Commentary: There will never be ‘enough’ gun control for left

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Once again, our elected officials make their annual prayer to that well-worn graven idol of gun control legislation. This year, the villains are 3-D printed firearms, non-factory assembled firearms, “untraceable” firearms, or their components. Last year it was bump stocks, pistol grips, magazines and even an effort to require buyers to obtain permission from state officials in advance of purchase. Many of these efforts failed, others succeeded. Readers can be sure that some sort of repeat performance will be made each and every year.

Some of these measures were and are outrageous on their face; others, taken singly, may seem reasonable to some. But make no mistake about the intention: the goal is to chip away at our constitutional protections as communicated in the 2nd Amendment, to inure our citizens to ever-encroaching limits to the same, and lastly, to wear down the (up to now) robust citizen-led opposition to these attacks. Exotic, rarely owned items such as plastic guns are simply the initial, low-hanging fruit.

What is the end game? Fortunately for us, we have voices from the past and the present to inform us. The statements of the Founders and their contemporaries were in unison on the subject of citizen arms, yet one especially serves as a warning.

George Mason, father of the Bill of Rights: “When the resolution of enslaving America was formed in Great Britain, the British Parliament was advised by an artful man, who was then governor of Pennsylvania, to disarm the people; that it was the best and most effectual way to enslave them; but that they should not do it openly, but weaken them, and let them sink gradually.”

Even then, the art of incrementalism was not unknown as a tool of oppressive government.

On the steps to our own Legislative Hall last April, during a peaceful protest by opponents of the last round of gun control bills, one of our own legislators was caught on video stating (still available for viewing on YouTube as of this writing ), “watching this scene just makes me want to vote for every bill”.

Stop and think about that -the free, peaceable exercise of First Amendment principles is a motivation for action to restrict the Second? When you see or hear men in power wax flippant about our rights, or reveal their secret supplications of the heart, you should take them seriously.

Writer Harald Zeiger, who grew up behind the Iron Curtain, was expelled from the East German Navy and oppressed by the STASI (East German State Security, for the younger folks) for his public declaration of his Christian faith.

Eventually emigrating to America, Zeiger has said, “America is the greatest nation on Earth because it’s the only one with a First Amendment. We’re the only nation with a First Amendment because we’re the only one with a Second Amendment.”

Matt Bucher is a resident of Milford.

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