A bill that would allow Colorado residents to carry a concealed handgun without a permit took its first step Wednesday through the Republican-controlled Senate Finance committee on its way toward the Democratic-controlled House, where it will face stiff opposition.

The “constitutional carry” bill, as Senate Bill 17 is referred to, sponsored by father and son Sen. Tim Neville, R-Littleton, in the Senate and Rep. Patrick Neville, R-Castle Rock, in the House, now moves to the Senate State, Veterans and Military Affairs Committee, where a Republican majority is again expected to pass it.

But the bill also launched what has become a ritual of passionate debate at the Capitol and online in recent years on gun rights and gun safety, on the meaning of the Second Amendment and the power of state lawmakers to regulate gun ownership and gun use.

Supporters of the bill argued that a free people with the constitutionally guaranteed right to bear arms are safer than an unarmed or “legislatively disarmed” populace. They testified that there was no need for concealed carry permits in the state, because, as the law stands, Coloradans can carry firearms openly. Beyond a gun-purchase background check, they said, additional “permissions” are redundant and an affront to the Constitution.

“If you buy a gun, you are screened, end of story, no need for a plastic-coated permission slip,” tweeted James Viser, a gun-rights author and near-constant defender of the Second Amendment in the Colorado politics social media space.

But opponents, including victims of the shooting at the Aurora theater in 2012, cited the horrors of mass shootings in Colorado and around the country and the number of victims who fall every day to gun violence. Why lift the concealed carry permitting process, which includes gun training? they asked.

In their closing arguments, Democrats on the committee — Sens. Jessie Ullibarri, D-Westminster, and Matt Jones, D-Louisville, — restated points made in emotional opposition testimony over the hourslong course of the hearing. More people with more guns and less training is a bad formula that will not result in increased safety, but likely the opposite, they claimed.

Although his bill includes no safety requirement for permit-less concealed carry, Neville told committee members that, when a similar bill passed in Arizona, the rate at which people voluntarily went through training increased. He said he expected that it would be the same in Colorado.

Merely “putting your coat over your gun” shouldn’t change gun training or gun safety, Neville told The Statesman.

Handgun permitting programs would continue in the state if the bill passed. They include background and fingerprint checks, training in shooting and gun-handling, and they grant state sheriffs the power to deny or revoke permits. Coloradans looking to carry concealed guns in the 30 other concealed-carry U.S. states would still be required to show Colorado concealed carry permits.

Jones was unconvinced by Neville’s arguments and said that, even under the current conceal carry law, training requirements are slim. He said he thought both sides of the argument could agree that the need for more live-fire training time should be required of all gun users.

“Who is the good guy?” in a gunbattle, he asked. “Well, that’s highly conditional,” He was responding to arguments that “good guys with guns” are the best way to stop “bad guys with guns.”

Neville is one of a field of 12 Republicans — as of this writing — running for the Republican nomination to unseat Democratic U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet in the general election this year. He said he understood that discussion of his bill was emotional because “lots of people have had losses,” as he put it, but he said that people seeking to defend themselves as best they can is a natural right.

“I don’t think anybody in this room thinks we should stop people from protecting themselves,” he said. “There are lots of (car) deaths,” Neville said. “And we still view (cars) as a tool.”

Ulibarri noted that testimony piled high against the bill — three to one in opposition, he said. This a contrast from 2013 gun legislation that brought throngs of gun rights supporters to the Capitol creating standing room only situations in the Old Supreme Court Chamber and driving committee hearings into the late night hours.

It seemed clear early on in the hearing that people testifying would fail to persuade one another to see things differently. There was a sense of fruitlessness in some of the chatter around the committee, but those engaged didn’t see a doomed bill and a depressingly gridlocked conversation.

Laura Carno, a coalition member at new gun rights group Coloradans for Civil Liberties, is the well known gun rights activist who spearheaded the historic 2013 recalls of gun-control Senate President John Morse, D-Colorado Springs, and Sen. Angela Giron, D-Pueblo. The two lawmakers were part of the majority party at the Capitol that year that passed a suite of gun safety laws inspired by the shootings in Aurora and at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut. Carno told The Statesman she was glad Coloradans “were still having these discussions.”

“Just because we have a divided legislature doesn’t mean you don’t run a bill. The Republican caucus is a pro-gun caucus. Of course we should try to take back our (gun) rights. Look at all the non-gun bills people run on both sides that aren’t likely to pass.

“I think it’s great politics,” she added. “In a presidential election year, too. People are in favor of gun rights. People don’t think the Colorado gun control laws have made anybody safer.”

At least two more gun bills for now are scheduled to be heard at the Legislature. One, co-sponsored by Sen. Neville, seeks to lift a 15-round state cap on ammunition magazines. Another, sponsored by Rep. Justin Everett, R-Littleton, and also co-sponsored by Neville, would extend “make my day” legal protections to use deadly force against intruders to business owners, managers and employees inside their places of work.

With reporting by John Tomasic.

—kara@coloradostatesman.com