cuchulainn
January 15, 2003, 07:41 PM
Oh, so now people are high-handed for trying to protect their rights. :rolleyes:
http://www.insidedenver.com/drmn/opinion/article/0,1299,DRMN_38_1674099,00.html
From the Rocky Mountain News
A high-handed grab by gun-rights fans
January 15, 2003
The farther Columbine retreats into the mists of memory, the more aggressive gun-rights advocates become at the legislature.
From merely trying to fight off gun-control efforts introduced in the wake of the 1999 shootings, they moved to promoting more liberal concealed-carry laws. This year's goal: ending local control over firearms altogether by making regulation a matter of "statewide concern."
What this means, in effect, is prohibiting local governments from adopting ordinances that would impose greater restrictions on a person's right to own, carry, use or transfer a weapon than are imposed by state law.
Senate Bill 25, the measure embodying this concept that is sponsored by Sen. Jim Dyer, R-Littleton, was approved on a party-line 4-3 vote by the Judiciary Committee Monday. We hope Dyer's bill dies, but give him credit for drawing a clear line in the sand. Dyer and his allies argued that gun ownership is a constitutional right - indeed the state's version of the Second Amendment is even stronger than the Second Amendment itself - and therefore shouldn't be abridged by mere local governments.
But here's the problem with that argument: The courts have never conceded that the right to own a weapon entitles the owner to go anywhere or do anything he wants with it. Even the strongest gun advocates admit that the owner of private property can prohibit someone from bringing a weapon onto the property. The bill itself concedes that a city zoning ordinance that applies equally to all commercial establishments isn't a restriction on the right to bear arms.
Sen. Sue Windels, D-Arvada, argued during committee hearings that if we ask municipalities to agree to statewide standards, shouldn't we first tell them what those standards are?
A fair question. A couple of standards were in fact tacked onto the bill by amendment just before it was sent to the floor. One would let cities forbid the firing of guns into the air; another would let cities continue to ban the open carrying of weapons. But if the state monopolizes gun control, there will be requests to the legislature every year for the power to do this or that. Why not let the cities continue to decide in the first place, and only have the state get involved when it wants to standardize one specific policy, such as concealed-carry permits?
Cities are not likely to go too far. If they do, believe it or not, the courts will usually stop them.
Opponents delighted in pointing out that the conservatives backing the measure would very much resist Washington doing to the states what the state of Colorado would be doing to home-rule cities under this bill. That's a valid point.
One of the old complaints about allowing different cities to enact different controls concerned the hypothetical motorist who, not knowing that Denver has stricter gun controls than other cities, gets arrested for violating one when driving through town. But that was taken care of a few years ago with a law permitting weapons to pass through one jurisdiction to the next.
Lawmakers shouldn't sacrifice the concept of home rule and local control on the altar of S.B. 25. They should kill this bill instead.
http://www.insidedenver.com/drmn/opinion/article/0,1299,DRMN_38_1674099,00.html
From the Rocky Mountain News
A high-handed grab by gun-rights fans
January 15, 2003
The farther Columbine retreats into the mists of memory, the more aggressive gun-rights advocates become at the legislature.
From merely trying to fight off gun-control efforts introduced in the wake of the 1999 shootings, they moved to promoting more liberal concealed-carry laws. This year's goal: ending local control over firearms altogether by making regulation a matter of "statewide concern."
What this means, in effect, is prohibiting local governments from adopting ordinances that would impose greater restrictions on a person's right to own, carry, use or transfer a weapon than are imposed by state law.
Senate Bill 25, the measure embodying this concept that is sponsored by Sen. Jim Dyer, R-Littleton, was approved on a party-line 4-3 vote by the Judiciary Committee Monday. We hope Dyer's bill dies, but give him credit for drawing a clear line in the sand. Dyer and his allies argued that gun ownership is a constitutional right - indeed the state's version of the Second Amendment is even stronger than the Second Amendment itself - and therefore shouldn't be abridged by mere local governments.
But here's the problem with that argument: The courts have never conceded that the right to own a weapon entitles the owner to go anywhere or do anything he wants with it. Even the strongest gun advocates admit that the owner of private property can prohibit someone from bringing a weapon onto the property. The bill itself concedes that a city zoning ordinance that applies equally to all commercial establishments isn't a restriction on the right to bear arms.
Sen. Sue Windels, D-Arvada, argued during committee hearings that if we ask municipalities to agree to statewide standards, shouldn't we first tell them what those standards are?
A fair question. A couple of standards were in fact tacked onto the bill by amendment just before it was sent to the floor. One would let cities forbid the firing of guns into the air; another would let cities continue to ban the open carrying of weapons. But if the state monopolizes gun control, there will be requests to the legislature every year for the power to do this or that. Why not let the cities continue to decide in the first place, and only have the state get involved when it wants to standardize one specific policy, such as concealed-carry permits?
Cities are not likely to go too far. If they do, believe it or not, the courts will usually stop them.
Opponents delighted in pointing out that the conservatives backing the measure would very much resist Washington doing to the states what the state of Colorado would be doing to home-rule cities under this bill. That's a valid point.
One of the old complaints about allowing different cities to enact different controls concerned the hypothetical motorist who, not knowing that Denver has stricter gun controls than other cities, gets arrested for violating one when driving through town. But that was taken care of a few years ago with a law permitting weapons to pass through one jurisdiction to the next.
Lawmakers shouldn't sacrifice the concept of home rule and local control on the altar of S.B. 25. They should kill this bill instead.