Friday, March 06, 2009

No recourse?

Interesting discussion at 2A Musing, of the Memphis Commercial Appeal's decision to put the Tennessee CHL records into a searchable online database — more or less using the First Amendment to take a big, steaming crap all over the Second and (in effect) the Fourth. I see what he's getting at, and from a purely legalistic standpoint the CA was within its rights to put those records online, but as I said over there, just because it's legal doesn't make it right. Even so though, it would appear since there's no law against what the CA did, Tennessee CHL holders don't have any recourse. (I really do wonder though, would they have any if a CHL holder came to harm as a result of the Commercial Appeal slapping the records up on their website?) I do agree with what Dock said — that is, that such actions are what happens when you let the state license what should be a natural, God-given right — but still it's just a damn shame that the Memphis Commercial Appeal can get away with shooting the middle finger, so to speak, at a group of people who did something they don't agree with. It's as if they didn't even stop to think about those folks who got the licenses to protect themselves from stalkers, abusive spouses or whatnot. I wonder what the Commercial Appeal would say if one of those folks was killed as a result of their actions. No doubt they'd come up with some disgusting rationalizations. I hope for the sake of all my Tennessee brothers and sisters that the Volunteer State legislators ignore the media's whining and take those records out of the public domain, as Texas did a couple of years ago. If they're not willing to acknowledge the right to carry without a license, they owe the citizens of Tennessee that much, at the very least.