Category Archives: Second Amendment

Yet despite things seemingly going our way, I cant help but keep asking myself one question: Now what?

What should we freedom lovers who believe so strongly in defending our Second Amendment rights do next? Should we rest on our laurels? Or should we continue to fight, while we have the numbers, to not only maintain the status quo but gain back some of the valuable ground weve lost over the years? I strongly believe its the latter, and that maintaining and gaining ground requires a three-pronged approach: (1) keep giving, (2) keep communicating and voting, and (3) keep recruiting.

Keep Giving

Its human nature to figure that, since things seem to be going our way, we dont need to give quite as much money, time, and effort to support the organizations on the front lines of the battle for our Second Amendment rights. In reality, people get comfortable and dont feel their way of life is at risk, so they scale back their contributions. For those that are aware of this, and are willing, we need to dig deeper, and give more to compensate the natural decline.

Im guilty of feeling this way myself. But I know that now, more than ever, organizations like the NRA, the NSSF, and ASA need our support, especially financially. If donations go down, those who seek to curtail our gun rights only gain strength and momentum. So I encourage you all to continue supporting the organizations that do much of the heavy lifting in support of the Second Amendment.

Keep Communicating and Voting

We need to stay vigilant in communicating not only with each other but also with our legislators. Second Amendment supporters now have the pulpit, but if we stop conveying our desires to those who make and enforce our nations laws, we could lose ground even though we hold most of the cards. I implore all of you to stay on top of your legislators and let your voice be heard. Believe me when I tell you the other side will do all they can to make sure their voices, and wishes, dont fall on deaf ears.

We have two bills that should get voted on this year that take back some of the freedoms we have lost over the years: The Hearing Protection Act and the Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act of 2017. I encourage you to vote for Representatives that support these two bills and to vote against those who do not.

Keep Recruiting

I dont know if recruiting is the best word, but I do know this: Were going to ultimately lose the battle if we dont introduce more people to shootingespecially the younger generation. At age 54, I still vividly recall the day and the experience as a youth, when I took a hunter safety course and got a chance to shoot skeet for the first time. This is an opportunity for you to take someone you know shooting. It will be an experience they will always remember.

Formative experiences like this go a long way toward encouraging younger people to learn about and develop an affinity toward firearms and Second Amendment rights. And its precisely these young people well need to carry on the fight. Along with introducing younger people to shooting, supporting organizations such as the Friends of the NRA, which raises funds for the future of shooting sports, is very important.

Lets not forget the importance of introducing women to shooting. Its definitely something women can, and should, enjoy as well. This is evidenced by my wife, Cindy. She recently told me, I think its important, when introducing a new female shooter into the sport, that they are comfortable with the environment and the trainer, as well as the equipment. Its all part of the experience. Having equipment that best fits the new shooter, a respected and inviting range, and the right people, will make for a better experience.

I would encourage every shooter, male or female; to take a lady shooting and expose them to the activity/sport you enjoy so much yourselves. Maybe even teach them on a suppressed weapon, so they dont react to the bang and the recoil, which the suppressor helps mitigate. We need their support, and getting themas well as our youthaboard ensures the Second Amendment will remain strong. This will also create opportunities the whole family can enjoy.

So remember, the stakes are simply too high to let up. Even though the pendulum seems to be swinging our way at the moment, we need to play to win. Had the Falcons been playing to win-instead of playing not to lose in the second half of the Super Bowl they would be champions today! We have not won this battle. It is only half-time and we must play to win. We have to continue to give and give big; we have to communicate with our legislators and vote for our issues; we must make every effort to recruit and bring new people to the shooting sports. Lets play to win!

Marty Daniel is the president, CEO, and founder of Daniel Defense and a guest columnist for Bullet Points with AWR Hawkins.

