Ready on the right, ready on the left, ready on the firing line . . .

Stand down.

We have a second amendment to our federal constitution, and most states have constitutional provisions, that protect citizens' rights to possess firearms. The Supreme Court has upheld that right.  Sure there are nuances and interesting arguments to make, but it is fairly simple and straightforward in the eyes of the U. S. Supreme Court.

It is equally well settled that the federal government has the constitutional authority to reasonably regulate that right.  The Supreme Court has upheld that premise as well.

Politics makes strange bedfellows, but the history of gun rights and gun control discloses clandestine lovers worthy of exposure.

If you want to read a really good article on this, this article in Atlantic is great.  If you are a fan of lesser quality and fewer words, read on.

The second amendment is in the Bill of Rights of the U. S. Constitution, which was adopted a few years after the original document.  Our founding fathers limited the right at the time, contrary to the rhetoric of today.   Only qualified men could own and possess firearms.  In fact, eligible men were required to own and possess firearms  (interestingly, one of the earliest basis for the mandate for health insurance required in Obamacare).  Those eligible men who were required to possess firearms were also required to muster from time to time, with their weapons. They were required to register their ownership of the weapons. And you could only own a gun if you made oath to support the young government of our country.

The National Rifle Association came along after the Civil War.  One of the founders was a reporter with the New York Times. (Who would've thought?)   The NRA, in the early twentieth century, proposed and advocated many of the same gun control measures that are being debated right now. Registration. Permits required to carry concealed. Waiting periods. Eligibility requirements. All advocated, some even originated, in the NRA.  They supported these positions well into the 1960's.  They mostly just wanted gun owners to be better marksmen. It was embarrassing when we started getting into wars in other countries and so many of us were bad shots.  Weird, huh?

It gets weirder.

The original proponents of the modern second amendment gun rights movement were . . .the Black Panthers in California in the 1960's as inspired by Malcolm X.

The original opponent of the modern gun rights movement was .  .  .Ronald Reagan, governor of California.

It will be inspiring.  Alabama libertarians and California Black Panthers marching hand in hand to defend constitutional protections for all people.

And that's what makes America great . . . and a bit humorous sometimes.  C'mon, we gotta laugh at ourselves. Otherwise we're all gonna go crazy, if it's not too late.

What is not funny is that we are becoming callous to our children being killed.

Jesus said we can't serve two masters.  .   .

Neither the  Remington GameMaster that killed Martin Luther King back in 1968, nor the BushMaster used in Sandy Creek, nor any of the other inanimate instruments of deadly violence fashioned by the hands of man that have become the master to a few. Certainly not every gun owner.  But apparently to an increasingly scary few.

Guns don't kill people. People kill people.  There is a lot of truth in that bumper sticker.

When I was young I was fascinated with my dad's guns.  He was a quail hunter. I loved to watch him clean his shotguns. I can still smell the sharp odor of the cleaning fluid. I loved it when he let me shoot it.  And I will never know if he knew of all the times I snuck his shotguns or pistols outside while he was away and did a little target practice of my own. Or shoot a rattlesnake. But those are different stories. Don't tell anyone.

But one thing I do not have to guess about.  Guns were serious business. They were dangerous. He had me convinced they could jump off the wall and go off  unprovoked if I didn't show proper respect.  And to suggest that they would or should be used against another human being would have resulted . . .well I don't even want to think about what the results of that kind of talk would have been.

Would he have protected his family with his guns if it was necessary?

Probably.  If it was absolutely necessary.

But  not to protect his stuff.

And certainly not to attack his own country.  That's just crazy talk.  So I agree. It is true. It is not the inanimate guns that scare me so much.  It is the people who apparently worship them.

I watched an interview with some of the parents of children who were killed at Sandy Hook.  The talking head followed the interview by saying that the course of the gun control debate was solely in the hands of those parents at Sandy Hook. They would have to be the advocates. It was up to the victims to get something done.

What a sad thought. As if they were in this all alone, even more than the tragedy must have made them feel. As if that tragedy belonged only to them.  It belongs to all of us.  Gun advocates and gun control proponents.  It doesn't matter.  It is our country. It is our tragedy.  Surely we are better than that.   Surely we can work on this problem together.

 I don't know the answer.  But I do not accept that the daily tragedy of American gun violence can be excused as the price of freedom.  There is a reasonable solution that is consistent with the second amendment and our real history.

And I am sure we can begin to find it.  All sides together.

But not by looking through the cross hairs.

.