The Civil Rights Coalition's Toby Leary and Massachusetts Coalition to Prevent Gun Violence head Ruth Zakarin recently squared off in an extended debate over Question 9 on this November's ballot, which would repeal the newest round of restrictions on gun owners in the state known as Chapter 135.
The 40-minute long debate can be viewed in its entirety on the CBS Boston website, and I wish that every Massachusetts resident would watch, as Leary did an excellent job in explaining why these laws are so off-base.
The big challenge for Leary and The Civil Rights Coalition is explaining to an audience that's comprised mostly of people who don't own guns why they should not only care about these laws, but why they should oppose them.
Throughout the debate, Leary kept hammering home the fact that Chapter 135 is aimed at those legal gun owners, not violent criminals.
"It's like trying to solve the problem of drunk driving by making it harder for sober people to go buy cars," he said at one point, which I think is a great analogy.
Zakarin responded by saying nothing Leary said made her feel any different about imposing those draconian laws on those who are trying to legally exercise their Second Amendment rights.
"Having regulations in place that help make folks more responsible gun owners is ultimately a very good thing."
As Leary noted, though, the vast majority of lawful gun owners in Massachusetts are already responsible. Criminalizing their possession of commonly owned arms, requiring them to register their guns, and even restricting what firearms non-residents can use for hunting or competitive shooting does nothing to make someone more responsible. Those laws just make it easier to charge someone with a crime for exercising their Second Amendment rights.
Leary also did his best to educate viewers on the underhanded way Chapter 135 was put in place, which included silencing gun owners during the legislative process and Gov. Maura Healey stepping in to retroactively include a preamble that allowed the laws to take immediate effect after The Civil Rights Campaign gathered enough signatures to put a repeal question on this year's ballot. Ordinarily that would have resulted in Chapter 135 being suspended until voters had a chance to weigh in, but with Healey's move the law was immediately enacted... though many portions were almost immediately suspended and put off by the governor through executive action.
Zakarin was able to avoid a direct response to Leary's explanation when the moderator switched gears and asked her about the motivation for the package of laws, which he described as a response to a Supreme Court decision that "liberalized access to certain kinds of weapons."
Zakarin agreed with that description, though the Bruen decision wasn't about access to certain kinds of weapons. It was about the ability to bear arms in self-defense without the state denying someone that right based on arbitrary and subjective licensing determinations. In her view, the Bruen response bill was about the need for a "comprehensive gun violence prevention" package to keep residents of the Commonwealth safe.
Safe from whom, exactly? Legal gun owners, apparently, since those are the only ones impacted by Chapter 135.
Leary did an outstanding job of explaining why Chapter 135 is aimed in the wrong direction, but given the anti-gun attitudes of so many Massachusetts residents I think The Civil Rights Coalition is still the underdog on Question 9. Still, with Healey actively campaigning to keep the laws in place and public sector unions spending hundreds of thousands of dollars in defense of the gun control package, I also suspect that the supporters of Chapter 135 know darn well their arguments don't stand up to much scrutiny.
Editor’s Note: The radical Left will stop at nothing to enact their extreme gun control agenda and strip us of our Second Amendment rights.
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