Sarah Brady, the gun control activist whose crusade against Americans’ civil right to keep and bear arms had brief success in the early 1990s, only to suffer repeated reverses a decade later, died today at the age of 73, reports NPR News . . .

Ms. Brady’s efforts to push gun control on the United States ironically served to strengthen advocates for the right to keep and bear arms. As the Washington Post notes in its obituary, “[t]he NRA’s legal efforts to overturn the Brady Bill led to a 1997 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that declared that under the 10th Amendment, state and local law enforcement officials could not be forced to handle the background checks required by the law.”

Her campaign for gun control, described contemporaneously as “an attempt to generate an emotional response to an issue that should be discussed intellectually,” served to fill the coffers of gun rights organizations such as the National Rifle Association. By the time of her passing, support for stricter gun control laws had fallen to what polling organization Gallup characterized as “record lows”.

Ms. Brady is survived by her son James “Scott” Brady Jr., and by her stepdaughter, Melissa “Missy” Brady Camins.

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121 COMMENTS

    • As so many denied the right to defend themselves by your efforts have done, rest in pieces Sarah. The world is that much better a place without you. Finally your special place in he11 if there is one is filled. Hope you’re nice and warm there, and Jim is likely glad to see you in your place at last from his perch on a cloud above.

    • I’m betting the kids will take over the income, uh, I mean responsibilities, of course, of keeping that cash cow, Ooops, I mean vital organization producing.

    • She was a lying liar that lied. She fabricated data, spun data, mislead people etc. to push an agenda. She and Nelson “Pete” Shields pushed the Shields model which was to get ALL guns registered and then ban them. Her passing doesn’t magically make her a saint.

  2. Wonder how many years the stress and toll of trying to squash my civil and human rights took from her lifespan?

      • When Jim Brady died on Aug. 4, 2014, Kyle in Ct requested we show respect for the dead.

        I’ll quote the entirety of my response to Kyle in CT: What I said about him goes double for her.

        “I’ll be civil to Mr. Brady.

        May you rest in peace. Peace, mind you, hard-fought and won by those using the very tools your wife was relentless in denying the (supposed to be) free people of the United States.

        I am utterly sickened and heart-broken the way she and all her ilk to this very day take advantage of a disabled, brain-damaged man.

        Rest in peace, Mr.Brady.

        May your wife and all others of her sick and twisted ideology get cancer and die a very slow and painful death.

        Was that civil enough Kyle in CT?”

        • And do we not see again today the same sad spectacle, as Mark Kelly seems to trot Gabrielle Giffords around, as she speaks words written for her with a voice and pacing reminiscent of a 10-year-old Shirley Temple?

          I hope that, at the very least, when Giffords has fully recovered (if it is possible) she does not feel she was abused by the rush to campaign for something to which only two years earlier she was openly opposed.

  3. Condolences to her familly for losing a loved one, and while I hate to admit it we may have to look out this getting politicized.

    In that vein vultures are undoubtedly watching these comments and seek to paint us all with the brush of any comments in poor taste, so lets please avoid that.

      • as for painting us all with the same brush, dont worry, the Anti liberty crowd has already upgraded from a brush to a pressurized spray painter. much more coverage per gallon too.

    • As Ambrose Bierce once wrote: “Death – when he comes announced, is to be greeted with all of the formal manifestations of respect, even by those most familiar to him.”
      She was a worthy foe, but there are still plenty more of her kind left for us to oppose. Keep your powder dry, yall.

    • Condolences to her family. I couldn’t stand her, but I am sure her family loved her.

      So I’m not sorry to see her go, but I have enough empathy to not be a dick about it.

  4. It’s a shame that the circumstances occurred that tilted her into her particular quest. Nobody should have to experience the sort of loss and suffering that her and her husband suffered. Unfortunately, misfortune does happen – it’s what we do with it those experiences that define our character. In Sarah Brady’s case, she channeled her sorrow into an emotionally-charged push for laws that have been empirically proved to do nothing to prevent future crimes like the one she suffered. It’s a shame that she couldn’t have pursued a path that would have been more productive and lead her to a happier life.

    One would hope that without their figurehead(s), her group, already cast into irrelevance, will quickly slide down the path to nonexistence.

