| John Woods was a senior at Virginia Tech in April, 2007 when Seung-Hui Cho killed thirty-two of his peers. One of those thirty-two was Maxine. Long-time friends, John and Maxine dated, broke up, remained close friends, dated again. They went out for the last time the Friday before the shooting, when John escorted Maxine to her sorority formal.
Less than two years later, John found himself in Austin, Texas, now a Ph.D student at UT in biological sciences. Around that time, word got out that State Rep. Joe Driver, chair of the Public Safety Committee in the Legislature, was planning to introduce a bill to allow people to carry concealed weapons in college campus buildings. Driver et. al. seemed to operate from the idea that more guns means more safety, despite research demonstrating that more guns means more suicide on campus, amongst other things. The massacre at Virginia Tech was often cited in justification for the bill, even though the bi-partisan review panel determined that campuses actually need the lawful ability to ban guns on campus. But nevertheless, here in Texas it was argued that if students and staff could whip out a gun and fire at will, then future campus shootings would be much less deadly. (Do these people have kids in college? Who wants more guns by their own kids?)
The bill would have allowed people to carry concealed weapons in campus buildings. To get a CHL (concealed handgun license), one must be at least 21 years of age, conform to a few other criteria, and take as little as one day of training. Now, I taught at UT for three years, and I had students who would have qualified for a CHL. I had my doubts that all eligible students could remember protocol for hostage situations, or know who to shoot at in an emergency. Furthermore, in my three years of teaching, we never needed a gun in the classroom. The better idea seemed to be to just keep guns out of schools and focus on learning.
Students were beginning to organize in opposition to the bill at UT, and John decided to get involved. John wrote a resolution in favor of the current ban on guns in campus buildings, and brought it to the Graduate Student Assembly, Senate of College Councils, UT System Faculty Council, and Student Government, where it passed every representative body, in many cases unanimously. By the time the Student Government measure came up for a vote, the NRA-supported "Students for Concealed Carry on Campus" had gotten wind of John's organizing, and were working hard to defeat the student resolution. They failed. Meanwhile, John started the Texas chapter of Students for Gun Free Schools, an organization of survivors, friends, and family members of the Virginia Tech massacre, and recruited broader local support from the University Democrats and other area activists.
By this time, the biennial Texas legislature was in session. The bill was introduced, and quickly picked up over 70 sponsors in the 150-member House and many in the 31-member Senate. In both bodies, I'm ashamed to say that many, many Democrats co-sponsored this bill, even several with colleges and university campuses in their district. With the Democrats clinging to a slim 74-76 minority, I think too many swing-district incumbents must have felt pressure from the NRA to cave on student safety. The bill moved to Committee hearings, where John helped organize student testimony against the bill, and also spoke about his own experiences at VA Tech. Students visited legislators' offices, distributing copies of the campus groups' resolutions.
The bill passed through the relevant Committees, and made it to Calendars, where it would be scheduled for a vote. If the bill came to the floor, it would surely pass. John urged students to continue calling relevant legislators, in the hopes of delaying the bill from coming to the floor. John also organized a student, faculty, and staff walk-out from UT and rally on the Capitol grounds, where folks made their opposition to the bill very visible to the lawmakers inside.
The UT System was loathe to get publicly involved at first, though they were clear on the widespread campus opposition to the bill. Finally, under mounting pressure to keep students, faculty, and staff safe, UT President Bill Powers penned an Op-Ed in the Statesman opposing the bill:
Universities should be a safe environment for free speech and civil discourse. Students are expected to express their opinions and make decisions about social interactions free of intimidation. So are faculty, counselors and other staff members. The presence of concealed handguns would not promote free expression.
Where did that mounting pressure come from? Students, faculty, and staff organizing, and making sure that everyone in the UT administration knew that the vast, vast majority of people on campus didn't want guns in their places of work and learning.
The bill did get scheduled, but it was so far down on the list that it never had a chance to make it to the floor. And once the House Democrats began a filibuster to prevent voter suppression legislation (a strict voter ID law) from coming to the floor, stuff at the bottom of the pile--like guns on campus--never had a chance. So despite overwhelming pressure from the NRA, despite having enough votes in the bicameral legislature, despite a lack of early and loud opposition from the UT System, the guns in schools bill never became law.
Of course, John didn't do it alone. He had help from various elected officials in the area, including Constable Bruce Elfant, a long-time Brady Campaign volunteer who spoke at a student rally at the Capitol; State Rep. Eddie Rodriguez, who shredded the NRA lobbyist's testimony during the Public Safety Committee hearing; and State Rep. Lon Burnam, who frequently drew on on his pacifist views as a Quaker to object to the bill from a First Amendment issue, as private religious institutions who opposed guns theologically would also have been forced to allow them on campus. Countless other state representatives, House and Senate staffers, campus activists, and student leaders got involved, and helped John defeat guns in schools. But without John taking the initiative and organizing on this issue, there would have been no ready outlet for their energy and activism.
I asked John what he wished he'd known when he started this process. John said, "I wish I'd always had a clipboard around, to get the names and contact information of every person I met along the way." He said this would have saved him tons of time later on, and enabled him to keep track of the many folks who helped out. In the end, he might have had to do less work himself by building an even bigger coalition of interested people. To that end, if you'd like to get involved or in touch, you can email sgfs.texas (at) gmail.com or follow @sgfstexas and @gunfreeschools on Twitter.
But there's another reason to highlight the work of John Woods and Students for Gun Free Schools here in Texas. Despite tremendous odds, they worked hard and organized, and they won. They didn't just yell on the Internet. They didn't just pout, get mad, and then give up. They organized. They took actions which had the direct result of shifting the legislative process in an intricate way, so as to achieve their desired outcome. Whatever the issue of the day, this kind of grassroots organizing can have an impact, and it's always more likely to lead to success than getting mad and doing nothing.
When the opportunity arose to do something and make a difference, John Woods stood up. He didn't complain, he took action. He learned how to impact the legislative process, make allies, work with existing groups across Texas, and organize individuals to make a much larger collective impact than any one could on their own.
John went from reading the news to changing the news, and he did it by organizing.
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Random, horrible things happen to people. Sometimes, people manage to take that experience and channel it into something bigger than themselves, in the hopes that some good might come out of it. And while I don't think anyone can say that the Virginia Tech massacre will ever have a happy ending, at least this story shows something positive coming out of a terrible event. And it's possible-I'd even say highly probable-that John Woods prevented other people from experiencing the same loss he did. Everyone who knows John is pretty proud of him for this, and I'm sure Maxine would be, too.
Meanwhile, Students for Gun Free Schools in Texas isn't done. They expect to see the bill come back in the next session, and are continuing to work to make sure that it doesn't gain traction. They're going to keep organizing, because there's always more work to do, and more progressive policy outcomes to push for.
But the moral of John's story is this: if you really care about an issue, if you want things to change, you need to get out there and do something about it. |
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