“Ohio's Mike DeWine became the latest GOP governor to dramatically roll back his state’s gun laws Monday when he signed a bill allowing all Ohioans 21 and older, who can legally purchase a gun, to carry a concealed firearm without a permit, training or background check.
“It was a gift to pro-gun groups, and may help shore up his support on the right with only weeks to go until he faces a gubernatorial primary challenge from a pair of Republican challengers who have aligned themselves with Donald Trump. It also underscores the emptiness of the right's 'law and order' rhetoric — and just how far Republican-led states are from accepting any gun control measures.”
(Eric Lutz. “Ohio's Republican Governor Just Made It Even Easier to Carry a Concealed Gun.” Vanity Fair. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2022/03/ohio-governor-makes-it-even-easier-to-carry-concealed-gun. March 15, 2022.)
Ohio Capital Journal’s Jake Zuckerman reported that studies have linked such laws to an increase in gun murders and violent crime. An American Journal of Public Health study, for instance, concluded that similarly relaxed gun regulations were “associated with significantly higher rates of total, firearm-related, and handgun-related homicide.”
(Michael Siegel, Ziming Xuan, Craig S. Ross, Sandro Galea, Bindu Kalesan, Eric Fleegler, and Kristin A. Goss. “Easiness of Legal Access to Concealed Firearm Permits and Homicide Rates in the United States.” American Journal of Public Health 107, 1923_1929. 2017.)
Under “shall issue” laws, the study found, the homicide rate was up 6.5%; firearm homicide rates were up 8.6%; and handgun homicide rates went up 10.6%. Gun deaths in Ohio have already increased recently, with deaths from firearms in 2021 higher in the state than almost any other on record. Under the upcoming rollback, advocates warn the trends could get worse.
States such as Alaska and Arizona have experienced an increase in the rate of aggravated assaults with a gun since the enactment of permitless carry legislation. This has resulted in hundreds more gun-related aggravated assaults in these states in 2017-2018 (the latest years for which data is available) compared to years prior to enactment.
(Christen L. Spears, “Crime in Alaska 2018,” Uniform Crime Reporting Program. Alaska Department of Public Safety, September 2019.)
(“Crime in Arizona 2018.” Arizona Department of Public Safety, Access Integrity Unit. https://bit.ly/2ZsFlce. Rates were calculated using population data from the United States Census Bureau.)
What Is Gained?
“Removing these responsible and reasonable precautions compromises the safety and security of our communities and law enforcement,” Democratic State Representative Allison Russo, the Ohio House minority leader, said in a statement after DeWine approved Senate Bill 215. “Republicans have made it crystal clear that they value the approval of the gun lobby more than the lives of Ohioans and the police officers who protect our communities every day.”
(Eric Lutz. “Ohio's Republican Governor Just Made It Even Easier to Carry a Concealed Gun.” Vanity Fair. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2022/03/ohio-governor-makes-it-even-easier-to-carry-concealed-gun. March 15, 2022.)
DeWine signed the measure, approved by the state’s Republican-controlled legislature last month. It will allow residents over the age of 21 to carry a weapon without undergoing training or a background check. (The previous law required anyone who wanted to carry a concealed weapon to pay a fee of at least $67, to take eight hours of training that covers safety features and public safety, and to undergo a background check by law enforcement.)
Also under the new law, when stopped by police, a person will no longer have to "promptly inform" the officer that they're carrying a concealed handgun, though they will have to disclose that they have a concealed handgun when an officer asks them.
In addition, the law lowers the penalty for not telling a police officer about a concealed handgun from a first-degree misdemeanor to a second-degree misdemeanor and does not allow a police officer to arrest a person solely because they didn't promptly show their concealed carry license.
People who had violated the prior notification requirements may also apply to have their record expunged.
Once in effect, the new law will still allow Ohioans to apply for concealed carry permits, but undergoing training and background check to legally carry a concealed handgun will be optional.
"Nowhere in the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution does it say you have to have training to defend yourself or to bear arms," Republican state Sen. Terry Johnson, who sponsored Senate Bill 215, said last fall.
(Veronica Stracqualursi. “Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine signs permitless concealed carry bill into law.” CNN. March 15, 2022.)
“Participants with lower levels of firearm training and experience performed worse than those with higher levels of training; many accidentally “shot” innocent bystanders or unarmed people.”
(J.J. Vince, T. Wolfe, & L. Field, L. “Does the Quality and Frequency of Training Determine the Realistic Use of Firearms by Citizens for Self-Defense? Firearms Training and Self-Defense, 1-57. 2015.)
Opposition Not Just Democrats
As Joe Biden calls for bipartisanship on gun control, Republican states are doing the exact opposite. From Texas to Ohio, police groups have expressed disappointment in the measures, arguing that such laws threaten the safety of everyday citizens and cops alike.
“Legislators don’t want to hear the concerns of the men and women who keep your family safe,” Fraternal Order of Police of Ohio President Gary Wolske wrote in a December op-ed, urging lawmakers and DeWine to reject SB215. “They aren’t interested in the balance between public safety and individual freedom.”
