We Must Pay Attention to the Rise of Gun Violence

Over a 48-hour period this Memorial Day weekend, 21 people were shot in New York City, six fatally. A gunman opened fire on a crowd in a shopping district in Queens and wounded five people. A 15-year-old was killed while leaving a party in Manhattan. A 13-year-old boy and a 15-year-old girl were wounded in Harlem.

This spring frenzy of gun violence has not been limited to New York. Other cities have experienced a similar rash of shootings. In one weekend in June, 14 people were shot to death in Los Angeles County. The police attributed the violence to gang activity. During the early morning hours of May 24, three men were shot to death in Philadelphia. Each was the victim of multiple bullet wounds. In the last weekend in May, seven people were killed and three were wounded in the District of Columbia in just nine hours. In a city where homicides had been on the decline in recent years, the number of D.C. murders surpassed the previous year's mark for May. A rash of shootings earlier this year caused the District's police chief to call a virtual "all hands on deck" alert to put as many officers on street duty as possible as a deterrent to more gun violence.

Regardless of whether the shootings were motivated by a gang rivalry, revenge or an unwelcome glance at someone else's girlfriend, the rampant gun violence plaguing our nation must stop. To do something about this scourge, we have to address its causes. There are more than 200 million privately owned firearms in the United States. Too many of these guns have ended up in the wrong hands. Congress's refusal to extend the Assault Weapons Ban didn't help. Since the ban expired in 2004, the number of deaths among children and teens from firearms increased for the first time since the ban was enacted in 1994. The June 26th Supreme Court ruling to strike down Washington, D.C.'s handgun ban dealt yet another blow to securing our children's safety from gun violence.

Putting a police officer on every street corner is not feasible and resorting to repressive measures would be abhorrent. But there are things we can do. Those who own guns should remove them from their homes so they are out of the reach of children and irresponsible adults. We don't need to read any more newspaper accounts like the one on June 9 when a 4-year-old girl in Columbia, South Carolina, pulled a gun from her grandmother's handbag and shot herself in the chest. We must urge Congress to impose common sense restrictions on the purchase and availability of firearms. Forty percent of all guns in the United States are purchased without a background check, including those bought at gun shows. Congress must enact legislation that closes the gun show loophole by requiring criminal background checks on those who purchase guns from unlicensed dealers.

There are a number of community-based models that can be replicated like the Boston Ten Point Coalition, an ecumenical Christian community, which achieved a 30-month moratorium on juvenile gun violence in that city. It focuses on developing Black and Latino youth, especially those at risk of violence, drug abuse and other destructive behaviors. The organization provides counseling in schools on peer conflict and gang mediation. Much of the group's work is done through home visits. In addition to faith institutions, the coalition includes community organizations, government agencies and local businesses.

The toxic elements of popular culture that celebrate violent behavior through the powerful media of music, movies and television are major contributors to the rise of gun violence. To counter the constant stream of brutal images our children witness daily, we must arm them with nonviolence strategies on how to resolve conflicts.

Each of us must do more to personally instill in our own children the values that will lead to the creation of safe communities. We need to mold them into healthy adults who are brought up with love, self-confidence and a generous spirit. As I've mentioned before, we need to bring back "Cradle Rolls" when a child born to anyone in our church community was immediately placed on this special list, and members of the congregation were responsible for following these children until they reached the "age of accountability." We need to extend the Cradle Roll to all our communities. And we need to enact common sense gun control measures.

The rise of gun violence in our communities is serious and dangerous, but we don't have to stand by as mere witnesses. We can do something about it. We must take action now to curb the threat that firearms pose to our nation. Too much is at stake. We cannot allow these shots to go unheard.

Marian Wright Edelman is President of the Children's Defense Fund and its Action Council whose Leave No Child Behind® mission is to ensure every child a Healthy Start, a Head Start, a Fair Start, a Safe Start and a Moral Start in life and successful passage to adulthood with the help of caring families and communities.

Mrs. Edelman will release her new book, The Sea Is So Wide and My Boat Is So Small: Charting a Course for the Next Generation, in September 2008. The book will be a look at what's been done and what still needs to be done to make our world safe and fair for all children.

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Comments

[Thirdpower]

Illinois Factoids according to the 2006 IL Uniform Crime Report and Chicago Crime Report.

Chicago has a HS drop out rate of 50%. 95% of murders this year have been committed by people w/ criminal records. Over 70% of victims have had records. Murder rates this year alone have risen 13% in the city with Robbery up 10%.

