pistol purchase permits

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Democrats Vote To Preserve Jim Crow Law

August 18, 2021 by 2 Comments

Every Democrat in the North Carolina Senate save two voted against the repeal of the pistol purchase permit. As I and others have noted many times, the history and purpose of this bill passed in 1919 was to disarm black North Carolinians.

The only two Democrats who didn’t vote against repeal of this Jim Crow law were Sen. Don Davis (D-Greene, Pitt) who didn’t vote and Sen. Ernestine Bazemore (D-Beaufort) who had an excused absence. By contrast, every Republican supported the repeal with the exception of Sen. Bob Steinburg (R-Camden) who had an excused absence.

HB 398 had already passed the NC House of Representatives with bi-partisan support.

The bill has passed its 2nd and 3rd readings and has been enrolled. It now goes to Gov. Roy Cooper’s desk where undoubtedly he will continue the Democrat’s support of a law conceived in racism. A law that research in the North Carolina Law Review has shown still discriminates against blacks.

In a day and time when I get virtually daily emails from liberal groups denouncing Confederate statues as racist symbols and college buildings being renamed due to the segregationist past of their namesakes, I find it hard to comprehend just how strongly Democrat legislators, both white and black, cling to a law conceived in racism. Not only was it conceived in racism but the law still has a disparate impact on minorities.

I guess Democrats are more afraid of white women funded by a New York billionaire than they are of their own minority constituents. Go figure.

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HB 398 Coming To Vote In NC Today

August 18, 2021 by 1 Comment

HB 398, the repeal of North Carolina’s pistol purchase permit, will be coming up for a vote in the NC Senate soon today. That may even be today as it has passed both the Senate Judiciary and Rules Committee. The NC House has already approved the repeal with a bipartisan majority. Undoubtedly, Gov. Roy Cooper (D-NC) will veto it and it will come up for an override. Pressure needs to be put on both Republicans and Democrats in the NC Senate to pass the bill and then to vote for the override.

Grass Roots North Carolina has been leading the fight on this for years. They sent out the following alert last night. I have sent my letters and I’d encourage you to do so as well. On the letter to Democrats, I added that we take down Confederate monuments as “racist” – shouldn’t we repeal a law that is actually still discriminating against blacks?

Action Vital to Repeal Purchase Permits

HB 398 to repeal our Jim Crow-era pistol purchase permit law passed the Senate Rules Committee today and heads to the floor for a vote as early as tomorrow. Please contact all members of the NC Senate immediately!
In today’s committee hearing, articulate defense of the bill was provided by sponsor Rep. Jay Adams (R-Catawba), Sen. Chuck Edwards (R- Buncombe, Henderson, Transylvania) and Sen. Ralph Hise (R- Madison, McDowell, Mitchell, Polk, Rutherford, Yancey). The usual leftist whining was made by Sen. Jay Chaudhuri (D-Wake). Thanks are also due Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger and Rules Chair Sen. Bill Rabon for moving HB 398 in a timely fashion.
GRNC president Paul Valone testified to the committee, noting both the racist origins of the law. (which is being racially applied even today), and the fact that GRNC has so far had to sue two sheriffs to get permits issued in the 14 days required by statute even as broad scale civil unrest causes thousands of new gun owners to unsuccessfully seek permits. After his testimony, Chaudhuri commented that it was acceptable that gun owners should have to sue sheriffs merely to exercise their rights. 
As usual, Marcus and representatives of North Carolinians “Against Gun Violence” (formerly North Carolinians for Gun Control) promulgated mistruths about guns being purchased without background checks at gun shows and online sales, blithely ignoring the reality that the same laws apply in those venues as anywhere else. 
Amusingly enough, Marcus admitted the Jim Crow discriminatory origins of a law which is being used even now to disproportionately deny guns to minorities, meaning that in the interest of banning guns, Democrats are now defending racism.
Perhaps most ironic was Marcus’ claim that she is “not anti-gun” but merely “anti-violence,” which not only belied the fact that she and others like her always support restrictions on gun ownership, but also attempted to falsely cast gun rights supporters as “pro-violence.”
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IMMEDIATE ACTION REQUIRED!
HB 398 Will have a probable floor vote tomorrow. Accordingly, we need you to contact all members of the NC Senate to tell them to support the bill. Please note that we are using different messages for Republicans vs. Democrats.

