Justices Weigh Challenge to Open-Carry Ban

[SecularMotion]

Law-abiding Floridians should be allowed to openly carry firearms in public, a gun-rights groups argued Wednesday to the Florida Supreme Court on behalf of a man arrested four years ago while strolling with a visibly holstered weapon in Fort Pierce.

Florida Carry attorney Eric Friday said the state's nearly 30-year-old concealed-weapons law violates the U.S. Constitution's Second Amendment, which he said requires people to be allowed to openly carry guns. Lawmakers this year considered a proposal to allow people with concealed-weapons licenses to openly carry firearms, but the bill did not pass.

"Quite frankly, the Legislature at this point has deprived citizens of the substantive right to bear arms," Friday said as some justices appeared skeptical of his argument.

Justices Barbara Pariente and Peggy Quince questioned how the current state law allowing citizens to receive concealed-weapons licenses to carry firearms suppresses gun ownership.

http://www.sunshinestatenews.com/story/justices-weigh-challenge-open-carry-ban

[Tortmaster]

1. I have yet to see an open carry.

When I do, I'll call the police.

[Duckhunter935]

2. I have many times

Ever felt the need to call the police as the person's were doing nothing wrong, it was legal and the weapons were properly holstered.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

3. Where I live it's so common as to not be worth a second look.

And not to be a jerk but I can't help but point out -- when you call the police you are calling for people with guns because they have guns.

[safeinOhio]

4. Works great for white people

others, not so much.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

5. Unless you're proposing that one abrogation of rights is satisfied by further abrogation of rights

I'm not sure what your comment is supposed to tell us.

Would the death of Eric Garner be improved if a white person was subsequently choked to death?

[gejohnston]

7. the white guy was well known to the local PD for baiting cops,

and was encountered by different cops, in a different PD, in a different jurisdiction. We don't know how many times the white guy was put on the ground, we don't know how many the black guy wasn't. We don't know what the SOPs of those departments are. Now if it were the same cops in the same jurisdiction, you would have valid point about those individual cops. The video is racebaiting bullshit. Overgeneralizing about whites, even white cops, is just as racist.

Back to Florida. Why did Florida ban open carry in 1893?

In an concurring the majority opinion of overturning a white person's conviction,
“I know something of the history of this legislation. The original Act of 1893 was passed when there was a great influx of Negro laborers in this state drawn here for the purpose of working in turpentine and lumber camps. The same condition existed when the act was amended in 1901 and the act was passed for the purpose of disarming the negro laborers and to thereby reduce the unlawful homicides that were prevalent in turpentine and saw-mill camps and to give the white citizens in sparsely settled areas a better feeling of security. The statute was never intended to be applied to the white population and in practice has never been so applied. We have no statistics avail­able, but it is a safe guess that more than 80 percent of the white men living in rural sections of Florida have violated this statute. It is also a safe guess to say that not more than 5 percent of the men in Florida who own pistols and repeating rifles have ever applied to the Board of County Commissioners for a permit to have the same in their possession and there has never been, within my knowledge, any effort to enforce the provisions of this statute as to white people, because it has been generally conceded to be in contravention of the Constitution and non-enforceable if contested” (Watson v. State, concurring opinion).

http://www.davekopel.org/2A/Mags/dark-secret-of-jim-crow.html
http://inthesetimes.com/article/3857/talking_about_guns_fighting_about_race

[safeinOhio]

8. Well, it's not easy being a cop these days

[gejohnston]

9. Yeah just ask the cops that were falsely accused of murder and racism

like Wilson by racist antisemitic fucks like Armenian genocide denier Cenk Uyger. Yes, I'm saying Uyger is an anti white racist. This, like all of his movies, are mockumentries not documentaries. BTW, if Moore were in the exact same situation, he would do the same thing.

[TeddyR]

6. Personally opposed to open carry

And don't agree that it is necessarily a constitutionally protected right. I prefer concealed carry with a shall-issue licensing approach.

[Eleanors38]

10. I am on the same page. States must recognize the right to carry, but

cannot deny the right. They can of course recognize both means, but they don't have to.

[TeddyR]

11. The 9th Circuit ruling today is interesting

Since it oks laws banning concealed carry but indicates open carry might be constitutional. Of course, some will argue that Heller is limited to self-defense in the home and that states can ban any kind of carry. That seems very questionable to me.

On edit, I really dislike these "good cause" laws. They are basically a means for denying the right to carry at all, dressed up as leaving the issue in the hands of the local law enforcement. That type of system is ripe for abuse. I wonder what gun control advocates would think of such a licensing scheme if it was proven that the local decision-maker was denying applications based on race?

[Eleanors38]

12. "Good cause" and "may issue" are, IMO, Jim Crow holdovers, and elitist in any case.