Arizona has some of the most liberal (in a good way) gun laws in the country. So liberal, in fact, that, at least until Trayvon et al, it was the common-sensers’ poster boy example of blood-in-the-streets, no holds barred firearm mayhem waiting to happen. The Grand Canyon state even has constitutional carry – no permit required to tuck one in your pocket and go. But it looks like even in Arizona, when it comes to where you can carry, some people are just like everyone else, only better. And Arizonans have Governor Jan Brewer to thank for it . . .

Yesterday she vetoed a bill, for the second time, that would have allowed concealed carry in government buildings. Her reason, according to azcentral.com:

“The decisions to permit or prohibit guns in these extremely sensitive locations — whether a city council chamber or branch office staffed with state workers — should be cooperatively reached and supported by a broad coalition of stakeholders, including citizens, law-enforcement officials and local government leaders,” Brewer wrote in her veto letter.

House Bill 2729, sponsored by Rep. David Gowan, R-Sierra Vista, was pushed by the Arizona Citizens Defense League, a gun-rights group. It proposed making it legal for people to enter public property with a weapon unless the property was secured by either a state or federal certified law-enforcement officer or an armed security guard and metal detectors.

It should be a local decision, at least that’s the way Brewer sees it. She even used Antonin Scalia’s opinion OK’ing restrictions in “sensitive places” in the Heller decision to justify the veto. Arizona local yokels also opposed the bill based on the cost of complying. But potential cost wasn’t her only reason for canning the new law:

“While I appreciate the efforts of the bill sponsor … there must be a more thorough and collaborative discussion of the proper place for guns in the public arena,” Brewer wrote.

So it’s OK for the state’s legislators and other public officials to pack heat wherever they like, just not their lowly constituents. Someone I know recently said, “If a politician doesn’t support the right to keep and bear arms, if he or she doesn’t “trust” citizens enough to exercise gun rights protected by the U.S. Constitution, the politician shouldn’t be trusted with power.” Words to live by.

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19 COMMENTS

    • Using NH as a test case is a hard one to pull off considering NH has what 10 court rooms total? Joking but you get my point.

  2. Wasn’t it a police officer (allegedly on a twinkie binge) that shot San Francisco’s mayor within his own office in City Hall?

    Moral of the story:
    We must ban police officers from carrying guns in city halls.
    We must ban twinkies.

  6. You know, there’s such a thing as “too close” to an issue. Just like a parent of a slain child wouldn’t be allowed on the jury deciding the killer’s fate, Brewer having any official power over gun issues is an agenda waiting to happen…or, giving her the benefit of the doubt, at least the surfacing of emotional trauma. Politicians are human (I think) and their judgment can get just as compromised and become just as skewed in objectivity as anyone else.

  7. “Something about politicians I don’t like, they can send people off to die for them, but won’t do the dying themselves.”
    – Gen. John Buford, from the movie Gettysburg.

  10. Elected officials feel they are on a plane above the rest of us.

    We can show them, at every election, how we feel about that attitude.

  11. I’ve lived all my 40 years in my beloved Arizona. I’m disappointed with this one but Jan’s otherwise been very good to us gunners and our state. Love her or hate her she’s a shit-ton better than Napolitano (yes THAT Napolitano) and she signed off on our Constitutional Carry.

  13. Think about this really hard for a few minutes, do you really care about being able to go into a federal, state or local government building at all? Let alone with your gun? Personally I avoid these places and indeed pretty much every single facet aspect etc of government at any level like the plague with the sole exception of the voting booth. In fact if I had my way the only time I would come within 100 yards of a building event etc. in any way associated with any form of government including our own would be in order to vote.
    Not being allowed to carry in these places is just one more valid reason to distance yourself as much as possible, in a constructive way from beauracracy.
    With the exception of voting I’ve been inside a government building exactly 3 times in the last 5 years, I for one am super happy about this.

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