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Marty Daniel We Have a Pro-Second Amendment President: Now What? - Breitbart News

Over the years, Ive developed an insufferable tic that I insist on fobbing off as a bad joke. Upon encountering someone going through seriously bad timescancer diagnosis, dead dog, divorce, child gone crazyI invariably blurt out, Well other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you like the play? In all these years, this has yet to inject a lick of levity. The punchline does not derive from the hilariously improbable notion that Mary Todd Lincolnafflicted with migraines, debilitating depression, racking physical pains, and what was likely a bipolar conditionmight actually have enjoyed anything. The play in question was Our American Cousin, which Mary Todd and her husband, Abraham Lincoln, were watching at Fords Theatre in Washington, D.C., when actor John Wilkes Booth shot and killed the president. Booth waited for the line that always got the loudest laughswhen a lovably loutish American proto-bro type calls a sniffy British dowager a sockdologizing old man-trapbefore aiming at Lincolns head and pulling the trigger. Bootha supporter of the Southern causedid notmiss.

Had Booth had at his disposal a sound suppressor for his pistol at the time, he would not have had to wait for the laughter. And Lincolns widow would not have had to ponder what a sockdologizing old man-trap was. More misogyny hiding behind humor, perhaps? If Booth had a silencer, he no doubt could have escaped. More than 150 years after the fact, another son of the SouthRepublican Congressmember Jeff Duncan from South Carolinahas introduced a bill that would have vastly improved Booths odds. Duncan is the proud author of the Hearing Protection Act, which would expedite and accelerate the sale of gun suppressorsalso known as silencersby exempting them from the additional layer of time-consuming background checks required by the National Firearms Act passed in 1934. According to Duncan, silencers are needed because shooting is notoriously hard on the hearing of those who shoot a lot. He also cites a study showing the number of violent crimes committed by people wielding silenced firearms can be counted on the fingers of one hand. Im sure theyre right about that. Theyre also right when they point outas they like to dothat more Americans are killed with hammers than by rifles. Its also beside thepoint.

Two weeks ago in Judge Brian Hills courtroom, I saw the real point during the triple-homicide trial of a man accused of killing noted Chinese herbalist Dr. Henry Han; his wife, Jennie Yu; and their 5-year-old child, Emily. Eight muffled bullets had been shot into the head of Emily and three each into the heads of her parents. Gruesome forensic photosshowing all 14 bullet entry woundswere splashed bigger than life up on the courtroom wall. This was one of those rare instances in which a silencer had, in fact, been used. The point was to help the killer get away withmurder.

Heres my point: Wearing earplugs and earmuffs significantly reduces hearing damage inflicted by shooting. It does not, however, help killers get away withmurder.

As usual, theres no shortage of grim ironies surrounding this legislation, which was supposed to have had its first committee hearing this past week. From the outset, the timing was awkward, coming on the first-year anniversary of the one-way shootout at the Orlando gay nightclub Pulse, which left 49 dead and 58 seriously wounded. The hearing was only postponed after a rage-addled Bernie Sanders supporter, James T. Hodgkinson, lit up a baseball field in Arlington, Virginia, last weekshooting rapid fire at members of the Republican congressional baseball team practicing for the big game the following night against their Democratic rivals. Just before the 66-year-old Hodgkinson began his rampage, he met none other than South Carolina Congressmember Duncan, author of the Hearing Protection Act, walking off the field. As Duncan and the shooter passed each other, Hodgkinson asked him, Excuse me, sir, whos practicing today? Democrats or Republicans? As Duncan recounted, I said, This is a Republican team, and he said, K, thanks. By the time Hodgkinson was done spraying the field, five people had been seriously wounded, including House Majority Whip SteveScalise.

The shooting has not shaken Duncans belief in the silencer bill. The gunman, Duncan observed blandly, did not use a silencer. Duncan added that Illinois, where Hodkinson is from, has some of the toughest gun control laws in the nation, yet even they failed to stop the allegedshooter.

Should the Hearing Protection Act be approved, it would repeal the outright silencer bans independently enacted by 11 states, most notably California and New York. So much for Southern conservatives passionate belief in states rights. It turns out there are roughly 1.3 million legally registered silencer owners in the United States. Should Duncans bill pass, all records of who own silencers will bedestroyed.

