Letter to the Editor: Vote in favor of stricter gun control laws

(Bill Deutsch and Joann Hagen, on behalf of the Decorah Friends Meeting, have submitted the following Letter to the Editor):

"We, the members of Decorah Friends Meeting, live in a beautiful rural part of Iowa, a place where we usually feel safe and secure in our homes and communities.  Even in peaceful rural Northeast Iowa, a four-year-old boy was fatally shot in June of this year in Fayette County when he discovered a loaded handgun in a home he was visiting.

We see the violence that guns do.  We see this violence in accidental shootings of children, in suicides committed with guns, in increased numbers of homicides that involve domestic violence, and in mass shootings.

While these are violent acts, we also believe it to be violent to fail to act to prevent these happenings through passage of common sense gun laws.
These could include, but are not limited to, requiring background checks on weapons sold over the Internet and at gun shows, keeping guns out of the hands of children younger than 14, requiring gun safety classes for everyone who purchases a gun, and funding research to study the public health effects of gun violence or others.

Everyday in the United States, there are more children who die from gun violence than there are children who die from cancer.  We urge our elected officials to not contribute by their inaction to the violence that guns cause.  We look forward to working with them in multiple approaches that might reduce gun violence in our nation."