Any frequent travellers have trouble remembering states they can carry in?

[JLStorm]

I travel to all 48 cont. states quite frequently (on the road 80 - 90% of the time), I can carry in 37 of them and I rarely spend more than 10 days in the same state at one time, often its more like 3 or 4. Anyway someone asked me what states I can carry in the other day and it made me realize that I really had no idea about most of them unless I look online or keep something in writing. I often find myself driving or flying to a different state with less than a few hours notice and having to do a quick search online if I have internet acces or hoping I have a copy of a map from handgunlaw.us to see if I am legal there. The problem is not everything can be planned ahead of time.

Anyway I decided to order 2 dog tags to attach to my briefcase, I figured they would last for a while without getting damaged or falling off (I couldnt fit all 37 state abrieviations on 1 tag) so that I would know if I was legal or not before crossing over state lines. I realized later, I could have fit the 11 states I couldnt carry in on one tag..but ohwell too late.


So I got to wondering, do any other people who travel often face similar issues or am I just the odd one out?

 

[Robert Hairless]

You're not alone. We print out an itinerary before we go anywhere and make doublesure of states in which we're permitted and places to circumvent. Ohio, for example, was okay as long as we stayed out of 70 or 80 cities in it: we decided that it was easier just to scrap Ohio. Now, I learned from a thread in this forum, Ohio was reunified by a preemption law that made places like Columbus follow the state's gun laws.

I've just come across another thing you might try. Someone posted a link to his site in another section of the forum: U.S.A. Carry. It has a "multi-state permit generator" in which you enter your state permits and it builds a custom U.S. map showing all the states that recognize them.

There's one problem, though. The way the map is color coded makes a print of it on a monochromatic printer less than useful. It would be more useful if the final display showed all the "okay" states in white and all the "not okay" states in black or grey for printing purposes.

One can hope for the national reciprocity bill to pass and do away with the need to do these things. I don't mind California not trusting other Americans but I'd expected most of us to be looked on more favorably states like in Nevada, Washington, Oregon, Maine, and Minnesota.

 

[vintage68]

Very cool tool, wish I had that when I made a move cross country!

Thanks though for the link to the map!

 

[6_gunner]

I keep a printed list of states which honor my permit under the visor of my truck, just in case. It was copy-and-pasted from Packing.org. It also includes .gov sources and looks official enough to possibly help convince a skeptical LEO who's not totally familiar with laws regarding reciprocity.

 

[wdlsguy]

There is a similar tool at handgunlaw.us:

http://www.handgunlaw.us/LicMaps/ccwmap.php

 

[Robert Hairless]

Wdlsguy, thanks for mentioning the one at hangunlaw.us. Its printout is more useful than the one I mentioned.

 

[Gator]

I printed a wallet sized map from U.S.A. Carry, laminated it and carry it next to my permit.

 

[ptmmatssc]

One can hope for the national reciprocity bill to pass and do away with the need to do these things. I don't mind California not trusting other Americans but I'd expected most of us to be looked on more favorably states like in Nevada, Washington, Oregon, Maine, and Minnesota.

Hopefully , with the new reciprocity law passed , Maine WILL honor those from away . They have until jan 8 to come up with something , and I'll be on my toes at that time to get as many states recognized as possible . Not only will it help those from away , but will get other states to recognize maine's also

 

[BADUNAME15]

Thank god for H.R. 218, that is a good idea about the dog tags though