Watts: Rethinking Gun Laws
The 2018 legislative session will be known as the year that Vermont took an important step towards reducing gun violence. Following the Parkland shootings, there was yet another national conversation about gun control. But so far only two states – Vermont and Florida – have passed significant legislation. That Vermont has led where most states have done nothing is remarkable for many reasons. We’ve always been known as a gun rights state, a state with a long tradition of hunting and gun ownership – and a state where most political leaders from Bernie Sanders to Phil Scott had repeatedly rejected significant gun control measures. But in 2018 this changed. And at the center of the change was an act of courage by our Republican Governor Phil Scott. Leadership should be about being open to new information. And Phil Scott, a lifelong hunter, and gun owner showed great courage in re-thinking his support for gun control. The governor says he’d always considered Vermont immune to the school shootings and daily carnage of gun violence. But he changed his mind after reading the police affidavit from the former student who had planned to wreak havoc on a Rutland school. The former student had recently purchased a gun and developed a plan of attack. This clearly could happen here and almost did, Scott said. And despite heated opposition from many members of his own party and other gun rights advocates, Scott supported the reasonable gun control laws that emerged from this legislative […]
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