Once again, on October 25, 2023, a deranged person with a gun walked into a public place (two places actually), this time in Lewiston, Maine, and shattered the lives of another two and a half dozen people. Eighteen died immediately or shortly afterward and 13 more were injured. These numbers don’t count the emotional casualties among the victims’ near kin.

On October 29, 2023, Jared Golden, Representative in Congress from Maine’s second district, emailed constituents the letter below (blue background). On October 30, 2023, I sent Rep. Golden the reply (yellow background) which follows his letter.

From Jared Golden:

Dear Mainer,

On Wednesday night, 18 Mainers were murdered and 13 others were wounded. Those who escaped unharmed are no doubt suffering from wounds that are not visible. And for the families of the victims – I recognize that there are no words and that try as we may, it is impossible to fully know or share their pain. 

I am not unfamiliar with violent death, nor am I unfamiliar with violence against innocent people. But I left much of my feelings about that behind in another part of the world and I buried those memories pretty deep. This tragic shooting has unburied those memories and carried a harsh reality about life, and about this world we live in, into the community that I call home and laid bare many reassuring lies that I have told myself for quite some time now. I recognize this dangerous world all too well, but I had convinced myself that we are protected against it here in Maine. Clearly we are not.

As you likely know, I have previously opposed calls to ban AR-15s or similar rifles. I am now joining the call to ban their sale and restrict the possession of them. Some people have accused me of trying to capitalize on this tragedy to push a liberal agenda – I am almost jealous of their ignorance – I hope they don’t have to learn the hard way how wrong they are as I have learned about myself this past week. 

It is not easy to admit being wrong. But I was. This represents a big policy shift for me and so I believe I owe you a full account of how this unfolded. 

I will begin with January 6, 2021. Remember that day? It was worse than you imagine and I think the country is fortunate that it wasn’t even worse. I left our nation’s capital thinking, for the first time, that large-scale partisan violence might actually be possible in America. Having fought in two wars involving partisans who warred against each other in their own communities, I can say confidently that you don’t want this in your community, it would be worse than you think. 

Like many elected officials, I received death threats after January 6. I went home and bought a handgun and later an A1 Government model rifle in 5.56 mm. I bought it because I am intimately familiar with it. With some modifications, it’s pretty much the same one I carried everywhere, and even slept next to, in Afghanistan and Iraq. I bought it to protect my wife, our home, and Rosemary, who was born in May 2021. 

I remain a strong believer in not only the right to self-defense but also, unfortunately, the necessity of it. This is what I believe to be at the heart of the Second Amendment. But anyone familiar with my legislative record would understand that I believe our Constitution and our courts seek to find a balance between the individual right and the public’s right for security and the obligation of the government to provide it. 

If you’d asked me Wednesday morning, I would have insisted on the righteousness of my previous position about rifles like the AR-15. By Thursday evening, that had changed. 

Wednesday evening, when I received word of a shooting at the bowling alley and the shelter in place order because it was an active shooter situation, the first thing that went through my mind is that the bowling alley is only a half mile from my home and that he might be in my neighborhood. I was unable to reach my wife until about 9 PM, almost two hours later. 

I spent all of Wednesday night and Thursday morning on the phone. I got on a flight to Boston with a plan to drive to Lewiston, check in on my wife and kid, and go to City Hall for a briefing on what was happening. During my drive, I learned that there would be a press conference and so I started thinking about what I would say to people who are more than my constituents, they are my neighbors. I wrote the remarks given at that press conference in the last 30 minutes of a two and a half hour drive. I knew that the question about the rifle used was going to come up and so I spent much of that drive thinking about it.

I looked at the photos of that man walking into the bowling alley. He held the rifle like, and had the walking stance of, a well-trained professional. I realized he was near the worse case scenario: armed with a rifle he was trained to use and gone crazy. 

I have often sat in restaurants or paced through the grocery store with my family, carrying a firearm for protection, and thought methodically through my reaction if a shooter walked in the door. My wife has asked me mid-thought what I was thinking about and I’ve replied “nothing,” or “don’t worry about it.” Sometimes I would tell myself to stop being paranoid – I don’t feel the slightest bit paranoid anymore. 

