Oregon DAS Enacting More Anti-Gun Rules — Legal Opinion Bleg Revisited

Long-time readers may recall me blegging for a legal opinion a while back. I was — and still am — trying to determine a clear answer to the question:

Is it legal or illegal for a state employee to carry a licensed, concealed firearm into state office buildings?

A couple of updates since then:

• DAS policy #125-06-321 seems to have disappeared off the Interwebz. Perhaps it has been rescinded?
• Other agencies have enacted their own agency-specific "no weapons" policies to replace it.

Now, I get this from the Oregon Firearms Federation: Kate Brown Prohibits Self Defense For State Workers:

The Department of Administrative Services, at the direction of Governor Kate Brown, has adopted a policy prohibiting all state employees from having a licensed firearm for self defense on "all property and facilities owned, leased, rented or otherwise occupied by the Oregon state government including grounds, buildings, parking structures and lots, vehicles and other equipment and any site where an employee enters on behalf of the employee's employment with Oregon state government except for an employee's home (including employees who live in state housing)…"

This policy extends to "All employees, including limited duration and temporary employees, board and commission members, volunteers, and others working in an agency…" [emphasis in original]

[blink blink]

Apparently either the Oregon Department of Administrative Services did not learn from its past mistake, or they are getting pressured by the Brown Administration to re-enact anti-gun policies.

But is it a legal policy, as in "supported by applicable law"? Further analysis below the fold.

ALERT: Oregon Gun Owner Action Required!

That didn't take long.

Barely two months after S.B. 941 (Oregon's shiny new "universal background check" law) went into effect, and two weeks after the mass killing at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, we have the anti-gun crowd's new demands for infringing our rights.

From Oregon Firearms Federation, we have a partial list (shamelessly copied from the alert, [with my thoughts in brackets]), including but not limited to:

• Central registration of all firearm owners and their weapons, and coordination of this data with criminal, mental health, and domestic abuse records at both the state and federal level. [Holy S@#t, they're going after the big fish, here.]
• Enactment of a 28-day waiting period on all firearm purchases. [Four weeks? Isn't that a bit excessive?]
• Institution of a license requirement to possess or purchase a firearm, with obtainment of a license requiring a gun safety course, an evaluation of personal history and mental well-being, and a thorough background check. [So Oregon will require some hybrid of Illinois' FOID card and Washington, D.C.'s gun license?]
• Requirement of a license to buy, sell, or transfer a firearm and ammunition, including through registered weapons dealers, private sales, individual transfers, and family transfers. [Knocking down all the exemptions in their already-extreme S.B. 941, I see, along with requiring another, separate license to transfer a firearm or to purchase ammunition.]
• Require that weapons be stored unloaded, in a gun safe, with a trigger lock. Possession of these safeguards should be necessary to obtain a firearm license. [Weren't "firearms must be stored incapable of being fired" laws struck down in D.C. v. Heller?]
• Render concealed carry illegal, and ban the open carry of a loaded firearm. [Weren't effective outright bans on carry struck down in multiple Ninth Circuit cases (of which Oregon is a part), including Peruta v. San Diego County?]
• Restrict ownership of automatic weapons, semi-automatic weapons, and handguns to existing owners and require their storage at a licensed gun range. [There's currently no licensing scheme for "gun ranges". Are we going to set that up, or will this become a de facto ban? And again, weren't bans on whole classes if firearms also struck down in D.C. v. Heller?]
• Ban any clip or magazine capable of holding more than 10 rounds. [You knew this was coming, right? At least they're now recognizing a distinction between "clip" and "magazine".]

These proposals, if passed, would represent a severe blow not only to gun ownership in Oregon, but to home- and self-defense.

Most, if not all, of these demands are blatantly unconstitutional, but I doubt our Legislature (with a Democratic super-majority) or unelected anti-gun Governor will care much. They'll see "new gun laws" and jump at the chance of passing them.

I hate to beg, but please, please, please hit up OFF's mailing form (at the bottom of same link) and strongly consider donating to the cause of fighting these outrageous proposals, none of which — separately or together — would have prevented the UCC murders.

It's time to act.

Stay safe.

Quote of the Day — Lynne Russell (July 6, 2015)

Lynne Russell (right) and husband Chuck de Caro.
[source: Mediaite]

Former CNN anchor Lynne Russell, as quoted at Mediaite:

If you don't want to carry, please don't. Then, shut the f—k up about it. Make your own decisions.

Background at the link.

I have nothing else to add.

Stay safe.

[Hat tip: Ilana Mercer, writing at The Zelman Partisans, updating her original coverage of this story here.]

More Thoughts on National Reciprocity

This time, nothing at all to do with the SCOTUS decision in Obergefell v. Hodges.

We took the family on an interstate road trip over the weekend. There were long drives, some sightseeing, spending time with extended family we hadn't seen in several years, and — of course — fireworks. Good times.

And yes, there is some truth to this:

(source)

During the drive back, though, I noticed something, and had a bit of an epiphany.

