In the aftermath of last November’s tragedy at New Hampshire Hospital, Gov. Chris Sununu hailed Bradley Haas, the unarmed security guard who was shot and killed there, as “an absolute hero.” That opinion apparently was not shared by Republicans in the New Hampshire Senate, who instead chose to regard Haas’ life as yet another necessary sacrifice on the altar of Second Amendment absolutism.

Haas was killed by John Madore, 33, seconds after the latter entered the lobby of the state’s main psychiatric facility on Nov. 17. State Trooper Nathan Sleight, who was on duty at the hospital, shot and killed Madore immediately afterward as Madore attempted to reload his pistol.

Madore, who was homeless and out of work, had been diagnosed with schizophrenia and was committed to the state hospital for extended periods in 2016 and 2017. His guns were confiscated by police in 2016 following an arrest and involuntary commitment.

As a result, he was prohibited by federal law from purchasing firearms, and the question naturally arose in the wake of the shooting of how he managed to obtain the weapon used to kill Haas. (He also had an AR-15 semiautomatic rifle in his vehicle in the hospital parking lot.)

That question was answered last month by the state Attorney General’s Office. Madore lied about his status on the federal Firearms Transaction form when buying the gun from a dealer in Barrington, N.H. He affirmed that he had never been committed to a mental health institution, and the dealer had no way of checking this false assertion because New Hampshire does not require reporting of involuntary mental health commitments to the national background check database.

Even before this came to light, a bill — known as Bradley’s Law — was introduced this year in the Legislature authorizing the New Hampshire judicial branch and the Department of Safety to transmit to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) records of those disqualified by federal law from purchasing guns because a) they have been found not guilty of a crime by reason of insanity; b) judged incompetent to stand trial and found by a court to be a danger to themselves or others; c) involuntarily committed to a mental health facility. In so doing, New Hampshire would have joined 47 other states that report such information.

The legislation was notable in several respects. The prime sponsors, Rep. Terry Roy, R-Deerfield, and Rep. David Meuse, D-Portsmouth, generally hold opposing views on gun rights but came together to propose closing this yawning loophole. They also included in the bill a detailed road map for how an individual could regain the ability to possess firearms through the court system. They took steps to protect privacy by specifying that the records transmitted would not include any clinical psychiatric information. The bill was sufficiently fair-minded to win approval in the House of Representatives, which is no easy feat.

When it got to the Senate, however, the gun lobby rallied and got it tabled by a 13-11 vote. J.R. Hoell, a Republican state representative from Dunbarton who also serves as secretary of the New Hampshire Firearms Coalition, led the effort to derail the bill. “There is no system that government can run that can keep firearms out of the hands of people who want to commit harm,” he told the New Hampshire Bulletin news site.

But the Washington Post reports that in the past seven years about 50,000 applications to buy firearms have been denied for “adjudicated mental health” issues reported to the NICS. Over the 12 months prior to October 2023, an average of 21 people a day had their applications denied for mental-health-related reasons. And surveys by the Pew Research Center indicate that 88% of Republicans and 89% of Democrats favor preventing those with mental illnesses from purchasing guns.

So Haas joins the hundreds — the thousands — of victims of gun violence whose senseless deaths are attributable to an ideological abstraction: that the Second Amendment to the Constitution somehow confers on gun owners the virtually unlimited ability to commit mayhem without government, or society, having any say in restricting access to firearms. This is a view endorsed by the majority of the U.S. Supreme Court, and so carries great weight.

We cede the final, rational word on this matter to Roy, co-sponsor of the defeated bill. “I continue to be a Second Amendment advocate,” he wrote in a text following the Senate vote. “But that does not mean that I cannot take extremely limited, constitutional, life-saving matters into consideration. The two are not mutually exclusive.”