Michigan

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Democrat State Party Platforms – Massachusetts To Missouri

October 9, 2018 by 2 Comments

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Continuing on with my series of posts detailing the position of the individual state Democratic Parties on firearms, we move on to a quintuplet of “M” states.

Massachusetts

The Massachusetts Democratic Party platform actually has very little in it regarding firearms. My supposition is that it was created in 2017 before red flag laws came into vogue and, perhaps more tellingly, because Massachusetts already so much gun control.

From the platform adopted in 2017:

Preventing gun violence through universal background checks and a ban on assault weapons and
high-capacity magazines.

This was from the section entitled, “Public Safety and Crime Prevention”, which deals more with the militarization of the police, community policing and corrections, and the like.

Michigan

The Michigan Democratic Party platform calls for “common sense gun safety” which must be the dog whistle code words meaning more gun control. In a section of the platform that deals much more with prison reform than crime, the Democrats have this to say about guns and gun control:

Enact common sense gun safety measures. Democrats recognize the Constitutional right of Americans to
keep and bear arms under the 2nd Amendment. The vast majority of Michigan gun owners are responsible
citizens and sportsman that value the strong Michigan tradition of hunting and safe use of firearms.
Democrats, along with vast majorities of the American public, support common sense gun safety proposals like closing the gun show loophole and preventing potential terrorists from purchasing
firearms. If an individual is deemed too dangerous to fly, they should be too dangerous to buy a gun.
Democrats also support banning military style weapons, like the AR-15, which has been used in mass
shootings in Sandy Hook, Dallas, Orlando, and across the nation.

The Michigan Democrat’s platform was one of the first I remember seeing advocating using the “no-fly” list to make one a prohibited person.

Minnesota

The Minnesota Democratic-Farmer-Labor (DFL) Party has much less on gun control in their ongoing party platform than I would have expected. Their section on Public Safety and Crime Prevention only had this to say about firearms:

Reasonable firearm policies that promote public safety and crime prevention without infringing on the
rights of hunters and other sports enthusiasts.

Now the question as to what is a reasonable policy is open to discussion. I would call attention to the fact that they don’t want to infringe “on the rights of hunters and other sports enthusiasts”. They say nothing about those who would use a firearm for self-protection and self-defense. This is interesting as this section also calls for mandatory sentences for drug dealer and rapists as well as stiff penalties for child abuse.

The Minnesota DFL webpage does have an endorsement of March for our Lives and condemns the NRA. That might give you a better feel for what the DFL considers “reasonable firearm policies.”

Mississippi

The Mississippi Democratic Party platform was adopted in 2016 and make absolutely no mention of firearms or gun control. It concentrates much more on education and voting rights. Given the history of voting rights in Mississippi in the 1960s, this is understandable.

The Mississippi Democratic Party web presence is a mess. They still have an active website the basically stops in 2008, the one they publicize on Twitter – http://www.mississippidemocrats.org – goes to a suspended webpage, and the one I got the platform from calls itself the classic Mississippi Democratic Party page.

Missouri

The Missouri Democratic Party platform was adopted in August 2018 and calls for reasonable gun control measures. Reasonable is in the eye of the beholder as you can tell below:

Reasonable firearm policies that promote public safety and crime prevention
without infringing on second amendment rights. Mandatory background
checks and 72-hour waiting periods on the purchase of weapons

  • An assault weapons ban
  • Keeping daycares, schools, health care providers, churches, and
    universities as gun-free zones
  • Keeping illegal guns off our streets and out of the hands of kids
  • Preventing domestic abusers from owning guns

Perhaps not surprising given that Ferguson was in Missouri but the platform endorses Black Lives Matter, body cams for cops, eliminating minimum sentences, and training in non-lethal techniques for police. It also calls for full restitution of voting rights and the ability to hold public office after a sentence is served.

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Knife Rights Moves To Reform Knife Laws In Michigan

February 5, 2018 by 1 Comment

Last year Knife Rights succeeded in getting Michigan’s switchblade ban repealed. This year they are seeking to repeal the ban on the concealed carry of specifically excluded knives.

From Knife Rights:

On the heals of last year’s enactment of Knife Rights’ switchblade ban repeal in Michigan, Representative Steven Johnson has introduced HB 5512 to removed all the knives prohibited from concealed carry in Michigan statute.

Sec. 227. (1) would be removed entirely from Michigan’s penal code:
“A person shall not carry a dagger, dirk, stiletto, a double-edged
nonfolding stabbing instrument of any length, or any other dangerous
weapon, except a hunting knife adapted and carried as such, concealed on
or about his or her person, or whether concealed or otherwise in any
vehicle operated or occupied by the person, except in his or her
dwelling house,  place of business or on other land possessed by the
person.”

