This essay tracks one man’s unique journey that began with his terrifying fear of guns. He morphed into a gun owner, competitive shooter, NRA Life Member and, most recently, advocate for sensible gun laws. His search for gun violence accountability revealed some unwitting but defiant contributors to the apocalyptic death and mayhem of the last two decades. The essay concludes with several ways forward for fellow Americans who are not content with only thoughts and prayers.
I. Unlikely shooter
My journey began when a military instructor shouted at me, “Step back from the line!” I froze.
I had failed to follow his order to grasp, load, and fire the weapon that I was too frightened to touch. I had received no prior training with that or any other weapon. Nevertheless, I marched alone on that cold winter weekend, while my officer-candidate classmates were on liberty.
After arriving at my first duty station, I embraced the reality that, if I froze like that again, someone’s life could be in danger. A senior enlisted mentor patiently took me under his wing. Within a year of my pistol paralysis, I had acquired the confidence and skill to compete in NRA-sanctioned military shooter matches. Realizing that shots to the head or vital organs are generally more fatal than elsewhere, I grasped the option to wound rather than kill.
During the remainder of my lone enlistment I logged the three consecutive years of qualifying as an expert, which were necessary for the “Silver E” distinction for qualifying military experts. Moreover, I amassed a shoebox full of medals won at numerous shooting matches, and became an NRA Life Member.
II. NRA for life
Once I’d chosen the path of a civilian career and family life, I made no time for shooting. Then, two things resurrected my attention to gun lore: the arrival of our four children, and an enduring NRA announcement. Turned off by the NRA’s evolving political posture, I sold three of the four guns I used for my military-era competitions, blocked the monthly arrival of the organization’s magazine in my family mailbox, and repeatedly attempted to exit the NRA.
For some half-dozen years, I snail-mailed the same resignation letter to the NRA. No response. What I did receive was its politically sinister claim: if a Democratic president were elected, “they will take away your guns.” This representative admonition effectively threatened my cherished competition weapon. The NRA apparently hoped to avoid hemorrhaging more gun owners like me, and to buoy its sagging membership–and leadership–numbers.
III. Personal responsibility
After my official retirement, I made two gun-accountability decisions.
First, I resolved to revive my gun proficiency. I sensed that when one possesses a gun and a brain, neither should be a relic. Too many owners learn the hard way that withered proficiency leads to criminals using victims’ guns against them. A major study found that “individuals in possession of a gun were 4.46 … times more likely to be shot in an assault than those not in possession.” It concluded that “[o]n average, guns did not protect those who possessed them from being shot in an assault. … Such users should reconsider their possession of guns or, at least, understand that regular possession necessitates careful safety countermeasures.” I thus opted against obtaining a concealed weapons permit, notwithstanding the recent Supreme Court holding that the beyond-home “proper-cause requirement … prevents law-abiding citizens with ordinary self-defense needs from exercising their right to keep and bear arms.”
Second, my writing career shifted to gun control advocacy. I penned a law journal article, magazine essays, op-eds and letters to the editor. One does not have to be a law professor to tread this path. One does have to be impassioned about the gun-violence crisis that impacts those who now stare at an empty chair—where their child, spouse, relative, or friend sat before committing suicide or being shot to death. Nearly 47,000 people died of gun-related injuries in the United States in 2023, according to the latest available statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That number has remained among the highest of annual totals on record.
IV. Research revelations
The research I conducted in my post-retirement career revealed a connection I would not have otherwise recognized; namely, that all three branches of the federal government have played a prominent role on our nation’s gun violence stage.
Congress
I wrote comprehensively about the congressional role in the heartbreaking gun-violence deluge of the last two decades: “Congress enacted the 2005 Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act [PLCAA]…. The gun industry dramatically increased its production, distribution, and marketing programs. … This uptick is especially evident in the U.S., during the last decade’s proliferation of assault rifles.” Furthermore, the international implications of America’s firearms industrial revolution are also striking.
Congress itself was affected by the post-2004 escalation of gun violence, including the attack on Congressman Steve Scalise. But no sitting member of Congress has personally endured the loss of a child, such as occurred at Sandy Hook, Uvalde, various universities and public spaces. Is that what it will take for Congress to revise the PLCAA? Today’s political polarization in Washington suggests that legislative repeal or compromise is not in our immediate future.
Supreme Court
The U.S. Supreme Court also played a supporting role in the drama of contemporary gun carnage. Its 2022 Bruen ruling changed the landscape of the nation’s local, state, and federal gun control laws.
Previously, gun control litigation chose from among the following three options. Did the challenged gun restraint alternatively: (1) present a rational relationship between the applicable law and the alleged deprivation of gun rights (lowest level of scrutiny); or (2) survive intermediate scrutiny of the particular law in question; or (3) survive strict scrutiny of the constitutionality of the regulation in question?
