Gun Violence
Floor Speech
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Mr. President, when I was young and going to grade school, we feared the bomb. We were in a cold war. We were given duck-and-cover drills to get under our desk just in case there might be a nuclear attack on the United States of America. That is imprinted in my mind to this day--the fear which we had about this threat to our safety.
I wish to read a commentary that is making the rounds with wide circulation by a mother who talks about a similar concern for her children. She writes:
Two weeks ago, my second and fourth grade daughters came home from school and
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told me they'd a ``code red drill in case someone tries to kill us. We had to all hide in the bathroom together and be really quiet. It was really scary but the teacher said if there was a real man with a gun trying to find us, she'd cover us up and protect us from him. [Her little boy] started crying. I tried to be brave.''
This mother goes on to write:
My 3-year-old nephew had the same drill at his preschool in Virginia. Three-year-old American babies and teachers--hiding in bathrooms, holding hands, preparing for death. We are saying to teachers: Arm yourselves and fight men with assault weapons because we are too cowardly to fight the gun lobby. We are saying to a terrified generation of American children--WE WILL NOT DO WHAT IT TAKES TO PROTECT YOU. WE WILL NOT EVEN TRY. So just be very quiet, hide and wait. Hold your breath. Shhh.
In the year 2013, the number of American police officers shot dead in the line of duty was 27--27, in 2013. In 2013, the number of preschoolers--that is, children under the age of 4--who were shot dead was 82; 27 American police officers, 82 children under the age of 4 were shot dead. We need to do better as a nation.
When I heard on the news this last Saturday that the monstrous tragedy in Oregon was the 45th--45th--school shooting this year in America, it broke my heart, and, more, it angered me.
In just a short while, in a few minutes, Members of the Senate Democratic caucus will come together outside of this building to talk about the need for America to take action to deal with gun violence. There are so many aspects of it.
I am honored to represent the city of Chicago, but having met with Mayor Rahm Emanuel yesterday, we have seen a 20-percent increase in gun violence and deaths this year, and in Milwaukee, a 100-percent increase over last year. In scores of other cities, there is the same phenomenon. The city of Chicago and many others will be flooded with guns.
When I met with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives in Chicago on Monday, I asked them: Where are all these guns coming from? And they told me they have analyzed the crime guns seized in the most violent areas of Chicago, and they found that 40 percent of those guns came from gun shows in Lake County, IN, just across the border from Chicago--40 percent of guns. We also know that we have a phenomenon where girlfriends and friends and family will go buy guns, because the criminal--the felon who wants to use those guns to terrorize and rob and kill--couldn't pass the test for purchasing a gun. It is known as a straw purchase. The girlfriend buys the gun and hands it over to the boyfriend who goes out and kills somebody. Well, there are things we can do to change this. We need to close the gun show loophole. It makes no sense that we don't even check the backgrounds of people who fill their trunks and their cars with firearms and ammunition at these gun shows. And yet when it comes to Federal licensed dealers, there has to be a background check. This gap in coverage accounts for 40 percent of the crime guns in the most dangerous neighborhoods in Chicago. So the gun show loophole needs to be closed.
We also need to make it clear that if you are going to make a straw purchase of a gun and do so for the purpose of giving it to someone who is going to use it in the commission of a crime, you will pay a heavy price for that, too.
I grew up in a family with a lot of members of my family owning firearms in downstate Illinois. It was common for families to go hunting, to go out for target practice, and there was a gun cabinet in most homes. When a little boy, sometimes a young girl, reached a certain age, they were taken out in a rite of passage to go hunting for the first time. It is a part of the culture where I grew up, and it is an acceptable part of the culture when those guns are used responsibly and safely.
I don't know a member of my family who would object to the following statement: No one who is a convicted felon or mentally unstable should be allowed to buy a gun in the United States. I don't know of a member of my family who would object to the notion that if you are going to buy a gun so someone you know can use it to commit a crime and kill someone, you are going to be punished. Those are the two things that we should start with when it comes to reducing gun violence. Those two provisions are not going to hurt any legitimate, responsible, legal gun owner. But they are going to keep guns out of the hands of those who would misuse them.
We have to restore some sense of order in this country, and we have to realize that when we reach the point that 3- and 4-year-olds are being killed in larger numbers each year by guns than even those brave men and women who serve in our police departments--when it has reached that point--clearly, Congress has to act. For Congress to act, we need to hear from the American people. If they share these feelings--if they share the feeling--we need to move forward as a nation and stop this senseless tragedy.
I hope that after we gather today on the floor, Members of the Senate will come together and talk about this issue, and that across America people will join us in this effort.
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