mayhem in the United States, the Second Amendment should be
repealed. Continuing to debate what the Second Amendment means is a waste of time.
16
5. Amending the Constitution
Parts of our Constitution have stood the test of time since 1787, and others have not.
Congress has amended the Constitution 17 times since the first Ten Amendments were
ratified in 1791, about once every 13 years. Recently, SCOTUS radically reinterpreted the
meaning of the First and Second Amendments; these decisions might as well be considered
backdoor amendments that legally by-passed the due process of congressional ratification.
5.1
Backdoor Amendments:
After all, if the meaning of words and terms in the Constitution are officially changed by
SCOTUS, but the printed word or phrase on the page remains unchanged, is the Constitution also
unchanged? Obviously not; it has a new meaning that may have profoundly different
consequences than flowed from the original meaning.
In order to show that SCOTUS’s reinterpretation of the Second Amendment is not an
isolated case, it’s instructive to see how SCOTUS reinterpreted First Amendment’s ‘freedom of
speech’ clause in 2010. The First Amendment states:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the
free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of
the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of
grievances. 1791 (emphasis added)
For 219 years, the term “speech” has been interpreted to mean the words expressed or
written by naturally born people. In 2010, that interpretation was turned on its head by
SCOTUS’s Citizens United86 5 - 4 decision which declared that corporations have the free speech
rights of naturally born persons, and that, for all practical purposes, money is speech because
money facilitates communications.87 In Citizens United the Court declared, by a one-person
majority, that the First Amendment now prohibited governments from restricting political,
independent expenditures by corporations, associations, or labor unions.88
This reinterpretation resulted in campaign donations reaching astronomical levels in the
2012 presidential campaigns. As a result, many people believe the SCOTUS’s reinterpretation 89
has put our elections on the block to the highest bidder, the super wealthy and big corporations.
Pew Research Center’s 2010 polling documented that 85% of Democrats, 80% of Independents,
and 75% of Republicans objected to the decision in Citizens United. Subsequently numerous
proposed constitutional amendments have been submitted to Congress to overturn the Citizens
United decision. In 2014, SCOTUS did it again in their 5-4 ruling in McCutcheon v. Federal
Election Commission that removed the cap on campaign donations from private individuals.
Now, let’s look at how SCOTUS changed the meaning of the Second Amendment also by
a one-vote margin.
5.2
Heller Decision: In 2008, for the first time in the history of the United States, SCOTUS
decided (5 to 4) in District of Columbia v. Heller90 that the Second Amendment included an
individual’s ‘right’ to own guns for self-protection:
17
The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected
with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as
self-defense within the home.91
The Heller decision overruled the “Washington D.C.’s Firearms Control Regulations Act
of 1975."92 This Act banned residents from owning handguns, which are used in 90% of murders,
and required safety features on those guns that were permitted.93 The purpose of the Act of 1975
was to reduce the homicide rate in D.C. that was 16.5 per 100,000 residents, the highest in any
city or state in our country.
Richard Posner, Judge for the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit,
declared that in Heller SCOTUS had created a new constitutional right that had not existed before.
He said,
The text of the [Second] amendment, whether viewed alone or in light of the concerns that
actuated its adoption, creates no right to the private possession of guns for hunting or
other sport, or for the defense of person or property.94 (Emphasis added)
In McDonald v. Chicago,95 2010, SCOTUS determined that its 2008 Heller decision
applied to all states, and, as part of the McDonald decision the Court overturned Chicago’s gun
restrictions, a city struggling with a gun-related homicide rate of 11.4 per 100 000 among youth
ages 15 to 19 in 2009,96 the highest among big cities. In disgust, an editorial of the Chicago
Tribune stated, June 27, 2010,
... the court curtailed the power of the legislatures and the city councils to protect their
citizens.
The Heller and McDonald decisions not only increase and sustain the lethal danger for
Americans, these decisions have made it more difficult for states and local communities to adopt
gun regulations that are in the public interest as discussed below.
5.3 The Public Interest The Heller and MacDonald decisions changed the purpose of the
Second Amendment from supporting the public interest for national defense to serving the selfinterest of some individuals. This change weakened the communitarian97 purpose of the
Constitution as defined in its Preamble :
We the people of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish
Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for a common Defense, promote the general
Welfare, and secure the Blessing of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and
establish this Constitution of the United States of America.
These goals summarize the Founders’ vision of our nation’s public interests.
Since gun ownership was disconnected from the nation’s “common defense” by the Heller
decision, what constitutionally defined public interest does gun ownership fill? How is our
national interest served by having 100,000 Americans shot dead or injured annually by other
Americans? What purpose is served by issuing a permit to a private individual for a pistol or an
18
AK47 which have no other primary purpose than shooting someone? Some countries permit guns
for hunting and target shooting, but these guns may be required to be stored in the facilities of
gun clubs for the public’s safety.
It may well be that arming the police would meet the public interest, but police in Britain
don’t carry guns and British police in 2012 shot no one even though they patrol complex, multicultural cities with social challenges equal to those in the United States. Similarly, the municipal
police in Ireland, Norway, New Zealand, Peru, and Ecuador are not armed. The expanding
revelations of the unjustified gun-related homicides by police in the United States raise the
question about what public interest is served by having all police armed?98 When the police need
guns in Britain they call in specially trained and armed swat teams.
One might reasonably assume that protecting citizens from gun violence is a rudimentary
public interest. But that assumption was undercut by the Supreme Court’s decisions in Heller
(2008) and MacDonald (2010) that overturned the strict handgun control law in Washington, D.C.
and the gun-control law that the City of Chicago had enacted to protect its citizens. The 2008 and
2010 decisions undercut the sheriffs’ efforts in San Diego and Yolo Counties, California, to
protect the public from gun violence. The sheriffs had been using what might reasonably be
considered a ‘public interest’ criterion for issuing gun licenses: what “good cause” was served by
licensing an individual to carry a gun? The sheriffs apparently were issuing licenses if the person
was transporting large sums of money, for example, or other valuables as a protection from
robbery. Gun rights groups challenged that criterion in court, claiming it was a violation of the
Second Amendment as redefined in 2008. The sheriffs lost their case 2 -1 in a court of appeals in
2014. Because of those Supreme Court decisions, most police chiefs throughout the nation have
little discretion to deny a gun permit to carry a concealed weapon if the applicant has passed the
statutory requirements such as a Federal Brady background check.99
As a result, police chiefs have been experimenting with alternative ways to protect the
public from gun violence, but they are now limited to asking the wrong questions. For example,
is the gun applicant mentally ill, unstable?
Not only do very few mentally ill people hurt anyone; medical science has not progressed
to the point that doctors can predict with a reasonable degree of confidence who will become a
mass murderer or kill his or her family. Many doctors do not feel their medical training qualifies
them to determine who is a public danger if that person was issued a gun permit. There are also
legal and ethical prohibitions preventing a doctor from releasing a patient’s confidential
evaluation without the patient’s permission.
An individual’s criminal record may be used to disqualify a gun applicant, but sometimes
that record is only used if the gun permit applicant was convicted of a violent crime. However,
the absence of a criminal record is not a reliable indicator that gun applicants will not commit a
gun-related crime or kill themselves in the future. For example, in North Carolina 2,400 people
licensed to have concealed weapons were convicted of crimes during a 5 year period. In Michigan
in 2005, 150 people committed suicide with their legally owned guns.100
A different criterion was devised by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. It legislated
that the gun applicant has to be “suitable” to be issued a gun permit, but the Commonwealth did
19
not define ‘suitable.’ The responsibility to interpret suitability was delegated to the municipalities
which usually hand that Gordian knot to their police chief to untangle.
Police Chief Gary Gemme of Worcester, Massachusetts, used his own interpretation. He
denied Raymond Holden a permit because Holden had been accused of domestic violence. Those
domestic violence charges were dropped, but Chief Gemme still refused to issue the permit.
On the one hand, perhaps Chief Gemme may have suspected that Holden would be a
dangerous threat. That’s not unreasonable given the violent pattern of behavior domestic abusers
often exhibit, but without proof of other violence Chief Gemme’s decision would seem to lack
legitimacy. Chief Gemme may have heard through ‘reliable’ back channels about the domestic
violence, but no one was examined under oath about the violence. Maybe Gemme suspected
Holden was possessed of the Devil, a serious concern of the courts in Massachusetts in 1692101,
and still a worry for some people.
On the other hand, Chief Gemme could have issued the gun license to Holden because the
abuse charges had been dropped and ‘suitable’ has no useful definition in the gun-licensing
legislation.
In any case, on March 11, 2015, the Chief’s decision was upheld by the Massachusetts
Supreme Judicial Court.102 However, if Chief Gemme had issued the license and then Holden shot
his wife to death, the public’s confidence in Chief Gemme and the police would have been greatly
diminished, and with it some of the glue that binds civil society.
This gun licensing/public-safety conundrum is, in large part, the result of the Supreme
Court’s 5-4 Heller and MacDonald decisions.
6. The Tide is Turning
The rapid fire opposition to gun control by gun manufacturers and their NRA lobbyists has
seemed formidable. However, our common impression is based more on the NRA’s narrative than
on the facts.
6.1
NRA is Out of Touch:
In opinion polls the general membership of the NRA indicated they did not agree with the
NRA leadership’s implacable opposition to gun control laws:
- There was nearly unanimous support among gun dealers and pawnbrokers to deny gun
purchases by those with prior convictions and for serious mental illness with a history of
violence or alcohol or drug abuse in a survey of 43 U.S. states by UC Davis Health
System.103
- 73.9% of NRA members, 84 percent of gun owners, and 89.9 percent of non-gun
owners support universal background checks.”104
- 74% of NRA members believe permits should only be granted to applicants who have
completed gun safety training. ....
- 68% ... believe permits should only be granted to applicants who have no prior arrests
for domestic violence ...”105
- The NRA claims it has great political clout. However, the NRA endorses political
candidates that are almost guaranteed to win because they are in safe districts or have
20
weak opponents. When they win, the NRA uses those wins to project an image that it’s a
political heavyweight, not just a cautious gambler, which is closer to the truth.106
- Contrary to the NRA’s claim of having 5 million members, independent research finds
that the membership is actually closer to 3.1 million and its membership has been
declining.107
6.2
The General Public: Gun ownership is declining as our population increasingly lives in
cities and suburban areas and recreational hunting declines.
- rates of gun ownership have been decreasing steadily for three decades. In 1977, 54
percent of American adults lived in a household that contained a gun. By 2010, that figure
had declined a full 22 percentage points to 32 percent. 108
- only about 22% of Americans claim to own guns personally, but they may live with
someone who does.109
6.3
US Senate: The Senate has not been able to get sixty votes to pass sensible gun control
bills that the majority of Americas want:110
- 92.1% of Democrats, 87.5% of Independents, and 86.3% of Republicans support
background checks,
- 82% want guns removed from persons convicted of domestic violence, and
111
- 83.5% want gun owners licensed.
- 77.4% want semi-automatic military assault weapons banned.112
113
- Calls to repeal the Second Amendment in editorials and OpEds are increasing.
7. Gun Control Challenge
A well managed small organization with a sharply focused agenda wins conflicts with
poorly organized larger groups or coalitions of groups with different primary agendas. The
NRA has a relatively small membership of 3- 4 million gun owners compared to the
population without guns, and the NRA has a clear agenda for promoting gun ownership
that is sharply focused.
7.1
Fragmentation: Although most Americans want gun controls, they are not organized to
advance that goal. Organizations that do promote gun control are fragmented and have not
developed a coordinated lobbying capability sufficient to challenge the NRA most of the time.114
State level gun-control groups are focused on what their state’s legislature might pass into state
law. Organizations that have a national orientation are focused on important goals such stopping
the illegal interstate trafficking of guns, litigating violations of existing gun-control laws, and
mobilizing citizens to lobby Congress, but they are not coordinated for maximum political effect.
The failure of fragmented gun-control efforts to reduce our national gun-homicide rate to
levels similar to those of other democracies should be sufficient motivation to consider an
alternative gun-control strategy.