But with the Court’s splintered, five-opinion, three-dissent decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, the Court upended the prior state and lower federal court tiered-scrutiny approach. The Court substituted a novel historical approach to assessing the nation’s gun and ammunition laws, opening the door to an extremist interpretation of the Second Amendment. That replacement sounded the death knell of the measured-level-of-scrutiny yardstick. As a result, “[t]he government must … [now] justify its regulation by demonstrating that it is consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation. Only then may a court conclude that the individual’s [prosecutable] conduct falls outside the Second Amendment’s [protection]” (italics added).
The Court did not categorize the various types of chargeable criminal conduct that previously triggered the various levels of scrutiny. It did not define “Nation.” What is unlawful in one state, might not be so in another. Nor did the Court specify any relevant historical period. As acknowledged in Justice Barrett’s concurring opinion, there is “ongoing scholarly debate on whether courts should primarily rely on the prevailing understanding of an individual right when the … [applicable] Amendment was ratified in 1868 or when the Bill of Rights was ratified in 1791.” Erratic judges could, alternatively, opt for either of the post-World War I or II historical periods. Or the two decades since passage of the PLCAA, which triggered the 21st century’s frightening proliferation of guns and ammunition technology.
Executive Branch
This branch also shares accountability for the uniquely American scenario in which the gun homicide rate is 26 times that of other high-income countries and gun violence is the leading cause of child death. The children of an entire generation have now grown up with, and spent time cowering in, active shooter drills.
The federal government has unwittingly placed a bullseye on gun law enforcement and research. Under the current presidential administration:
- The 2023 White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention was shuttered.
- The prior Surgeon General’s advisory on gun violence and public healthwas taken down.
- Entire teams at the CDC’s Injury Center recently vanished. They collected data on violent death and injuries, such as suicides, domestic violence, firearm suicides and unintentional shootings. They studied gun deaths and injuries. That Center lost three-quarters of its staff.
- The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives budget was cut by 29%.
- Over $150 million in gun-relevant Justice Department grants were canceled. These grants were managed by the department’s Community Based Violence Intervention and Prevention Initiative. The government’s pennywise-but-pound-foolish cancellation impacts at least 65 community-based programs across 25 states.
- The Department of Education cut $1 billion in Safer Communities Act funding for school violence and student mental health.
The Trump administration has targeted those and other efforts to prevent gun violence in the U.S.
Altogether now…
Every day in the U.S., 327 people are shot; 117 will die. Every day in the U.S., 23 minors are shot. Now, federal cutbacks have “dramatically undermined the federal government’s capacity for an evidence-based approach, unwinding recent progress. … [Federal agencies have] also fired experts who were actively researching gun violence, which removed critical knowledge and experience and jeopardized important data collection systems that inform policymaking. And … they are trying to solidify the degradation of knowledge on gun violence by proposing … cuts [of] all funding for firearm injury and mortality prevention research and the national violent death reporting system.”
Unfortunately, states like California are already facing huge budget deficits, for years to come. Cash-strapped states will have to determine whether to allocate or divert funding to address not only the contemporary gun crisis, but also federal budget gaps that defy common sense.
V. Going beyond thoughts and prayers?
Many state and federal legislative bodies will remain Red, as a result of both the 2026 midterm elections and the 2028 general election. That prospect may doom any progress we could hope for, to confront the above-described federal cohort.
But you can take aim at all the smoking guns and scorched-earth body counts the nation bemoans each day. You don’t have to “do it all.” But doing nothing is not an option. British philosopher Edmund Burke said it best: “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men … do nothing.” Are you content with only thoughts and prayers as a response to today’s extraordinary uptick in gun violence?
I joined San Diegans for Gun Violence Prevention (SD4GVP) this year. It is a coalition of some twenty local, regional, and national groups. Its raison d’être is simple: to end gun violence. Specifically, “SD4GVP is a coalition of concerned citizens united to end gun violence in America. Our coalition includes representatives from many … organizations and individual citizens, just like you and me, who are stepping up to change our laws and prevent gun violence once and for all, through advocacy and education.” SD4GVP’s incredibly dedicated members include and invite local, regional, and national advocates from other prominent groups like Giffords and Brady.
I am not advocating that everyone follow the path I’ve chosen. Nor that other lawyer readers similarly resign their membership in the Supreme Court Bar. Forge your own path. We all have to pitch in, to find ways to actively address the gun violence of yesterday, today, and tomorrow. Here’s what you can do: contact your legislative representatives; vote for candidates with a record of gun violence prevention measures; and embrace the advocacy of your preferred gun violence prevention organization.
The various GVP entities typically provide convenient and doable action roadmaps. They encourage you to become active in GVP but do not require that you do so. You can commit to the extent that you feel comfortable, knowing that however you decide to get involved, you will be demonstrating that preventing gun violence is important to YOU.
Bill Slomanson is Distinguished Professor Emeritus, Thomas Jefferson School of Law.
photo credit: Everytown for Gun Safety