Chris W. Cox's Political Report: Annual Meeting 2006

n 2004, I promised that, with your help on Election Day, your NRA would save the American firearms industry. Well, as you know, last October Congress passed our Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act. It is now law, and American gun makers will never be held liable for the acts of violent criminals again!

We’re also fighting in our state capitols for laws like the Castle Doctrine. Criminals should have to retreat from you—not the other way around. The Castle Doctrine says you no longer have a “duty to retreat” if you’re attacked in your home, your vehicle, your place of business or anywhere else you have a legal right to be.

Americans are fed up with government bureaucrats that put the rights of criminals ahead of the rights of lawful citizens.

We’re also fighting state by state for worker protection laws. It’s wrong for employers to fire employees who choose to keep a legal firearm in their locked vehicles at work. If you can’t safely store a firearm in your car, the right to defend yourself away from your home disappears! No company, I don’t care if it’s Wal-Mart or Joe’s Mart, can infringe on your right to defend yourself. Your boss didn’t give you that right, and we won’t let him take it away!

When former New Orleans Police Chief Eddie Compass gave the order to confiscate all firearms from everyone in New Orleans, your NRA-ILA went down there and filed a federal lawsuit demanding that Mayor Ray Nagin stop this assault on civil rights. And we won.

Now, we’re working to make sure that the laws in every state in the country are clear—that what happened in New Orleans will never, ever happen again.

You’re hearing a theme here: your right to defend yourself! There’s a reason for that. Americans are fed up with government bureaucrats that put the rights of criminals ahead of the rights of lawful citizens.

Let me tell you a true story. Across the Wisconsin border in Des Moines, Iowa, Darlene Loudon is sitting in the waiting room at her dentist’s office. Suddenly, a man assaults her with an 8-inch knife! Just then, Darlene’s husband sees what’s happening, pulls his handgun and wounds the knife-wielder before he hurts anyone else. Darlene Loudon’s husband is licensed to carry.

Across the Wisconsin border in Detroit, Mich., an ex-con named Clabe Hunt is waiting. He’s waiting as 32-year-old Barbara Holland pulls into her garage. The ex-con slams her to the floor. Flat on her back, she looks up and sees his pistol in her face. She thinks about her young daughter inside the house. She draws her 9mm pistol from her waist, fires and kills Clabe Hunt. Barbara Holland is licensed to carry. This story happened on the other side of the Wisconsin border. Now let me tell you a true story about this side.

Two criminals, Maurice Mason and Bernie Frier, kidnap David Kline and drive to an abandoned farm, bind his hands with duct tape and rope and leave him for dead. David Kline is found six days later, barely alive, but doctors have to amputate his hands. As the criminals leave the farm, their car gets stuck, so they call a taxi. Cab driver John Romberg drives them to Baraboo, where Mason kills him.

Then on to Middleton, where both men beat, rape, then murder 22-year-old Jennifer Hitchcock. Now, I can’t tell you if David Kline, John Romberg or Jennifer Hitchcock ever wanted a Right-to-Carry permit. But I can tell you this: In Wisconsin, they never had that choice. Because Wisconsin is one of only two states in America that denies its residents any form of Right-to-Carry for personal protection. Why?

Why is your life worth less than someone’s life in Minnesota or Iowa or Michigan or in 45 other states? It’s not because the people don’t want Right-to-Carry. The polls show that you do. But your governor doesn’t.

Two times in three years, your legislature passed a personal protection act. Both times Gov. Jim Doyle vetoed it. He and his allies need to explain why they don’t trust the people who elected them, who pay their salaries and who pick up the tab for their armed security

365 days a year!

The truth is, in Right-to-Carry states, not all gun owners actually choose to get a carry permit.

But the criminals don’t know which ones do. When the wolves can’t tell the sheep from the lions, everyone is safer. But in Wisconsin, the wolves know that everyone is a sheep!

It’s time to get rid of politicians who play partisan politics with your rights and with your life! So, if you want a Castle Doctrine in Wisconsin; if you want Lawsuit Preemption; if you want Worker Protection in Wisconsin; and if you ever want a Personal Protection Act in Wisconsin … Dump Doyle, and replace him with a true friend of the Second Amendment, Mark Green!

We’ve got some big races coming up in November that will pave the way for the Second Amendment shootout of all time in the 2008 elections. If we don’t make sure that our pro-gun friends are re-elected this November, then the gun haters Hall of Shame—Ted Kennedy, Chuck Schumer, John Kerry and Dianne Feinstein—will control the U.S. Congress next year, along with their friends Nancy Pelosi and John “Let’s Ban All Handguns” Conyers. And in 2008, you can bet they’ll be together, campaigning for Hillary Clinton for president.

Friends, now is the time to unite, fight and make our politicians do what’s right. Thank you very much.