State Rep town hall in Carpentersville

Illinois State Representative Keith Farnham (D-43rd District) conducted a town hall meeting last night in the Village of Carpentersville Board Room. The room was packed, including standees. Of the more than 80 persons there (men and women), only about a dozen were from Rep. Farnham's own district.

The town hall meeting was not an anti-concealed-carry meeting. Rep. Farnham wanted to know what the people in his district want him to do in the next session. But word had gotten out through the gun groups that the

Rep. Farnham conducted a good meeting. It got off to a rocky start, when the first speaker was brash and belligerent in his remarks. He was seated in the first row and he almost shouted that it was his RIGHT to carry a gun. There were other remarks that followed his that demonstrated, to me, that the person speaking had closed his mind and had no ability to or interest in considering any other point of view.

I recall a remark by a mediator in Colorado who was giving a talk about negotiation. One member of the audience argued with her, and he had only one point - nothing else mattered. When she said, "So, in a negotiation, you lose," he repeated his one point. "See?" she asked. She said she would cut him up in little pieces, figuratively, and beat him because she had many arguing points, not just one.

Rep. Farnham explained that he had walked his district many times, and the majority of residents in his district did not want a concealed carry law in Illinois. He himself is not anti-gun; he mentioned he grew up with guns in Maine, but he is not a gun-owner now.

It's clear that what we, being law-abiding citizens who want the right to defend ourselves outside our homes with loaded handguns (and that's what this law is all about), must do is educate those who do not want such a law. They must be shown that they are safer, when law-abiding citizens have the right to carry a concealed gun.

Rep. Farnham acknowledged the passion of the audience last night. But there were people in that audience last night, about whom I would worry, if they were "packing". It is an awesome responsibility to carry a concealed weapon. One must know, absolutely, that he will never brandish it or ever threaten anyone with words that he is "packing." A concealed weapon is for self-defense and, under extremely limited circumstances, protection of another person.

Police officers know the rules. Non-police persons who will carry must know the laws. Considerable time in training classes for concealed-carry permits is devoted to those situations where you might lawfully use a weapon and the situations when you must not.