By Michael Piwowarski
BAY CITY – “It’s my civic duty as a United States citizen.”
Bay City resident Padraic Ingle is an unapologetic supporter of the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. He is among the many residents of Bay County who are lobbying to make their county into a “sanctuary” for Second Amendment rights.
Second Amendment sanctuaries refer to states and counties in the U.S. that have adopted resolutions that do not allow the enforcement of certain measures that infringe on Second Amendment rights. Individual counties in several states – including Colorado, Florida and Illinois – have become second amendment sanctuaries. However, no counties or governances in Michigan have followed suit yet.
Ingle’s Facebook event “Bay County 2A Sanctuary Resolution,” to which 30 responded “going” and 136 “interested,” rallied his fellow citizens to attend the Bay County board of commissioners meeting Tuesday and present them with a “sanctuary county” resolution.
After the citizens voiced their support at public comment, the commissioners agreed to review the resolution and look into putting it up for vote at the next meeting.
“I don’t think there’s any reason why the resolution shouldn’t pass,” says Ingle. “It’s simply a reaffirmation of oaths that they have already taken to the U.S. and Michigan Constitution.”
Ingle says that it is important for the commissioners to reaffirm their oaths because of legislation happening in other states which undermines the second amendment.
“Specifically, extreme risk protection orders – also known as red flag laws – they are unconstitutional and they are in place, and they are being enforced, and we don’t think it’s fair on the law enforcement officers to have to enforce unconstitutional laws and put themselves in harm’s way,” says Ingle.
Earl Lackie, Republican candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives in Michigan’s 5th congressional district, also came to the meeting in support of the measure.
“These red flag laws that are coming down the pipeline; what we’re trying to do is head it off so we don’t have a problem like they got in Virginia,” says Lackie.
On Monday, several gun control bills were passed in Virginia by the state’s senate judiciary committee, as reported by WTVR-TV. Background checks, monthly gun limits, red flag laws and restrictions are among the restrictive measures that they have put into place.
When talking to the Collegiate about his beliefs, Ingle quoted author Robert A. Heinlein: “An armed society is a polite society.”
“When people don’t have the right to defend themselves,” Ingle continued, “criminals sweep in and they’re the only ones with the means to exert their power over anybody else. How are you going to defend against that?”
Michael Duranczyk, chair of the board of commissioners, also supports the Second Amendment, citing other states that have passed similar measures to the sanctuary county measure.
“If you look out west, just about all of the western states have passed it statewide […] so they’re […] concerned about their firearms rights and the second amendment rights being deterred upon,” says Duranczyk.
Lackie and Ingle are both optimistic that a Second Amendment sanctuary measure can be passed in all other Michigan counties.
“People who favor gun control don’t understand that all these things that are happening with gun violence; it’s not the gun, it’s the person,” says Lackie. “What we need to do is put more money into the mental health of the people involved, and more money into mental health overall.”
