MACON, Ga. (ABP) — A federal judge declined Aug. 23 to block enforcement of Georgia's new law banning the carrying of firearms in a house of worship. Instead District Judge Ashley Royal will make his decision on whether the law is constitutional after fully considering arguments by attorneys in legal documents.
The lawsuit, filed July 7 by plaintiffs including GeorgiaCarry.Org, a non-profit gun-rights organization, and Baptist Tabernacle, an independent Baptist congregation in Thomaston, Ga., is thought to be the first of its kind since the U.S. Supreme Court ruled June 28 that handgun possession is a constitutional right under the Second Amendment.
The lawsuit contends that a bill signed into law June 4 by Gov. Sonny Perdue (R) making it a crime to carry a weapon in a "place of worship" violates not only the church's Second Amendment rights, but also "interferes with the free exercise of religion" guaranteed in the First Amendment by prohibiting activities in place of worship that are "generally permitted throughout the state."
"One of the sacred rights given to man by God Almighty is the right of self-defense," says a statement on the church website explaining why the congregation is suing the state. After the shooting death of a Southern Baptist pastor preaching in his pulpit at an Illinois church in March 2009, the church says it resolved "to always have a responsible and trained individual armed for protective services." Georgia now regards that precaution, the statement says, as a "criminal" act.
The lawsuit says the church would like to allow certain members possessing a valid Georgia weapons license to carry firearms on church property.
Pastor Jonathan Wilkins, who is also named as a plaintiff, claims that while conducting worship services he would like to "carry a firearm for defense of himself, his family and his flock, but he is in fear of arrest and prosecution for doing so."
Wilkins, frequently the only occupant of the building while working in his office at the church, would also like to keep a firearm there for self-defense.
The church says in its website statement that the new Georgia law "forbids our sacred right to carry weapons to defend our families from lawless renegades while at church" and "serves notice to criminals that we are unarmed leaving us defenseless and vulnerable to attack."
"As a body of believers, on our own property, it should be our decision and not the state's as to whether we will allow armed people on that property," the statement says.
The plaintiffs asked for a preliminary injunction to block enforcement of the gun law, claiming "irreparable harm in the form of the inability to exercise their fundamental constitutional First and Second Amendment rights."
After a 30-minute hearing in the federal District Court for the Middle District of Georgia, however, the judge denied the preliminary injunction, citing complexity of legal issues involved in the case.
According to the Macon Telegraph, Georgia is one of four states — along with Arkansas, Mississippi and North Dakota — that prohibit guns in churches. Several states allow guns in church, as long as the church gives permission.
-30-
Bob Allen is senior writer for Associated Baptist Press.