Tennessee presently does not REAL Constitutional Carry – which means that it is not a crime to carry a firearm with the intent to be ready to defend yourself or your family. In Tennessee, carrying a firearm with intent to go armed is a crime. Tennessee’s Legislators put the burden AND expense on you to prove that you fit into one of several statutory affirmative defenses.
There is a big difference in lawfully exercising a constitutionally protected rights and … being stopped or arrested for doing so and having to prove that you were complying with a defense (like having a permit)!
For even more talking points see TFA’s Constitutional Carry Talking Points.
Red Flag laws are also sometimes referred to as Extreme Risk Protection Orders. They are designed to take firearms away from individuals if a report is made by or to government officials (think perhaps weaponized claims in divorces) that a specific person possess a risk to himself/herself if allowed to possess or purchase a firearm. Such laws have been opposed generally by conservative Republicans while they are favored by gun control advocates, many Democrats and apparently a lot of people who “identify” as Republicans.
One of the problems with a “Red Flag” law is that the entire focus is on seizing guns. The focus is not on seizing the individual, assessing the individual’s mental health, charging the individual with perhaps an assault, or ensuring that the individual has no access to anything that could be used to commit suicide or hurt others – such as the proverbial “rock” that some presume was used by Cain to kill Abel. No, it is all about “the gun”.
Contrast that, for example, with Tennessee’s existing laws regarding “emergency involuntary committals”. Under these laws, which Tennessee has had for many years, a person who poses an imminent risk of harm to himself/herself or to others can be involuntarily held by ex parte court order in a mental health facility for up to perhaps 2 weeks for professional observation and assessment by mental health professionals. The procedure focuses on the individual and whether the individual is a risk. It does not focus on the mechanism of the potential risk – which could easily be carried out with everything from a knife to farm fertilizers.
Emergency committal orders place the focus on the real risk – the person. Red flag laws do nothing but advance a gun control myth and agenda. Red flag laws make progressives “feel good”.
Further, after the United States Supreme Court’s decision in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen in June 2022, there is a serious constitutional question of whether a “Red Flag” law would be an intentional violation by the state and the proposing legislators of the 2nd Amendment, 14th Amendment and constitute a knowing federal civil rights violation if enacted. The Supreme Court clearly placed an affirmative burden on the state to show that a law of that type existed in 1791 and you can almost certainly bet that the Legislators proposing such a law now are not able to and will not put forth clear and convincing proof that a “red flag” law or a clear analogue was part of the “national historical tradition” in the states as of 1791.
Use this TFA provided tool to contact your legislators today!