Articles by Herschel Smith

I think both bullets did their job very well.  I take it the Hornady round would be great for Eastern white tail, while the Buffalo Bore monolithic round would be great for defense against dangerous game.

I think he’s being a bit hard on his dog.  The dog can’t patrol everywhere all of the time, or the dog may be sick, or simply playing at the time (dogs need play time too).  Or the dog may be making a visit to the Vet that particular day and unable to patrol the grounds.  Having dogs is a wonderful thing, but we can’t place more on their back than they can handle.  And if a dog is wonderful, having more than one is great!

I get the issue of not wanting to carry a pistol on your person everywhere you go, or a phone for that matter.  But I also know a man who carries everywhere all of the time, and the only time he ever removes his backup pistol from his ankle is when he’s in the shower.

In the end, I consider the greatest failure to have been leaving children alone in an unlocked house.  Even if the house is on your property, you just cannot do that, especially if you live on a large plot in a rural area.  Men aren’t the only threats.  There are Coyotes, hogs, etc.  The children should either (a) go with the parents and learn to care for the chickens, or (b) understand that they have to stay home with the door locked. It’s sad that this is the state of affairs, and it might not have been so 50 years ago. But we are where we are today.

Of the two, I think (a) is the better choice.  Jesus taught us to teach our children by carrying them with us in our daily tasks.  It’s how He learned to be a carpenter.

By the way, as I’ve said before, I consider the shotgun to the be the best home defense weapon available.  I applaud his choice of weapons.  Also, if I’m not mistaken, he’s shown carrying a Beretta 1301 with an extended tube mag and red dot sight, my favorite home defense tool.

Dean Weingarten has an exposé on the status of Young v. Hawaii.  I knew this and had read the reports, but the interesting thing about this is that in the comments section, Charles Nichols drops by the make an extended comment.

I suspect that the Young v. Hawaii en banc panel would like to issue an opinion that says states can ban Open Carry in favor of concealed carry. However, there are a couple of jurisdictional problems with the en banc panel doing that.

The first is the Young v. Hawaii three-judge panel was bound by the Peruta v. San Diego en banc panel opinion and held that there is only a right to Open Carry. Neither side fled an en banc petition challenging either that holding of the three-judge panel opinion or the Peruta v. San Diego en banc panel opinion.

The State of Hawaii did file an en banc petition limited to the Open Carry holding of the three-judge panel, which was granted.

During the en banc oral argument, Mr. Young’s attorney (Alan Beck) was asked point blank if he was challenging the Peruta v. San Diego en banc opinion which held that there is no right to concealed carry. He said that he was not challenging Peruta v. San Diego, en banc.

Putting all of that together, the en banc panel does not have the jurisdiction to decide anything other than whether or not the denial of Mr. Young’s permit to openly carry a handgun violated the Second Amendment. And the en banc panel might not even decide that question because there were a couple of reasons given by the en banc panel, that were independent of the Second Amendment, for upholding the decision of the district court.

My California Open Carry lawsuit, Charles Nichols v. Gavin Newsom et al, does not challenge the Peruta v. San Diego en banc panel opinion either. My lawsuit is not limited to handguns. I challenge California’s bans on openly carrying loaded and unloaded rifles, shotguns, and handguns. I also challenge the license requirement.

My three-judge panel asked for supplemental briefing. The Young v. Hawaii en banc panel has not. Supplemental briefing was completed in my appeal on August 8th.

So if I read this right, Young was about open carry alone.  Peruta was about concealed carry alone.  The Nichols case is about open carry alone, and in California, not Hawaii (although presumably deciding for Nichols in California would be favorable to Young and vice versa).

The trouble is that Bruen didn’t decide open carry, and thus we are left with patchwork rulings and patchwork laws in states.

I continue to maintain that gentlemen, good citizens and men of fine upbringing don’t mind openly carrying their weapons in public.  It is for the good and peace of the country.

Field & Stream does a good job outlining the history of the Open Fields Act, the history of this issue, and what’s at stake.  It’s in three parts.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

In part 3 the author writes the following.

There’s simply no getting around the fact that Hollingworth is a poacher, by definition. He has admitted to, been charged, and/or convicted of the following:

• Chasing coots with a boat and shooting them with lead shot.
• Shooting deer at night from a vehicle (though he insists his buddy pulled the trigger).
• Shooting cliff swallows.
• Shooting beavers at night on public land.
• Baiting migratory game birds.
• Shooting over the limit on ducks.

Hollingsworth told me that he believes that there should be some game laws—but he also said private-property owners should be able to shoot a deer or turkey any time of the year, so long as they use common sense and are shooting it to eat it, and that baiting waterfowl should be legal on private land, too, provided hunters adhere to the bag limits.

All of a sudden, I wasn’t so sympathetic.

That said, no matter how many past violations Hollingsworth has or how inexcusable they are, it is still fair to ask whether the wardens overstepped their bounds in this case. Did they go too far in planting the hidden trail camera? I think they did. And did they really need (as Hollingsworth describes it) to surround his home with multiple officers just to serve a warrant for a “stolen” trail camera? I suspect they didn’t.

Good grief.  Do you know how many bird species are included in the migratory bird act?  More than 800.  If a Woodpecker is tearing a tree apart on your property, and that tree, or group of trees, is (or are) necessary to prevent washes and fissures on your land, too bad.  You can’t kill it.  Chimney Finches or Chimney Swifts are protected.  If one gets into your chimney and dies for whatever reason, you have to live with the smell of death in your house because you didn’t drive it out of there before it died.

If a Killdeer nests in your gravel road, you can’t move it under Federal law.  I didn’t say not to kill Woodpeckers killing your trees.  I said that under federal law, you cannot do it.  These rules are stupid, concocted and promulgated by stupid and wicked men.

As for killing deer out of season, it would be nice for every man to be as well off as every other man, but that won’t happen in time and on earth.  Thus, some people just have to do what they have to do to feed their families.  I get the issue about modern game management techniques historically increasing herd size.  I really do.

But the creature isn’t above the creator.  And the creator gave man charge over the animal kingdom.  I am opposed to anything that gives government more power, because controlling men are always abusive.

It might be more accurate to do this while the rifle is in a vise.

Dancing around a tree trying to swat a woman.

And then there’s this.

CRAZY NANCY: "Mother Earth gets angry from time to time, and this legislation will help us address all of that."

pic.twitter.com/MhwEHszFjI

— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) August 13, 2022

Mother earth, father fortune and lady luck are all figments of the pagan imagination, no different than motionless totem poles.  There is no such thing as mother earth. Fortune and luck are pagan replacements for God’s providence and sovereignty. They have no causative power at all.

American Rifleman.

This round can launch projectiles weighing between 145 grains to 255 grains at higher velocities for an effective range of around 250 yards. The case is slightly tapered to contribute to positive ejection from bolt-action and semi-automatic rifles alike. Winchester’s initial ammunition options included 150 grain (2,350 f.p.s.), 160 grain (2,225 f.p.s.) and 180 grain (2,100 f.p.s.) hunting loads …

I try to step into sporting goods stores frequently to see what ammunition is for sale and what it’s selling for.  I noticed in the last two I surveyed (just this week) that there were dozens upon dozens of boxes of 350 Legend.  Between the two stores there were multiple hundreds of boxes.

These data points are anecdotal, but they’re still data points nonetheless.  It would seem to me that the 350 Legend has staying power.  I think the thing that has helped it most of all is that the case is designed to fit inside the AR chamber (something like 2.2″).

Making it look very easy.

That bear showed real dexterity and quick movement.

Dean Weingarten has a very informative article up at Ammoland.  He’s always a good read, although I disagree with his seeming exoneration of the NRA in these affairs.  It’s not just that they didn’t stop some of it, they actively participated in it, and failed to stop the worst parts.  Those failures today haunt the firearms community.

I won’t lift any of the article.  In this case it would be bad form since it’s so long and detailed.  But go read his piece.

I will mention that TCJ commenter Sisu mentions this in the comments.

Sen Thomas Dodd (Christopher’s corrupt, demonrat father; another political dynasty) had many roles in government including a stint with the FBI, and was second ranking lawyer at the Nuremberg Trials, it is there where he is said to have obtained and retained a copy of the Nazi’s Gun Control Acts. … Many will recall JPFO translated the Nazi 1938 Act and compared it to US GCA of 1968 proposed by Dodd; they are in all material respects the same legislation.

I didn’t know that.  Thanks to reader Sisu for educating us.