    • It can be said, and respectfully, that Mrs. Brady (as also Mr. Fineman) could have better directed her post-trauma energies to the improvement of the treatment and surveillance of the seriously mentally ill. Untreated and unsupervised serious mental illness leads not only (and rarely) to violence, with guns or otherwise, but more frequently to the destruction of families and ultimately devastation of the life of the person so afflicted.

      To the extent handguns are a problem, they are merely an ancillary tool of drug gangs and gang wars, which will be fought with whatever weapons are at hand, be they knives, guns, explosives, or incendiaries. The problem is how we handle drugs and young men who deal them. The problem is severe mental illness and how we fail to treat the ill person, we the families, we the law-makers, we the communities.

    • Her husband was injured while protected by a whole bunch of the best trained men in the world, carrying machine guns. Her solution (to her financial problems) was to attempt to leave everyone else utterly defenseless against evil. I think she ended up more brain damaged than he was.

    • You’re right, we need to keep it civil. Yet it’s fair to note that I (and millions of others) haven’t dedicated my adult life to crushing *her* civil liberties simply because some random-tragedy affected my life.
      In other words, her personal tragedy is not a mandate to take away my rights. She spent every day of her life trying to diminish our nation, and while I offer her family my condolences, I’ll shed no tears tonight.

      • You’re right, of course, but it’s still no excuse to lower to the level of personal insults. I’ve seen at least one removed so far.

      • I’m a libertarian, thus an advocate of the right of self-defense. However, that is also how I’m sensitive to the many losses of civil liberties suffered at the hands of right-wing voters over the years. I don’t mean to characterize you as an individual, I don’t know your politics, but the intersection of RKBA activism and very insidious violations of the proper role of government like the RFRA in Indiana along with many other harms directed at the LGBT population, your attempt to send women back to the kitchens, barefoot and forced to bear children, and the every tax dollar stolen from the people to fund the insane war on terror for the last 15 years as well as its surveillance state, proliferation of drone technology, and more can be traced back to many of you. So don’t act like this movement is full of hard-core freedom activists. A good majority of you are some of the most totalitarian authoritarians the world has ever seen.

        • BS. You are no libertarian. A libertarian will think that commercial transactions are between voluntary parties, not forced by LGBT fascists. A libertarian will think that the right to ones property (his business) is fundamental in a free society. Fail.

        • @AnonInWA: I was thinking about the same as you commented. There is no true libertarian that I know who would support forcing anyone to transact business with another. That flies in the face of libertarianism.

        • “like the RFRA in Indiana along with many other harms directed at the LGBT population, your attempt to send women back to the kitchens, barefoot and forced to bear children,”

          Wrong. Name one piece of legislation the Republican Party is pushing that discriminates against women or gays. The “war on women” is a complete lie generated by the left, and the RFRA does not harm the LGBT population, there is no provision in it that allows one to “deny business” to a LGBT community.

        • @Mikester – That’s a bit out of no where. I don’t see the context of what SD3 said that would prompt such a response.

          @John in Ohio – There are many degrees of libertarianism. Anything ranging from Anarcho-Capitalism to Republican Lite.

          @AllAmerican –

          Name one piece of legislation the Republican Party is pushing that discriminates against women or gays.

          Oklahoma House Bill 1597
          Oklahoma House Bill 1598
          Oklahoma House Bill 1599

          And saying the Indiana “Religious Freedom” law isn’t anti-gay is like saying the NFA isn’t anti 2A. The rest is just doublespeak.

          Small Government Republicans[tm] – Pushing Religious law like it’s going out of style.

        • A quick summary for Grindstone and others who don’t feel like reading the OK HBs:

          OK HB 1597: People/businesses can refuse to do business with homosexuals.

          OK HB 1598: People can seek counseling for themselves or their minor dependents for homosexuality.

          OK HB 1599: The state denies homosexual marriage, its employees from recognizing it, will not fund it, etc.

          Regardless of this audience’s views on homosexuality, none of the above threaten fines, breaking and entering, physical arrest or potentially lethal conflict like laws “against” almost everything else. The most common claim of civil rights or Bill of Rights violations of these HBs (according to Legiscan comments) is that forcing a child to go to counseling for homosexuality (in their view a false and damaging reason) is child abuse. Even from the homosexual view, that seems like a stretch. (<— This would be the part against which to argue.)

