I know that from current manifestations. I know that from recent history. I know that from the long history stretching way back beyond the founding of the country.
I am convinced, and I stand to be corrected, that I cannot safely carry an open weapon in Alabama in spite of the law. I am a Black man who turned 77 last week. However, if I took a rifle or a pistol and walked into a Walmart or any other store, I would likely be shot. I don’t have to wave the gun or say anything; I just have to have it and for other people know it.
Just in the last year or so, a Black man in a store near Birmingham, Ala. was present when a shooting occurred. He was not involved, but law enforcement shot him down just because he had a gun. The idea of a Black man with a gun is enough for other people to shoot and kill.
In 2016, Philando Castile was in his car. A policeman stopped him. His pistol was in the car and he had a permit to carry it as a concealed weapon. He informed the officer that he was licensed to carry a gun. The police officer did not see the gun, but he pulled his gun and shot him dead. The Second Amendment does not apply to me and other Black people.
Tamir Rice was just 12 years old. He had a toy gun in a park in Cleveland, Ohio. He was talking on a cell phone while looking at a BB gun, and a police officer shot him to death. An officer came on the scene and shot him dead seconds after arriving. He was a child, but more importantly, he was Black and male.
In 2014, 22-year-old John Crawford III was in a Walmart in Beavercreek, Ohio. He was talking on a cell phone while looking at a BB gun, and a police officer shot him to death.
There are so many other examples, but this did not begin recently. When Virginia was a colony, long before the Declaration of Independence, laws were passed prohibiting Black people - not just an enslaved Black person - from having a gun. This was in 1640, more than one hundred years before the Second Amendment came into existence. I think it was the Colony of Virginia that actually required every white male to own a gun but prohibited every Black person from owning a gun. The Second Amendment does not apply to me and other Black people.
In the famous Dred Scott case, Chief Justice Toney argued that Black people, whether slave or free, could not be citizens. Part of his argument was based on the fear of Black people potentially bearing arms. One of the arguments against Black people serving in the army during the Civil War was that they would be armed. When the situation became desperate, Black people were allowed to serve in the army and carry arms. The Second Amendment does not apply to me and other Black people.
After Black people had served in the army during the Civil War and helped to win the war, a number of former confederate states passed laws prohibiting Black people from owning guns. Alabama led the way with a law passed in 1866, less than a year after the end of the Civil War.
I used to keep a pistol in my car back in the seventies and eighties. I eventually realized that I was reducing my safety, rather than increasing my safety, by carrying a gun. I ceased to carry a gun. In the spirit of full disclosure, I must also say that having children played a role in that decision as well.
California was an open carry state in the late sixties. Some Black Panthers, in protest of law enforcement shootings, decided to utilize the open carry provision. They showed up at the state capitol in Sacramento with guns out in the open pursuant to California’s law. The law was changed forthwith. The Second Amendment does not apply to me and other Black people.
EPILOGUE – Laws are powerful. However, in the face of powerful prejudice, laws can be impotent. The Second Amendment is one such example.
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