Please sign this petition - CA AB1934

[MovedWest]

I've searched and can't find this anywhere else in the forum. And I'm sure it belongs in activisim, but I'd like for it to get as much traffic as possible. Please hit this petition to help protect open carry in California.

http://www.petitiononline.com/CalOC/petition.html

To: California State Legislature & Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger

We urge you to oppose Assemblywoman Lori Saldana's AB 1934, a bill to ban the open carry of handguns in public places, for the following reasons:

1. The open carry of holstered handguns has always been legal in California - it is an old right, not a new threat. In fact, 43 states allow the increasingly common "open carry" of handguns in public, in most cases at age 18 without any permit - and only California forbids openly carried guns to be loaded in cities.

2. The US Supreme Court in DC v. Heller (2008) held that the right to "bear arms" means "the individual right to possess and carry weapons in case of confrontation."

3. California greatly restricts concealed carry by granting Sheriffs complete discretion in issuing permits and requiring the applicant to show “cause” to exercise their right to discreetly bear arms; therefore open carry is most Californians' only viable option to exercise their right to bear arms.

4. AB 1934 attacks California property rights by banning open carry on private property - under California law, all private property is presumptively considered a "public place." As Justice Richard Aldrich of the California Appeals Court recently ruled in People v. Strider (2009), “[p]laces of business and parking lots on private property, open to the general public, have consistently been held to be public places . . . [as is] the area outside a home in which a stranger is able to walk without challenge. . . . The term public place generally means a location readily accessible to all those who wish to go there . . . . The key consideration is whether a member of the public can access the place without challenge.” So anyone who owns a business, a home with a yard, or any other land, even a farm or ranch, should be concerned about AB 1934 because absent physical barriers or guards, the business or land is considered a “public place” under Saldana’s bill.

5. AB 1934 would bizarrely force citizens who currently open carry properly holstered handguns in public places to carry rifles or shotguns instead for their own personal protection. We agree with the US Supreme Court which said in DC v. Heller (2008) that bearing a handgun has a key advantage over bearing long guns, i.e., that it can be held "with one hand while the other hand dials the police."

For the foregoing reasons, we residents of the State of California affirm and assert our opposition to AB 1934 and urge the Legislature and Governor to reject it. We further call on the Legislature to reform and simplify California's gun laws to be more like those of the vast majority of states which uphold the right to bear arms by allowing both open and concealed carry, and issuing any permits which are needed to bear arms on a "shall issue" basis.

Sincerely,

The Undersigned

 

[Buck Snort]

Open carry is a dead duck in California. The only hope we have is that when/if we win McDonald then law suits will be effective to force the state to allow EITHER open carry or concealed carry on a "Shall Issue" basis. However, I may very well be rotting in my grave before that comes about. CA is suffering from terminal liberalitis and getting ANYTHING passed that leans right instead of left is a tough battle every step of the way.

 

[bootless]

Buck Snort, I understand your frustration but that does not mean that we should give up. Yes the petition will most likely fail, but we should still fight in every way possible. It is the same as not voting for a conservative in a venomously liberal county/state because you believe that there is no chance that they could win. I just signed a I was the 2,200 signiture.

 

[Zoogster]

Well the petition clearly wishes to make it appear to be open carry, perhaps specifically to incite participation and signatures.


Maybe that angle is expected to result in better support.




However I actually think this petition is poorly thought out.
It strongly tells the legislator that they are voting on an "open carry" bill.

This is not open carry, and a petition that tells them it is open carry is in fact more likely to cause them to ban the ability to take an unloaded unconcealed handgun from point a to point b!




Open Carry was outlawed in most of California in 1967. This is not open carry.
The fact that some use the ability of everyone else to lawfully transport an unconcealed handgun in order to strap an unloaded pistol to their side and stand around while never going within 1,000 feet of a school zone notwithstanding.





If the ban passes it will make it illegal to even unlock a gun case with an unloaded handgun in it in your own front yard or driveway, or even in the middle of the woods.
It has nothing absolutely nothing to do with a loaded handgun, or self defense with a handgun in any of the places it lists.
A loaded handgun is already illegal in most of those places.

This petition also never mentions these are unloaded handguns.
The ability to transport an unloaded handgun never has had anything to do with self defense, in fact there is several laws on the books in California specifically to prevent someone from having a firearm ready for self defense in public.
If that is in fact what it was about, they would pass it without hesitation.
Portraying it as such as is done in this petition is just more likely to cause passage.

This petition makes it sound very much like the legislator will be voting on the ability to carry a loaded firearm around or not, something outlawed in 1967.
Many legislators are ignorant, and don't fully read or understand what they are voting on as they vote on many things in a given day.
You may actually cause many to think they are voting on what was already outlawed in 1967!
Being even more likely to insure defeat and passage of this ban.

Is this petition about voicing a feeling or trying to really get the ban stopped? If it is to tell the legislator or governor something that will actually have him pause and consider, it will in fact be more likely to result in the opposite.