Tennessee: Vote for Bob Corker for A Pro-Gun U.S. Senate

With Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist—a staunch pro-gun leader—stepping down from his post as Tennessee’s senior senator this spring to prepare for a possible presidential bid in 2008, the race for his vacant seat could well be the deciding factor in whether pro-gun or anti-gun forces control the U.S. Senate in years to come.

In contention for the seat vacated by Frist are former Chattanooga Mayor and Republican candidate Bob Corker, and Democrat contender and current Tennessee Congressman Harold Ford Jr.

Corker’s Second Amendment views and judicial philosophy have earned endorsements by newspapers in Nashville, Knoxville, Memphis and Chattanooga, endorsement by Sen. Frist himself, and endorsement by the National Rifle Association’s Political Victory Fund (PVF).

“With Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist vacating his seat, Tennessee voters will have a major impact on the future makeup of the U.S. Senate,” said NRA-PVF Chairman Chris W. Cox. “On Tuesday, Nov. 7, voters in that state must protect our gun rights by electing Bob Corker and, therefore, solidifying a pro-Second Amendment majority in the Senate.”

Elected mayor of Chattanooga in 2001, Corker used the business acumen he obtained through years of success in construction and real estate to dramatically improve life in Tennessee’s fourth-largest city. Under Corker’s leadership, violent crime in Chattanooga was reduced by 51 percent. “The drop in crime our city has realized,” Corker says, “is the result of hard work and a focused strategy designed to get criminals and thugs off our streets and behind bars for many, many years.”

During Corker’s tenure as mayor of Chattanooga, city government became smaller and more efficient. Nine public schools that had been listed as “failing” by the state soon began to outpace all other schools, with educators clamoring to work there.

“Corker is a proven leader,” Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist told the Associated Press. “He’s a man of character, a man of integrity and a man who knows how to get things done.”

But it’s Corker’s stance on both the Second Amendment and judicial appointments that hold the greatest prospect for securing the future of our Right to Keep and Bear Arms.

On his campaign website, Corker pledges: “As senator, I will protect the Second Amendment’s guarantee of our right to bear arms and reject attempts to limit the freedom of law-abiding gun owners. The best way to stop crime is to capture and imprison criminals—not to impose new burdens on law-abiding citizens. During my tenure as mayor of Chattanooga, we cut violent crime in half in three years by putting repeat criminals behind bars.”

In his “Blueprint for Tennessee,” a treatise on his values and aspirations for the state, Corker notes, “To preserve the traditions of faith and family, and uphold our traditional values, we must ensure the judicial branch respects its proper role in a constitutional democracy, and we must fight for our Second Amendment rights.”

Corker, too, holds the view that judges must not legislate from the bench, but rather issue rulings that comport with the intent of the Constitution. Therefore, he will be a critical ally to gun owners when elected to the Senate.

On his campaign website, bobcorkerforsenate.com, Corker promises once elected to, “Support the confirmation of conservative judges like Justices Roberts and Alito, who will interpret laws, not create them,” and to “oppose any legislative efforts to restrict our constitutional right to bear arms.”

Considering the Chuck Schumer-led, full-on push to retake a U.S. Senate majority in November, the reason why Tennessee voters must elect Corker is revealed in utmost clarity.

Schumer, head of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, needs every seat he can muster if he is to reach his goal of congressional control in 2007.

Be it filling election coffers, or be it forming an imposturous pro-gun, pro-hunting group called the “American Hunters and Shooters Association”—led by AGS, HCI and Brady Campaign operatives—Schumer is doggedly pursuing a majority that will gladly deconstruct the Second Amendment gains made since the twilight of the Clinton administration.

“The reason Tennessee voters must elect Bob Corker to the U.S. Senate this November is two-fold,” said NRA-ILA Chief Cox. “One, Corker will do what’s right for the constituents of his state.