Another Week, Another Mass Shooting

(This photo from the scene of the latest mass shooting is from CNN.)

Mass shootings in the United States have become a common occurrence (although so common that only the worst ones are reported on in the mainstream media). Yesterday, the latest one occurred near the campus of the University of California. Why won't Americans (and their elected officials) do something to curb this violence?

The following is part of an editorial piece at the CNN website by Mark O'Mara (criminal defense attorney and CNN legal analyst). I found it particularly fitting at this time (and urge you to read the whole thing). Mr. O'Mara writes:

Another week in America, another mass shooting. . .

A friend of mine predicted that the United States would suffer probably 10 such shootings in 2014. I didn't want to believe him, but I knew it would be true.

It turns out we will suffer far more than 10. We've seen a shooting where an assailant targets multiple people somewhere in this country every week this year, according to the website Shootingtracker.com. Only a small number -- such as the recent FedEx shooting in Georgia, or those at Fort Hood, Texas, or Jewish facilities in Kansas -- will gain national attention.

We have a problem with gun violence in this country. I think this much is not in dispute. The real debate is this: What do we do about it? Unfortunately, most answers to this question involve greater governmental regulation and intrusion into our lives.

Americans are fiercely independent, sometimes to a fault, and we bristle at any effort seen as trampling our inalienable rights. But the freedoms guaranteed in our Constitution have never been unfettered. Each amendment in the Bill of Rights has spawned a legacy of case law that interprets, defines, refines and restricts our basic freedoms based on the values and needs of the people at the time. . .

The Constitution is not written in stone. It evolves as our society evolves. The Second Amendment is more complicated, however, because it deals with issues larger than freedom and oppression; it deals with life and death.

Buried in the Second Amendment is the right to self-defense, the very mechanism that allowed our Founding Fathers to win freedom from tyranny. Some argue it is the right that guarantees all other rights. Our forefathers wanted us to be able to protect ourselves against outside threats, and even from internal tyranny. They may have even intended us to be able to protect ourselves from each other.

It is a stretch to argue they intended guns to be so available, in such strength, that children, high-school populations and co-workers and law enforcement could be so easily slaughtered.

A gun in the hands of a law-abiding citizen is the perfect, unassailable instrument for self-defense and for the protection of one's family. To tell someone who is acting reasonably and rationally that they have to give up that right is unfathomable to the responsible gun owner. That's why gun rights advocates have such a negative response to any perceived restrictions on gun ownership: They know, without question, that they will only use their weapon properly.

But all too often guns are used improperly, without justification, with tragic results. While we have laws preventing convicted felons from legally owning guns, we live in a reality where even properly maintained guns wind up in the wrong hands, where the overly free commerce of firearms virtually assures that some of them will be used by people with criminal intentions.

Gun rights advocates often see a comment like that as an argument for further restriction on their use of weapons, but that's not the way I intend it. I myself am a responsible gun owner. I believe in the right to justified self-defense. I also believe that reasonable restrictions to assure that only law-abiding citizens can purchase firearms better prevents over-restriction of our Second Amendment.

Our Constitution is a resilient force, and our Bill of Rights has survived countless modifications and restrictions without the erosion of fundamental freedoms. Our Second Amendment right is no different: It can survive modification and restriction without the fear that it will vanish altogether. . .