What I noticed was that, while hurtling along an interstate highway in California, we were surrounded by other vehicles feet or yards away, traveling at similar velocities (~70 mph) negotiating curves in the road, changing lanes, passing, allowing others to pass, and so forth. Being a holiday weekend, there were a healthy number of license plates from states other than California. I saw other Oregon plates, Washington plates, Colorado plates, a couple from Georgia, Florida, and New Jersey (long drives, those), and a few from the Canadian provinces of British Columbia and Alberta.

Yeah, kinda like that.
(source)

Yet, we all took the curves and traffic in stride — with very nearly the precision of a school of fish or a flock of birds moving in sync, and with no communication amongst each other besides the occasional flashing lights known colloquially as "turn signals" — and managed to not hit each other.

The phrase "poetry in motion" came to mind. That might be an exaggeration, but it was still somewhat amazing to observe once I noticed it.

We take it for granted, but it happens every day with shockingly few mishaps given the number of drivers and vehicles on the road at any given time. We don't suddenly become unsafe drivers when we cross an arbitrary line on a map.

That was the observation. Here's the epiphany:

The driving laws among the 50 states (and D.C.) are mostly the same. There are some minor variances — the speed limits on highways, emission requirements on vehicles, the fines and penalties for specific violations, etc. — but for the most part, the act of driving doesn't change when you cross state lines.

Additionally, although we all come from different states, and each state has different training and testing requirements for those who wish to earn their license to operate a motor vehicle on public roads, that license is good in all 50 states (and D.C.) in the Union.

So why is national reciprocity for carrying a concealed firearm such an issue?

Same reciprocity map from last week.
(source: USA Carry)

We hear from the anti-rights crowd how national reciprocity can't work because the laws and training requirements for CCW licenses are different in all 50 states, so there's no consistency, and that lack of consistency could cause problems.

Horse$#!+, I say.

I mean, sure, the gun laws vary a bit — some are "shall issue" while others are "may issue", New Jersey bans hollow point ammunition, several states require magazines that carry 10 or fewer rounds (and New York demands you only put seven rounds in those magazines), and some states require that a concealed firearm remain concealed — but then again, the driving laws of each state/province vary, too. Some states require emissions checks and some set their highway speed limits differently (Oregon's 65 vs. California's 70 vs. Idaho's 75). Some prohibit drivers from using cell phones without hands-free devices, some only prohibit sending text messages while behind the wheel, and others have no rules on the use of cell phones. Yet most days we (as a nation) manage to travel from point A to point B without getting speeding tickets or causing 50-car pile-ups on interstate highways.

And statistically, we have just as many cars in the country as guns, but guns cause far fewer fatalities — accidental or not — than cars. Repeat after me: The tool is not the problem. Misuse of the tool is.

[UPDATED TO ADD:] U.S. Concealed Carry Association published this article addressing events world-wide wherein people used motor vehicles as weapons, with the specific intent to harm or kill as many people as possible. Yet, nobody is questioning whether we should be allowed to own or operate cars, and nobody is protesting Ford or General Motors for manufacturing such "dangerous weapons". [/UPDATE]

The bottom line is this: If we can be trusted to responsibly operate a two-ton, 300-horsepower, mechanically-complex (have you looked under the hood of a modern car lately!?), seven-passenger moving death machine across state lines, it's safe to assume that carrying an operable defensive concealed firearm across state lines will be no big deal.

Write your Congressional representatives. Tell them to support and/or co-sponsor the various concealed carry reciprocity bills currently introduced in Congress. Remind them that the "sky is falling", "road-rage-turned-deadly", "blood in the streets" predictions of the anti-rights crowd over expanding gun rights have never come true, and that if we can be trusted to responsibly drive a motor vehicle safely nationwide with all the varying driving laws, then surely we can be trusted to safely carry a concealed, holstered firearm in any state in the Union.

Stay safe.

A Monster Fisking

You keep using the term, but last time I checked “wishful thinking” and “emotionally laden nonsense” weren’t synonyms with “common sense”.
        Larry Correia, Fascist Cisgender Normative Male and Author

 

Larry Correia
International Lord of Hate
and Combat Accountant

Larry Correia writes some of the most violent, blood-soaked, bullet and explosive laden, misogynistic, unapologeticly cisnormative, non-vegan, best selling and downright fun fantasies around. You'll find his Grimnoir, Monster Hunter International and Dead Six series perennially perched in the best seller lists. They're diverting, oft bloody romps, with encompassing world builds, surprising characters, and fast paced plots. The author is known for his creativity, wicked sense of humor, weapons-grade sarcasm, sheer inability to suffer fools gladly, and what is assumed to be an epochal case of the 'roids.

