From our friends at the NRA, comes word that the Wisconsin Legislature has (finally) passed a Conceal Carry bill, and with the Governor solidly on the side of the angels, the Bill should become a Law just any time now. We don’t normally reprint press releases verbatim here at TTAG, but this one is pretty sweet. So here it is: 

Fairfax, Va. – Both chambers of the Wisconsin state legislature have voted to approve one of the nation’s strongest Right-to-Carry license bills, by solid bipartisan margins.  Senate Bill 93, which was strongly backed by the National Rifle Association, now goes to Governor Scott Walker for his expected signature.  When signed, it will leave Illinois as the only state that provides no way for citizens to carry concealed firearms for self-protection outside their homes or places of business.

“For more than a decade, NRA has fought for Right-to-Carry in Wisconsin. That perseverance and determination has paid off.  Today, Wisconsinites are one step closer to being able to defend themselves outside their homes,” said Chris W. Cox, executive director of the NRA Institute for Legislative Action. “Thanks to the actions of a bipartisan majority of state legislators, honest people who choose to get a  permit will be less vulnerable to criminal attacks outside their homes. NRA is grateful for the unwavering leadership of Senators Pam Galloway, Rich Zipperer and Neal Kedzie, Assembly Majority Leader Scott Suder and Representative Jeffrey Mursauwho fought for the passage of Right-to-Carry in Wisconsin.”

Currently, there are 40 Right-to-Carry states: 37 have “shall issue” laws, requiring that carry permits be issued to applicants who meet uniform standards established by the state legislature. Two have fairly-administered discretionary-issue carry permit systems. Vermont respects the right to carry without a permit. Alaska and Arizona have “shall issue” permit systems for permit reciprocity with other states, and have allowed concealed carrying without a permit since 2003 and July 2010, respectively. Wyoming passed a permitless carry law earlier this year that goes into effect in July. Of the 10 non-RTC states, eight have restrictively-administered discretionary-issue systems; Illinois and Wisconsin are currently the only states to have no permit system and generally prohibit carrying.  The Wisconsin legislature had twice passed Right-to-Carry bills only to have then-Governor Jim Doyle veto them.  The efforts to override Gov. Doyle’s vetoes failed by very narrow margins.

Wow. So for years, Wisconsin’s legislature tried to Do The Right Thing and get a law through the system, and twice, their previous (Leftist) Governor vetoed them. And twice an override measure failed by the slimmest of margins. What’s the takeaway here, kids? That elections matter. If you care about things such as your Second Amendment rights, you’ve got to vote, damnit. (Of course, it helps if you can get candidates to run that believe in and support the Constitution, and then get them elected.)

My other thought is that my adopted state of Texas needs to get a move-on and pass some revisions to it’s own Conceal Carry statutes. When a bunch of cheese-heads have better laws than you do, down in the land of the Dallas Cowboys, the Alamo, and the World Champion Dallas Mavericks, that’s just downright embarrassing. Note to Rick Perry: if you’re not too busy deciding if you’re gonna run for President, could you be so kind as to fix this? I’d really like to not have to rely on our reputation, and have the laws to back it up. Okay? Okay.

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15 COMMENTS

  1. Do you know why they had a leftist governor for 8 years? The stupids voted for the pure “libertarian candidate” instead of the mediocre republican candidate. And a couple of the democratic legislators wouldn’t vote to override the governor because he had a D after his name and “it might weaken him”. That’s why.

  2. I believe that HELL has finally frozen over. Now will they allow other states carry permits and will they issue non resident permits?

  3. ahhh jealously from the old line state! Hopefully if/when our Dem Gov moves into national politics, his very weak Lt. Gov will run and lose to the challenger from across the spectrum.

  4. Does this bill require training? If so, screw that. The next step is abolishing the permit system.

    • A pretty minor amount. Pretty much any national organization or government training qualifies, military experience qualifies, and the standard WI Hunter Safety Course from the past decades qualifies. All hunters younger than 35 or so are required to take that course to hunt anyway, so those people will already qualify.

