On the recordNovember 16, 2011
I thank the gentleman for yielding. I love the Second Amendment. I got my first gun from Santa Claus when I was 6 years old. The first handgun I ever fired wasn't my dad's or my uncle's or my grandfather's--it was my mother's. I got my first concealed-carry application filled out as a freshman in law school. I lived in a bad neighborhood and needed it for self protection. I've had it for the last 20 years. I love the Second Amendment. But if the Second Amendment protects my rights to carry my concealed weapon from State to State to State, I don't need another Federal law that says, yeah, I really mean it. It's already protected. If the Second Amendment doesn't protect my right to carry a concealed weapon from State to State to State, then the Ninth and 10th Amendments leave that responsibility to individuals and the States to regulate on their own. I came to Congress to protect freedom. I don't believe the Second Amendment was put in the Bill of Rights to allow me to shoot targets. I don't believe the Second Amendment was put in the Bill of Rights to allow me to hunt for deer and turkey. I think the Second Amendment was put in the Bill of Rights so that I could defend my freedom against an overbearing Federal Government. I don't want the Federal Government in any issue of the law where the Constitution does not require it. And it does not require it here. Don't tell me it's an Interstate Commerce Clause issue; we dismiss that on my side of the aisle regularly.…
