New Democrat Update

COLUMBINE HIGH SCHOOL

The tragedy at Columbine High School is a devastating experience for the affected families and friends. All Coloradans and the rest of the nation are trying to make sense of the needless death of 12 innocent students and one teacher, as well as the hatred consuming the two killers. Sadly, all of them are gone and nothing can bring them back. The scars will be felt by many people for a very long time.

The only real way to get any meaning out of this awful calamity is for all of us to take a stand and do everything we can to minimize the chances that something like this will ever happen again. If we succeed, maybe something positive can come out of this terrible situation.

The first step on the long road to solving a problem is to admit we have one. When compared with other nations, the United States is tragically off the charts. Children here die from guns at a rate 12 timers higher than the combined totals of 25 other industrialized countries. In 1994 and 1995, we accounted for 86 percent of the world's youth firearm-related fatalities.

The equivalent of the Columbine massacre - 13 students killed by guns - occurs everyday in this country. According to the federal government, 10 percent of American schools experienced violent crime in 1997 - not surprising when, in a recent survey, almost six percent of all students said they carried a gun to high school within the last 30 days.

A recent Washington Post-ABC News poll revealed that one-third of teenagers say they have heard other students threatening to kill someone, 20 percent say they know someone who has brought a gun to school and one-half say it is easy for them to get one. Four of 10 believe they know a peer capable of doing something like Columbine. Just as important, there are no significant differences reported by students from urban, suburban or rural districts.

Without question, better parenting must be part of the solution. Mothers and fathers must spend more time paying attention, getting in touch, setting realistic limits and closely monitoring their children's media consumption. However, even that fundamental solution is not enough.

Public policy can and should play an important and effective supporting role in helping parents raise their children. One obvious way is to keep guns away from kids.

Even if 99.9 percent of parents across the country are successful, that still leaves 52,000 children who might fall through the cracks and have the potential to cause another catastrophe. Sadly, some teenagers will continue to be cruel to others and victims will seek ways to strike back. Government's job is to make sure that guns are not on their list of options, turning typical teenage antics into deadly behavior.

As is now being proposed, Democrats and Republicans in the state legislature should require the safe storage of firearms, (none of the states that have this legislation has had a school shooting incident), ban “straw purchases” (when qualified gun buyers get firearms for criminals and minors) and require background checks of people buying firearms at gun shows. Legislators should go a step further and put the licensing and registration of handguns on the table.

The National Rifle Association and their conservative allies in the legislature will surely make the same old tired arguments. They will say that now is not the time to argue this issue. It is irresponsible or distasteful to debate remedies while we are grieving. Besides, the above proposals will never solve the whole problem, may not work at all and criminals will ignore them anyway. If the children cannot get guns, they will use knives, pipe bombs or other weapons. Finally, the schools would be safe enough with armed guards and teachers carrying concealed weapons.

We should speak to those objections with some simple truths:

The best way to start the healing process is to confront this epidemic now. Responsible and substantive policy responses will show respect toward the victims and their families. We should honor the Columbine community by making sure that twelve students and a teacher did not entirely die in vain.

Americans have a proud history of responding to crises with swift action. Upton Sinclair’s novel, “The Jungle” resulted in food safety laws and the Selma-to-Montgomery civil rights march led to the Voting Rights Act. Closer to home a few years ago, Colorado's “Summer of Violence” motivated the legislature to create a progressive youth offender system.

Firearms do deserve special attention because they are much more deadly than weapons like knives or even pipe bombs. For obvious reasons, bank robbers or drive-by gangs strongly prefer guns.

Finally, we should not let the perfect be the enemy of the good. The current proposals will not solve the entire youth violence problem but represent a healthy step toward cutting it down to size.

For their part, conservatives should do some serious soul-searching about their belief that more guns will lead to less violence. Prior to the Columbine tragedy, the legislature and Gov. Owens were ready to “deregulate” the issuance of concealed-carry permits and prohibit lawsuits against gun manufacturers. While maintaining that these were good ideas unrelated to the massacre, they nonetheless backed off, indicating it would be “inappropriate” to debate firearm-related issues after the worst school shooting in American history. They have also said they do not expect to introduce similar proposals next year.

While their “this is not the time” argument holds no water, finger pointing serves no real purpose. However, as responsible citizens looking to the future, we must question their public policy reasoning.

Despite seven school shootings in other states over the last two years, the right wing made gun deregulation a significant part of their agenda this session. Colorado conservatives have an obligation to the public to fully explain their policy reversal. If other school shootings did not matter and these ideas are not relevant to what happened at Columbine anyway, what changed their minds? We suspect that at least part of the explanation is fear from an electorate that is now paying very close attention.

At the same time, while recognizing that the special interest lobbies are partly responsible for the gun epidemic we face today, blaming them is not enough. We must acknowledge that it was not NRA members who actually committed this heinous crime. Conservatives do have a point when they say “Values Matter.”

Moral relativism has provided much of the fuel behind many of our most intractable social problems. Traditional liberals must discard their misgivings about promoting sound values - even in public institutions. For example, Democrats should take State Senator Stan Matsunaka's (D-Loveland) lead and become advocates of character education in our schools - teaching basic civic virtues like courage, respect, responsibility, compassion and integrity. These values should be integrated in the school's curriculum and, more importantly, its culture.

Lt. Gov. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend made Maryland the first state in the country to implement character education on a statewide basis. Where instituted, surveys indicate that schools experience fewer disciplinary problems, increases in attendance and much less vandalism.

Of course, restricting access to guns and character education are only parts of the solution. But they are a start.

For the sake and safety of our children and the rest of us, we can only hope that all Coloradans and all Americans remain part of these and other important debates. We cannot let Columbine be the end - it must be the beginning!