Mississippi Attorney General on Open Carry

[rickward]

ISSUE (Requested by a Mississippi Police Chief, response date June 14, 2012)

Is there a law in Mississippi that requires a permit holder to completely cover his weapon in public by means of a shirt, jacket or other piece of clothing?

RESPONSE
.
Yes. The authority to legally carry a pistol or revolver is derived from Section 45-9-101 of the Mississippi Code which provides in the first sentence: "(1 )(a) The Department of
Public Safety is authorized to issue licenses to carry stun guns, concealed pistols or revolvers to persons qualified in this section."

This provision does not authorize a person to carry a pistol "concealed in part", but requires that it be totally concealed. This conclusion is succinctly set forth in Section 45-9-101 (18): " ... Further, nothing in this section shall be construed to allow the open and unconcealed carrying of any stun gun or deadly weapon as described in Section 97-37-1 Mississippi Code of 1972."

Section 97-37-1 prohibits the carrying of listed weapons "concealed in whole or in part":

(1) switchblade knife, metallic knuckles, blackjack, slingshot, pistol, revolver, or any rifle with a barrel of less than sixteen (16) inches in length, or any shotgun with a barrel of less than eighteen (18) inches in length, machine gun or any fully automatic firearm or deadly weapon, or any muffler or silencer for any firearm, whether or not it is accompanied by a firearm, or uses or attempts to use against another person any imitation firearm, shall upon conviction be punished as follows:

Thus, it is illegal to carry the weapons described in Section 97-37-1(1) without securing a license as provided in Section 45-9-101, which license authorizes the carrying of a concealed pistol or revolver. The securing of the 'enhanced" permit provided in Section 97-37-7 does not abrogate the requirement that the weapons be carried totally concealed.

 

[General Geoff]

If I recall correctly, Mississippi also has standing case law which dictates that a pistol in any kind of holster is considered "partially concealed" and thus illegal. I wonder if anyone has tried using a transparent plastic holster to open carry...



edit; I don't understand this section of the law:

This conclusion is succinctly set forth in Section 45-9-101 (18): " ... Further, nothing in this section shall be construed to allow the open and unconcealed carrying of any stun gun or deadly weapon as described in Section 97-37-1 Mississippi Code of 1972."

There is no part of 97-37-1 which prohibits the open and unconcealed carrying of said deadly weapons. So how can a law which prohibits only the concealed or partially concealed carry of something, ALSO prohibit the unconcealed carrying of something merely by saying that this law does not ALLOW for it, when in fact there is no other law PROHIBITING it???


Furthermore, that particular section does NOT address partial concealment at all, so I cannot for the life of me see how his conclusion is "succinctly set forth" in it.

 

[General Geoff]

I would also like to point out that if the Mississippi courts have ruled that an openly carried pistol in a holster is partially concealed (thus requiring a license), then that means that Section 45-9-101 (18) has no bearing on it in any way, regardless of whether it does or does not prohibit the physically-impossible act of carrying openly and unconcealed in the legal sense.

 

[smalls]

So in Mississippi, you can openly carry a gun if you are not a CCW (sorry, dunno what your permit's called) holder, but it can't be holstered, as that's partially concealing it. On top of that, if you do have a CCW, you may no longer carry it openly, and must conceal it?




That's one of the most idiotic things I've ever heard.

 

[Need8YourTooLate]

Attorney General's open carry opinion

ISSUE (question posed by a police chief in Mississippi) AG Opinion dated June 14, 2012

Is there a law in Mississippi that requires a permit holder to completely cover his weapon in public by means of a shirt, jacket or other piece of clothing?

RESPONSE
.
Yes. The authority to legally carry a pistol or revolver is derived from Section 45-9-101 of the Mississippi Code which provides in the first sentence: "(1 )(a) The Department of
Public Safety is authorized to issue licenses to carry stun guns, concealed pistols or revolvers to persons qualified in this section."

This provision does not authorize a person to carry a pistol "concealed in part", but requires that it be totally concealed. This conclusion is succinctly set forth in Section 45-9-101 (18): " ... Further, nothing in this section shall be construed to allow the open and unconcealed carrying of any stun gun or deadly weapon as described in Section 97-37-1 Mississippi Code of 1972."

Section 97-37-1 prohibits the carrying of listed weapons "concealed in whole or in part":
(1) switchblade knife, metallic knuckles, blackjack, slingshot, pistol, revolver, or any rifle with a barrel of less than sixteen (16) inches in length, or any shotgun with a barrel of less than eighteen (18) inches in length, machine gun or any fully automatic firearm or deadly weapon, or any muffler or silencer for any firearm, whether or not it is accompanied by a firearm, or uses or attempts to use against another person any imitation firearm, shall upon conviction be punished as follows:

Thus, it is illegal to carry the weapons described in Section 97-37-1(1) without securing a license as provided in Section 45-9-101, which license authorizes the carrying of a concealed pistol or revolver. The securing of the 'enhanced" permit provided in Section
97-37-7 does not abrogate the requirement that the weapons be carried totally concealed.

 

[hermannr]

I think Mississippi would say if you had it in your hand it would be "partly concealed" also

 

[BBQLS1]

So, if I open carry while hunting.... I might be breaking the law?

