Captain Nemo
Regular Member
With only three weeks until election day it's time to really hit the keyboards. Especially to those legislators running for re-election. Below is an email I sent to the politician running for re-election in the district I live. You may or may not agree with my message but what is important is that you become vocal and express your opinions to those running in your district. Rest assured the anti's are doing just that.
Representative XXXXXX:
It pleases me that you are running for re-election. I think you are doing an excellent job representing our district. With this letter I would like to present for your consideration a subject important to me. In fact I discuss it with the hope that you will become an active participant. The subject is our right to carry firearms for personal protection. The constitution of Wisconsin contains an amendment numbered Article I section 25. It was enacted in 1998 by a voter approval percentage of 76%, an extraordinary margin. It reads "The people have the right to keep and bear arms for security, defense, hunting, recreation or any other lawful purpose". Simple, to the point with no ambiguity and manner of carry neutral. One serious impediment to the exercise of the amendment is the outdated 138 year old state statute 941.23. "Only a peace officer may go armed with a concealed and dangerous weapon". In 2003, in it's opinions concerning the cases of Hamdan and of Cole, the Wisconsin supreme court by a narrow 4 to 3 margin upheld the constitutionality of 941.23 declaring that the statute is not an infringement of the right to keep and bear arms because it merely addressed the manner of carry. In my opinion that is a bit of judicial construction to validate the existence of 941.23. Two justices on the Court at that time share that opinion and implied so in their dissentions. They stated clearly that in their opinion statute 941.23 was indeed made unconstitutional by the will of the people when the people ratified Art I sec 25. Even in it's opinion that the concealed weapon prohibition statute is constitutional the Court did state that the conflict, implied by the concealed weapon statute and the constitutional amendment, will create great a serious dilemma for the judicial system. The Court stated that only the state legislature can resolve the conflict.
How the conflict would be resolved is at the will of the legislature. There are some number of options. Among them are a shall issue concealed carry statute with onerous rules and regulations. An optional permit to conceal carry permit as an adjunct to the Court recognized right to open carry. A right to carry similar to the one the state of Arizona just enacted. A right to carry similar to that in Vermont or Alaska. All of these options are befit with problems. They all present various degrees of infringement on the state of Wisconsin's no nonsense right to keep and bear arms amendment. As I stated earlier the amendment is manner of carry neutral. If the legislature had intended that the concealed carry prohibition statute was to remain in place there certainly would have been words to that effect contained in the amendment. Because there are no such words it can only be assumed that the intent of the legislature and the voting public is the amendment applies to all manners of carry.
I believe that if one wades through all the hyperbole, the solution is rather simple, rescind statute 941.23. It is definitely an infringement on our constitutional rights and is of little value in today's society. It only only penalizes those that are law abiding and wish to provide for their only personal protection. It has no impact on criminals. Criminals are criminals because they have no respect for the law. Law abiding means law abiding, as such, people are not going to abuse their rights. Contrary to what many anti gun people claim, the streets won't run red with blood. We won't revert to the days of the "wild west". Neither of these situations have manifested in the 48 states that have some provision for carry of firearms for personal protection. The percentage of abuse is almost non existent.
Rescinding statute 941.23 has a number of advantages. It doesn't require the draft of a new statute with endless hours of debate, and filled with unimaginable amount of confusing rules an regulations. It doesn't have any financial burden on the State or law enforcement. It doesn't present any additional tax burden on the people. Most important it brings the state firearm laws closer in concert to the intent of the legislature and voting citizens.
My plea to you is that you will become proactive in fulfilling the wishes of the people when they overwhelmingly voted to allow the people of Wisconsin to enjoy the activities of firearm recreation, hunting and most of all the right to personal protection.
It is also my hope that this coming November that the Assembly will be controlled by the Republican party and that the party will not forget that one of the planks in it's platform is choice of carry.
Representative XXXXXX:
It pleases me that you are running for re-election. I think you are doing an excellent job representing our district. With this letter I would like to present for your consideration a subject important to me. In fact I discuss it with the hope that you will become an active participant. The subject is our right to carry firearms for personal protection. The constitution of Wisconsin contains an amendment numbered Article I section 25. It was enacted in 1998 by a voter approval percentage of 76%, an extraordinary margin. It reads "The people have the right to keep and bear arms for security, defense, hunting, recreation or any other lawful purpose". Simple, to the point with no ambiguity and manner of carry neutral. One serious impediment to the exercise of the amendment is the outdated 138 year old state statute 941.23. "Only a peace officer may go armed with a concealed and dangerous weapon". In 2003, in it's opinions concerning the cases of Hamdan and of Cole, the Wisconsin supreme court by a narrow 4 to 3 margin upheld the constitutionality of 941.23 declaring that the statute is not an infringement of the right to keep and bear arms because it merely addressed the manner of carry. In my opinion that is a bit of judicial construction to validate the existence of 941.23. Two justices on the Court at that time share that opinion and implied so in their dissentions. They stated clearly that in their opinion statute 941.23 was indeed made unconstitutional by the will of the people when the people ratified Art I sec 25. Even in it's opinion that the concealed weapon prohibition statute is constitutional the Court did state that the conflict, implied by the concealed weapon statute and the constitutional amendment, will create great a serious dilemma for the judicial system. The Court stated that only the state legislature can resolve the conflict.
How the conflict would be resolved is at the will of the legislature. There are some number of options. Among them are a shall issue concealed carry statute with onerous rules and regulations. An optional permit to conceal carry permit as an adjunct to the Court recognized right to open carry. A right to carry similar to the one the state of Arizona just enacted. A right to carry similar to that in Vermont or Alaska. All of these options are befit with problems. They all present various degrees of infringement on the state of Wisconsin's no nonsense right to keep and bear arms amendment. As I stated earlier the amendment is manner of carry neutral. If the legislature had intended that the concealed carry prohibition statute was to remain in place there certainly would have been words to that effect contained in the amendment. Because there are no such words it can only be assumed that the intent of the legislature and the voting public is the amendment applies to all manners of carry.
I believe that if one wades through all the hyperbole, the solution is rather simple, rescind statute 941.23. It is definitely an infringement on our constitutional rights and is of little value in today's society. It only only penalizes those that are law abiding and wish to provide for their only personal protection. It has no impact on criminals. Criminals are criminals because they have no respect for the law. Law abiding means law abiding, as such, people are not going to abuse their rights. Contrary to what many anti gun people claim, the streets won't run red with blood. We won't revert to the days of the "wild west". Neither of these situations have manifested in the 48 states that have some provision for carry of firearms for personal protection. The percentage of abuse is almost non existent.
Rescinding statute 941.23 has a number of advantages. It doesn't require the draft of a new statute with endless hours of debate, and filled with unimaginable amount of confusing rules an regulations. It doesn't have any financial burden on the State or law enforcement. It doesn't present any additional tax burden on the people. Most important it brings the state firearm laws closer in concert to the intent of the legislature and voting citizens.
My plea to you is that you will become proactive in fulfilling the wishes of the people when they overwhelmingly voted to allow the people of Wisconsin to enjoy the activities of firearm recreation, hunting and most of all the right to personal protection.
It is also my hope that this coming November that the Assembly will be controlled by the Republican party and that the party will not forget that one of the planks in it's platform is choice of carry.
