The Texas House passed a bill allowing adults over the age of 21 to carry a gun without a permit or license on Thursday.
H.B. 1927 passed with an 87-58 vote and would allow adult citizens to carry a gun without a permit unless the state or federal government prohibits them from owning a firearm. The “Constitutional Carry” bill was sponsored by state Rep. Matt Schaefer, according to The Dallas Morning News.
“The bill should be called common-sense carry,” Schaefer said. “Law abiding citizens need the ability to protect themselves and their families.”
Under the current Texas law, citizens must obtain a license to carry a handgun openly, The Texas Tribune reported. To purchase a gun an applicant must submit fingerprints, go through training, take a written exam and complete a shooting proficiency test.
State Rep. James White issued a statement Wednesday saying that citizens will continue to seek training and licenses, regardless of the bill’s proposed changes. The statement includes quotes from five firearm instructors that support the legislation.
“If other states’ experiences are any indication, passage of this bill will not likely diminish the number of people acquiring an LTC. Most other states which have passed Constitutional Carry did not see a significant reduction in the rate of license issue,” instructor Larry Arnold said, according to the statement.
????Texas House APPROVES NRA-Backed Constitutional Carry pic.twitter.com/WyevoGn3v9
— NRA (@NRA) April 15, 2021
Only one Republican voted against the bill while seven Democrats supported the legislation, the Tribune reported. Democratic pro tempore and state Rep. Joe Moody, an opponent of the legislation, strived to pass an amendment that would scrap the bill.
Moody said no action has been taken to prevent mass shootings after a gunman killed 23 people in El Paso in August 2019, according to the Tribune.
“After those shootings…there were roundtable discussions and stakeholder meetings and a lot of promises-and I was hopeful, members, even knowing the political realities, I was hopeful,” he said to members on the House floor, according to the Tribune. “Members, I’m so tired of doing nothing, when are we going to do something?”
Texas currently has over 580,000 registered guns making it the state with the highest number of registered firearms in the country, according to the World Population Review. Fifteen states currently have constitutional carry.
Tennessee and Iowa passed similar bills earlier this year, The Hill reported.
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It’s about time to honor 2nd amendment in this country
Which means “constitutional carry” is MOOT!!!
Please correct the statement about the requirements to purchase a gun. Those are the requirements to get a LTC (I know, i have one), NOT the requirements to purchase a gun. Those are license check, background check, and registration.
I just want to make sure the information in this article is as accurate as possible.
They also say “Registered Guns”. There is no registry of possessed guns in Texas.
Not license check. It is photo identification check.
@ Eric Of the twenty-seven words contained in our Second Amendment of which our founding forefathers were absolutely magnificent and incredibly smart and didn’t write it in “lawyer-ease,” nowhere do I see any caveats allowing for the feral government, any government state or local the ability or responsibility to restrict my God given and constitutionally protected right of self preservation. Therefore a “Constitutional Carry” bill is not necessary if we adhere to the Rule of Law.
There are no clauses allowing for background checks, waiting periods, psychological profiling, permitting, or the registration of any firearm to anyone! Along with the constitution were added the Militia Acts of 1792 which addressed the ammunition issue. Most of our elected politicians in Government don’t recognize the Clause “the right of the “people” to keep and bear (carry) arms ‘SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED’ or are aware of the Militia Acts of 1792.
However, I do see plenty of elected officials who would just as soon try and TAKE our God given right by usurpative fiat while at the same time refusing to abide by their oaths of office. We go back to the simple question of “What part of “shall not be infringed” do these Leftopathic Corruptocratic Globalists not understand”? Any law restricting ownership of any firearm written since 1791 is UNCONSTITUTIONAL and therefore technically unenforceable! Guns have but two enemies, RUST and Politicians!!!
Now the tenth amendment of the bill of rights allowed for the individual states to enact statutes that are NOT IN CONFLICT with our constitution (The Rule of Law) Therefore state gun laws restricting our second amendment rights are UNENFORCEABLE!!
As for the NICS Universal background checks, they are the opposite of being effective and a solution to a problem that doesn’t exist. It’s already a crime to sell a firearm to somebody who is not legally allowed to own a firearm, whether one goes through a background check or not, that is already a crime.