Some paper's Social Justice Warriors got all butthurt when a feminist cancelled her appearance because the Utah State University couldn't cancel the audience's 2nd Amendment Rights. The Deseret News editorial staff saw fit to publish an emotional, cliche riddled, bitterly anti-CCW editorial. Unfortunately for them, they happened to be Larry Correia's local paper. This caused Larry to put down his side of beef, gird up his keyboard, and carpet bomb some logic and facts all over their sloping foreheads. In a deliberate, brutal, line by line Fisking, Correia knifes through the feldercarb to cut away the misrepresentations and unicorn-based assumptions of the unsigned editorial.

Fisk me, baby!

The Deseret News' own summary of the editorial: "It’s time Utah law stood up for safety, not the empowerment of bullies" gives just a hint at the over-emotional fear and fuzzy thinking it contained. Larry not only makes short work of the editorial's overheated verbiage, but he provides a damn good basis for the necessity of concealed carry. He also provides a link to his seminal work supporting gun rights that he wrote shortly after the Sandy Hook tragedy. Both of his posts are HIGHLY recommended.

It should be noted that Correia writes fantasies that some see as excessively violent. In reality, they're simply entertainment. The blood splattered across his books is ephemeral, existing only in the imagination. On the gripping hand, the editorialists advocate for laws that disarm the law-abiding populace, leaving them helpless before the true threat.

The blood that can flow then is very, very real.

HT: Miggy of GunFreeZone.com

Bloomberg/Watts' Revenge - Kroger in the News Again

Alternate title: "Store Wars: The Empire (State) Strikes Back"*

(source)

Some time back, we reported that Kroger opted not to bow to pressure from Shannon Watts' and
Michael Bloomberg's gun control group, Everytown for Gun Safety, to ban the peaceable carrying of firearms in their stores. Kroger's perfectly reasonable statement (emphasis added):

The safety of our customers and associates is one of our most important company values. Millions of customers are present in our busy grocery stores every day and we don’t want to put our associates in a position of having to confront a customer who is legally carrying a gun. That is why our long-standing policy on this issue is to follow state and local laws and to ask customers to be respectful of others while shopping. We know that our customers are passionate on both sides of this issue and we trust them to be responsible in our stores.

 Like I said: perfectly reasonable. Law-abiding folks will abide by laws, responsible folks will conduct themselves responsibly, and respectful folks will respect others. In other news, water is wet (ZOMG, insert dramatic "Dun dun DUUUUNNNN!!" sound here).

Naturally, though, when dealing with megalomaniacal billionaires (like Bloomberg) and control-freak busy-bodies (like Watts), you just knew this wouldn't go over well.

And so it hasn't. Forbes reports (emphasis added):

Michael Bloomberg-backed gun control group Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America launched its first ever large-scale corporate campaign on Thursday with an advertising spend of six figures aimed at pressuring Kroger, the country’s biggest grocery chain, to change its firearms policies.

Yep. A six-figure advertising campaign against Kroger, for the audacity of telling Hizzonner to shove it where to go and what to do there to leave them alone and let them make their own decisions on what will and will not be allowed at their own properties.

The ads themselves are pretty pitiful, too, following a pattern familiar to those of us who remember Moms Demand Attention Action's previous campaign against carrying in schools:

Seriously, I wouldn't want to see that in the store, either.
"No Shirt, No Shoes, No Service," man!
Click to embiggenate, or spare your eyeballs and don't.
(source: Moms Demand Attention Action)

So again, I'm asking that we, collectively, throw Kroger some business and thank them for upholding the rule of law, and our rights. They did right by us - even it if was just refusing to get caught in the middle - so we need to do right by them.

(Hat tip: Bitter at Shall Not Be Infringed)
------------
* - With the most sincere apologies to George Lucas.

Armed Citizens Making a Difference

Detroit Police Chief Gives Credit to Armed Citizens For Drop in Crime

Detroit Police Chief James Craig - TDN

I'm really liking this guy.

But, it seems, to quote Josey Wales: "When I get to likin' someone, they ain't around long."

We worry, because Detroit Police Chief James Craig has been a lone voice crying in the concrete wilderness - insisting that armed citizens deter crime. As the Detroit News pondered the causes of the significant drop in Detroit crimes, they didn't want the armed citizen to look too good. They led the article with an elderly homeowner they characterized as having "an itchy trigger-finger". Even thought he actually didn't defend himself during the home invasion robbery, and therefore actually isn't part of the story's subject matter, he did take a pot shot at a TV news crew who wouldn't get off his porch. While we applaud him for his public-spirited action, it doesn't really reflect well on armed homeowners. Which was obviously the intention of TDN.

The remainder of the article is mostly well-balanced; even though Josh Horwitz, Sad Panda of the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, rears his misshapen head for a discredited platitude or two. Chief Craig credits the good work of his department, but also affirms that armed Detroiters are part of why crime is declining. TDN buries the article's money quote: “If I was out there now robbing people these days, knowing there are a lot more people with guns, I know I’d have to rethink my game plan,” said Al Woods, 60, a self-described former criminal. "They’re less likely to do so if they think they (the citizen) might be armed.”

  Well... duh. 

  Recommended reading.

  HT: The Detroit News