The Hearing Protection Act is part of a broader legislative package known euphoniously as the SHARE Actwhich stands for Sportsmens Heritage and Recreational Enhancement. Duncan is also the author of that. Included in SHARE are provisions to revoke bans on the sale of armor-piercing bullets. SHARE abolishes existing bans on the importation of elephant and polar bear body parts as big-game hunting trophies. It also contains unprecedented new protections for transporting guns and ammo across state lines. Should any law enforcement officer seek to enforce local prohibitions against certain guns or ammo being shipped through their jurisdiction, the officer could be personally sued for so doing. Thats radicalstuff.

The good news? No new date has yet been set for a hearing on the silencerbill.

So other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you like the play?

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Triple Homicide Collides with Second Amendment - Santa Barbara Independent

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CARMEL, Ind. - Organizations calling for stricter gun laws and Second Amendment supporters united Wednesday for National Ask Day.

The day is put on by the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Brady Organization and encourages parents to ask the caretakers of their children's friends if guns are stored safely in the home.

It may sound intrusive, but I think its totally appropriate to say, are there guns in the home? Are those guns locked up? Are they secure?'" gun advocate and founder of The Law Office of Guy A. Relford, Guy Relford, said. "And thats not an anti-gun message.Im the most ardent second amendment supporter there is, but I wouldnt hesitate to ask those questions. Just because I store my guns responsibly that doesnt mean everyone does, and if anyone is offended by that I dont think they are taking the safety of the child as their first priority.

Relford has taught gun safety for more than 20 years to children and adults. He said gun safety is a sometimes a difficult conversation for parents to have with their children, but it shouldn't be.

"I dont put gun safety in any different category than any other kind of safety whether youre talking about swimming pool safety or traffic safety," Relford said. "Your kids won't be under your belt all the time so those kids need to know how to react if they come across a gun."

The Pew Research Center said about a third of homes in America that have kids in them also have gun and a study recently published in the journal, "Pediatrics," found 1,300 children die from a gun-related injury each year.

Originally posted here:
National Ask Day unites Second Amendment supporters and groups calling for stricter gun laws - WTTV CBS4Indy

By Jacob Sullum Creators Syndicate

Philando Castile did what you are supposed to do if you have a concealed-carry permit and get pulled over by police: He let the officer know he had a gun.

Had Castile been less forthcoming, he would still be alive.

Last Friday, a Minnesota jury acquitted the cop who killed Castile of second-degree manslaughter, demonstrating once again how hard it is to hold police accountable when they use unnecessary force. The verdict also sends a chilling message to gun owners, since Castile is dead because he exercised his constitutional right to keep and bear arms.

Jeronimo Yanez, an officer employed by the St. Anthony, Minnesota, police department, stopped Castile around 9 p.m. on July 6 in Falcon Heights, a suburb of Minneapolis and St. Paul. The official reason was a nonfunctioning brake light.

The actual reason, according to Yanez, was that Castile resembled a suspect in a convenience store robbery that had happened four days before in the same neighborhood. The full extent of the resemblance was that Castile, like the suspect, was black, wore glasses and dreadlocks, and had a "wide-set nose."

Castile, a 32-year-old cafeteria manager, had nothing to do with the robbery. But in Yanez's mind, Castile posed a threat.

The traffic stop began politely but turned deadly within a minute. Audio and video of the encounter show that Yanez asked for Castile's proof of insurance and driver's license.

After Castile handed over his insurance card, he calmly informed Yanez, "Sir, I have to tell you that I do have a firearm on me." Yanez interrupted him, saying, "OK, don't reach for it, then."

Castile and his girlfriend, Diamond Reynolds, who was sitting in the front passenger seat, repeatedly assured the officer that Castile was not reaching for the weapon. But by now Yanez was in full panic mode.

"Don't pull it out!" he screamed, immediately drawing his weapon and firing seven rounds into the car, heedless of Reynolds and her 4-year-old daughter, who was in the backseat. Mortally wounded, Castile moaned and said, "I wasn't reaching for it."

Reynolds, who drew nationwide attention to the shooting by reporting it via Facebook Live immediately afterward, has consistently said Castile was reaching for his wallet to retrieve his driver's license, per Yanez's instructions. Yanez initially said he thought Castile was reaching for his gun; later he claimed to have seen Castile pulling out the pistol, which was found inside a front pocket on the right side of the dead man's shorts.

