(June 2003) Early in May Tripwire readers had the bright idea of asking the GOP to nominate Don Murphy, former Delegate, for a Republican 'man of the year' award to be given at the recent convention. Murphy was certainly deserving of the honor. Even though redistricted out of his seat, he selflessly dedicated himself against difficult odds to elect pro-gunners across the state. He played a key role in our ouster of Casper Taylor, which rocked state politics.

We thought positive recognition for efforts that benefited the firearm community and citizens of Maryland would strengthen the party's support for our issue. To spotlight this idea, we dropped a note to a few hundred subscribers suggesting they and friends contact state HQ and express support - just enough to lock it on the GOP agenda.

The office staff there kindly confirms that response to our mailing was terrific, with nearly a thousand cards and letters flowing in to their Annapolis headquarters. Good show, gang! Unfortunately, the effort was all for nothing.

You see, when party leaders announced they would accept nominations for the prize, it was just for show. We now know they had already purchased the award plaque announcing someone else as the winner a full month before the nomination deadline. Okay. If that's the way the GOP wants to do business, then that's entirely their concern. We launched our project with full knowledge that someone else might win, so congrats to the fundraiser they selected.

Unfortunately the GOP reached this end in a way that fully justifies criticism we've leveled at it in the past. When responding to press inquiries about our project, state GOP chairman John Kane worked aggressively to minimize and deny the extent of our grassroots outreach. Then in widely distributed email he declared activists ought not be "developing issues." Insiders confirm party leadership is unwilling to touch firearm issues which might risk their 'big tent' model of fund raising ('we have a place for everyone's money!') and in this case did not want to reward party upstarts … upstarts like organizational professional Don Murphy, who won gains on behalf of citizen rights.

Instead of boosting a constituency by acknowledging our community's strong grassroots interest (independent of who won this award), Kane sought to diminish the visibility of our reach. If any party wants to treat issue groups as competitors instead of possible allies, then too bad for us all.