A week ago, the Kentucky Senate pulled a bill for permitless or Constitutional carry. Pols claimed they didn’t have the votes; the Republican leadership didn’t want to risk a loss. Senate bill (SB 7) has now been changed to conform to the House version of Constitutional carry, HB 316. Constitutional Carry is back in the running.
A Second Amendment activist offers insight into the situation [via gutshot at opencarry.org]:
Today, Senator Robin Webb introduced a complete and total substitute to SB 7. Senator Web is a democrat from Grayson. The amendment is word for word like HB 316. The only difference between the new SB 7 and the old one is that the new bill requires anyone carrying a concealed weapon to be 21 years old or older.
The other wording in the new bill just says the same things that the old bill said, but says it in fewer words. There is one other democrat co-sponsor of SB 7, Ray Jones of Pikeville. There may be some life in this bill yet.
Gutshot says that the learning curve in Kentucky has been steep.
Maybe,but most of the legislators that I have talked to think that Ky. is plowing new ground here. They had never heard of constitutional carry before they saw this years bill and then thought that it was the first one ever written.
The ignorance and misunderstandings around this bill are amazing.They don’t believe it when I tell them that other states have had this for years. There has been a terrific learning curve and we haven’t caught up with it yet.
The Constitutional carry bills keep the current permit system in place.
Kentucky is one of the states where a carry permit serves as an alternate to NICS checks for firearm sales from gun dealers. A permit is useful for carry in other states that have reciprocity with Kentucky.
The Kentucky Senate consists of 11 Democrats and 27 Republicans. The Kentucky House consists of 36 Democrats and 64 Republicans, a dramatic reversal from 2015, where the House had 53 Democrats and 46 Republicans. The Kentucky Governor is Republican Matt Bevin.
In odd numbered years, the Kentucky legislature is limited to 30 days in session, and the session must end by March 30th. If Kentucky is going to pass Constitutional carry this year, they will need to get busy. Yesterday’s strike and insert amendment to SB 7 shows that it can happen.
©2017 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.
Get it done.
About time, with all that Kentucky windage they were bound to be on target eventually.
Good shot, Dan’l!
We are trying.
Best of luck!
Unfortunately, I am really pessimistic about this stuff. I’ll believe it when I see it.
“Pols claimed they didn’t have the votes; the Republican leadership didn’t want to risk a loss.”
In other words, the Republican leadership didn’t want to force its members to actually vote for an issue and let their constituents know where they stand so they quietly killed it.
Gotcha.
^ This!
Typically, they will meet for 29 days scattered over 2 months, send everything to the governor and then come back on March 30th and use the final day to deal with any vetoes.
Get ‘er done.
This needs to pass. It is ridiculous that we have to pay a fee to exercise what is already a right guaranteed by the 2nd amendment. No one is asking us to pay a fee to exercise our right to free speech.