21
7.2
Common Goal: It is time for organizations working for gun controls to embrace a
common goal. Repealing the Second Amendment would increase the options available to local
and state governments and to Congress to pass effective gun-control laws.115 No other goal will
be as easily understood by citizens in all 50 states. No other goal has the potential to reduce the
gun violence in America. The very possibility that the Second Amendment might be repealed
would undermine support for the NRA among those of its members who are not hardcore gun
advocates, and shake the confidence in politicians who believed they had found a safe political
haven by pledging allegiance to the NRA regardless of the gun-related homicide rate in their
districts.
States with improving gun control laws should embrace repealing the Second Amendment
because they are negatively affected by those states which are the source for guns that are illegally
trafficked across state lines.
In 2009, just ten states supplied nearly half - 49% - of the crime guns that crossed state
lines before recovered in crimes. Together, these states accounted for nearly 21,000
interstate crime guns recovered in 2009 ... and 12,000 murders.116
Repealing the Second Amendment strikes at the heart of the NRA’s raison d’etre and the
norms that sustain its narrative. Repeal would overturn the Heller and McDonald decisions that
transformed the obsolete Second Amendment into a lethal national liability in 2008 and 2014.
7.3
A Problem: Many supporters of gun-control organizations did not sign up to take on the
challenge of repealing the Second Amendment. That goal may well be experienced as an
annoying distraction for the leadership of gun control organizations with full annual agendas.
However, agreeing to work toward repealing the Second Amendment does not need to upset
current programs. That initiative can be phased in over time in conjunction with current
programs. Unless the leadership of gun-control organizations figures out how to cooperate
productively on repealing the Second Amendment, their efforts will remain fragmented.
While we equivocate on a united strategy, the NRA is and will be busy promoting a more
fully weaponized society: armed teachers in every class room, concealed or open weapons legal in
all public places, and ‘stand your ground’ laws throughout the land.117
8. Taking Stock
So how do we get from here to a Constitution without a Second Amendment? We need a
practical perspective. First, if the Second Amendment were repealed tomorrow, that would not
make 310 million privately owned guns evaporate. However, it would free our local and state
governments and Congress to enact gun-control laws and regulations they believe would be
sensible in their communities. Today, this is not possible for many communities because of the
radical reinterpretation of the Second Amendment by the Supreme Court in 2008.
22
8.1
Times are Changing:
Second, the gun culture in this country is already shrinking. There are fewer gun owners,
but these people own more guns; more guns are being trafficked illegally; and the gun related
homicides remain high.
Third, by most measures of violence, societies around the world are becoming less
violent.118 Capital punishment by states and nations 119 and corporal punishment of children in
public schools have declined.120 Thirty two states in the United States have ended corporal
punishment of children in schools and all European countries have ended it in the home as well.
The decline of corporal punishment of children may be one of the most important advances
towards a less violent society in history because how children are disciplined informs their
conflict resolution skills which they will teach their own children. This is one of the most positive
and productive feedback loops underway toward less violent societies. Domestic violence, sexual
abuse, and rape have been declining for years.
Fourth, we are living in a time when other values are changing at warp speed. In 1964 the
Surgeon General reported that smoking was dangerous for your health; smoking had plummeted,
and it is now outlawed in many public places and places of work. In 2002 no states allowed same
sex marriage. By 2015, 37 states permit it, and then SCOTUS made same-sex marriage legal in all
states.
All of these changes were preceded by incremental modifications to the cultural norms
which were reflected in the narratives people have used to explain themselves to themselves or
justify their actions to others. Change the narrative and the behavior changes.
8.2
The Icon: The national discussion about gun violence lacks agreement about the status of
the Second Amendment. This Amendment has an iconic status among gun advocates because of
the bravery and patriotism of the militia in 1775, and because the NRA only focuses on the second
clause of Second Amendment while ignoring the first clause which states its purpose.121 In 2008,
the Supreme Court, for the first time, reinterpreted the Second Amendment as if its first clause
did not exist.
A well regulated Militia,
(1st clause) being necessary to the security of a free State,
(2nd clause) the right of the people to keep and bear Arms,
shall not be infringed.
The power of an icon is its capacity to stimulate myths which eclipse documented history
as well as contort common sense into, I believe in the Second Amendment, and I want gun control.
The NRA has effectively transformed the Second Amendment for its membership into an icon
that magnifies ‘my right,’but without the parallel responsibility to support norms and laws in the
community to protect the safety of others.
Because of the emotional freight that gun advocates invest in their gun rights, it can be
tricky, even hazardous, to discuss gun controls or repealing the Second Amendment. Public
meetings called to discuss gun controls have become unmanageable on occasion when gun
advocates have shouted down speakers. As a result, the Second Amendment has been off the
table in many discussions about gun-related violence.
23
8.3
The Second Amendment is Central: If effective gun control is ever going to be realized,
the Second Amendment cannot be side-stepped; it is the central issue for several reasons. First,
the universal name recognition of the Second Amendment makes it the only gun law that most
Americans know. This name recognition makes it possible for a wider citizenry, than just gun
owners, to engage in a discussion about the Second Amendment than has been possible when guncontrol proposals only focus on the technical aspects of background check, gundealer loop holes,
tiger locks or clip sizes.
Second, from a public safety perspective, the Second Amendment is a moral issue as well
as a legal one; you, one of your children, or someone else could be one of the 30,000 people shot
to death this year by one of the 300 million privately owned guns. It is irresponsible for those
who oppose gun controls to turn a blind eye on the gun mayhem. Their indifference and active
opposition to gun controls has contributed to the high rate of gun homicides.
Calling for the repeal of the Second Amendment will need strong resolve. Such
suggestions challenge a gun culture that is deeply meaningful to some people. Such a call will
likely be rejected by many folks as wrong- headed, ignorant, unAmerican, or worse.122 Those are
the initial reactions to be expected if you challenge any entrenched cultural norm. This challengeresponse dynamic often evolves into better public policy, but it’s seldom a smooth or quick
process.
We are more likely to be successful sooner if we:
- stick to the facts of history,
- remind people of the aspirations our founders had for our democracy,
- cite the statistics of our gun mayhem compared to those of other democracies,
- explain how the NRA’s strategy works, and
- explain why the NRA’s claim of a “fundamental” right to own guns is rhetorical rubbish.
As the human cost of gun violence becomes increasingly unacceptable, more parents will
not allow their 4-year-old to have a play-date in homes containing guns. Hosts of parties will
request ‘no guns in attendance please.’ Churches, theaters, libraries, and bars will begin posting
‘no gun’ policies. As gun ownership becomes less tolerated, a national buy-back program may
well be started. This will reduce gun ownership. As citizens begin to feel safer, gun sales will
decline. As the public’s attitude becomes less tolerant of gun mayhem, the norms about gun
ownership will change and with it the gun narrative will change. Then legislators will sense the
wind has changed. This scenario of how gun violence can be reduced traces an incremental path
of change that is similar to how other forms of violence are declining. Those changes happened
because dedicated people made these happen.
Like other social changes, the reduction in gun violence may happen much faster than
most people expect. That speed will be influenced by how many people want it to happen. There
is an active role in this scenario for everyone who wants a safer society.
24
9. Recommendations
The Second Amendment should be ruled null and void by the Supreme Court or repealed
by Congress in order for Congress, states, and local governments to pass gun-control laws,
including handgun laws, that are appropriate to the circumstances.123
In order to remove the Second Amendment from the Constitution, we should do the
following:
é We need to stop treating the Second Amendment as the third rail of civic discourse.
Everyone should talk about the repealing the Second Amendment. This is the only way a
serious debate about gun-control can get started.
é The leadership of gun control organizations should jointly coordinate their work
towards repealing the Second Amendment and initiating court cases that create the
opportunity for the Supreme Court to rule on it again.
é Associations of medical, public health, law enforcement, education professionals, and
religious leaders should adopt resolutions in favor of repealing the Second Amendment
and forward these resolutions to their representatives in Congress and publish their
resolutions in the media.
é Non-profit organizations should approve resolutions calling for the repeal of the Second
Amendment and forward these resolutions to their representatives in Congress.
é Citizens should not vote for candidates for public office at the local, state, and national
levels who do not support tight gun control laws.
é Individuals throughout our country should write letters to their congressional
Representative and Senators asking them to initiate the steps to start the process of
repealing the Second Amendment.
é Representatives and Senators in Congress need to start the process for repealing the
Second Amendment.
é Everyone needs to follow up with their elected representatives regularly to see what
progress they are making toward initiating and supporting a constitutional amendment to
repeal the Second Amendment.
é Forward the website, www. repeal2ndAmendment.org to your friends and family. Print
out the PDF of “Why the Second Amendment should be Repealed” and share it with others.
9
25
APPENDICES
A: Includes a list of shooting during a weekend in February 2014
B: Documents the suppression of information about defects in newly manufactured gun.
C: List gun massacres during 2013
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------Appendix A: Joe Nocera’s “Weekend Gun Report,” New York Times, 2/18/14124
“Friday: A 4-year-old boy was accidentally shot in the chest and wounded in Aransas Pass, Tex., Friday night. An
8-year-old girl accidentally shot herself with an unsecured revolver at her grandparents’ house in Fayetteville, N.C.,
Friday afternoon. Makayla Darden, 8, was shot in the chest and critically wounded while walking home from her
aunt’s apartment in Southeast Washington, D.C., Friday afternoon.
é
-Three men in their 20s were found shot to death execution-style in a Philadelphia, Pa., home Thursday afternoon. A
13-year-old boy was shot in the head in front of a home in Watsonville, Calif., Friday night. A 16-year-old boy was
shot in the leg by a homeowner while allegedly breaking into a home in Lexington, Ky., Friday night. An intruder was
shot to death by a homeowner in west Pasco, Wash., early Friday.
-A 16-year-old boy was shot in the thigh following an altercation in front of a Wendy’s in Orange City, Fla., early
Friday, and police are searching for a 17-year-old suspect. A 17-year-old girl was accidentally shot and wounded in
front of a library in Gaithersburg, Md., Friday afternoon. A 17-year-old boy was found shot in the head and seriously
wounded in a roadway in Muskegon Heights, Mich., Friday night.
-A 76-year-old woman and a 77-year-old man were found shot to death in a murder-suicide in a retirement community
in Bloomington, Ind., Friday morning. Fabian Sebastian Romero, 22, was shot in the torso and critically wounded in
El Paso, Tex., Friday afternoon, and police are investigating whether the wound was self-inflicted. A man was grazed
in the head during an argument with another man in a gas station parking lot in Nashville, Tenn., late Thursday.
-A man was shot in the leg when an argument broke out at Military Circle Mall in Norfolk, Va., Friday afternoon.
Johnnie Nottingham, 21, was shot in Norfolk early Friday and died two days later. Aleksander “Lenny” Wysocki, 74,
was found shot to death in his front yard in Cary, N.C., Friday morning, and the suspect, Eric Paul Engel, 43, a
University of New Hampshire lecturer, later killed himself.
-A 31-year-old man was shot three times and killed in the Juniata Park neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pa., Friday
night. A 21-year-old man was found shot to death between two parked cars in the Feltonville neighborhood of
Philadelphia Friday night.A woman was shot in the hip on the east side of Indianapolis, Ind., Friday morning, and her
boyfriend is a suspect.
- A man was shot in the head and killed on a street in the Carrollton neighborhood of New Orleans, La., late
Thursday. A 31-year-old man was shot several times and killed in the 7th Ward of New Orleans Friday evening. A
21-year-old man was shot in the leg when a man appeared in his home as he slept in the Wilbur section of Trenton,
N.J., Thursday afternoon.
- A man was shot in the groin during an attempted robbery in Immokalee, Fla., Friday night, and a 16-year-old and a
17-year-old were arrested. A 33-year-old man was shot in the leg at a recreation center in Cleveland, Ohio, Friday.
Jeffrey Williams Jr. was shot twice and wounded while leaving the Oakland Park Grill in north Columbus, Ohio,
Friday morning. A man was shot in the Evanston neighborhood of Cincinnati, Ohio, Thursday night.
