ATLANTA -- A bill loosening restrictions on how and where Georgia drivers can carry weapons overwhelmingly passed the Senate today.

House Bill 89, approved 41-15, would also allow gun owners to carry their firearms anywhere in their vehicles and could require some employers to allow employees to bring weapons to work in their vehicles. It would also bar someone from buying a gun for anyone who's would not be eligible to own a firearm, such as a convicted felon.

The employer provision, a legislative priority for the National Rifle Association, was heavily modified by an effort to satisfy the Georgia Chamber of Commerce. The chamber opposed an earlier Senate proposal that would have required most companies to allow employees to keep guns in vehicles parked at work, saying it would infringe on the private property rights of employers who own the property where their business is located.

The measure approved Thursday includes several exceptions that would exempt any property owner or any employer who provides a secure parking lot and bans all guns from their property.

"A private property owner may in fact ban weapons on their property at any time," said Sen. Chip Rogers, R-Woodstock.

Rogers said the measure would protect Georgians' Second Amendment right to bear arms.

"Those rights have already been granted. ... However it's being taken away from them through a decision that they've had to make whether they want that job or not," he said.

A proposed change to HB 89 was turned back on a 17-29 vote that would have given lease owners a greater say in whether guns could be carried on property they control. Supporters of the original bill said it could lead to conflicting orders from different leaseholders in the same complex, an issue labeled a "red herring" by Sen. David Adelman, D-Decatur.