Yanez clearly acted out of fear. The question is whether that fear was reasonable in the circumstances and whether deadly force was the only way to address it.

Jeffrey Noble, an expert on police procedure, testified that Yanez's actions were "objectively unreasonable." The officer had "absolutely no reason" to view Castile as a robbery suspect, Noble said, and could have mitigated the threat he perceived by telling Castile to put his hands on the dashboard or stepping back from the car window.

If Castile planned to shoot Yanez, why would he announce that he had a firearm? That disclosure was obviously aimed at avoiding trouble but had the opposite effect because Yanez was not thinking clearly.

Officers like Yanez, who is leaving his department under a "voluntary separation agreement," pose a clear and present danger to law-abiding gun owners. Yet the National Rifle Association has been curiously reticent about the case.

The day after the shooting, the NRA said "the reports from Minnesota are troubling and must be thoroughly investigated." It promised "the NRA will have more to say once all the facts are known."

The reports have been investigated, and the facts are known. Yet the NRA has not added anything to the bland, noncommittal statement it made a year ago. You'd think "the nation's largest and oldest civil rights organization" would have more to say about an innocent man who was killed for exercising his Second Amendment rights.

Jacob Sullum (jsullum@reason.com) is a senior editor at Reason magazine. He writes for Creators Syndicate.

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Sullum: The NRA shuns a Second Amendment martyr - The Ledger

Photo: Cathy Zuraw / Hearst Connecticut Media

Second amendment group opposes lawsuit in Sandy Hook shooting

The Connecticut Citizens Defense League has filed a brief opposing a lawsuit that would hold manufacturers and sellers of the gun used in the 2012 Sandy Hook shooting liable for the crime.

The suit filed by the families of 10 victims argues that makers and distributors of the AR-15-style rifle used in the shooting recklessly marketed it to civilians, ignoring the risks that it would be misused. The suit was thrown out by a lower court, and the families have appealed to have it reinstated.

CCDLs brief against the reinstatement argues that the firearm is 25 percent as powerful as a regular hunting rifle, because it uses lightweight ammunition. It also states that crime statistics show that ordinary handguns are more than 15 times more likely to be used by mass shooters than the model of firearm chosen by Adam Lanza.

If the defendants are held liable in this case, then, it will set a precedent that would expose businesses to legal liability each time they sell virtually any type of firearm in Connecticut, the CCDL news release states.

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Second amendment group opposes lawsuit in Sandy Hook shooting - Danbury News Times

Republicans who had gathered for the morning workout before Thursday nights annual congressional baseball game were blunt about their sense of vulnerability.

Five people were shot at a morning practice about five miles from the Capitol, the police said.

The field was essentially a killing field, said Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, who was there when the shooting happened. You had no way to defend yourself.

The emboldened response on the right illustrated how much the center of gravity has shifted in the gun debate. As Republican lawmakers grow more uniformly conservative and centered outside urban areas, few prominent voices in the party are willing to support gun control measures.

This is a striking departure from recent political history, when clashes over gun rights often fell along regional rather than partisan lines. The Republican majorities on Capitol Hill have blocked every attempt to enact significant gun control legislation, most recently after the massacre of 49 people in an Orlando, Fla., nightclub last June. Measures to block people on the federal terrorism watch list from buying weapons and to close background-check loopholes failed in the Senate.

And that was before President Trump was elected with far more help from the National Rifle Association than Mitt Romney got in 2012. Mr. Trump received more money from the N.R.A. than any other outside group.

You came through big for me, and I am going to come through for you, he told N.R.A. members at the groups annual convention in April, the first time a president had addressed such a gathering in person since Ronald Reagan. The eight-year assault on your Second Amendment freedoms has come to a crashing end.

Witnesses describe the scene of the shooting that injured Representative Steve Scalise and others Wednesday morning. President Trump and Senator Bernie Sanders made statements.

With no appetite in Congress or the White House for restrictions on gun access, Democrats have become all but resigned to inaction. And with one of their colleagues in critical condition, many were muted on Wednesday.

The problem is that nobody looks for a middle ground, said Representative Steve Cohen, Democrat of Tennessee.