 Senate Republicans:  Ted.Alexander@ncleg.gov; Deanna.Ballard@ncleg.gov; Lisa.Barnes@ncleg.gov; Phil.Berger@ncleg.gov; Danny.Britt@ncleg.gov; Jim.Burgin@ncleg.gov;Kevin.Corbin@ncleg.gov; David.Craven@ncleg.gov; Warren.Daniel@ncleg.gov; Chuck.Edwards@ncleg.gov; Carl.Ford@ncleg.gov; Amy.Galey@ncleg.gov; Kathy.Harrington@ncleg.gov; Ralph.Hise@ncleg.gov; Brent.Jackson@ncleg.gov; Steve.Jarvis@ncleg.gov; Todd.Johnson@ncleg.gov; Joyce.Krawiec@ncleg.gov; Michael.Lazzara@ncleg.gov; Michael.Lee@ncleg.gov; Tom.McInnis@ncleg.gov; Paul.Newton@ncleg.gov; Jim.Perry@ncleg.gov; Dean.Proctor@ncleg.gov;Bill.Rabon@ncleg.gov; Norman.Sanderson@ncleg.gov; Vickie.Sawyer@ncleg.gov; Bob.Steinburg@ncleg.gov
Senate Democrats:
Sydney.Batch@ncleg.gov; Ernestine.Bazemore@ncleg.gov; Dan.Blue@ncleg.gov; Jay.Chaudhuri@ncleg.gov; Ben.Clark@ncleg.gov; Sarah.Crawford@ncleg.gov;Don.Davis@ncleg.gov; Kirk.deViere@ncleg.gov; Toby.Fitch@ncleg.gov; Valerie.Foushee@ncleg.gov; Michael.Garrett@ncleg.gov; Jeff.Jackson@ncleg.gov; Paul.Lowe@ncleg.gov; Natasha.Marcus@ncleg.gov; Julie.Mayfield@ncleg.gov; Mujtaba.Mohammed@ncleg.gov; Natalie.Murdock@ncleg.gov; Wiley.Nickel@ncleg.gov;Gladys.Robinson@ncleg.gov; DeAndrea.Salvador@ncleg.gov; Joyce.Waddell@ncleg.gov; Mike.Woodard@ncleg.gov  
DELIVER THIS MESSAGE

Message for Senate Republicans: Suggested subject: “Support HB 398: Repeal archaic permit law”   Dear Senator:
Please accept my thanks to Republicans for moving HB 398, “Repeal Purchase Permit Law,”. 
If the law is repealed, background checks for gun purchases will be done at the time of sale, rather than up to five years earlier, as under current law. In fact, the Charlotte Observer documented cases of people getting purchase permits, committing crimes, but still having permits available for use (and to bypass the National Instant Background Check System) even after becoming ineligible to purchase firearms.
This year, the North Carolina Sheriffs Association reversed its position and now supports repealing the law. With both gun rights supporters and law enforcement organizations now supporting repeal, only gun control advocates want to keep the system despite the fact that it gives criminal access to firearms.
I will be monitoring all actions on HB 398 through Grass Roots North Carolina legislative alerts.
Respectfully, Message for Senate Democrats: Suggested subject: “Support HB 398: Repeal racist permit law”
Dear Senator:
In the interest of bringing background checks into the 21st Century, I strongly urge you to support HB 398, “Pistol Purchase Permit Repeal.” The North Carolina Sheriffs’ Association now supports repeal of our Jim Crow-era pistol purchase permit law as “duplicative.” Meanwhile, as depicted in a recent NC Law Review paper, black applicants are being denied permits at a rate three times that of whites, revealing that racism in permit issuance continues to this day.
Moreover, sheriffs in Wake, Mecklenburg and Guilford counties are using the law to obstruct lawful citizens from obtaining handguns for self-defense, even as rising civil unrest around the country makes it more vital than ever that citizens have the means to defend their families.
Worse, an investigation by the Charlotte Observer found that pistol purchase permits, which are untraceable and valid for five years, continue to be held – and potentially used to bypass background checks – by people who subsequently become ineligible to own guns.
I strongly encourage you to support repeal of the archaic permit law, after which background checks for gun purchases will be done at the point of sale, not up to five years prior. I will continue to monitor this issue through Grass Roots North Carolina legislative alerts.
Respectfully,
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Pistol Purchase Permit Repeal Passes NC House

