Voters in 14 Illinois Counties Have Voice on CCW Issue
November 1, 2008

by Joseph P. Tartaro
Executive Editor

What may be the longest presidential election campaign in US history is drawing to a close. It probably started right after the election returns in November 2004 became final, at least for Hillary Clinton. It certainly has been running in earnest since the first Wednesday in November 2006, and the media has stuffed itself and us on the stuffing of a long primary run and feasted on a turkey of a campaign ever since.

Two days after this is being written, the third and final McCain-Obama debate will be broadcast. If it is anything like the first two match-ups, it probably won’t play much of a role in deciding who voters will choose. The debates so far—with the possible exception of the one vice presidential face-off—have been pretty short on specifics and pretty big on generalizations. The candidates haven’t been too forthcoming on details while their campaign spokespeople have been spinning a constant web of campaign rhetoric.

The economic sinkhole the world seems to be in now may have an affect on the presidential race. It should. And it should also play a big role in the 435 House races and 33 Senate contests. But maybe it won’t. That’s because voters have a tendency to reelect incumbents even when the entire Congress—and especially their individual representatives—played a key role in causing the banking problems in the first place— and did little to take corrective action in time. Congress has lower poll numbers than President Bush, but everybody thinks their own representative deserves another term.

I mention this because judging by the major print and electronic media, the only contest on Nov. 4 that matters involves the question of whether a Democrat or a Republican will take the oath of office as president next January. Truth is, there are a lot of important contests, not just for congressmen and senators, but for many governorships and state lawmakers, as well as a variety of other state, county and local offices that could have an impact on your future, especially the future of the right to keep and bear arms.

Judging from what we know of Gun Week readers, I am sure that everyone will be casting informed ballots on a variety of races at all levels of government. But one of the states with the most interesting perceptions regarding the will of the people is, strangely enough, Illinois—which along with neighboring Wisconsin are the only two states in the Union which still do not have a provision for legal concealed firearms for personal, family and property defense.

For many months, Illinois citizens—with the help of the Illinois State Rifle Association (ISRA) and countless grassroots civil rights activists—have been asking their county lawmakers to officially adopt positions in support of the civil right to arms for citizen defense. To date, the county boards of 86 counties in the Prairie State have adopted official pro-Second Amendment resolutions. The latest of these have been Boone, Rock Island, Bureau and McDonough Counties. And efforts to advance the resolution are currently underway in Lake and Will Counties.

In fact, Lake County activists were expected to pack the house at the Oct. 14 county legislature’s board meeting in a show of support for the resolution.

And, on Oct. 23, the Winnebago County board was expected to be voting on establishing county concealed carry within county limits.

But grassroots republican action though elected representatives is not the only way that Illinois citizens are pushing the concealed carry issue.

In Illinois, the home state of the Democratic presidential candidate, there is a unique grassroots movement seeking to fix the problem of legalized conceal carry.

On Nov. 4, the voters in 14 more Illinois counties will have a chance to express their preferences in Election Day ballot referendums. Those voters will be asked “Shall the (state) General Assembly enact legislation to permit the carrying of concealed firearms? [ ] Yes [ ] No.”

Those 14 counties where the voters can respond individually include: Crawford; Effingham; Franklin; Greene; Jasper; Jefferson; Kendall; LaSalle; McDonough; Ogle; Saline; Union; Woodford, and Winnebago.

As Election Day nears, the ISRA is urging members and supporters to blanket those 14 counties with letters to the editor, flyers, and yard signs. You do not have to live in a particular county to send a letter to the editor. “Even if you don’t live in those particular counties,” the ISRA notes, “you can write letters to the editors in those counties.”

There are a lot of important voter education programs in force. In Saline County, for example, a Town Hall Meeting was scheduled for Oct. 14 to educate voters about the concealed carry referendum.

These activities in support of a very important public issue in Illinois reflect grassroots citizen action at its best: the people petitioning their elected state officials to correct the shortcomings in existing state law regarding the right and the means to self-defense.

Meanwhile, back on the presidential campaign trail, the anti-gunners are snatching at every straw to get their man, Sen. Barack Obama, elected the next president of the United States. While Obama says he supports the right to keep and bear arms, he also supports such draconian gun laws as those in Chicago. The anti-gunners at the Brady Campaign and the Joyce Foundation are positively salivating at the prospect of once again being able to carve away all or parts of the right to keep and bear arms. Of course, their ultimate goal, by whatever means, is to eradicate the right to keep and bear arms completely. Well, not quite completely. Perhaps they’ll let you take your single shot hunting rifle or shotgun out of the state armory when you go hunting, or target shooting at officially approved sights.

The Brady Campaign and their allies in the American Hunting and Shooting Association (AHSA) are supporting Obama with the clear intent of blocking any realistic relief for Washington, DC, residents who would like to legally own guns for personal and home defense. They also want to put restoration and enhancement of the Clinton semi-auto and full capacity magazine prohibitions at the top of their new president’s “to-do” list. And they sure as shooting want to shut down all gun shows and private sales, even among relatives.

Both groups shed crocodile tears as they accused the National Rifle Association of hypocrisy for endorsing the McCain-Palin ticket. Their efforts to win votes for Obama have been very constant and very public, and not without a lot of subterfuge.
However, they are the first to blame outside “NRA lobbyists” for supporting McCain’s election.

Backing up the Brady Campaign and AHSA, their ally in the labor-based, far left Mother Jones magazine claimed that “two former NRA lobbyists are neck deep in McCain’s campaign and may have violated the McCain campaign’s own conflict of interest policy.”

At the same time, all of Obama’s supporters, including the anti-gunners, ducked any mention of the ousted, pork-barrel Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac officials who have advised the Obama campaign on banking, mortgage and economic issues. Apparently, American schools—or at least journalism schools—have abandoned reading of Joel Chandler Harris’s “B’rer Rabbit” tales, since they want to put the foxes in charge of the chickens—or at least what’s left of the chickens.

There is still some time before Election Day—use it wisely to inform yourself and your friends. This is a pivotal election year and the state of the economy is far from the central issue. Your rights are at stake as well and you should vote informed and help inform others.
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