Throwing the door wide open: the pistol permit police-radio database is back
South Dakota Gun Owners E-mail
Alert
PO Box 3845, Rapid City, SD 57709
(605) 737-5583
LibertyTeeth@sdgo.org
http://www.SDGO.org
(February 2, 2005) – The anti-gun crowd has always wanted a police operated central registry for concealed pistol permit holders.
Now, a new bill has been introduced to allow just such a database. Under the guise of protecting gun owners, HB 1209 repeals the current state law prohibiting a pistol permit police-radio database and specifically grants law-enforcement the authority to establish one.
Currently, each permit holder’s information is kept in the Secretary of State’s office and is only accessible to those with a bona fide need, and only during business hours. While the law requiring the permit is in itself a denial of the right to self-defense, up till now the permit system has not been abused.
But if HB 1209 is passed, the door to abuse will be wide open. The bill expressly allows a pistol permit police-radio database. Once such a database has been established, it will almost certainly be presented to our law-enforcement officers as a means of protection from folks who have a permit.
This is exactly how the database was presented in 2001, when the anti-gunners first introduced a bill to create a new central registry. They claimed that officers need to know if a person has a permit, so that with “a heightened awareness” of the potential threat, they can take action to protect themselves. Sen. J.P. Duniphan, sponsor of the original database bill, put it this way, “I think any tool we can make to make our law enforcement officers safer, and yes, I hope they have a heightened awareness if they know a gun is in the car, because, potentially, their life may depend on it."
In other words, if you have a permit to carry a gun for self-defense, you are somehow more likely to be dangerous than someone who doesn’t have a permit. Thus the database would be, at best, misleading. It would suggest to the officer that if you have a pistol permit, you are a threat. If you carry a gun, you are a potential criminal.
Once a pistol permit police-radio database has been set up, it would be impossible to keep it from being used to blacklist law-abiding citizens as armed and dangerous suspects, just waiting to commit a crime.
Bottom line, this database tells our officers that permit holders, as a class, constitute a special threat and need to be treated differently than the general population.
In reality, however, concealed pistol permit holders are among the most law-abiding people in the state. Currently, there are approximately 43,000 permits. Of these, less than one half of one tenth of one percent have been revoked for any reason. Law-enforcement has nothing to fear from model citizens like these.
Gun owners across the state overwhelmingly defeated the original database bill in 2001. In 2002, South Dakota Gun Owners lead the charge to pass the current law prohibiting the database when the anti-gunners moved ahead to establish their central registry. Now, HB 1209 has been introduced to remove that prohibition. This is not good for gun owners, and it is not good for law-enforcement.
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Pro-gun bills introduced
Two bills dealing with purchasing and carrying handguns have also been introduced in the last week. HB 1189 would clarify who must enforce the unconstitutional law requiring a waiting period for buying a handgun. Currently, the law prohibits all “sellers” from delivering a handgun to most buyers before the two-day waiting period is up. HB 1189 would change “seller” to “federal firearms licensee,” thus clarifying that private sales are exempt.
HB 1190 brings a more substantial change. This bill would recognize the concealed pistol permit of any state in which “the terms of issuance comply with any appropriate South Dakota statute or promulgated rule.” Art. IV sec. 1 of the US Constitution requires each state to give full faith and credit to the laws of every other state. South Dakota’s current system of concealed carry reciprocity does not comply with this Constitutional mandate because it only allows this state to recognize the permits of states that will recognize ours. HB 1190 opens the door for limited recognition. While it is not full recognition in the sense that it does not recognize the carry laws of state like Vermont and Alaska, it is an excellent step in that direction.