Letter to Rep Riddle: CHL's on Campus

Thus far, at least four bills have been authored relating to carrying concealed handguns on college campuses. The language eventually says something like this:

An institution of higher education or private or independent institution of higher education in this state may not adopt any rule, regulation, or other provision prohibiting a license holder who is a faculty member, staff member, or employee of the institution from carrying a handgun on the campus of the institution. (HB 1356).

When I addressed this issue with my state senator Dan Patrick two years ago, his only response was that we have the right, according the the Second Amendment, to carry firearms. Evidently, the only consideration, then, is an amendment, and no other considerations should be discussed.

Then, of course, when faced with mind-blowing events such as an attempted assassination of a congresswoman and the murder of her friends and colleagues, we immediately retreat into a flight or fight response, and legislators tend to fight by retreating into the most obvious solution, instead of the most constructive.

But on college and university campuses, even if staff and faculty are required to be CHL holders, this cannot guarantee that they are in fact safe users of their CHL -- there are actions of violence conducted by Texas CHL holders every year, and though we may acknowledge that they are a minority, these assaults by CHL holders still occur. Being a CHL holder doesn't magically make one a safe gun user.

Neither would allowing firearms on campus make the campus safer. We can hypothesize that if someone had a firearm at Virginia Tech Seung-Hui Cho would have killed fewer people, but that would require us to believe that there was someone in every classroom with a firearm ready to return fire. And as horrible -- truly horrible -- as it is to consider or imagine the nightmare of a student killing his fellows, what could we think about having dozens (and at a university as large as UH, hundreds) of firearms on campus with all the potentialities. We claim that if a faculty or fellow student had a firearm that Seung-Hui Cho could have been stopped, but there is no guarantee of that. Perhaps, then, instead of legislating guns on campus, the Texas State Legislature could make campuses safer by increasing funds for mental health services. The one solution expects someone to be killed; the second hopes that someone can be helped.

And what about the professional atmosphere in our classes and buildings? If we know that a colleague is "carrying," will contracted employees be allowed to walk away from their contract if they are uncomfortable with having weapons in the buildings? Would this division of status -- "carrying" and "non-carrying" actually make us a better school, or build divisions that we cannot afford? And how can any instructor in an instructional building know if a "carrying" faculty is anywhere else in the building? Typical legislation is written that a campus cannot prohibit firearms on campus, but the legislation never considers the hundreds or thousands of students and faculty who do not want firearms in their presence. Of course, if the Legislature wants safe campuses, they can increase funding for passive and active security. But they choose not too. Their solution, again, provides for killing (in the name of defense, I understand), instead of real security.

Some will argue that no legislation will prohibit an angry or mentally unstable or completely unhinged person from coming to our peaceful campus and do the unspeakable. True. But neither will arming faculty and staff keep these people from coming to our campus. The argument is that "fewer" people might be killed. This doesn't comfort me.

Finally, let's examine what such proposals are really saying about us and our community. The proponents of guns on campus effectively are saying that we cannot be a civil society, that we've given up on trusting one another, that a university campus cannot exist as a separate space of inclusion, exchange of ideas, and civil life. They are saying that the campus is nothing better than the dark alleys of the inner city, and that we must throw away our expectations of the best of people and prepare for the worst. Instead, I would prefer that we can fully engage with one another, helping each other and trusting one another. When someone is hurting, we help. When someone is lonely, we comfort. When one of our own feels alienated, we should approach and befriend. By legislating guns on campus, we reject the best of ourselves and build walls. Our legislators often mock the idea of the academy as one of their tools to divide their own constituency. But the idea of the academy can be a place of inclusion and growth; guns on campus may make us feel safer for the moment, but we lose so much of our communion and purpose by believing that the intrusion of force in the guise of safety makes the university a better place. Idealistic, I know, but that's what a university is really about.

I urge you to oppose all legislation that would permit handguns on college campuses by anyone other than public safety officers.