The NICS background check database is “faulty” and “racially biased,” in that minorities are more likely to share a surname with someone else who may have a criminal record. Consider for decades now our Bill of rights has been under attack. Again I want to reference the Amendment that the framers intended to guarantee compliance of the other nine amendments, our second amendment, as does the regulation of Ammunition sales which in effect is a TAX on Law abiding citizens exercising their rights under the second Amendment and Militia acts of 1792!.
I am curious to find out just how many politicians would be willing to place the same caveats as they have on our Second Amendment or any other amendment e.g. file a form and wait several days so one can exercise their first Amendment right to exercise free speech – file a form and wait several days to exercise their third amendment rights protecting us from unreasonable search and seizure. Or the ninth amendment that states that there are other rights that may exist aside from the ones explicitly mentioned, in the Bill of Rights even though they are not listed. Meaning they can be violated. The proverbial political foot is in the door, and APATHY from the American people is allowing the door to usurpation to be thrown WIDE open as if it wasn’t there.
Regarding Red flag gun confiscation laws; they violate the Fourth Amendment. If the government takes somebody’s God-given rights because they think that a person might someday commit a crime, then we enter into the realm of dystopian science fiction movies.
Whether one is an ardent defender of the Second Amendment or not, all of us should be concerned about the implications of the Fourth Amendment and due process. The fourth amendment is a foundation of our country.”
Demoshits don’t care about keeping people safe. For Demoshits, this issue is about control employing emotion. They’re appealing to emotion and not reason. If they were appealing to reason, they would know ways to keep people safe and that, to quote a book, ‘more guns equal less crime.’ But also for the Demoshits, it’s about paying back their donors. Soros and Bloomberg are going to want to get what they paid for, and what they paid for is disarming our society.”
No one but God can dictate policy to me and my family and I will do whatever it takes to secure my liberty and the liberty of my fellow patriots. Stand in my way try and usurp my rights or otherwise enslave me, you should be prepared to back your actions up with your life as I am prepared to do likewise!!
There comes a time when you have to stand for the Constitution or die by legislation one usurpative bill at a time.
I will offer this little but important lesson in history – The reason Americans should be aggressively fighting against gun control is because armed people will not willingly load themselves in boxcars or FEMA camps!
Wow brotha well said. You hit the nail on the head so many times so I hope a lot of people read your comment and are enlightened.
Explain what God-given rights are, or are you just running off at the mouth
LIFE! LIBERTY! AND THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS! Have you not read the Declaration of Independence!?
That should be pretty self explanatory but basically it means the rights you are born with. We all have a right to life, we all have the right to defend ourselves and things like that that any living being has. What would happen if you told a dog (assuming the dog could u derstand you) that he/she couldn’t defend the self and then attacked them? They’d bite the crap out of you. What did the colonists do when the British came to take their guns? They resisted, the British fired the shot heard round the world and long story short they beat the snot out of the most powerful military on earth at the time. So when leftists do the same thing now they need to be met in kind if they refuse to back down.
Tired of Texas being a hold-out state. Next we the people in Texas need 2ND AMENDMENT SANCTUARY STATE. Need to remember some of these politicians next election!
Moody said there’s been no action to prevent mass shootings. Citing El Paso in 2019. Typical way for a Democrat to look at things. This bill IS doing something to prevent mass shootings. Someone starts crap like 2019, a law abiding citizen, carrying his weapon, drops the a$$h0le and bingo, mass shooting averted. Constitutional carry should be a national, federal law. You’d see mass shootings drop dramatically.
@MedicJoe Something for everyone to consider. Has anyone noticed each time the Leftopathic Deep State Globalists find themselves in trouble something magical occurs to DEFLECT attention from themselves onto other subjects usually a mass shooting in a supposed “gun free zone” mandated by LIEberal Demoshits. Think of Columbine Sandyhook Las Vegas (which, the FBI recently claimed was an elaborate suicide attempt carried out by a Leftopathic loser) Marjorie Stoneman in Florida and now Indianapolis.