Illinois had a population of 12.8 million w/ a murder rate of 6.1/100K (780) .

Chicago had 22.2% of the population of Illinois yet accounted for 60% of murders w/ a per capita rate of 16.4/100K .

Cook County had 41.4% of the population of Illinois yet accounted for 73.6% of murders w/ a per capita rate of 10.83/100K .

The Cook County murders in raw number/per capita increased 4.4% and 4.9% respectively while arrest numbers and rates dropped over 18% from '05 to '06.

If Chicago were to fall into Lake Michigan, the Illinois murder rate would drop to 3.14.

Were the rest of Cook County to follow suit, the rate would drop to 2.74.

Guns are effectively banned in Chicago and severely restricted in Cook County.

Where's the problems again?

[djkrlsn]

Folks, how about a couple of completely off the wall ideas as far as dealing with violence in general: first, if convicted of a crime of violence--long very uncomfortable prison tern; second, if attacker is injured by victim--victim automatically gets all of attacker's assets and attacker and attacker's family are barred from suing victim.

[mrqapla]

1 million + dead in Iraq.
Trust the government?

[montestruc]

Laws against anything are only obeyed by the law abiding. Criminals obey laws only pragmatically, and it is easy to get away with owning a gun illegally, it is also easy to make money dealing in illegal guns, so all you are doing is creating a black market for criminals.

See "Carry A. Nation", and how much good prohibition did.

[rich3324]

Over half of all gun deaths are suicides. Rather than an intruder you are more likely to kill yourself.

[djkrlsn]

Rich--Japan and Russia have gun control laws the Brady campaign and the VPC can only dream about (you know the ones teenage males have that involve Sports Illustrated swimsuit models and Playboy bunnies) and suicide rates far higher than ours.

[T4Phage]

Being from Canada and now living in the united states I'm still baffled as to why americans are so in love with their guns....let's not forget that 99% of criminals are cowards (watch them crying when busted on cop reality shows) but they feel so powerful with a gun in their hands....because they can kill from a safe distance without getting their hands dirty, so to speak....but put a knife or a bat in their hands and suddenly they aren't quite as brave anymore or as apt to commit the brutal crimes...can you imagine a drive-by knifing ? kinda hard to picture isn't it ? as for the second commenly heard arguement i hear when discussing this with my new american friends and family...'we need our guns to protect us from the government' my god, do you really believe your little pistol would be mean anything if the government became an open dictatorship with the military backing them up ? lol that little part of the 2nd was intended to scare off King George back in the 1700s !!!!!

[djkrlsn]

Just a couple of points--just look how badly the Afghanis beat the USSR with WWI SMLEs (as well as what happened in Viet Nam)--so small arms are very effective at resisting modern armies, and firearms work just as well in the hands of the vicitims as they do for criminals (since armed victims tend to be far better with their firearms than criminals are)

[rektruax]

I understand your point, but you say this as if stricter gun laws were handed down, the criminal element that do drive-by's would magically become law abiding citizens. They won't. They'll find a way to get their firearms with little or no regard to the law... I assure you.

As for cowardice, I'd be very interested to see the reaction of some of these Marcy project gang-bangers (armed or not) when some Canadian calls them "cowards". You'll need more than a bat or knife. These kids don't care if they or you live or not. And unless they're dealing with an armed opponent, they're not afraid.


In fact, in many US cities, stricter gun laws are in effect, yet handgun violence is still on the rise... That alone speaks volumes.

[candyperfumegirl]

I see a lot of comments shifting the blame from guns to criminals. "Guns don"t cause violence, criminals do!" Maybe this is true. I have yet to see a gun fire itself. Generally, a person has to do that bit. It is no the guns themselves, but the people in possession of guns that have the potential to harm others. Whether or not they do so, it has been suggested, depends on whether they are "criminals", i.e. bad guys. Well, why are there bad guys anyway? Is it because our society is flawed and drives the desperate to crime? Or is it something in human nature that drives us to be violent? Either way, our society has criminals, and it will continue to produce criminals, and we are a long, long way from eliminating crime. So, for now, perhaps it is better not to arm the potentially violent? And I strongly suspect a person"s potential for violence increases when it is literally at their fingertips.

