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“I have looked at 25 years of data on permit fees, training requirements and other regulations, and factors such as income. My research examined how these factors affect the number of people with permits. Connecticut’s proposed fee of $370 is so far above existing state fees that there is no way of reliably estimating its impact. But I estimate that just an increase of $100, from $140 to $240, would . . .

reduce the number of permits by 60 percent. This would decrease total state and local revenue by $9.8 million, with local governments bearing virtually all the loss. This isn’t the only cost of increased fees. I believe that disarming law-abiding citizens means higher crime rates and more work for the police.” – John Lott in Guns Only For The Rich In Connecticut [via courant.com]

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44 COMMENTS

    • While I understand your sentiments, the day you happily pay an unconstitutional tax is the day that Constitution dies.

      Pay it if you must, like I do in Illinois. But pay it begrudgingly, and then work tirelessly to put an end to such tyranny.

    • By the time you add up the 16 hours of training, the live scan (fingerprinting), and the state fees you are over $340 in California

    • Precisely. Keep damning the poor while blaming it on the other side to guarantee re-election and continuation of the cycle.

      • Wouldn’t a involved electorate that forced politicians to run on there own platforms and ideas instead of paying service (sometimes lip service) to a country wide conglomerate of career politicians, that push agendas that run counter to the interests of the electorate, be nice? The federal government should only do things that the states can’t, the states should only do what the counties can’t, the counties should only do what the towns can’t. And the towns should only do what the individual can’t. Our marvelous experiment flipped the predominant theories of how governments work, let us not now give in to governmental theories that run counter to our freedoms.

  1. The stated excuse of raising funds is pretty much bullshit considering how many people will just say effit to yet another $400 tax in the great shit state of CT.

    Wasn’t more than 3 years ago the state flipped its shit over bottle redemption costs. See, they pushed for it in the name of saving the environment blah blah blah but when people actually recycled the legislatures heads popped because what they really wanted was for the consumers to pay the deposit and then never actually recycle so the state could keep the money.

    CT and everyone in it needs to die so everyone else can have a nice flat preserved forested state to hunt deer in. The state has been run like the Sopranos with severe brain damage for 70 years. Time to pull the plug.

    • Just take this as a great big middle finger right in your face motor mouth. There are some of us fighting the good fight here in Connecticut. This might really astound someone who is so simple as to assume that all the people in a given state are all left wing scumbags. But that simply isn’t true, any more than all the people in your state are fat ignorant blowhards bloviating from their armchairs and sucking down cheap beer as their wives are bonking the next door neighbor.

      • He probably doesn’t think that everyone in CT is actually a lowlife liberal. It’s worse than that.

        Shireman knows the numbers. He can read the voter turnout reports, in the primaries and general elections, in presidential and off-years. He knows that the Republican votee are there to take back the state.

        Look at how many GOP votes a given Republican presidential candidate loses CT with. Compare that to how many Democrat votes a given Dem gubernatorial candidate wins with in the off years. If Republican voters wouldn’t just vote in presidential general elections, but instead got off their collective butt and voted in state legislative and governor elections in the unglamourous off years, too, then they’d win. Soundly.

        This pattern plays out in other slave states, too, like Maryland. It even plays out nationwide. If tge people who voted for Trump over Hillary had shown up in 2008 and 2012, especially in the primaries, we’d be in a much better place today.

        So, no, the problem isn’t simply evil liberals, as evil, craven, and villainous as they surely are. The problem is lazy, complacent, indifferent Republicans who think “somebody else” will take care of saving America, because somebody else always has.

        • The problem is simpler than that. The number of people getting a government has gotten out of hand. They vote for the guy that promises to keep it coming.

        • Not even. If anything Malloy is living up to all of his promises by going after state employees and the unions as much as he can with layoffs to cut the budget, attempting to cut the budget and raise revenues in other ways (like the permit fee increase) and keeping true to his work against guns by signing anything anti gun that gets to him.

          I’m no fan of the guy but I’d take him over 90% of the legislature any day, they are the ones spending all the money, continuously increasing entitlements and handouts, and ignoring the unfunded liabilities while squeezing those of use in the middle.

