When asked by Andrea Mitchell on MSNBC whether the problem of gun violence was all about guns or if there were other issues, such as mental health, Rep. John Lewis of Georgia, who was a black civil rights activist in the 1960’s and had been talking about the murders of Martin Luther King and Medgar Evers, decided to revoke the Second Amendment:
It’s not all guns. We must bring the issue of mental illness out into the sunlight, out of the shadow, out of the closet, deal with it, treat people, have centers where people can get the necessary help. But we can start by dealing with the issues of guns. There’s too many guns. The British are not coming. The Russians — the Russians are not coming. The British are not coming. We don’t need all these guns to kill people.
As Lewis likes to invoke history, it might be wise for him to brush up a little. After the Civil War, the Confederate States enacted the Black Codes. These codes forbid the new free blacks from having guns, leaving them vulnerable to organizations like the Ku Klux Klan, which pushed for these laws.
The Republicans in Congress pushed back with various measures: the Freedmen’s Bureau Bill, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, the 14th Amendment and the Civil Rights Act of 1870. President Grant, who went after the KKK with both barrels, served as president of the NRA.
It was the 14th Amendment that guaranteed equal protection of the laws, which meant gun control, which harmed Lewis’s forebears, was thrown out.
The same people like Lewis that want to eradicate gun ownership are the same people who endangered blacks 150 years ago. Before Lewis bloviates any farther, he might want to study his history so he doesn’t sound so uninformed.
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