Let me put it another way. If "guns don"t kill people," but rather "apes with guns kill people," then perhaps we shouldn"t allow apes to have guns? Just a suggestion¦

[djkrlsn]

It is already illegal for felons to own firearms, so it look like we are at least trying to disarm the "apes"

[candyperfumegirl]

I agree that we should do background checks and all, but that's not quite what I meant. I was referencing a Charleston Heston statement, but perhaps it came out wrong. My point was only that if we want to prevent gun crime, we should not have guns. I read a few comments expressing the sentiment that guns are only a problem in the "wrong hands" as it were. I disagree with this because I think that it is hard to predict who's hands are the "wrong hands." I think firearms definitely increase people's ability to be destructive, whether they intend to engage in criminal activity or not. Now, given the number of gun related accidents, such as the young girl who accidentally shot herself in a Sam's Club, and other tragic events such as the school shootings that have happened over the last few years, I think it is safe to say that anyone's hands can be the wrong hands.

[Chrisallalone]

Ms. Edelman,

Thank you for bringing up the recent case in South Carolina of the woman and her 4-year-old granddaughter. This has been troubling me for weeks, especially followed so closely by the SCOTUS decision. I've read the comments here that talk about criminals being the real problem, not guns, but of course this woman was not a criminal in any way. She had a legal permit to carry a concealed weapon. I'm sure she imagined that she -- and perhaps her granddaughter -- would be safer because she was going to produce a weapon and scare off the bad guys. Look what it got her.

We have what I fear is largely a fantasy of frontier justice, wherein ladies in their fifties and sixties, say, or sleeping homeowners, can quickly and competently fend off armed bad guys who take us by surprise because our weapons are loaded and close at hand. I don't mean to deny that there are any such cases. But in the meantime, leaving criminals out of the picture, we also have suicides (>90% successful with a firearm), domestic violence, and granddaughters who shoot themselves at Sam's Club. How many of these incidents are to be considered acceptable in the name of this idealized notion that we'll all be safe as long as we're packing heat?

[djkrlsn]

While what happened at the Sam's Club was a tragic accident, it occured because Grandma made a major mistake--since her gun was in her purse--the grandmother should have been carrying the purse and not left it where the granddaughter had access. My oldest nephew just turned 8 (youngest is four), and the basic rule when the boys are around is that items that the boys are too young to handle safely are locked up or inaccessible--and with a 90 pound Labrador around most things that I have to worry about the boys getting into are normallly kept relatively inaccessible--and for those that are not familiar with Labs--their intelligence is comparable with that of toddlers and they are very inquisitive

[fsilber]

"To do something about this scourge, we have to address its causes." -- Availability of guns is not the cause of gun violence. The cause of the violence is the existence of living criminal gang members; they are what we must eliminate to reduce violence (by eliminating either their existence as criminals or their existence in general).

If one wants specifically to massively reduce gun violence without eliminating criminals, that answer is also obvious. One must give them an incentive to use other means to do their murders. Theoretically, this could be done by eliminating the availability of firearms, but we can no more do that than we can eliminate the availability of heroin and cocaine. A much more plausible approach would be to sharply reduce penalties applied to criminals who use something other than guns to commit murder.

In the mean time, the rest of us do need guns to defend our Constitutional Rights (right to control our own bodies, our privacy in the home, our right to travel freely, our right to freedom from unwarranted searches and seizures) from those who would infringe them (i.e. rapists, burglars, muggers, car-jackers).

[mamacat]

I don't have any answers. I am a long time gun owner, but I think that it should be possible to do something to minimise the number of handguns flooding the streets in our major cities. I just don't know what that thing, that needs to be done, is.

[CCW4ME2]

Marian Wright Edelman writes, " . . . . the rampant gun violence plaguing our nation must stop."
It's not GUN violence, it's CRIMINAL violence, Marian. You want background checks of gun buyers, why not background checks on everybody? If you can't pass a "Brady" background check you have two choices, move out or move to jail! Get rid of the criminals and you'll get rid of the crime, and not just "gun violence" but a lot of other crimes as well. There is NO Constitutionally protected right to reside in any particular place. Why blame the guns, why not blame the people? It makes absolutely no sense to say that a person can get out of jail after doing time for murder, assault, robbery, rape, etc. and move right into an apartment in New York City or Chicago or Washington D.C. and live their legally, but if a law abiding gun owner moves in next door and brings his gun with him is breaking the law. Who would you rather have as a next door neighbor, a violent ex-con or a law abiding gun owner with a clean record who has just passed a "Brady" background check?