May 6, 2021 by 1 Comment

The North Carolina House of Representatives passed H398 yesterday which repeals the state’s Jim Crow-era pistol purchase permit. The repeal passed on a vote of 69-48 with three absences. The bill had the support of the NC Sheriffs’ Association.

Grass Roots North Carolina which has fought for the repeal for years released this statement:

By a vote of 69-48, today the NC House passed H. 398 to repeal our Jim Crow-era pistol purchase permit system. Having passed one chamber before next week’s crossover deadline, the bill remains alive for action in the Senate. Grass Roots North Carolina has been the main advocate for the bill, having worked for nearly twenty years to repeal the archaic law.

GRNC president Paul Valone said, “Today, the North Carolina General Assembly has taken a step toward abolishing a vestige of the Jim Crow era which is being used by a small number of sheriffs to obstruct citizens from protecting their families, as well as bringing gun purchase background checks into the 21st Century. GRNC would like to thank primary bill sponsor Rep. Jay Adams and Republican leadership. We would also like to thank the North Carolina Sheriffs’ Association for its support.”

Looking at the breakdown of the vote, you had two Democrats and 67 Republicans voting for passage while 47 Democrats and one Republican opposed passage. The Democrats supporting passage of the bill were Rep. Shelly Willingham (D-Martin/Edgecombe), an African-American, and Rep. Michael Wray (D-Halifax/Northampton). The lone Republican who opposed the repeal was Rep. Dudley Greene (R-Avery/McDowell/Mitchell) who had previously served as sheriff of McDowell County.

My own representative, Rep. Brian Turner (D-Buncombe), is more concerned about allowing you to walk around downtown Asheville with a drink in your hands than about repealing a bill that was meant to discriminate against blacks. As The Animals sang in 1965, we gotta get out of this place!

If you live in North Carolina, go here to see if your representative thinks you still should be living under a law that was intended to curtail the rights of African-Americans or not.

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Vote On H398 Is Wednesday

May 2, 2021 by 1 Comment

It finally looks like the North Carolina pistol purchase permit will be on its way out. A vote in the NC House is scheduled for Wednesday, May 5th.

Of course, I fully expect Gov. Roy Cooper (D-NC) to veto H398 if it passes the North Carolina General Assembly. An override will depend upon whether Democrats want to defend a racist, Jim Crow-era law that has been shown still to discriminate against African-Americans.

As Grass Roots North Carolina says in the alert, now is the time to put on and keep up the pressure.

Call your own representative, Democrat or Republican, and demand they pass this bill. If you don’t know who your representative is, use this tool.

Email every House Republican. Their email addresses are in the alert. You may need to copy the email addresses into your word processor and convert the “;” into a “,” depending upon your email program. I’d also suggest pasting them in as a BCC. Two minutes of copy and paste is all it takes. I just did it.

If you are not on the Grass Roots North Carolina email alert list, you need to be! Go here to sign up.

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NC’s Pistol Purchase Permit May Be Eliminated

April 21, 2021 by 4 Comments

That 1919 remnant of the Jim Crow era, North Carolina’s pistol purchase permit, may finally be on its way out. The North Carolina Sheriffs’ Association has finally endorsed its elimination and the House Judiciary 4 Committee voted out a bill that would do away with it.

