interesting, troubling question about CCW

[hcddog]

Someone on a car board I frequent brought up the following, and somewhat troubling point today...

Concerning CCW permits: When you purchase a permit/license, you acknowledge/give up that the "Right" and voluntarily turn it into a privilege... I am not advocating breaking the law or anything here, but it truly concerns me... The State can revoke your privilage any time they see fit. That is not a Right...
Point in case: During the Olympics held in Utah a few years ago, Concealment Permits were suspended for the duration of the event.
***!
Once again, I think we are being sold a bill of goods by our elected officials. It's one more infringement.

I don't see the government requiring a permit, along with a fee for such permit, to be able to exercise my religion, practice free speech, etc.

At what point did a constitutional right become subject to having to obtain a permit for, that the government can take away at will? I thought that rights were no subject to the will of the government and could not be revoked.

Forgive if this has been brought up before, I never thought about this until someone else brought it up today, and it kinda bugs me.

 

[strat81]

The Constitution does not enumerate your right to carry a concealed weapon. Nor does it enumerate your right to kill people in the name of religion or yell "Fire!" in a crowded theater.

Of course, open carry rights and even rights of possession are severely compromised in certain jurisdictions. If you have a way of correcting that, let me know. Or, move to NYC, LA, or Chicago, let everyone know you have an unregistered weapon, and be a test case.

Or move to Alaska or Vermont. CCW is sans-permit there.

 

[Standing Wolf]

Concerning CCW permits: When you purchase a permit/license, you acknowledge/give up that the "Right" and voluntarily turn it into a privilege...

Yep. I see paying for the privilege of exercising my rights as an evil. It's the lesser of two evils, but an evil all the same.

 

[hcddog]

The Constitution does not enumerate your right to carry a concealed weapon. Nor does it enumerate your right to kill people in the name of religion or yell "Fire!" in a crowded theater.

Of course, open carry rights and even rights of possession are severely compromised in certain jurisdictions. If you have a way of correcting that, let me know. Or, move to NYC, LA, or Chicago, let everyone know you have an unregistered weapon, and be a test case.

Or move to Alaska or Vermont. CCW is sans-permit there.

So just because there are current restrictions in place, that makes it OK?

What part of "shall not be infringed" is open to interpretation?

I can "possibly" see the concealed part being an issue, but many places don't allow open carry as an alternative.

It's like placing a frog in a pot of water and slowly bringing it to a boil. It won't know it's being cooked and jump out until it's too late.

 

[strat81]

So just because there are current restrictions in place, that makes it OK?

What part of "shall not be infringed" is open to interpretation?

I never said it was ok. What do you propose to fix it?

All of "shall not be infringed" is open to interpretation. Just look at the mountain of federal, state, and local laws we have interpreting it. Some interpretation is fine, other interpretations... not so much.


I think we all agree with you, but, short of a new Revolution, there's not much that can happen so long as Joe Six-pack doesn't care. I counted... approximately 95% of the population can be considered Joe Six-pack. Unfortunate? Yes.

 

[JesseL]

Freedom comes from inside you. The State doesn't give it and they can't take it.

Generally I'll do what I want (such as carrying a concealed weapon), and I may or may not choose to make some effort (such as getting a CCW permit) not to stir up unwanted trouble with the gendarmes.

 

[Tommygunn]

Concerning CCW permits: When you purchase a permit/license, you acknowledge/give up that the "Right" and voluntarily turn it into a privilege... I am not advocating breaking the law or anything here, but it truly concerns me... The State can revoke your privilage any time they see fit. That is not a Right...