Mr. Cohen said part of the difficulty was that many Republicans in right-leaning districts are more afraid of conservative primary challengers than of Democrats in general elections. And few interest groups have as much clout among Republican primary voters as the N.R.A.

They have an N.R.A. rating they want to keep, he said.

Stymied in Washington, gun control activists have taken their fight to state capitals, city halls and corporate boardrooms.

This is a marathon, said Shannon Watts, who leads Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, a group that sprang up after the 2012 elementary school shooting in Newtown, Conn.

Ms. Watts reeled off the gun restrictions the group has helped enact since shifting its focus away from Congress. Seven states have passed laws tightening the sale of firearms at gun shows since the Newtown massacre, and retailers such as Target and Chipotle have begun asking patrons not to bring in weapons. Any new federal laws, she conceded, would take several more elections.

As for the calls from Republicans to empower more people to carry weapons, Ms. Watts said, if more guns and fewer laws was the best solution, we would be the safest country in the world.

But with death threats against members of Congress already on the rise before Wednesday, Republican leaders are in no mood to rethink their gun rights stances.

Mr. Garrett, who has received threats this year, said it was not only lawmakers who deserved the right to protect themselves.

There shouldnt be one standard for members of Congress and another for citizens who otherwise have the same right to self-defense, he said.

To many Republicans, the issue is fundamental.

Representative Mo Brooks of Alabama, who helped apply a tourniquet on Mr. Scalise, wasted no time dismissing a question at the Capitol about whether his views on gun rights had changed.

As with any constitutional provision in the Bill of Rights, there are adverse aspects to each of those rights that we enjoy as people, Mr. Brooks said. And what we just saw here is one of the bad side effects of someone not exercising those rights properly.

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A version of this article appears in print on June 15, 2017, on Page A18 of the New York edition with the headline: Their Own Targeted, G.O.P. Lawmakers Want Looser Gun Laws, Not Stricter Ones.

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Their Own Targeted, Republicans Want Looser Gun Laws, Not Stricter Ones - New York Times

At the center of the gun control debate, few things are as hotly disputed in the United States as the Constitution's Second Amendment.

History of the Second Amendment

The Second Amendment provides U.S. citizens the right to bear arms. Ratified in December 1791, the amendment says:

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.

James Madison originally proposed the Second Amendment shortly after the Constitution was officially ratified as a way to provide more power to state militias, which today are considered the National Guard. It was deemed a compromise between Federalists those who supported the Constitution as it was ratified and the anti-Federalists those who supported states having more power. Having just used guns and other arms to ward off the English, the amendment was originally created to give citizens the opportunity to fight back against a tyrannical federal government.

The U.S. Constitution guarantees the inalienable rights of citizens.

Interpretations of the Second Amendment

Since its ratification, Americans have been arguing over the amendment's meaning and interpretation. One side interprets the amendment to mean it provides for collective rights, while the opposing view is that it provides individual rights.

Those who take the collective side think the amendment gives each state the right to maintain and train formal militia units that can provide protection against an oppressive federal government. They argue the "well regulated militia" clause clearly means the right to bear arms should only be given to these organized groups. They believe this allows for only those in the official militia to carry guns legally, and say the federal government cannot abolish state militias.

Those with the opposite viewpoint believe the amendment gives every citizen the right to own guns, free of federal regulations, to protect themselves in the face of danger. The individualists believe the amendment's militia clause was never meant to restrict each citizen's rights to bear arms.

Both interpretations have helped shape the country's ongoing gun control debate. Those supporting an individual's right to own a gun, such as the National Rifle Association, argue that the Second Amendment should give all citizens, not just members of a militia, the right to own a gun. Those supporting stricter gun control, like the Brady Campaign, believe the Second Amendment isn't a blank check for anyone to own a gun. They feel that restrictions on firearms, such as who can have them, under what conditions, where they can be taken, and what types of firearms are available, are necessary.

The Supreme Court and the Second Amendment

While the right to bear arms is regularly debated in the court of public opinion, it is the Supreme Court whose opinion matters most. Yet despite an ongoing public battle over gun ownership rights, until recent years the Supreme Court had said very little on the issue.

The Supreme Court Building in Washington, D.C.

