Gun Advocates: Rights Don't End at Schoolhouse Door

A member of the Michigan Open Carry group said this week that allowing guns in schools makes them safer. Banning them, Joshua Wade asserted, makes schools “mass murder enablement zones.” (Photo via Shutterstock)

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A couple of high profile cases recently put Michigan gun laws in everybody’s face – including students whose school was placed on lockdown twice this month after a man with a holstered Glock 23 semi-automatic handgun and antique, Russian-made Mosin-Nagant rifle slung over his shoulder stood near their schoolhouse door.

Shawn Nixon, 39, openly carried the weapons as he walked from his home in Royal Oak to Lamphere High School in Madison Heights on March 4. Officials locked the schoolhouse doors, and area police asked him to leave.

Nixon, who moved to Michigan from Florida in 2011, pulled the same stunt against Wednesday, doing his part in what gun rights activists say is an orchestrated effort to raise awareness of open-carry and other gun laws by the Michigan Open Carry group.

In doing so, they have moved the front line of their gun rights campaign to an unlikely place – Michigan’s public schools – an unnerving twist for people like Miriam Meisler, a grandmother of two students in the Ann Arbor school district.

That’s where Michigan Open Carry member Joshua Wade, 22, walked into a school concert with a pistol strapped to his hip earlier this month.

“I am terrified about accidents with loaded weapons in the schools,” Meisler said.

The head-scratcher for school officials is that there’s nothing in Michigan law that makes either man’s action illegal.

“The presence of guns in schools runs contrary to everything we are wired for in education,” Ann Arbor schools Superintendent Jeanice Swift said.

Showing Guns At School Could Backfire

Wade returned to Ann Arbor schools Wednesday with 40 other armed activists with the Michigan Open Carry group, including three state lawmakers, for a meeting with the school board.

Upset parents and citizens demanding that guns be kept out of schools also attended the meeting, which had so many speakers on the agenda that it had to be moved to a larger location.

“We don’t want guns in our schools and the safety of our students and school community is paramount,” Ann Arbor school board President Deb Mexicotte said, according to a report on The Ann Arbor News/MLive.com.

Related:

• Man with Gun Sparks Fear, Prompts Lockdown

By taking their awareness campaign to schools, the two gun-toting activists may have pulled a trigger on legislative changes that would restrict, rather than affirm, where they can pack heat.

Dearborn lawyer Jim Moskowski, who defends clients on weapons violations, told the Detroit Free Press that gun rights advocates in Michigan and across the nation fear erosion of their rights.

“It’s a constant battle for us,” he said.

They lost a skirmish Wednesday when the Ann Arbor school board passed a resolution asserting its opposition to “any form of open carry by individuals other than law enforcement officers within gun-free school zones,” and urging the Michigan State Legislature to “eliminate the CPL open carry loophole.”

“We are bound to follow the law, but we do not have to agree with it,” Mexicotte said. “This makes us all a little bit on edge. It’s a safety issue to us that could take our children in a blink of an eye.”

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At the same Ann Arbor school board meeting, Wade’s assertion that “allowing guns in schools just makes sense” drew heckles and jeers.

Without weapons, the lifelong Ann Arbor resident and former Eagle Scout said, schools can become “mass murder enablement zones.”

Other members of Michigan Open Carry said they shouldn’t be discriminated against in their efforts to protect their families. It’s no different than equipping a home with a fire alarm system or wearing a seatbelt, Dan Watchmaker, of Shelby Township, said in an interview with The Ann Arbor News.

He said he wears his Springfield XDS .45 caliber handgun on his hip every time he visits his children’s schools.

“No children or parents have ever been frightened at the sight of my firearm,” he said. “I think a lot of it is myth. For me it’s not a political statement. I carry everywhere I’m allowed to (for) personal protection, mainly for me and my family. It’s not to try to be a hero.”

Warning: Video of Shawn Nixon’s confrontation with police contains graphic language. More video of his armed awareness walks are found on his YouTube channel.

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