This is a "canard" that is often brought up by Constitutional purists. I think you have a point, as illustrated by your example of the CCW permits in Utah being suspended during the Olympics.
Oliver Wendell Holmes once stated; "If a man fails to enforce his rights, he cannot complain if, after awhile, the law follows his example." For a long time states got away with banning CCW (or open carry) of guns, and only in the last fifteen years or so has public pressure been enough to reverse this trend, which has been through licensing.
Ideally, I think we should not need a CCW permit. But, here in Alabama we have a system, while not "shall issue," is almost as good and fairly easy. I got my CCW in maybe five minutes.
Although I philosophically oppose it ... I still obey the law and have my CCW.
As Voltaire said; "It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong."

 

[wjustinen]

...voluntarily turn it into a privilege...It's one more infringement.

What you are actually acknowledging is that the state has the power - note that I did not say authority - to infringe upon your rights. The problem you face is that many - see the posts above - have bought into the nonsense that restricting various arms and methods of bearing arms does not infringe upon the right because - insert reason here.

It has been the norm for most of the last 200 years that various infringements are either considered to be "reasonable" or "necessary" and therefor legitimate. While that might be true if we were talking about any of the other enumerated or un-enumerated rights, the second ammendment specifically states "shall not be infringed."

Why anyone would think that the manner of carry - concealed or open - would be an issue is beyond me. There was certainly nothing mentioned in the debates surrounding the bill of rights that would indicate that the framers considered it to be an issue one way or the other.

 

[strat81]

While that might be true if we were talking about any of the other enumerated or un-enumerated rights, the second ammendment specifically states "shall not be infringed."

Are you implying drunk, meth-crazed rapists that beat their wives should enjoy the right to keep and bear arms?

 

[Zundfolge]

You have an alternative ... prostrate yourself before the government or become part of the "criminal class".

I'd rather carry a gun and survive a criminal attack.


Some of you people are living under the misapprehension that you still live in a free republic.

Are you implying drunk, meth-crazed rapists that beat their wives should enjoy the right to keep and bear arms?

No laws have stopped them from being "drunk, meth-crazed rapists that beat their wives" to this point. I guarantee you they are still armed. All restrictions on the ownership, possession or bearing of arms do is disarm the law abiding.

 

[fletcher]

This has been discussed before, and here's pretty much what I said last time:

It's better to pay for your permit and be armed than to go around armed with nothing but principle.

 

[Car Knocker]

Point in case: During the Olympics held in Utah a few years ago, Concealment Permits were suspended for the duration of the event.

This is not true. Olympic venues, for the duration of the Olympics, were added to the short list of places that CCW was prohibited. CCW in the rest of Utah went on as normal. See U.C.A. 53-12-301.1

 

[ServiceSoon]

Good point, but what is a poor white man to do?

 

[DoubleTapDrew]

Are you implying drunk, meth-crazed rapists that beat their wives should enjoy the right to keep and bear arms?

Are you implying drunk, meth-crazed rapists that beat their wives DONlT have weapons (and carry them concealed)? The laws only apply to those that obey them. I agree with where you are coming from but the flaw of laws is they only apply to the law-abiding.

 

[rb8941]

The government also has an obligation to protect its citizens. If concealed carry permits help to do that by reducing the number of weapons in the hands of convicted felons, the mentally impaired, etc., I'm all for them.

Before anyone gets crazed, I recognize that every law written can be broken and that carry permits will not prevent a bad guy from carrying a weapon if he wants to break the law. That doesn't mean, however, that the government doesn't have the responsibility to try to protect its citizens.

 

[strat81]

Are you implying drunk, meth-crazed rapists that beat their wives DONlT have weapons (and carry them concealed)? The laws only apply to those that obey them. I agree with where you are coming from but the flaw of laws is they only apply to the law-abiding.

Where in my post did I say anything about laws? I think that to enjoy a right, you have to be "in the right". That is, murder with a gun or slanderous speech is NOT what the 2A and 1A are about.

 

[Euclidean]

CCW permits are in fact morally wrong and detestable because it's nothing more than a modern day king's ransom.

So why do I have one?

#1. Competing moralities.

