Question: What’s the point of the metal detectors when entering the General Assembly? What are they looking for, if not guns? Apparently it’s not knives that they’re concerned with — I carry my Spyderco Calypso Jr. with me everywhere, and they’ve never minded the 2.5″ folding blade. If they were looking for bombs, they’d use bomb-sniffing dogs or some of those fancy new bomb-detectors, since C4 isn’t going to set off any metal detectors.
So why the heavy security when entering the building? Why the metal detector? What, specifically, are they trying to prevent people from bringing into the building?
If I and a dozen friends wanted to walk in with shotguns, straps of sabot slugs slung over both shoulders, and armored vests, would that be legal? Would the security guards be obliged to let us in? Does anybody know?
I guess they didn’t hear about security in NYC City Hall waving councilmen by, only to have one of them shoot the other dead right in the chambers. Remember this?
I think it is meant as a kind of lock on the door, not really meant for real security; Kmart security.
Troubling.
Mark,
The guy who shot councilman James Davis was not a councilman himself. He was a sort of fringe character who had tried to run against the councilman unsuccessfully. Davis felt bad for him afterwards and tried to take him under his wing. The gunman, Othniel Askew (quite a name) followed Davis into council chambers while avoiding metal detectors and opened fire.
It is an interesting sidenote that Davis did happen to legally carry a concealed handgun, but was not able to draw it quickly enough to defend himself and was taken out of the fight immediately with a fatal shot to the chest from a .40 caliber Smith & Wesson at very close range. A police officer nearby was able to gun Askew down before anyone else was hurt, but was not close enough to have possibly reacted with the speed necessary to prevent Davis from being killed.
So if the 2003 incident in NYC council chambers teaches us anything, it’s that a legislator who legally carries a gun into the building is not necessarily paranoid. Davis’ biggest mistake was a slow draw, perhaps due to lack of practice or maybe a poorly chosen holster. Given the fact that it isn’t practical to assign a personal bodyguard to every legislator in the country, the only person who could have saved Davis’ life once Askew was in the building with him was Davis himself.
A further sidenote about James Davis: he was a Democrat and a former police officer who led a successful effort to convince Toys R Us to stop selling realistic-looking toy guns (I’m down with that). He also loved the Second Amendment and carried a gun with him in council chambers. Which was apparantly not such a crazy thing for him to do.
Thanks for your responses. Please correct me if this is wrong. Wasn’t the first report that Mr. Davis aided Mr. Askew through the metal detectors?
I didn’t mean to say that carry and conceal is a bad idea, I just think that if what Waldo relates above is true, then his question is still there; why have security if they are not going to be looking for any weapons?
Isn’t the security of our representatives worth more than to encourage and expect that they should carry firearms with them at all times? Who is failing here?
Am I that naieve? I guess I always err on the side of thinking that things will work the way they are supposed to in these matters. I have been proven wrong for the most part. But this does raise interesting questions about our society, in that public figures have to pack weapons in order to feel safe.
It is a sad commentary on our society, and I am glad that I removed myself from urban areas, partly to avoid random/senseless violence. (Partly also to just get away from so many people crammed in an area.)
Last time I was in the capitol I chose to walk to the left of the metal detector through the WIDE OPEN SPACE. I too cary a knife everywhere with me (Cold Steel 3″ tanto point voyager, I prefer it to my old SpiderCo). I just didn’t want to deal with all the blah blah blah of setting the detector off. So I just walked around it.
Good thing we spent money on those things.
Who needs metal detectors???
Uhh, Waldo, I doubt very seriously that Reid, as a Delegate, was required to go through metal detectors.
When you run a security system, unless you’re absolutely paranoid, you trust some people, and at the House of Delegates, you trust the Delegates.
I have no patience for Al Gore. Politically, I think he’s a lunatic. But, as happened at DCA a few years back, I certainly don’t think he should have been subject to the proctological exam.
In short, Waldo, this post is a little silly.
Whether or not Reid is run through metal detectors is irrelevant. It wouldn’t have made any difference. The question is this: If anybody who wants to can legally carry a knife or a gun into the General Assembly, why does security check people at the door? What are they looking for?
Answering that question is the only point of this blog entry. Can you answer that question? Because I can’t.
It might be because you are not allowed to brandish firearms or wear them openly. Only those with Concealed Weapons Permits are allowed to carry. If a lunatic without a permit tried to sneak in, the Capitol Police would confiscate his firearm, I believe.
This seems like a reasonable measure to ensure that only those with (court-issued) concealed weapons permits carry.
