Ray of Hope?

Something Mike said got me to thinking yesterday. WI, the second-to-last state to ban concealed carry, recently became the 49^th state to pass some form of concealed carry provision. WI opted for "shall issue", meaning that a CCW permit is automatically granted upon an applicant's successful completion of all requirements for the permit. This is different from "may issue", where the granting of the permit is often at the whim of a single person or entity and can be denied for a host of reasons. CA, NY, NJ, MD, HI, CT, DE, MA, and AL are all "may issue" states and can deny their residents the right to carry concealed for any reason whatsoever.

What jumped out at me was that WI wasn't the only state to jump from no carry to "shall issue" - in fact, I checked this map and noticed that every single state that had no concealed carry provision turned to "shall issue" when the decision was reached to allow folks to legally carry concealed. Every. Single. State. It runs counter to what one would expect - a state that did not allow any sort of concealed carry at all going directly to "shall issue", meaning that anyone who qualified could get a concealed carry permit. The anti-freedom mindset being what it is, it's surprising that the powers-that-be in those states didn't try to push the legislation towards "may issue".

Of course, "may issue" itself is running into some pretty heavy fire these days - it's possible that the anti-freedom folks saw the writing on the wall. They may have realized that the folks pushing so passionately for the right to legally carry a concealed firearm wouldn't stop pushing if it was simply a permit that could be denied for any reason. It certainly can't be that they saw the unconstitutionality of "may issue" - in that applicants are not treated uniformly across a single state, let alone the country. State groups in the last nine states are pushing the change to "shall issue", and with any kind of luck they will be successful in their endeavors.

Here in MA, we're unique. You need a Class B at a minimum to own a handgun - and the Class B permit is "may issue". This means that in the state of Massachusetts, you could be a model citizen with a spotless criminal record, unimpeachable credentials, training to put that of a Navy Seal to shame, and still be denied a permit to own a handgun simply because the Chief of Police didn't like the look of you when you walked through the door. How this has been allowed to stand is beyond my comprehension - given that handguns are a staple of the military, it's hard to apply a Miller-esque approach that they are not covered by the Second Amendment.

Maybe Comm2A will be successful in the Hightower case and I won't have to hold my breath in 2013 when my permit comes up for renewal...

Again, the whole concept of a permit is an affront to all thinking people. If you can possess a handgun, you are more than capable of concealing it upon your person and carrying it anywhere you damn well please. Smith & Wesson does not refuse to ship J-frames to IL, nor did they refrain from selling them to Nebraska or Kansas before those states allowed concealed carry. It is folly to think that folks weren't simply carrying regardless of the law - having a permission slip from the government doesn't change who a person is. If they're of the kind to shoot someone over a parking space, they're not going to let the absence of a permit stop them.

The only people who get the permits are the ones that are trying their best to stay within the law - ironically this makes them the last people that need a permission slip...

That is all.