- Michael Boone, 32, shot and killed himself in a home following a police chase in Steubenville, Ohio, early Friday.
Two men were shot and critically wounded while standing outside a public housing building in the 3rd Ward of
26
Paterson, N.J., Thursday night. Delawrence Andrew Thomas, 19, was shot and killed in northwest Huntsville, Ala.,
Thursday night, and a 17-year-old was arrested.
- A man was shot and killed in a drive-by shooting in north Houston, Tex., Friday evening. A man was shot in the leg
at a motel in Brunswick, Ga., Friday morning. One person was shot in the back and wounded in Pahokee, Fla.,
Thursday night. Darrell Lee Thompson, 24, was found shot to death in the front yard of a home after giving his
girlfriend a Valentine’s gift in Lumberton, N.C., Friday afternoon, and police suspect the woman’s ex-boyfriend.
- Anthony Wisdom was shot and seriously wounded following a verbal altercation in Lawrenceville, Kan., early
Friday. A man was shot and wounded following an altercation at a home in Iredell County, N.C., late Thursday. A
man was shot in the head after an altercation with four men in a car on Interstate 10 northwest of San Antonio, Tex.,
late Thursday.
- Two men, 20 and 34, were shot at the Ruggles T-Station in the Roxbury section of Boston, Mass., Friday evening.
Edward Harris, 37, was shot and wounded in Edwards, Miss., late Friday. A 41-year-old man was found shot and
seriously injured on a sidewalk in the Austin neighborhood of Chicago Friday night. Eric Darnell Noel, 29, was shot
and killed in Port Arthur, Tex., early Friday.
- A man was shot and killed during a robbery at a business in Downey, Calif., Friday afternoon. Bob Pera, 35, a game
warden, was shot and seriously wounded while conducting a compliance check on two hunters in El Dorado County,
Calif., Friday evening. A man was shot in the foot while waiting for a bus in Flint, Mich., Friday night. A 40-year-old
man was shot in the foot while standing on the street in Columbus, Ga., Friday night.
é Saturday:
An off-duty corrections officer reaching into his pocket for a valet ticket accidentally triggered his
concealed handgun, firing a round that sent ricocheting shrapnel into at least six people in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.,
Saturday evening. Adrian Broadway, 15, was shot and killed by a homeowner after she and her friends egged his
house in Little Rock, Ark., early Saturday.
- Briana Valle, 15, who was shot along with her mother, allegedly by a former boyfriend, in Romeoville, Ill.,
Thursday, died Saturday afternoon. A 13-year-old boy was accidentally shot in the elbow as a friend showed him a
.22-caliber rifle in South Daytona, Fla., Saturday, and the shooter’s family may face charges. Shamarcus James, 16,
was shot in the leg while visiting family at an apartment complex in Macon, Ga., Saturday afternoon.
- A 16-year-old boy was shot and critically wounded after walking up to a vehicle in Phoenix, Ariz., Saturday night.
James Hudgins, 67, was shot to death and dismembered in Sumner County, Tenn., Friday afternoon, and his
son-in-law, 42-year-old Sandie Calvert, was arrested. Several people were shot and wounded during an argument at a
wedding party in Las Vegas, Nev., late Saturday.
- Two people were wounded when a man accidentally discharged a handgun at a south Wichita, Kan., bar early
Saturday. Michael Walton, 43, was shot and killed by a tenant while breaking into an apartment in Tulsa, Okla.,
Saturday evening. A man in his 30s was shot on the street in the Garland District of Spokane, Wash., Saturday
afternoon.
- Naomy Rojas, 16, was found shot to death between a set of railroad tracks in Fairfield, Calif., early Saturday. A few
hours later in Fairfield, a man was shot and killed. A man was shot and wounded at a home in South Valley, N.M.,
Saturday afternoon. A man was killed and two people were wounded in a shooting in Rio Rancho, N.M., Saturday
afternoon.
- A police officer was shot three times and wounded while responding to a disturbance call in Dallas, Tex., Saturday
afternoon. Donelle McCray Jr., 22, was shot and killed in Norman, Okla., Saturday night, and his neighbor was
arrested. Andrea Hollis was killed and a man and a woman were wounded when someone discharged 12 to 15 rounds
from a high-powered rifle in Tecumseh, Okla., Saturday afternoon.
27
- A man was killed and a 44-year-old police officer was shot in the head and wounded during an exchange of gunfire
in Hamilton, Ohio, Saturday morning. A man was wounded when an argument led to gunfire in Jacksonville, Fla.,
early Saturday. James Jeremy Owens, 31, was shot in the shoulder with a shotgun at a mobile home in Stevenson,
Ala., Saturday afternoon.
- A 23-year-old man shot and killed himself while detained by police at a traffic stop in Murray County, Ga., Saturday
afternoon. A man shot and killed himself during a police traffic stop in the Strathmoor Manor area of Louisville, Ky.,
Saturday night. A woman was shot and wounded during an altercation at a Valentine’s Day dance in Louisville late
Saturday.
- Devante Hill, 20, was shot and killed on the southeast side of Colorado Springs, Colo., early Saturday. A man was
shot and wounded at a gun range in Lake Worth, Fla., Saturday afternoon. Two men were found shot to death in the
street in Newark, N.J., early Saturday. A man drove himself to the hospital after he was shot and seriously wounded in
Kansas City, Mo., Saturday afternoon.
- Thomas Eugene Edwards, 71, was shot in the chest and killed in Hungry Horse, Mont., Friday night, and Pamela
Ruth Haines, 55, is in custody. A 22-year-old man was accidentally shot and seriously wounded by an acquaintance at
a home in Rockville, Md., early Saturday. One person died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound in Waterloo, Ind.,
Saturday evening.
- Eun Kim, an owner of the Dry River Store near Clover Hill, Va., was shot and killed during a robbery Saturday
afternoon, and her husband was wounded. Donald Lee Battle Jr., 26, was shot and killed across the street from the
Branch House Tavern in Flowery Branch, Ga., early Saturday. Brison Bea, 19, shot himself during a disturbance
outside an apartment complex in Rock Island, Ill., late Saturday, and he was arrested.
- One person was shot and wounded in the Santa Fe neighborhood of Oakland, Calif., Saturday afternoon. A man shot
and killed himself after shooting his girlfriend in the arm in Jonesport, Me., Saturday night. Alex Serrano Jr., 25, who
sustained a gunshot wound in Santa Ana, Calif., late Saturday, was driven by a friend to an emergency room, where he
died.
- A 32-year-old man was found shot several times in the head and killed on a sidewalk in the Gert Town
neighborhood of New Orleans Saturday night. George A. Lewis, 36, was shot and killed outside his home in
Bridgeton, N.J., late Saturday. A 30-year-old man was shot in the leg in Calumet City, Ill., Saturday night.
- Christopher Allen, 43, and Erica Casto, 41, were found shot to death in a murder-suicide in Erie, Pa., Saturday night.
A man was shot in the leg at a bar in Erie early Saturday, and the victim is not cooperating with police. One person
was shot and wounded in Hemet, Calif., Saturday evening.
Sunday: Lily Anna Valent, 2, and Neveah Oliva, 6, were killed when bullets tore through their home during a
family birthday party in Corpus Christi, Tex., late Sunday. Terrance Carroll, 21, was killed and six others were
wounded in a gang-related shooting at CLUB B-N-H in Dallas, Tex., early Sunday. One person was killed and four
people were injured in a shooting at a nightclub in Jacksonville, Fla., early Sunday.
é
- Okeem Jarvis, 24, was killed and six others were injured when gunfire erupted at a party in Orlando, Fla., Sunday
morning. Five men were wounded in a gun battle that spanned three locations in Fort Wayne, Ind., early Sunday. One
woman and three men were shot and wounded outside a club in Saginaw, Mich., early Sunday. A 16-year-old boy was
shot in the leg on the east side of Cleveland, Ohio, Sunday morning.
- Kriston Charles Belinte Chee, 36, was shot and killed after a fight at the service counter of a Walmart in Chandler,
Ariz., Sunday afternoon, and the suspect, Kyle Wayne Quadlin, 25, was not arrested because he said he acted in
self-defense. A man was shot several times and wounded in front of the Westfield San Francisco Centre in the heart of
the city’s shopping district Sunday evening.
28
- A man was shot to death at a home in La Mirada, Calif., early Sunday. A man in his early 20s was shot in the neck
during a fight in the parking lot of Club Haze in Tulsa, Okla., early Sunday. Melvin Connors III, 21, was shot while
talking to his girlfriend in the parking lot of the Nathan Health Care Center in East St. Louis, Ill., early Sunday. A man
was shot and wounded in downtown Richmond, Va., early Sunday.
- A man was shot and wounded at a pizzeria in the East New York section of Brooklyn, N.Y., Sunday afternoon.
Keith Atkinson, 31, was fatally shot in the Hollygrove neighborhood of New Orleans, La., Sunday morning. Kevin
Banner, 41, was found shot and killed on a sidewalk in Wilmington, Del., Sunday afternoon. Robert J. Harris, 56, was
shot and killed while visiting an apartment in west Columbus, Ohio, Sunday morning.
- A woman was shot in the knee during a home invasion in Sacramento, Calif., Sunday evening, and police found
marijuana and cash at the scene. A woman was shot during a bungled robbery attempt at the restaurant where she
worked in north San Antonio, Tex., early Sunday. Jamel Forbes, 30, was shot and killed in Albany, N.Y., early
Sunday.
- Amanda Turner, 35, was wounded when bullets came through the window of a home in Albany, Ga., early Sunday.
A 16-year-old girl and a 20-year-old man were wounded in a shooting in Albany, N.Y., early Sunday. Lonnie
Flemming, 31, was shot in the chest near a high school in east Knoxville, Tenn., Sunday morning. One person was
shot multiple times and wounded during an altercation in a parking lot Columbia, S.C., early Sunday.
- Two men were wounded in separate shootings in Anderson, S.C., Sunday afternoon. Two men were shot in the neck
and critically wounded in north Philadelphia, Pa., early Sunday. Jordan Wells, 20, was shot several times in the back
at an apartment complex on the southeast side of Indianapolis, Ind., early Sunday. A bystander was shot twice in the
leg and wounded at an apartment complex in Crowley, La., Sunday afternoon.
- Clint Galentine was shot twice and nearly killed by hunters while practicing turkey calls with a friend at the Lower
Hillsborough Wildlife Management Area in Tampa, Fla., Sunday night. Irais Acosta, 19, was shot and killed inside
her boyfriend’s home in Pasadena, Calif., Sunday morning. A man was shot in the neck and a woman was shot in the
arm on Camano Island, Wash., Sunday afternoon.
- A man was shot in the face and critically wounded following a possibly gang-related shooting in the Koreatown
section of Los Angeles early Sunday; he is the third person killed in gang-related gunfire in the neighborhood so far
this year. A woman and a man were shot and wounded in a crowded shopping center in East San Jose, Calif., Sunday
afternoon.
- A student at Old Dominion University was shot and critically wounded at an off-campus residence in Norfolk, Va.,
early Sunday. A 16-year-old boy accidentally shot himself in the foot while trying to defend himself during a robbery
in the East Garfield Park neighborhood of Chicago late Sunday. Edward Kelly Spangler, 43, was shot and killed while
driving, sending his car crashing into a tree, in Grants Pass, Ore., early Sunday.
- Thomas Jacob “T.J.” Bowman, 33, was shot and killed and Kenneth Joe Wray Jr., 73, was wounded in a home
invasion in Rural Hall, N.C., Sunday. A man was wounded in a shooting outside a strip club in eastern Travis County,
Tex., early Sunday. Lamar R. Booker, 23, was found shot to death in the parking lot of a nightclub in south Toledo,
Ohio, early Sunday. A 26-year-old man was shot and critically wounded on the east side of Buffalo, N.Y., Sunday
evening.
- Paul Samaniego, 33, was shot to death in Little Rock, Ark., early Sunday, and his roommate was arrested. Wendy
Hall-Onkle, 40, was shot and killed, possibly by her niece, during an argument in south St. Louis County, Mo., early
Sunday. Jordan Wells, 20, was shot several times on the near south side of Indianapolis early Sunday.
