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      Neal Knox Update,  April 11 -- The Minnesota House passed a
shall-issue licensed carry bill which strips sheriff's of their frequently
abused discretion in issuing such licenses.  The 85-46 vote, and
Gov. Jesse Ventura's support, may revive a companion bill which was
killed by a Senate committee last week.

     It requires issuance of licenses to persons over 21 without
mental or felony records, who have completed some firearms
training.

     In a decision issued the same day, a Michigan Court of Appeals
refused to stop the counting of petition signatures attempting to
stop a public referendum of a similar bill scheduled to go into
effect this summer.  The referendum is being challenged by NRA and
Michigan groups contending that because the law contains an
appropriation it cannot be referred.
------------------

     New Mexico's compromise "shall issue" concealed carry
licensing law, signed last week by Gov. Gary Johnson, is facing
constitutional challenges from both sides according to Deputy
Attorney General Stuart Bluestone.

     It allows local communities to ban carrying within their
jurisdictions, but Bluestone said the constitution "is firm"
prohibiting local firearms regulations.

     Opponents of the law cite the constitution's strong right to
bear arms provision "for security and defense, for lawful hunting
and recreational use" also says "but nothing herein shall be held
to permit the carrying of concealed weapons" -- which they argue
bans all concealed carrying.
------------------

     Yesterday by a 5-3 vote a Texas House committee approved a
bill requiring a Federal NICS criminal background checks on all
sales at gun shows.

     Rep. Rick Green argued that the bill was too restrictive
because FBI will not conduct the checks for individuals.  Rep.
Green told me in Austin last month that the Criminal Jurisprudence
Committee, to which Speaker Pete Laney had assigned all this year's
gun bills, was 5-4 in favor of the gun show bill.
------------------

     In the Louisiana Senate yesterday a bill requiring all
handguns to be locked up if there were children under 11 in the
home went down in flames -- gathering on eight votes in the 39-
member body.

     His attempt to pass a resolution saying that was how guns
should be stored failed by the same vote.
------------------

     The state Education Minister told New South Wales Parliament
that a 15-year-old Australian boy had written detailed plans in his
diary to "replicate" the Columbine school murders at his high
school.  The diary was given to school officials by three fellow
students last week.

     The boy's father was licensed to own a gun, police told reporters.
--------------------

     Dr. Miguel Faria, editor of The Medical Sentinel, official
journal of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons,
rips the public health establishment for presenting biased studies
condemning firearms in its spring issue.

     In 1979, Dr. Faria charges, the health establishment stated
its objective was "total eradication of handguns in the United
States," and claims the subsequently published studies reflected
and were influenced by that objective.
------------------

     The Cato Institute, a highly respected Libertarian think tank
in Washington, has published a scathing indictment of former
Senator and Special Counsel John Danforth's investigation of
whether Federal agents "committed bad acts" at Waco.

     The 18-page report, "No Confidence: An Unofficial Account of
the Waco Incident" by Timothy Lynch, is a carefully footnoted,
detailed timeline and critique of unquestioned violations of law by
Federal officers which were never prosecuted -- such as the beating
of a television cameraman filming BATF's retreat after the initial
raid, the raid supervisors' lying to officials, admitted firing of
potentially lethal ferret rounds into the building without knowing
where innocents were during FBI's final assault, and other illegal
acts.

       Lynch discusses at length the stacatto flashes on the FBI
infrared tape of the final fire, which numerous FLIR experts declared were
gunflashes, but Danforth unquestioningly accepted the government-hired
experts'
testimony.

     "Danforth's sweeping exoneration of federal officials is not
supported by the factual record," he concluded.  The report is
available at www.catoinstitute.org.
--------------------

     The Senate left for "spring break" Monday after putting the
final touches on the Campaign Finance "Reform" Bill.  In last
Friday's Wall Street Journal two ACLU officials -- one of whom had
argued and won the landmark Buckley campaign law case -- blasted it
as unconstitutional and a violation of the First Amendment rights
of NAACP, National Right To Work, NRA and other groups.


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