Half Price Offer to Meet a True Hero in the Field of Gun Violence Prevention

Dear Friends,

I’ve been working in one way or another on the issue of gun violence prevention for much of my adult life – at least since 1969, that is, when I returned from serving in combat as a member of the U.S. Marines in the war in Vietnam. Having just left a war zone, I didn’t want to permanently live in one.

In all the years that I’ve worked on the gun violence issue, I’ve never met anyone who’s endured a greater personal loss due to gun violence than Dr. Michael North, or anyone who's subsequently done more to ensure that no one else in in his country – and especially, no child, parent, or teacher – will ever have to endure another tragedy like the Dunblane Primary School massacre.

Michael North, Ph.D.

Dr. North lost his five year-old daughter, Sophie, in the 1996 mass shooting at the elementary school in Dunblane, Scotland, in which Sophie’s teacher and 15 other children were also killed and 10 other children and three other teachers were wounded. (Sophie is the second child from the left, second row from the bottom, in the picture below, which also includes the 15 other children and the teacher killed in the Dunblane shooting.)

The mass shooting was committed by a man who legally owned the handguns he used to commit his horrific crime. (Britain already had a ban on civilian ownership of automatic and semi-automatic long guns, including so-called “assault rifles.”)

Following the Dunblane Primary School mass shooting, Dr. North helped lead a successful campaign to completely ban civilian ownership of handguns in Great Britain within less than two years. There hasn’t been another school shooting in Britain since the handgun ban went into effect, and the rate of gun-related deaths in Britain is currently 1/70th the rate in the United States.

We’re bringing Dr. North to the United States to be our keynoter speaker at our annual dinner co-hosted with the Sacramento Chapter of Physicians for Social Responsibility on Saturday, October 21. Dr. North will speak on the topic, “Gun Control in Great Britain after the 1996 Dunblane Primary School Mass Shooting: A Model for the United States.” The dinner is being held at the Hilton Arden West, 2200 Harvard Street, in Sacramento. Doors open for social hour at 6:00 PM, dinner begins at 7:00, and the program begins at 8:00. The dinner is open to the public, but paid reservations are required in advance.

The deadline to make reservations for the dinner is Monday, October 16, which is fast approaching. We originally set the price for making dinner reservations at $60 per person, which is higher than we’d like, but which is exactly what the banquet facility charges us. So far, though, the number of reservations we’ve received has been far less than we would expect for an event that features someone as distinguished as Dr. North speaking on a topic as critically important as the definitive steps necessary to protect our children and youth from the threat of gun violence.

Ensuring that more people come to learn from Dr. North, to be inspired by him, and also to honor him, is a greater priority for us than breaking even on the cost of the dinner; and we recognize that these are trying economic times for many people. For these reasons, we’ve decided to offer a $30 per person half price dinner reservation option for anyone who can’t afford the full $60 per person price.

To make reservations at either the full $60 per person price or at the $30 half price option, please go to the Events page of the Americans Against Gun Violence website. On the Events page, there’s also a link for making discounted room reservations at the hotel at which the dinner is being held if you’re coming from outside the Sacramento area and would like to stay overnight. (Note: If you've already made reservations at the $60 per person price and would like a $30 per person refund, let us know in a reply to this email, and we'd be happy to send you one. And whether or not you'd like a refund, we hope you'll encourage other friends, family members, and colleagues to come to the dinner too, at either price.)

We recognize, of course, that many of our supporters live outside of Northern California and won't find it practical to travel to Sacramento to attend the dinner on October 21. Dr. North has agreed to stay with us in the United States for a couple of weeks after the dinner in Sacramento, and we're currently in the process of trying to line up other opportunities for him to speak in other parts of the country. If you'd be interested in helping set up a speaking engagement for Dr. North near where you live, please let me know in a reply to this message.

At the annual dinner, I'll also be talking briefly about some of our many other Americans Against Gun Violence activities over the past year. These include:

Our 2023 National High School Essay Contest in which we asked students to describe their thoughts about lockdown drills conducted in response to the threat of shootings on U.S. school campuses

We received a record high number of 1,159 entries in our 2023 essay contest from students all across the United States, and we awarded a total of $18,000 to 28 winners. Winning essays are posted on the High School Essay Contest page of our website.

Our 2023 Summer Intern Project

The essays that we received in this year's essay contest were so poignant - and in many cases, so heart wrenching - that we decided to hire summer interns from among the essay contest winners to catalogue the students' responses in all 1,159 essays and prepare a formal report. The essay contest report is nearing completion, and when it's done, we'll send a copy to President Biden, Vice President Harris, and to every member of Congress. We'll also send a copy of the report to you, of course, and post it on our website.

Our amicus brief in the case of United States v. Rahimi

This is the third Supreme Court Second Amendment case in which we’ve filed an amicus curiae (friend of the Court) brief. In this case, in which oral arguments are scheduled for November 7, the Court is considering whether a prohibition on persons under a domestic violence restraining order from possessing firearms violates the Second Amendment. A ruling by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals that such a prohibition is unconstitutional is based on the Supreme Court’s 2022 Bruen decision, which rests in turn on the Court’s rogue 2008 Heller decision. The amicus brief that we previously filed in Bruen was the only one submitted by any gun violence prevention (GVP) organization that made the case that Heller was egregiously wrongly decided and should be overturned, and our brief was also the only one cited by Justices Breyer, Kagan, and Sotomayor in their dissenting opinion in Bruen. In Rahimi, we are once again the only GVP organization to make the case that the Heller decision and its progeny are not only wrongly decided, they’re literally death sentences for tens of thousands of Americans annually, and they must be overturned. (For additional details concerning our amicus briefs, see our August 23, 2023 press release).

In conclusion, I hope to see you either at our October 21 annual dinner in Sacramento or at some other speaking event for Dr. North in another part of the country later this fall. I also hope you'll consider making a contribution to Americans Against Gun Violence, if you’re able, to help us fund Dr. North’s speaking tour and to also help us continue our other work.

Thanks for your support. And thanks for helping us show through our actions, and not just our words, that like Dr. North and his colleagues in Great Britain, we're a society that loves our children more than our guns.

Sincerely,