I supported the emergence of that new understanding and the Supreme Court made it the law of the land in the Helen Mcdonald decisions. In 2008 and 2010. Of that pair of decisions demolishes the slippery slope theory of those who oppose basically all firearms regulation on the view that once we permit any new firearms regulation at all, we will be inviting the government stepbystep to come ever closer to disarm the people. Leaving only the police and military with firearms. With heller and mcdonald on the books, Supreme Court in its own words took certain policy choices off the table. Thereby cleared the path a reasonable regulations to be enacted without fear that those policy choices would either open the door to unlimited government control, or be imperiled by exaggerated interpretation of the Second Amendment. As Justice Alito put in mcdonald, theres no longer any basis for such doomsday proclamations. Justice scalia speaking for the court and heller said at the end of his opinion. Under our interpretation, the constitution leaves open a variety of regulatory tools for combating the problem of gun violence in this country. The court was explicit in saying what some of those tools include. They include come anytime am quoting from the core, conditions and qualifications on the transfer of firearms to keep them out of dangerous hands, including felons and the mentally ill. They include longstanding regulatory measures to keep firearms out of particularly sensitive places. They include complete bans of firearms that are quote not typically possessed by lawabiding citizens for lawful purposes such as shortbarreled shotguns. And firearms that are especially dangerous or unusual such as m16 rifles and the like. That was a list the court explicitly said was not meant to be exhaustive. They include other regulations designed to protect Public Safety without cutting into the core right of the Second Amendment protects the right of selfdefense in the home. Those legitimate other regulations certainly encompass advance on a legal straw purchasers and gun trafficking, both of which can totally frustrate any system of background checks or gun registration. And the kind of regulation that do not trigger close scrutiny under the Second Amendment obviously include universal background checks on registration systems for the simple reason that systems with loopholes and less than universal coverage our calculator to be invaded by those very people who have no right to bear arms under the Second Amendment. People we cannot safely entrust with lethal weapons. Finally, those other obviously valid regulations, ones that do not trip the Second Amendments trigger, have to include bans on highcapacity magazines, and especially lethal weapons that someone can keep firing for 10 rounds or even more without reloading. Banning those weapons gives people a chance to escape, and gives the police a chance to interrupt the slaughter. A category of valid regulations under heller, in my view, also covers bands and weapons designed for assault or military use, rather than for lawful civilian use. And the court did not nearly say that such regulations would ultimately survive Second Amendment scrutiny. It said that heller would not even quote cast its shadow of doubt on such measures should they be considered in the future. Now we should have no illusions that adopted measures like these nationally will completely solve the epidemic of gun violence in america. More will be needed to we clearly need to address metal Health Issues as well as other potential contributors to gun violence such as violent video games, films that glorify murder and mayhem, and other aspects of our violent culture. But if we do nothing until we can do everything, we will all have the blood of innocent human beings on our hands, and we will besmirch the constitution in the process. Just in closing let me say that our constitution, as many have wisely observed, does not make the perfect enemy of the good, and whatever else it is, it is not a suicide pact. A suicide pact that condemns us to paralysis in the face of a National Crisis of domestic bloodshed. Thank you very much, thank you your. Ms. Wortham. Good morning, chairman durbin, members of the committee. Thank you for the opportunity to speak today. Its really an honor. We discussed a lot about law this morning, and im an attorney. I love the law. I respected. I think its great but i would like to talk a little bit about life and the human impact that this issue has on me, my family and the families we have here today. So to do that id like to take us back to may 19, 2010. On may 19 i had a good day. I was having a good day. Went to line dancing class with my mother. We did every wednesday that spring. As you can imagine that was quite entertaining. When we got home a friend asked me to go scout Birthday Party locations with her for the big 25. So i of course said yes. We went out and we had a good time. On my way home i got a call from a mother which was not unusual because we speak at 1000 times a day. We still do. This call was different. She was crying at this time and she said sandy, come home. And she continued to cry, and she said they tried to rob him. So the him she was speaking of was my older brother, Thomas Wortham the fourth will make. We were raised in a great family, full of characters but craig. Are parents taught us we could do everything, the everything, the world was ours. They taught us we had a responsibility to our community and to people who didnt have the opportunities that we had. And thats how thomas lived his life. He dedicated his professional life to service. He served two tours of duty in iraq with our National Guard and is also a Chicago Police officer protecting the southside of chicago where we lived. Earlier that week thomas had traveled here to washington, d. C. To participate in activities for National Police week honoring fallen Law Enforcement officers and then travel to nuke city to run in a race in