- One person was shot and wounded during a brawl between neighbors in east Paragould, Ark., Sunday night. A
29-year-old man was shot and wounded in an alley in York City, Pa., Sunday afternoon. A man was shot several times
29
and wounded in the Canal area of San Rafael, Calif., early Sunday. A 25 year-old man was shot three times and
wounded after he answered a knock at the door in Edinburg, Tex., Sunday night, and he is not cooperating with
police.
- Sylvia Salazar, 56, was killed and four people were wounded in a shooting at a bar on the north side of Fort Worth,
Tex., early Sunday. Two people, ages 22 and 25, were shot and wounded at an apartment complex in Salinas, Calif.,
Sunday night. Two men, 25 and 29, were shot in the neck and wounded in the Kensington neighborhood of
Philadelphia, Pa., early Sunday.
- Terra Blanford was wounded when her husband accidentally shot her while cleaning a .40-caliber pistol in
Owensboro, Ky., Sunday. Brandon Michael Mende, 16, was shot and killed at a house party in Moses Lake, Wash.,
early Sunday. Jeffrey Lewandowski, 44, shot himself in the leg at a motel in Wilmington, Del., late Sunday, and he
was charged with reckless endangering and possession of a firearm by a felon.
- One person was shot across the street from a roller rink in south Hazel Crest, Ill., Sunday evening. A 22-year-old
man shot his way into a Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, home to attack an ex-girlfriend, and then fatally shot himself in the
head when police confronted him late Sunday.
- A woman was wounded when a gun belonging to her companion discharged under a table at an ale house in
Orlando, Fla., Sunday night; the shooter had a concealed weapon license and won’t be charged. Rick “Ricky”
Roberts, 49, a police volunteer, was shot to death in his garage in downtown Sonora, Calif., Sunday morning.
Monday: Three people were shot and wounded at Lava nightclub in Jacksonville, Fla., early Monday; it was the
second nightclub shooting in the city in as many days. An 8-year-old girl was injured by broken glass during a
drive-by shooting in Raytown, Mo., Monday afternoon. Jeremiah Rivera, 16, died and Julio Cartagena, 18, was
hospitalized in a shooting in East Chicago, Ind., early Monday.
é
- A man was shot several times in the buttocks in the Leonidas neighborhood of New Orleans Monday afternoon. A
few hours later, a 20-year-old man was shot in the arm and hip in the Gentilly neighborhood of New Orleans. A man
was shot in the neck and chest and critically wounded in the City Park neighborhood of New Orleans Monday
afternoon.
- A 21-year-old man was shot and wounded in North Charleston, S.C., Monday afternoon. Aaron Jones, 19, was shot
several times and wounded at an apartment in Youngstown, Ohio, Monday afternoon. A woman was shot in the arm at
a home in the Crafton Heights neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pa., early Monday, and her partner, Judith White, 27, was
arrested.
- A man was shot in the arm and wounded in his ex-girlfriend’s home in Chesapeake, Va., Monday evening, and the
woman is in custody. Chrishawn Grice, 17, was shot twice and wounded while walking home from a friend’s house in
southwest Atlanta, Ga., early Monday. A man breaking into a home was shot and wounded by the homeowner in Bell
County, Tex., early Monday.
- A 28-year-old man was hospitalized after a family dispute ended in gunfire in Phoenix early Monday. A 22-year-old
man was shot during a fight at a nightclub in Horry County, S.C., early Monday. A man was shot and killed when two
people broke into his home in northwest Houston Monday morning. A man was shot in the leg in the South Fairmount
neighborhood of Cincinnati, Ohio, Monday afternoon.
- Jaime Velez, 34, was shot and critically wounded in a chiropractor’s office in Holiday, Fla., and the doctor who
owns the office is a person of interest. Donovan Webster, 16, was shot and killed in Merced, Calif., early Monday.
Marvin McClinton, 21, was shot in the face with a shotgun and killed in Camden, N.J., early Monday. A 39-year-old
man was killed and a 12-year-old boy was wounded in a shooting at an unlicensed tattoo shop in Camden, N.J.,
Monday afternoon. .....”
30
Appendix B: “Banished for Questioning the Gospel of Guns,”
The New York Times, Jan. 5, 2014, p. 1. By Ravi SOMAIYA
BARRY, Ill. — The byline of Dick Metcalf, one of the country’s pre-eminent gun journalists, has gone missing. It has
been removed from Guns & Ammo magazine, where his widely-read column once ran on the back page. He no longer
stars on a popular television show about firearms. Gun companies have stopped flying him around the world and
sending him the latest weapons to review.
In late October, Mr. Metcalf wrote a column that the magazine titled “Let’s Talk Limits,” which
debated gun laws. “The fact is,” wrote Mr. Metcalf, who has taught history at Cornell and Yale, “all
constitutional rights are regulated, always have been, and need to be.”
The backlash was swift, and fierce. Readers threatened to cancel their subscriptions. Death threats poured in
by email. His television program was pulled from the air.
Just days after the column appeared, Mr. Metcalf said, his editor called to tell him that two major gun
manufacturers had said “in no uncertain terms” that they could no longer do business with InterMedia
Outdoors, the company that publishes Guns & Ammo and co-produces his TV show, if he continued to work
there. He was let go immediately.
“I’ve been vanished, disappeared,” Mr. Metcalf, 67, said in an interview last month on his gun range here,
about 100 miles north of St. Louis, surrounded by snow-blanketed fields and towering grain elevators. “Now you see
him. Now you don’t.”
He is unsure of his next move, but fears he has become a pariah in the gun industry, to which, he said, he has
devoted nearly his entire adult life.
His experience sheds light on the close-knit world of gun journalism, where editors and reporters say there is
little room for nuance in the debate over gun laws. Moderate voices that might broaden the discussion from within are
silenced. When writers stray from the party line promoting an absolutist view of an unfettered right to bear arms, their
publications — often under pressure from advertisers — excommunicate them.
“We are locked in a struggle with powerful forces in this country who will do anything to destroy the Second
Amendment,” said Richard Venola, a former editor of Guns & Ammo. “The time for ceding some rational points is
gone.”
There have been other cases like Mr. Metcalf’s. In 2012, Jerry Tsai, the editor of Recoil magazine,
wrote that the Heckler & Koch MP7A1 gun, designed for law enforcement, was “unavailable to civilians and
for good reason.” He was pressured to step down, and despite apologizing, has not written since. In 2007, Jim
Zumbo, by then the author of 23 hunting books, wrote a blog post for Outdoor Life’s website suggesting that
military-style rifles were “terrorist” weapons, best avoided by hunters. His writing, television and endorsement
deals were quickly put on hiatus.
Garry James, a senior editor at Guns & Ammo, said in a phone interview several weeks ago that its readers
were the magazine’s main concern and its editorial independence was not at risk. But, he added, “advertisers
obviously always have power, and you always feel some pressure.” He declined to discuss Mr. Metcalf’s matter
specifically, and the company did not respond to further phone calls and emails seeking comment on other aspects of
the operation.
Mr. Metcalf said he was told that advertisers feared customers would boycott their products if they continued
to advertise on TV shows and magazines featuring his work. Two major advertisers with InterMedia are the gun
companies Ruger and the Remington Arms Company. Ruger’s general counsel, Kevin B. Reid Sr., said in an email
that it did have a conference call with InterMedia to discuss the column, but that it was informed “that the decision
had already been made to part ways with Mr. Metcalf.” He denied Ruger pressured InterMedia to fire Mr. Metcalf.
A spokesman for Remington did not respond to messages seeking comment.” ....
“Reporters and editors say that reviews are often written in close consultation with manufacturers. If a gun is
judged to be of poor quality, magazines will quietly send it back for improvements rather than writing a
negative review. The system is broadly accepted at these publications, gun writers say. ... .”
[Emphasis added. For the balance of the article see
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/05/business/media/banished-for-questioning-the-gospel-of-guns.html?_r=0&pagewa
nted=print ]
31
Appendix C: “Mass killings proliferate as Congress fails to control guns”
Editorial, Boston Globe, Tuesday, 12/31/13. [ Emphasis added below]
“When 17-year-old Claire Davis died, after being shot Dec. 13 by a classmate at their Colorado high school, there
were expressions of sorrow from local and national politicians. Davis’s murder got a measure of attention because it
occurred only 8 miles from the site of the 1999 Columbine High School massacre and one day before the anniversary
of last year’s Newtown, Conn., slayings. But as her family and classmates confronted their grief, there was no serious
outcry for new gun laws. America has been there, tried that, and run up against an impenetrable wall: the National
Rifle Association, which controls politicians through lavish campaign contributions, mainly, but also a relative
handful of diehard supporters who oppose even the puniest efforts to control guns.
In 2013, the failure to pass gun legislation stood as the strongest example of how money and special interests
can influence the country’s political system, and how Congress is incapable of responding pragmatically to matters of
urgent national concern. Confronted with Congress’s inexplicable failure to pass a background-check bill that was
supported by more than 80 percent of the people, many Americans simply gave up. They risk becoming inured to the
fact that another 32,000 to 33,000 people will likely die from a bullet in suicides and homicides in the United States in
2014.
Instead, Americans should be indignant. There were a whopping 24 additional mass killings — defined as
the murders of more than four people in one spree — using guns in the year after Newtown. They appear like regular
marks on the calendar:
Jan. 7: Tulsa, Okla. Robbery, four victims, all women.
Jan. 19: Albuquerque. Boy, 15, shoots his parents and three siblings to death.
Mar. 13: Herkimer, N.Y. Man kills four people in a barbershop and car-care shop rampage.
Apr. 18: Akron, Ohio. Robbery, four victims.
Apr. 22: Federal Way, Wash. Gunman kills girlfriend, three others.
Apr. 24: Manchester, Ill. Man in custody dispute kills five people, including a pregnant woman, a child, and a great
grandmother.
Apr. 28: Ottawa, Kan. Man accused of killing lifelong friend and three others.
May 11: Waynesville, Ind. Man accused of killing four in possible drug-related slaying.
May 13: Fernley, Nev. Man accused of killing couple married for 60 years, stealing their car, and killing three others
afterwards.
June 7: Santa Monica, Calif. Man kills his father, brother, and three others at Santa Monica College.
July 26: Clarksburg, W.Va. Ex-Marine kills two people over possible drug debt, then kills 70-year-old newspaper
delivery man and son in street.
July 26: Hialeah, Fla. Enraged man kills six throughout an apartment building.
Aug. 7: Dallas. Man accused of killing estranged wife and three others.
Aug. 14: Oklahoma City. Mentally ill man kills mother, sister, niece, and nephew.
Sept. 11: Crab Orchard, Tenn. Man and woman kill four in attempted drug robbery.
Sept. 16: Washington, D.C. Defense contractor kills 12 at Navy Yard.
Sept. 20: Rice, Texas. Woman kills husband and three sons.
Oct. 9: Paris, Texas. Four men shot dead.
Oct. 26: Phoenix. Depressed man kills four neighbors, including 17-year-old autistic boy.
Oct. 28: Terrell, Texas. Man kills mother, aunt, and three others.
Oct. 29: Callison, S.C. Man kills girlfriend, her parents, and two of the parents’ grandchildren.
Nov. 7: Jacksonville, Fla. Four people shot dead in a home.
Nov. 23: Tulsa, Okla. Four shot dead in second quadruple homicide of the year in that city. Three victims were
women.
Dec. 1: Topeka, Kan. Woman found shot to death behind restaurant. Bodies of her ex-husband, brother, and another
woman found at the first woman’s home. Meanwhile, even in Massachusetts, new measures to tighten up loopholes in
gun-purchase limits and increase mental health reporting are still being slowly studied in the Legislature. The extra
deliberation isn’t out of ordinary caution. Many legislators are simply afraid of the money the gun
lobby will spend targeting their seats. They should think of Claire Davis, and the Newtown children, and,
most chillingly, the thousands of victims yet to come.”
