By Dick Pettys For the Morris News Service
ATLANTA – A pair of bills about gun rights are likely to lead to a shootout of sorts during the session of the General Assembly that starts in two weeks because they have competing aims.
The first bill is a holdover from last year and has the backing of the National Rifle Association. It would prohibit employers from taking steps to bar their workers from having guns in cars parked at the workplace. The NRA bill was introduced last year and was blocked by a strong coalition of business groups arguing that it would violate private-property rights. The measure is alive this year, however, and remains the NRA's top priority.
A rival proposal by Rep. Tim Bearden, R-Villa Rica, and a group called GeorgiaCarry.org, does a number of other things. Among them: New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg would face criminal penalties for sending undercover agents to Georgia to try to get gun shops to sell to "straw purchasers" with plans for reselling in other states, the government couldn't seize weapons as Louisiana authorities sought to do after Hurricane Katrina, and Georgia's carry laws would be substantially overhauled.
One link between the two bills is procedural. Last year, Bearden passed a much less complicated bill through the House intended to give people more latitude in carrying guns in their autos. In the Senate, it became a vehicle for the NRA to bring its parking-lot bill back to life after the original proposal ran afoul of a Senate deadline. The omnibus bill - now House Bill 89 - did not reach a vote on the Senate floor.
But there's more. Some of the GeorgiaCarry folks think the NRA is out of step with what Georgia sportsmen and shooters want, and is putting forward its plan as a counter-measure. (It does, however, contain some things the NRA wants and has supported in other states, and some of the backers don't view the upcoming fight so much as a confrontation with the NRA as a simple disagreement among advocates of gun rights.)
Now for the meat in the coconut. Bearden's bill - prefiled last week as HB 915 - contains this language: "Nothing in this Code section shall be construed to limit, restrict, or prohibit in any manner the existing rights of a private property owner, unless such private property has been leased to a government entity, and nothing in this Code section shall be construed to limit, restrict, or prohibit in any manner the existing rights of a private tenant, private employer, or private business entity."
That, according to those who have looked at the law carefully, makes the NRA's guns-in-the-parking-lot effort moot, and, at the proper time, you can bet the national gun group will weigh-in with both barrels. It's already warned lawmakers that the issue will be the only thing it judges on its legislative scorecard – and this is an election year.
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