I have an obligation to certain people including myself to not go to jail, and it's either commit the sin of paying the king's ransom, or risk serious problems in court if anything were to happen. I judge my responsibility to keep out of the clink to be greater than my responsibility to not obey a bad law. The CCW is more of an "insurance policy" than anything. Which brings me to reason #2:

#2. The government forces us to do what it wants at gunpoint.

And on a more positive note:

#3. It sends a message to my politicians, and it helps show statistically that CCW permit holders are not dangerous people.

I believe at this point since I'm not willing to do anything illegal because of 1 and 2, while it seems counterintuitive, the best thing I can do is work with the CCW permit process that exists and try to expand its power and improve it. It really needs to become where it's no big deal in the minds of the public to carry a gun, like in Arizona or Alaska. Having the CCW permit is a concrete step towards change. After all, the CCW permits have been expanded on and made more powerful since the law was originally passed, and that implies to me it may be possible to use the CCW process to eventually reclaim lost rights or at least get pretty close. The thing is, laws, once passed, tend to stay on the books, so if you can get a law like a CCW permit passed and then slowly expand it every year (which is what the TSRA does) you can gradually get what you want in a realistic manner.

So yes, it's wrong, but I just have too many obligations to die on that hill yet. I've seen that the CCW process can be used to gradually work back towards what I want, and small but important gains are made yearly for the 2A using the CCW permit as a foothold.

 

[romma]

I was amazed when I found out CT even had a permit system before I started getting into guns. I had never met anybody that told me they had one, or even carried guns.

At the time when I found out, it was like pure joy that I would be able to carry.

Then I met you guys that taught me the truth about the whole thing.

 

[JohnBT]

"and somewhat troubling point today..."

I don't find the reality of day-to-day living troubling. I suppose if I were prone to navel gazing I could get wrapped up in thinking and worrying about a subject like this at length, but there's too much to do and too little time for action.

John
NRA Patron
Member www.vcdl.org

 

[Correia]

During the Olympics held in Utah a few years ago, Concealment Permits were suspended for the duration of the event.
***!

As pointed out above by Car Knocker, that isn't true at all. Only the Olympic venues were off limits, and even then, the state legislature put into the code that if anything bad happened because you were disarmed there, they took on the civil liability.

It is one thing to freak out about stuff, but please try to keep your freaking out to be about stuff that actually happened.

Turning a right into a privledge?

Well, in 48 states, if you carry without a permit, you're considered to be breaking the law, and you get punished.

In something like 40 states, if you do some paperwork and pay a fee, you can carry a gun.

So you can push it if you like. Good attorneys start at $250 an hour. Pony up, Activist Boy.

Now before the absolutists get all huffy and offended, I'm on tap to testify as a CCW instructor before my state legislature the next time Vermont carry comes up. I'm all about putting myself out of work. I don't think anything should be required to carry.

In the meantime, we've now got millions of people carrying guns around the country. I honestly believe that CCW has been the single most important thing we've got going for us in the culture war. A couple of decades ago, people who carried were seen as weird or paranoid in most places. Now it is mainstream and normal. Outside of a handful of states, everybody knows someone who carries, and it is coming to be seen as normal.

I'm teaching people to get CCWs now who I'm positive there was no way in the world they would have even thought about it ten years ago. In numbers comes strength.

We just had the biggest mass shooting in US history, and for the first time in my lifetime, the other side couldn't get jack squat out of it. Instead you had just as vocal a group shouting for CCW to be allowed to the students. That is amazing.

Sometimes when you stick to absolutes, you get absolutely nothing. CCW spreading through the nation has kicked the anti-gun movement in the groin, and has been a huge win for our side.

 

[bulgron]

A big part of the reason for the current state of carry laws is that for the last 50 years the courts have held that the 2A is not an individual right. They had to go into extreme logical contortions in order to do that, but they did get away with it.

It was the people that let them get away with it.

We aren't going to simply reverse 50 years of broken court rulings over night. But the Parker/Heller case, if it goes our way in SCOTUS, will be a big step forward in the right direction.