32
ENDNOTES
1. “An American army under the command of William Hull invaded Canada on July 12, with his
forces chiefly composed of untrained and ill-disciplined militiamen.”
Source: Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_1812#Invasions_of_Upper_and_Lower_Canada.2C_1812
2. In addition to the major wars such as War of 1812, Civil War, WW I & II, Korea,
Bay of Pigs, Vietnam, Iraq (1 & 2) and Afghanistan, the United States government has
authorized well over 250 military international operations. In addition, 134 domestic military
operations within the United States, big and small, have been authorized since 1792, after the
Second Amendment was ratified. These include 81 campaigns against American Indians, 15
dealing with slave rebellions, 9 “range wars,” 8 domestic paramilitary guerrilla groups, 6 labor
strikes, 7 armed efforts at secession from the U.S., 4 urban riots such as Watts, 2 actions against
the Latter Day Saints, and 2 against Texan rebellions. See “Timeline of United States military
operations,” Wikipedia (printed pages: 2- 29)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_United_States_military_
operations#1810.E2.80.931819
3. History: Interchangeable Part: http://www.history.com/topics/interchangeable-parts
4. “Currently, the United States has military personnel deployed in about 150 Countries... This
covers 75% of The World's Nations.” Source: US Deployment Facts-How Many US Troops are
Overseas: http://www.vetfriends.com/US-deployments-overseas/
5. (a) GUNFAQ “There’s no perfect estimate of firearms in the United States because creating a
national registry of firearms is prohibited by federal law,” noted Alex Katz, a spokesman for
Mayors Against Illegal Guns. “But academics and interest groups across the political spectrum
broadly agree on the 300 million figure.”
“The number of privately owned guns in the United States is at an all-time high, upwards
of 300 million, and now rises by about 10 million per year,” said the NRA’s Institute for
Legislative Action in a firearms safety fact sheet released Jan. 17, 2013.”
Source: http://www.gunfaq.org/2013/03/how-many-guns-in-the-united-states/
(b) Wikipedia: 281 million guns at 89% of an estimated population of 316 million in 2013 by
the United States Census Buearu.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_of_guns_per_capita_by_country
6. Article III, Section 2 of The Constitution of The United States
7. Control, Robert, “Presser v. Illinois (1885), ” in Kermit L. Hall, The Oxford Companion to the
Supreme Court of the United States, Second Edition, (New York, NY: Oxford University Press,
2005) p. 773.
33
8. Hemenway, David, Private Guns, Public Health (Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan
Press, 2004), p. 159
9. Hemenway, David, Private Guns, Public Health (Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan
Press, 2004), p. 159.
10. Spitzer, Robert J., “Five Myths about gun control,” Washington Post, Dec. 21, 2012.
Www.washingtonpost.com/com/five-myths-about-gun-control
11. Zimring, Franklin, “Firearms and Federal Law: The Gun Control Act of 1968,” Journal of
Legal Studies, 4 (1975): 133., pp. 1 - 63. Franklin Zimring, Professor of Law and Co-Director of
the Center for Studies in Criminal Law, University of Chicago.
http://www.saf.org/lawreviews/zimring68.htm
12. Ibid:Zimring, p. 30
13. Ibid: Zimring,
The following very incomplete summary is based on Zimring’s thorough study of the gun
control efforts by Congress published in 1975. Between 1880 and the end of WWI there were
some failed Congressional efforts to ban interstate commerce in handguns. By 1924, there were
more than a dozen federal firearms control bills before Congress which were not adopted. In
1927, Congress prohibited using the United States mail to transport ‘concealable firearms’ to
stop “mail order murder.” Numerous ideas to constrain gun availability were proposed, but not
enacted during the 1920's, e.g. the Uniform Firearms Act, 1927, which would have required a 48
hour waiting period for handgun deals before sale. The National Firearms Act of 1934 included
numerous provisions for dealing with a “machine-gun-toting interstate gangster” like John
Dillinger.
In the 1950s, foreign made guns were flooding the United States. As a result, proposals
to both restrict trade and set standards for the quality of imported guns were discussed. In 1968,
Congress enacted Title IV of the Omibus Crime Control Act. This Act was the product of
numerous compromises that weakened the Act, but it included “mandatory prison sentences for
violent crimes committed with guns.”
14. Ibid: Zimring, p.51.
15. “Gun laws in the US, state by state – interactive”
Guardian US interactive team
theguardian.com, 16 January 2013
http://www.theguardian.com/world/interactive/2013/jan/15/gun-laws-united-states?guni=Article:
promo-related-article%20US%20Gun%20laws:microapp%20guardiannews-interactives-static:U
S%20gun%20laws%20promo
16. Waldman, Michael, The Second Amendment: A Biography, (New York, NY: Simon &
Schuster, 2014, pp.151- 160
34
17.“The True Cost of Gun Violence: A Special Investigation by Mark Follman, Julia Lurie, Jaeah
Lee, & James West based on Research by Ted Miller,” Mother Jones, May/June 2015
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/04/true-cost-of-gun-violence-in-america
Also see: Weisser, Mike, “How Much Does Gun Violence Cost? Mother Jones Has A New
Number”. Mikethegunguy: News and Notes About Gun, April 16, 2015
http://mikethegunguy.com/2015/04/16/how-much-does-gun-violence-cost-mother-jones-has-a-ne
w-number/
18. “100 Best Cowboy Movies,” Wikipedia: http://www.imdb.com/list/k-gnJV0oHFg/ and
“List of Western films,” Wikepedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Western_films
19. There are at least 27 gun magazines sold promoting the latest technology for killing. I briefly
reviewed eight of these magazines* collected at random from a newsstand. Only
two advertized storage equipment to keep guns safe. Most feature police and military using guns.
The threat of home invasion by bad guys and women at risk in those situations is a theme.
Several pictured men’s and women’s underwear designed to conceal pistols. Guns for hunting,
competition shooting, and collecting as a hobby were themes in most magazines.
* (Combat Handguns - Issue: Jan. 14, 2014; Home Defender - Issue Winter 2013;
Guns&Weapons - Feb. 2014; Book of The AR-15 - Display until 2/17,2014; Guns - Issue:
Display until 2/13/2014; Gun World - Issue: Jan. 2014; Gun Collector - Dec. 2013; and ShotGun
News - Issue Dec. 9, 2013.)
20. “Innocents Lost: A Year of Unintentional Child Gun Deaths,” Everytown or Gun Safety and
Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America June 2014, p.3.
21. “ATF agents have lost track of dozens of government-issued guns, after stashing them under
the front seats in their cars, in glove compartments or simply leaving them on top of their
vehicles and driving away, according to internal reports from the past five years obtained by the
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
Agents left their guns behind in bathroom stalls, at a hospital, outside a movie theater
and on a plane, according to the records, obtained Tuesday by the news organization under the
federal Freedom of Information Act.
In December 2009, two 6-year-old boys spotted an agent's loaded ATF Smith & Wesson
.357 on a storm sewer grate in Bettendorf, Iowa. The agent lived nearby and later said he
couldn't find his gun for days but didn't bother reporting it — until it hit the local newspaper.
In Los Angeles in 2011, an agent went out to a bar drinking with other agents and
friends, reportedly consuming four alcoholic beverages. The next morning he woke up and
realized his ATF-issued Glock was gone. It was not found.” More examples are in the report
cited below.
Source: Diedrich, John, and Rutledge, Raquel, “ATF agents lost track of dozens of their own
guns, reports show.” Journal Sentinel, Feb. 25, 2014.
http://www.jsonline.com/watchdog/watchdogreports/atf-agents-lost-track-of-dozens-of-their-own
-guns-reports-show-b99213499z1-247182581.html#ixzz2ueUmeIVl
35
22. Millstein, Seth, See Common Argument #1 in “How To Argue For Gun Control: 5 Anti-Gun
Regulation Arguments, Debunked” Bustle, 03.12.2014 News
http://www.bustle.com/articles/17787-how-to-argue-for-gun-control-5-anti-gun-regulation-argum
ents-debunked
23. In order to make apple to apple comparisons of gun ownership and gun-related deaths
between the United States and other countries, the countries selected for comparison in the table
have cultures similar to that of the United States; they are industrialized democracies with
roughly similar legal and legislative processes and similar social traditions. For example,
comparing Norway or France to the United States makes far more sense than comparing the
United States to a war-torn Syria, an impoverished, agrarian Bangladesh, or Communist North
Korea.
24. Hemenway, David; Miller, Matthew. Firearm availability and homicide rates across 26 high
income countries. Journal of Trauma, 2000; 49:985-88.
http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/hicrc/firearms-research/guns-and-death/ (12/18/13)
25.Hemenway, David, Private Guns, Public Health (Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan
Press, 2004), p. 198 (United Nation’s data 1998)
26. Hemenway, David, Private Guns, Public Health (Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan
Press, 2004), p. 198 (United Nation’s data 1998)
27. Hemenway, David, Private Guns, Public Health (Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan
Press, 2004), p. 198 (United Nation’s data 1998)
28. “Number of guns per capita by country,” (2007) Wikipedia
29. Hemenway, David, Private Guns, Public Health (Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan
Press, 2004), p. 197 (data source: “Killias Van Kesteren, and Rindishbacker, 2001)
30.Wikipedia; “List of countries by firearm-related death rate: This is a historical list of countries
by firearm-related death rate per 100,000 population in one year.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_firearm-related_death_rate
31. Many gun owners have more than one gun. For example, “Mark Russo of Middletown, CT,
had 18 rifles and shotguns when he threatened to shoot his mother.” Michael Lou and Mike
McIntire, “When the Right to Bear Arms Includes the Mentally Ill,” The New York Times, Dec.
22, 2013, p.28.
32. Hemenway, David, Private Guns, Public Health (Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan
Press, 2004), pp. 1-3.
Also: Hamilton, David, and Kposowa, Augustine J., “Firearms and Violent Death in the United
States: Gun Ownershi;, Gun Control and Mortality Rates in 16 State, 2005- 2009," British
Journal of Education, Society & Behavioural Science, 7(2):XX-XX, Article no. BJESBS.
36
2015.073 February 2015
http://www.sciencedomain.org/abstract.php?id=21&aid=8157
33. Gilson, Dave, “10 Pro-Gun Myths, Shot Down:
Fact-checking some of the gun lobby's favorite arguments shows they're full of holes,”
Politics: Crime and Justice, Guns, Top Stories, MotherJones, Jan. 31, 2013
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/01/pro-gun-myths-fact-check
34. “The study, led by a Boston University School of Public Health researcher, examines the
National Rifle Association's (NRA) claim that increased gun ownership does not lead to
increased gun violence. It is the largest study conducted to date into the correlation between gun
ownership and firearms violence, and the first to comprehensively examine the issue since the
tragic shooting last December of 20 children and 7 adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School in
Newtown, Connecticut...” Contrary to the NRA’s claims, “....The results of the research are
consistent with previous studies that have demonstrated a correlation between higher levels of
gun ownership and higher levels of firearm homicide. ...The regression model predicted that each
1 percentage point increase in gun ownership increases a state's firearm homicide rate by 0.9
percent, translating into a 12.9 percent increase in the gun homicide rate for each one standard
deviation increase in gun ownership.”
Source: “A New study from the American Journal of Public Heatlh shows that U.S. states with
higher estimated rates of gun ownership experience a higher number of firearms-related
homicides.” ScienceDaily, September 12, 2013
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/09/130912203315.htm
http://www.sciencedomain.org/abstract.php?id=21&aid=8157
35. Missouri’s increasing gun violence:
- Chokshi, Niraj, “Study: Repealing Missouri’s background check law associated with a murder
spike,” The Washington Post, February 18, 2014
- Tavernise, Sabrina, "In Missouri, Fewer Gun Restrictions and More Gun Killings, The New
York Times, pp. 1, 15-16, DEC. 21, 2015
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/22/health/in-missouri-fewer-gun-restrictions-and-more-gun-kil
lings.html?smid=nytcore-ipad-share&smprod=nytcore-ipad
36. Trace The Guns: The Link Between Gun Laws and Interstate Gun Trafficking
A Report from Mayors Against Illegal Guns, September 2010, pp 1 and 2.
