Texas Makes a 2nd Amendment Move: Senate Removes the Limit on Armed Teachers. Is Safety the Result?

 

 

Last May, at a high school southeast of Houston, a mass shooting left 10 dead and 13 wounded (see here and here).

The murders prompted much debate in the area of gun control and the arming of school staff. And on Monday, the Texas senate passed a bill that would eliminate a cap on how many trained, packing employees — known as “school marshals” — each campus may have. The legislation marks the first change to the marshal program since the Santa Fe High School killings.

Advertisement

Under the program, staff are instructed to serve as armed peace officers; their identities are kept secret from all but a handful of local officials.

Republican State Sen. Brandon Creighton told the Texas Tribune the bill grants control to individual school systems:

“School districts need to be able to tailor the school marshal program for their unique needs. SB 244 removes those limitations in statute on the school marshal program to accommodate the unique needs of districts across the state. Each individual district would be able to make those choices on what’s best for them.”

As expected, not everybody’s super psyched about a buncha school staff walking around strapped. Moms Demand Action volunteer Hilary Whitfield ain’t much for it:

“I’m very concerned for the safety of our schoolchildren as lawmakers continue to pass bills that would aggressively increase how many of our children’s teachers are armed. We all want to keep our schools safer, but adding guns to the problem is not the solution.”

To put it simply, she’s wrong. If staff members are armed, that will serve as a deterrent to those hoping to take a school by storm. As my Navy Seal friend puts it, schools are currently “soft targets.”

Advertisement

However, there does remain a question: What is the balance of lives saved due to the deterrent versus harm done via accidents or improper use of force?

The bill — which was initially proposed by police groups — passed 20 to 10.

It’ll now go to the House for debate.

What do you think? Are we safer with more guns in school? Or is it best to limit the number of armed staff, therefore hopefully more effectively relegating the privilege to the very most-equipped staff to handle such an immense responsibility? That privilege, of course, should be limited thusly, regardless.

Personally, I like the idea of the districts deciding for themselves. How about you?

I look forward to hearing from you, in the Comments section below.

-Alex

 

Relevant RedState links in this article: here and here.

See 3 more pieces from me: helping women by aborting them, Family Guy on millennials, and the beauty of Superman.

Find all my RedState work here.

And please follow Alex Parker on Twitter and Facebook.

Thank you for reading! Please sound off in the Comments section below. For iPhone instructions, see the bottom of this page.

Advertisement

 

 

If you have an iPhone and want to comment, select the box with the upward arrow at the bottom of your screen; swipe left and choose “Request Desktop Site.” If it fails to automatically refresh, manually reload the page. Scroll down to the red horizontal bar that says “Show Comments.”

Recommended

Join the conversation as a VIP Member

Trending on RedState Videos