I had a memory surge and recalled something that I had read on the subject years ago which came from a book “Behold the Pale Horse by William Cooper in 1991 a former US Navy Intelligence briefing team member outlined such a scenario as we have had recently in Indianapolis. William Cooper died under mysterious circumstances in 2001 On page 225 Cooper dropped the following bombshell paragraph which should be considered more deeply in light of what just happened in Indianapolis.
Cooper was a former US Navy Intelligence briefing team member outlined such scenarios as mass shootings at “gun free zones” (soft targets) we have had recently in Indianapolis . and Vegas. William Cooper died under mysterious circumstances in 2001 On page 225 Cooper dropped the following bombshell paragraph which should be considered more deeply in light of what has happened in Florida Vegas Sandyhook El Paso Dayton etc. all which were in some way “manufactured” events. Chapter 12, “The Secret Government,” page 225 excerpt: “The government encouraged the manufacture and importation of military firearms for the criminals to use. This is intended to foster a feeling of insecurity, which would lead the American people to voluntarily disarm themselves by passing laws against firearms. Using drugs and hypnosis on mental patients in a process called Orion, the CIA inculcated the desire in these people to open fire on schoolyards and inflame the anti-gun lobby. The plan is well under way, and so far is working perfectly. The middle class is begging the government to do away with the second amendment.”
Bill Cooper was shot to death in Edgar, Arizona on Nov. 5, 2001.
Dope up some looser basement dueller who plays video games all day and night and send him on his way to create a suitable distraction. Never mind the man behind the curtain.
Looks to me like rime in Texas is fixin to drop dramatically and mass shootings will stop except in gun free zones. So next we need to ban gun free zones.
But here’s the thing most folks don’t understand. The 2nd amendment doesn’t GIVE us the right to keep and bear arms. It prohibits government from infringing on our natural right of self defense including from tyranny in our own government. So literally any law, code, policy or otherwise that inhibits that right is illegal and illegitimate and we have no legal or moral obligation to obey them. This bill is a great step forward but it is instilling in people’s minds that the right to own and carry arms of is something benevolently granted to us by our government which simply isn’t the case any more than they can grant you a permit to breathe (although they’d like to try to).
Biden and the DEMOcraps stealing the election and many before it will either wake the public up to the fact that something drastic must be done to keep us all from continuing into bondage or we will be destroyed as a nation and as a people. We had a chance at a bloodless cou ter coup when Trump was still in office but now that the demoncrats are nearly in full power they will not allow their foothold to be taken without a very bloody backlash. So expect new plagues to be released and violence of all kinds and expect it all to be blamed on us by their bought and paid for project mockingbird mainstream media.
I remember when open carry was going to become law in Texas, the libs filled their depends, claiming “we’re going to turn into the wild west again”….. just to show you how stupid they truly are….. the murder rate in the “wild west” was like 14 per 100,000. Chicago loses that many almost every weekend. ONE WOULD HOPE WE GO BACK THERE! I was chatting with a Richardson, TX sergeant as we were filling up our vehicles. He asked, if you were going to rob this place, and saw 5 or 6 guys out front wearing guns, what would you do? I looked at him and said, “I’d go down the block to the Walmart”….. he laughed, and agreed. I don’t carry openly, just my preference.
The libs are so ignorant of guns in general it’s mind boggling.
Question, how do you end a liberal?
Answer, play russian roulette with them. with a semi auto, they go first!
Think about that for a minute….. lol.
I’d love to chat with you. I’m the current President of the Texas Handgun Association. I’m a fervent supporter of the Constitution. You make many salient points regarding the Constitution and how much most people misunderstand it. If we TRULY stuck to the tenets of the 10th Amendment we’d fix most of what’s wrong with our Federal Government. I retired from the Army but Semper Fi! You can contact me through the association. If I put my email here they mark it as spam.
Modern translation:
“In as much as a well regulated, trained, equipped and armed Militia, is necessary for the security of any FREE State,
the naturally inherent and irrefutable right of the PEOPLE, as opposed to the Militia, to LIKEWISE keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
i..e There shall be no monopoly of control by the state concerning arms.