By Donald H. Smith

I am a law abiding NY citizen of 73 years. I was born and raised in the foothills of the Allegheny Mountains near the PA border. My parents worked hard to provide us with a minimal standard of living. Life was good to any kid growing up in that environment.

The family shotgun rested in the wash room next to the door. A box of shotgun shells were kept separately in the dining room cabinet on an upper shelf. My friends came and went on a daily basis and none of us even considered playing with the gun. It was “off limits,” and so were the shells. It was not until my father passed that I discovered a revolver in the dining room buffet beneath a pullout drawer. Its ammunition was found in a separate location.

I recall my father and brother going hunting on weekends. I was too young and stayed home. This suited my mother who grew up on a farm and detested the killing of animals, especially farm animals. She considered them her pets. I remember her telling about Papa killing “her” chickens for Mama to cook. She never ate meat, although she cooked plenty of it for the rest of the family. This may have contributed to her longevity. She lived with my wife and I until she passed at the age of 102. I eventually became old enough to take a Hunters Safety course. It was taught by my shop teacher who was also one of my paper customers. He was a strict teacher and took the course very seriously. Believe me, so did those of us who took his course.

Safety is not necessarily a natural instinct. It requires a parent’s or instructor’s diligence and the undivided attention of the student. I had been forewarned at home of the importance of taking gun safety seriously. So I was a willing student in the course.

I passed the course and was allowed to join my dad and brother when they went hunting. We couldn’t afford an extra gun, so I just tagged along. The best part was just being in the woods. When I was in high school, I was able to hunt alone. I often shouldered the shotgun and walked up the street past our K-12 school building. It was not unlike carrying a fishing rod in the village. Others did the same. A short walk and I was on the nearest hill.

I have never considered myself a “killer.” I have shot and killed a grouse, squirrel with a shotgun no less; never did that again, simply no sport to it, a turkey, a few pheasants and a deer. I’ve proven to myself that I can shoot accurately, so my shooting today occurs at the range with clay pigeons and paper targets.

I still look forward to hunting seasons so I have a good excuse to be in the woods. I enjoy the camaraderie of my friends, along with the beauty and solitude of the forest. Listen to the birds, see a few animals, especially when they don’t see me. My camera is now my “weapon” of choice. The last time I recall firing my shotgun was at a coyote chasing a deer while I sat in my chair trying to stay awake (naps are great in the woods).

My college roommate was from Smithtown, L.I. He grew up in a different environment and with a vastly different viewpoint on guns. We shared many interests, but one of them was not guns nor hunting. I can’t say he feared guns, but he could not see the logic of owning one. Our commonalities were in the field of science, music and food.

I believe this helps explain why the NY SAFE Act was acceptable to so many legislators from Downstate NY. This is not meant to be critical of those with a different point of view. But surely we all recognize that the same set of values are not shared by those in Upstate vs Downstate. What justification is there for a Downstater to subject those of us in Upstate to a set of regulations that may be suitable in New York City but make absolutely no sense to the majority of the state's Upstate citizens?

I sat recently with Senator Boyle and discussed that very issue. He explained that 2 of 3 of his constituents favor the SAFE Act. I believe this is due to their lack of understanding of the Act and its intrusions on the lives of law abiding citizens like myself.

It is my opinion the SAFE Act is NOT about gun control, but it is certainly about CONTROL.

Gun control in this state and country is not simply an attempt to outlaw 'scary' firearms. Autocratic states like New York have successfully regulated common sporting rifles and magazines under the guise of improving the safety of its citizens. But what is their ultimate agenda? Listen to the words of Sara Brady: "Our main agenda is to have all guns banned. We must use whatever means possible. It doesn't matter if you have to distort the facts or even lie. Our task of creating a socialist America can only succeed when those who would resist us have been totally disarmed." Source: Sara Brady, Chairman, Handgun Control Inc, to Senator Howard Metzenbaum The National Educator, January 1994, Page 3.

These are disconcerting words coming from the mouth of an American. Recall:

1] Chancellor Hitler in 1933: "This year will go down in history. For the first time, a civilized nation has full gun registration. Our streets will be safer, our police more efficient, and the world will follow our lead into the future!"

2] Senator Dianne Feinstein: “If I could have gotten 51 votes in the Senate of the United States, for an outright ban, picking up [every gun]… Mr. and Mrs. America, turn ‘em all in.” 

3] Governor Cuomo in December 2012: "Confiscation is an option".

Governor Cuomo claimed the federal government and other states would follow suit upon passage of the SAFE Act. He was wrong and remains so today.

California first introduced a so-called “assault weapons” ban in 1989 followed by Connecticut in 1993. The Connecticut ban did nothing to stop the horrific event in Newtown. The town had built a mental institution in 1933 where Adam Lanza might have been housed. Unfortunately the state closed it in 1975. NY State has followed a similar pattern in closing such facilities and exposing the public to potential danger. Consider these thoughts by David Kopel, who is research director of the Independence Institute in Colorado and co-author of the law school textbook, “Firearms Law and the Second Amendment” [Aspen, 2012].

His article in the Wall Street Journal, dated Dec.17, 2012, is entitled Guns, Mental Illness and Newtown. It points out that “none of the guns that the Newtown murderer used was on the ban list since those bans concentrate on guns’ cosmetics, such as whether the gun has a bayonet lug, rather than their function”.

