I’ve asked for permission to reprint this entire guest editorial from attorney and Oakton (MI) sociology and criminal justice teaching adjunct Chester Kulis, published in Wilmette Life. Nope. So I’m presenting the first few ‘graphs under the fair use provisions, so you can get a feel for Mr. Kulis’ argument, and then link over to the paper for the rest. As President Nixon said (with tremendous unintentional irony), I want to be perfectly clear: The Truth About Guns is catholic on gun issues. As a publisher, I welcome all perspectives on gun rights and responsibilities. That said, we have a strict anti-flaming policy: no flaming the website, its authors or fellow commentators. You are free to attack an argument as passionately as you please, but personal insults will be removed. Persistent offenders will be permanently banned from commenting.
I am a retired federal law enforcement officer who worked on gun-trafficking cases. My 20-year-old brother, Michael, was killed in an armed robbery on the CTA in 1972 when he was coming home from Loyola University. I have known several friends who were shot or killed with guns. I strongly support Chicago’s handgun ban.
Under Chicago’s gun ordinance, about 15,000 guns are seized and then melted down each year from individuals who were illegally carrying them in their cars or on the street. Many were involved in gang activity, assaults or domestic disturbances. Chicago citizens and police are better off with these guns destroyed. If these handguns were left in circulation, some no doubt would have been turned against us. Unlike Chicago, Memphis police resell confiscated guns. We now know what became of two of these recycled guns: One was involved in the shooting at the Pentagon, and another in the shooting at the federal court house in Las Vegas.
Where do guns in Chicago originate? They come from outside Chicago, often from the suburbs and from states like Mississippi and Alabama where there is no gun control whatsoever. The lack of meaningful gun regulation nationwide is the real “gun control” problem, not the Chicago ordinance.
The lead plaintiff in the challenge to the Chicago ordinance in the U.S. Supreme Court admitted that a few years ago a shotgun was stolen in a burglary of his house. If he had handguns, they too would now be on the street and be used against us law-abiding citizens. Stolen guns are one of many reasons Chicago is trying to cut down on guns in the home. A gun in the home is not the only way — or the wisest way — to protect our family.
Read the rest here.