Source.

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — A Florida appeals court has struck down the state’s decades-old ban on the open carrying of firearms, ruling the prohibition violates the Second Amendment.

In a decision released Wednesday, the First District Court of Appeal of Florida reversed the conviction of Stanley Victor McDaniels, a Pensacola man arrested after openly carrying a holstered handgun during a July 4 demonstration in 2022.

Judge Stephanie Ray, writing for a unanimous three-judge panel, said Florida’s law “cannot be reconciled” with the U.S. Constitution.

“The Constitution protects the right to carry arms openly for self-defense,” Ray wrote. “Florida’s Open Carry Ban cannot be reconciled with that guarantee. Section 790.053, Florida Statutes, is therefore declared unconstitutional.”

McDaniels had been standing at a downtown intersection with a visible holstered handgun and a copy of the U.S. Constitution, waving to cars while recording himself on camera. Police later charged him with violating Florida’s 1987 open-carry statute, one of the strictest in the nation. He was convicted and sentenced to probation and community service, though his sentence was stayed pending appeal.

He argued the law violated his Second Amendment rights. The trial judge disagreed but certified the issue as one of “great public importance,” sending the case up to the appeals court.

Florida’s ban made it a second-degree misdemeanor to openly carry a firearm, with narrow exceptions for activities like hunting and fishing. The court said that approach was far outside the nation’s historical tradition of gun regulation.

The panel relied heavily on the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 Bruen decision, which required judges to assess gun laws based on text, history, and tradition rather than balancing public safety against individual rights.

The court found no historical precedent for a categorical ban on open carry. Instead, it said 19th-century courts and legislatures generally treated open carry as the preferred and constitutionally protected method of bearing arms, while restricting or prohibiting concealed carry (Editorial remark: I’ve said this for as long as I’ve been covering this issue. Historically, only criminals concealed their weapons).

The decision marks a sharp reversal from just eight years ago. In 2017, the Florida Supreme Court upheld the state’s open-carry prohibition, ruling it did not violate either the U.S. or Florida constitutions. The justices at the time said the law was substantially related to the state’s interest in public safety and that Floridians still had broad access to firearms through the state’s concealed-carry licensing system.

Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis applauded the decision in a post on X. He has called for lawmakers to pass an open carry bill.

“This decision aligns state policy with my long-held position and with the vast majority of states throughout the union,” DeSantis wrote. “Ultimately, the court correctly ruled that the text of the Second Amendment — ‘to keep and bear arms’ — says what it means and means what it says.”

Attorney General James Uthmeier, whose office defended the statute in court, quickly welcomed the decision.

In a post on social media Wednesday afternoon, Uthmeier wrote: “Florida’s 1st District Court of Appeals just ruled that Florida’s open carry ban is no longer constitutionally enforceable statewide,” said Uthmeier. “Our office fully supports the Court’s decision. This is a big win for the Second Amendment rights of Floridians. As we’ve all witnessed over the last few days, our God-given right to self-defense is indispensable.”

The ruling immediately vacates McDaniels’ conviction and reverses his sentence. It also calls into question the enforceability of Florida’s open-carry law statewide, potentially making Florida the latest state to allow open display of firearms in public.

The state could still seek further review, either by requesting a rehearing or appealing to the Florida Supreme Court.

Ridiculous. As if “public safety” had anything to do with the law.

Between the state supreme court’s decision in 2017 and this decision came Bruen with its tests, forbidding tiers of scrutiny.

This was a manly move by McDaniels and I applaud his courage to challenge the stupidity of the law. He has done what the legislature was too cowardly to do over years and even decades.

Hopefully this silliness is finished, and the law is unenforceable (and the state AG will say so to law enforcement).

Who knows what the future holds is a democratic administration falls in behind Santis or later?

I knew that the senior senator in the Florida legislature had taken this position. I’m not sure I have faith or confidence in Ron Desantis any more. He could put a stop to this charade with one simple sentence: “I will not sign any more legislation until an open carry bill is brought to my desk. That includes shutdown of the Florida government.”

But he doesn’t do this.

The main reason I’m lifting prose out of this article at Bearing Arms is to point out yet another lie that they have bought.

Florida’s not anti-gun, though it’s not as pro-gun as some like to think. Still, getting open carry should be easy and yet, the fight is still going to be a rough one.

Efforts to pass open carry legislation in Florida are faltering, even with strong backing from Gov. Ron DeSantis. Senate President Ben Albritton, newly installed in his leadership role, has voiced opposition to the measure, aligning with concerns from law enforcement groups.

Albritton, a Republican, said last week he stands with the Florida Sheriffs Association, which has consistently opposed open carry policies.

“I trust my law enforcement officials, and that’s where I stand,” Albritton said, signaling little appetite for pushing the controversial measure forward.

Florida currently prohibits openly carrying firearms in public spaces, except in limited circumstances such as hunting, fishing or target shooting. That stance makes it one of only four states in the nation with such restrictions.

Gov. DeSantis has publicly expressed his support for open carry and suggested earlier this year that the Legislature could revisit the issue. The debate comes months after Florida adopted a permit-less concealed carry law, a measure DeSantis and other Republican leaders hailed as a victory for Second Amendment rights.

However, some gun rights advocates were disappointed that the bill stopped short of allowing individuals to openly carry firearms in public. Groups like Florida Carry argue the state’s refusal to expand gun rights further undermines constitutional freedoms.

“It’s a fundamental right that the state continues to deny its citizens,” said Richard Nascak, co-executive director of Florida Carry. “There’s no logical reason for Florida to lag behind the majority of the country on this issue.”

