Possible good news: legislative backlog

[SigNerd]

Normally I wouldn't say "yay, the legislature is proposing so many bills that they can't get through them all," but that might be a bit of good news with the more controversial gun bills like SB1.

“We are not going to be able to pass every bill that either could be passed or should be passed. It’s a logistic impossibility,” said Senate President Bill Ferguson (D-Baltimore City). “We’re going to do the best that we can to prioritize the things we know we have the votes for, the things we know that we can get through and don’t back up additional bills.”

Political Notes: Bill backlog likely spells doom for some proposals, fundraising off a failed nominee and much more as General Assembly hits halfway point - Maryland Matters

A slow start to the 2023 Maryland General Assembly Session means some bills likely won't pass. Maybe even those on Gov. Wes Moore's agenda.

www.marylandmatters.org

 

[Combloc]

WoW! And it doesn't even occur to them; if you have SO MANY bills you don't have time to get to them all, maybe, just MAYBE, you're introducing too many bills. Oh well. To quote the immortal words of Hermann Hesse:

“Those who are too lazy and comfortable to think for themselves and be their own judges obey the laws. Others sense their own laws within them.”

 

[Jimgoespewpew]

Except that it's called sb1 for a reason. They have deemed it their number 1 priority.

 

[rbird7282]

This is probably true every year.


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[outrider58]

They can eat me. I don't plan on obeying any of their new laws anyway.

 

[annihilation-time]

Yup. They can pound sand.

 

[MJD438]

This is probably true every year.


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This... combined with the fact that the Speaker and President are not Mike x2, and don't have the Legislative clout, yet.

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[Patattack88]

Non-compliance is necessary when dealing with a tyrannical government!

 

[erwos]

Except that it's called sb1 for a reason. They have deemed it their number 1 priority.

Nah, it's because the dude prefiled it super early last year. It's clear that the committee is not a huge fan of this thing in the current judicial environment. Unsure if it'll get the 'ol desk drawer or not, but it wouldn't surprise me. We got lucky this year that the increasingly-public MPCT debacle is sucking a fair bit of attention away from us.

 

[Jimgoespewpew]

Nah, it's because the dude prefiled it super early last year. It's clear that the committee is not a huge fan of this thing in the current judicial environment. Unsure if it'll get the 'ol desk drawer or not, but it wouldn't surprise me. We got lucky this year that the increasingly-public MPCT debacle is sucking a fair bit of attention away from us.

I hope you are right!!

 

[PapiBarcelona]

Except that it's called sb1 for a reason. They have deemed it their number 1 priority.

I think it's SB1 because it was literally the first bill before anyone else submitted which I assume goes in chronological order.

Number 1 priority? Nah. It may be important for the bumper sticker slogan politics but it's definitely not the highest priority.

If it was such a big deal they should have called a special session to deal with it, evidently campaigning last year was more important than +100,000 people with W&C permits now, probably

 

[pcfixer]

Except as provided in subsection (b) of this section, a person may not:
(i) wear, carry, or transport a handgun, whether concealed or open, on or about the person;
(ii) wear, carry, or knowingly transport a handgun, whether concealed or open, in a vehicle traveling on a road or parking lot generally used by the public, highway, waterway, or airway of the State;
(iii) [violate item
(i) or (ii) of this paragraph while on public school property in the State; (iv)] violate item
(i) or (ii) of this paragraph with the deliberate purpose of injuring or killing another person; or
[(v)] (IV) violate item (i) or (ii) of this paragraph with a handgun loaded with ammunition.
(2) There is a rebuttable presumption that a person who transports a handgun under paragraph
(1)(ii) of this subsection transports the handgun knowingly

https://www.marylandshallissue.org/jmain/documents?task=download.send&id=419&catid=4&m=0

This equates to complete BAN. Just didn't use the word ban.

 

[pcfixer]

Thought this was clear.
We reiterate that the standard for applying the Second Amendment is as follows:
When the Second Amendment’s plain text covers an individual’s conduct, the Constitution presumptively protects that conduct.
The government must then justify its regulation by demonstrating that it is consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation. Only then may a court conclude that the individual’s conduct falls outside the Second Amendment’s “unqualified command.”