Research published in the North Carolina Law Review showed that African-Americans were three times as likely to be denied than whites. This comes from a study of permits issued in Wake County where Sheriff Gerald Baker (D-Wake) is facing lawsuits for refusing to issue permits “due to COVID”.

This is not a done deal and I fully expect Gov. Roy Cooper (D-NC) to veto it. The law was intended to deny constitutional rights to African-Americans and its practice still does. Let him veto it and then try and defend that!

Since this is not a done deal, Grass Roots North Carolina is calling people to contact first Republicans and then later Democrats to pass this bill.

House Committee Passes Purchase Permit Repeal
Thanks to Reps. Jay Adams, Hugh Blackwell, Keith Kidwell, and George Cleveland, today the NC House Judiciary 4 Committee passed H398, a full repeal of North Carolina’s Jim Crow-era pistol purchase permit (PPP) law – a law which not only allows some urban sheriffs to obstruct people from buying handguns for self-protection, but to this day also disproportionally denies minorities the ability to buy handguns for self-defense.

Not only are Republicans on board with repealing the racist law, but now the NC Sheriffs’ Association has joined them in supporting repeal. And who does that leave still supporting racist gun control? Democrats.
Said GRNC president Paul Valone:
“We are encouraged to see that the North Carolina Sheriffs’ Association now agrees to bring gun purchases in North Carolina into the 21st Century by eliminating our Jim Crow-era permit system and requiring background checks at the point of sale. Given that a recent UNC School of Law paper found that in Wake County, black applicants are being denied permits three times more often than whites, it is clear that racism in issuing permits continues to this day. Consequently, we are calling upon Democrat legislators to join in repealing this racist law.”

Presuming the PPP repeal passes the General Assembly, anti-gun Democrat Governor Roy Cooper will certainly veto it. Because Republicans don’t have the 6/10 majority in either chamber that is required to over-ride Cooper’s veto, at least some Democrats will have to vote to over-ride.

Will Democrats do the right thing, or will they be the only ones left clinging to racist gun control? Please note that this message goes to Republicans.

Very soon, we will issue another alert with a message for Democrats.

EMAIL ALL NC HOUSE REPUBLICANS:  Please note that the large number of Republican recipients may require you to break up your message into multiple groups.   
CALL YOUR NC HOUSE REP:  You can find your NC House rep by going to: 

https://ncleg.gov/FindYourLegislators

PLEASE CONTRIBUTE TO GRNC: Help us fight gun control while we promote Second Amendment principles. Please CLICK HERE to contribute. Bear in mind that GRNC is an all-volunteer organization, so you can be sure your donations are put to the best possible use. Any amount helps, and any amount is appreciated.

CONTACT INFO
 
Copy each block of address and paste into an email

 
Edward.Goodwin@ncleg.gov; Larry.Yarborough@ncleg.gov; Steve.Tyson@ncleg.gov;   Jimmy.Dixon@ncleg.gov;  Bobby.Hanig@ncleg.gov; Matthew.Winslow@ncleg.gov;  John.Bell@ncleg.gov;  Chris.Humphrey@ncleg.gov; Pat.McElraft@ncleg.gov;  Phil.Shepard@ncleg.gov; Carson.Smith@ncleg.gov; Frank.Iler@ncleg.gov;  Charles.Miller@ncleg.gov; Ted.Davis@ncleg.gov;  William.Brisson@ncleg.gov;   Donna.White@ncleg.gov;  Larry.Strickland@ncleg.gov; 

Erin.Pare@ncleg.gov;                           Diane.Wheatley@ncleg.gov;  John.Szoka@ncleg.gov;  Brenden.Jones@ncleg.gov;  Graig.Meyer@ncleg.gov;                              John.Sauls@ncleg.gov;  Jamie.Boles@ncleg.gov;                        Howard.Penny@ncleg.gov;  Mark.Brody@ncleg.gov;                            Jon.Hardister@ncleg.gov; 
 
