Well, one of many but clearly one of the biggest.
The Oath of a legislator in Tennessee has survived intact in our state constitution, though seemingly less important than it should be, since the Founding in 1796.
Originally constructed to read in the Tennessee Constitution, Article 9 § 2:
It has fallen one spot in importance (imagine that) to now reside at Article X § 2:
The most often violated codicil of that entire oath is the part where they promise to vote without prejudice.
This “Jim Crow “loving gaggle, untrustworthy as a whole, assemblage of lawmakers (as an aside, the General Assembly has a PHD in that very thing, lawmaking, piling them higher and deeper as the years roll on) are the worst at intentionally refusing to look at the instructions from the People’s contract (the constitution) or “Orders of the Court” (Heller, McDonald, Caetano, Bruen and Beeler come to mind) when it comes to REMOVING infringements on arms rights ginned up by preceding General Assemblies. Not all, but most…
In conversation, I once had a Senator tell me the only thing, he “listened to” was the “little old ladies in his church” and “they did not want to see AR15s in the Walmart.” It made no difference to him what the constitutions of the state or Union called for, or the courts had mandated.
If a bill or resolution seeks to restore the preexisting right to arms codified in the original 1796 Second Amendment analogue, it is out of hand denied a floor vote in both chambers, proof being the recent attempt to the Second Amendment analogue of our TN constitution, having passed the Senate with every Republican voting in favor, engrossing the resolution and sending to the House for action where it was killed without even letting the House Sponsor put it on notice (SJR 0904) for a vote.
Was that denial simple animus against the arms rights of the People, or prejudice against the state and national advocacy groups seeking support to let the People reclaim their pilfered rights?
The Chambers play ping-pong on Second Amendment issues, one being for, the other against year to year and the sides switch depending on which has the most to lose in primaries each election cycle. Collectively however, they never seem to back away from being prejudiced against that God-given, natural, preexisting to the Founding right to arms as described in Heller.
Time and again we hear from our state legislators that We the People cannot “expect” to get all of our Second Amendment rights back in one fell swoop. I have repeatedly asked a number of them in private and in public, what clause of our constitution mandates that. I have never received an answer.
