Guns to be allowed on Amtrak

Jersey_Mike wrote:Oh I'm sorry I forgot this was a non-humor zone.

You have a strange sense of humor then, extending from dead dogs to 9/11. I don't think there was any humor in your post, dry, implicit, or explicit.

Let's move on.

No one needs a gun....until you need a gun.

There are literally hundreds of stories of guns being used in self defense every day that eclipses the few that are used criminally.

People who carry guns have permits, and undergo background checks, and are very unlikely to do anything to endanger that right.

Criminals are not required to register guns, obtain permits to carry, or anything like that (See Hayes vs United States, USC 1968)

I have no problem with people carrying on a train provided they are legally authorized to do so. When I carry, I conceal, and you wouldn't even know I"m carrying. I don't think it hurts the family environment of the train at all.

Having you carry a gun on a train doesn't make me feel any safer.

And Amtrak policy is:
Gun must not be loaded
Must be in gun case
Must be locked in Bagage car
and 24 hour notice before traveling
and only on trains with checked bagage.

I feel much safer knowing the gun is unloaded and unlocked in the baggage compartment than in the pocket of a stranger across the aisle who may be getting drunk off amtrak beer.

Of course, in reality, anyone who wanted to could carry any form of weapon onto an amtrak train in a backpack. So the law is really just a giant waste of money because it makes amtrak spend money to transport something only a minority of passengers want.

If amtrak is going to remodel their baggage cars, personally, I'd prefer the changes were made to make them pet friendly, not gun-friendly. Or better yet, BIKE friendly.

I'm not so sure it's accurate to say "a minority of people want" to guns anymore than it is to say that to bikes. These are both things I think a lot of people want to transport. I'd say, in terms of baggage cars, bike friendly should be fairly easy to implement.

What will be somewhat interesting to see is how states that do not honor the Firearm Owners Protection Act respond to this and how it will affect people who are delayed. For those of you who don't know, IL, MA, NY, NJ all require permits to own a handgun. Carrying a gun into those states without a permit is a crime in of itself. There is a federal law which states that a traveler who is passing through those states and makes no un-needed stops is immune from that law and cannot be prosecuted provided the gun was secure and unloaded in the trunk. There was a recent case were a man had a connecting flight in NJ. His flight was cancelled, and he was given his luggage and a hotel. A judge ruled that FOPA did not apply because he had a break in his travel. I will be interested to see if there are any prosecutions, especially in the extremely anti-gun environment of Chicago, especially with Amtrak's not 100% on time record.

This is going to open up new markets for Amtrak. Hunters can now take the train to weekend hunting trips in the mountains and take their guns along. Previously, there only options were to fly or drive and many of the areas may be expensive to fly to.