John.Faircloth@ncleg.gov;  Dennis.Riddell@ncleg.gov; Jerry.Carter@ncleg.gov; Ben.Moss@ncleg.gov; Wayne.Sasser@ncleg.gov; David.Willis@ncleg.gov; Dean.Arp@ncleg.gov; Pat.Hurley@ncleg.gov;  Lee.Zachary@ncleg.gov; Jeff.Zenger@ncleg.gov; Donny.Lambeth@ncleg.gov; Harry.Warren@ncleg.gov; Julia.Howard@ncleg.gov; Allen.McNeill@ncleg.gov; Sam.Watford@ncleg.gov; Larry.Potts@ncleg.gov; Kristin.Baker@ncleg.gov;  Dudley.Greene@ncleg.gov; Hugh.Blackwell@ncleg.gov; Destin.Hall@ncleg.gov;  Mitchell.Setzer@ncleg.gov; Sarah.Stevens@ncleg.gov
 
Kyle.Hall@ncleg.gov;  Ray.Pickett@ncleg.gov; Jeffrey.Elmore@ncleg.gov; Grey.Mills@ncleg.gov;  Jason.Saine@ncleg.gov; John.Bradford@ncleg.gov;  John.Torbett@ncleg.gov; Dana.Bumgardner@ncleg.gov; Kelly.Hastings@ncleg.gov; Tim.Moore@ncleg.gov; David.Rogers@ncleg.gov; Jake.Johnson@ncleg.gov;  Tim.Moffitt@ncleg.gov; Mark.Pless@ncleg.gov; Mike.Clampitt@ncleg.gov; Karl.Gillespie@ncleg.govsomebody@ncleg.net
 
DELIVER THIS MESSAGE

Suggested Subject: “Repeal our racist pistol purchase permit law”  
 
Dear NC House Representative:
 
As stated by NC Sheriffs’ Association Executive Director Eddie Caldwell in the Judiciary 4 Committee, the association now supports the repeal of our Jim-Crow era pistol purchase permit system. Describing recent improvements to North Carolina reporting to the computerized National Instant Background Check System (NICS), Caldwell described the archaic and racist permit law as “duplicative.”

A recent UNC Law School paper noted that in Wake County alone, from 2015 to 2020, black applicants were denied permits at a rate three times that of whites, demonstrating that racism in the permit law continues to this day. In early 2020, Wake County Sheriff Gerald Baker decided to stop issuing permits altogether in violation of G.S. 14-404(f), which requires permits to be issued to qualified applicants within 14 days. In other urban North Carolina counties, permits are still being delayed by weeks, even months.

Finally, purchase permits remain valid for 5 years, raising the possibility that an individual could obtain a permit, commit a crime and then, once disqualified from buying a firearm, use the 5-year-old permit to bypass NICS.

I strongly urge you to support the repeal of our archaic, racist, and obstructionist pistol purchase permit law. I will be monitoring this issue through Grass Roots North Carolina legislative alerts.


Respectfully,
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NC Republicans Waffle on Pistol Purchase Permit Fix

April 5, 2021 by 1 Comment

In a year in which we saw the state of Iowa ditch their requirement for a pistol purchase permit, the Republicans in the North Carolina General Assembly still are kowtowing to the NC Sheriffs Association. Certain sheriffs in North Carolina have been obstructing the issuance of pistol purchase permits since the beginning of the pandemic.

A simple bill, HB 398, would provide citizens of a county an alternative where their sheriff has been one of these obstructionists. It simply allows them to apply for a permit in an adjoining county. So, for example, a citizen of Wake County, where Sheriff Gerald Baker has been such an obstructionist that he is being sued in US District court, could apply for a permit in one of the seven adjoining counties. This bill is a mere tweak to a Jim Crow law that should have been ditched years ago. Notwithstanding that the sheriffs of the seven largest counties in the state are all African-American who you would think would want such a racist law abolished, the NC Sheriffs Association seems to be objecting to such a fix. That has the GOP in the General Assembly – or some of them – caving.

Grass Roots North Carolina has fought the issue for over 20 years. They just issued an alert after HB 398 was removed from a hearing calendar.