      The required CC training is apparently 1) so people new to guns don’t look down the barrel when they pull the trigger, and 2) to make those who don’t understand guns and carrying feel better that there won’t be “blood in the streets.”

      The worst part of the bill is the new police database to list CC holders “so police officers can know if a bank robber they are chasing might have a concealed weapon.” Talk about stupid arguments given for its creation. I’m not kidding, a Democrat Rep used that as an argument. And Milwaukee’s formerly-of-Massachusetts police chief Flynn was very vocal about a database and against constitutional carry, using the typical nonsensical talking points and “for the children”, etc, and for some reason Governor Walker and others listen to him.

      The database and permits/training were suddenly added during the last few weeks. So hopefully the voters will remember who added that crap come the next election, especially the database.

      I watched the debates on the WI internet feed, (WI Eye, for those who want to watch the reruns), and I’d swear every person arguing for permits and training must not know or must not care that WI already has constitutional open carry except in a car. Put on a jacket, and suddenly you’re a menace to society, I guess.

  5. Rick Perry-another male cheerleader, and unknown to most, Al Gore’s campaing manager for the 2000 election. I’ll pass when the establishment offers him and Palin up for President. Poor TX, a very restrictive state as far as guns go. Wisconsin and 30 other states don’t even require a permit to open carry, yet even printing is illegal in Texas. Pathetic.

    • Actually, that’s not quite right. Perry (who at the time was a Blue Dog Democrat) endorsed a then Southern Centrist Senator Al Gore in 1998 in the Primary for the Dem. nomiation for President. Here’s what Wikipedia says about the Gore campaign:

      According to CNN, Gore ran his campaign as, “a Southern centrist, [who] opposed federal funding for abortion. He favored a moment of silence for prayer in the schools and voted against banning the interstate sale of handguns.” In addition, CNN notes, “in 1988, for the first time, 12 Southern states would hold their primaries on the same day, Super Tuesday. Gore thought he would be the only Southern candidate. He had not counted on Jesse Jackson.”

      In 1998, Gore ran far to the right of the rest of the Democrat field. In fact, you’d be hard-pressed to tell his platform from a lot of right-of-center Republicans. Of course, if you look at Gore today, you’d hardly recognize him from that moderately-conservative guy who ran in 1998. Which goes to show you really can’t tell what a politician will do, even based on their record.

      Perry was a Dem at the time, like most of Texas, not because he was a Liberal, but because Texas was mostly a one-party state. If you wanted to have your vote counted in the primary, you pretty much had to be registered as a Democrat. That’s all changed now. Whereas the Texas Democrats used to have a left wing, a right wing, and a centrist group, now the right wing and most of the centrists are registered as Republicans.

      It may also help to keep in mind that Reagan was a Democrat at one time, too.

      Having lived in Texas for a long time, I was there to see the evolution of Rick Perry. My opinion of him has gone up over the years. He’s not necessarily my first choice in this election, but I don’t think he’d be a bad one.

  6. At least Wisconsin’s got concealed carry now – get on abolishing the permit system and the databases next session, guys

  7. Welcome to the USA, Cheeseheads. First the Packers win the Superbowl, and now you have concealed carry. I’d say you’ve had a great year so far.

  8. What’s the takeaway here, kids? That elections matter.

    Yes, they do, but not very much. The best you can hope for is to attain an exception to the rule. The gains in liberty are still vastly outweighed by the gains in tyranny.

  9. As to why the TX CCW law is so restrictive, most of the “early adopters” had fairly restrictive aspects to their laws. I saw the same thing in NC. Later adopters like CO got better laws as a result of seeing how the restrictive laws in other states didn’t work.

    This is actually exactly what the Framers of the country intended: That each state be a “Laboratory of democracy” where they could experiment with different laws and figure out which systems worked better than others.

  10. Hey.., carefull about who you’re calling a “cheese-head” now, pardner. We’re packin’ HEAT!

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