When I played those scenarios out in my mind they always ended well. But looking at those images last Thursday I realized how unreasonable that expectation is. Can a good guy with a gun stop a bad guy with a gun? Yes they can. But is it guaranteed to go that way? Absolutely not. Actually, it won’t without some serious good luck – right time, right place, right angle. Everything has to go right. 

The first question I asked myself on Thursday was would it make a difference to me, if I’d been there armed with my sidearm when that man walked in the door, whether or not he had an AR-15, some other rifle, or a shotgun? The answer is yes, in a life or death game of milliseconds and distance, it does make a difference. 

I know the counter argument. He could do it with other rifles. That’s true. But this style of rifle is near perfect for the rapid reacquisition of targets. The recoil more or less puts your muzzle right back on target if you know the proper technique. Coupled with a 30 round magazine of 5.56 or .223 that with muscle memory you can speed reload in seconds. That pop pop pop doesn’t make the eye blur or hardly distract your focus in the slightest. It’s near perfect and that’s why these killers keep using it to carry out these mass shootings.

The next question I asked myself is, what do I do now that I’m ready to admit this can happen in any neighborhood? Are guys like me going to have to start carrying AR-15s strapped over our shoulders like we strap handguns on our waists when we take the family out to eat, to buy groceries, go to the movies, drive them to school? If we have to for the protection of our loved ones a lot of us surely would. But is that the society we want for our families or for our kids’ future? For me, the answer to this question is an easy no. And by the way, like many of us just experienced, you can’t always be there. 

Do we want an increased police presence everywhere or a surveillance state that follows our every move? I don’t think so. And like many of you, I remain skeptical of the government’s ability to efficiently run complex programs and to do it equitably. I don’t think making it harder for the average American to buy guns is the right answer. I think it should remain fairly easy. Do we have great faith in the government to use laws, like red flag programs, in a timely manner, and always fairly? I think we all know it’s unreasonable to expect perfection – things fall through the cracks and authority sometimes overreaches.

I’ve come to believe that the easiest step we can take is the simplest solution: we should remove these deadliest of rifles from the equation. We should ban the further sale of them and, at a minimum, we should regulate the ongoing possession of them with a permit and a regular review process in order to keep them.

Last Wednesday night, I prayed for the safety of my wife and my daughter and I prayed for the lives of everyone caught in the sights of the shooter. I remember my friend and colleague praying that God would be their shield and blade. Later, I picked up a daily bible study, turned to October 25 and read. I said the Lord’s Prayer repeatedly. I asked for strength and grit. I prayed for wisdom and grace. 

Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about something the Marine Corps calls the Ladder of Accountability. The bottom four rungs of the ladder are behaviors that cause things to happen to you. They are: blame others, personal excuses, “I can’t”, and wait and hope. The top four rungs are for accountable behaviors such that things happen because of you – they lead to the “bell of success.” They are: acknowledge reality, “embrace it,” find solutions, and make it happen. 

The answer about what to do washed over me as I wrote my remarks on the way to Lewiston. I didn’t have the slightest clue what the answer was when I started typing, but it became clear to me that I’d been hanging on to the bottom four rungs of that ladder and terrible things happened to people in my community. Thursday night, I started climbing the Ladder of Accountability by accepting reality and embracing it. I’ve proposed a solution but I haven’t yet reached the top.

From David Woodbury to Rep. Golden:

Dear Representative Golden:
Your email of October 29 was poignantly sincere, an honest outpouring of frustration and commitment. It spurred me to spend today on the following, which I am also sending to Senators Collins and King with courtesy copies to Representative Pingree and Governor Mills:

It is time for a reasonable update to the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and I am here to propose one.

I have my own experience with an “assault” rifle, the M16 ( U.S. Army, 1970-1973). As a UMO-educated wildlife biologist, Registered Maine Guide, and DIFW hunter safety instructor in firearms, I of course have owned a few guns. Since leaving the Army, though, I nevertheless do not own, have never owned, and do not want to own a firearm with the M16’s capacity to inflict harm. (I lean toward revolvers and lever-action rifles.)

