Marysville shooting calls for greater urgency on gun control; ‘Yes’ on I-594 | Letters

Published 6:18 pm Sunday, October 26, 2014

As I listen to coverage of the Marysville high school shooting, I am wondering, with great rage, how many more innocent people, and children, must die before gun control becomes a reality in this country.

Mr. Guard, no one is interested in depriving supervised young adults from safely hunting legal game with legal and appropriate hunting rifles. It is scare tactics such as those expressed in your article “As I See It” (“Madden’s first deer: Inside view of I-594,” Oct. 22, pg. 9) which will cause otherwise responsible people to defeat I-594.

This bill closes the loophole enabling anyone to purchase a gun, through the Internet or at a gun show, without a background check. It will save lives, as documented by other states which have enacted such legislation. That is a proven fact.

If Madden was to follow the exact letter of the bill, she might have had to wait a few days to bag the deer totally legally with her dad, the gun owner, or use her uncle’s gun. Is this small inconvenience worth the death of so many men, women and children?

Do you really think law enforcement on the island has any interest in putting legal hunters behind bars?

I think they have more pressing issues to occupy their time. Ask the parents of the dead Marysville children.

We are the only Western country which allows purchase of weapons, including automatic and assault weapons by anyone. And we call that “civilized?”

When the second amendment was written, obviously the authors did not have these weapons in mind, nor the large population of mentally ill or abusive people who now have access to weapons.

Marysville is very close to home. Two dead, three seriously wounded. A horrifying wake up call.

We need to pass I-594, as a first step to prevent the death and wounding of innocent people. No one, perhaps even those thrilled at the appearance of beautiful bucks on this island, wants to take hunting rifles away. Madden’s future killing of deer is not in jeopardy. But your life, or your child’s, may be.

Please, fellow islanders, pass I-594 before we have a replay of Marysville on the island, and happy stag hunting.

Marlynn Littauer/San Juan Island