The recent mass shootings in downtown Tuscaloosa and Aurora, Colo., have sparked much debate over the Founding Fathers’ belief in every American’s innate right to bear arms, 225 years after they first enacted it into law as the 2nd Amendment to the United States Constitution.
Early on the morning of Tuesday, July 17, video cameras caught a man walking toward Temerson Square in downtown Tuscaloosa with a gun at 12:19 a.m. Minutes later, the man opened fire on Copper Top bar, injuring 18 people, three of whom were University of Alabama students. Twelve hours after the shooting, Nathan Van Wilkins, 44 and a resident of nearby Northport, was charged with 18 counts of attempted murder, having also fired into a house in his hometown.
For many Tuscaloosa residents and UA students, the Alabama state law that allows anyone to open carry, or to visibly show, a gun without a permit became a frightening realization.
“Guns can kill people in an instant…tons of people in an instant, if you consider how confined of an area the bar was [in Tuscaloosa] and how jam-packed the theater was [in Colorado],” Elizabeth Burns, a junior majoring in accounting, said. “It turns the carefree and fun spirit of going out to a bar or to a movie into a terrible experience.”
Just after midnight on the morning of Friday, July 20, a packed movie theater in Aurora, Colo., turned to mass chaos when an armed man burst through an emergency exit, opening fire on the crowd of viewers at the midnight premiere of “The Dark Knight Rises.”
Minutes later, police arrested James Holmes, a 24-year-old neuroscience graduate student at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus in Aurora. Twelve people were killed, and 58 were wounded in the massacre.
Similar to the law in Alabama, Colorado law states that a person must have a permit to carry a concealed weapon.
In the wake of the shootings, Alabama Open Carry, an organization dedicated to the preservation of the 2nd Amendment and the Constitution in general, held a statewide event in Tuscaloosa to educate members about gun laws and rights in the state. The event, which had already been planned prior to the shootings, took place on Saturday, July 21, at the Northport Civic Center.
“We want the same thing that everybody else in the United States and Alabama want, and that’s to live in peace,” said Eddie Fulmer, regional coordinator for Alabama Open Carry and organizer of the Alabama Gun Rights Tuscaloosa Meet Up event. “The only way we can live in peace is to be strong enough to be able to deter any criminal element or act that comes before us.”
Fulmer, who has open carried his gun for two-and-a-half years, believes that if citizens had had guns on them in the Colorado movie theater or near Copper Top, many lives would have been saved.
“We don’t want people to go on emotions because there’s a lot of emotions going on after a shooting spree like that happens, but we should go on facts. Those are very few and far between. And, realistically speaking, an armed citizen deters a lot of crime,” he said.
Phillip Harding, who has been carrying a gun for two years, is the state director of Alabama Students for Concealed Carry, and his goal is for students to be able to obtain a permit in order to protect themselves against “violent crime that runs rampant in gun-free zones across the state.”
“In a defense scenario, an openly carried firearm can be drawn and fired far more quickly and accurately than one which is concealed,” Harding said. “However, to my knowledge, both establishments had no-carry rules in place that affected the patrons’ ability to carry a firearm legally.
“The Copper Top bar in Tuscaloosa is an establishment that serves alcohol, which is a type of establishment that the rules go fuzzy on. It is also my understanding that the Century 16 movie theater in Aurora is owned and operated by Cinemark, who has a no-weapons policy in effect at all of its locations. I have heard that many gun owners have been ejected from their theaters because they were carrying a legal firearm and that a few organizations have called them out on their policy, citing that it creates a haven for the criminally-minded to target.”
Auburn University has the only school-recognized chapter of Students for Concealed Carry in the state. Harding is still looking to create stable chapters at his school, the University of South Alabama, as well as the University of Alabama and the University of Alabama at Huntsville.
Although proponents of gun rights say carrying a weapon is a defensive measure and a deterrent to crime, many still believe anyone carrying a gun could cause a crime.
“I almost feel like guns should be illegal outside of one’s home,” Burns said. “I can understand having one at home for safety, but carrying one around is scary. You never know what people are going to do with one.
“I feel like guns are something that only experts should operate, and I don’t trust gun licenses. Personally, I think police should protect us, instead of relying on someone we don’t know or someone who may actually turn out to be a criminal.”
Fulmer disagreed.
“We want people to take responsibility for themselves; we don’t want to depend on law enforcement,” he said. “Law enforcement’s not there at the time you need them.”