Fair ’nuff, Waldo. And I suspect J. Sarge has it right.
I had no idea that carrying in the GA is limited to those with concealed weapons permits — that makes a big difference. Given the hoops necessary to jump through to get a concealed permit, I certainly feel better about that. That is, if anybody is going to be allowed to carry guns in the GA, it ought to be people who have a concealed weapons permit.
I still don’t think that there ought to be guns in the GA, but I do now feel a bit safer about it all.
Mark,
Funny, because I’m moving out to the country in a few months in part so that I can open fire on offending bullseyes at any reasonable hour.
There will always be bad people and violent people. We’ll try to put them in prison but more are always being born and they have to commit a few crimes against the innocent before they get locked up. The need to protect one’s self from them isn’t a sad commentary on our society. It’s a basic fact of humanity throughout the ages. Historically speaking, our crime rate is pretty good. There will be no ‘end of history’ a la Karl Marx. There is no series of policies or philosophy of government that will ever lead to the end of bad things happening to good people at the hands of the evil. Don’t ever believe anyone who says that there will be, because every single time this will lead to the justification of ending all sorts of freedoms which lead in the end to having neither freedom, justice nor security. This was true of Communists and it’s true of Republicans.
There is nothing wrong with wishing to have control over one’s own security rather than trusting blindly that ‘they’ will take care of you. Some people carry a multi tool around with them. Why? If something needs to be fixed then won’t ‘they’ fix it? Why carry a car jack or a first aid kit in your trunk? If something goes wrong, you could just call an ambulance or a tow truck. Sometimes it works out ok and ‘they’ come to take care of it for you. But for many people, the idea of trusting the system to bail you out at every moment is just not good enough. Many of those people choose to carry a gun just as naturally as they’d keep a first aid kit in the trunk or a hundred dollar bill in a secret corner of their wallet. Maybe they’ll go 20 years without needing it. But it only takes the one time to be really glad you brought it.
I’m not sure, but I actually believe that, in Virginia, we are allowed to carry both concealed weapons (with permits) and unconcealed weapons into the GA. In Virginia its perfectly legal to walk down the street with a gun at your hip. even without a permit. The metal detectors in the capitol are there to catch people with concealed weapons without permits. i dont believe that the legislature has put in place any more extra restrictions on guns in the GA than they have in place for the state as a whole.
I’d certainly like to see some documentation one way or the other.
Good question Waldo, but i suspect J. Sarge has hit upon the only logical answer.
It’s definitely the only logical answer, but doesn’t jibe with what several other people have told me, which is that people can carry openly, no permit required.
I’m tempted to bring my Mossberg with me tomorrow. I think that would end badly, though.
J Marks and others:
Many of you are confused – CHP holders MAY open carry in the GAB and other captiol buildings if they choose.
Until on or about April Fools Day, 2005, any person could walk into the General Assembly Building openly carrying a handgun, without any concealed handgun permit. But on or around April Fools Day 2005, Sen. Stolle convinced the Joint Rules Committee to pass a rule banning handgun carry by anyone in teh GA except for members, law enforcement, and persons holding CHPs. Open carry is not banned, but you must have a CHP to do it. I open carry at the GA periodically.
One problem with Stolle’s April Fools Day ban is that it never got an “up or down” vote in the GA as required by the VA FOIA – see Va. Code 2.2-3700 et seq.
Another problem with the ban is that it sets a rule for the GA that localities cannot set – “do as I say, not as I do”. That’s why anybody can open carry in city council meetings.
Obviously, the rule insults the right to bear arms of all Americans, especially persons who are 18-20 years of age and inelegible for CHPs but who can, under state and federal law, carry handguns openly.
Furthermore, while the Capitol Police are charged with storing guns of non-permit holders, they do not have a clearing barrel set up, and thus their operation is unsafe – likely to encourage another accidental discharge.
The April Fools day ban should either receive an up or down vote, or be rescinded.
As for metal detectors, they too are not so koshur – set up under a rule of the JRC after 2001, they never received an up or down vote – presumptively then, an unconstitutional search.
See Bourgeouis v. Peters, Dozier, and the City of Columbus, GA (4th Cir. 2004) (“Sept. 11, 2001, already a day of immeasurable tragedy, cannot be the day liberty perished in this country”), a ruling issued by Federal Judge Gerald Tjoflat, writing for the unanimous 11th federal Circuit Court of Appeals panel quashing the use of metal detectors to “screen” demonstrators in public areas on 15 October 2004.