Federalized Concealed Carry Reciprocity
Date: Jul 1, 2006 5:59 PM
Friends:

Following is an excellent expansion of my recent article
explaining why National Concealed Carry Reciprocity is a Trojan
Horse for taking our gun rights. It is by Mike McHugh of the
Virginia Gun Owners Coalition. As I stated before, I am very
proud to be standing with such good company in speaking against
this idea, and I am proud that JPFO has chosen to distribute our
message.

–Andy

P.S.: If you are receiving this after having earlier requested
removal from this or another mailing list, my apologies.
It was recently necessary to retrieve a “backup” list
that may have some addresses that were later removed
at the recipient’s request. If you wish again to be
removed, just let me know.

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Federalized Concealed Carry Reciprocity
A Right to Keep and Bear Arms Trojan Horse
by Andy Barniskis and Mike McHugh

Mr. Barniskis chairs the legislative committee of the Bucks
County Sportsmen’s Coalition. He also is Legislative Chairman
for Falls Township Rifle and Pistol Association. In 1995, he
was the plaintiff in a suit successfully challenging the
authority of the Bucks County Sheriff to introduce new
requirements to the process of applying for a permit to carry a
concealed firearm. Mike McHugh is President of Virginia Gun
Owners Coalition.

If you have a concealed carry permit would you like to get
your name out of the massive government data base so that your
guns are not first on the list to be confiscated? Would you like
to one-day enjoy the right to carry concealed WITHOUT a permit
as Vermonters and Alaskans now do? If you don’t have a permit,
do you want those who do to trade your hope of a restored 2nd
Amendment for the temporary carrot of national concealed carry
under ever increasing federal regulations and restrictions? If
so, then stop reading and do nothing to oppose Virginia Senator
George Allen’s Trojan Horse Federal Government Power Grab. And
by all means don’t tell George Allen to stop using your gun
rights as a gimmick to get elected President. Just sit still
while easier to win state gun grab efforts are shifted to a
distant, unresponsive federal bureaucracy. And by all means
forget the dream of armed self defense as a genuine
constitutional right, and inalienable right that should not be
subject to the prior constraint of licensing.

You see, there are presently in congress several pending bills
that would require all states to honor concealed carry permits
issued in any state of the union. At first glance it would seem
that passage of such legislation would be a major triumph,
expanding our right to keep and bear arms nationally. However,
the stakes are high and the consequences of involving the
federal government in carry permit matters will prove counter -
even detrimental – to both our gun rights and states rights.

Proponents of these bills maintain that the issue is simple;
carry permits should be treated no differently from state
drivers licenses or marriage licenses under the “full faith and
credit” provision of Article IV, Section 1 of the U.S.
Constitution. The first sentence of that section reads, “Full
Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public
Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other State.”
That sounds all good. But, the second sentence reads, “And the
Congress may by general Laws prescribe the Manner in which such
Acts, Records and Proceedings shall be proved, and the Effect
thereof.” In other words, the federal government may butt in to
dictate the proceedings of the states!

What will surely happen, if the federal government dictates
that states must accept concealed carry permits from other
states, is that anti-gun states will raise a cry that
“reasonable minimum standards” should be applied to the issuance
of carry permits. The result? Take my home state of
Pennsylvania, for example, which is arguably one of the less
restrictive “shall issue” concealed carry states. Currently, I
can carry in a restaurant that serves alcohol. And, all I need
to do to obtain a permit to carry is apply, have a clean record,
and pay $19 for a five-year permit, which must be issued to me
in less than 45 days. Will states that don’t allow their own
citizens to carry firearms at all regard that as a reasonable
minimum standard? Don’t bet your freedom on it – but do expect
congress in the very near future – if not immediately – to
impose fingerprinting, mug shots, mandatory training, high
administrative costs, and create numerous criminal “safe zones”,
where only the criminals have guns. And, once the principle of
federally-dictated criminal safe zones and federally-dictated
standards for concealed carry is established, increasingly
restrictive standards will become a backdoor way for carry
permits to be de facto prohibited by federal regulation, without
congressional action.

And in fact, this is what happened to the free cantons (i.e.
states) in Switzerland in 1999 when the centralized federal
government of Switzerland required the anti-gun gun cantons to
allow carry of firearms where it had been prohibited. The
result? The anti-gun cantons muscled the central government
into a strangling array of regulations and restrictions that
destroyed the liberty of the formally free cantons.

Those who argue that the application of full national faith
and credit to drivers licenses is a good analogy for what they
seek for carry permits, may be raising a better example than
they realize. Here in Pennsylvania, over the years we have had
photo drivers licenses, auto emissions inspections, and “motor
voter” registration forced upon us by the federal government,
all over the futile resistance of our state legislature. In the
case of emission inspections, not only were emission standards
dictated, but also the levels of fines for non-compliance. The
experience of many other states has been similar, so why would
anyone not expect federal involvement in carry permits to result
in federal micro-management of issuing standards?

Firearms permit-to-carry reciprocity in neighboring states
is desirable, but will never be worth trading away our
fundamental rights to obtain, nor placing our fundamental rights
at risk. In fact, what advocates of federalized concealed carry
reciprocity seek, benefits only a minority of a minority – those
who have a carry permit at home, and also wish to carry in
another state. But, if obtaining reciprocity results in
increased restrictions in our home state, that affects every
single citizen, every single gun owner. We will be better off
continuing to fight for reciprocity at home, on a state-by-state
basis, never forgetting that licensing a right converts that
right to a privilege. Ultimately, if we accept this Trojan
Horse concealed carry federal government power grab, we will
have put a nail in the coffin of restoring the 2nd Amendment.