          My views in general are not recognized by most of society, but my biggest concern is laws that will financially destabilize me or get my doors kicked in.

      • Sh1t results from the process of digestion. Digestion starts in the mouth.

        Therefore, sh1t comes from the mouth.

        I don’t care if someone else is an a-hole or disagrees with my world view. The problem arises when they open their mouth and start spewing forth their sh1t and trying to persuade others into taking action (like voting, etc).

        (Sorry…must be in a metaphorical frame of mind today…)

  7. Whatever you might think of her efforts, Sarah Brady was trying to deal with a untenable situation in the way she thought best. I hope that she is now at peace and reunited with her husband.

    • “in the way she thought best”

      With no care, compassion or thought towards the rights, feelings and safety of others.

      My condolences to her family for their loss but I will not lament for one second the loss of such a self obsessed and inconsiderate human being.

      I truly mean this with no intention of ill will whatsoever….. Humanity is better off without her and her kind.

    • Puh-lease!
      Every evil person in history has cloaked themselves in false righteousness and most of them even believed their own spin.

      She was no different. Regardless of her intentions, which I am sure she believed were right, the net result was a curtailment of Americans’ natural rights. That is evil, plain and simple. Good riddance.

  9. I do feel sorrow for all the suffering she and her family have had to deal with all these years. Sadly I’m sure the organization she started, will continue on without her, continuing to eliminate our God given rights.

  10. Wonder how many victims of her lifes work died sooner than her due to infringments upon their rights pushed by her and her campaign.

  11. Having lost a daughter to violence and my wife of 31 years. Then my Father….her mother and father…..in 4 short years…I wish she finally has some rest.

    Now. As I live….we, the NRA, went from 3M members to over 5M and growing and for my NRA donations it was ‘The Brady Bill’ that was the catalyst!

    Thanks Sarah!

  12. She was worthy enemy in our conflict. She must be respected for that at least. May her family get over their loss soon, and may she rest in peace now that her earthly job as come to an end with her passing.

  13. Hmmm. God says to love ones enemies. She was an enemy of freedom, attempting to mandate by law that my fellow Americans, my family, my friends and myself to be helpless in the face of those with evil intent.

    The best epitaph for her death is as the article says. That her efforts, and those that continue the fight for the same mandate, have invigorated and brought back to our collective awareness how important our right to defend our lives, as represented by the Second Amendment, is for a free people.

    So thank you, Sarah Brady, for this gift, and may you find the peace in the next life you could not find in the this one.

  16. I was going to post some truth, but I’ll try to be a better person and go clean my umpteen rifles and handguns instead.

  17. I’ll be sure to hit the range this weekend in her memory.

    A weekend of load development should honor her memory.

    • Yep, you got that right. I will think of her as I go through this weekend’s gun show…

    • Good call. I’ve got some fresh .375’s loaded and want to put another 20 through the .500.
      Recoil therapy my brothers and sisters!

  18. I really only have one question, will the president wait to Monday to call a national press conference praising Sarah’s life work and demand that “we” must pass more gun control in her memory (for the children of course) or will he do it tomorrow?

      • I believe NCAA basketball also has control of the president, so I concur.

        Hey! It just struck me, I mentioned the prez without voicing a criticism! That may be a first. Everyone should be able to enjoy some entertainment.

        • Even one life is too much. She campaigned against firearms, and in so doing, contributed to victims being defenseless against violent criminals. I have nothing positive to say about her or her passing, so I will simply say rest in peace.

  20. “Meaningless! Meaningless!”
    says the Teacher.
    “Utterly meaningless!
    Everything is meaningless.”

    Ecclesiastes 1:2

  22. I saw Sarah Brady speak in Detroit in the early 90s. I asked her about the 2nd amendment and her reply was that it was about militias (only). She had massive security, police and others. A woman was going around taking pictures of every attendee. At the time I thought it was for an article. After some thought, I realized it was another security measure.
    A couple of weeks later I saw the Japanese ambassador speak. He had a single bodyguard.

    • Like so many gungrabbers, Sarah was a flaming hypocrite where her own safety was concerned. By the way, she and Morris Deas before her had vowed to put the NRA out of business. So much for freedom of expression of opposing views.

      As for the Japanese ambassador, he must not have feared that in America there would be a rifle behind every blade of grass.