One of the first rulings came in 1876 in U.S. v. Cruikshank. The case involved members of the Ku Klux Klan not allowing black citizens the right to standard freedoms, such as the right to assembly and the right to bear arms. As part of the ruling, the court said the right of each individual to bear arms was not granted under the Constitution. Ten years later, the court affirmed the ruling in Presser v. Illinois when it said that the Second Amendment only limited the federal government from prohibiting gun ownership, not the states.

The Supreme Court took up the issue again in 1894 in Miller v. Texas. In this case, Dallas' Franklin Miller sued the state of Texas, arguing that despite state laws saying otherwise, he should have been able to carry a concealed weapon under Second Amendment protection. The court disagreed, saying the Second Amendment does not apply to state laws, like Texas' restrictions on carrying dangerous weapons.

All three of the cases heard before 1900 cemented the court's opinion that the Bill of Rights, and specifically the Second Amendment, does not prohibit states from setting their own rules on gun ownership.

Until recently, the Supreme Court hadn't ruled on the Second Amendment since U.S. v. Miller in 1939. In that case, Jack Miller and Frank Layton were arrested for carrying an unregistered sawed-off shotgun across state lines, which had been prohibited since the National Firearms Act was enacted five years earlier. Miller argued that the National Firearms Act violated their rights under the Second Amendment. The Supreme Court disagreed, however, saying "in the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of a 'shotgun having a barrel of less than eighteen inches in length' at this time has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument."

It would be nearly 70 years before the court took up the issue again, this time in the District of Columbia v. Heller in 2008. The case centered on Dick Heller, a licensed special police office in Washington, D.C., who challenged the nation's capital's handgun ban. For the first time, the Supreme Court ruled that despite state laws, individuals who were not part of a state militia did have the right to bear arms. As part of its ruling, the court wrote, "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."

The court would rule on the issue again two years later as part of McDonald v. City of Chicago, which challenged the city's ban on private handgun ownership. In a similar 5-to-4 ruling, the court affirmed its decision in the Heller case, saying the Second Amendment "applies equally to the federal government and the states."

Despite the recent rulings, the debate on gun control continues. Incidents like those in Aurora, Colo., and Sandy Hook, N.J., only serve as motivation for both sides to have their opinions heard and considered.

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The Second Amendment & the Right to Bear Arms

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Posted: Jun 18, 2017 12:01 AM

All lives matter. As do Second Amendment rights.

Which is why the killing of 32-year-old Philando Castile last July was disturbing, and the acquittal of St. Anthony, Minnesota, police officer Jeronimo Yanez, this past Friday, so troubling.

Castiles girlfriend, Diamond Reynolds, who live-streamed the chilling aftermath of the shooting on her cell phone, assumed the traffic stop was for a broken tail-light. But Officer Yanez, four years on the force, stopped Castile believing he might be the perpetrator of a recent robbery. Castile was not; he was merely the same race (black), roughly the same age, and had the same hair-style (dreadlocks).

Of course, many men in the Twin Cities metro area fit those characteristics.

Much about the incident remains unclear and in dispute. What seems indisputable is this: Philando Castile told the Latino officer that he was carrying a gun, for which he had a concealed carry permit. That doesnt sound like an admission someone would make if planning to whip out that pistol and start blasting away.

Also certain is the fact that Officer Yanez fired seven times into the automobile carrying Castile, Reynolds and Reynolds four-year-old daughter. Five bullets struck Castile, two in the heart. One bullet barely missed the toddler strapped into a car seat in the back. Castile later died at a local hospital.

The audio on the cellphone footage, which began after the shots were fired, has Yanez yelling: I told him not to reach for it! I told him to get his hand out.

You told him to get his I.D., sir, his drivers license, Ms. Reynolds responds, almost eerily calm. Please dont tell me, please dont tell me my boyfriend is gone. Please dont tell me hes gone. Please Jesus, no.

Yanez was charged with second-degree manslaughter and reckless discharge of a firearm. The officer testified in court that he fired his weapon after seeing part of the gun emerging from Castiles pocket. Reynolds told jurors that Castile was slowly pulling out his wallet in response to Officer Yanezs request, definitely not his handgun.

