Arne

It depends on the math. When the cost to sustain the current number of criminals and victims in the State of NJ exceeds the resources of the states criminal justice system, it will become more economical to allow ccw. The real surprise will be the outrageously tremendous increase of overall economic productivity when the citizens of NJ no longer have to devote so much of their resources to prevent victimization and may lawfully exercise all rights protected by the US Constitution in the State of NJ of self defense in public, where only the criminals now rule.

Went to the NRA website where all the new ads are posted and watched a few more. The NRA has come a long way since just making sure the safety's on. The ads are encouraging. Sad too, though, that so much has been lost that these are needed today.

North. Thank you Mr. Hart.

A gentleman who lives in PA is standing across the NJ - PA borderline; one foot on the PA side and one foot on the NJ side. A PA State Trooper, with both feet on the PA side, stands next to him. A NJ State Trooper stands next to him on the NJ side, both feet on NJ soil. He's carrying a legal pistol and has a PA carry permit. Does the NJ Trooper attempt to arrest him? If the NJ Trooper attempts this apprehension, is the PA Trooper obligated to prevent a unlawful arrest, since the gentleman is acting lawfully in PA?

Today in NJ on a cable tv channel, two different NRA ads appeared, asking for the new members. One had a Navy Seal as the spokesperson, and I thought it was a well done ad. Any opinions on the ads? Especially if you think they well have an impact on influencing a change in NJ law for lawful exercise of all rights protected by the Constitution of the United States in the State of New Jersey.

...all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. Many strokes fell great oaks...read, write, vote. Don't give up.

Their decision will not be whether we have a right to "bear" arms depending on our physical location; i.e., in "home" or "public" or "private". Anyone with a high school education knows "bear" means carry. We already have that unalienable right, granted by our Creator. What they are deciding is whether or not they will obey the Constitution, to protect that right, as sworn in their Constitutional and Judicial Oaths: "I, _________, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God." "I, _________, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will administer justice without respect to persons, and do equal right to the poor and to the rich, and that I will faithfully and impartially discharge and perform all the duties incumbent upon me as _________ under the Constitution and laws of the United States. So help me God." If they honor their oath, I believe our State (and Country) will prosper enormously.

"Im guessing that Arne is posting First Lieutenant Patrick Cook's letter. Not that he is First Lieutenant Patrick Cook... " That's affirmative Shane45...his letter also speaks for us. Keep the blue side up.

My letter to Congress, read today at Texas Senate committee on Constitutional Carry. It is now public record. To my friends, fellow Texans, brothers in arms, members of the committee, and everyone within the sound of my voice, greetings. My name is First Lieutenant Patrick Cook of the 49th Transportation Battalion, Fort Hood, Texas, and this past Wednesday I found myself trapped in an enclosed room with fourteen of my fellow Soldiers, one of whom was barricading the door against a madman with a .45 pistol when he was fatally shot. Through what I can only describe as a miracle, he somehow found enough strength to continue pushing against that door until the shooter gave up and went elsewhere, at which time he collapsed. Nearly a week later, I can still taste his blood in my mouth from when I and my comrades breathed into his lungs for 20 long minutes while we waited for a response from the authorities. This Soldier’s name was Sergeant First Class Daniel Ferguson, and his sacrifice loaned me the rest of my life to tell this story . . . But I write to you today not to memorialize this brave Soldier, nor to tell a war story about how we made the best of a losing situation, but to express the part of that story that some in high positions of power clearly do not want told: I knew this was going to happen. I had been saying for five years that Fort Hood was a tinderbox of another massacre waiting to happen. It had to happen, because our betters failed to learn the obvious lesson of five years ago. Worse yet, I know it will happen again. More will die, more will be wounded, more families will be torn apart, needlessly. It happened again, and will happen again, because Fort Hood is a gun free zone. When the first shots rang out, my hand reached to my belt for something that wasn’t there. Something that could have put a stop to the bloodshed, could have made it merely an “ugly incident” instead of the horrific massacre that I will surely remember as the darkest twenty minutes of my life. Stripped of my God-given Right to arm myself, the only defensive posture I had left was to lie prostrate on the ground, and wait to die. As the shooter kicked at the door, I remember telling myself, “oh well, this is it.” It is beneath human dignity to experience the utter helplessness I felt that day. I cannot abide the thought that anyone should ever feel that again. At the point blank range at which this shooting occurred, anyone with an M9 and some basic instruction could have ended the mayhem as quickly as it began. An MP by trade and a CHL holder, I am convinced that concealed weapons would have stopped it, but openly carried side-arms, like the ones carried in a law enforcement capacity, could have prevented it entirely. Instead, many more died because of the fatally misguided restrictions on the carrying of arms, which obviously the madman did not respect. I shall conclude by restating my warning. This will happen again, and again until we learn the lesson that suppressing the bearing of arms doesn’t prevent horrific crimes, it invites them. To those of you who hold elected office, if you hear nothing else I have told you, hear this: you have the power to stop the next massacre from happening. You have an opportunity to restore the sacred Right to bear arms, which has been either stripped entirely or unjustly relegated to the poor substitute of a probationary, government-issued privilege. For God’s sake, do the right thing. Thank you for your attention, and good day.

