There was another shooting on a college campus this week. It appears to have been a gun battle between two men on Tuesday in Texas.
USA Today reported in a late afternoon posting on Tuesday, Jan. 22, that three people had been wounded, one a gunman. The report said two men apparently opened fire on each other in the library of the Lone Star College, North Harris campus near Houston, Texas, earlier that day.
Two of the Lone Star victims were bystanders; one was in critical condition. A fourth person at the scene suffered a heart attack.
A man suspected as being the second shooter, described as a black male, 18 to 20 years of age and wearing a red shirt and Atlanta Falcons cap, turned himself in later in the day.
This looks more like the kind of urban violence that accounts for so many of the gun deaths in this country than the slaughter of the innocent victims at Sandy Hook or Columbine.
But this episode also will be used to fuel demands for greater gun controls. And, conversely, it points out one ludicrous contention by many who would like to see gun laws totally expunged: the idea of allowing guns on college campuses.
Guns in the hands of trained professionals or a dedicated volunteer force would be one thing. But allowing any adult-aged student or visitor to carry guns on campus, carte blanche, would open the door to spread gun violence from drug-plagued streets to college hallways.
No matter your position on guns and the Second Amendment, you should be concerned about any action or proposed action that would encroach on American gun rights without following due process. If any Constitutional provision or amendment can be ignored or overruled, all are in jeopardy.
The Second Amendment is simple: “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.”
The nation’s high court has affirmed that the Second Amendment applies to the individual right to bear arms and not just some collective right for a state militia. But it’s one and the same. If disaster strikes and the authorities are unable to provide protection from looters, gangs or invaders, citizens in each community will band together and form a “well-regulated” militia if they are armed. And they will stand against any tyrannical government, as well, that would ever come to power in this nation, as unthinkable as that may be,
And according to a Jan. 18 Rasmussen Reports poll Americans get that.
Rasmussen says: Two-out-of-three Americans recognize that their constitutional right to own a gun was intended to ensure their freedom.”
The report says “65 percent of American adults think the purpose of the Second Amendment is to make sure that people are able to protect themselves from tyranny. Only 17 percent disagree, while another 18 percent are not sure.”
Having a gun at home slants the results of the poll: 72 percent of those with a gun in their family regard the Second Amendment as a protection against tyranny,” Rasmussen says. “However, even a majority (57 percent) of those without a gun in their home hold that view.”
In light of President Obama’s executive orders to establish new gun regulations without benefit of legislative action, you might think this was only a Republican issue. And, indeed, 75 percent of Republicans say the Second Amendment is designed for the people to defend themselves against governmental tyranny. But 54 percent of the Democrats agree with the GOP and 68 percent of unaligned voters also see the Second Amendment as protection against a tyrannical regime.
But after the massacre of babies in Newtown, Conn., 51 percent of those in the Rasmussen telephone poll advocate stricter gun control laws.
They support stronger background checks, but a plurality said dealing with mental health problems would be more effective.
It would be wise for the White House to take Rasmussen’s findings to heart. None of the proposed executive orders actually addresses security at our schools or curbing black-on-black violence in our urban ghettos. By focusing only on the rights of law-abiding Americans to keep and bear the arms that a majority believes protects us from tyranny, the president does damage to the mental health of the nation.