Here's the nauseating reply I got from Congressman Keating:
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Thank you for contacting me regarding gun control legislation. I appreciate hearing from you on this important issue, and I welcome the opportunity to respond to your concerns.
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With the onset of the horrific tragedy in Newtown, Connecticut as well as the countless reports of gun violence that we find all too frequently in our local newspapers,
*I want you to know that gun control and gun violence are issues that I care deeply about and have been at the forefront of my legislative portfolio since my time as a State Senator and as the Norfolk Country District Attorney.
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I often worked with victims groups and had discussions with survivors of such senseless violence as well as family members and parents of victims that were not so lucky. I have seen in concrete terms the indelible scars left from such violence, which led me to support banning assault weapons and armor-piercing bullets, among other issues as Senate Chairman for the Public Safety Committee and now, as a U.S. Congressman. As District Attorney, I aggressively enforced our gun laws.
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I will continue to support responsible gun legislation in Congress. That is why
*I voted against the
*National Right to Carry Reciprocity Act, which would force states to recognize "concealed carry" licenses from other states.
*For the safety of my constituents and their families, I also opposed the repeal of a current requirement to report a purchaser of ten or more weapons to the Justice Department. Further, I have cosponsored the
*Large Capacity Ammunition Feeding Device Act, which would prohibit the trade and
*manufacture of dangerous, high-capacity ammunition like that which was used in the horrifying attacks in Newtown, Connecticut,
*Tuscon, Arizona and Aurora, Colorado. I have also worked to close what is known as the Fire Sale Loophole by cosponsoring legislation aimed to prevent anyone whose firearms license has been revoked or denied from transferring firearms into a personal collection or to an employee. Recently,
*I joined my colleagues on the newly formed congressional Gun Violence Prevention Task Force that will look at ways Congress can help reduce gun violence in the U.S.
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While I recognize the Constitutional right to bear arms, I also believe that in the interest of public safety there must be greater accountability for gun violence, which includes the elimination of easy access to high capacity ammunition and automatic weapons.
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It is my opinion that the regulations currently in place in Massachusetts, which include a ban on assault weapons, serve as an example of what could be accomplished on the national level. Along with our strict gun control laws, we have the lowest rate of gun-related deaths per capita in the United States. I do not believe that that is a mere coincidence.
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Again, thank you for contacting me. I have also enclosed a copy of a recent op-ed that appeared in local publications. Please do not hesitate to contact me in the future regarding this or any other matter of concern. Additionally, you may find my website (
The Online Office of Congressman Bill Keating) to be a useful resource for keeping up with my work in Washington and the Ninth District of Massachusetts. I look forward to hearing from you again.
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Sincerely,
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William R. Keating
Member of Congress
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GUEST OPINION: We must prevent tragedy from striking again
By Bill Keating
U.S. Representative
Posted Dec 20, 2012 @ 05:31 PM
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Few buildings provide more feelings of safety and security than fire houses. Merely driving by one evokes the thoughts of a community that is safe and strong and at the ready.
That is why last Friday's scene at the local firehouse in Newtown, Conn. is all the more haunting. Absolutely nothing could prepare that community – and our nation – for what had happened. As parents gathered at the fire station to wait for their children, I was told by someone there of both
*the elation and relief of reunited families and the unthinkable grief of parents realizing their children would never be coming home again.
All week, the indelibly marked memories of crime scenes where children perished and informing parents of their child's death flooded back to me, vestiges of my time as a district attorney. Despite the anguish I felt for these families, I know that I could never satisfactorily comprehend the magnitude of their losses.
As I've driven by firehouses since last Friday, I realize that we, as a society, have taken common sense approaches to making our community safer. For example, we require smoke detectors, sprinklers, safer electrical standards and strict building codes. We do this to ensure that our children, our neighbors and our first responders are safer from fires, accidental and intentional. Why is it that we haven't made our communities safer for our families and our children and our police officers through common sense gun laws?
In Tucson, Ariz., 31 rounds were discharged in less than 45 seconds, killing six and wounding 13. In Aurora, Colo., where 12 people were killed and another 49 wounded, the gunman had magazines that allowed him to discharge upward of 60 rounds a minute. In Newtown, approximately 100 rounds were discharged in minutes.
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It did not take an army of people to cause this damage. These heinous crimes were, in each instance, perpetrated by a lone individual. What is the need in our everyday lives for assault clips or magazines capable of discharging a hundred rounds in mere seconds? The sad answer is none – other than to kill more people more quickly. That is why they are called assault rifles; there is no attempt to mask their purpose.
It is time for a national answer to this mass violence. We need to eliminate the ownership of assault weapons and military-style automatic machine guns beyond law enforcement and military use. And we need to prohibit assault clips and banana clips and multiple-round magazines. If we already place limits on the capacity of weapons used to hunt deer or ducks, why can't we do the same for guns that are used to harm people? Nothing in these proposals will limit a person's sport or hunting interests.
As a nation, we have been in this situation before. We have been here after Virginia Tech and Tucson and Aurora. I imagine that what makes Newtown more haunting to us all is the collective age of the majority of victims. They were babies. They couldn't have defended themselves, and they shouldn't have had to. Virginia Tech, Tucson and Aurora all should have mattered enough to
*change the way we address guns in this country. We are past the time for "should have."
* Last Friday must matter.
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