The glass is half empty...but by God, at last it's on the scale! Prep for knowledge oral exams on firearm law in any event, state and federal; remain proficient, lawful and safe.

Common sense. http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20140103/METRO01/301030038/Detroit-police-chief-Legal-gun-owners-can-deter-crime?odyssey=tab|topnews|text|FRONTPAGE

The following article by Don Schanzenbach expands upon the God-given right and responsibility of self-defense, including the right to bear arms. It started in 1866, that is, the beginning of gun control laws in Ottoman Turkey. Article 166 was the first, then further laws were enacted in 1911 and 1915. First permits were required, then came a government list of all gun owners, and finally, a ban on possession. It was gradual. The entire process took 49 years. Finally however, the citizens were disarmed. The government, of course, was not. The death toll? So many their number was never In the Soviet Union the process advanced much faster. Gun control laws began under soviet resolutions in 1918. Then they enacted Articles 59 &182 of the penal code. First came licensing of owners, then a ban on possession with severe penalties. By 1926 ownership of firearms by citizens (not government) was a fact of life in Soviet Russia. The death squads and violent persecution of Russian Christians and dissidents began in 1929. It took only 3 years to go from full gun control to the murder of Russian civilians. The death count? A minimum of 20 million with some historian’s estimates ranging up to 50 million. Only the Lord knows the full number.fully counted, 1 million to 1.5 million Armenians, mostly Christian people, who had become helpless before their enemies. More easily within our memories is Rwanda in 1994. That was the year 800,000 innocent civilians were murdered in just a few weeks. The anti-gun laws were enacted in 1979 – Decree #12. Gun owners, guns, and ammunition had to be registered. Owners had to justify need. Concealed guns became illegal and the government gained the power to confiscate. The end result? 800,000 Tutsi people killed, mostly by machete. We could go on in similar fashion remembering Nazi Germany (ban on possession 1938), Red China (1957), Uganda (Firearms Act 1970), and many more with the count of unarmed, civilian dead, killed by their own governments ranging around 170,000,000 in the 20th century alone (see the Genocide Chart, JPFO.org for a quick summary). All of this ought to be a sober reminder, pointing us back to those old Bible stories and doctrines that served Christian societies for so many centuries. It was under King Saul we read (1 Samuel 13:17-22) how the nation of Israel was oppressed by the Philistines. Raiders came from the camp of the Philistines in three companies, each turning in different directions. Times had become desperate and dangerous. Saul was camped in Geba of Benjamin, but the nation’s enemies were spreading out to wreak havoc on the people. This is when the Scripture writer drops in this little tidbit for our consideration. He writes, “Now no blacksmith could be found in all the land of Israel, for the Philistines said, ‘lest the Hebrews make swords or spears.” So, here the nation was, under direct attack by their long-time enemy. Israel had already been disarmed and cowed into submission. The text lets us know that, “all Israel went down to the Philistines, each to sharpen his plowshare, his mattock, his ax and his hoe. “ They supposed they would have a king who would lead them out against their enemies (1 Samuel 8:20). What they actually got was a sometimes heroic leader and an often waffling, indecisive, cowardly man to rule them. Now as the enemy spread out over the land, the people found themselves unarmed and undefended. Did God give His people victory in the battles that followed? Yes He did. However, the obvious message from the text is that it is ruinous and morally wrong for God’s people to be disarmed and defenseless before their enemies. This was not His command nor law for them. It is a description of slavery, not liberty, for they were (as are we) called to liberty, under the Lord. Some of our Christian brethren are shouting at us that in all circumstances it is our duty to turn the other cheek. This philosophy derives from the idea that only the New Testament may be used to inform our doctrine. When I ask people online how they might defend this idea my questions are either ignored, or the discussion abandoned. They cannot answer any close questions as to why the Old Testament has, by them, been rendered of no account. Like the Pharisees, they have strained out a gnat and swallowed a camel. The foolishness of modern American evangelicalism is often bared to daylight when we start discussing issues about how to actually live in this fallen world. They have eliminated the Old Testament which makes up about 70% of the entire Bible. Then, they stumble around the New Testament text snapping at theological mismatches of verse and doctrine, attempting to make sense of their, now, truncated Book. All of this derives to the detriment of the kingdom and the church. When the Jewish people returned from captivity in Babylon to re-build the Temple and the holy city, they met tough resistance. As work on the city walls advanced their enemies began to offer threats. There was no army to protect this frightened band of inchoate settlers. Sensing the doom of their righteous project, Nehemiah instructs them to arm themselves. They are to carry a sword or spear in one hand and raise the stone walls with the other. He tells them to fight (Nehemiah 4:14), “for your brothers, your sons, your daughters, your wives, and your houses.” That is what the chosen people (remember the New Testament calls us the chosen people), were to fight for under Godly law. This is not instruction for only Jewish settlers in Jerusalem. Rather, it establishes a moral paradigm for righteous men. We are to be defenders of our brothers, our sons, our daughters, wives, and houses. This is a definition of righteousness for Godly people. Now, we are being told to abandon that right principle and become slaves dependent upon the state. We may ask if there is any New Testament principle that might inform our doctrine concerning the carrying or use of weapons. If we remind ourselves that we are to treat our neighbor as ourselves the answer remains unchanged from our Old Testament lessons. Suppose I were to find myself in a parking lot with a couple of guys kicking in my ribs. I would be glowingly pleased to have any of my neighbors step in with a hand gun, machine gun, or assault rifle to save my life. Most of us would consider that to be right neighborly. In my view, it would not matter a wit if the person saving me had a banana clip on his assault rifle or if the flash suppressor were illegal. The Old Testament principle of fighting for our brothers is a fundamentally righteous principle that carries forward into the New Testament era. Basic morality has not changed. The New Testament has not morphed right principle into nothing but a bunch of love and hugging. We need love and hugs, but we also need safety, liberty, and justice. All of these are discovered in the sphere of Biblically-based action. The current political situation seems to be pushing us toward new laws for gun control. The sin nature of man always pushes fearful men to seek safety in the state. It appears that most Americans would prefer to unburden themselves from the duty to defend our neighbors and families and have the state provide that service. Jeremiah informs us that the human heart is desperately wicked and seeks to do evil continually. This principle applies both to those who run the government and to the governed. If the citizens are unarmed, and helpless before a power-hungry civil government, the results are always the same. Over time, that government will follow its sinful bent and murder its own citizens. An armed citizenry is the right answer, and I mean the doctrinally right answer, to limiting tyranny and defending what is ours. The civil government may go so far but no further. They do not have a right to take everything. They cannot rightfully take our wives, or daughters, our houses – or guns. The right to own weapons is implicit in the command to defend. This concept of citizens having a duty to defend their liberty used to be well understood by our Christian ancestors. Even as late as World War II the Japanese Imperial Naval Commander-in Chief, Isoroku Yamamoto is said to have warned, “You cannot invade the mainland United States. There would be a rifle behind every blade of grass.” That was a compliment to the American men of that time. Those cheering for our personal disarmament would have us wear chains rather than the accoutrements of warfare. I will not volunteer for chains. - Don Schanzenbach