The Ohio Association of Chiefs of Police, opposed the bill too, particularly its modification of the "duty to notify," arguing that it threatens officers' safety. But, Republican state lawmakers and DeWine didn’t listen. The Republican-led Ohio state legislature passed the legislation earlier this month on near party-line votes.
In an interview last week, a top law enforcement officer in Cincinnati, Hamilton County Sheriff Charmaine McGuffey, said the new law would contribute to the wave of violence.
“To vote for people to be able to concealed carry without a license, without any training, without any documentation, it makes it exponentially harder for law enforcement to prevent gun crimes,” McGuffey said. “It is going to promote lawlessness. I think that there will be people who carry weapons concealed for the purpose of being vigilantes.”
(Reid Wilson. “Ohio governor signs permitless concealed carry bill.” The Hill. March 15, 2022.)
McGuffey continued …
"To allow people to carry concealed with no background check, no documentation of who they are and no training is dangerous. I am not against the Second Amendment – the right to bear arms. What I'm asking people to do is consider that there must be some failsafe placed into the system."
The training is especially key, McGuffey said.
"I have 900 officers," she said. "Our deputies are well-vetted for their backgrounds, their personalities, their integrity, their ability to follow rules and follow the law, and I would not hand one of them a gun with no training."
Background checks are another important piece, McGuffey said. In 2021, Ohio issued 202,920 new or renewal concealed carry permits, denied 2,668 applicants who failed to meet state requirements and revoked another 420 licenses "for causes including felony convictions and mental incompetence," according to a state attorney general's report. McGuffey said she signed 93 revocations last year for people who were convicted of menacing, domestic violence, assault and other violent actions.
"Police weighing in against permitless carry matters," Shannon Watts, founder of Everytown subsidiary Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense, told ABC News. "But I guess the question is at end of the day, those Republicans who are worried about being primaried, are they going to put public safety over their hopes for the primary election?"
(Meredith Deliso. “Permitless gun carry laws draw opposition from law enforcement.” ABC News. March 11, 2022.)
Other gun safety advocates, including Moms Demand Action, and Dion Green, a survivor of the 2019 shooting in Dayton that killed his father Derrick R. Fudge and eight other victims, testified in opposition to the bill.
(Veronica Stracqualursi. “Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine signs permitless concealed carry bill into law.” CNN. March 15, 2022.)
Conclusion
The significant risks associated with rolling back Ohio's gun laws should be enough to prevent legislation like this from being enacted. Anyone can see the politics behind this dangerous new law.
"This particular bill goes a large distance in getting the Second Amendment restored," Sen. Terry Johnson, R-Scioto, said.
Johnson is clearly putting up a smokescreen to hide GOP voting interests. This has nothing to do with the Second Amendment.
Here is the text of the Second Amendment:
“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
The Second Amendment holds the distinction of being the only amendment to the Bill of Rights that essentially goes unenforced. The U.S. Supreme Court has never struck down any piece of legislation on Second Amendment grounds, in part because justices have disagreed on whether the amendment is intended to protect the right to bear arms as an individual right, or as a component of the "well-regulated militia."
How does the new legislation – undeniably rolling back gun laws that protect public safety – “well regulate a militia”? If anything, Johnson's legislation “dreadfully” regulates gun ownership … even if you stretch the constitutional definition of all gun owners – good and bad characters with firearms – to be part of “a militia.”
The truth is these reckless changes put Ohio citizens, including law enforcement officials, in the line of fire and make them less safe. Research and professional experience both point to this conclusion. The new law causes a lack of regulation – it is simply a matter of convenience for those who choose to carry, a wider and less manageable open-door for hands on triggers.
“The biggest problem that I have with (permitless carry) is that there is no trainer. So someone that has never picked up a firearm can go purchase one and begin to carry with absolutely no experience of safety or shooting that firearm. Which makes them more of the problem on the streets than making the streets safer.”
– A law enforcement officer in West Virginia, after the passage of a permitless carry law in 2016, Charleston Gazette-Mail
The Columbus Dispatch reports Ohio legalized concealed carry in 2004, requiring adults to pass a background check, attend an approved safety class, and fire their weapon at a range.
The state doesn't consider the total number of active license holders a matter of public record, but a Cincinnati Enquirer analysis from 2019 estimated that about 673,000 or one in 17 Ohioans has a CCW.
And it's a number that's been growing as the required training hours have dropped. "The number of licenses renewed was 50% higher than the 2020 total and a record high for the program," according to the attorney general's 2021 report.
Statistics show that 88% of Americans think you should get a permit before carrying a concealed gun in public.
(K. Ingham. “New Survey Finds Strong Opposition to Concealed Carry without a Permit.” Strategies 360. 2015.)
Over 80% of gun owners, non-gun owners, Republicans, Democrats, and Independents agree that high safety standards are critical in issuing concealed carry permits.
(Daniel W. Webster et al., “Concealed Carry of Firearms: Fact vs. Fiction.” Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Center for Gun Policy and Research. 2017.)
