Listen to the Professor
Don't automatically assume…
Bob Cottrol is a remarkable fellow by anyone’s standards — a chair at the George Washington University Law School, an occasional speaker at the annual Gun Rights Policy Conference, author and a guy with whom this correspondent has had some insightful chats about gun ownership and the right to keep and bear arms.
Not What You’d Think
As noted in his biography, he supports background checks to prevent gun acquisition by convicted felons. We don’t see eye-to-eye on this one as I’m not sure convicted felons bother with background checks, and it’s sort of like having to prove you’re innocent in order to exercise a constitutionally protected right. Aside from this point, he argues “that law-abiding citizens should have ready access to guns ‘for self-defense.’ He says that minorities in particular need them to counter the threat of harsh treatment in racist cultures,” his biography says.
At the end of the day, he’s a guy who makes anti-gunners a little uneasy, if not downright squirm. Prior to his tenure at George Washington, he taught at Rutgers University and Boston College, and as noted by The Federalist Society, “His writings on law and history have appeared in the Yale Law Journal, Georgetown Law Journal, American Journal of Legal History, Law and Society Review, Slavery and Abolition: A Journal of Slave and Post-Slave Studies and American Quarterly.”
Cottrol’s advice to Second Amendment activists heading into 2025 is pretty simple — Learn to reach out to liberal gun owners, find ways to accommodate their “other issues” while reminding them of the right to keep and bear arms shouldn’t really be just a conservative issue. The Second Amendment belongs to everybody.
“I think people need to be proactive in searching out opportunities to educate the public,” he observed, “particularly the non-gun owning public and people not engaged in the Second Amendment (fight).”
No Dems
Cottrol is quick to acknowledge that in politics, there are very few, if any, strong pro-gun Democrats on Capitol Hill anymore. A generation ago there were, but the party has drifted as the recent elections reminded us. But that’s the difference between what’s going on inside the Beltway and out here where the people reside.
“I think the Second Amendment enjoys overwhelming majority support (among the American public),” he says, subsequently stating as an example, “My sense from the polls is that the public no longer buys the notion of banning so-called ‘assault weapons.’”
Ever the educator, Cottrol has his students read his book on the Second Amendment and examine 21st Century Second Amendment cases — Heller (2008), McDonald (2010), Caetano (2016) and Bruen (2022) — which have reinforced the individual right to keep and bear arms, including non-firearms (“all instruments that constitute bearable arms,” as noted by Justia). The good news is that every law school now must deal with those Supreme Court rulings.
“They’re teaching the Second Amendment at a lot of schools,” Cottrol said. “I know people who have been teaching Second Amendment seminars at other law schools.”
Long story short, it’s not just grassroots activism and lawsuits that will win the gun rights war. It is education, and the ability and willingness to engage with those in the neutral “cultural middle” where one of the most effective arguments is the gun control movement is, in many ways, an anti-self-defense movement. Cottrol suggested the basic contention is anti-gunners are making it difficult for average citizens to defend themselves and they “need to be called out.”
Here’s an interesting tidbit: I routinely get concealed pistol license data from my state’s Department of Licensing. Guess what I find interesting? In King County, Washington —the state’s most populous and most liberal county — I always find the highest number of active CPLs of any county in the state. Looks like even liberals feel the need to defend themselves and their families.
Consider this: When was the last time the gun prohibition lobby stepped forward to recognize the bravery of armed private citizens who take action to stop criminal acts? For example, a would-be mass shooting at a shopping mall in Indiana back in July 2022? When has anybody wearing a “Moms Demand Action” T-shirt openly applauded when a legally armed citizen has intervened in a violent crime and saved the day? Right, the gun ban bunch traditionally develops lockjaw after such incidents because it goes squarely against the gun control narrative.
One example is 22-year-old Elisha Dicken who was at the Greenwood Park Mall two-and-one-half years ago when he used a legally carried GLOCK 19 to take down a rifle-toting 20-year-old who had just fatally shot two people in the food court. While the nation was recognizing his actions, gun control proponents skulked back into the shadows.
If you find yourself at a public meeting on gun control and a bunch of T-shirt-clad “Moms” troop into the room, hit them with this question: “What have you got against my right to defend myself and my family from a violent criminal?” Don’t allow anyone to dodge the question. “Hey, you showed up here to back a proposal that will make it impossible for me to defend my home and family. Why are you doing this?”
Last year about this time, I testified before a Washington State House committee against legislation that would have made it more difficult for honest citizens to purchase firearms. By no small coincidence, a judge in Oregon had recently declared the state’s effort to require a purchase permit to buy a gun, part of the broader Measure 114, to be unconstitutional. I reminded the committee about this and was pleasantly surprised when the legislation subsequently died in committee.
Marching Orders
Grassroots activists can do their homework and testify at their state’s legislative hearings. It’s not that difficult, and in Cottrol’s world, it’s one of the “common sense” things to do in order to protect and defend the Second Amendment.
If the issue of banning so-called “assault rifles” comes up in your state, you have FBI annual crime data on your side to remind lawmakers rifles of any kind are used in a fraction of all homicides in any given year. More people are fatally stabbed than are fatally shot with rifles. More people are beaten or stomped to death with hands, fists and/or feet than are killed with rifles. Data is easily available online, just go get it, and then use it.
The obvious question to lawmakers: “Since these guns are used in such a small number of murders, why would you want to ban them?”
2A Defense can involve much more than blowing off steam on social media. Study up on what experts such as Bob Cottrol say about the Second Amendment, because he presents arguments in a way that even liberals can understand.
Learn to call B.S. on the other side diplomatically. Remove the terms “liar” and “traitor” and “communist” from your vocabulary. When someone on the other side makes a specious argument — they do it a lot! — come back with the facts, and arguments one might find between the covers of Cottrol’s book.