Michigan Votes Forum

This bill should be passed. 

Criminals don't follow the law and will carry anywhere they please. Allowing everyday citizens to protect themselves is necessary, especially on a college campus.

In my 4 years at MSU, I read about many assaults on campus that could have been prevented had students been allowed to exercise their 2nd Amendment right. The police can't be counted on to stop all crimes from occurring.

Curious how when there are no laws being proposed to ban guns, the gun rights people want to pass laws to prempt colleges and local communities from passing laws to restrict carrying guns in their schools or communities. The right claims to be for individual freedoms, but it wants to restrict the rights of colleges and local communities, the branch of government closest to the people, from choosing how to protect themselves.

Not true. The law is that colleges and universities, "higher education" as you say, cannot restrict the the carrying and possession of firearms. This law is just clarifying that because the universities are pushing because they say the law is not clear enough.

dbiegan:

Not true. The law is that colleges and universities, "higher education" as you say, cannot restrict the the carrying and possession of firearms. This law is just clarifying that because the universities are pushing because they say the law is not clear enough.

Thanks for clearing that up.

No one should be carrying weapons on campuses except trained police and security.

BlueWaterTeacher:

No one should be carrying weapons on campuses except trained police and security.

Why should the police be the only ones with the means to defend themselves? Besides, it's not the duty of the police to protect individuals. Sorry, but I don't have faith in the psychic ability of the police to know exactly when and where I might be mugged or sexually assaulted.

CPL holders are already trusted to carry a firearm, so what changes when they enter a campus? 

I am a CPL holder myself, and a faculty member at a small four-year college which has a no-firearms policy. 

I'm quite surprised that this bill apparently would have the effect of allowing students to carry on campus, but would allow colleges & universities to forbid faculty & staff from carrying. That just makes no sense to me at all.

Many college campuses are not at all self-contained areas. The core campus of the University of Michigan, for example, is highly integrated with the streets of the city. It is not at all clear to me that it is practical to try to ensure that no one is carrying "on campus" when university properties, private residences, and public businesses are cheek-by-jowl on the same streets. In some places, you can be on and off UM property several times in the course of walking one or two blocks down a single street.

I've always been of two minds about allowing students to carry on campus. Students are typically young and a bit on the hormonal side, and on a self-contained campus, are highly concentrated in high-density living quarters. Drugs and alcohol are pretty readily available and pretty frequently used and sometimes abused. Just as my gun club doesn't allow alcohol on the range, I'm don't think good firearm safety is served by mixing guns with drugs or alcohol in any situation. On the other hand, I firmly maintain that everyone has a fundamental right to self-defense in all situations, and so I can't actually come down against firearms on campus. I think we would have to look at ways to ensure that people who possess and carry firearms on campus observe proper firearm safety more carefully and more stringently than we would need to do in some other situations. This is directly parallel to good firearm safety at shooting ranges. At my club, we have one set of standards for ordinary shooting, and another, stricter standard for activities such as drawing from the holster, shooting while moving, shooting multiple targets and the like that involve higher risk. In like manner, possession and carry in a campus environment poses special problems and risks that need to be addressed. I think ultimately every CPL holder needs to be trained to recognize situations of special risk and learn how to decide whether and how to carry in such situations wherever they might occur. The right of self-defense must be exercised responsibly, particularly when the means of defense involve lethal force. I think this sort of solution would be far more appropriate, and ultimately more effective, than trying to forbid firearms on campus.

rbethune:

I've always been of two minds about allowing students to carry on campus. Students are typically young and a bit on the hormonal side, and on a self-contained campus, are highly concentrated in high-density living quarters. Drugs and alcohol are pretty readily available and pretty frequently used and sometimes abused. Just as my gun club doesn't allow alcohol on the range, I'm don't think good firearm safety is served by mixing guns with drugs or alcohol in any situation.

I agree with the intent of this concern.  But it is not supported by facts.  The majority of public university students in Michigan live-off campus, typically within walking distance to campus.  This is where most drinking takes place.  Yet even with the drugs, alcohol, and multi-student rental houses and apartments, East Lansing, Ann Arbor, Kalamazoo and Mt. Pleasant don't have high rates of firearm related crimes in their off-campus student neighborhoods.  Statistics, both nationally and in Michigan, do not support the argument that gun bans result in lower firearms-related crime rates.  If they did, Washington D.C. and Chicago would be the safest cities in the country.  The bottom line is that people with a criminal intent don't abide by gun laws.

BlueWaterTeacher:

No one should be carrying weapons on campuses except trained police and security.

This is pretty naive. 

First, criminals know about this law and prey on students.  I get the WSU crime alert e-mails and it is just a fact.

Second, police and security do not protect you from an attack.  They come after that attack is reported.