 

[NavyLCDR]

The Constitution of the State of Mississippi overrides an Attorney General's opinion:

Article 3, Section 12

The right of every citizen to keep and bear arms in defense of his home, person, or property, or in the aid of the civil power when thereto legally summoned, shall not be called in question, but the legislature may regulate or forbid carrying concealed weapons.

The state cannot have it both ways. If the Attorney General says there is a difference between partially concealed and fully concealed and the license only allows for full concealment, then the Legislature, according to the Constitution of Mississippi has no power to forbid or regulate the carrying of a partially concealed firearm. In order to forbid the carrying of a partially concealed firearm, the State must admit that partially concealed is exactly the same as fully concealed, in order to not violate the State Constitution - therefore the license must allow for a "partially concealed" firearm as much as it allows for a fully concealed firearm. You cannot apply a "rule of grammar" to a statute and not apply the same "rule of grammar" to the Constitution which limits the authority of that statute. Every other state in the union considers a firearm visibly carried in a holster to be open carried because anybody with more than one functioning brain cell can look at it and say, "Hey! That guy has a gun in that holster on his belt!"

I would not allow this Attorney General's opinion to deter me one bit from open carrying a firearm in a holster if I had a recognized concealed pistol permit.

 

[Frank Ettin]

...In order to forbid the carrying of a partially concealed firearm, the State must admit that partially concealed is exactly the same as fully concealed, in order to not violate the State Constitution - therefore the license must allow for a "partially concealed" firearm as much as it allows for a fully concealed firearm. You cannot apply a "rule of grammar" to a statute and not apply the same "rule of grammar" to the Constitution which limits the authority of that statute....

A nice argument, but in a practical sense meaningless unless or until the courts of Mississippi sustain it.

...I would not allow this Attorney General's opinion to deter me one bit from open carrying a firearm in a holster if I had a recognized concealed pistol permit.

Of course doing so would invite arrest and prosecution. It would give one the opportunity to test your argument in a Mississippi court. And that might be fine if someone has the time and inclination for a possibly protracted court fight and is willing to spend the several hundreds of thousands of dollars it would probably cost. And of course, anyone doing this would still risk losing and being convicted, with all the baggage that would go with that.

Are you volunteering?

 

[andrewstorm]

Buy a fishing or hunting licence in mississippi....

,,,,its perfectly legal to carry a concealed/open carry pistol while engaged in a sport or ON THE WAY to or from such activities,.just load up the po-peals pocket fisherman,your fishing licence,put lynyrd skynyrd Mississippi kid on the cd player and go!

 

[razorback2003]

I was under the impression that what most people would consider 'open carry' without a license is illegal in MS because putting the gun in a holster 'partially conceals' the gun. So, if you want to carry your gun uncovered in a holster you need a license to do that.

 

[NavyLCDR]

Of course doing so would invite arrest and prosecution. It would give one the opportunity to test your argument in a Mississippi court. And that might be fine if someone has the time and inclination for a possibly protracted court fight and is willing to spend the several hundreds of thousands of dollars it would probably cost. And of course, anyone doing this would still risk losing and being convicted, with all the baggage that would go with that.

Are you volunteering?

Respectfully, I don't have to volunteer to be a test case. There is a group of people who carry their firearms everyday in Mississippi "partially concealed":

http://forums.opencarry.org/forums/forumdisplay.php?108-Mississippi

I highly doubt that a clearly flawed attorney general's opinion is going to deter them at all, but feel free to ask them.

 

[F-111 John]

Respectfully, the Mississippi Constitution protects the right to "keep and bear arms in defense of his home, person, or property," and the statute prohibits the concealment in whole or in part of a pistol, revolver, short barreled rifle, short barreled shotgun, or machine gun.

You should be able to open carry a rifle or shotgun, satisfying the constitution and the statute.

 

[Owen Sparks]

I was in Mississippi not too long ago doing some banking business and two Loomis Fargo guards came out of the vault area wearing holstered pistols. These men are private security guards, not law enforcement. How can they get away with open cary in the state of Mississippi when you can't?

 

[Kleanbore]

I was in Mississippi not too long ago doing some banking business and two Loomis Fargo guards came out of the vault area wearing holstered pistols. These men are private security guards, not law enforcement. How can they get away with open cary in the state of Mississippi when you can't?

Licensed armed guards.

 

[NavyLCDR]

Respectfully, the Mississippi Constitution protects the right to "keep and bear arms in defense of his home, person, or property," and the statute prohibits the concealment in whole or in part of a pistol, revolver, short barreled rifle, short barreled shotgun, or machine gun.

You should be able to open carry a rifle or shotgun, satisfying the constitution and the statute.

Good point. People in Mississippi should start having open carry rifle rallies.

 

[Owen Sparks]

What if you wish to "guard" your own business in Mississippi? Can you get licensed and carry openly like the Armored car people do?

 

[45crittergitter]

Welcome to Mississippi, folks. IMHO, this particular AG's opinion is erroneous. Perhaps it was intentionally so simply in order to give the po-po's some legal cover to harass legal gun folks. However, I know of no one who wishes to be the test case.