by Dave Workman
Senior Editor
He was a soft-spoken, gentle man from the proverbial “old school,” and when Otis McDonald passed away in April, the firearms community remembered him fondly as having played a pivotal role in the fight to restore Second Amendment rights.
Mr. McDonald’s final resting place is the Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery in Elwood, IL, but his name has become famous across the country as the lead plaintiff in the landmark 2010 US Supreme Court Second Amendment ruling in McDonald v. City of Chicago, a case brought by the Second Amendment Foundation, Illinois State Rifle Association and three other individual plaintiffs, Adam Orlov and David and Colleen Lawson.
McDonald’s name will remain synonymous with Second Amendment activism, and his passing made headlines across the firearms forums and blogs.
Born in the small community of Fort Necessity, LA, McDonald served in the Army and upon his return from overseas duty, he traveled to Chicago, arriving there with $7 in his pocket, given to him by his mother. For a while, he lived with a friend until finding work, and he held a number of jobs prior to finding what would become a career as an engineer at the University of Chicago, where he worked as a journeyman engineer. He also worked his way through college, earning a degree in engineering from Kennedy-King College in Chicago. He later served as president of his local trade union.
But his historic prominence came late in life when he found himself in the middle of a civil rights battle that would reach all the way to the Supreme Court. McDonald had raised his family in a neighborhood that became increasingly dominated by gang violence. While he owned a shotgun, he felt that he needed a handgun for home protection, but that option had been legally precluded by Chicago’s ban on handgun licenses that dated back more than two decades.
On the day that the high court announced its first major Second Amendment ruling in the Heller case, attorneys Alan Gura and David Sigale set in motion the challenge to Chicago’s handgun ban. At the time, McDonald was 74 years old and for the next two years, his case wound its way through the federal court system.
“Otis truly loved people,” Gura recalled. “He was universally kind, patient, and positive, and wanted very much to see his neighbors enjoying their freedom to which they are entitled. We all owe Otis a debt of gratitude that he could fulfill that wish.
SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan Gottlieb told TGM, “Otis will continue to live in the hearts and minds of freedom-loving Americans who will long remember his important contribution to the gun rights movement. We were honored to know him, and we are heartbroken at his loss.”
Gottlieb recalled the day in June 2010, immediately following the Supreme Court’s ruling, when he and McDonald were leaving to go meet the press gathering on the steps below the court building in Washington, DC.
“Walking down the stairs from the Supreme Court from our victory,” Gottlieb said, “Otis told me that he promised his mother that he would one day make her proud. He hugged me and I told him, ‘Truth is, Otis, you made us all proud’.”
In a prepared statement, the National Rifle Association noted, “Heroes like Otis McDonald have shown us the way forward. He fought an over-reaching government for his basic civil rights—and prevailed. Thanks to his desire to protect his family, many more families are safer. And thanks to his unwavering commitment to achieve equal protection under the law, Americans across the country can enjoy more of their fundamental freedoms.”
The NRA had filed a similar lawsuit against the Chicago handgun ban, and during oral arguments before the high court in early 2010, an NRA attorney was allowed time to argue on behalf of the association while Gura, representing McDonald and the SAF lawsuit, handled the bulk of the presentation.
At the time of the victory, McDonald was 76, and still eager to fight “the good fight.” His victory paved the way for subsequent legal challenges to gun control laws all across the county, as well as Illinois gun laws that have national implications, including SAF’s two important cases, Moore v. Madigan and Ezell v. City of Chicago, and the NRA’s Shepard v. Madigan. Both the Moore and Shepard cases forced Illinois lawmakers to pass a concealed carry statute.
Services for Mr. McDonald were held at Bethlehem Missionary Baptist Church in Harvey, a Chicago suburb, with his nephew, the Rev. Dr. Fred Jones officiating. Mr. McDonald is survived by his wife, Laura, and four daughters. He was preceded in death by a son.
The family suggested that remembrances in his name be made to the Second Amendment Foundation and Illinois State Rifle Association.
