Frankly, I don't like talking about guns in Texas.

Especially since the state passed the "right-to-carry" law, meaning the right to tote concealed weapons almost anywhere you want.

Before that law was passed, presumably we noncarriers had the "right" to at least see a gun (while being carried in public) before it was used.

Those racks in pickup windows filled with high-powered rifles were never comforting, but at least we knew where the guns were.

Well, maybe not all the guns. Even before the new law, going to the Cultural District in Fort Worth to visit an art museum or to take in a little science and history could be a heart-stopping experience if it coincided with the bimonthly gun show that had rented one of the great exhibit halls for the weekend.

In the parking lot, you could see scores of people taking weapons from their cars, trucks and oversize vehicles, and proudly parading them into a public place where they would be exhibited and/or sold.

At the invitation of one gun show promoter, I attended one ... once.

I wasn't just frightened by the number of guns, knives, ammunition and other weapons of mass destruction. I was also taken aback by the anti-government (and at that time, anti-president) propaganda so prominently displayed.

But I've come to learn that that is the nature of gun shows and gun-show enthusiasts.

As one who grew up around guns and hunters and men of the land, I'm not as frightened of the weapons as I am of the people who feel it necessary to espouse their right to use them, especially when they quote the Second Amendment while holding a high-powered rifle or an automatic pistol.

Yes indeed, those people unnerve me more than do the guns.

So, as I said, I don't like talking about this subject in Texas because nowadays - since former Gov. George W. Bush signed that right-to-carry law - you never know who's "packing."

The original legislation even permitted concealed weapons in church. No kidding.

Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition, Bubba!

Now comes President Bush's administration with a not-so-veiled attempt to broaden the definition of the right to bear arms.

For decades, it is has been widely held by the Justice Department (under Republican and Democratic administrations) that the Second Amendment does not grant the absolute right of an individual to own a firearm.

That "right of the people to keep and bear Arms," as stated in the Constitution is tied to those first 13 words of the Second Amendment, namely: "A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state ..."

The courts have regularly ruled that ownership is not unlimited - that government has the right to impose reasonable restrictions.

In briefs filed Monday in two cases before the Supreme Court, the Justice Department went on record to clarify "the current position of the United States."

That position "is that the Second Amendment more broadly protects the rights of individuals, including persons who are not members of any [state] militia or engaged in active military service or training, to possess and bear their own firearms."

We've known for some time that that is the view of the president and Attorney General John Ashcroft.

It also happens to be the view of the National Rifle Association to which the administration and many members of Congress are beholden.

The Justice Department's action before the Supreme Court on this matter is in part an attempt by the administration to appease the NRA. Grandstanding, if you will.

I suppose that's fine. But it is depressing to know that the administration would be willing to take such a drastic step backward to do so.

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Bob Ray Sanders' column appears Sundays, Wednesdays and Fridays. (817) 390-7775 bobray@star-telegram.com