  23. This seems like a good reason to review the source of the problem.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Hinckley_Jr.

    The article is fairly balanced and concise, and it is a good review of what led up to the incident and its aftermath. Missing from the article is the iconic picture of the Secret Service agent with his Uzi SMG. One interesting thing is the Rohm RG-14 revolver Hinckley used. What a POS!

  24. RIP.
    The death of anyone is a sad thing for the family and friends..
    Even for a person so passionately wrong and misdirected about a belief,
    I have no need to add more.

  25. My wife told me I should say “I am sorry for your loss”, and avoid saying what I really want to say. Oh, look at the time. Got to go now and load some magazines, for I am going to the range tomorrow and Sunday to exercise my God given 2nd amendment rights.

  26. The woman spent her life trying to take away our civil rights because of some sick piece of shit that shot our President and also shot her husband. There was no excuse for what happened to everyone shot and their families. There is also no excuse for what she did as well. The right to keep and bear arms is just that, our right and not a privilege. It is getting real old having to defend a right that should not need defending. There is less than two years of the criminal Obama administration left. I fear we are going to see an assault on all of our civil rights, the likes of which we have never seen before. Be vigilant and never loose sight of the threat to our liberty and freedom. We have everything to loose and the progressives have everything to gain. Remember, we surround them and out number them.

    • I disagree with your contention that progressives have anything at all to gain, they are chasing an illusion.

      • Their push to disarm the People has always seemed to me like suicide. I agree, they gain nothing in the long term. They would be in servitude just like the rest of us if their plans were to come to fruition.

  27. Everybody dies… Aint no one getting out of here alive.. Sympathy? Why?, The rest of us are in line for the same ride…….Shes gone, Im glad,I never liked what she dedicated her life too..the bitch, she tried to take my rights by trotting out her equally spiteful 2A rights hating husband….. Worm dirt, both of them..

      • Right. May she rest in peace. You may disagree with an opponent in politics, but some comments here are dehumanizing. I’m very, very disappointed in the tone of (some of) what is being said. Very off-putting and sure to alienate anyone who does not already have a firm view on guns. It is not in the interest of pro-gun people to present themselves as callous and hostile–it reinforces negative stereotypes.

  28. My mother used to say, “If you can’t say anything good about him/her, don’t say anything at all.”

    So I will not say anything…

    • Got it in one. Not sure why I should feel anything but schadenfreude over the departure of someone who made a lucrative career out of trying to destroy my civil right to self-defense. How many people in anti-gun jurisdictions have been killed due to her efforts to disarm victims? If anyone reading this finds that offensive, I regret the fact that they are stupid enough to be offended by the truth.

  32. I have no doubt the deceased believed in her cause and thought it to be good and just. That’s all I got.

  37. Sarah Brady-Master Statist Puppeteer. She moved the strings, and barely moved her mouth.
    Mark Kelly will be your living legacy.

  38. I have no sympathy for someone that worked to make us serfs and slaves again. Who tried to ensure an America that was helpless and disarmed in the face of criminals and tyrants. Good riddance to all such traitors.

  39. I have about the same reaction to Sarah Brady passing as Eddie Rickenbacker did with FDR.

  40. Condolences to the family. Death of a loved one is always difficult.

    As a purely personal matter for me, I will not be shedding a tear as far as I am concerned she caused enough damage to gun rights and spurred so many frivolous lawsuits that I am happy to see her go.

    All her effort and fund raising could have better been used in research for brain damage, shooting trauma research or research into mental illness. There is a far disproportional amount of money raised for breast cancer ( and many in the field believe much of the money is not needed) versus other illnesses. mental illness does not show up on the radar in terms of money raised.

    May the rest of the gun grabbers soon go visit with Mrs Brady and we someday rid ourselves of the anti-gun nonsense.

  43. She should have been shot and killed years ago. I am so glad she is gone now. Repeal the brady law. 2nd Amendment SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED.. Do you understand that US Government???

  45. “‘In the history of our nation, there are few people, if any, who are directly responsible for saving as many lives as Sarah and Jim,’ Brady Campaign and Center President Dan Gross said in a statement.”

    Name one.

  46. Ding-Dong! The Witch Is Dead

    She deserves NONE of my respect. Anybody that wants my family to die at the hands of an armed criminal while I am defenseless (thanks Gov. Tomblin) deserves less than nothing from me.

