AMGOA Staff
Pennsylvania


Posts: 1,429

Heading into the home stretch, the Rhode Island House of Representatives voted Monday to require convicted domestic-abusers to surrender their guns for up to six years.

The House approved the legislation, after more than an hour of debate, on a 55 to 12 vote.

The opposition was led by the 11 member Republican bloc, with Rep. Sherry Roberts, R- West Greenwich, among those arguing: "We are going to make many of our constituents into criminals needlessly."

"If you get some crazy person who really wants to kill someone and they don't have a gun, guess what?" she said. "They're going to find another means to do that. They'll hit them with a car if they have to and what are we going to do? Are we going to outlaw cars?"

But proponents called the legislation, now headed to an uncertain fate in the Senate, a "reasonable balance" between gun rights and a public health threat, that has left a trail of homicide victims in its wake.

"This isn't a liberal [versus] conservative debate. It's a life saving-debate," said the lead sponsor, Rep. Teresa Tanzi, D-South Kingstown, reading off the names of many of the 27 states that, along with the District of Columbia, have what she described as similar laws.

http://www.providencejournal.com/news/20170626/ri-house-votes-to-require-domestic-abusers-to-surrender-their-guns-for-up-to-six-years