I am not a registered Republican or Democrat, nor am I a member of or aligned with any special-interest group such as the NRA or its detractors. I am also not a lawyer.

In order to be ratified, any proposed change that hopes to supersede the Second Amendment needs to infringe as little as possible on our present freedom while accomplishing enough to make a difference. A change in the Constitution to address gun ownership must be written in language so plain as to require no new federal agency, must be enforced with the absolute minimum of relevant regulations, and must result in no conflicting rulings by confused courts. It must also alter present rights so minimally that it meets the spirit of Falkland’s Maxim: When it is not necessary to change, it is necessary not to change.

Before considering the recommended amendment which follows, please give heed first to these realities behind the Second Amendment, which few Americans and members of Congress appear to understand:

A) In 1791, when the Second Amendment was ratified, the phrase, “a well regulated militia,” presumed that the borders of the United States were vulnerable to military invasion by land, and the right to keep and bear arms reflected George Washington’s opinion that “a free people should have sufficient arms and ammunition to maintain a status of independence from any who might attempt to abuse them…”

B) The Militia Act of 1903 redefined and recreated the well-regulated state militias as the National Guard (a term in use since 1824). This would seem to obviate any reason for individual citizens to remain armed for an invasion. In 1908 the prohibition against using the National Guard overseas was dropped, leaving one to wonder: If the National Guard is engaged abroad, who’s minding the store?

C) Article I Section 8 (11) of the Constitution provides that only Congress has the power to declare war.

D) Article 1, Section 8 (12) limits expenditures for a standing army to two years in the absence of a declared war. The last time Congress declared war on an enemy was in 1942. And yet, since the end of World War II we have maintained not just a standing army but a military force of ever-growing dimensions and presence in the world. None of the battles since 1945, in which we have sacrificed over 100,000 U.S. citizens wearing military uniforms in violation of Article I, Section 8 (12), have been considered wars worthy of a declaration by Congress.

E) The War Powers Resolution of 1973, later the War Powers Act, gave the President sole discretion to commit the United States to war. While then-President Nixon brought the Vietnam war to a close, every chief executive since then has enjoyed the power of a monarch almost as frightening as that of his majesty V. Putin — and not only the power to thrust us into war but the horrifying option to fail to act or go to Congress when the threat may call for action.

While I do believe the Second Amendment was intended to assure citizens the right to possess even the most sophisticated and deadly weapons of war when it was written — and, since it has not been rescinded or further amended, still does protect that right, it is lunacy for anyone to believe his possession of today’s high-tech armament will serve in any way to defend this country. The Second Amendment is obsolete in that regard.

What most people are now missing in their calls for restrictions on “assault” rifles and high-capacity magazines is that the Second Amendment still stands as the law of the land.

Many a modern “gun nut” perceives himself as a militia of one, since there is no longer a well-regulated citizen militia to join. A four-page excerpt from A History of Farmington [Maine], published in 1885, is posted at AlbertJayNock.org (https://albertjaynock.org/2021/03/15/a-well-regulated-militia/) and describes the general muster of the Farmington militia in 1799 under the authority of the governor of Massachusetts. The account given is actually humorous in exposing the lack of discipline among the men; Farmington, at the time, was just beginning to organize and regulate its militia.

Anyone who sees himself today as an army of one as well as any private militia of loosely-disciplined renegades is deluded about their potential effectiveness in defending this country from enemies both foreign and domestic.

I submit these guiding principles for any reconsideration of the Second Amendment:

Total gun registration in the United States is an idea as abhorrent as tattooing serial numbers on peoples’ foreheads.

Blaming gun or ammo manufacturers for homicides is as illogical as blaming car or tire manufacturers for multi-car pile-ups on foggy roads.

Abusive taxes on guns or ammo is as absurd an idea as abusive taxes on products that contribute to obesity.

There are two words in the phrase, gun violence. We must stop focusing solely on the first word. Eliminating guns does not eliminate violence, and we need to address that too, but separately.

So, yes, rescind/revise/replace the Second Amendment as written.

