By a razor-thin margin, the Senate defeated an effort Tuesday to make permits to carry handguns available to more Minnesotans, apparently ending the initiative for this legislative session.
But despite the Senate's 34-32 vote to retain broad discretion for police chiefs and sheriffs to issue or deny permits, gun-rights advocates promised to return next year with another push for Minnesota to join 33 other states with less restrictive laws regarding permits to carry handguns.
"The people of Minnesota aren't going to let it drop," said Sen. Pat Pariseau, R-Farmington, sponsor of the bill, which was supported by the National Rifle Association and other gun-rights groups. The House had passed the bill and Gov. Jesse Ventura endorsed it.
For gun-control advocates, some of whom wielded protest signs Tuesday in the Capitol, the Senate was the last line of resistance to the bill.
Howard Orenstein of Citizens for a Safer Minnesota praised the Senate majority for heeding the opposition of law-enforcement, health and religious groups. But Orenstein, a former DFL legislator from St. Paul, also said the close vote should be a warning to police officials who abuse their discretion by denying handgun permits even to those with legitimate personal safety hazards.
The key 34-32 vote came on an amendment offered by Sen. Steve Murphy, DFL-Red Wing, that Orenstein described as "reasonable reform, not radical reform."
It would have required more training for permit applicants, raised the minimum age from 18 to 21 and ordered statewide data collection on the permit process while retaining chiefs' and sheriffs' discretion over issuance.
Pariseau told the Senate after the vote: "In this case, discretion is discrimination, especially against the women who are more likely to be crime victims. This is nothing short of taking the rights away from innocent people who are going to be victims." With that, Pariseau withdrew her bill.
'Serious mistake'
The bill had followed a circuitous path to the Senate floor with a defeat in one committee, a walkout that blocked action in another panel and several procedural setbacks. But Majority Leader Roger Moe, DFL-Erskine, decided last week to let the full Senate vote on it anyway.
Moe, however, led the opposition Tuesday. The Murphy amendment, he said, "addresses legitimate concerns" over the current permit process, and "to go beyond it would be a very serious mistake."
Each senator had been delivered an NRA warning that a vote for any amendment to Pariseau's bill "will be a vote against the NRA and its members in your district."
Murphy, however, waved his NRA membership card as he proposed his amendment, saying: "Let's not be afraid of the NRA, but let's be afraid of 'shall issue,'" a term for less restrictive gun laws.
He also acknowledged that he had backed out on an earlier agreement to support Pariseau's bill, attributing his switch to "a massive attack of conscience." He was one of only a handful of rural senators who opposed the Pariseau measure. In the end, five Republicans from the Twin Cities suburbs and Rochester joined 29 DFLers in voting for the Murphy amendment. Eight outstate DFLers, 23 Republicans and Sen. Bob Lessard, IP-International Falls, were on the other side.
Emotional debate
The vote followed an emotional 2?-hour debate. Sen. Ellen Anderson, DFL-St. Paul, an opponent of the bill, fought back tears as she read a letter from a shooting victim, and she hushed the chamber to silence when she simulated a gunshot by dropping a statute book on her desk.
Sen. Arlene Lesewski, R-Marshall, who supported the bill, told of a young mother stabbed to death by her abusive estranged husband and said: "If she had had a small weapon in her purse, she could be here today to raise her two children."
But Sen. John Hottinger, DFL-Mankato, said the issue was less about personal protection than plummeting gun sales in a nation saturated with firearms. "The handgun industry wants to expand its market to get out of its financial trouble," he said.
Senators also debated the effects of handgun policy on violent-crime rates. Sen. Mady Reiter, R-Shoreview, said a less restrictive law would help Minnesotans defend themselves against criminals moving here from Illinois, Indiana and Michigan in search of "fresh territory."
But Sen. Linda Scheid, DFL-Brooklyn Park, quoted a letter from a constituent seeking her support for the Pariseau bill: "Please help us turn our neighborhood around." Scheid continued: "What in the world does that mean? It's pretty scary to me."
Despite the defeat, Pariseau said she sensed political momentum moving in her direction. Next year, she noted, all 201 legislators will be up for reelection.
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