Gun control measures discriminate against poor

Dear Editor, Re “LETTER: Second Amendment helped South suppress slave revolts,” by Stewart Dean, March 31, 2018: Dean left out the part about how the militias served a general policing function. Being that slavery was legal in the South at that time, rounding up runaway slaves, suppressing revolts, etc., would have fallen in the domain of their role. It was the reality of the times and using modern day values to politicize it is disingenuous.

Dean also ignores the welldocumented history of gun control as a means to control blacks, poor people, political opponents and other groups. See the academic works of Robert J. Cottrol, Joyce Lee Malcolm, and others on the intentional discrimination carried out through gun control. Listen to a historical summary by Malcolm on YouTube.

New York state’s Sullivan Act of 1911, with it’s creation of “may issue” pistol permits, was viewed as being written to protect state Sen. Timothy Sullivan while disarming his opponents, and as an anti-immigrant tool to disarm alleged “criminal elements.”

Today this discrimination continues primarily in the form of economic discrimination by pricing low-income individuals (particularly minority individuals) out of legal handgun ownership through sales restrictions on inexpensive handguns, onerous fees, taxes, training, and storage requirements. Low-income individuals are often those most in need of defensive handguns due to the lack of other security measures such as living in safe neighborhoods, alarms, guards, effective security doors and locks, and even effective police coverage.

Regarding the latter, police, despite their best intentions, have no legal liability for failing to protect individuals. Google “Warren v. District of Columbia” as an egregious example of how the courts see things. John Grossbohlin Kingston, N.Y.