Rescind the War Powers Act as well and return that responsibility to Congress.

Preserve existing rulings by the Supreme Court and other relevant courts regarding the possession and carrying of firearms.

Recognize that Americans choose to live in environments of extreme contrast, from dense urban concentrations to sparsely populated wilderness, and the Constitution applies to all of them. Guns that are scary in one place ride safely in the rear windows of unlocked pickup trucks someplace else.

Acknowledge that guns are tools not only for self-defense but have many other practical as well as recreational uses, including — let us not forget — the Olympics (biathlon).

Face the fact that people intent on committing violence, whether against individuals or against gatherings, do so using any means they find convenient besides guns: fire, explosives, knives, vehicles, poisons, and more. You can’t prohibit all terrorist weapons or weapons of mass destruction without prohibiting the possession of a five-gallon can of gasoline.

Understand that in the relatively safe United States of fifty or more years ago, which we older citizens remember, a person who was generally deemed a serious threat to society was more likely than now to be committed to indefinite confinement or otherwise subdued, shamed, or repressed even though guilty of no crime greater than being scary. Much of our trouble today is a consequence of perhaps an over-zealous commitment to a citizen’s right to be scary, and so we no longer institutionalize people for that. In short, we have conceded that being irresponsible, unproductive, and dependent, not to mention being mentally ill, is not a crime. But it may not be advantageous to anyone if we assure everyone the right to bear arms.

Remember that the purpose of the Constitution is to restrict the reach and role of the federal government, not the people.

A replacement for the Second Amendment needs to stand the test of time. Therefore it must avoid reference to any specific weapon type which may become obsolete. Who can say that death rays and other weapons of imaginative fiction won’t one day become widely available?

These questions must be considered:

What to substitute for the all-inclusive word, “arms”? For the purpose of a new constitutional amendment I propose the word, “weapons.”

How can we define the scale or quantity of weaponry and ammunition that a citizen may possess? What is to be forbidden and why?

How do we assure that a citizen’s privacy regarding weapons will not be violated, as has already occurred where registration lists have been publicized?

How do we assure that a burdensome tax won’t be levied on a weapon or collection of weapons — an infringement that has thus far been avoided?

How do we avoid regulations requiring gun owners to purchase exorbitant premiums for required levels of liability insurance? (Remember that, with Obamacare, the Supreme Court ruled that required purchases from private companies constitute a tax.)

Here is what I propose as an amendment that stands a chance of ratification:

AMENDMENT XXVIII

Section 1.
The second article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States is hereby repealed.

Section 2.
The United States shall not infringe upon the right of a citizen to possess and to carry weapons designed for personal protection, hunting of wildlife, or other benign use.

Infringement consists of but is not limited to compulsory registration, coercive regulation, rationing of supplies, targeted taxation, and compulsory levies for indemnity.

A weapon with the capacity to inflict harm to human targets beyond the scope of personal protection may be subject to restriction and regulation as directed by Congress.

Section 3.
This amendment applies only to citizens of the United States. Congress shall identify circumstances under which non-citizens may possess weapons and under which any person may be denied protection under this amendment due to criminal record or state of incapacity.

Congress shall cause the creation and maintenance of an efficient and effective system to assure that weapons are not sold or transferred to persons who are not protected by this amendment.

Section 4.
This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by conventions in the several States, as provided in the Constitution, within seven years from the date of the submission hereof to the States by the Congress.

[END]

Constraints on regulation:
Under the language of this proposed amendment, benign use does not need to be spelled out in the Constitution but may include recreational shooting, competitive shooting, display, transport, gifting, and transferring to heirs.

Outside of gifting and transfer to heirs, the private sale of a weapon may or may not be regulated as Congress and the states may decide, provided that such regulation does not constitute registration.

State of incapacity may be understood to include a child too young to understand, a developmentally-delayed individual, or a person diagnosed with a mental illness, to name a few circumstances.

An efficient and effective background check system must be central and must be exempt from current regulations that prohibit sharing of pertinent information.

And there it is. Please, elected leaders, have at it!

Sincerely,
David A. Woodbury

= DAVID A. WOODBURY =