 

[SigNerd]

To temper the good news of a backlog, here's Senator Smith, chair of the Senate JPR committee which is the committee for gun control issues, on guns in Maryland and plans for this session:

My quick take (from the perspective of someone that tries to be optimistic in life, so take it as you will), while he did talk about pushing ccw qualifications and sensitive places to the "constitutional limit," some important parts were his use of "historical analogues" and "constitutional limits," on multiple occasions referenced Bruen by name (never calling it flawed, seemingly accepting it and moving forward), and that he acknowledged that illegal guns are the bigger issue overall (but that legal guns do end up in the illegal side of things). Like I said, I'm an optimist. I'd prefer that this segment didn't exist, but I'm not hearing enough to where I'm panicking yet about JPR taking up SB1 without serious amendments and establishing their analogues as part of the legislative process. And since it wasn't crossfiled, they have a limited time period for doing that.

If you want to listen to the full segment with Smith on various different topics, it's here: https://wamu.org/story/23/02/24/metro-general-manager-randy-clarke/

His segment starts around here (at least on my phone no timestamp was displayed):

 

[Some Guy]

Thought this was clear.
We reiterate that the standard for applying the Second Amendment is as follows:
When the Second Amendment’s plain text covers an individual’s conduct, the Constitution presumptively protects that conduct.
The government must then justify its regulation by demonstrating that it is consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation. Only then may a court conclude that the individual’s conduct falls outside the Second Amendment’s “unqualified command.”

Great quote. Thanks for the reminder.

 

[welder516]

Sucky Bill 1


Never heard of that one

 

[MigraineMan]

I think it's SB1 because it was literally the first bill before anyone else submitted which I assume goes in chronological order.

Number 1 priority? Nah. It may be important for the bumper sticker slogan politics but it's definitely not the highest priority.

If it was such a big deal they should have called a special session to deal with it, evidently campaigning last year was more important than +100,000 people with W&C permits now, probably

Senator Jeff Waldstreicher pre-filed the bill in August 2022. Why would he do that if he didn't think it was a "highest priority"?

Here, you can watch Senator Waldstreicher demonstrate his contempt for the Bruen decision, from an interview in July 2022.

I'm willing to bet that his ego desperately wanted the coveted "Number One" bill designation.

 

[JohnnyE]

If things in Annapolis work anyway similar to the way they do in DC (where I spent a decade serving as a counsel in the House) little happens by chance. In the House, leadership may reserve certain numbers for specific bills. Plan on introducing a bill regarding Pearl Harbor? If you think of it in time and leadership like you, you may get H.R. 1941. Etc. It is not necessarily first come, first served.

The excuse of having too many bills to act upon them all is just that, an excuse. IIRC it was 1988 and the House, which normally allots 15 minute for each recorded votes, had so many bills to pass that it strung together perhaps 30 or 40 bills, took them up sequentially, and reduced the time allotted to vote on each bill to two minutes. Rep, Ken Gray, (D-Ill.) was put into the Speakers chair because prior to coming to Congress, he was an auctioneer.

The excuse just provides legislators the opportunity to tell bill supporters that they would have voted yes on their favorite bills (even though they would not), but blame the failure to get a vote on process, and not the fact that leadership did not want to bring up dog crap unconstitutional bills only to have their pee pees smacked later on by the court. Avoiding accountability for an issue, that's what they do.

 

[SigNerd]

Senator Jeff Waldstreicher pre-filed the bill in August 2022. Why would he do that if he didn't think it was a "highest priority"?

Here, you can watch Senator Waldstreicher demonstrate his contempt for the Bruen decision, from an interview in July 2022.

I'm willing to bet that his ego desperately wanted the coveted "Number One" bill designation.

Certainly he thinks (sorry, feels; there was 99% emotion and 1% made up "facts" in his presentation to the committee) it's the highest priority, but he's one senator. He's vice chair of JPR and on no other committees. He holds no leadership positions other than VC of JPR. I've seen no indication that it being SB1 has any significance to other Democrats.

 

[Allen65]

Certainly he thinks (sorry, feels; there was 99% emotion and 1% made up "facts" in his presentation to the committee) it's the highest priority, but he's one senator. He's vice chair of JPR and on no other committees. He holds no leadership positions other than VC of JPR. I've seen no indication that it being SB1 has any significance to other Democrats.

Maybe my memory is bad, but didn't Sen Ferguson say it was a priority at the start of the session?