Chicagoans Deserve a Fighting Chance

by Stacy Dittrich

The United States Supreme Court got it right. In an overwhelming decision on June 28, 2010, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of McDonald v. The City of Chicago, ending the toughest gun restriction laws in the country. Justices noted that "the plight of Chicagoans living in high-crime areas'' was highlighted by the legislators, who had compared the number of people murdered in Chicago to the number of soldiers killed in Afghanistan and Iraq, while also noting the majority of victims were minorities.

For 28-years, the city of Chicago refused to allow its citizens to honor the second amendment of our own Constitution which gives all citizens the right to bear arms. Residents of Chicago were allowed to have one shotgun in their home and it had to be locked up. They were allowed one handgun, but it wasn’t permitted to be loaded. What the heck is the point? For the unfortunate residents of Chicago that happen to be living among a cesspool of thugs, rapists, burglars, and home invaders their chances of protecting themselves were dismal at best.

“Excuse me, sir? You want to break into my home, rape my wife, and steal my belongings? Oh, can you wait a minute while I look for the key to my shotgun locker and find the bullets to load my handgun?”

It’s ridiculous.

“Readily available” is the point of having firearms inside your home. Chicago seemingly refuses to see that. Now that the Supreme Court has demolished their gun ban, they are going to great lengths to circumvent the ruling. Unveiling a new ordinance just days after the ruling, Mayor Richard Daley (pictured right) relented, but he continues to be a pain in the rear. The new ordinance requires owners to register their guns with the city, undergo an eyesight exam, be fingerprinted, go through extensive training, and keep all but one gun locked up—rules that typically are required for Concealed Carry laws, not owning a gun to keep in your home. Chicago’s crime rates are among the highest in the nation. With a population of over 2 million people, your chances of becoming a victim of a violent crime is 1 in 82—a horrific stat. Mayor Daley claimed the Supreme Court took a cheap shot at his city, which boasts a murder rate so far this year three times higher than New York City.

"To suggest that Chicago's elected officials haven't done enough to protect our city residents shows that many of our highest-level officials don't understand that gun violence pervades America and not just Chicago," Daley said. "Across the country, cities are struggling with how to address the issue. Common sense tells you we need fewer guns on the streets, not more guns."

“We don’t need more guns on the streets” is the repeated mantra. This is what I simply don’t get. It’s not rocket science here folks! The people we fear with guns are the same ones that possess them illegally. They are the crooks—the bad guys. They are the ones that couldn’t pass a background check to save their lives. You can turn a blind eye to the fact that they may, or may not, get their hands on guns, but the hardened truth is they are—and they will continue to do so. Why in the world would we not give John the banker or Susie the homemaker a fighting chance at survival if they find themselves facing some street thug with a handgun?

As a police officer, who do you think I was more leery of: John the banker who readily announces, “I have a concealed carry permit, ma’am,” or Ricky the robber who has outstanding arrest warrants and points an AK-47 at my face?

Perhaps our nation’s founding fathers were slightly more astute then we give them credit for. They drafted the Constitution during an era where people still said, “Please, thank you, and God.” Perhaps—just maybe, they saw our country’s future society dwindling and in great need of firearms for protection; the right to bear arms. Please, Mayor Daley, read the Constitution since you clearly haven’t as yet, and take your head out of the sand. The Supreme Court recognized that your city is in crisis, why haven't you?

Give your citizens a fighting chance.

Tweet

My gun, my rights

by Katherine Scardino

I live in the great State of Texas where the deer and the antelope play; where John Wayne defends the Alamo and guns are part of our culture. The small town where I grew up had guns in every pickup truck, in plain view. My father went "hunting” regularly with his “hunting dog” Carlo - and regularly brought back food for my mother to cook for our dinner. (Today, it would look like road kill, and I probably wouldn't even look at it, much less eat it!)

That's the history of guns in Texas. We had roses in our front yards and guns on our shoulders and hips. We can own almost any type of gun except a machine gun or a grenade launcher. In Texas, a loaded gun in the car has always been permissible if you are "traveling,” defined as driving from one county through another to a third county.

Of course, there's always been the other side of the barrel, the side that argues that an abundance of guns makes us less safe, placing all of us at greater risk. A lot of people believe that, but we didn't buy into that theory in Texas. Instead, the state passed new laws and began issuing concealed handgun licenses on January 1, 2006. Now, if you want to carry a gun in your car, you have to be licensed. This resulted in an interesting phenomenon: a class of people who have no criminal record and statistically no propensity for criminal activity carrying concealed weapons.

All of this gun stuff has a connection to the Constitution of the United States - the Second Amendment - which protects a right to keep and bear arms. The Second Amendment was adopted on December 15, 1791, along with the rest of the Bill of Rights. At the time, no one paid much attention to the Second Amendment, which 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.”

Of course, the situation varies state to state even county to county and city to city. For instance, in Arkansas, laws require that traveling be a journey of at least 21 miles before it is permissible to have a loaded gun in your auto. In the Wild West of New Mexico, concealed handguns are illegal, but one can be worn in plain view on the hip in a holster.Chicago passed an ordinance decreeing that “no person shall...possess...any firearm unless such person is the holder of a valid registration certificate for such firearm.” The code also prohibits registration of most handguns, which had the result of banning handgun possession by almost all of Chicago's residents. At least, that's the conclusion the U.S. Supreme Court came to in a June 2010 decision styled McDonald v. City of Chicago, Illinois, after Mr. McDonald and three other petitioners became concerned that they would not be able to protect themselves and their families from the bad guys and sued the city.

In a 5-4 vote, the Supreme Court declared that the “right to keep and bear arms,” as guaranteed by the Second Amendment, “applies equally to the federal government and the states.” The Second Amendment was appended to the Constitution to provide citizens with the means to protect themselves, and was meant to restrain overbearing legislatures at all levels of government bent upon interfering with the basic right to keep and bear arms, so states John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute. In keeping with this country’s historical roots and traditions, the Supreme Court’s decision ensures that state governments cannot ride roughshod over this bedrock principle of liberty - a right which predates the establishment of the United States.

So, what does all this do for us? Well, it means that the government cannot prohibit us from “bearing arms.” Does this mean we will have more crime? Actually, statistically, it means just the opposite. Someone told me one time that the crooks are concerned with people who carry a concealed weapon - they do not know whether their intended victims are armed. Not that this would be the only reason, but studies have shown that crime decreased after the concealed weapon laws were passed in various states.

Admittedly, there are criminals who could care less what the gun laws. The man who shot more than 20 people to death in

Luby’s in Killeen, Texas would not have paid any attention to a “No Guns” sign posted at the door. I cannot recall one of the many murder cases I have handled where the killer gave a second thought to whether his victim was armed. Usually, homicides are crimes of passion - the gun laws be damned.

I used to have a concealed weapon license and had a small handgun in my car. I liked it. I had the gun with me when I drove around at night. I never used it. I am not even sure if I could get it out of my car quickly enough if I was accosted by the proverbial bad guy. But, I didn't renew my license when it expired. I don't know why. I have heard so many stories about women being kidnapped, murdered, raped by bad guys wandering around in shopping center parking lots. That is a woman’s worst nightmare. I should have gotten it renewed.

Tweet