honor of a Chicago Police officer have been killed in the line of duty a year before. So on the evening of march may 19, thomas the tank our parents house when i left to show the pictures of police week activities. So he finished, they ate dinner and he went to lead. Actually delete my father went with them to the door to walk met. I wasnt there obviously but according to reports this is what happened. Two men approached thomas as he went to get on his motorcycle, pulled a gun on him and tried to take his motorcycle. Now, thomas was a Police Officer so he was armed or told them he was a Police Officer. My dad, standing at the porch saw this happening to my dad was also armed. He had a gun and as. He went in the house to get the gun. He came back out. So there was an exchange of gunfire between the offenders, my brother and my father. When i got the call from my mother i had no idea how bad this wasnt. No idea. I just knew she was crying. She is a crier sometimes so i just knew i needed to get him. Shortly after of the call traffic was stopped. The police have blocked of all the streets on way to our house. So i got out and started to run. I just had let me run home and see whats going on. And as i ran, an ambulance passed me. And steel come in m in my mind d no idea does anything to do with thomas. I have no idea how bad it was but im running down the street. In retrospect it was like a movie because its like slow motion. So in and those passes me but i know now that thomas was in the and it was because hed been shot and thats what all the streets were blocked off. So i go to the house. They rushed him to the hospital. We get there, we waited, prayed a lot, we waited. But thomas died. Strangely, the week before our couple weeks before thomas died in an interview with the chicago tribune, because thereve been two shootings across the street from our house and a couple of months before that, and he was the president of the park advisory counsel, and in the interview ill read a direct quote. He said, when people think of the southside chicago, they think violence. And he went on to say, we are going to fix it so it doesnt happen again. So thomas is dead, obviously, but im here today, my parents are here today. I see all of these families are here today because we still believe we can fix it. So outside the standard this hearing has been called a discussed the ways we can respect the Second Amendment and protect our communities. I have to be very honest and of those are some of the people left the cubs i was very, im confused as to where were having disagreement about this. Like i said, i understand the law. I respect our constitution, but to me this isnt about taking a way the law for right to own guns. We are not antigun people. My family estaban at icann family. My brother and father were Chicago Police officers and carried guns most of the time. Thats how i was raised, but they were trained and they were law abiding citizens. I value and respect the right, the rights that are provided by our constitution. However, i find it very hard to believe that our founders intended those rights to go so unreasonably unchecked. It isnt about the right to take away pashtun it isnt about the right to lawfully own guns. This is not trying our best to keep guns out of the hands of the people, like people who killed my brother. They didnt walk into a gun store and buy a handgun because all the reports are right, they would have been able to do so. They got the guns the same way that many ill intended people receive guns in this country. They body on the street. Its also a reality that the gun didnt arrive in chicago on its own. Again according to reports it was traffic from a posh up in mississippi. Chairman, you spoke about his earlier. According to news reports a gun trafficker went to mississippi, used straw purchasers to buy multiple handguns from that shop and brought those guns to chicago to sell the gang members. And you spoke very well about this earlier and thats a huge problem we are talking about. And for me as someone who has been personally affected by this i can accept that we can do better than that. I cant accept we cant fix that problem. If we know as everybody who does, that many, many criminals obtain their guns through street purchases easily, then i feel like we have a responsibility to address that problem. And we have an opportunity through this body to do that to the only people who should be disturbed by gun laws are people who shouldnt have guns in the first place. Lawabiding citizens shouldnt be disturbed by the proposals here today. So when we speak about the constitution and all the rights afforded by the constitution, i think we would also be well served remember the words of another document in our countries history. So we talked earlier about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness your while, those things are taken away from thomas when he was 30, and quite frankly our rights to those things have been affected by this situation. So we talk about lawful gun ownership to my brother owned a gun. My father owned a gun. But the fact that they were armed that i didnt prevent thomas murder. So we need to do more to keep guns out of the wrong hands in the first place, and i dont think that makes us antigun people. I think that makes us prolawabiding citizens who want to live life without the constant fear of this violence as a result of guns. Im not to say that anyone law would change what happened to thomas but image is a i think we could do better. This isnt about me, thomas, my family or anyone them in general. This is about our country and now have a system to affect change, to do something about this, and i think its time that we do that. So thank you. Thank you for your testimony. I still would member your brothers of service, and the comments that were made by some of his friends of the National Guard, and others in Law Enforcement. He was an amazing individual. Sad that we lost them. Im sure that he is