Well, wouldn’t you know it? It seems Dick Cheney, the Republican nominee
for vice president, has grown on a number of issues — particularly guns.
The statists are having a field day with Cheney’s reversals on Head
Start, mandatory child vaccinations and the Department of Education. But,
most of all, they are celebrating Cheney’s cowardly flip-flop on the right
to bear arms.
Cheney now says he might support outlawing armor-piercing bullets and
plastic guns and definitely has no problem requiring trigger locks on
handguns.
I do have a problem with trigger locks. The issue is as phony as a
three-dollar bill. The whole concept is based on bogus statistics and faulty
thinking about the growth of homicides by juveniles.
Think about this. The gun-grabbers claim that juvenile homicide is a
result of too many firearms. I can prove that is not true. In the 17th and
18th centuries, there were no laws against minors owning and using guns.
Most boys did. In fact, Thomas Jefferson believed every 10-year-old boy
should be given a rifle, as his parents had given him.
Some of the American colonies had laws requiring every male over 16 to
own a gun for the purpose of militia service. Not only were juvenile
homicides practically unheard of during these years, murder of any kind was
extremely rare.
Most states did not ban juvenile firearms until the late 20th century —
ironically coinciding with the so-called upsurge in juvenile homicides.
The truth is there are still, relatively speaking, very few juvenile
homicides taking place in this country — certainly outside of major urban,
gang-infested environments. And, remember, trigger locks are only designed
to protect children from unintentional injuries and death from firearms.
How many of those are there?
Well, let’s see. In 1997, according to the National Center for Injury
Prevention and Control, about 1 percent of unintentional deaths were caused
by guns –a total of 981 of 95,644.
On the other hand:
- more than 44 times as many deaths were caused by automobile
accidents; - more than 12 times as many deaths were caused by falls;
- more than 10 times as many deaths were caused by poisonings;
- more than seven times as many deaths were caused by unspecified
means; - more than four times as many deaths were caused by accidental
suffocation; - more than four times as many deaths were caused by drowning;
- more than three times as many deaths were caused by fires;
- more than three times as many deaths were caused by the adverse
effects of medical care;
With all those accidental suffocations taking place out there — a
virtual epidemic, it seems to me — tell me why those who want to protect us
so badly are not trying to register or ban pillows? With all of those deaths
resulting from the adverse effects of medical care, why aren’t those Good
Samaritans trying to ban doctors and hospitals?
Perhaps I shouldn’t give the would-be tyrants any ideas. Because those
wacky ideas would have at least as much merit as the notion of banning guns
or requiring trigger locks.
I guess it’s time for another lesson on the Second Amendment. Because,
when you get right down to it, the statistics don’t really even matter. The
Constitution is clear.
“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.”
That’s what it says, in its entirety. What does it mean?
It’s quite simple. The founders recognized the principle that only an
armed populace would have a hope to remain a free people. Two things, they
said in the Second Amendment, could not be infringed by government: a
well-regulated militia and the right of the people to keep and bear arms.
The militia, in their eyes, was not a government force — not a National
Guard, not a standing army. It was the people. “Well-regulated” certainly
didn’t refer to government regulation. It meant orderly, disciplined,
efficient, reliable.
Dick Cheney may think he’s buying votes for his ticket by caving in on
such important principles. I say he’s sold out any principles he ever had.
