To the Editor:

Remember “Jim Crow?”  It was a term used to describe post Civil War laws and ordinances that enabled racial discrimination and segregation, in flagrant violation of the Constitution.  Well Jim Crow has found a new home in Newtown thanks to an invitation from the Newtown Action Alliance, endorsed and signed by First Selectwoman Pat Llodra.

Yes, welcome to Newtown, Jim Crow, where the exercise of certain Constitutional rights and certain individuals aren’t welcome. Violators will be picketed, refused service, and called vile names in public forums.  The “violators” are residents of Newtown and Connecticut who own and possess a gun.

Some in Newtown don’t want to own a gun or see a gun in public, but there are quite a few who do. According the Wall Street Journal and CNN, in the first half of 2013 alone there are 203 more Newtown residents now permitted to buy and possess a hand gun.  Jim Crow’s going to be very busy!

The Right to Keep and Bear Arms is not mandatory and it’s not for everyone.  But it is a right enumerated in the original Bill of Rights and on par with privacy, trial by jury, and eventually the abolishment of slavery, and universal suffrage as examples.  But in Newtown, some rights and residents are now less equal than others.

An elected public official, ethically bound to treat and represent all Newtown residents in a fair and impartial manner, using his/her position to lobby a company to prohibit lawful activity is nothing short of discrimination. If the endorsed prohibition in Newtown were against a certain gender, race, ethnicity or sexual orientation, the public would be outraged, and rightfully so!  But when it comes to lawful gun ownership, some in Newtown, starting with First Selectwoman Pat Llodra, endorse and cheer the blatant and disgraceful discrimination against their fellow residents.

Welcome to Newtown, Jim Crow!

Bill Stevens

139 Huntingtown Road, Newtown   August 27, 2013