You hear an ambulance flash by the house, siren wailing, and you give it little thought. It has nothing to do with you. Until it does.
Suddenly I saw my teenage son on a stretcher, coming from a neighbor’s house where a handgun with live ammunition was casually stored in — of all things — a shoebox. The ER doctor, who could not look me in the eye, suggested I not view the body, but rather “remember Ethan as he was.” I ignored him. I had to see. But Ethan was gone. All was quiet but for the sound of my heart beating. My heart breaking.
This awful day in 2018 set in motion a chain of events that included the passage of Ethan’s Law, which mandates safety rules for storing a weapon in a home where minors are present. It passed in our state of Connecticut a few years ago by a near-unanimous vote. It even won the support of many Second Amendment advocates.
And that’s the point — neither the state nor federal version of Ethan’s Law should be called “gun control.” It’s life-saving legislation for our children, period.
Our caring society mandates and regulates car seats, smoke detectors, and seat belts, because neglecting such simple, common-sense, low-cost measures was costing the lives of children. The same motivation drives our efforts to make Ethan’s Law (H.R. 660, S. 173) federal law.
And the danger is growing. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that guns became the leading cause of death among children in 2020, killing more people aged one to 19 in the U.S. than vehicle crashes, drug overdoses or cancer. The Journal of Injury Epidemiology estimates there are 430 unintentional firearm fatalities in the U.S. per year; the CDC puts the 2020 tally at 476. That’s an average of more than one per day. The rate is highest for teens and young adults (my Ethan was 15). The National Institutes of Health notes that teens in that group often are shot in the homes of friends.
Then there are the more complicated and nuanced questions of adolescent mass shooters, of gang violence, of teen suicides. Where do these young people obtain those guns? Often from unsecured locations in the home. And the trend is discouraging — a Journal of Urban Health survey reports that the number of children living in a home where they are exposed to unsafely stored guns jumped from 1.6 million in 2002 to 4.6 million in 2015.
I’m a politically agnostic advocate for the adoption of Ethan’s Law at the federal level. Given the perennial party split on gun issues in the U.S., it’s not surprising that most of our support has come from Democrats. But I welcome and even expect support on the issue of safe gun storage from Republicans as well.
According to its own website, the National Rifle Association should be banging the table for Ethan’s Law. The NRA, after all, is an enthusiastic advocate for responsible gun ownership, urging members to “store guns so that they are not accessible to unauthorized persons” and recommending gun storage devices. Moreover, with today’s biometric/pin code safes, gun owners can access smartly stored weapons faster than they can open their iPhones. If the NRA’s endorsement of responsible gun ownership is sincere, the organization surely must also endorse negative consequences for gun owners who elect to be irresponsible.
If my son had been in the home of a “responsible gun owner” as defined by the NRA, he would not be dead. If Ethan’s Law passes at the national level, or if a similar law passes in your state, many other sons could be saved, and many other mothers could be spared my nightmare of grief.
Congress needs to act for child safety by requiring all gun owners with children in their homes to secure their weapons. Until that happens, Ethan will not rest in peace. But when that happens, maybe I can rest too.
Kristin Miller Song is the mother of Ethan Song, who died with an unsecured gun in a neighbor’s home in 2018. Her website advocating for the federal passage of H.R. 660, S. 173, or Ethan’s Law, is www.songstrong.org/.