Gun lobby has little to fear in O’Connor

S andra O’Connor, President Reagan’s nominee to the Supreme Court, has won the endorse- _ ment of a couple of “gun lobby” groups in Yashington, but so far the National Rifle Association has been silentconcerning her nomination. For what it is worth, I am sure the NRA also a~proves_ of her _no~ination based on her record as a fm and unpartial Judge, one with the courage to be to~h _when toughness is called for, and her legislative record as a state senator. I was covering the state Senate during most of O’Connor’s service there, and I worked closely with her as a citizen on an important firearms bill. Th~t bill was described by the Washington lob~yists as measure “that would have made it easier for ArJZOna residents to obtain permits to carry concealed weapons.” That statement is 100 percent wrong. There never h~ been any such thing in Arizona as getting a permit to carry concealed weapons. In states w~e~e such pe~ts can be obtained, it seems that cnmmals sometimes wind up with permits easier than honest citizens. At my request – as a citizen who has worked for many years to see to it that Arizona has reasonable and enforceable firearms-control laws – O’Connor h_e~ped me rewrite state statutes to protect honest citizens from harassment or unwarranted arrest on concealed-weapons charges. We undertook to do that by detailing out in the law how firearms could be legally carried. During that period I learned a lot about O’Connor’s philosophy and character, because we debated the