NC SHERIFFS EFFECTIVELY SAY ‘POUND SAND’
In the early months of the pandemic, GRNC began receiving complaints of abuse of the NC pistol purchase permit system by sheriffs in Wake and Mecklenburg counties and elsewhere. Wake County Sheriff Gerald Baker even tried to stop issuing permits altogether…until GRNC and two other organizations sued him. Yet despite even this, purchase permit and concealed handgun applicants are reporting multi-month delays in scheduling appointments for permits.

NC Sheriffs effectively say ‘pound sand’ GRNC has been trying to repeal the Jim Crow-era purchase permit law for 20+ years, even getting a repeal through the NC Senate in 2014. Unfortunately, each time we have encountered opposition from the powerful NC Sheriffs Association (NCSA).

In the interest of getting permits into the hands of applicants until we can fully repeal the law, Representative Jay Adams (R-Catawba, GRNC ****) introduced HB 398, a simple bill to at least allow applicants to apply in counties adjoining their county of residence if their own sheriff is being obstructionist. 

The bill was calendared for a hearing last Wednesday…until, apparently, the Sheriffs’ association objected to even that minor change. Then Judiciary 4 Committee Chair Hugh Blackwell (R-Burke) pulled it from the calendar at the last minute, claiming leadership planned to “improve” the bill, but not telling anyone what the “improvements” might be, suggesting that Republicans might once again be caving to the NCSA. 
IMMEDIATE ACTION REQUIRED!
With the crossover deadline little more than a month away, your IMMEDIATE action is crucial. Please send three emails and make three phone calls:
CALL AND EMAIL: NC House Speaker Tim Moore at: (704) 739-1221   (919) 733-3451   Tim.Moore@ncleg.gov 

CALL AND EMAIL: NC House Rules Chair Destin Hall at: (919) 733-5931   (919) 733-5931   Destin.Hall@ncleg.gov

CALL AND EMAIL: NC House Judiciary 4 Committee Chair Hugh Blackwell at: (919) 733-5805   (919) 733-5805  Hugh.Blackwell@ncleg.gov

 CONTACT INFO Tim.Moore@ncleg.gov; Destin.Hall@ncleg.gov; Hugh.Blackwell@ncleg.gov  
DELIVER THIS MESSAGE

Suggested Subject: “Enough is enough: Pistol permit obstruction must stop!”    

Dear :[Speaker Moore/Rep. ___:]
You must stop obstruction of NC pistol purchase permits and the resulting denial of citizens’ rights by returning House Bill 398 to the House calendar for immediate action.

Using COVID-19 and increased permit applications as an excuse, sheriffs in Wake and Mecklenburg counties, among others, are obstructing pistol purchase permits and concealed handgun permits, often taking months to schedule appointments for applications, even in the face of multiple lawsuits filed by Grass Roots North Carolina and others.
For years, sheriffs have objected to repealing our Jim Crow-era pistol purchase permit law – a racist law passed to prevent minorities from buying guns for self-protection. Now we are encountering resistance even to a small and simple change which would allow permit applicants to bypass obstructionist sheriffs by applying in adjacent counties.

Enough is enough. Citizens have been denied their right to purchase handguns for self-protection for entirely too long. In the 2020 elections, gun voters supported you because they expect you to protect and defend the Second Amendment. 

It is now time for you to do what we elected you to do by passing House Bill 398. Additionally, please advise me of your position on this issue. I will be monitoring your actions through Grass Roots North Carolina legislative alerts.
Respectfully,

The official state motto of North Carolina is Esse Quam Videri. Translated from the Latin it means “To be rather than to seem.” The Republicans in the General Assembly always say they support the Second Amendment and gun rights. If so, now is the time for them to be rather than to seem!

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Every Picture Tells A Story, Part XI

April 3, 2021 by 6 Comments

Iowa becomes the 19th state and 3rd state this year to adopt permitless or constitutional carry. What a change since the times when only Vermont had constitutional carry and a number of states didn’t allow carry in any form.

