Year: 2013

Governor Corbett has been asking universities to review their policies on this matter, and many schools have, including Kutztown, Shippensburg, Edinboro, Slippery Rock, and Millersville. It’s not blanket campus carry at this point, but it’s at least getting a discussion started.

Students with concealed-carry permits had questioned the constitutionality of blanket weapons bans at state-owned universities, prompting a legal review that found such bans were vulnerable to court challenge.

About a year ago, the state system provided a model weapons policy for consideration by all 14 schools “that more narrowly tailored the firearms restriction, addressing both public safety and constitutional concerns,” said Nils Hagen-Frederiksen, a spokesman for the governor’s Office of General Counsel.

It’s always been an up-in-the-air question as to what power state universities had to control guns on campus. Pennsylvania law does not prohibit firearms on college and university campuses specifically, but it’s not clear how much power the state university system has to control students from carrying, or exclude non-student LTC holders from carrying on their campus or in buildings. State law preempts not only local municipalities from regulating firearms, it also prohibits any “political subdivision,” a term which is not defined in the statute. Are the Regents of state universities political subdivisions of the state, given they are state chartered institutions?

Corbett is at least willing to force the universities to start taking those questions seriously, rather than dismissing them and doing what they want. Combine this with the fact that Corbett’s post-Newtown pronouncements on gun control essentially indicated the Governor’s Office would have our back, and it leads me to be quite pleased with Corbett from a gun policy point-of-view. Pennsylvania has a long history of Republican governors being lukewarm to the interests of gun owners, but Corbett is someone I’ll happy volunteer for in the 2014 election. If he doesn’t win another four year term, I believe it will be a major setback for us, especially given the slate of likely opponents are all thoroughly anti-gun.

I agree that they have a First Amendment right to ask. And I have a First Amendment right to say “None of your goddamned business, Doc.” I know there are a lot of doctors out there who are pro-gun, but you need to speak up against the politicization of your profession, especially given that it’s starting to look more and more like a government protected cartel.

I think this Maryland activist’s heart is in the right place, but I don’t agree with using referendum to try to overturn gun control laws. While, generally speaking, gun bans have never fared well in ballot referendums, they are a hugely expensive undertaking if you want to have a prayer of winning. Why? Because you have to reach a lot of low-information voters who barely pay attention to your issue, and may not understand it. There’s also very very dire consequences to losing. I cannot stress enough how dire the consequences would be to losing a ballot measure on O’Malley’s gun control package. And losing is a possibility. Why?

Because it comes down to spending. That’s it. Grassroots mobilization is certainly important in a ballot fight, but it’s the money that’s going to get you to a majority for the win. In a battle of our grassroots energy against Bloomberg’s billions, I’ll put my money on our grassroots any day of the week. In a cash fight for low information votes? It’ll be NRA’s money against Bloomberg’s money, and if Bloomberg wants to, he can outspend NRA. So I’m a little amused and more than a little annoyed to see that GOA is getting behind and effort to spend NRA’s money in a ballot fight we could end up losing because we’re up against a billionaire who can outspend us if he wants to. Do you feel confident you can beat a ballot measure with Bloomberg filling the airwaves with images of schoolchildren getting mowed down with automatic weapons? Oh, I know it’s a lie, but that doesn’t matter. What matters is what works, and who has the money to lie the loudest.

NRA is correct in this matter. The courts is the far safer course of action. Those of you who are regular readers know how little faith I have in the courts, so that gives you an idea of how reckless I think our side volunteering for ballot fights is.

From Professor Nick Johnson:

The reason I retrieved Sherrill’s Saturday Night Special from the back of a high shelf was that he offers a lively argument that the 1968 Gun Control Act was mostly about controlling Negroes and not much about controlling guns. That account was the primary reason I bought the many book years ago, and I confess I only just now read it cover to cover. Some of it is quite extraordinary.

Once you cut through the vitriol, the striking thing is Sherrill’s clearheaded critique of several issues that are central to the current gun control debate.  Indeed, on several key points Sherrill is in basic agreement with claims that I have developed in detail in my scholarship and summarized in previous posts to this blog.

There have always been honest gun control people, like Robert Sherrill, who’s book Prof. Johnson speaks of, that have been willing to admit that many of their core tactics are a sham. Read the whole thing.

As a side note, I’m also glad to see someone else railing against the current status of the nondelegation doctrine. I think the empowerment of the bureaucratic elite is one of the most damaging things the courts have ever allowed to be done to our government. Far worse than the current broad reading of the commerce clause, in my opinion.

Looks like the magazine ban is back in Illinois. You have to wonder about the sanity of these people. Concealed carry has been a complete non-issue in every other state that adopted it, and you’d think a court order would give the politicians cover from their supporters. “Well, you know, the courts made us do it.” I also don’t think these politicians are considering the benefits of being able to blame the Second Amendment for their own shortcomings. They should really have a chat with Philly politicians on that count.

But these things aren’t entirely rational. There’s an emotional aversion to empowering “those types of people,” you know.