As I posted, I recently made a hiking trip to Mount Mitchell State Park with my son Joseph. Along the way (during a visit to a store to pick up some souvenirs for my son’s friend), I saw this sign.
“Firearms and lethal weapons are prohibited except by permit.” Now, this causes a whole host of problems, and so let’s begin our discussion.
First of all, North Carolina is a traditional open carry state, and there is nothing in any statute that excepts the state parks as being areas where one cannot open carry or stipulates the manner of carry, whether a handgun or long gun (rifle or shotgun). Furthermore, hunters carry firearms into the park all the time, hunting mostly for black bear during the summer and fall.
This all caused me to research the regulations, or at least, the publicly available statements by the park service, concerning firearms in North Carolina state parks. I landed on this web site, where we read the following concerning firearms.
Firearms and other weapons are prohibited except that those with a proper permit may possess a concealed handgun in permitted areas and under the requirements of North Carolina G.S. 14-415.11. All firearms and weapons are prohibited in state park visitor centers and park offices.
This makes it sound as if firearms are prohibited unless they are concealed, since it is only under those conditions that a permit is legally required. In other words, it appears that this statement on the park web site is a spurious prohibition of open carry in contravention of state law (which does not speak to the issue of open carry, and simple carry of a handgun in a holster has never been considered carrying a weapon “to the terror of the public” or brandishing a weapon).
The statute to which this statement refers (North Carolina G.S. 14-415.11) simply makes it clear that “Any person who has a concealed handgun permit may carry a concealed handgun on the grounds or waters of a park within the State Parks System as defined in G.S. 143B-135.44.” It says nothing about prohibition of open carry, in parks or anywhere else. Nor does any other North Carolina statute speak to the issue of open carry.
So this leaves us with only two apparent options for interpretation of the signage and the statement on the park web site. The first option is that it is intended to be an end run around the legislature who has not spoken to the issue of open carry in state parks, or anywhere else for that matter. The state park service is making up their own laws.
The second option is that this signage is a mistake, but even more than that, contains material false information and is therefore unlawful due to its false and misleading information. Frankly, either option means that the park service is behaving in an unlawful manner, where they are making up their own laws, or simply communicating material false information to park visitors.
Which is it, and is the park service aware of their unlawful behavior on this issue?
