Congressional candidate Charlotte Lane is running in a crowded Republican field in West Virginia’s Second Congressional district.
Lane is a former commissioner of the International Trade Commission and of the West Virginia Public Service Commission.
The West Virginia Coal Association has endorsed her.
Lane is being challenged from the right by a number of candidates — including out of stater Alex Mooney and Berkeley Springs native Ken Reed.
On Hoppy Kercheval’s Talkline radio show on Monday, Lane was asked “What does the Second Amendment mean to you?”
“The Second Amendment means that we have a right to bear arms,” Lane said. “I am a strong supporter of the Second Amendment. I am a member of the NRA (National Rifle Association). And I will not do anything that will diminish the Second Amendment protections that we have under the constitution.”
Kercheval asked whether there were any “limitations on an individuals ability to keep and bear arms.”
Lane said “not that I’m aware of.”
Kercheval then asked — “so I could have a bazooka?”
“Yes,” Lane answered matter of factly.
After the interview ended, Kercheval told his audience that the bazooka question was not a “trick question” or an “unfair question.”
“Almost every candidate in West Virginia is going to be for the right to keep and bear arms, which is what I think,” Kercheval said. “However, the courts have said over and over again that there are limitations to rights. And some of you just drive off the road when I say that. But it’s true.”
“There are limitations to free speech,” Kercheval said. “You can’t yell fire in a crowded theater or slander someone. Same way with the Second Amendment. Don’t take my word for it. Listen to Justice Antonin Scalia. This from an interview he did about a year or two ago. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia said that the Constitution’s right to bear arms isn’t absolute and could be changed in the future. Scalia, a card carrying conservative and stalwart of the Court’s right leaning majority, told Fox News Sunday that the Second Amendment’s language, allowing citizens to own weapons, doesn’t mean they can own any weapon they want. ‘There are some limitations that can be imposed,’ Scalia said. ‘Obviously, the Second Amendment does not apply to weapons that cannot be hand carried. It’s to keep and bear, so it doesn’t apply to cannons. But I suppose there are hand held rocket launchers that can bring down airplanes, so that will have to be decided.”
Kercheval called the right “a right with limitations.”
“Where are those limitations?” Kercheval asked.
“You may believe that a bazooka is within the realm of the right to keep and bear, because you could bear it, you could hold it. I’m really not trying to trick. I’m trying to establish what you believe the Second Amendment means.”