Being debated in the House right now. It would appear there will be a vote on it, which I believe will end up going in our favor. For live coverage of the debate, you can follow @PAGunRights on Twitter. Â Bitter will be covering the debate, which she is watching live. Here’s hoping we’ll get to see some cane waving legislators on the floor like we did last time.
UPDATE: It has PASSED! 161-35, and is headed to Governor Rendell.
Just passed! That is awesome.
Yep… but it’s not over yet. The fat man still has to
singsign it. I won’t celebrate until the ink from his pen is drying on the bill.Has Rendell indicated if he will sign it?
There will be snowflakes in hell before Eddie signs castle doctrine.
I am confused about wether or not he can veto parts of the bill. It seems that a man concerned with his legacy might not want veto the Megan’s Law parts of it. Hopefully that will get him to sign it.
So what do you think the chance is that Rendell won’t veto it?
Is there a timetable as to when Fat, Fast Eddie would need to sign it? Great that it has gotten this far! Now for the yapping Comcast Sportsnet commentator to just sign it…
I don’t think anyone really knows. My bet will be that he vetoes it. But who knows? I don’t think he can line item Castle Doctrine because I think line item veto is for budgetary items only.
I think that he would have to sign it before the house finishes up the season. Otherwise it will automatically be vetoed. Feel free to correct me. This is my cursory understanding of the procedure.
Can’t it just become law if ed doesn’t touch it? In my state if it passes the house and senate if the govenor doesn’t do anything it still becomes law. Or is it different in there?
I wonder if those who trashed John Hohenwarter and the NRA will apologize?
Just kidding–this has happened before and one thing I have learned is that an awful lot of people have absolutely no shame!
Rendell has ten days to sign it, or return it to the legislature by veto. If he doesn’t sign it in ten days, it becomes law. There is a different procedure if the legislature is adjourned if he wants to veto it, but I don’t think they are yet adjourned.
I noticed that Bryan Lentz voted against the bill. Thank god this jackass got his butt kicked 2 weeks ago!!
Well I for one sure hope he vetoes it, since I believe it’s unlikely to pass PA constitutional muster.
Anyone want to tell me what the ONE subject is here:
“Amending Titles 18 (Crimes and Offenses) and 42 (Judiciary and Judicial Procedure) of the Pennsylvania Consolidated Statutes, IN GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF JUSTIFICATION, FURTHER PROVIDING FOR DEFINITIONS, FOR USE OF FORCE IN SELF- PROTECTION, FOR USE OF FORCE FOR THE PROTECTION OF OTHER PERSONS, FOR GRADING OF THEFT OFFENSES AND FOR LICENSES TO CARRY FIREARMS; PROVIDING FOR CIVIL IMMUNITY FOR USE OF FORCE; AND further providing for registration of sexual offenders AND FOR SENTENCE FOR FAILURE TO COMPLY WITH REGISTRATION OF SEXUAL OFFENDERS.”
The PA constitution requires that bills only have ONE subject. But that “AND” in there seems like it joins TWO subjects. This is a bad bill, and if we get cozy with this bill, it’s likely that it’ll lose a court challenge. That court challenge might even occur when we don’t have control of the house, senate, and gov mansion anymore. Seriously, next year we’ll have the chance to do it right instead of always hoping nobody challenges this bill in court.
To be clear, this is the beginning of the second subject:
“AND further providing for registration of sexual offenders…”
It clearly has nothing to do with anything preceding it, unless you want to really stretch logic and say things like “they’re both written in English.”
If challenged, does the entire bill go down the drain, or is the Megan’s law crap get severed?
Some folks on pafoa are saying that you cannot line item veto bills like this one. If they are correct then the whole bill lives or dies together.
Some folks on PAFOA are correct. Line item only applies to appropriations.
Congratulations guys! You’ve worked hard for this
Guest, Mike, et al:
While I believe John Hohenwarter was as instrumental in getting this bill passed, as was the FOAC and its volunteers, PAFOA and its volunteers, and all citizens who called in support of this bill, I personally believe he still has questions and actions to answer for. To say he was right now simply because HB1926 has passed is Monday Morning Quarterbacking; IMHO the ends don’t justify the means. At the time of the lobbying event last month, we knew none of the information we have now, so basing any discussion on information obtained after that is disingenuous. That’s why I still want to know:
– Why, AT THE TIME, he took what appeared at the time to be a longer, more difficult route
– What he knew that we didn’t AT THE TIME
– Why he didn’t share what he knew AT THE TIME if he did know something we didn’t
Getting this done is a good thing, but how we reach the end of the road is as important as the end itself. If we can’t work together along the way, it will make future efforts as hard or harder.
If this bill is challenged in court on constitutionality, it’s been decided in previous PA Supreme Court cases that the court can “sever” the unconstitutional portions of the bill from the rest, leaving the remainder of the bill intact. As HB1926 prior to the Alloway amendment was already a Title 18 and Title 42 bill, as long as the entirety of the Title 18 portion isn’t severed, there’s no reason to believe the CD/SyG portion would be removed by the court. Even if it was challenged, as I’ve said, the common link is abduction/kidnapping, as that’s at the heart of Megan’s law, and use of force guidelines have always had in them an affirmative defense for use of force to prevent abduction/kidnapping.
Just my $0.02.
So ChamberedRound, which is the ONE subject in the bill?
I may do some research on the PA germaneness issue and write a post about it. There’s a constitutional provision that requires it, but I don’t know how courts have typically enforced it. They are both changes in criminal law. Is that enough? I don’t really know. I’d need to find people well versed in PA constitutional law.
Actually it was the NRA strategy, a strategy that was [u]quite different[/u] from the strategy of “the FOAC and its volunteers, PAFOA and its volunteers” (who trashed John H. and the NRA online) that proved to be successful.
You can try and minimize it by calling it “Monday morning quarterbacking,” but who was really correct is obvious.
I don’t have a problem with disagreements on how to get things done, but what has left a bitter taste is the intemperate and baseless criticism by the tail that got butthurt ’cause it couldn’t wag the dog!
IMHO, the subject is amendment of codes pertaining to abduction/kidnapping and those who perpetrate such crimes.
HB1926 was a dual-title bill even prior to the Alloway Amendement being added. Adding a 3rd title wouldn’t have been relevant, IMHO, but I don’t see how amending codes underneath one of the titles already specified (Crimes Code) is a problem, especially when codes amended already mentioned adbuction/kidnappping in their text.
Whether all of the amended codes contained therein are germane: my opinion is yes, as I’ve stated before in other comments here. You obviously don’t agree, and I don’t think one of us is going to convince the other.
Interview with John Hohenwarter, NRA’s PA lobbyist here.