looking down smiling at his mom and dad and sister who stand up for him today. Ms. Hupp. Thank you, mr. Chairman, members, speaking for myself today and not in any official capacity. Ive wanted to mention right off the bat that when you opened the proceedings here you asked all of the victims of gun violence to stand, and i hesitated. But honestly i dont feel myself as a victim of gun violence. I suppose of as a victim of a maniac who happened to use a gun as a tool. And i see myself as a victim of the legislators that we have at the time that left me defenseless. So thats why i hesitated. I didnt go grow up in a house with guns. When i was 21 and a move that on my own i was given a gun by a friend and taught how to use it. And then i had a patient when i was in the city of houston who was the District Attorney, an assistant District Attorney in houston. And he actually convinced me to carry the gun, which at that time was illegal in the state of texas to he said susy, you dont see this stuff, id. You need to carry a weapon and nobody will mess with you. Several years later in 1991, my parents and i went to have lunch at his local cafeteria with a friend of mine who is managing the cafeteria that day. We finished eating when all of a sudden this guy drove a pickup truck, came crashing in maybe 15 feet from me. Of course, we thought it was an accident. And i rose up and begin to go to help the people that he had knocked over. But then we heard gunshots. And my father and i immediately got down on the floor. We turn the table up in front of us. My mom got down behind us. And the shooting continued. At that time in 91, we werent seeing these Mass Shootings that were seeing now so i was waiting for him to Say Something like all right, everybody puts her waltz upon the table, or a thought maybe it was a hit. Maybe there was somebody important in there. But the shooting continued. Im going to tell you, it took a good 45 seconds, which is an eternity, to realize that the guy was simply going to walk around, take aim, pull the trigger, go to the next persons, taking, pull the trigger. He was executing people. When i did realize i thought ive got this guy. I reached for my purse that was on the floor next to me, realize i had a Perfect Place to probably arent. He was up to everybody else in the restaurant was down. Then i realized that if you want to earlier i had made the stupidest decision of my life. I had begun leaving my gun out in the car because i did what most normal people would do. I wanted to be a lawabiding citizen. I didnt want to get caught with a gun and maybe lose my license to practice. I remember looking around and thinking great, what do i do now, throw a shawl throw a salt shaker adding . At that point my father got my attention. He said got to do some become hes going to kill a but and you. I tried holding down by the shirt collar. But when he saw what he thought was a chance, he went at the guy. You have to understand though, a man with a gun in a crowded room has complete control. My dad covered maybe half the distance, and the guy just turned and shot him in the chest. Mmy dad went down in the aisle maybe seven or eight feet from me, and he was still alive and conscious, but as dreadful as this may sound, i saw the when and i basically wrote them off at that point. The good news is that it may be gunmen change direction slightly. Instead of coming directly towards me he went off to my left. And that the point somebody way at the back of the restaurant broke out another window. I renewed hearing the crash and thinking here comes another one. But instead i saw people getting out that way. So i looked up over the top of the table. When the gunman had his back to me, i stood up, grabbed my mother but which are called and i said come on, come on, weve got to get out of here. And my feet grew wings. I made it out that back window, rain into my manager friend that was coming out a side door, and he said thank god youre all right. And i said yeah, but dads been hit and its really bad. And i turned to Say Something to my mother, and realized that she hadnt followed me out. Now, to wrap the story up, the Police Officer, several of them were patients of mine, told me a few days later a field in the gap. They said that they were actually one building away in a conference, and in an odd twist of gun control fate, the hotel where they were having the conference, the manager there didnt want them to be wearing their guns, and potentially offending any of our science professor. So she asked him to leave the guns in their car. So precious minutes were lost while they retreated their guns from their locked cars. They said when i got over there, worked their way into the broken window behind a pickup truck, they did note the gunman was. There were bodies everywhere, but they said they did see a woman out in the aisle on her knees cradling a mortally wounded man. They said they watched as some this 30 something year old man walked up to her. She said she looked up at him, he put a gun to her head, she looked down at her husband and he pulled the trigger. Thats how they knew who the gunman was. They said all they have to do is fire a shot into the ceiling and they got immediately went to a alcove area. Exchange a little gunfire with him and then put a bullet in his own head. 23 people were killed that day, including my parents. Didnt occur to me at the time, but mom wasnt going anywhere without debt. They just had their 47th wedding anniversary. So you may think that i was angry at the guy who did it, but the truth is thats like being mad at a rabid dog that you dont be mad at a rabid dog. He take a behind the bar and kill it but you dont be mad at it. But ive got to tell you, i was mad at my texas legislator cannot honestly believe they legislating out of the right to protect myself and my family, and i would much rather be sitting in jail right now with a felony offense on my head and have my parents alive. With that, i thank you. Thank you ver