Thousands rally across the country to support gun rights and freedoms

Wednesday, January 23, 2013 by: J. D. Heyes
Tags: high noon, gun rights, rallies

(NaturalNews) Scores of rallies held Jan. 20 around the country to demonstrate support for the Second Amendment and opposition to new gun control regulations proposed by President Obama and some Democrats in Congress drew thousands in a rare show of constitutional solidarity, reports said.

The "high noon" rallies, as they were called, sprang up following renewed debate over stricter gun control policies that are being pushed in the wake of the tragic murder of 20 young children and six adults at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., in mid-December.

"We are law-abiding citizens, business owners, military, and we are not going to be responsible for other people's criminal actions," former Marine Damon Locke said to applause at a Florida rally he helped organize, Reuters reported.

'It's about control'

Some attendees in the crowd of about 1,000 in Brooksville, located an hour north of Tampa, held signs saying, "Stop the Gun Grabbers," and, "Gun control isn't about guns, it's about control."

The president has asked Congress to enact new legislation that would essentially reinstate a ban on military look-alike weapons, high capacity magazines over 10 rounds and other provisions. Several states have already begun debating new gun control legislation, though the state of New York broadened its existing ban on so-called "assault weapons."

In addition to bans and ammunition limitations, Obama wants universal background checks for all guns purchased, including those bought at gun shows and from private individuals.

Rallies were held in all 50 states, the Washington Times reported.

At the statehouse in Connecticut, where state lawmakers have already taken up measures to tighten existing gun control laws, about 1,000 gun owners and supporters showed up to rally, few if any of them happy about new legislation many said still would not prevent future Sandy Hooks.

"They could take away the 10-round magazine today and tomorrow it would be the five-round and the next day it would be the whole thing," gun owner Jessie Buchanan, who attended the rally in Hartford, told Reuters.

'I've earned my Second Amendment rights'

In Denver, where 500-plus folks rallied, Don Dobyns, an Air Force veteran and former police officer from Colorado Springs, said, "I have earned the right to have my guns."

"All I want is my Second Amendment rights. I've earned them," he said. "Nobody that hasn't even served has a right to take them away from us."

Others said Obama's 23 new executive orders aimed mostly at tightening up existing gun rules and signed in front of four children the White House said wrote to him asking for new gun control laws would do nothing to stop future massacres - which, despite being horrific, are extremely rare in a country where nearly 80 million households have firearms.

"The [executive] orders do nothing to make us safer," said Robert Wareham, a Colorado attorney specializing in gun rights, the Times reported. "They placate special interest groups to keep them happy and motivated, but [they are] not going to do a single thing to keep us safer."

The Times said the idea to stage the rallies reportedly came from Eric Reed, a Texas airline pilot, who said he wanted to send "a very, very strong message to Congress and to our president that we the people are against any more gun control."

Sources:

http://www.reuters.com

http://www.thedailybeast.com

http://www.washingtontimes.com