On Friday afternoon, Gov. Kim Reynolds (R-IA) signed House File 756 into law. In addition to adopting constitutional carry, the bill also removed Iowa’s pistol purchase permit. I hope the North Carolina General Assembly is paying attention to that facet of the bill!

Gov. Reynolds said in her statement:

House File 756 “protects the Second Amendment rights of Iowa’s law-abiding citizens while still preventing the sale of firearms to criminals and other dangerous individuals,” the governor said in a statement.

The new law also takes “greater steps to inform law enforcement about an individual’s mental illness helping ensure firearms don’t end up in the wrong hands,” she said.

“We will never be able to outlaw or prevent every single bad actor from getting a gun, but what we can do is ensure law-abiding citizens have full access to their constitutional rights while keeping Iowans safe,” the Osceola Republican said in the statement.

Thanks again to Rob Vance, we have a graphic that illustrates the growth of constitutional (and shall issue) carry since 1986. A better way of putting it is that it is a growth of freedom whereby now 19 state governments have recognized a citizen’s inherent right to self-defense without the need for a permit.

I anticipate that a 20th state – Tennessee – will be added to this list before much longer. Indeed, I was a bit surprised that Iowa beat them to the punch.

Predictably, gun prohibitionists and Iowa Democrats are not pleased by Gov. Reynold’s signing of the new law. They threaten to make it a campaign issue in 2022 when she comes up for re-election. If I were Gov. Reynolds, I’d quote the immortal words of Dirty Harry and say, “Make my day!”

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Sheriff Gerald Baker Allowed To Slow Walk Permits

October 22, 2020 by 1 Comment

Wake County Superior Court Judge Bryan Collins has denied Grass Roots North Carolina’s lawsuit motion for temporary restraining order against Wake Sheriff Gerald Baker over dragging his feet on the processing of pistol purchase and concealed handgun permits. The law states that the sheriff must issue pistol purchase permits within 14 days but Baker’s office has been taking much longer.

From CBS17 in Raleigh:

Superior Court Judge Bryan Collins wrote that the sheriff’s office continues to insure that permits are properly processed to prevent convicted felons and other non-qualified persons from obtaining handguns, while also complying with Gov. Roy Cooper’s executive orders concerning the pandemic, a release from the sheriff’s office said.

The court also said that the manner in which the sheriff’s office processes applications for the permits was not unreasonable.

“I’m very pleased with ruling rendered by Judge Collins,” Baker said in the release. “As I’ve stated before, I will continue to ensure and protect the Second Amendment rights of all qualified citizens, while continuing to protect the safety and welfare of my staff, Wake County citizens and the jail residents housed in the Wake County Public Safety Center, during this pandemic.”

If this judge rings a bell in your memory, it is because he is the same judge who tried to strike down voter-passed amendments to the North Carolina constitution that mandated voter-ID and capped the income tax. Collins argument was that both constitutional amendments were invalid because the General Assembly was gerrymandered. Interestingly, he did not declare that every other law passed by the General Assembly was similarly invalid.

The North Carolina Court of Appeals overturned this ruling in September. That decision concluded:

We conclude that the superior court erred in holding that our General
Assembly lost its power granted by our state constitution, while retaining other powers, simply because a federal court had determined that the maps contained too many majority-minority districts, such that some members elected to that body were from districts that were illegally gerrymandered based on race. It is simply beyond our power to thwart the otherwise lawful exercise of constitutional power by our legislative branch to pass bills proposing amendments. Accordingly, we reverse the order of the superior court and declare the challenged constitutional amendments duly ratified by the people to be valid.

One other note here – Judge Bryan Collins is the husband of NC Appeals Court Judge Allegra Collins who was elected in 2018. I would presume the judicial ethics would force her to recuse herself from any case decided by her husband.

More on the Baker case here.

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Roy Cooper, Brady PAC, And Systematic Racism

August 11, 2020 by 3 Comments

I just listened in on a public Zoom webinar with Gov. Roy Cooper (D-NC) hosted by the Brady PAC and the Democratic Governors Association. It featured Cooper, Wendi Wallace of the DGA, Brian Lemak of Brady PAC, and Kris Brown, president of Brady United.

