Posted on 02/15/2015 5:33:10 AM PST by marktwain
Texas moved a bit closer to passing campus carry and open carry bills out of the Texas Senate yesterday, February 12. The Senate has been the bottleneck for these bills because a super majority is needed to get them out of the Senate. That majority used to be 21 votes out of 31. It was amended early this session to become 19 votes out of 31. It is still a high hurdle, but Lt. Governor Dan Patrick heads the Texas Senate. He has promised to pass both campus and open carry. I am convinced that he is working hard to do so. Here is a statement that he posted on his facebook page:
OPEN CARRY AND CAMPUS CARRY PASS OUT OF STATE AFFAIRS TODAY 7-2 All Republicans voted yes. We are now one step closer to passing these two bills out of the Senate.
Congratulationsto Senators Birdwell and Estes for building support for their bills and moving them forward. Also a big thank you to Chairman Huffman, the Senators, and the people who traveled to Austin to testify on these bills. It was a very long day for all.
When session began Sen Birdwell already had 19 co-authors for his Campus Carry bill. He has been working on that bill for years and was within one vote of passing it last session out of the Senate.
On the other hand, Senator Estes had few co-authors just a few weeks ago. Over the past 3 weeks he gathered nearly a dozen co-authors and gained full support on the committee.
I promised we would pass Open Carry and Campus Carry. I worked on the bill as well, but 100% of the credit goes to the Senators as always.
Open carry activists continue to push hard for constitutional carry. Comments at the facebook page show that support.
Matthew StringerCampus carry is great, however we really want constitutional open carry! Not this liberal licensed carry junk. I do not want to pay a tax and trade a right for a privilege! Honor the GOP platform and constitution!
Yesterday at 7:09pm
Dan Patrickthe votes aren't there yet
The disarmists in the media, particularly the Texas Tribune, seem to be the only real opposition. Former Governor Perry did not do his presidential bid or the open carry movement any good when he voiced a personal preference for concealed carry. From the texastribune.org:
Perry said he was “not necessarily all that fond of this open carry concept,” adding that those who carry guns ought to be “appropriately backgrounded, appropriately vetted, appropriately trained.”
“We license people to drive on our highways,” he said. “We give them that privilege. The same is true with our concealed handguns.”
But also, he said he prefers concealed handguns for “a more practical reason.”
“I don’t want the bad guys to know if I’m carrying," he said. "I don’t want to be the first person shot if something’s going down.”
This bit of Internet mythology does not hold up to investigation. Most attackers simply target someone else if they find an armed person at the scene; and concealed carriers can and have been attacked because the attacker did not know that they were armed. It may be that former Governor Perry and the Texas Tribune have stopped constitutional carry in Texas for the moment,
but legislative politics are fluid. With the help and support of legislative leaders like Dan Patrick, much may happen. The next month or two will be very interesting for second amendment supporters.
The bills that passed the Senate committee are SB11, campus carry with a requirement to conceal the weapon on campus; and SB17, a licensed open carry bill. The only senators voting against the bill were the two Democrats. Here is a link to committee testimony video. Both bills are scheduled go in front of the entire Senate on next Tuesday, 17 February. That is the crutial vote, it appears. 19 votes are necessary out of 31. There are 20 Republicans in the Senate.
©2015 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice is included.
I do agree that people need to be trained with guns before they carry a gun. (I’ve come across waaaay too many idiots in my lifetime) In the old days, kids grew up with guns. They were taught to shoot young and had positive examples all around them. That’s not happening enough now.
But the idea of having restrictions on a ‘right’ doesn’t sit well with me.
So, the solution would to be to have every high school student take a mandatory firearms safety class in order to graduate. That way everyone has some training and there’s no excuse to restrict their rights.
Now who shouldn’t be allowed to carry? Anyone who’s lost their right to vote due to committing a felony. That’s it.
I agree that the mentally ill shouldn’t be running around with a gun, but that’s a slippery slope (at what point do we stop? Pure psychosis? Depression? Anxiety? A person who needed counseling to get through a rough patch at one point?)
The fact is that criminals, the mentally ill, and anyone else who wants to cause problems with a gun, will find a way to get their hands on a gun.
It's right there in the second sentence of The Second Amendment.
I agree with you, but will add that the novelty of open carry will quickly wear off.
A disarmist is one type of a traitor.
Some people just can't concealed carry without printing.
/johnny
Printing is no longer a problem in Texas after the 83rd Legislative Session. Both printing and inadvertent exposure are no longer CHL violations.
Did you read past the first paragraph?
Some people just don't want to print, and if that is going to happen, may as well open carry.
/johnny
This is good news, one step closer!
You said”Now who shouldn’t be allowed to carry? Anyone who’s lost their right to vote due to committing a felony.”
Did you know that anyone convicted of a felony who has completed his sentence is now allowed to vote in the state of Texas?
Neither of those are violations here in IL. And I would certainly like having the option available to me.
Are you promoting mandatory training before a person is ‘allowed’ to carry?
If so, the rest of the first paragraph is irrelevant.
I said what I said. Mandatory training for all high school graduates.
We’ve lost too much knowledge over the last 20 years.
I agree.
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