[1will]

I absolutely love this column.
There is finally an anti gun group that says what it wants. They want all guns removed from the home. If only all of the anti gun groups were so honest.
I only wish this group would address the root cause of these shootings, the criminals. Somehow I doubt if the rest of us gave up our firearms the criminals would do the same.
Perhaps one day 80 million legal gun owners will not be blamed for the actions of a few thousand felons.

[djkrlsn]

at least she is honest,

[nogimmicks]

My friend was killed by five gunshots in the face. The gun was freely purchased by a depressed person. The Supreme Court did nothing to stop torture, violations of Constitution, privacy etc, but they were quick to change the status quo even further in the direction of guns. At least they are consistent: always 'pro-murder'.

[djkrlsn]

I have a problem with your phrasing--the SUpreme COurt is not pro murder, it is in favor of self defense

[Tubby]

Sorry, apparently you missed the Supreme Court decision the other day about the 2nd Ammendment.

Also, you fail to recognize the "Liberty Valence" dilemna. LV (Lee Marvin) used his gun to terrorize law abiding townsfolk. Ransom Stoddard (Jimmy Stewart), the new young lawyer, found out that his lawyering meant nothing against a gunfighter, and had to pick up a gun to defend himself. LV was ready to kill him out of hand, except John Wayne saved the day by using his own gun in the shadows. Remember that great flick? The point is, you can't rely on anyone else to save you in a pinch against an armed criminal. That's why good people feel secure having one in the house, or better yet, on their person.

[Tao21Zen]

Wow, you cite a number of killing by criminals unlawfully using illegal guns in cities that already have the strictest gun control laws on the books and honesty try to claim that this is why the rest of America should adopt the same draconian gun laws that turns law abiding citizen to innocent prey?

And, in the typical "bait and switch" anti-gun fear mongering tactic you mention the assault weapons ban as if it did anything at all to curb violence. Numerous unbiased studies, such as those by the DOJ, have shown that Assault Weapons (even before the ban) only accounted for less than 2% of a gun crimes.

It is not a matter of how many total guns are on the street, it is a matter of whose hands these guns are in. There have been numerous studies that have shown decreases in crime rates immediately following the enactment of concealed carry laws. Imagine that, more guns on the street in the hands of law abiding citizens and less violent crime.

The simple fact is, criminals will always illegally obtain and illegally use firearms. What we need to do is focus on dealing with these criminals themselves rather than passing laws that will only disarm the law abiding.

[nogimmicks]

So much for the Tao and Zen ideas.. The sentence "It is not a matter of how many total guns are on the street, it is a matter of whose hands these guns are in", shows that you are not familiar with the basic notion of statistics. The guns are evenly distributed between all kinds of 'hands': a child, picking a gun by mistake, angry, depressed or schizophrenic people, criminals, etc. etc. It is just a matter of likelyhood. Plus somebody who is perfectly fine today, goes insane tomorrow.

[BilCon]

to your points, nogimmicks:
The SCOTUS ruling on the 2nd amendment did not speak to reasonable limitations on who can and can not possess guns, nor did it remove the responsibility of the gun-owner to keep the guns out of the hands of children. It specifically stated in the majority opinion that there were no questions about restricting the ownership of guns to exclude felons and the mentally inferm, leaving those reasonable restrictions in tact. the only thing decided here is that "The People" have an individual right to keep and bear arms in their houses for self defense and for sport. The right to keep and bear arms does not, nor should it absolve the gun-owner from responsibility for the use of the arm.

[Tao21Zen]

Sorry to disappoint you but I have a lot of experience with statistics. I have a BS in Physics, a BS in Psychology, a minor is Philosophy, a MS in Business Administration and am currently working on a MS in Information Science.

Here are some statics for you. According to FBI DOJ crime statistics (sources cited below):

http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2006/data/table_05.html

2006 Violent crime rates (per 100,000)

Virginia = 282.2
Washington DC = 1,508.4

Washington DC had its outright ban on firearms meaning (for the most part) the only non-law enforcement individuals that had firearms were, by definition, criminals.
On the other hand, Virginia had (and still has) much more lax gun gun laws [which anti-gun folks claim puts "more guns on the street"] than Washington DC. In Virginia, a much greater number of firearms are in the hands of honest law abiding citizens than in DC. However, DC with its fewer guns that are disproportionately in the hands of criminals has over 5 times the violent crime rate of Virginia, which has many more guns that are mostly in the hands of law abiding citizens.