  2. My best guess is telling the DemocRats it would reduce the number of permit holders makes their day.

    CT is a failed State, remember that when you see “Lips” Murphy or “Vietnam (era) vet” Blumenthal blathering on

    the national news about how to be just as f’up as CT is.

  3. On point. Idk about his numbers, but he admits he doesn’t either. He’s at least thinking in the Right direction..!

  4. “Concealed Carry Permit” = Your stupid neighbors that needed a job don’t trust you, but if you pay them $150 – $500 dollars to carry their card around and your edc weapon. But they still don’t trust you.

  5. Didn’t this type of tax start a revolution? We have Democrats taxing by fees for no reason that to push their party line for overall dominance. Should be something illegal about this. NRA and our local organizations should be suing or petitioning for these people’s removal from office. Hit them where it hurts. Call them stupid, biased and discriminatory in a court of law and in public opinion. Slam any support from their Democrat peers (or republican peers) as equally stupid, biased and discriminatory.

    • “Should be something illegal about this.”

      Why, yes. Yes it is. It is akin to a poll tax, and it’s blatantly unconstitutional to require a payment to the government in order to exercise an enumerated Constitutional right.

      But the good people of Connecticut have a long history of electing representatives, who then appoint judges, who willfully violate their oaths of office by enacting such legislation and wrongfully affirming their validity.

      Lawsuits only work when judges understand their jobs and the Constitution they are sworn to protect. Which is why the only hope for states like Connecticut is a SCOTUS that will slap them into compliance.

  6. time to purge these Anti- American, Anti -Constitutional’s out of our Government, outlaw the Democratic Party, Hard too do especially in a communist brainwashed welfare State like Minnesota where the refugees out number the Indigenous population.

  7. These fees also disproportionately effect the poor which is exactly what I think many lawmakers intend. Closing down legal options for self-defense while failing to promote safe neighborhoods are great for the prison industrial complex.

  8. Also CT is trying to pass a bill that “– If people carry firearms in public, Gov. Dannel P. Malloy says police ought to be able to demand to see their state gun permit.”

    That may sound “commonsense” but as it stands today there is a requirement that there be probable cause that some crime has been committed. It appears to be intended to give police power to stop at will regardless of the situation. It is not hard to imagine that the intention is to force police to harass any and all gun carriers.

    Imagine if they were talking about drivers licences. In CT it was estimated that 9% drive without drivers licences. Perhaps the legislature should focus on allowing police to stop anyone who is driving a car in public to verify they are driving legally, without probable cause, because they might not be driving legally.

    http://www.newstimes.com/news/article/Police-target-unlicensed-drivers-99740.php

    “One by one, the cars pulled up to the roadblock at Main and Patch streets in Danbury. Drivers rolled down their windows and came face to face with a police officer. “We weren’t targeting anybody. Everybody was asked the same questions,” Danbury Sgt. Michael Sturdevant said. Just like at most checkpoints, police were on the lookout for drunk drivers. But last weekend they also focused on another problem – people driving without valid licenses. And they found them by the dozens. Of the 75 people cited for violations over two nights, 47 were caught driving without licenses. “That’s just one checkpoint and one weekend.”

    https://www.rep-am.com/news/news-connecticut/2017/03/08/malloy-backs-show-permit-firearms-bill/
    http://www.courant.com/politics/hc-show-gun-permit-20170307-story.html

    • Malloy in CT wants to harass gun owners in general and is going after specific groups. For example, Dontrell Brown:

      “A Bridgeport officer who had been waiting in the line before Dontrell Brown noticed a bulge beneath Brown’s shirt and commented about the gun.
      Brown told FOX 61 what happened next: “Well, you have a gun. So then he said, ‘do you have a permit?’ And I’m like why? He said ‘because I (expletive) said so.'”