Yes, in the name of politics, the GOP legislators in Ohio decided to eliminate essential controls. Where is the justice? The representation of the people?
To me, here is the bottom line. In 2021, 1,762 Ohioans died from gun violence, a near-record-setting year, according to preliminary data from the Ohio Department of Health and the Ohio Capital Journal. From 2019 to 2020, the gun-related homicide rate rose 46 percent, the Giffords Law Center said. In August 2021, Ohio implemented its version of a "Stand Your Ground" law.
The numbers show a 62% increase from 2007, the earliest data available, when 1,085 Ohioans died at the barrel of a gun. In comparison, gun deaths rose nationally by about 27% during the same period according to data from the CDC.
The Republican-dominated Ohio legislature has steadily relaxed state gun laws during the period in question. Lawmakers have expanded the right to shoot to kill in perceived self-defense, limited cities’ ability to adopt gun control laws stricter than the state level via “preemption” laws, and decreased training requirements to carry a concealed weapon.
More than 91% of the nine in ten of the 205 people killed in Columbus last year (2021) were gunshot victims, prompting Mayor Andrew J. Ginther and other city leaders last month to declare gun violence a public health crisis.
Going forward, Ginther said, Columbus Health Commissioner Dr. Myshieka Roberts will for the first time in the city's history coordinate with other city departments to address the problem of gun violence from a public health perspective.
(Monroe Trombly. “Ohio is seeing more homicides and suicides, and guns are more often involved, report says.” The Columbus Dispatch. March 15, 2022.)
Perhaps Ohio GOP legislators should walk out of the Statehouse and onto the streets of the capital city to get a better perspective on the seriousness of the issue. You can bet none of them live side-by-side those who carry firearms for the wrong reasons. Guns for votes? You decide.
I'll close by telling you that the three Republican commissioners of my county in rural Southern Ohio – Scioto, declared perennially as the “unhealthiest” of Ohio 88 counties –
took it upon themselves to adopt a resolution in 2020 “declaring the opposition of Scioto County to any restrictions on the Second Amendment.”
The resolution itself declared the opposition of Scioto County to any restrictions on the Second Amendment and stated the Board of Commissioners in Scioto County wish to resolve to protect the right to bear arms in Scioto County, Ohio “even if state and federal laws are passed restricting ownership or possession.”
With that, Scioto County, in the throes of an opioid epidemic and public health crisis became 2A or officially a “Second Amendment Sanctuary County.”
(Ivy Potter. “Scioto County becomes 2A sanctuary county.” Portsmouth Daily Times. January 16, 2020.)
So, it's damn the research, damn the police, and damn the firearm deaths. In our great wisdom, we make it easier for everyone to pack firearms. Jesus, I guess my county officials drafted me – with no input – into a militia I had no intention of serving. I can't even understand why a Constitutional Amendment needs a “sanctuary” in my poor and depressed county. It seems to me that designation should be one of the last things we need.
Postscript:
Damn the logic, too. For those who reason with it, here is an exercise to examine the NRA Argument: “The only thing that will stop a bad guy with a gun, is a good guy with a gun”
Modus
Tollens
P>Q ~] Q
~] P
If
P, Then Q
Not Q
Therefore: Not P
Application:
IF The only thing that will stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. Then lives will be saved.
Good guy; Deputy Scot Peterson, was at the school and armed and no lives were saved.
Therefore, the only thing stopping a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun, is false
Exactly one of the premises must be negative to construct a valid syllogism with a negative conclusion.
P1: The only thing that
will stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun
(affirmative premise)
P2: Deputy Scott Petersen is a good guy
with a gun at Stoneman Douglas HS. (affirmative premise)
C:
Therefore, a good guy with a gun saved lives at Stoneman Douglas
High School (false conclusion)
The NRA argument is invalid.
Negative conclusion from affirmative premises is a syllogistic fallacy committed when a categorical syllogism has a negative conclusion yet both premises are affirmative.
A negative premise requires a negative conclusion, and a negative conclusion requires a negative premise. (Alternate rendering: Any syllogism having exactly one negative statement is invalid.)
The logic of the NRA argument is invalid. Here the conclusion is false. True premises can lead to either a true or a false conclusion in an invalid argument. This conclusively proves that this argument is invalid since the premises are the defining condition and the Major Premise 1. Is falsified by the minor Premise 2. The conclusion is False.
Modus Tollens – Conditional If/then (Latin for “Mode that denies”)
IF (P)The only thing
that will stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. Then
(Q) lives will be saved
(Not Q) Good guy; Deputy Scot Peterson,
was at the school and armed and no lives were saved.
Therefore,
(Not P) the only thing stopping a bad guy with a gun is a good guy
with a gun, is false
(Adagio4639. Larry Allen Brown's Weblog. https://adagio4639.wordpress.com/2018/06/17/nra-argument-the-only-thing-that-will-stop-a-bad-guy-with-a-gun-is-a-good-guy-with-a-gun/. June 17, 2018.)
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