On Gun Control

Prologue

After the Parkland, FL school massacre (Feb. 4, 2018) Lea, my younger daughter and mother of two girls, asked me why a private citizen needs an assault rifle. 

Dear Anne, Allen, and Lea,

The Parkland School massacre pushed me over the edge. No private citizen needs an assault rifle. I imagined JuJu and Kate cowering under their desks while a gunman worked out his anger blasting the flesh of their classmates.

The most fundamental obligation of government is to provide for the safety of its citizens. Our children are not getting the bare minimum they deserve: classrooms safe from mass murder. Every schoolchild in America knows the “active shooter” drill. This is crazy. America is better than this. How did we get in this mess?

There is a distinction between Fairness and Justice. Fairness is characterized by openness, impartiality, and adherence to “the rules” (laws). Justice is different. Roman jurist Ulpian put it this way: “Justice is an unfailing disposition to give everyone his legal due.” Justice is getting what you are due. For good or for ill you get what you deserve. The Law should deliver justice. You know it in your gut: Justice is what’s right, not necessarily what the rules (laws) provide. “He got off on a technicality,” comes readily to mind. 

In quest of their desire for freedom the Founders crossed a mighty ocean and conquered a vast continent. But not the freedom to massacre children on the altar of the Constitution. “The Constitution is not a suicide pact,” wrote Justice Jackson in 1949. That captures the idea.

Even Thomas Jefferson was concerned. He wrote “A strict observance of the written law is doubtless one of the high duties of a good citizen, but it is not the highest. The laws of necessity, of self-preservation, of saving our country when in danger, are of higher obligation. To lose our country by a scrupulous adherence to the written law, would be to lose the law itself, with life, liberty, property and all those who are enjoying them with us; thus absurdly sacrificing the ends to the means.“

More than 1000 people, mainly children, have died in mass shootings since 1966 when Charles Whitman killed seventeen from the campus tower at the University of Texas. The weapon of choice is usually a rapid-fire rifle that holds a dozen or so cartridges. And yet these weapons remain widely and legally available. And the massacres continue with sickening regularity. 

I recall Alan Simpson, Republican Senator (1979–1997) from Wyoming defining gun control as “Taking steady aim.” He was smiling as he said it. I wish he was still in the Senate.

It’s time for change. Restrict assault rifle sales, or maybe large capacity magazines, to anyone other than law enforcement. That sounds about right to me.

Mother’s idea was this: “Always do right,” the rural east Texas version of the Ten Commandments rolled into one. “Think about it,” she said, “You can figure it out.” 

It’s taken me a lifetime to appreciate her wisdom. Other kids had lists of do’s and don’ts drilled into their skulls, and artful ways of bending the rules to their advantage. No such nonsense at our house. If we’d done right or wrong, justice, not rules, would apply.

What is justice for the 1000+ people murdered in mass shootings since 1966 when Charles Whitman killed 17 at the University of Texas? 

For me it will be that they did not die in vain; that the accumulated weight of their corpses, and the tide of tears shed over them has grown so great that justice will prevail. 

Guns and the great outdoors have always been a part of my life. It began in grade school. My first gun was a single shot .410 shotgun. Before that I patrolled the neighborhood with my trusty Red Ryder BB gun. Later I would lay my little .22 Winchester pump across the handlebars pedal south on Gilmer street, headed for the woods. And it has continued in one form or another to this day. We share stories around the campfire. I’ve had some of the best days of my life with them. So it is with much forethought and some trepidation that I admit my views about gun control and the Second Amendment have changed.

Hunters are a band of brothers. Among my best friends are those I hunt with. It’s no exaggeration to say I love them. They fit a mold. We share old fashioned values not much honored nowadays. 

If you are going to have children, get married and be serious about staying married. Get an education. Don’t be lazy. Get a job and stay off welfare. Keep your promises, even small ones. Give full value for every commitment.  Be patriotic, ready to serve our country. Be a good citizen in your community. Be generous with the less fortunate. Mind your manners, especially in public. Be respectful of authority. Don’t do drugs.

I hope it will be a difference among friends and not a parting. But I must put myself on record while I can. Turning eighty puts you in that frame of mind.

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