      This was for a concealed carrier. The messaging that Gov Malloy is using is that it is for open carry, however it seems to be staged to harass concealed carry also, and like the fee hike, seems directed at minority gun owners.

      http://fox61.com/2016/01/15/bridgeport-man-denies-a-police-request-to-produce-his-gun-permit/

      https://youtu.be/B1-A5V3Z6f4

  9. “I estimate that just an increase of $100, from $140 to $240, would reduce the number of permits by 60 percent. … I believe that disarming law-abiding citizens means higher crime rates and more work for the police. – John Lott

    That is a feature, not a bug!

  10. Just say no! Dont register a firearm ever and carry concealed. Practice civil disobedience and clog their friggn courts. Few states will take a case to court when you are otherwise a decent citizen with no record. Dont plea bargain.

    • Says the guy with nothing to lose.
      FYI the Los Angeles DA’s office prosecutes each and every gun possession charge, no exceptions. Buddy of mine was a temporary ADA and was given the case of prosecuting a security guard, who had a guard card and on-the-job gun permit, for the “crime” of having his duty gun belt in the footwell of his car (after shift) instead of the trunk. Yes, jury acquitted him. But by then he had lost his permit and job.

    • You’re full of it and shouldn’t be giving any advice to anyone. States will and DO prosecute. They’re often very willing to make a deal if you are an otherwise lawful citizen- the kind of deal where there’s almost no punishment, sometimes- but if you fight them they’ll nail you.

      It won’t clog the courts, either, because otherwise lawful citizens don’t usually get arrested for carrying a concealed weapon. The bit of advice is “don’t commit two crimes at once.” And if you don’t, the only way you get caught carrying is bad luck- medical emergency, etc. And so at any one time there aren’t enough people in the system to clog anything. You’ll get rolled over by the machine, that’s all. The only way to really do anything would be to practice civil disobedience on a larger scale, like having a bunch of people carrying openly where there is too many to arrest, etc.

  11. Seems like a lot of money to pay to exercise a Constitutional right.

    The democrats are against requiring an ID to vote because that imposes an unfair burden upon low income voters, which of course isn’t true at all, but they don’t have a problem with several hundred dollars cost for a carry permit. It sure seems their reasoning is either flawed, or there is a serious conflict of interest.

  12. That’s not even considering the cost of making felons out of potentially thousands of people who can’t or won’t renew their permits at this new fee. People who previously were law abiding people.

  13. I’d like to see how the dollars are justified. Maybe they claim it’s going to victims or more LE enforcement. Either way they eventually will raise the fee to 1000 dollars or more to discourage CCW.

  14. The thing about raising CC permit fees to even skyhigh-er rates is that there’s apparently no sunset provision being offered by Gov. Malloy as a means to temporarily balance his $1.7 billion budget-in-a-hole. So it gets raised to $300 for a five-year renewal…then what? The year after that the fee doubles again? This guy is the worse thing to hit an already
    gutted state that’s on a tax and spend life support management style. Malloy let GE’s corporate HQ slip away to an ever bigger taxaholic state…Massachusetts. That’s not a trick many can accomplish. And he provides tax bennies to one of the world’s largest hedge funds to remain in the state. What’s up with that one, guv? Did they promise you a big buck job after you’re through F-ing up Connecticut even more?

    And hey, let’s not forget the tax revenues Connecticut will lose from less guns and ammo being sold as fewer permits get issued because they’re too costly. But its a Democrat Dream: Curtail the 2nd Amendment, one way or another. But the criminals in New Haven, Hartford, Waterbury, Bridgeport and the other places that are a part of the Connecticut Dreamscape will still have their guns to hold up the Mon and Pop liquor stores who’s lobby helps keep Connecticut liquor prices high by state minimum pricing, keeping their monopoly going.

  15. The payment of a fee in order to exercise a right is heinous on its face and directly contradicts the 24th Amendment to the Constitution, the one which eliminated the poll tax and literacy tests as a condition to vote in federal elections:

    “Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any State by reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax.
    Section 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.”

    That was passed in 1964 and further expanded in 1966 when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6–3 in Harper v. Virginia Board of Elections that poll taxes for ANY level of elections were unconstitutional. For us to have to pay to exercise a right which is guaranteed by the Second Amendment and says “will not be infringed” is a logical and legal anomaly which needs to be addressed by gun rights organizations and Congress.

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