In January 2020, I glimpsed at a possible American future, and it was ominous.
The winter months of 2020-2021 saw the so-called Second Amendment sanctuary movement sweep across the country. Then, in January, this movement came to Montgomery County, Virginia, and I witnessed it up-close and uncomfortably. They had come to try and persuade the County Board of Supervisors to vote and declare the County a Second Amendment sanctuary.
In two months, more than 400 municipalities in 20 states had passed resolutions opposing the enforcement of some of the gun laws passed by state and federal lawmakers. In effect, law enforcement departments would not enforce specific gun control laws.
Gun Rights supporters modeled this Second Amendment sanctuary movement on the immigration policies adopted over the preceding decade or so by liberal cities. Provisions in these gun resolutions across the country varied. Some just expressed strong support for the Second Amendment–as newly interpreted by the conservative U.S. Supreme Court in the Heller decision in 2008.
Other resolutions often specified how local officials would not support state or federal laws, such as bans on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines.
Of course, there is a legal difference between sanctuaries for immigrants and sanctuaries for guns. Jurisdictions that declared themselves immigration sanctuaries usually stated that if asked, they would refuse to support actions that were federal responsibilities. They did not agree to break the law.
On the other hand, the Second Amendment sanctuary movement advocated for positions contrary to state and federal law. I attended the second hearing on the gun sanctuary movement by the Montgomery County Virginia Board of Supervisors, providing numerical support for the gun-control side. However, this overflow crowd of gun rights supporters greatly outnumbered us.
I kept thinking that it was a good thing ordinance prohibited guns in this government building. Else I would have vamoosed. But I stayed and listened intently to the arguments.
What I heard and felt—yes, “felt” –was something that took me a day or so to digest. Then, as I left the building early with a friend, I mentioned that I thought I had heard something odd that I needed to reflect on before discussing it.
By the next day, the disturbing thing I had heard and felt was clear to me. These gun sanctuary people were not interested in just having their arsenal to protect house and home as they sometimes mentioned. Instead, they wanted their guns to use against an overreaching federal government. And they are pretty loose with the term “overreach.” In other words, they wanted to be fully armed to attack democracy, the presumably loosening of white supremacy.
And that is what we saw on January 6, 2021, less than one year after my unwitting preview. Of course, I did not predict January 6, but a look back suggests the Second Amendment Sanctuary movement seems to have come from the same place as the insurrection.
That idea indicates we may suffer more of the same in the not-too-distant future.
