Experimenting on Voters

24 April 2014

Cogito Ergo Non Serviam

Georgia's "Guns Everywhere Law" Passed

Yesterday, Georgia's Governor Nathan Deal sign a law that would allow residents of his state to take a gun just about anywhere they wanted, presuming they have secured a permit to carry a firearm. Currently, Georgia ranks 10th in the nation when it comes to gun violence. From 2001-2010, Georgians died in gun-related incidents at twice the rate of US combat troops in Afghanistan and Iraq. Now, the world will see whether more guns really can make a place safer. One doubts it.

At the signing ceremony, Governor Deal said the law "will protect the constitutional rights of Georgians who have gone through a background check to legally obtain a Georgia Weapons Carry License. Roughly 500,000 Georgia citizens have a permit of this kind, which is approximately 5 percent of our population. License holders have passed background checks and are in good standing with the law. This law gives added protections to those who have played by the rules -- and who can protect themselves and others from those who don't play by the rules."

That, of course, is the National Rifle Association's claim, that it takes a good guy with a gun to stop a bad guy with a gun. As a result, Georgians with the appropriate permit (and here the state has been pretty responsible -- a resident has to have a background check and thus far only 5% of the population has done this) may now take firearms into bars, churches, school zones, government buildings and parts of airports. The property owner may ban weapons, but the state has said the matter is an issue of private property rights.

What is troubling to many are the margins by which the State House and Senate passed the bill. In the House, the yeas were 112 to 58 nays. In the Senate, there was a 37-18 split. This wasn't even close. To be sure, Georgia is near the center of America's gun culture, but the wide-ranging provisions, hoped the opponents, would be rejected by most of the legislators. One doesn't think the NRA had to do much convincing, but no doubt it spent freely. The Georgia bill will be a model for legislation in other states.

"Among its many extreme provisions, it allows guns in TSA lines at the country's busiest airport, forces community school boards into bitter, divisive debates about whether they should allow guns in their children's classrooms, and broadens the conceal carry eligibility to people who have previously committed crimes with guns," said Pia Carusone of the Americans for Responsible Solutions, a group opposed to the law. She added, "So it is no surprise that while being trumpeted by the NRA as the 'most comprehensive' gun bill in state history, the legislation ... was opposed by Georgia law enforcement, county commissioners, municipal leaders, and the Transportation Security Administration for its potentially harmful impact on Georgians' safety."

And so Georgia has embarked on a grand experiment on its own citizens. There will be more guns in public in Georgia as a result of this bill, and it is reasonable to assume that there will be more applicants for a carry permit, and one expects issuance of more permits. The increase in guns in public is the variable in this experiment, and the outcome will be measured in the number of dead. If that number goes up, as one expects it will, one can safely conclude that increasing the number of guns increases the amount of gun violence. If the number goes down, well, this journal will be equally pleased and surprised. It is, however, an interesting way to reach out to voters, by experimenting on them.

© Copyright 2014 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Ubuntu Linux.



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