IF THE U.S. SENATE CANNOT PASS A GUN VIOLENCE UNIVERSAL BACKGROUND CHECK WITH 90% AMERICAN SUPPORT WHAT CHANCE IS THERE FOR A MORE CONTENTIOUS IMMIGRATION REFORM BILL ?.............

What has been apparent for some years now became even more apparent on Thursday with the failure of the United States Senate to pass the Manchin-Toomey Amendment to the Gun Violence Bill which has been before Congress in recent months, a Universal Background Check for the buying of guns that has the support of 90% of all Americans; the ability of the Legislative Branch of our American Government is flawed and broken.  When the politics of self preservation and the prerogatives of one particular lobbyist group take precedence over the proper interpretation of the Second Amendment to the Constitution the Freedom to Bear Arms on the part of law abiding and peaceable citizens, not mentally ill, deranged, demented, criminal, violent, and terrorism intending, persons, in an open society of justice our nation was founded to be, then we face a crisis of civility and safety and a moral and ethical abyss  where common sense and the mutual good of the entire citizenry is supplanted in favor of self interest and the malcontent.  After the Newtown Connecticut mass shooting last December and the numerous other such occurrences that have taken place in the USA during past years, the widespread support and overwhelming embrace of our citizens for a consistent, absolute, universal background check for the purchase of firearms at gun shows and online, was thought quite rightly, to be the least the current effort to address Gun Violence would achieve.  And the bipartisan, Manchin-Toomey Amendment assured the background check would not infringe on sales or exchanges between family members or legally constituted groups of persons. strengthened the likelihood that a Universal Background Check would be passed into law with bipartisan support.  Alas the sad reality, 93% of Republican Senators voted against the Amendment, ( 42 out of 45 No) and 92% of Democratic Senators voted for the Amendment, (49 out of 53 Yes) with 100% of the Independent Senators voting in the affirmative, (2 of 2 Yes).  This resulted in a majority vote of 54 Yes; 46 No; for the Manchin-Toomey Amendment, because it fails the 60 votes necessary to overcome the Senate Filibuster rules.  Filibuster Reform is another topic of urgent concern in a country founded on majority rule that we must soon address.  However, at present as the struggle to enact Gun Violence reform that includes a universal background check for gun show and online buyers regroups, if this issue with 90% support of the populace can be blocked, what kind of legislation for vital concerns and necessary problems such as the need for objective Immigration Reform, a more contentious issue, can we be assured of achieving in the United States Congress ?  What is increasingly certain is the need to repair the politics fist brokenness that thwarts the will of the majority and prevents sound and necessary reform legislation from gaining passage into law.............Fr.  Troy