As reported here several states are considering laws making confidential permits to carry concealed guns. That debate, which has pitted open-government proponents against gun advocates and has had its unsavory moments, escalated in Tennessee after The Commercial Appeal of Memphis "posted government records on the Internet that showed who had gun permits," reports the newspaper's Thomas Hargrove. Some who disliked that posted editors' addresses on the Web, causing some concern for the journalists' safety.
"The press wants to put a scarlet letter on these people," said Chris W. Cox, chief lobbyist for the National Rifle Association. "This serves no public good. It's potentially dangerous to post these lists." Open-government advocates argue that a database of individuals with gun-permits allows the press to investigate state practices for issuing the permits. Frank Gibson, executive director of the Tennessee Coalition for Open Government, said journalists have used the database to show that state officials do "a lousy job" keeping gun permits from people with mental-health problems. "The fact that these records are public" allowed the press to prove that the Tennessee Department of Safety "was issuing permits to convicted felons."
Bills to end public access to gun permits have been filed in Alabama, Arkansas, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Tennessee and Virginia. In Tennessee, the deck may be stacked against open-government advocates; 34 of the 132 state's legislators have right-to-carry permits. To read more and see a list of them, click here. To view the gun-permit database at The Commercial Appeal, click here.
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