The recent and tragic mass shooting incidents in Texas and elsewhere have provoked new debate over “gun violence” (i.e., violent acts committed by people, using guns). It has also led to inevitable election year emotional demagoguery (“let’s ‘do something’ about increasing gun control, or else you don’t care about children”). Here are excerpts adapted from one email discussion that include remarks by QL members and former LPNY Chairs Mark Glogowski, and John Clifton:
Steve James:
…Let me expand on what I am proposing. I am saying repeal the second amendment that radicals have used to forbid any common-sense regulation of killing machines. Our country needs to do away with the militia amendment which is hopelessly out of date and adopt rules that license and regulate the use of these exponentially more lethal machines than the muskets of the authors of the constitution could possibly have imagined. We need about 300 million fewer guns in circulation, age limits, licensing that requires training, bonding, insurance, background checks so that guns are not sold to international and domestic terrorists, and other rules of use. The rules should be as restrictive as the rules for driving trucks and cars that are also lethal but not designed to be as dangerous as automatic weapons.
Canada and Mexico are far less dangerous than the US. We can debate the reasons why, but whatever the reasons, at the very minimum, we should have enough sense to not put assault weapons and 375 rounds of ammunition in the hands of teenagers.
If you want protection, use body armor and a helmet like our soldiers and SWAT teams. A killing machine will not protect you. That’s a fantasy.
One more thing. My nephew died by gun-related suicide or accident — no one knows for sure. “In 2020, 54% of all gun-related deaths in the U.S. were suicides (24,292), while 43% were murders (19,384), according to the CDC. The remaining gun deaths that year were unintentional (535), involved law enforcement (611) or had undetermined circumstances (400).” https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/02/03/what-the-data-says-about-gun-deaths-in-the-u-s/ Suicide or accident by gun takes a spilt second, often alcohol-related. That alone is a good reason to change the constitution, get rid of the militia amendment, and make guns available only to responsible, trained adults.
Mark Glogowski:
… Repealing the 2nd amendment is not necessary. No elected officials are enforcing it. They ignore the fact that the 10th amendment mentions specifically ‘restrictions’ in the constitution that governments must follow, especially the states. Your right to bear arms is a 9th 
amendment right. Sort of like your right to own property, and your right to raise your family as you please, and your right to accept any job that you want that someone would offer you, and your right to work, too relax, to interact with people you choose, your right to travel. These are all 9th amendment rights. But not one Grand Jury will protect them. Your right to use deadly force to protect those rights is part of the 10th amendment powers we never gave up. The same as the right to vote and choose individuals we want to place into office. If none of the rights alluded to in the 9th and 10th amendments mean anything to you, then by all means don’t get a weapon because when you completely lose your unenumerated rights, it probably won’t mean anything to you anyway.
As a Libertarian, I will not comply with any of the registration laws nor the requirements to have a license or permit. But I also will not violate the law. The consequence is, I am unarmed. If I see someone in trouble, being robbed, butalized, or a victim of any crime, I am going to look the other way, or flee. That is because people like you want honest people to be totally defenseless. Consequently, we have shootings, and murders, and muggings, and robberies galore – because good people have had their hands legally tied. A person who fires a warning shot to ward off a criminal will go to jail in most cities, almost 100% of the time. The criminal, who just robbed a store or shot someone will get away with it nearly 80% of the time (and that is giving the benefit of the doubt to the police and courts that they will do their job). I can cite many incidents – from Kathy Gifford to police strikes, to countries going 100% gun free, to prove that an armed citizenry, empowered to use weapons to defend themselves, their families, and their neighbors, will actually produce a more civil, peaceful society than all the gun restrictions in the world. Only honest people obey the law. Criminals are criminals and they want gun control. That makes their job much easier because they don’t have to worry about the ‘honest citizen’ interfering. So, next time you know of someone being shot, you can think of me, because if I were there, all I would do is watch, and I might even say to myself is – oh well,too bad for them. And I would move on as quickly as possible.
The violent world we live in was not created by Libertarians, it was created by people like you. Apparently you enjoy being powerless and want everyone else to be at the mercy of the no-goods in our society too. With every new gun restriction you are getting your dream come true. Can’t wait to hear of another shooting in a safe ‘gun free’ zone. What a utopia you seem to be creating.
John Clifton:
Steve clearly wants effective self defense to be a government privilege, not a basic right of a sovereign people whether government recognizes it or not. Which means, of course, a bureaucratic managerial elite will be deciding (and endlessly extending) the “common sense” restrictions that will be imposed upon the peasants. Would there have been a US at all, if the British regulars were appointed to be the deciders?
There are already over 300 “common sense” gun control laws at the federal, state or municipal levels. How much “common sense” do we actually need? The elite never answers this question, and just keeps on advocating to pile on more restrictions. Would we put up with 300 such restrictions on our 1st amendment rights, or our 4th amendment rights, and so on?
The notion that this nation is more gun-dangerous than other countries (such as our neighbors Mexico and Canada, or in terms of mass shootings) is vastly overstated. The Lott studies have shown the number of such shootings in the US is only 2% of mass shootings worldwide:
https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Comparing-the-Global-Rate-of-Mass-Public-Shootings-Lott/fbbbcb6b32e57c07334cfab0a1483063f5fa1a98
Finally, the point of specifying no infringements on keeping and bearing arms in the Bill of Rights, was to recognize the federal government did not have the authority under the Constitution to even be legislating in this area at all—it was reserved to the people, or the states. Currently, the states that recognize this Constitutional consideration have responded to the gun incidents by REMOVING gun restrictions, not adding more gun control freak laws to the books.
P.S.: Guns Prevent Thousands of Crimes Every Day, Research Shows
“Guns prevent an estimated 2.5 million crimes a year, or 6,849 every day. Most often, the gun is never fired, and no blood (including the criminal’s) is shed. Every year, 400,000 life-threatening violent crimes are prevented using firearms.”