Gun Nuts

mac · Posted: Sat Mar 24, 2018 1:51 pm Post subject:

Just came from the Oakland march. Lots of old hippies and young activists. Gun nuts seemed scarce. Virtually everyone now in school has lived their whole life in the shadow of Columbine. They are saying enough.

“Mom, please know that I love you”
“I’m so scared”
“What if_____ has to grow up without a sister, tell her I love her, tell everyone I love them”
“I just want to go home.”

These are some of the texts my 15-year old granddaughter sent her mother on Wednesday March 14 as she lay in a corner of her locked classroom at San Leandro High School, with a bucket in case anyone had to go to the bathroom. Helicopters circled overhead as the school was locked down for hours in response to a threatening graffiti. Her father, an Oakland police officer, the “good guy with a gun,” could do nothing to reduce her terror. He has to deal with the large number of guns in the hands of felons on the streets of Oakland.

I have spent the 13 years since I retired volunteering up to 4 days a week in different elementary schools in Berkeley and San Leandro. Many of the kids that I work with are the same age of the kids slaughtered at Sandy Hook, one of the saddest days in our long history of debate over gun ownership and regulation. I was further saddened by the response of Congress to not even debate restrictions on access to guns for the mentally ill. Instead Congress passed, and Trump signed, a measure drafted by the NRA making it easier for the mentally ill to evade background checks and buy guns.

I know that the Supreme Court held, in District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008), that there was in individual right to own a gun for personal protection. It is important to understand what the court said.

…the Second Amendment conferred an individual right to keep and bear arms. Of course the right was not unlimited, just as the First Amendment’s right of free speech was not, see, e.g., United States v. Williams, 553 U. S. ___ (2008). Thus, we do not read the Second Amendment to protect the right of citizens to carry arms for any sort of confrontation…

The Supreme Court also held:

The term was applied, then as now, to weapons that were not specifically designed for military use and were not employed in a military capacity.

Thus, the court specifically held that there was no Constitutional right to semi-automatic weapons developed for use by militaries. It also indicated that certain restrictions would be “presumptively lawful,” including restrictions that limited the ability of the mentally ill and felons to possess firearms, restrictions against firearm possession in places like schools, and restrictions on the commercial sales of firearms. The latter seems to clearly allow background checks and waiting periods.

One of my really smart friends has noted that the First Amendment protects the right of the people peaceably to assemble. School is one place that we have a right to assemble, without the fear of gun violence. This provides a guarantee for our children that must be balanced against the Second Amendment.

Must our young children cower in the corner of their classrooms because we lack the political will to establish sensible regulations that fall within the direction of the Supreme Court? The vast majority of people in this country support reasonable regulations that would protect our children. That does not mean confiscation of guns; we recognize the right to own a gun for self-protection. But there are steps we can take that would help. We must take them and stop this madness. Even more important, vote those who would prevent consideration of gun safety laws out of office.

mat-ty · Joined: 07 Jul 2007 Posts: 7850

techno900 · Joined: 28 Mar 2001 Posts: 4161

It seem logical to restrict firearms from the hands of the mentally ill, but it's not that simple. Just a few things off the top of my head.

1. We would have to have a national registry of those that are too mentally ill to have a gun.
2. Where do you draw the line in the realm of mental illness? Everyone diagnosed with depression or is some depression mild enough to have a weapon.
3. Once diagnosed, does the government have the right to take all weapons that happen to be in the home of that person?
4. If you own guns, it seems that you would be less likely to seek help with your mental health.
5. With a national registry of those too sick to have a gun, how secure is that information and what other businesses, employers or companies would like to have access to that information.
6. If one recovers from a mental illness, how does one get their name off the list? Note from the doctor or a court order?
7. If you are mentally ill, but never diagnosed, then what? Can the government force you to be evaluated against your will because a friend or neighbor claims you have something wrong with you? Will the police bring you in for an evaluation, plus who does the evaluation and who pays?
8. For the millions already diagnosed with mental illness, how can that information be collected without dumping on privacy rights?

It all sound so simple to the nieve, but to me, it seems very complicated, so much so that I doubt that it will ever happen, at least at the "national registry" level.

mac · Posted: Sat Mar 24, 2018 2:52 pm Post subject:

It is simple. Vote out every person—all from the GOP—who voted to make it easier for the mentally ill to get guns. Every one, no matter how much merit thet otherwise have as politicians. Ban semi-automatic weapons—they are the military weapons the Supreme Court referred to—and the weapons used at Sandy Hook, Florida, and Nevada mass murders. Institute a 30 day waiting period and background check for all new gun purchases—including those at gun shows— and have fees on gun sales pay for the administrative costs.

It won’t stop most murders and suicides, which are perpetrated using hand guns. It will, with the 30 day waiting period, reduce the number of suicides and mass shootings.

Your list of hand wringing questions is a recipe to make perfect the enemy of good—and continue to terrorize school kids. There is no Constitutional right for that.