Posted on 03/13/2012 2:38:54 PM PDT by marktwain
Second Amendment advocates on the federal and state stages can take a cue from Students for Concealed Carry on Campus, a national organization fighting for a fundamental civil right on university and college campuses.
Students for Concealed Carry on Campus won a huge victory on March 4, when the Colorado Supreme Court affirmed a lower-court ruling that a policy on four Colorado state university campuses that banned handguns for everyone but law-enforcement officers was unlawful.
The ruling follows an Oregon Court of Appeals decision in late September that overturned a longstanding rule of the state university system, which, like Colorado, can no longer ban concealed carry for permit-holders.
The Colorado decision "sends a message to other public colleges and universities in this country that Students for Concealed Carry will persist in the fight to restore reasonable firearm policies, which afford licensed adults the same personal protection on campus they already enjoy in off-campus," said David Burnett, communications director for Students for Concealed Carry on Campus, which filed the lawsuit.
According to the Students for Concealed Carry on Campus, 220 campuses in six states already allow campus carry.
“We expect other colleges to see the handwriting on the wall and comply with the court’s ruling,” Burnett said. “If they refuse to adopt more reasonable policies, we may explore litigation against them as well.”
Right now, Nevada and Utah are the only states that allow unfettered concealed carry at all public colleges and universities. Proposed bills prohibiting campus czars and their elitist cronies from banning the Second Amendment have, once again, been introduced in Arizona, Florida, Louisiana, Texas, Ohio, South Dakota, Virginia, Indiana, Washington, Nevada, and Oklahoma during this year's legislative session.
Similar proposals in these states were gunned down last year, except in Nevada.
In Oklahoma, a bill allowing students with valid permits to store their weapons in their cars parked on the state's vocational college system's 54 CareerTech campuses was approved.
There are 21 states that expressly prohibit concealed carry on college campuses by persons with a valid concealed handgun license/permit: Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, and Wyoming.
Texas law includes a clause, which allows an individual college/university to 'opt out' of the law and allow concealed carry.
There are 15 Right-to-Carry states that leave the decision entirely to each college/university: Alaska, Colorado, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Virginia, Washington, and West Virginia.
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