Posted on 02/05/2007 8:15:23 AM PST by kiriath_jearim
On New Year’s Eve, my friend and rowing teammate was killed by a gun in Dunbar. Regardless of who pulled the trigger, I blame the gun.
Guns were invented with the specific purpose to kill. People were not. Disturbed people pull triggers, but do not directly send speeding bullets through people’s skin and souls. My friend, University of Charleston alumna Lori Francis, is no longer living because she couldn’t stop the bullet that ended her life.
I wrote the Gazette in 2003 regarding a shooting at my graduate college, the Appalachian School of Law in Virginia. Ironically, I finished that submission two hours before I rode my bicycle toward my Lee St. apartment, past the Kanawha County Board of Education building, which was suffering after-affects of another school shooting. For the second time in two years, a former teacher of mine was shot.
I used to think school shootings followed me. But now, I realize that school shootings rather follow a national trend that shows no signs of slowing. It does not slow because the only solution is one that makes the most sense — but sounds the most ridiculous.
In my 2003 submission, I called for abolition of guns. I cited school and workplace shootings initiated by disturbed people, but concluded by bullets. I continue to call for the abolition of guns for the same reason that left my friend and her parents dead in their Dunbar apartment: Americans are in love with guns and are not brave enough to part with them.
The constitutionality of possible gun abolition would be an issue with many Americans who are law-abiding gun owners. But it is the courts that interpret the Constitution, not the popular vote. 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.” In United States v. Miller, the U.S. Supreme Court interpreted this provision to mean that citizens do not have an individual right to bear arms unless they possess “some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia.”
In United States v. Warin, the Sixth Circuit provided more context to this interpretation, stating: “Since the Second Amendment ... applies only to the right of the state to maintain a militia and not to the individual’s right to bear arms, there can be no serious claim to any express constitutional right to possess a firearm.” Neither Miller nor Warin has been overruled.
My distant ancestor, Major Gen. Ambrose Burnside, was the first president of the National Rifle Association. Gen. Burnside would have liked Lori Francis. He would have liked her heart and passion. Gen. Burnside would not like, however, what his organization has become and what it promotes. The NRA was founded by some old Army officers disappointed by their soldier’s marksmanship skills. Its purpose was “providing firearms training and encouraging interest in the shooting sports.” It is now a gun-promoting juggernaut that appears to suggest that teachers should be armed to combat the growing number of school shootings. I don’t think my ancestor would approve of the NRA’s solution to stopping violence in America today.
In the late 1990s, you may have seen Lori Francis rowing on the Kanawha River. She rowed hard and never complained. She rowed on a lightweight crew but had a heavyweight heart. She rowed with a peaceful fluidity. Lori will never row again as her dreams were cut short because of a gun. In 2007, more innocent people like Lori will die in West Virginia because of other guns. There will be several school and workplace shootings in 2007. People will die in those shootings because of guns. As usual, no one with power and influence will offer any solutions other than arming more people with more guns.
It’s about time the coxswains of our government do something about the guns that are shooting holes in the boat they command, which we call America. As they continue to promote more guns for more crime, our vessel of prosperity and peace continues to sink. How much longer can stubbornness for a misguided view of the Second Amendment keep us afloat? Sadly, not long enough for our society to ever row like Lori did.
[Burnside is a trial lawyer in Cleveland. He graduated from the University of Charleston in 1999 and was an employee of the West Virginia Senate and Kanawha County Public Defender’s Office.]
"Let's ignore reality" ping.
Another moron speaks out -- and again, people are not responsible for killing people. Maybe this leftist fool should be selling a bumper sticker that says...
** PUT GUNS IN JAIL, NOT PEOPLE **
Then why are there not millions of dead bodies piled up?
If the only reason to have a gun is to kill, why doesn't someone die everytime a gun is fired?
He doesn't blame the guy who killed his friend, he blames the gun...What an ass.
Yes, and I blame cars, alcohol, knives, pencils, and long, boring lectures for the deaths that resulted from their use, rather than blaming the persons who controlled these effective means of killing.
Freakin' moron.
Without a gun, it would be a can of gasoline and a lighter.
Murderous intent kills; inanimate objects do not.
Jeremy, professional help is available. You may want to consider committing yourself.
We all realize that reality is hard to take sometimes, but in the long run we are all better off when we come to terms with it.
Yup. It's the guns. Just last week, I caught my pistol trying to sneak out, headed for the playground about a block away.
Idiot alert.
Hmmm, not all guns kill people, just the ones used by people. Why not consider who pulled the trigger. If it was from a group that commits a lot of violence then why not just get rid of them?
Same logic
sorta
I note your lack of condemnation for the evil SUV's. Don't you know there is an epidemic (according to MSM) of SUVs going around killing people?
...and the proof is that NO murders took place before the gun was invented. /dripping sarc.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
Yeah no one was ever murdered prior to the invention of firearms. /s
I'm just speechless.
Because of nonsense like this I belong to the NRA and invite everyone to join.
The message: The Mandarins of the Law will tell the common people what the law means, even when the law clearly means somethng other than what they say. We lawyers have a duty to pervert the Constitution is we don't like what it means.
You sir are an idiot, The People Decide what the Constitution means not the courts, The Constitution is written in language for the common Man, not Scumbag lawyers in dresses,
The Jury shall decide on the Law as well as the facts in controversy.
John Jay
1st Supreme Court Justice
if the government controls the law as well as the facts permitted into evidence, then guilt or innocence is irrelevant
Libs love to anthropomorphize and vilify inanimate objects. Makes banning them easier.
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