Given Sen. Tom Harkin's warning this morning on the Senate floor: "It's dangerous. It's very dangerous. I believe, Mr. President, we are at one of the most dangerous points in our history right now. Every bit as dangerous as the break-up of the Union before the Civil War." What are the legal differences, rules and responsibilities of lawful firearm owners in a period of civil war in the State of New Jersey?

1LtCAP, on 24 Jul 2013 - 1:17 PM, said: Suggested reading before applying: The United States Constitution The Amendments to the Constitution The Declaration of Independence The Articles of Confederation Common Sense - Thomas Paine The Second Amendment - David Barton The Federalist and Anti-Federalist Papers Complete Works - Pacific Publishing The View of the Constitution of the United States of America - William Rawle That Every Man Be Armed - Stephen P. Halbrook The Founders Second Amendment • Origins of the Right To Bear Arms - Stephen P. Halbrook New Jersey Gun Law Guide 3rd. Ed. - Evan F. Nappen & Richard Gilbert GunDigest Book of Concealed Carry 2nd Ed. - Massad Ayoob The 7 Things You Must Know Before You Draw Your Gun - Patrick Kilchermann 1947 State of New Jersey Constitution In re Preis, 118 NJ 564 (1990); Siccardi v. State, 59 NJ 545 (1971); Reilly v. State, 59 NJ (1971); In re Application of X, 59 NJ 533 (1971)

Thanks, Alpo. Wilco. Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice; Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgement.