What are the top 5 gun friendly states?

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Indiana is indeed a very gun friendly state. We score a few points with Brady for not allowing open handgun carry without a permit...technically "no open carry". With the "Indiana License to Carry a Handgun", you can carry that handgun however you wish and wherever you wish with only the usual suspects excluded (airports, courts, post offices, etc).

From a practical standpoint, Indiana is as good as any that are in the "bottom 10"...all but for open handgun carry without the permit.
 
New Mexico has to be near the top, we have CCW and open carry. It is actually legal to open carry in the State Capitol.

And half the state is National Forest or BLM land open to shooting. I never pay range fees.
 
A number of states keep getting repeated as best even though they are bad for many NFA owners.

Vermont bans Silencers
Washington bans both Short Barreled Rifles and Machine Guns
Indiana bans Short Barreled shotguns.

Vermont is the worst since despite a ban on a very common and useful NFA item people keep mindlessly repeating them as the absolute best state. For New England, both Maine and New Hampshire are better states.
 
Arkansas Paul said:
I like living in Arkansas and we don't have extremely restrictive gun laws, but we're not in the top 5 I don't think.

For starters, you can't carry concealed without a permit on your person. The new law everyone is referring to merely describes what a journey is for carry in your vehicle. It doesn't specifically state that, but I suspect there will be a test case soon that will go to the courts and we will find out for sure. However, even if there is and we as gun owners win, you have to be on a journey. You won't be able to go to the store in your own county of residence while carrying. People are saying it's Constitutional Carry now, but its not.

2. We do not have the option of open carry.
3. Signs carry the weight of the law here. If an establishment posts a "No Firearms" sign, you are violating the law if you carry there.

Like I said, we are pretty good, but for the above reasons, I wouldn't put us top 5.
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Paul-

The sign has to be readable at 10 feet, and hast to have specific language. I tend to more outdoor activities and don't spend a lot of time going to different commercial businesses, but I have only seen one bank and the Habitat for Humanity ReStore in North Little Rock that actually have the sign posted correctly. Although I am sure there are others. If it does't meet the rules in the law it doesn't count. This is quoted from the code

"The carrying of a concealed handgun may be disallowed in any place in the discretion of the person or entity exercising control over the physical location of such place by the placing of a written notice clearly readable as a distance of not less than ten(10) feet that the:

' Carrying of a handgun is prohibited '"
 
Why isn't Virginia in the Top?

No cosmetic features are are banned and no limits are in place.
Everyone who isn't a criminal is allowed to buy a gun & carry it openly without a permit.
Private gun sales are legal.
CCW permits are issued to in and out of state residents.
CCW permits only take about a month or two to obtain.
There's no waiting period to buy a firearm, and no limits on how many you can purchase at one time.

In what way are the other states better?
 
Praxidike said:
Why isn't Virginia in the Top?

No cosmetic features are are banned and no limits are in place.
Everyone who isn't a criminal is allowed to buy a gun & carry it openly without a permit.
Private gun sales are legal.
CCW permits are issued to in and out of state residents.
CCW permits only take about a month or two to obtain.
There's no waiting period to buy a firearm, and no limits on how many you can purchase at one time.

In what way are the other states better?
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Arizona, Alaska, Wyoming, Vermont are all constitution carry. Meaning that no CCW is required to conceal carry pending you are not a felon or anything else that would prohibit gun ownership. I'm a VA resident too and can vouch for this being a wonderful state for firearms, but a few things keep it out of the top 5.

Join the VCDL! They do wonders for Virginia's gun laws.

You did forget to add that open carry is legal. It only took me 10 days to get my CCP. The lack of places to shoot (other than private land) is a real bummer though.
 
Wow I never knew such states existed that allowed conceal carry w/o a licence. Yes, I know it's an open carry legal state, but forgot to mention it. There are several free state owned ranges, and there are dozens of privately owned indoor and outdoor ranges that I know of in the Hampton Roads and Richmond areas. Several Superior Pawn and Guns have ranges in VA Beach, Norfolk, and Hampton (4 in all). There's the The Marksman in Newport News. There's Bob's Gun Shop in Norfolk. Colonial Shooting Academy and Dominion Shooting Range in Richmond. The C2 Shooting Center in Virginia Beach... I'm sure that there are others that I have not been brought to my attention yet...
 
No mention of Ohio? Very gun friendly here. Some large city restrictions, but the rest of the state is very good. All NFA items are allowed.
 
Praxidike said:
Wow I never knew such states existed that allowed conceal carry w/o a licence. Yes, I know it's an open carry legal state, but forgot to mention it. There are several free state owned ranges, and there are dozens of privately owned indoor and outdoor ranges that I know of in the Hampton Roads and Richmond areas. Several Superior Pawn and Guns have ranges in VA Beach, Norfolk, and Hampton (4 in all). There's the The Marksman in Newport News. There's Bob's Gun Shop in Norfolk. Colonial Shooting Academy and Dominion Shooting Range in Richmond. The C2 Shooting Center in Virginia Beach... I'm sure that there are others that I have not been brought to my attention yet...
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Awesome! Thanks for the link brother. Shooting at a paper target while sitting at a bench or standing still isn't my idea of much fun unless I'm zeroing a rifle or finding POI on a pistol. I do like a place where I can set up obstacles and run n gun. Maybe those places offered up by he state can provide that. Pending no one else is there of course. Since I've gotten out of the Army I've not had nearly the chance to play the way I want.
 
OK, Weblance, I'm curious what are the large city restrictions in Ohio? Doesn't your carry bill have preemption? Not to say Ohio isn't a lot better than Illinois, who finally got a CCW bill passed but they won't issue til next spring, I'm sure it is.


I've got a daughter and family that lives in Akron. I remember seeing a no-carry sign on a drug store because it sold alcohol. Was this a restriction in the original CCW bill?

BTW, I am glad that Ohio accepts my non-resident Utah CCW.
 
Indiana
Arizona
Vermont
Wyoming
Utah
Alaska


(people don't mention Texas because Texas IS NOT especially gun friendly. The CHL permitting process is an overpriced abomination with no open carry, for starters)
 
lcambre said:
A number of states keep getting repeated as best even though they are bad for many NFA owners.

Vermont bans Silencers
Washington bans both Short Barreled Rifles and Machine Guns
Indiana bans Short Barreled shotguns.

Vermont is the worst since despite a ban on a very common and useful NFA item people keep mindlessly repeating them as the absolute best state. For New England, both Maine and New Hampshire are better states.
Click to expand...

This is wrong.

Indiana bans "sawed off shotguns".

If the gun was manufactured as a SBS and you go through the proper federal channels.

I have 99% certain of this (just haven't done it myself)
 
junglebob said:
OK, Weblance, I'm curious what are the large city restrictions in Ohio? Doesn't your carry bill have preemption? Not to say Ohio isn't a lot better than Illinois, who finally got a CCW bill passed but they won't issue til next spring, I'm sure it is.


I've got a daughter and family that lives in Akron. I remember seeing a no-carry sign on a drug store because it sold alcohol. Was this a restriction in the original CCW bill?

BTW, I am glad that Ohio accepts my non-resident Utah CCW.
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Basically, I was refering to magazine capacity limits. The state has a centerfire capacity limit of 30 rounds, but individual cities has their own limits. When looking for more info, I came across THIS, that if I understand correctly, makes all city limits unconstitutional.
 
While I don't think ANY State is "Gun Friendly" some are less friendly than others and some are more friendly than others.

What I don't understand is how does a State like California (which I don't like for many more reasons than guns) sell so many guns a year? (1.2 MILLION?).

And by the way KY was the number 1 State for NICS checks (2.4 million) the previous year. Maybe they went to Illinois and California (LOL) or you got a free rifle for every bottle of Jack Daniels you bought, now that would be an expensive bottle of booze. (LOL)

Your right not all purchases go through the NCIS, but it is still astounding the number that do from supposedly unfriendly States.

Jim
 
jim243 said:
While I don't think ANY State is "Gun Friendly" some are less friendly than others and some are more friendly than others.

What I don't understand is how does a State like California (which I don't like for many more reasons than guns) sell so many guns a year? (1.2 MILLION?).

And by the way KY was the number 1 State for NICS checks (2.4 million) the previous year. Maybe they went to Illinois and California (LOL) or you got a free rifle for every bottle of Jack Daniels you bought, now that would be an expensive bottle of booze. (LOL)

Your right not all purchases go through the NCIS, but it is still astounding the number that do from supposedly unfriendly States.

Jim
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California has a population of 38 million or so, officially. I don't think one gun sale per 37 people, or whatever the ratio is, is a whole lot.

Kentucky is because they run a NICS check regularly (monthly, I think) on every carry license holder to make sure that they haven't done something they shouldn't have, in which case their carry license would be revoked. In other words...NICS checks are NOT THE SAME thing as gun sales...so it isn't really even worth comparing the number between states...at all. The number of NICS checks only seems useful when used from same state to same state, across time, when no laws that alter its use are passed during the timespan being compared.
 
I think there are cultural as well as legal aspects to gun friendliness. Open carry is legal in Pa. And Ky., but if you walk around pitsburgh with a gun, it seems to bother people more than walking around Lexington with a gun.
 
Warp said:
This is wrong.

Indiana bans "sawed off shotguns".

If the gun was manufactured as a SBS and you go through the proper federal channels.

I have 99% certain of this (just haven't done it myself)
Click to expand...

Any source for that? Here are the ones I found indicating a ban:

http://www.guntrustlawyer.com/2009/03/indiana-in-what-nfa-firearms-c-1.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_laws_in_Indiana
http://ingunowners.com/forums/carry-issues-self-defense/41868-indiana-ltch-sbs-laws.html

The last link included the laws IC 35-47-5-4.1 and IC 35-47-1-10. The definition clearly states nothing under 18" barrel length. 35-47-1-10 (2) may be what you are referring to as allowing under 26" oal. if not made from a shotgun. The IN residents at that site didn't give any indication that people were able to use that interpretation. At best this would still stop the usual sub 18" barrel SBS configuration.
 
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