Patron Saint of Gun-Grabbing Sarah Brady Dead at 73

Sarah Brady, wife of Reagan press secretary James Brady, passed away on April 3, 2015, in Alexandria, Virgina of pneumonia.

Brady became the face of gun control activism following the shooting of her husband during an assassination attempt on President Reagan.

Writes the Washington Post, “The turning point for her activism came four years later, when their 6-year-old son, Scott, found what he thought was a toy gun and pointed it at his mother. She told him never to point a gun at anyone and, when he handed it to her, she found to her horror that it wasn’t a toy but a fully loaded .22 similar to the one used to shoot her husband.”

(Who left a loaded gun where a 6-year-child could get it?)

Brady began her gun control campaign by contacting Handgun Control Inc., which would later become the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence.  She is best known for the Brady Bill, which mandated potential firearms purchasers undergo a background check. The bill was twice introduced by Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY), signed into law President Bill Clinton in 1993, and went into effect in 1994. The bill suffered a small setback in 1997, when the Supreme Court ruled that federal law could not mandate the states handle background checks under the 10th amendment. One year later, the FBI’s background check program, National Instant Criminal Background Check System, came on line and began to handle the background checks of gun purchasers.

Survivors include a son, James “Scott” Brady Jr. of Rehoboth Beach, Del.; a stepdaughter, Melissa “Missy” Brady Camins of Woody Creek, Colo.; and a brother, William Kemp of Arlington, Va.