[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 50 (Tuesday, March 24, 2009)]
[House]
[Pages H3754-H3755]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




            CONSISTENCY, NOT CHAOS IN OUR PUBLIC LAND POLICY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Utah 
(Mr. Bishop) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BISHOP of Utah. Mr. Speaker, I am sure we all know the old story 
of the newlywed couple whose wife on her first meal that she prepares 
of a cooked ham presents the ham, and the two ends have been cut off.
  When her husband asks why, she says, ``I don't know. That's the way 
my mother did it,'' and when the mother-in-law shows up, they ask why, 
and she says, ``I don't know. That's the way my mother did it,'' and 
when the grandmother finally arrives and they ask why she cut the ends 
of the ham off, the grandmother simply says, ``I have a small oven. A 
full ham won't fit.''
  There are many things we do in government that are traditions that 
are as totally illogical as cutting the ends of the ham off. Only in a 
Federal court in this United States can we find a special interest 
group that can track down a maverick judge that contends that 8 months 
of study by the Department of Interior is, in fact, a last-minute 
review and because, in January of this year, the Department of Interior 
and the National Park Service finally updated its rules to allow 
concealed carry on national parks lands and make it consistent with our 
policy of concealed carry on all public lands.
  You see, the national forest does not prohibit someone with a valid 
concealed carry license from going on public lands. The Bureau of Land 
Management, which manages some of our national parks, does not prohibit 
a valid concealed carry permit for going on their lands. Even President 
Clinton gave an executive order saying that our policies should reflect 
the State prerogative and authority. Only the National Park Service has 
tried to prohibit that practice, and the National Park Service is not 
just things like Yellowstone. It is virtually impossible, or at least 
it will challenge you, to try to get from Virginia into Washington, 
D.C. without either driving or walking on National Park Service land. 
You go in and you go out. There are no signs to tell you what you were 
doing, and indeed, law-abiding citizens have been

[[Page H3755]]

entrapped on park service land, carrying a concealed weapon permit, 
where if they had gone a couple of blocks further and had been back in 
Virginia, they would have, indeed, been legal. That is illogical and it 
is also unfair.
  What we should do is what the National Park Service decided to do in 
January and simply say State laws will be the ruling procedure. If it 
is legal for a concealed carry in this State, it is legal on all lands 
that are owned and controlled by the Federal Government, not just some 
lands ``yes'' and some lands ``no.''
  Mr. Hastings of Washington has an amendment that should be put on the 
bill that will be before us tomorrow to clarify once again that the 
policy of the United States should be consistent on all of their lands, 
not on some ``yes'' and some not on the others. It was an amendment 
that would bring respect back to the policy and the consideration and 
the study done by the Department of Interior, and it would reject an 
outstandingly flawed decision made by a judge that actually creates 
chaos rather than solving this particular problem.
  It is important that the Rules Committee does open up this particular 
bill for allowing the Hastings amendment so that we could actually 
debate this issue on the floor, because this is the proper time; this 
is the proper vehicle, and it is the right time for us to have 
consistency on our public land policy, not chaos in our public land 
policy, created by a judicial decision.

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