Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, June 29, 1995 TAG: 9506290098
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-14 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Each and every one of us, right?
Thanks to sympathetic state legislators who want to help us out, a new law goes on the books Saturday that will make it possible for virtually all of us law-abiding citizens to carry concealed weapons - for self-defense, of course.
No longer will we have to convince fuddy-duddy judges that there's good reason for us to pack heat.
We can stop worrying, too, that police may not be around when we need them. Who needs them? We can protect ourselves. We can enforce the law.
And if our guns occasionally fall into the wrong hands, maybe children's hands; or if a law-abiding citizen here or there acts hastily, in the heat of a moment, in a way that he and others later regret (assuming they're still alive), and a few innocent people are injured or worse - well, that's the price we pay for greater freedom from fear. Right?
For all this, we probably owe a portion of our gratitude to ... Oliver North.
Yep, just two years ago, Virginia's legislature won national attention and plaudits for passing a law limiting purchases of handguns to one per month and standing up against the deadly profusion of gun violence in our society. Then, last year, North, a U.S. Senate candidate, was denied his request to carry a concealed weapon to protect himself against terrorists' attacks. (The Clarke County judge who said no to North did so ``on the ground that the applicant is not of good character.")
That brought out stories from other Virginians who claimed their requests for concealed-weapon permits had been arbitrarily and unfairly denied, mostly by a handful of judges in Northern Virginia and Tidewater.
Rather than having a quiet heart-to-heart talk with those General Assembly-elected judges and suggesting that they be a bit more generously judicious, legislators decided to throw wide the door for most everyone to carry concealed weapons.
Keep in mind we're not talking about hunters or collectors here. This has to do with gun-toting in public.
Perhaps the predictions by many law-enforcement officials, who warned lawmakers not to pass this statute, were wrong. Maybe the new statute won't lead to increased gun violence. Maybe police officers won't be more nervous with the growing uncertainty over who might be packing a gun. Reported results of liberalized concealed-weapons laws passed by a few other states are mixed, so really there's no telling.
But even if most Virginians don't become gunslingers, and shoot-outs in the streets don't become as common as in the Wild West of yore, this new law - a retreat by the General Assembly from its position of two years ago - will almost surely increase the presence of guns, and the risk that goes with increased presence. Says Bedford Police Chief Milton Graham, ``We're going to have an armed camp in Virginia, it looks like.''
How this is supposed to make us feel more secure is a puzzlement.
by CNB