Yes, the Bushmaster AR-15 and even the AK-47 are "military-style weapons." But the key word is "style"—they are similar to military guns in their cosmetics, but not in the way they operate. The guns covered by the original ban were not the fully automatic machine guns used by the military, but semiautomatic versions of those guns designed for non-military use.

The civilian version of the Bushmaster uses essentially the same types of bullets as small game hunting rifles, fires at the same rapidity (one bullet per pull of the trigger), and does the same damage. The civilian version of the AK-47 is similar, though it fires a much larger bullet—.30 inches in diameter, as opposed to the .223 inch rounds used by the Bushmaster. No self-respecting military in the world would use the civilian version of these guns.

The large-capacity ammunition magazines used by some of these killers are also misunderstood. The common perception that so-called "assault weapons" can hold larger magazines than hunting rifles is simply wrong. Any gun capable of holding a magazine can hold one of any size. That is true for handguns as well as rifles. A magazine, which is basically a metal box with a spring, is trivially easy to make and virtually impossible to stop criminals from obtaining. The 1994 legislation banned magazines holding more than 10 bullets yet had no effect on crime rates.

I have watched a demonstration where 3-ten round magazines were duct taped together side by side. Thirty rounds were first shot from a 30 round magazine. Then the 3-ten round magazines were used with the shooter interchanging magazines as quickly as possible. The time difference for the total of 30 rounds was approximately 2 seconds...barely noticeable.

Let's consider how effective the Clinton 1994 Assault Weapons ban was on curbing crime in the US. A series of studies concluded with a 2004 study led by Christopher S. Koper for the U.S. Dept. of Justice and this statement by Koper: “In general we found, really, very, very little evidence, almost none, that gun violence was becoming any less lethal or any less injurious during this time frame. So on balance, we concluded that the ban had not had a discernible impact on gun crime during the years it was in effect.”

Compared with 1993, the peak of U.S. gun homicides, the firearm homicide rate was 49% lower in 2010, and there were fewer deaths, even though the nation’s population grew. The victimization rate for other violent crimes with a firearm—assaults, robberies and sex crimes—was 75% lower in 2011 than in 1993. Violent non-fatal crime victimization overall (with or without a firearm) also is down markedly (72%) over two decades. Despite national attention to the issue of firearm violence, most Americans are unaware that gun crime is lower today than it was two decades ago. According to a new Pew Research Center survey, today 56% of Americans believe gun crime is higher than 20 years ago and only 12% think it is lower.

Mass shootings are a matter of great public interest and concern. They also are a relatively small share of shootings overall. According to a Bureau of Justice Statistics review, homicides that claimed at least three lives accounted for less than 1% of all homicide deaths from 1980 to 2008.

Safety can simply not be legislated with so-called “feel good” gun bills. Note that the Newtown, CT crime occurred in a “gun free zone”. Kopel continues: “Real gun-free zones are a wonderful idea, but they are only real if they are created by metal detectors backed up by armed guards. Pretend gun-free zones such as schools, movie theaters, shopping malls, etc, where law-abiding adults [who pass a fingerprint-based background check and a safety training class] are still disarmed. These pretend gun free zones are magnets for evildoers who know they will be able to murder at will with little threat of being fired upon”.

Again Kopel: “People who are serious about preventing the next Newtown should embrace much greater funding for mental health, strong laws for civil commitment of the violently mentally ill and stop kidding themselves that pretend gunfree zones will stop killers. Safety can simply not be legislated with so-called ‘feel good’ gun bills”.

I find it interesting that the national media chooses to magnify some shootings but ignore others. The ones they ignore involve armed citizens who were at the scene and thwarted the shooter’s attempt to continue killing. These include the Shoney’s Restaurant in Anniston, Ala. [1991]; the high school in Pearl, Miss. [1997]; the middle school dance in Edinboro, PA [1998]; and the New Life Church in Colorado Springs, CO [2007] where our son and his family live. These are but a few examples.

A deranged man with a gun entered the Clackamas Mall in Oregon a week before the Newtown, CT shooting. He killed two people, then saw a shopper pull a handgun on him and committed suicide before being shot. The shopper had a concealed carry permit.

Most recently there was a shooting in San Antonio, TX. A disgruntled boyfriend entered a restaurant and shot his ex-girlfriend. Patrons ran to a nearby theater (i.e. “gun-free zone”). The shooter followed them, intent on shooting them as well. An off-duty county deputy was in the theater. She pulled out her handgun and killed him. What is the lesson to be learned here? “Good guys with guns stop bad guys with guns”.

“The Copycat Effect: How the Media and Popular Culture Trigger the Mayhem in Tomorrow’s Headlines” was written by Loren Coleman in 2004. Kopel claims it shows that the copycat effect is as old as the media itself. He goes on to say that Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s 1774 classic, “the Sorrows of Young Werther” triggered a spate of copycat suicides all over Europe. But today the velocity and pervasiveness of the media make the problem much worse. Again, the exceptions are when a “good guy with a gun” shoots a “bad guy with a gun”.

Why does this discrepancy in reporting exist? Perhaps the media, like the legislators mentioned above, has an agenda of gun bans at the cost of our God-given rights protected by our Constitution. The same Constitution elected officials took an oath of office to defend. Many of our forefathers defended it with their lives. Now it is your turn, with your votes.

I respectfully request that you co-sponsor the FULL Repeal Bill in your house if you have not already done so. Then lobby your colleagues to vote to repeal the NY SAFE Act. Finally, vote to bring the repeal bill to the floor of your house for an up or down vote.