We will let you know when it’s time to contact your legislator on this bill. Stay tuned.

Knife Rights’ record
of 28 bills repealing knife bans at the state and local levels in 20
states in the past 8 years is unrivaled. With your support, Knife Rights
is rewriting knife law in America™.
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SAF Sues On Behalf Of Foster Parents In Michigan

July 18, 2017 by 3 Comments

While posting will be sporadic this week as I’m on vacation with my family, I did come across this from the Second Amendment Foundation. They are suing the state of Michigan because of their policies regarding firearms and foster or adoptive parents.

From SAF:

The Second Amendment Foundation today filed a federal lawsuit against the head of the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS) on behalf of four Michigan residents, alleging civil rights violations under color of law for enforcing restrictions on the Second Amendment rights of people who want to be foster or adoptive parents.

SAF is joined in the lawsuit by William and Jill Johnson and Brian and Naomi Mason. The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Michigan, alleges that MDHHS caseworkers told Mr. Johnson, a 100-percent disabled Marine Corps veteran who sought custody of his grandson that he would have to give the agency the serial numbers of all of his firearms. When he questioned this, the caseworkers allegedly told him, “If you want to care for your grandson you will have to give up some of your constitutional rights.” This was after the state asked the Johnsons to be foster parents to their grandson.

Two weeks later, the lawsuit alleges, a Gogebic County Court judge told the Johnsons that if they wanted their grandson placed in their care, “We know we are violating numerous constitutional rights here, but if you do not comply, we will remove the boy from your home.”

“The statements from the caseworker and judge are simply outrageous,” said SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb. “This amounts to coercion, with a child as their bartering chip. I cannot recall ever hearing anything so offensive and egregious, and we’ve handled cases like this in the past. Blatantly telling someone they must give up their civil rights in order to care for their own grandchild is simply beyond the pale.”

The lawsuit asserts that “the policy of the MDHHS, by implementing requirements and restrictions that are actually functional bans on the bearing of firearms for self-defense, both in and out of the home, completely prohibits foster and adoptive parents, and those who would be foster or adoptive parents, from the possession and bearing of readily-available firearms for the purpose of self-defense. This violates Plaintiffs’ constitutional rights under the Second and Fourteenth Amendments.”

The Johnsons and Masons reside in Ontanogan, a small community on the north shore of the Upper Peninsula, on Lake Superior. Mr. Mason has been the Pastor at the Ontonagon Baptist Church in Ontonagon for nine years. He is also the Chair of the Ontonagon County Department of Health and Human Services Board.

“This is a case we simply must pursue,” Gottlieb said. “State agencies and the people who work in those agencies simply cannot be allowed to disregard someone’s civil rights.”

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Privilege Or Right

April 29, 2012 by 3 Comments

Ana Simvoska of TV-6 – Fox UP – in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan has a story posted yesterday concerning concealed carry in the state of Michigan. The station’s Facebook followers wanted to know more about Michigan’s concealed pistol license and what was required to obtain one.

She titled her story, “Concealed carry a privilege, not a right”, because of the information she was given by officials with the Michigan State Police.

Those hoops are a loaded application, fingerprints and a background check. Any felonies, or misdemeanors can disqualify you. That’s because carrying is a privilege not a right, officials said.

“They’re trying to ensure that when they give you the ability to carry concealed that you’re doing so safely, that you don’t have a history of violence, you don’t have a history of mental instability, and certainly that you’ve been a good citizen,” Lt. Robert Pernanski said.

In a few states such as Vermont and Arizona which have constitutional carry, carry is treated as a right and not a privilege. However, in the majority of states it is treated like in Michigan as a privilege.

That said, given the Heller decision which found that the right to keep and bear arms meant both “to possess” and “to carry weapons in case of confrontation” and subsequent decisions such as Woollard and Bateman which confirmed this right exists outside the home, I think states are treading a fine line between privilege and right.

Alan Gura has pointed this out forcefully in many briefs when he writes that the dictum from Heller that states the Second Amendment “is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose” cannot be used to eliminate all carry outside the home. As he wrote in Bateman, “the Court confirmed that there is a right to carry at least some weapons, in some manner, for some purpose.” Gura notes that Justice Stevens in his Heller dissent acknowledged that the Court’s opinion “protected the public carrying of arms”.

While we aren’t there yet, I do think there will come a time when carry (in some form) will be recognized as a right and not a privilege.