Analysis of Texas Bill 11 and 17 - Essay Example

Analysis of Texas bill 11 and 17 Introduction The Texas open carry laws are not absolute because every legal law for an individual must balance with the rights of every stakeholder, both for the community and the individuals. Concerning the open carry laws, guns have a lot of power, they have the power to injure, destroy and even take out life ( Stimson 67). While the process of checking the backgrounds of the people before giving them the license to carry guns may not be foolproof, it is reasonable for the government to take this precautionary act (Bernard 660). Texas residents may have been used to hearing about licensed concealed carry of handguns but whether the residents oppose or support the bills, the next step that will be done by the legislators will be the passing of open carry bills in the Texas legislature house. There has been the previous support of the anticipated step by the Senate to pass the bills proposed concerning open carry. Though, sometimes back, the Texas Senate passed the senate bill 17 (Doeden24). The bill is titled “Authority of a person who is licensed to carry a handgun to carry a holstered gun openly." The bill together with Bill 11 would do away with the concealed requirements in every region in Texas, and extend the options of licensed open carry to similar places and circumstances. Legislators are said to develop a positive attitude towards voting the bills into laws. It has been argued that majority of the workers who carry guns in their places of work are more likely to be killed in time of shoot outs than those without their guns (Tanne 1043). Going by statistics, the Texas current house membership consists of 98 Republicans, 51 Democrats and a single vacant seat. Most of the senators have been said to support Bill 17, and it has been noted that the National Rifle Association tend to favor such legislations on the basis that open carry would continue to include licensing of gun owners, training offered accompanied by background checks (Lavergne 54). The legislators have asserted that, the enforcement of the law will continue to check for a person to carry license while keeping the reasonable safeguards for safety. In some other states where open carry is allowed like Massachusetts, every person willing to apply for a license must get permission from their local police chiefs who have proper knowledge of applicants and the same should be done in Texas (Smith 30). Most likely, the new open carry law may have minimal effect on Texas. Most of the residents will opt to do their businesses without carrying the guns with them all day (Kraemer, Newell and Prindle 76) The major challenge is that, most of those who will have the guns are the ones who live in phobia and paranoia and need the guns for the dose of courage that the gun gives offers. If the bill is passed, will also require the citizens of Texas to obtain a license in order to carry the handguns (Crooker 111). About 850,000 concealed handgun license holders are under classroom and gun range training. Those who hold both the licenses have to carry their guns using their shoulders and belt holster and they are given the choice to conceal or leave them open (Smith 41). Even though, business owners also have the capability of banning weapons from entering their premises and carrying guns openly cannot be allowed in college and campuses. A Democrat by the name John Whitmire argued that voting for the open carry bill would be an unnecessary step that will introduce the presence of guns in some of the largest cities and towns of the world (Englund Dimitrova et al. 38). Those who are opposed to the open carry bills have argued that, the open carry on the street majors on intimidation rather than gun rights and self-defense. There are speculations that the bill will allow for open carry without a license and it has raised lots of concern in the Senate house though it had to be retained (Durant 162). Moral reasoning The passing of the open carry bills will lead to an increase in the rate at which gun trafficking is done within the state. Reports have suggested that, laws that deny law enforcement of discretion that relate to the issuance of concealed carry permits act as the main sources of recovering crime guns at a faster rate compared to those states that grant law enforcement such discretion. The common belief that having every person authorized to carry their gun will reduce the rate of crime Texas by providing the people to be attacked with security will always not be true but it instead threatens public safety (Levy, Karst and Winkler 183). Again, there has been no evidence to show that permissive CCW laws tend to reduce crime, but they may actually increase the rate of crime in the streets with the conclusion that more guns will create more opportunities for injury and death (Durant 162). A study that was carried previously has shown that, the Texas handgun license holders were arrested for around 5,300 crimes that included those of rape, murder, theft and kidnapping (Doeden 67). The investigations that followed showed that some of the license holders have been arrested for committing more than two crimes a day and others were arrested for drunken driving offenses in a weeks’ time. The period between 1996 and 2000, the rate of arrests that were made to those who own license was at 81% higher than that of the state’s general population age of 21 and above years old. Therefore making it not relevant to pass these bills (Doeden 65). Based on the Violence Policy Center analysis reports, license holders have been reported to kill at least 14 law enforcement officials and around 622 private citizens from May 2007. The incidences that have been looked into include the mass killing of 27 and 39 murder-suicides. All the claims that guns have been used defensively in many times have also been broadly discredited (Stimson 76). It has been found that, carrying a firearm increases the risk of injury to the person carrying the gun during a crime. In 2010, most of the Americans have opposed the laws that allow people to carry concealed and loaded handguns in public places ( Durant 162 ). To add on this, there is an almost a near-universal agreement that a number of public places should be free from people with guns (Stimson 89). According to some polls carried, a ratio of nine out of ten people in America tend to oppose the laws that allow people to carry guns on college campuses, restaurants, stadiums, bars, government buildings and campuses (Wintemute 35). Conclusion The passing of Bill 17 has been met with lots of resistance from the Texas chapter of Moms Demand Action for gun sense in Texas. The chair of the commission went a step ahead to call for those who own guns and licenses to vote against the passing of the bills. The only solution to these bills lies with the members of the Senate who can jointly oppose the bills and represent the people of Texas as they were sworn in to do. One of the reasons why the legislatures should vote against the bills is because there is no particular evidence that exists about any bill stopping violent actions from the public. The other option is that of engaging the organizations that have dedicated their time to fighting for the safety of the public by protecting them from dangerous gun laws. The other solution is to carry out campaigns for new and stronger solutions to lax the existing laws and the loopholes that put the safety of the citizens in risk. Establishing a chapter in all the estates that will work with the mayors against illegal gun might form part of the gun safety and prevent the citizens from the violence that may arise from the passing of the two bills. Works Cited 1. Harcourt, Bernard E. On Gun Registration, The NRA, Adolf Hitler, And Nazi Gun Laws: Exploding The Gun Culture Wars. SSRN Journal n. pag. Web. Retrieved from, http://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4029&context=flr 2. Hupp, Suzanna Gratia. From Lubys To The Legislature. San Antonio, Tex.: Privateer Publications, 2010. Print. Retrieved from, http://www.buckeyefirearms.org/book-review-luby’s-legislature-one-woman’s-fight-against-gun-control 3. Kahan, D. M. Harry L. Wilson. Guns, Gun Control and Elections: The Politics and Policy of Firearms.’ Public Opinion Quarterly 71.2 (2007): 318-322. Web. Retrieved from, http://poq.oxfordjournals.org/content/71/2/318.extract 4. Lott, John R. More Guns, Less Crime. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2010. Print. Retrieved from, http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/M/bo6686900.html 5. Tanne, J. H. US Workers Who Carry Guns Are More Likely To Be Killed On The Job. BMJ 330.7499 (2005): 1043-1043. Web. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC557217/ 6. Txchia.org,. TCHA: CHL History. N.p., 2015. Web. 11 Mar. 2015. Retrieved from http://www.txchia.org/history.htm 7. Wintemute, G. J. Gun Shows Across a Multistate American Gun Market: Observational Evidence of The Effects of Regulatory Policies. Injury Prevention 13.3 (2007): 150-155. Web. 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