Seeing that I live in CA, we have a lot more ways to come than most of the rest of the country. For this reason, I'd be thrilled if we could leverage a favorable Parker/Heller ruling into follow-on rulings that (1) declare good cause statements to be unconstitutional and (2) force CCW laws for off-duty and retired LEO to be identical to that of regular citizens. If we got that out of the courts, then as a matter of politics all of the states would be forced into "shall issue" status. It would also mean that regular citizens would get the same reciprocity as LEO.

We also need a court ruling that finds that outright bans on carry are unconstitutional. This is how we get open carry back, but I fear that in CA at least they'll invent a permit system for it.

So there's at least three court battles (past Parker/Heller) just to get law abiding America back to a place where we are guaranteed some way to legally exercise our constitutional rights.

And all because our parents and grandparents for the last 50 years just shrugged as the courts slowly stripped away the 2A.

If it can be done with the 2A, it can be done with any of our rights.

Consider it all a brutal lesson in what happens when a free people decide that they don't care about their freedoms.

If gun owning America continues to push politically and legally on gun rights, then MAYBE in 50 years time Americans in all 50 states will once again be able to carry without a permit.

Sad, but there you have it.

 

[AJ Dual]

In something like 40 states, if you do some paperwork and pay a fee, you can carry a gun.

So you can push it if you like. Good attorneys start at $250 an hour. Pony up, Activist Boy.

That is quote-worthy right there.

While I think most of us agree with "Vermont Carry" in principle, pragmatisim forces us to look elsewhere. Here in WI, where there is no concealed carry whatsoever for anyone other than LEO's, there will never be an "awakening" where WI suddenly "goes Vermont".

In fact, those in WI who profess to be pro-RKBA but are trying to sandbag efforts to push for a fair shall-issue CCW permit system are running the perfect scam.

By advocating "constitutional carry" or whatnot, they've got the perfect platform for unlimited tough talk, and at the same time, the perfect excuse to collect dues from well-meaning dupes, and never have to do anything. When you demand the moon, and don't get it, who's going to blame you?

And Alaska has shown us the way. They went first to a shall-issue permit system, then went "Vermont" afterward.

The point of the game is to move the ball forward, the team that gets consistent first downs wins. The team who's only strategy is 100 yard Hail-Mary punt returns every time never wins.

 

[GhostlyKarliion]

The Constitution does not enumerate your right to carry a concealed weapon.

h-e-double-hockey-sticks freakin mother of hilliary clinton it does!!!

The RIGHT of the PEOPLE to keep and BARE ARMS shall NOT be INFRINGED.

that's however I want to do it, concealed or not, mounted on a rotating turret on my truck or not, NOT INFRINGED.

that is not open to interpretation, it is not open to change, it is part of the lifeblood of my country, the dims have thrown sh!$ on it for long enough...

go read your constitution, then go study some American and world history...

 

[bulgron]

While I think most of us agree with "Vermont Carry" in principle, pragmatisim forces us to look elsewhere. Here in WI, where there is no concealed carry whatsoever for anyone other than LEO's, there will never be an "awakening" where WI suddenly "goes Vermont".

This is why we need a follow-on ruling to Parker/Heller that says off-duty and retired LEO cannot have CCW privileges that exceed what the rest of the population can do. Do that and it will force WI to go shall-issue for everyone because ain't no way LEO is not got to be packing, even once he's retired.

Of course, I continue to assume that SCOTUS will hear Parker/Heller and that they will rule in our favor. I'm being optimistic, yes, but not wildly so, I think.

 

[TallPine]

Well, in 48 states, if you carry without a permit, you're considered to be breaking the law, and you get punished.

That's not quite true, as there are a number of states in which open carry is perfectly legal. In Montana you can even carry concealed without a permit outside of city limits (98% of the state).

So it really is a question whether it's worth it to go through the permit process.