Noah Williams

As of August 1^st 2016, all public colleges and universities in the state of Texas must allow qualifying students to carry concealed handguns on campus. The law happened to be put into affect on the 50^th anniversary of the Clock Tower Massacre at the University of Texas at Austin.

During the 1966 shooting, which has come to be recognized as the first mass shooting in U.S. history, former Marine Charles Witman climbed 300 feet up the campus clock tower, and began shooting passers by bellow. During the hour and a half long slaughter, Witman managed to shoot 49 people, including the 14 who died.

Texas is now one of ten states in which the right to carry firearm onto a college or university campus is protected by law. Federal law prohibits any one under the age of 21 from purchasing or possessing a handgun, as does the new law in Texas, and the schools have retained the right to distinguish “exclusion zones” where firearms will not be allowed.

At the University of Texas Austin, firearms will not be allowed in dorm rooms, sporting events, chemical laboratories, or business that acquire 51% of their income from the sale of alcohol, but firearms may be keep in sorority and fraternity housing because they are not campus property. Students must possess a valid concealed carry license for the state of Texas and be 21 years or older, and meet certain other requirements in order to be eligible.

There has been considerable backlash from students and faculty over the implementation of “campus carry,” including the resignation of UT Austin’s dean of architecture, and the rise of a student protest group called “Cocks not Glocks”.

The student protesters openly carry sex toys (which is against UT Austin’s Code of Conduct) as a statement against the right to carry a gun to class. Openly displaying a sex toy in public is a misdemeanor in Texas. However, the law stipulates that no public college or university can prohibit the lawful carry of a concealed weapon, and as of yet no changes to the law have been made.

In 2017, all two-year community colleges and private four-year schools will be required to allow qualifying students to carry concealed weapons on campus as well as all public institutions.

In addition to the ten states which allow students on public campuses to carry firearms, ten states out-right ban the practice, while the other thirty give varying degrees of self-determination to public post-secondary institutions.

The university has put forth a multitude of information in an attempt to sooth the uneasiness soundings this transition. Such statistics include the fact the students have been able to have concealed firearms on campus (not in buildings) for twenty years, that fewer than 1% of the student body meets the requirements carry a firearm on campus.

Maine does not require a concealed weapons permit for a legally purchased firearm, but it is illegal to posses a weapon in a few locations including schools, bars, national parks, and most government buildings.