Its Time for Constitutional Carry in Texas

Its Time for Constitutional Carry in Texas

By

James Scott Trimm

House Bill 375, filed by conservative hero Jonathan Stickland would finally allow Texans the right to carry a firearm without a state “license”, and without paying a fee to purchase this “right from the state, a concept known commonly as “constitutional carry.”

The Tarrant County Republican Party has taken an official stand on Constitutional Carry.   The Tarrant County Republican Party Executive Committee passed (on 11/12/16) a very strong resolution calling upon the Texas legislature to “pass constitutional carry legislation.”  The resolution also calls upon legislators representing parts of Tarrant County to "work together and with organizations and advocates in bringing about the passage of constitutional carry legislation.”

The resolution, which I myself had proposed to the committee, reads as follows:

Resolution in Support of Constitutional Carry Legislation

Be it resolved, that the Tarrant County Republican Party calls upon the Texas Legislature to pass constitutional carry legislation.

Be it resolved, that the Tarrant County Republican Party calls upon the state legislators representing parts of Tarrant County to work together and with organizations and advocates in bringing about the passage of constitutional carry legislation.

Be it further resolved that a copy of this resolution be sent to every state legislator representing Tarrant County.

The 2016 Texas Republican Platform states “We collectively urge the legislature to pass ‘constitutional carry’ legislation, whereby law abiding citizens that possess firearms can legally exercise their God given right to carry that firearm as well.”

Moreover the 2016 Texas Republican Platform lists as a legislative priority a directive for the Texas Legislature to “Pass constitutional carry while maintaining licensing as optional for reciprocity purposes.”

In order to understand the need for Constitutional Carry, I thought it would be helpful to compare the way we treat the right to bear arms right, to the way other rights (or so-called “rights”) are treated.  When we do so, I think you will see that a certain hypocrisy becomes obvious.

Lets begin with an apocryphal pseudo-right, the right to an education.  (This is not a true “right” if one understands what a “right” actually is, but that is a whole different blog).

If the right to bear arms was treated like the so-called right to an education, we would not only be allowed to own a fire arm, we would be required to own one, and if we could not afford a fire arm, one would be provided for us by the state.

What if the right to bear arms was treated like the pseudo-right to healthcare that liberals speak so often about?  Imagine not only being required to own a fire arm, but having to buy one that met certain government standards and being fined (or taxed) if you could not prove on your taxes that you owned one.

Now lets compare the right to bear arms to our first amendment rights.

What if our first amendment rights were treated the way our second amendment rights are as a matter of routine?

Imagine if you could only wear a “What Would Jesus Do?” T-shirt if you had a license?  How would that go over?  We seem to accept this treatment of the right to bear arms, when we would never accept the same treatment of our first amendment rights.

And what does “infringed” mean?  A fringe is the border of something.  To infringe on something is to intrude even on the furthest border of something.  This word implies that the founders intended this right to be given the broadest possible application, and they certainly never intended this right to mean that we must pay a fee or be licensed by the state to bear our firearms.

Folks, it is high time that we started demanding that our second amendment rights be treated the same way that our first amendment rights are treated!