The recent epidemic of shootings in the United States underlines again the horror of gun violence in America.
We stand out among western nations for the number of gun-related deaths in our country. Thus, the most recent statistics available show that, in 2005, 30,694 people died from firearm-related deaths in America; of that number, 12,352 were murdered; 17,002 killed themselves; 769 were killed accidentally and 330 died by police intervention.
The comparison with other countries is staggering. In 2004, firearms were used to murder 56 people in Australia, 184 in Canada, 73 in England an Wales, 37 in Sweden. And, in America, guns that year murdered 11,344 people.
These miserable statistics apparently are a direct result of the gun lobby's never-ending, successful crusade to intimidate our lawmakers and keep freedom to own and use guns intact. The argument that the Second Amendment to our Constitution makes it virtually impossible to enact strict gun controls is phony. That 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."
We're not fighting the Revolutionary War any more. We don't need militias to make us secure. King George died a long time ago. There are no more Red Coats or tax collectors roaming our roads and villages.
If Washington or Jefferson or Madison could have foreseen the way the Second Amendment has been distorted to justify anarchy and mayhem, they would have been aghast. The founding fathers drafted a document that promised peace and security to all citizens. The preamble to the Constitution made the purpose of our new government clear: "... to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity ..."
When Jiverly Wong, armed with two handguns, rushed into the center in Binghamton and mowed down 13 immigrants who yearned to be American citizens, was that securing for them "the Blessings of Liberty?" When Robert Stewart shot and killed eight people in Carthage, N.C., on March 29, was that insuring domestic tranquillity? On the same day, in Santa Clara, Calif., Devan Kalathal shot and killed his two children and three other relatives. Was that in the spirit of the Constitution? Other recent examples of where our leniency about guns leads us -- the fatal shooting of five students in a lecture hall at Northern Illinois University; the killing of nine people at Red Lake High school in Minnesota; the seven parishioners massacred by a fellow congregant in Wisconsin; the three police officers slain in Pittsburgh and the four shot in Oakland, Calif.
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We can go on and on. The gun lobby makes a mockery of our Constitution and Bill of Rights. The most basic right of all -- for all Americans -- is the right to live in peace. The founding fathers never intended to protect maniacs armed with guns.
Somehow, President Obama and the governors and mayors of America must find a way to start getting guns off the streets. That these massacres continue to occur is a disgrace. We have to find a way to hunt down illegal weapons and destroy them. We owe that to our posterity, and especially to our children.