The jury was initially deadlocked, ten jurors voting to acquit and two to convict. But the judge urged them to continue deliberating. Though whites outnumbered African Americans on the jury five to one, some jurors told reporters that the two jurors initially favoring conviction were not the two black jurors.

Late in the deliberations, the jury requested to again review several videos introduced into evidence. The two videos the judge allowed them to re-watch were an interview of Diamond Reynolds and the dash-cam recording from the police car. The dash-cam recording has not been released to the public.

Last Friday, the jury unanimously acquitted Officer Yanez of all three charges.

Mistakes happen. Deadly ones, even. One can certainly sympathize with the plight of police fearing for their safety at traffic stops, which they know can turn deadly in an instant. Yet, law enforcement officers cannot go around blowing away innocent people because they are scared.

A young man who worked as a supervisor at a public school cafeteria and had no criminal record is dead. Many others black and white are dead in incidents that suspiciously lack good explanations. There is nothing in our American can-do spirit that accepts fatal errors. Especially repeated ones.

What to do?

Lets outfit police with body cameras. And lets write the rules for those cameras as voters in Ferguson, Missouri, did last April by passing a ballot initiative such that (1) police face repercussions for not having the cameras on, and (2) the footage is made publicly available, so people know there will be accountability and no cover-ups.

Then-President Obamas Justice Department investigated the 2014 shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson and found that Brown was at fault, as the aggressor, not the police officer. Had body cam footage been publicly released the riots that followed may not have erupted. Citizens would have been saved millions in property damage and spared the divide along racial and political lines all across the nation.

In other instances, body cams might help convict the cops.

Still, even with body camera footage available, it seems difficult to gain convictions against police when they clearly err by killing innocent folks. Numerous cases of police shooting unarmed men have been caught on video and yet either not resulted in officers being prosecuted or with officers acquitted of charges.

Like Officer Yanez, the officers are often removed from the police force. But too late.

Police need better training on how to protect both themselves and citizens they encounter. Too much of the current training appears to encourage a warrior ethic of shoot-first and ask-questions-later. In fact, Officer Yanez attended a controversial seminar called the Bulletproof Warrior in 2014, which some police forces have discouraged their officers from attending.

Yet, even with better training, and with cameras always rolling, the problem wont be solved completely. I do not have all the answers, but as Americans we must find those answers.

Rarely do I agree with Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson, but hes hard to rebut when, after police killed Philando Castile in Minnesota and Keith Lamont Scott in North Carolina, last year, he wrote, If you are a black man in America, exercising your constitutional right to keep and bear arms can be fatal.

Black lives matter. Blacks Second Amendment rights matter. If we cannot protect black lives and rights, we cannot protect white lives and rights. Much less all lives and rights.

Originally posted here:
Black Lives, and Black Second Amendment Rights, Matter - Townhall

BELCHERTOWN, Mass. (WWLP) A Springfield native, who gained national attention for his controversial politics, returned to western Massachusetts Saturday.

Former Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio is best known for his anti-immigration tactics, but on Saturday, he came to talk about a different controversial topic hes passionate about, Second Amendment rights. I had a posse of 3,000 people, I armed 500 to carry weapons. I believe citizens, private citizens should be able to carry weapons, he said.

Arpaio was one of several gun activists invited to speak at the fourth annual Second Amendment Rally at the Swift River Sportsmans Club in Belchertown Saturday.

Lou Hermanson told 22News, their goal is to educate others on what the right to bear arms means to them. There are so many people who are fighting against it, and not enough people for it. I think a lot of it is education, people dont understand what weapons can do, or what their use is for, he said.

One man from New Hampshire told 22News, hes a supporter of Second Amendment rights, but accepts the fact that many other New Englanders are not. Unfortunately, theyre misunderstanding the fact theyre law abiding citizens just like them. We respect their right if they dont agree with the Second Amendment, but they should respect ours that we do agree with it, he said.

The debate over the SecondAmendment has continued to heat up in recent years. According to the National Violence Archive, there have been 154 mass shootings this year alone.

