As a reply to Jennifer Little’s letter in the 4/25/21 Odessa American, wherein she decries the possibility of Texas passing the Constitutional Carry bill (HB1927), saying that it will increase shootings, and make it easier for people to get guns, she is dead wrong!
The Bill does not change any of the requirements for background checks, or minimum ages to buy guns. One must still be 21 to purchase a handgun, and 18 to buy a rifle or shotgun. It also does not make it easier for criminals to carry guns, because they are going to carry them anyway.
All HB1927 does is make it easier for law-abiding people, who are legally allowed to own a gun anyway, to carry them, in accordance with the wording of the 2nd Amendment, which states, “the right of the people to keep and bear arms SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED”! Although I have a carry permit, and have had since 1996, it is technically an infringement, because I should not have to have permission from the State, or any Government, to exercise a “right”. If it is a right, it is God-given. If the State can forbid it, or restrict it, then it is a privilege, not a right!
I have heard many people, who are obviously ignorant of the 2nd Amendment, say that “we license car drivers, so why shouldn’t gun owners be licensed also?” Well, that is because driving is a PRIVILEGE, not a RIGHT! Nowhere in the Bill of Rights does it say that you have the right to drive a car, or even ride a horse. But, keeping and bearing arms is a RIGHT!
Also worth noticing is the fact that all of the states that have Constitutional Carry have less gun crime than states with highly restrictive gun laws. Maine, Vermont, and New Hampshire are ranked as the three safest states in the U.S., and they all have Constitutional Carry.
I heard this same crap, about how shootings in the streets, and gunfights at 4-way stops would be rampant, back in 1996, when Gov.
Bush first signed the Texas concealed carry bill into law, and it never happened. Actually, permit holders commit fewer gun crimes than the general public. 99% of gun crimes are committed by people who are not legally allowed to have a gun in the first place.
To sum up, legal gun owners are not the people one has to worry about. And, Constitutional Carry will not magically make honest people into gun carrying criminals. Real criminals are the problem, not legal gun owners.
Sandy Milner
Odessa