  47. Rest in peace Mrs. Brady. You are with Jim now. We we did disagree but I know you loved your man.

      • Grow up. On the bad-taste-o-meter this doesn’t come close to some of the comments made previously. The only person I named was Hinckley. I said he was crazy. So you didn’t like Reagan? May he rest in peace. You need to get educated and read what Voltaire said about democracy………

  50. In many ways, the Brady clan is responsible for the resurgence of 2nd Amendment rights in this country. The massive overreach in the 80’s and early 90’s by the gun grabbers spurred interest in firearms and gun rights. I know I never wanted an AR until they told me I couldn’t have one. Mrs. Brady, may you experience the same peace in your eternal slumber that I experience, knowing you lost.

  53. Let’s not forget about all of Sarah Brady’s VICTIMS — They are more deserving of prayers and kind thoughts than this woman ever was. Who are her victims?

    Direct Victims — The hundreds of small businesses that were sued and forced into bankruptcy by the Brady Campaign Legal Action Project. Their crime? Selling a legal product, following all laws doing so, but having the misfortune of having a customer whom the GOVERNMENT approved to purchase commit a crime with the product. Sarah Brady directed her staff of 3 attorneys to sue these innocent Americans, because she absolutely hated what they did for a living and decided it was her RIGHT to destroy them. How many families lost everything because of Sarah Brady’s political vendetta against something she hated and didn’t think had a place in America despite our founding fathers making it the 2nd Ammendement!

    Indirect Victims — How many people were so put off by the process to purchase a gun never did so? Tens of thousands. How many of them found themselves the victims of a violent crime where they were defenseless and died? We will likely never know, but statistically speaking it has to be thousands of people.

    So enough with all of this Rest In Peace. Sarah Brady lived her life hell bent on destroying everyone who did not agree with her. She nor her family deserve even an ounce of sympathy. Had a mysterious illness came out that only killed gun owners, you can bet her response would have been “Good Riddance” and not “Rest In Peace”

    • Agreed. S. Brady’s anti-American activities earned a good riddance to bad rubbish. Unfortunately S. Brady’s legacy and anti-American activity continues. I am grateful that more people are active against these anti-American activities, but we have a long ways to go.

    • Agreed. But in defense of those who offered their condolences, we who support the 2nd amendment are better people than our opponents. Our side represents We The People, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. Their side represents potential tyrants and the self described ruling class. Our cause is just, and history will prove.that. Anyhow, our cause is staff by good people with a good cause, so it is inevitable that we will always take a higher road than Sarah and her minions.

  55. Always a grand day when a fascist dies. Good riddance and if a hell exists, may she make a nice barbecue for the devil.

    No sense pretending otherwise. She devoted her life to endangering the lives of innocent people, destroying liberty, and crusading against human rights. She’s a monster and the only sad thing about her dying is that it didn’t happen sooner.

    Good riddance and may every other of your ilk follow you soon.

  56. When former senator T. Kennedy passed away, the best I could say of this anti-American is: T. Kennedy is finally out of the senate.

    The best that can be said for S. Brady is: another anti-American is longer active.

    These anti-Americans which have passed on, like so many others, left a legacy which takes from our freedom and does not insure justice against those violate the 100% equal rights of others, especially violent criminals. They would force us to be defenseless, take our property, would take away decisions of how to live away from us, and take away the means to produce and trade freely.

    • Hey, don’t besmirch my favorite dead senator, a man of such overwhelming intelligence:

      “It is a special pleasure for me to introduce our two home run team for working families in America, Mike McGwire and Sammy Sooser of the White House, it’s a pleasure to introduce them, first of all our friend Al Gore. Let’s give them a Boston welcome.”

      “Why don’t we just ask Osama Bin Laden uh Osama Obama uh Obama what the uh since uh he won by such a big amount.”

      “Well, I’m, um, were I to to make the uh the announcement and uh to run, the reasons I that would run is because I have a great belief in this country that it is, there’s more natural resources than any nation in the world.”
      Ted Kennedy

  58. “I never wished anyone dead. I have read a few obituaries with great pleasure!”

    ______ Mark Twain

  59. Lol Mark Twain has the best quotes.

    In any case, I don’t cry for the deaths of tyrants.

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