Press-Citizen Editorial Board: Gun safety rollback rolls Iowa the wrong way

Press-Citizen Editorial Board

Content Warning: This column discusses both gun violence and suicide.

Not even halfway through the year and it is already painful to watch the stories cycle in of lives lost to gun violence. With state leaders pulling back gun safety laws, we are concerned about the safety of our neighbors.

Since 2021 began, 12,283 U.S. deaths resulted from gun violence. According to the Gun Violence Archive, 5,353 were homicides, murders or unintentional. More than half of the total were suicides. The archive counts 148 mass shootings — incidents where four or more people were shot or killed. There have been 10 incidents that meet its standard for mass murder (four or more killed):

  1. A shooter killed five people in Rock Hill, S.C. A sixth person was shot and died from injuries at a hospital. The shooter killed himself.
  2. Police in Allen, Texas, reported a murder-suicide that left six people dead.
  3. A shooter opened fire at an Orange, California, office park, leaving four people dead and one wounded.
  4. A shooter in Essex, Maryland, killed his parents and two others, leaving a fifth wounded. 
  5. A gunman shot 10 people in a grocery store in Boulder, Colorado.
  6. A shooter killed eight people at three Atlanta-area spas.
  7. A shooter killed four people in Indianapolis.
  8. A shooter killed six people and injured another in Muskogee, Oklahoma. 
  9. Five were killed and one injured in Indianapolis.
  10. Five were killed and two were injured in Evanston, Illinois.

It's only April.

Long-barreled rifles (above) and AR pistols sit on display for sale Tuesday at L.E.P.D. Firearms and Range in Columbus, Ohio. President Joe Biden has issued two executive orders on firearms: one that would help stop the proliferation of "ghost guns," or guns assembled from kits with many components needed to complete a firearm but that lack a serial number that can be used to trace the firearm; and another rule that would effectively ban the use of a stabilizing arm brace on AR-style pistols, subjecting them to the same regulations as short-barreled rifles in the National Firearms Act.

Yet Iowa's Republican-led Legislature and Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds passed legislation allowing people to buy and carry handguns without first obtaining a permit. Starting July 1, a person can purchase a handgun in a private sale without having gone through the background check required of permit holders. 

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There are 15 other states that have approved the purchase and carry of guns without a permit, calling it “constitutional carry." These laws are supported by powerful gun lobbyists, the National Rifle Association and the gun industry.

Meanwhile, a USA Today/IPSOS poll, taken March 23 and 24, found that two-thirds of Americans do not support weaker gun laws. That study also reported that looser gun laws were among the top three reasons cited for the increase in mass shootings in the United States, along with mental health issues and racism/white supremacy.

Some historians and legal scholars believe that the Second Amendment ensures our right to own firearms. Others argue that states should have the right to regulate the purchase and use of those firearms. As citizens, whether we own a gun or not, shouldn’t we have the right to feel safe in our communities and not be confronted with armed fellow citizens at any moment? How are we to know if it’s a good guy with a gun or a bad guy? How do police know?

And, does the Second Amendment really guarantee unfettered access to as many guns as a person wants, including weapons of war designed to shoot 600 rounds per minute and as much ammo as they choose? The second and first amendments are often conflated, but — much like a person has to get a permit to protest, comply with all sorts of regulations when buying and driving a car, or even building or renovating a home —gun ownership must be regulated. 

If you want to own a gun, that's fine. But if you want to own five or 10 guns, that's materially different. If you want to own a handgun, rifle or shotgun, that's OK. But if you want to buy an AK-47 assault rifle or an Uzi submachine gun, then there needs to be more oversight.

The more power and ammo a person desires should merit more evaluation, particularly concerning what they plan to do with it. People who conceal-carry thinking they're going to be Olivia Benson or Jason Bourne in a shootout at the local grocery store should go through the same weapons training that a police officer goes through. Gun owners need to teach their children to respect guns, and they need to lock up their guns unless at the shooting range. 

Of course, we recognize that most gun owners practice safety. Most gun owners teach their kids the importance of gun ownership. Most gun owners keep their firearms locked up. But what about those who don't? What about the gun culture that is increasingly fetishizing and glamorizing guns? What about people who treat firearms as another line in the culture war, rather than the killing machines that they actually are? 

We’ve heard people say that nothing is ever going to change when it comes to more gun control. Some go on to explain that if it didn’t happen in 2012 after 20 white children at Sandy Hook Elementary School died in Newtown, Connecticut, it will never happen. They may be right, but that's a sad realization.

When Iowa law enforcement officers expressed concern about this change in the state’s law, the Legislature should have listened. It didn’t, and now we should all be worried.

The Iowa City Press-Citizen Editorial Board is a volunteer group of readers who meet weekly. They are Venise Berry, Dave Bright, Shams Ghoneim, Robert Goodfellow, Kylah Hedding, John Macatee and Jocelyn Roof.