LETTERS

Teaching the Second Amendment?

Posted 5/12/15

To the Editor:

One hopes that, in addition to spelling, grammar and English composition, students learn critical thinking skills in school. Take the letter to the editor from Kaylee Beato, a …

This item is available in full to subscribers.

Please log in to continue

E-mail
Password
Log in
LETTERS

Teaching the Second Amendment?

Posted

To the Editor:

One hopes that, in addition to spelling, grammar and English composition, students learn critical thinking skills in school. Take the letter to the editor from Kaylee Beato, a student at Rogers Williams Middle School in Providence (“Stopping gun violence”, April 30th) as an example.

Miss Beato argues for legislation for an annual “state-wide Gun BuyBack Program” (sic). She believes this is “the start of a puzzle” of “innocent people dying because of [gun violence]” but acknowledges, “one of the main problems is that state officials are not enforcing gun laws”. Exactly how a voluntary gun buy program back addresses a lack of enforcing existing laws is unanswered.

Other questions a teacher should have asked: Will the guns be bought back at their fair market value or some arbitrary set price? If the latter, why would someone sell their gun?

Why would gang-bangers and drug dealers in Providence turn in their “community handguns” such as the 9 mm Glock Model 17 that was featured on the front page of a recent Sunday edition of the state’s daily newspaper? This gun was involved in five shootings and was traced back to an unreported theft in Warwick several years before.

Miss Beato acknowledges that gun buy backs are “usually sponsored by local businesses and private donors.” Her letter fails to identify a source of funding for a state-mandated annual buy back.

Miss Beato asks, “who would you need to protect yourself from, if there we no guns on the streets?” I suppose one shouldn’t expect a young student from Providence to understand that guns are also legally used for hunting and sport shooting. But the teacher correcting her letter should.

One should expect students will learn sometime during their school years that the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and Section 22, Article I of our state’s Constitution were put there to allow citizens to protect themselves from a tyrannical government and to avoid the need for a large standing army. I suspect that with today’s emphasis on training rather than educating students this is expecting too much.

Richard J. August

North Kingstown

Comments

1 comment on this item Please log in to comment by clicking here

  • davebarry109

    Great letter Richard. It is too much to expect teachers, nearly all liberals, to teach the 2nd amendment and the reason for it. They gloss over the parts of the constitution they disagree with. Even with the threat of ISIS on our shores, they continue to call for gun control.

    Thursday, May 14, 2015 Report this