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Former Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio returns to western Massachusetts for 2nd Amendment Rally - wwlp.com

A year ago, Democratic members of the U.S. House of Representatives staged a sit-in demanding a vote on federal gun-safety bills following the shootings at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando. The National Rifle Associations lobbying was largely blamed for no vote happening. But looking deeper, the Second Amendment, with the unique American individualism wrapped around it, underlies all. It is Americas fundamental gun problem.

As Michael Waldman at the Brennan Center for Justice suggests in Politico Magazine, the NRAs construing of the Second Amendment as an unconditional right to own and carry guns (a right beyond actual constitutional law in Supreme Court rulings) is why it thrives and has clout.

Without clout derived from Second Amendment hyperbole, we might not have, for instance, stand your ground laws in more than 20 states starting with Florida in 2005, laws that professors Cheng Cheng and Mark Hoekstra report in the Journal of Human Resources do not deter crime and are associated with more killing.

Pockets of America were waiting for the NRAs Second Amendment fertilizer.

For many gun advocates, the gun is an important aspect of ones identity and self-worth, a symbol of power and prowess in their cultural groups. Dan Kahan at Yale University with co-investigators studied gun-safety perceptions and wrote in the Journal of Empirical Legal Studies how those most likely to see guns as safest of all were the persons who need guns the most in order to occupy social roles and display individual virtues within their cultural communities.

Or, as the essayist Alec Wilkinson writes more starkly on The New Yorkers website, although the (gun) issue is treated as a right and a matter of democracy underlying all is that a gun is the most powerful device there is to accessorize the ego.

A gun owner carrying his semiautomatic long rifle into a family department store, like Target, in a state permitting such if asked why will likely say because it is his right. He is unlikely to reveal the self-gratification gained from demonstrating the prowess and power of his identity, gained from using the gun to accessorize the ego. The Second Amendment here is convenient clothing to cover deeper unspoken needs, needs that go beyond the understandable pleasures and functions of typical hunting, for instance.

Australia is often mentioned as an example of nationwide gun-safety legislation reducing gun violence. Following the 1996 massacre of 35 people in Port Arthur, Australia, the government swiftly passed substantial gun-safety legislation. And as Professors Simon Chapman, Philip Alpers and Michael Jones wrote in JAMAs June 2016 issue, (F)rom 1979-1996 (before gun law reforms), 13 fatal mass shootings occurred in Australia, whereas from 1997 through May 2016 (after gun-law reforms), no fatal mass shootings occurred.

But Australia also has nothing akin to the Second Amendment.

Anthropologist Abigail Kohn studied gun owners in the U.S. and Australia who were engaged in sport shooting. She describes in the Journal of Firearms and Public Policy (2004) how it is immediately apparent when speaking to American shooters that they find it impossible to separate their gun ownership, even their interest in sport shooting, from a particular moral discourse around self, home, family, and national identity.

And thus, American shooters are hostile to gun control because just as guns represent freedom, independence the best of American core values gun control represents trampling on those core values.

In contrast, the Australians view guns as inseparable from shooting sports. And perhaps most importantly, Australian shooters believe that attending to gun laws, respecting the concept of gun laws, is a crucial part of being a good shooter; this is the essence of civic duty that Australian shooters conflate with being a good Australian. While the Australian shooters thought some gun-safety policies were useless and stupid, they thought that overall gun-safety measures were a legitimate means by which the government can control the potential violence that guns can do.

Unlike Australia (itself an individualist-oriented country), America has the Second Amendment. And that amendment has fostered a unique individualism around the gun, an individualism perpetrating more harm than safety.

Maybe someday the Second Amendment will no longer reign as a prop serving other purposes and, thus, substantive federal gun-safety legislation happens. But as Professor Charles Collier wrote in Dissent Magazine: Unlimited gun violence is, for the foreseeable future, our (Americas) fate and our doom (and, in a sense, our punishment for (Second Amendment) rights-based hubris).

The Second Amendment, today, is a song of many distorted verses. A song of a uniquely American tragedy.

Fred Decker is a sociologist in Bowie, Md., with a background in health and social policy research. He wrote this for the Orlando Sentinel.

Originally posted here:
Second Amendment: An American tragedy | Local | azdailysun.com - Arizona Daily Sun