On Wednesday, November 29, 2023, Governor Bill Lee made a major policy announcement that he would be pushing for school choice legislation in 2024. Tennessee Firearms Association generally does not comment on education topics such as that although it does support including a focus in Tennessee’s mandated school curriculum that would teach the fundamentals of a constitutional republic, the constitutions and the true meaning and purpose of all the provisions of the Bill of Rights.
However, this major announcement by Bill Lee does have a significance. It is significant to the extent that its demonstrates the Governor and the Legislature, as an entity, are not similarly announcing that they are going to move forward in 2024 with a policy package to purchase the state of any laws, regulations, orders or policies that infringement upon the civil rights that are protected by the Second Amendment and which the United States Supreme Court has made clear in its June 2022 decision in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen, No. 20-843, are presumptively unconstitutional unless the state can affirmative demonstrate that the infringement is consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition as of 1791 of firearms regulation.
This is not the first time that the Governor and Legislative leadership have championed a non-constitutionally mandated policy agenda while ignoring a constitutional crisis that exists with numerous state laws, regulations, orders and policies which are clear violations of the Second Amendment’s constitutional mandate.
Certainly, the Second Amendment is not the only public policy issue of importance, but it is one of constitutional importance. As the Supreme Court stated at page 62 of its Bruen decision:
The constitutional right to bear arms in public for self-defense is not “a second-class right, subject to an entirely different body of rules than the other Bill of Rights guarantees.” McDonald, 561 U. S., at 780 (plurality opinion). We know of no other constitutional right that an individual may exercise only after demonstrating to government officers some special need. That is not how the First Amendment works when it comes to unpopular speech or the free exercise of religion. It is not how the Sixth Amendment works when it comes to a defendant’s right to confront the witnesses against him. And it is not how the Second Amendment works when it comes to public carry for self-defense.
Certainly, the Legislature as the state’s only branch of government that is constitutionally vested with the duty to make, create and form the state’s public policy can and should consider a wide range of topics. However, when the Legislature, as a body, and the Governor as the state’s chief administrative (as opposed to policy making) official obviously and repeatedly ignore the constitutional importance of the Second Amendment, one must question whether these state officials are fit for the stewardship roles that they asked the voters to give them.
With the Governor’s announcement of his intent to focus on school choice, it should also be time for the citizens of Tennessee to be in contact with their elected officials and demanding that the state’s public policies – as reflected in its laws, regulations, orders and ordinances – be immediately reviewed and revised to achieve full compliance the the Supreme Court’s mandate in Bruen – that is, that the civil right at issue be freed from “infringements” as the Second Amendment mandates.
If you are not sure of who your legislators are or need their contact information, you can look them up by your street address on the Legislature’s website.
John Harris | Executive Director Tennessee Firearms Association