37. NRA’s advice to members: “It should also be remembered that you have constitutional
protections both against unreasonable searches and seizures and against compelled
self-incrimination. Although the authorities may search anywhere within your reach without a
search warrant after a valid stop, they may not open and search closed luggage without probable
cause to believe evidence of a crime will be found, particularly when it is in a locked storage area
or trunk of a vehicle, unless you consent. You have a right not to consent. Furthermore, although
you may be required to produce a driver's license, vehicle registration, and, perhaps, proof of
37
automobile insurance, you have a right to remain silent.” (emphasis added)
“Guide To The Interstate Transportation Of Firearms,” NRA/ILA Institute of Legislative Action,
Dec, 20, 2012.
http://www.nraila.org/gun-laws/articles/2010/guide-to-the-interstate-transportation.aspx
and http://www.cjrpc.com/interstate_1.htm
38. “Mental disorders have been found to be common, with over a third of people in most
countries reporting sufficient criteria to be diagnosed at some point in their life.” Also, the severe
mentally ill are 6 to 23 times more likely to be the victim of crimes than the assailant. Source:
The World Health Organization (WHO) reported in 2001 that about 450 million people
worldwide suffer from some form of mental disorder or brain condition, and that one in four
people meet criteria at some point in their life.
Source: “Prevalence of mental disorders,” Wikimedia
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1389236/
39. “More than one quarter of persons with SMI [severe mental illness] had been victims of a
violent crime in the past year, a rate more than 11 times higher than the general population rates
even after controlling for demographic differences between the 2 samples (P<.001). The annual
incidence of violent crime in the SMI sample (168.2 incidents per 1000 persons) is more than 4
times higher than the general population rates (39.9 incidents per 1000 persons) (P<.001).
Depending on the type of violent crime (rape/sexual assault, robbery, assault, and their
subcategories), prevalence was 6 to 23 times greater among persons with SMI than among the
general population.”
Source: Linda A. Teplin, PhD, Gary M. McClelland, PhD, Karen M. Abram, PhD, and Dana A.
Weiner, PhD, “Crime Victimization in Adults With Severe Mental Illness
Comparison With the National Crime Victimization Survey”
NIH Public Access Authors Manuscript
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1389236/
40. Appelbaum, Paul S., M.D.; Jeffrey W. Swanson, Ph.D., “Law & psychiatry: Gun laws and
mental illness: how sensible are the current restrictions?” Psychiatry Services, July 2010.
http://ps.psychiatryonline.org/solr/searchresults.aspx?q=%22Gun%20laws%20and%20mental%2
0illness%22&fd_JournalID=18&f_JournalDisplayName=Psychiatric%20Services&SearchSource
Type=3
41. Women at home and domestic abuse centers
- Sorenson, Susan B. and Wiebe, Douglas J., “Weapons in the Lives of Battered Women,”
American Journal of Public Health: August 2004, Vol. 94, No. 8, pp. 1412-1417.
doi: 10.2105/AJPH.94.8.1412
http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/full/10.2105/AJPH.94.8.1412
- Hemenway, David, “Risks and Benefits of a Gun in the Home,” American Journal of Lifestyle
Medicine, 2011. http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/753058
38
42. Editorial | “The Gun Challenge: Dangerous Gun Myths,” Sunday Review, The New York
Times, Feb. 2, 2013,
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/03/opinion/sunday/dangerous-gun-myths.html?_r=0
43. Hemenway, David, “Risks and Benefits of a Gun in the Home,” American Journal of
Lifestyle Medicine, 2011. http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/753058
44. For an unnerving video of children’s reactions to a gun when no parents are around. Either
click:
http://www.truth-out.org/buzzflash/videos/video/quot-young-guns-quot-abc-news-report-infuriat
es-the-nra
or search for: “Young Guns: ABC News Report Infuriates the NRA”
45. Future Without Guns:
http://www.futureswithoutviolence.org/userfiles/Gun%20Fact%20Sheet_FINAL.pdf
46. Thompson, Cheryl W., “Police officers killed by guns,” Washington Post, Nov. 2010.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/nation/guns/officers-killed-by-guns/
(December 16, 2013)
47. “Using the most recent CDC [Centers for Disease Control] estimates for yearly deaths by
guns in the United States, it is likely that as of January 22, 2014, roughly 37,269 people have
died from guns in the U.S. since the Newtown shootings. Compare that number to the number of
deaths reported in the news in our interactive below, and you can see how under-told the story of
gun violence in America actually is.”
Source: Chris Kirk and Dan Kois,“How Many People Have Been Killed by Guns Since
Newtown?” Slate, Jan. 22, 2014.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/crime/2012/12/gun_death_tally_every_america
n_gun_death_since_newtown_sandy_hook_shooting.html
48. “Gun Violence Statistics,” Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence,
http://smartgunlaws.org/category/gun-studies-statistics/gun-violence-statistics/ (12/20/13)
49. Brair, Pete J., Martaindale, M. Hunter, and Nichaols, Terry, “Active Shooter Events from
2000 to 2012” FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Jan. 2014, p. 2
http://leb.fbi.gov/2014/january/active-shooter-events-from-2000-to-2012;
Also see: Mass Shooting Tracker: http://shootingtracker.com/wiki/Main_Page
50. Maria Cramer, “Rate of fatal Shootings sparks alarm in city,” The Boston Globe, 1/28/14, p.
A1 & A8.
51. Firearm Industry Statistics, Researech Date: February 15, 2015
Statistic Brain, http://www.statisticbrain.com/firearm-industry-statistics/
39
52. “Guns in America, a Statistical Look,” Nation, ABC News
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/headlines/2012/08/guns-in-america-a-statistical-look/
53. “United States — Gun Facts, Figures and the Law,” Gun Numbers, GunPolicy.org
http://www.gunpolicy.org/firearms/region/united-states
54. (a)The total number of hunting licenses sold by the 50 states increased by 836,352 licenses
between 1958 and 2013, a mere 0.05%, from 14,138,182 to 14,974,534 . (b)Meanwhile during
those 55 years the population grew by 44%, from 174.8 million to 316 million according to the
estimates of the U.S. Census Bureau. Hence, a lower and lower percent of our growing
population are hunters. Only about 4.9% of our current population are licensed hunters. The per
cent of hunters is slightly higher (6.4%) if calculated on the 76.5% of the 2012 population that is
over 18 years. However, many states sell hunting licenses to those younger than 18 years, and
some sell junior hunting licenses to those quite young. The percent differences don’t make a
material difference to this argument.
(a) Hunting License data for 1958 and 2013 by state: Wildlife & Sport Fish Restoration Program
Home | United States Fish and Wildlife, Department of the Interior:
http://wsfrprograms.fws.gov/Subpages/LicenseInfo/Hunting.htm
http://wsfrprograms.fws.gov/Subpages/LicenseInfo/HuntingLicCertHistory.pdf
Also, state’s hunting licenses are issued annually according to a Google survey of 10 states’
hunting license time limitations in the west, middle, east, north and south of our country (CA,
WA, Il, OH, PA. MD, ME, Fl, MI, AK, and FL).
(b) Wikipedia’s United States Census Bureau data on populations: 1958 population was
174,881,904. (http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_was_the_US_population_in_1958?#slide=2 )l
55. Of the 300 million guns, only about 34.4 million guns, 11.5%, are used for target shooting
according to “Sport Shooting Participation in the United States in 2009,” conducted for the
National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) by Responsive Management, 2010, Harrisonburg,
VA 22801, pp. 10 & 11. The NSSF is the gun manufacturer’s association.
http://nssf.org/PDF/research/NSSF-Shooting-Participation-2010-Report.pdf
56. Webster, Daniel W., and Vernick, Jon S. Reducing Gun Violence in American: Informing
Policy with Evidence and Analysis (Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press, 2013) page
241.
57. “State & County QuickFacts,” U.S. Census Bureau, Department of Commerce
http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/00000.html
58. “A New study from the American Journal of Public Health shows that U.S. states with higher
estimated rates of gun ownership experience a higher number of firearms-related homicides.”
ScienceDaily, September 12, 2013
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/09/130912203315.htm
40
59. Lou,Michael, and McIntire,Mike, “When the Right to Bear Arms Includes the Mentally Ill,”
The New York Times, Dec. 22, 2013, p.28.
60. National Shooting Sports Foundation:
http://www.nssf.org/members/whyjoin.cfm
61. Dickinson, Tim,“The NRA vs. America: How the country’s biggest gun-rights group thwarts
regulation and helps put military-grade weapons in the hands of killers,” Politics, Rolling Stone ,
Jan. 31, 2013 http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-nra-vs-america-20130131
62. The NRA successfully weakened the 1986 federal gun law: “The episode was testimony to
the power of the National Rifle Association, one of the best organized and most feared lobbies in
Washington. Dismantling the Gun Control Act of 1968 has long been a top priority. In
accomplishing most of its objectives, the N.R.A. achieved more than a particular legislative
victory. It defined the framework for the debate. Since 1938, the Gallup Poll has shown that a
majority of Americans favor handgun control. Yet during the two days of debate last week, no
Congressman spoke up for tightening the 1968 law.\” .... The N.R.A. dedicated $1.6 million of its
$5 million annual legislative budget to [weaken] the bill; the police coalition spent $15,000 [to
stop the bill from being weakened].”
Source: Linda Greenhouse, “Assembled by the hundreds on Capitol Hill, officers representing 13
national organizations tried to persuade Congress not to gut Federal gun control.” The New
York Times, April 13, 1986.
http://www.nytimes.com/1986/04/13/weekinreview/the-nra-s-lobbying-is-as-effective-as-ever.ht
ml
63. Hickey,Walter, “How The NRA Killed Federal Funding For Gun Violence Research,”
Politics, Insider, Jan. 16, 2013.
http://www.businessinsider.com/cdc-nra-kills-gun-violence-research-2013-1
64. Tiahrt Amendment and Remington Fire Arms
- Tiahrt Amendment
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mayors_Against_Illegal_Guns
- Remington Fire Arms defects have caused many deaths and injuries according to a
CNBC report. “CNBC continues its investigation into allegations of a deadly defect and
corporate cover-up by an iconic American company. In 2010, CNBC presented an original
report that examined accusations that the world's most popular hunting rifle is susceptible
to firing without pulling the trigger, and that its manufacturer, Remington Arms, has been
aware of the problem for decades. Now, in a newly updated documentary, CNBC reveals
unsealed company documents, once secret, that shed light on how Remington handled the
alleged defect – one that's been linked in court battles to dozens of deaths and scores of
injuries. The story, told through corporate insiders and a father searching for answers
about the death of his son, also explores how information about potentially defective and
dangerous products sometimes remains hidden in confidential legal settlements.”
Source: "Gunfight: Remington Under Fire," CNBC , Dec. 20.2015, 9pm and
41
12:00am
http://www.cnbc.com/2015/12/14/cnbcs-gunfight-remington-under-fire-to-premiere65.Comments by Wayne LaPierre made during a radio interview with Glenn Beck January 2012,
published in Wayne LaPierre (Executive Vice President and CEO) in “Meet the NRA
Leadership,” p.9, Hard copy printed from the web on Dec. 24, 2013, 4:06pm. The website is no
longer available.
66. “Fundamental right n. Any right expressly guaranteed by the Constitution, or deemed by the
Supreme Court to be so basic to the concept of liberty as to be protected from government
restriction (except to the extent necessary to serve a COMPELLING INTEREST) by the DUE
PROCESS clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Areas now deemed fundamental include
voting and running for office, access to the courts, freedom of travel, freedom of association, and
decision making in matters of marriage and procreation.”
Clapp, James E., Dictionary of the Law: The New Authority on Traditional and Modern Terms
(New York, NY: Random House, 20000) p.196
67. Because the Preamble lists both the “general welfare’ and ‘defense’ as aspirations,
presumably the founders did not intend the term ‘general welfare’ to include ‘defense.’
However, there is a good deal of uncertainty of how the term ‘general welfare’ was used in 1776.
“In one letter, Thomas Jefferson asserted that “[T]he laying of taxes is the power, and
the general welfare the purpose for which the power is to be exercised. They [Congress] are not
to lay taxes ad libitum for any purpose they please; but only to pay the debts or provide for the
welfare of the Union. In like manner, they are not to do anything they please to provide for the
general welfare, but only to lay taxes for that purpose.”
In 1824 Chief Justice John Marshall described in obiter dictum a further limit on the
General Welfare Clause in Gibbons v. Ogden: "Congress is authorized to lay and collect taxes,
&c. to pay the debts and provide for the common defence [by 1824 the United States had a navy
and an army] and general welfare of the United States. ... Congress is not empowered to tax for
those purposes which are within the exclusive province of the States."(a)
We use the term ‘general welfare’ more expansively today. It is fair to say that
Americans’ sense of our ‘general welfare’ was seriously threatened when President John
Kennedy was assassinated in 1963. That was followed by the assassination of our nations’ civil
rights leader Martin Luther King in April of 1968. Then, just two months later, the Attorney
General of the United States Robert Kennedy was shot dead in 1968. There was national grief in
the North when Abraham Lincoln was shot to death. Then James A. Garfield, and William
McKinley were killed in gun assassinations. The Second Amendment has provided no protection
for our presidents. As the number of guns has increased the attacks on our presidents have
increased. This is threat to the ‘general welfare’ assuming that the life of our president, the head
of the Executive Branch of our Republic, is important to the welfare of the nation.(b)
Sources: (a) For more on how the term ‘general welfare’ was interpreted in the 1800s see:
“General Welfare clause,” Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Welfare_clause
(b)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_presidential_assassination_attempts_and_
plots
42
68. “Gun control supporters can point to broad and consistent public support for expanded
background checks. Fully 81% favor making private gun sales and sales at gun shows subject to
background checks, little changed since January (85%). The proposal draws nearly equal levels
of support from Democrats (83%), Republicans (81%) and Independents (80%).”
Source: “Broad Support for Renewed Background Checks Bill, Skepticism about Its Chances,”
Pew Research Center, May 2013
http://www.people-press.org/2013/05/23/broad-support-for-renewed-background-checks-bill-ske
pticism-about-its-chances/ (December 20, 2013)
69. “Gun Debate Highlights Voter Distrust of Government.” Rasmussen Reports, 1/18/2013,
A Commentary By Scott Rasmussen
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/political_commentary/commentary_by_scott_r
asmussen/gun_debate_highlights_voter_distrust_of_government
70.“LaPierre’s statement about ATF agents involved in the Ruby Ridge and Waco assaults being
“jackbooted thugs” led former President George H.W. Bush, a lifetime member of the NRA, to
resign his membership in 1995.”a The NRA News reported on June 12, 2013, that “Game show
legend Chuck Woolery discusses the state of gun control in America and what we can do to
protect the Second Amendment from an overreaching government. "It's time that America
realizes that an attack on any constitutional right is an attack on all of them."b Woolery and the
NRA did not explain how amending the Constitution 27 times since 1778 with additions, repeals,
and reinterpretations has been “an attack on all” civil rights.
a. Biography: “Wayne LaPierre, A Look at the Life and Career of the NRA's Executive
Director,” http://civilliberty.about.com/od/guncontrol/a/Wayne-LaPierre-Biography.htm
b. http://www.nranews.com/resources/video/chuck-woolery-on-saving-thesecond-amendment/list/in-the-news
71. In 1794 in Western Pennsylvania, protesters used violence to prevent federal officials from
collecting the whiskey excise tax. Five hundred armed men attacked the fortified home of the tax
inspector. In response, George Washington led 13,000 militia from various states to suppress the
insurgency.
72. “In August of 1992 Americans tensely watched as events began to unfold on a remote ridge
in Northern Idaho, involving a white separatist family and the FBI. Eleven days after it had
begun, a 14-year-old boy, a 42-year-old mother, a federal marshal, and one yellow Labrador
retriever had all been shot dead.”
Source: Lohr, David, “Randy Weaver: Siege at Ruby Ridge,” CrimeLibrary
http://www.crimelibrary.com/gangsters_outlaws/cops_others/randy_weaver/1.html
73. “Waco siege,” Wikepedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waco_siege
74. Source: Tefft, Michael, “NRA Joint Statement on Supreme Court Nominee Sonia Sotomayor,
Mind of Tefft, July 17, 2009
43
http://www.themindoftefft.com/blog/2009/07/17/nra-joint-statement-on-supreme-court-nomineesonia-sotomayor/
75. Source: Comments made by Wayne LaPierre, CEO of the NRA, during a speech at the annual
Conservative Political Action Conference, 2009, published in “Wayne LaPierre (Executive Vice
President and CEO), “Meet the NRA Leadership,” p. 11. Copy of summarized transcript printed
off the web Dec. 24, 2013, 4:06PM. The website is not longer available.
76. Handguns as concealed weapons.
- A 2013 FBI report on gun-related murders documents that in the 5 years including 2009 to
2013, hand guns were used in 91% to 89.2% of the gun-related murders. Long guns and shot
guns accounted for 9% to 10.8% of the shootings. It is assumed the gun-related murders
committed with firearms that were not documented by the police had a similar distribution
between handguns and long guns and/or shotguns.
Source: FBI: Uniform Crime Reports, Crime in the United States 2013
Expanded Homicide Data Table 8: Murder Victims by Weapon, 2009–2013
https://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2013/crime-in-the-u.s.-2013/offens
es-known-to-law-enforcement/expanded-homicide/expanded_homicide_data_table_8_mu
rder_victims_by_weapon_2009-2013.xls
-“Our analysis of the year-by-year impact of RTC laws [right to carry] also suggests that RTC
laws increase aggravated assaults.”
Abhay, A., Donohue III. J., & Zhang, A., “The Impact of Right to Carry Laws and the
NRC Report: The Latest Lessons for the Empirical Evaluation of Law and Policy,”
Stanford Law and Economics Olin Working Paper No. 461, September 4, 2014, 104
pages.
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2443681##
77. Hemenway, D., Solnick, S.J., “The epidemiology of self-defense gun use: Evidence from the
National Crime Victimization Survey of 2007-2011,” Prev. Med. (2015)
78. “The nominee [for Surgeon General], Dr. Vivek H. Murthy, an internist and political ally of
the president’s, has come under criticism from the National Rifle Association, and opposition
from the gun-rights group has grown so intense that it has placed Democrats from conservative
states, several of whom are up for re-election this year, in a difficult spot. ... The N.R.A. has said
it will “score” any confirmation vote — meaning that voting yes would negatively affect a
senator’s annual rating from the group. This is not an idle concern for senators like Mr. Begich,
Mary L. Landrieu of Louisiana, Mark Pryor of Arkansas and John Walsh of Montana — all
Democrats who represent states where opposition from the N.R.A. could mean the difference in a
close race.”
Peters, Jeremy W., “Senate Balks At Obama Pick For Health Post,” The New York Times, March
15, 2014, p. 1
44
79. (a) Gun Control & Political Suicide, April 23, 2013 Episode #18090.
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-april-23-2013/gun-control---political-suicide
(b) “Australia & Gun Control's Aftermath,” April 25, 2013
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/thu-april-25-2013/australia---gun-control-s-aftermath
80. Most people, when directly confronted with proof that they are wrong, do not change their
point of view or course of action but justify it even more tenaciously.”
Source: Tavris, C. and Aronson, E., Mistakes Were Made (But not by me) (New York,NY: A
Harvest Book, 2007) p. 2. Also see: Haidt, Jonathon, “The Emotional Dog and its Rational
Tail: A Social Intuitional Approach to Moral Judgements,” Psychological Review, 2001 Oct:
108(4) 814-34
81. Berlow, Alan, “The NRA’s brazen shell game with donations: a Yahoo News investigation,”
Politics, Yahoo News, April 21, 2015
https://www.yahoo.com/politics/the-nras-brazen-shell-game-with-donations-a-116744915796.ht
m
82. Easley, Jason, “NRA Fueled Loonies Are Now Threatening Democratic Members of
Congress,” Real Politics USA, Janurary 19, 2013.
http://www.politicususa.com/2013/01/19/nra-fueled-loonies-threatening-democratic-members-co
ngress.html
83. Warren Burger’s tape recorded TV interview with Charlayne Hunter-Gault on the MacNeilLehrer News Hour on Dec 16, 1991. Lathrop, Don, “Burger saw through the gun fraud,” Letter
to Editor, Berkshire Eagle, February 5, 2013
http://www.berkshireeagle.com/letters/ci_22520051/burger-saw-through
84. Debates about the meaning of the Second Amendment:
- Sanford Levinson, “The Embarrassing Second Amendment,” Yale Law Journal,
Volume 99, pp. 637-659 [1989-1990]
- Review of Mark V. Tushnet’s Out of Range (Oxford University Press) by Cass R.
Sunstein,“The Most Mysterious Right,” New Republic Nov. 18, 2007;
www.newrepublic.com/article/books-and-arts/archive/76368/second-amendment-gun-rights;
- Gun Ownership and the Supreme Court, Law Library of Congress,
http://www.loc.gov/law/help/second-amendment.php ;
- “BEARING ARMS: SECOND AMENDMENT,” CRS Annotated Constitution,
Amendment 2 Table of Contents, Legal Information Institute, Cornell University Law School
http://www.law.cornell.edu/anncon/html/amdt2_user.html;
85. The interpretation of this data is not as simple as it appears. For a detailed analysis of the
complexities involved in evaluating the effects of gun control regulations and buy back programs
on the incidents of suicide and homicides see Andrew Leigh and Christine Neill, “Do Gun
Buybacks Save Lives? Evidence from Panel Data,” American Law and Economics Review,
August 20, 2010, pp. 509 - 557.
45
http://andrewleigh.org/pdf/GunBuyback_Panel.pdf
86. Citizens United v Federal Election Commission, 558 United States 310 (2010)
87. The argument made in Buckley v. Valeo - 424 U.S. 1 (1976) is “that restrictions on both
giving and spending money are tantamount to restrictions on speech, thus can only be sustained
in the service of important or compelling government interests” in short... “money facilitates
speech; money incentivizes speech; and giving and spending money are themselves expressive
activities. Therefore, restrictions on giving and spending constitutes restrictions on speech.”
Source: Deborah Hellmand, “Money Talks But It Isn’t Speech,” Minnesota Law Review,
February 2011.
88. The legal background to the Citizens United decision is complicated. For a brief overview of
the case see Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission
or google the case and read Justice Kennedy’s opinion and Steven’s 90 page dissent.
89. This argument is strongly rejected by many lawyers: Hellmand, Deborah, “Money Talks But
It Isn’t Speech,” Minnesota Law Review, February 2011; Clements, Jeffrey, Corporations are
not People: When they have more rights than you do and what you can do about it. (San
Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2012); Lessig, Lawrence, Republic, Lost: How
Money Corrupts Congress - and a Plan to Stop it (New York, NY: Hachette Book Group, 2011)
90. District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 United States 570 (2008)
91. For an in depth analysis of the permissions, limitations, and ambiguities of the Heller
decision, see Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence at
http://smartgunlaws.org/category/second-amendment/
92. “...nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the
possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms
in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and
qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.” - Justice Scalia in the Heller Decision
93. Wikipedia: “Gun violence in the United States,”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_violence_in_the_United_States [See note 146]
94. Richard Posner continued, “.... It is doubtful that the amendment could even be thought to
require that members of state militias be allowed to keep weapons in their homes, since that
would reduce the militias' effectiveness. Suppose part of a state's militia was engaged in combat
and needed additional weaponry. Would the militia's commander have to collect the weapons
from the homes of militiamen who had not been mobilized, as opposed to obtaining them from a
storage facility? Since the purpose of the Second Amendment, judging from its language and
background, was to assure the effectiveness of state militias, an interpretation that undermined
their effectiveness by preventing states from making efficient arrangements for the storage and
46
distribution of military weapons would not make sense.”
“District of Columbia v. Heller,” Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/District_of_Columbia_v._Heller#Dissenting_opinions
95. McDonald v. Chicago, 561 U.S. 3025 (2010)
96. “Policy Statement: Firearm-Related Injuries Affecting the Pediatric Population.” Pediatrics,
American Academy of Pediatrics, Vol.130 No.5 November 1, 2012
http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/130/5/e1416.full
97. The Constitution of the United States is a communitarian docment as reflected in both its
Preamble and the Declaration of Independence. “Communitarianism is a “social and political
philosophy that emphasizes the importance of community in the functioning of political life, in
the analysis and evaluation of political institutions, and in understanding human identity and
well-being. It arose in the 1980s as a critique of two prominent philosophical schools:
contemporary liberalism, which seeks to protect and enhance personal autonomy and individual
rights in part through the activity of government, and libertarianism, a form of liberalism
(sometimes called “classical liberalism”) that aims to protect individual rights—especially the
rights to liberty and property—through strict limits on governmental power.” - Encyclopaedia
Britannica
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/1366457/communitarianism
98. See the “Law Enforcement” paper in the Opinion Leaders’ section of this website.
99. Adam Winkler, a law professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, reported in the
Wall Street Journal. Source: Editorial: “Sensible Question for Gun Owners,” The New York
Times, p. 20A, July 3, 2015
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/03/opinion/a-sensible-question-for-gun-owners.html
and
Hemenway, David, and Hicks, James G., “‘May issue’ gun carrying laws and police
discretion: Some evidence from Massachusetts,” Journal of Public Health Policy, 2015,
Aug;36(3):324-34. doi: 10.1057/jphp.2015.11. Epub 2015 Apr 16.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25880883
100. Goldstein, Adam O., M.D., et al, “Assessing Competency for Concealed-Weapons Permits The Physician’s Role,” The New England Journal of Medicine, 36824, June 13, 2013. pp. 22512253
101. “The Salem Witch Trials, 1792'” Eye Witness to History.Com
http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/salem.htm
102. Gary J. Gemme v. Holden, Chief of Police of the City of Worester (Plaintiff-Appellee) vs.
Raymond J. Holden (Defendant -Appellant), Case No. SJC-11682, and
LeBanc, Steve, “Court: Chief within rights to deny gun license,” State&Region, The Daily News,
March 12, 2015, p. A3.
47
103. “Gun retailers strongly support expanded criteria for denying gun purchases, UC Davis
survey finds,” News from UC Davis Health System, UCDavis Health System, Sept. 23, 2013
http://www.ucdmc.ucdavis.edu/publish/news/newsroom/8217
104. Webster, Daniel W., and Vernick, Jon S. Reducing Gun Violence in American: Informing
Policy with Evidence and Analysis (Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press, 2013) Table
19.1.
105. Webster, Daniel W., and Vernick, Jon S. Reducing Gun Violence in American: Informing
Policy with Evidence and Analysis (Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press, 2013)
106. “There are a few critical things to understand about NRA endorsements. First, they are
overwhelmingly given to Republicans, as one might expect. But just as important, they are
overwhelmingly given to incumbents. Over the last four elections, 86 percent of NRA House
endorsements went to incumbents. In fact, not a single Democratic challenger won the group’s
endorsement (though some certainly tried). And if you’re a Republican incumbent, the
endorsement is almost guaranteed: 90 percent of GOP House incumbents got the endorsement in
2004, 91 percent in 2006, 96 percent in 2008, and 97 percent in 2010.”
Source: Waldman, Paul, “The Myth of the NRA Dominance: II,“ The American Prospect,
February 9, 2012
http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2012/02/09/421893/the-myth-of-nra-dominance-part-i-the-nras-in
effective-spending/
107. Kessler, Glenn, “Does the NRA really have more than 4.5 million members?” The Fact
Checker,02/08/2013
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/does-the-nra-really-have-more-than-45million-members/2013/02/07/06047c10-7164-11e2-ac36-3d8d9dcaa2e2_blog.html
108. Waldman,Paul, “The Myth Of NRA Dominance Part IV: The Declining Role Of Guns In
American Society,” Justice, ThinkProgress, March 1, 2012
http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2012/03/01/435437/the-myth-of-nra-dominance-part-iv-the-decli
ning-role-of-guns-in-american
109. Webster, Daniel W., and Vernick, Jon S. Reducing Gun Violence in America: Informing
Policy with Evidence and Analysis (Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press, 2013) page
241.
110. Chow, Emily, Park,Katie, and Yourish,Karen, “How Senate gun control amendments
fared,” The Washington Post, April 17, 2013
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/politics/gun-amendments/
111. Webster, Daniel W., and Vernick, Jon S. Reducing Gun Violence in America: Informing
Policy with Evidence and Analysis (Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press, 2013) Table
19.1.
48
112.Webster, Daniel W., and Vernick, Jon S. Reducing Gun Violence in America: Informing
Policy with Evidence and Analysis (Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press, 2013) Table
19.3
113. Calls to repeal the Second Amendment:
-“The Second Amendment impedes the power of the government to regulate the sale or
possession of firearms.” “Repeal the Second Amendment,”Editorial, America, the
National Catholic Review, February 25, 2013.
http://americamagazine.org/issue/repeal-second-amendment
- Penrose, Mary Margaret (Meg) law professor, Texas A&M University School of Law
called for the “..repeal and replacement of the Second Amendment...” Source: Eric
Owens, “CALL TO ARMS: Texas A&M law prof says it’s time to repeal Second
Amendment,” The Daily Caller, November 11, 2013.
http://dailycaller.com/2013/11/16/call-to-arms-texas-am-law-prof-says-its-time-to-repealsecond-amendment/#ixzz2uuSdhNWW
- “Does the threat of tyranny, a legitimate 18th-century concern but an increasingly
remote, fanciful possibility in the contemporary United States, trump the grisly, daily
reality of gun violence?” Villareal, Timothy, “More Solid Arguments for Second
Amendment Repeal,” Tikkundaily, November 20th, 2013
http://www.tikkun.org/tikkundaily/2013/11/20/more-solid-arguments-for-second-amend
ment-repeal/
- “It is clear that the Second Amendment as written is an anachronism in today's world,
a part of our constitutional rights that has outlived itself.” Spicer, Myles, “It is time to
repeal the Second Amendment,” MINNPOST,
01/08/13
- “... unfortunately, so long as this “Second Amendment” mantra can be thrown into the
gears to stop all reasonable conversation, a real discussion will never take place.” Kurt
Eichenwald, “Kurt Eichenwald: Let’s Repeal the Second Amendment,” Vanity Fair,
January 3, 2013
http://www.vanityfair.com/online/daily/2013/01/kurt-eichenwald-lets-repeal-second-ame
ndment
“.... the constitution needs to be amended.” “Newtown Horror,” The Economist, Dec. 22,
2012.
- “Repeal the 2nd Amendment,”Editorial, Chicago Tribune, June 27, 2008
- Crimson staff writer, “Repeal Second Amendment: Constitution should reflect that gun
ownership is a privilege, not a right,” Harvard Crimson, May 15, 2002
http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2002/5/15/repeal-second-amendment-when-two-third
49
s-of/
114. “History has left the gun-control movement with a more fractured nature. The biggest group
is the Brady Campaign, which emerged from a group called Handgun Control Inc., which was
founded in the nineteen-seventies. In 2000, it was renamed in honor of James Brady, the former
press secretary in the Reagan Administration who was partially paralyzed after being shot in a
1981 assassination attempt on the President. According to Gross, the Brady Campaign now has
about a million members and supporters. Then there is the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence,
which brings together almost fifty medical, religious, and community groups. There is also
Mayors Against Illegal Guns, an increasingly aggressive and influential organization that
Michael Bloomberg set up in 2006, and a number of smaller groups, such as the National Gun
Victims Action Council and Stop Handgun Violence. After the Newtown massacre, a new
organization appeared on the scene, Moms Demand Action, which shouldn’t be confused with
Million Mom March. (That’s part of the Brady Campaign.)”
Source: Espo, David,“Liberal Groups Mobilizing Against NRA Disclosure Concession,” Politics,
Huff Post 06/15/10
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/06/16/liberal-groups-mobilizing_n_614013.html
115. See the Gun-Control Organization paper in the Opinion Leaders’ section of this website.
116. “A Blueprint for Federal Action on Illegal Guns,”
Mayors Against Illegal Guns, January 4, 2010
http://everytown.org/article/a-blueprint-for-federal-action-on-illegal-guns/
117. “A stand-your-ground law is a type of self-defense law that gives individuals the right to use
deadly force to defend themselves without any requirement to evade or retreat from a dangerous
situation. It is law in certain jurisdictions within the United States. The basis may lie in either
statutory law or common law precedents or both. One key distinction is whether the concept
applies only to defending lawfully occupied locations. Under these legal concepts, a person is
justified in using deadly force in certain situations, and the stand-your-ground law would be a
defense or immunity to criminal charges and civil suit. The difference between immunity and a
defense is that an immunity bars suit, charges, detention, and arrest. A defense, including an
affirmative defense, is a fact or set of facts that may avoid or mitigate the adverse legal
consequences of the defendant's otherwise unlawful conduct.”
Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stand-your-ground_law
118. Pinker, Steven, The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence has Declined (New York,
NY: Viking, Penguin Group, 2011) 802 pages.
119.Eighteen states have abolished capital punishment, 8 of these in the 42 years between 1957
and 1999. In one third that time, six states abolished capital punishment since 2000.
Death Penalty Information Center
http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/states-and-without-death-penalty
50
Also see: “Less Support for Death Penalty, Especially Among Democrats: Supporters, Opponents
See Risk of Executing the Innocent,” Pew Research Center, April 16, 2015
http://www.people-press.org/2015/04/16/less-support-for-death-penalty-especially-among-democ
rats/?utm_source=Pew+Research+Center&utm_campaign=535408677a-April_16_Death_Penalt
y_Marijuana4_16_2015&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_3e953b9b70-535408677a-3994979
05
120. In 1876, New Jersey was the first state to end corporal punishment of children in public
school. Massachusetts became the second in 1971. By 1987 nine states joined the list. In 2015,
31 states have ended corporal punishment of children in public schools.
121. “[i]t cannot be presumed that any clause in the constitution is intended to be without
effect.” Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch 137, 174 (1803),” as quoted by Supreme Court Justice
Stevens on page 8 in his dissent to Heller.
122. Trying to win over gun advocates to see the harmful effects that guns have had and will
continue to have unless the Second Amendment is repealed will be very difficult as Tavris and
Aronson point out. “Many gun advocates have invested a great deal of time and effort in
defending their philosophy of gun ownership. “... all of us share the impluse to justify ourselves
and avoid taking responsibility for any actions that turn out to be harmful, immoral, or stupid. ...
Most people, when directly confronted with proof that they are wrong, do not change their point
of view or course of action but justify it even more tenaciously.”
Source: Tavris, Carol, and Aronson, Elliot, Mistakes Were Made (But not by me) (New
York,NY: A Harvest Book, 2007) p. 2.
123. “Article V of the Constitution prescribes how an amendment can become a part of the
Constitution. While there are two ways, only one has ever been used. All 27 Amendments have
been ratified after two-thirds of the House and Senate approve of the proposal and send it to the
states for a vote. Then, three-fourths of the states [38 states] must affirm the proposed
Amendment.
The other method of passing an amendment requires a Constitutional Convention to be
called by two-thirds of the legislatures of the States. That Convention can propose as many
amendments as it deems necessary. Those amendments must be approved by three-fourths of the
states.”
Source: “The Constitution,” LexisNexis
http://www.lexisnexis.com/constitution/amendments_howitsdone.asp
124. Joe Nocera’s Blog: “Weekend Gun Report: Presidents Day Edition,”Opinion Pages, New
York Times, February 18, 2014, 9:00 am (compiled by Jennifer Mascia)
http://nocera.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/02/18/weekend-gun-report-presidents-day-edition/?_php=t
rue&_type=blogs&_r=0
51