February 25, 2020, was a revealing day in the Legislature for some of the bills that Tennessee Firearms Association is monitoring. Some good news, some just worthy of closer observation. First, HB2660 (Rep. Chris Todd) is a bill that is designed to strengthen Tennessee’s civil immunity laws relative to self-defense events which is needed since…
Author Archives: JohnHarris
Action notice – bills are moving! Legislative Report and Calendar for February 21, 2020
It seems with approximately 60 bills related to the issues that Tennessee Firearms Association tracks having activity since the first of the year, that it is going to be a busy and fast session. We are seeing bills now that are starting to move through the committees and we are starting to see suggestions of…
Legislative Bill Report and Calendar for February 17, 2020
The TFA’s Legislative Bill Report and Calendar for the week of February 17, 2020 are linked below. It appears that our primary bills of interest are not on notice or moving at this time. However, it is also prudent to understand that some bills which do not appear significant might suddenly be amended at the…
Legislative bill report as of February 7, 2020
The TFA has been reviewing some of the 1500 or so bills that have been filed for the 2020 legislative session. It appears about 60 new bills have been filed since last year’s legislative efforts ended. At the bottom of this page are the bill reports as of February 7, 2020 and the calendar report…
How does Tennessee compare to the “serious attack” on the 2nd Amendment in Virginia?
The news media is on fire for the last few weeks about the events that have been taking place in Virginia and that are scheduled for today. Even President Trump recently tweeted that “your 2nd Amendment is under very serious attack” in Virginia. While there is a great deal of main stream media focus on…
Reciprocity Update – Tennessee’s TWO permits are not treated equally
Tennessee has had a civilian handgun permit since May 1994. Tennessee’s original civilian handgun permit was renamed in 2019 as the “enhanced” permit. Nothing was enhanced or improved, it was just a new name. At present, thirty-six (36) states honor the Tennessee “enhanced” permit. For the last several years, TFA has pushed legislation that would…
Tennessee’s alternative “concealed only” permit and why you should not pick it
Tennessee legislators created a second type of civilian handgun permit in 2019 that went into effect on January 1, 2020. It is a “concealed only” permit. Tennessee Firearms Association opposed the legislation and strongly recommends against citizens considering this concealed only option. Here is why. Tennessee first passed a handgun permit law in May of…
Tennessee Public Officials call for more infringements on a right which “shall not be infringed”
As citizens of this state and nation, the United States Supreme Court has declared that we all enjoy as a fundamental human right, a right which pre-exists the formation of any state or even the United States, the right to keep and bear arms. The Second Amendment in the Bill of Rights does not create…
Tennessee Attorney General Opinion released on “antique firearms”
The Tennessee Attorney General issued an opinion (AG 19-19) on October 9, 2019, in which the AG concluded that “…the prohibitions in Tenn. Code Ann. § 39-17-1307 on the possession of firearms by individuals convicted of felonies and certain misdemeanors still apply to the possession of antique firearms…” no longer apply after the passage of…
September 11 – a call to protect liberty over perceived safety
The Tennessee Firearms Association came into existence just a few years prior to the terrorists attacks of September 11, 2001. Since then, we have seen massive changes in our government and many of those have needlessly come at the expense of our personal freedoms and liberties. We have seen material erosions of our freedoms in…