I should note off the bat that the chat function and any way to ask questions was disabled. I imagine that was to prevent any awkward questions from being raised by the audience.

It started with Wendi Wallace who is the Deputy Executive Director of the DGA. She came to them from the Planned Parenthood Action Fund last year. She was praising the efforts of the governors of Nevada and New Mexico to bring more gun control to those states.

The conversation then switched to Brian Lemak and Kris Brown. Among the things they said is they are hoping that with Roy Cooper that they can make North Carolina into the next Virginia. In other words, to impose gun control from on high upon the people of North Carolina. They said they are making North Carolina one of their highest priorities at all levels – Federal, state, and even county commissions.

Finally they allowed Cooper to speak. He welcomed this opportunity to talk about “gun safety”. Cooper then started out by saying the usual boilerplate of I grew up on a farm, I am a gun owner, and I support the Second Amendment. He then segued into his support for “responsible gun laws” and talked about the campus shooting at UNC-Charlotte.

Cooper then went to talk about how Obama carried North Carolina in 2008 but that there was a Republican “backlash” in 2010 which allowed them to take both houses of the General Assembly. Not only that but those Republicans had the temerity to gerrymander the state to keep their seats. This led to the state “going backwards on gun laws”.

He said when he was elected in 2016 that the Republicans still held a super-majority in the General Assembly. Cooper said he had three tools with which to stop “bad legislation”: the bully pulpit, the veto, and executive orders. This is where he noted his veto of HB 652 saying guns didn’t belong in schools. I’m not going into that here with the exception of noting that the bill only applied to schools attached to churches and that no firearm were allowed during school hours including during extracurricular events.

As to executive orders, Cooper said he ordered the State Bureau of Investigation to send over 200,000 more names to the NICS system after it was discovered a number of convictions had not been reported. What he didn’t say and didn’t want the listeners to know is that for most of his tenure as Attorney General of North Carolina (2000-2016), the SBI was under his control. It was only moved from the Department of Justice to the Department of Public Safety in 2014.

Cooper moved on to existing laws including the Jim Crow-era pistol purchase permit law. He said he wanted to expand that law to include “assault weapons”. He thought honest and responsible gun owners would go along with that. Cooper also mentioned his support for red flag laws.

The discussion then moved into more political matters such as mail-in ballots, how the Brady PAC planned to focus on not only Cooper’s race but the race for Lt. Governor, the pandemic, etc. Then Cooper said how he said the fight against “systemic racism” need to be a priority.

This is where I exploded.

What more obvious an example of systematic racism exists than a law specifically passed to prevent African-Americans from having access to handguns, other concealable weapons, and pump shotguns! Historian Clayton Cramer found in his research that the impact of the law was “to grant discretion to local white officials to use their discretion to disarm nearly all blacks and some disreputable whites of deadly weapons.”

All four on the webinar today would have denied that gun control had its origins in keeping African-Americans disarmed. However, the record is what it is and it’s legacy is systematic racism that progressives say they abhor.

As to the rest of the webinar, I couldn’t take any more and turned it off.

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GRNC Lawsuit Against Sheriff Baker Makes The News

August 5, 2020 by

The lawsuit GRNC has brought against Wake County Sheriff Gerald Baker has caught the attention of local news stations. CBS 17 News of Raleigh did a report yesterday on Moore v. Baker and interviewed Marc Erickson of GRNC. The lawsuit is over Sheriff Baker dragging his feet in the processing of pistol purchase permits. It is taking over 2 months to process them when state law only allows 14 days. Sheriff Baker is still using the tired excuse of “it’s the pandemic”.

As Marc made clear, a right delayed is a right denied. The pistol purchase permit is superfluous given the NICS System but North Carolina sheriffs claim they know people in their county better. That might be true in eastern NC’s Tyrrell County – population 4,016. It certainly is not true in Wake County population 1,111,761. Wake, by the way, has now officially surpassed Mecklenburg as the largest county by population in North Carolina.