Then, Tom Knighton waffles and genuflects over a falsehood.

Albritton’s reason for opposing this is a big problem.

Look, I respect law enforcement as a general thing, but they’re also trying to do a job and they don’t like the idea of anything that makes their jobs the least bit more difficult. That’s understandable, but we also need to remember that we can find law enforcement groups who don’t really like Fourth Amendment protections on your vehicle or mobile device, either, because it makes things harder on them while trying to do their job.

No, and a thousand times no, that has nothing whatsoever to do with their reason for opposition. Oh, the LEOs are opposed because they won’t be “special” anymore. But LEOs are always opposed to open carry by anyone but them.

No, the real reason for this opposition in the senate is that they think this will hurt tourism. And the real problem Tom should be addressing is that this is all lies. It doesn’t hurt tourism. It didn’t in S.C. either. It doesn’t cause blood to run in the streets. It doesn’t cause LEOs to have more problems with doing their jobs. It doesn’t matter how someone carries their firearms. Peaceable men could have their firearm concealed and yet unholster it by the time LEOs arrive on the scene (like almost always happens) and LEOs still wouldn’t know who had carried openly and who had carried concealed.

That objection is literally a stupid objection crafted for people stupid enough to buy it.

Tom at Bearing Arms needs to think a bit harder.

Eating crumbs that fall from the master’s table, like a stray dog.

Yes, you heard that right, as stupid as it sounds. While I discussed the recent actions in the S.C. Senate, I didn’t read the amendments. But thankfully someone did.  NARG.

So basically with the amendments, the S.C. Senate passed a new bill that requires a permit to carry in any fashion, open or concealed, and tacked on some additional stuff. But that’s the situation now – open or concealed carry with a permit, or permission slip from the state.

This is legitimately wicked. They’ll go home and tell their constituency that they “did something,” and support the RKBA, knowing full well that they did nothing at all good.

Liars one and all, at least the ones who voted for it.

They listened to the LEOs, didn’t they? The LEOs don’t like you carrying without their approval and power to check you out to see if you have their approval. No they don’t. They’re not “special” then.

We did open carry with a permit (if you recall, I listened to and reported on the entire floor debate in the S.C. senate that day). And I told you that we needed to embrace incrementalism. Now it’s time to do more.

A bill passed in the South Carolina Senate on Thursday would allow gun owners to carry their weapon in public without a concealed carry permit and would provide free firearms training.

The bill was approved by a 28-15 vote after nearly two weeks of debate surrounding concerns from some lawmakers and law enforcement officials over the open carry aspect. The addition of free firearms training is what led to a compromise and ultimately ended the debate.

The proposal now returns to the House, where representatives will need to agree to the Senate’s addition of the free firearms training, and other changes, in order for the bill to make it to Gov. Henry McMaster’s desk.

If signed into law, South Carolina will join 27 other states – including nearly every one in the Deep South – that allow open carry without a permit.

[ … ]

Law enforcement leaders have expressed worry over people carrying guns without training or experience, and the possibility of encountering armed people at a shooting scene and not being able to determine who is a threat and who is trying to help.

Oh, you know law enforcement is going to be against it. When it came attached to a permitting scheme, they didn’t want to waste their power because they knew it was going to pass.

Now, they’re inveighing against it.  I would suspect that SLED is especially against it, including that corrupt, awful head of SLED, Mark Keel, whom we’ve discussed at length.

Source.

Florida House Speaker Paul Renner is shooting down any hopes of Florida becoming an open-carry state, at least for now.

During last Thursday’s remarks to reporters, Renner said while he supports the idea of open carry, it would be unlikely to see a law get passed this year.

“I’m a supporter of the Second Amendment across the board in many aspects,” said Renner. “There’s not an appetite in both chambers to get that done.”

Renner’s comments come after Rep. Mike Beltran, R-Riverview, filed legislation to make changes to the state’s current gun laws, including allowing people to openly carry firearms on college campuses.

“We always have to measure whether it’s worth the committee [and] House floor time to pass a bill that would be controversial that would take a lot of time, that we know is dead on arrival.”

The bill(HB 1619), would also allow guns to be carried in certain government buildings and at voting polls. The proposal comes just a year after the state made it legal for most Floridians to carry guns without a permit, as long as it’s concealed.

It was the first bill submitted when they came back into session. They had plenty of time to work on it.  What a bunch of pusillanimous cowards and spiritless, lying scoundrels.

Cops are against it, and that would be enough for the bootlickers to stop the bill, but they enacted gun control in the wake of the Parkland shooting and they won’t reverse course now. They would be seen as the duplicitous punks they are. So along with NY, Hawaii, California and Illinois, the communists in Florida (you know, the “law and order conservatives”) have left it all in place and don’t even mind telling you they don’t care about it immediately after the bill was filed.

Here is more perspective.

Long ago I posted on Jeremy Bryant who hitchhiked with a .357 magnum wheel gun openly carried.  He did it “For the peace, good and dignity of the country and the welfare of its people.”  I respect that. Unfortunately, the URL changed and the link went dead (the embedded video wouldn’t respond).

I quite accidentally stumbled across this video again, and I can’t think of a better way to ring in the new year than to commit to making gun carry commonplace among gentlemen of good character.

Nevada.

A trending TikTok video uploaded by the shows a Jack in the Box drive-thru worker who open carries—even at work.

[ … ]

The 26-second clip with more than 814,000 views unfolds with a brief yet potent exchange. It begins with a question, “Is that the 45 or 9?” She responds that it is the latter, and explains why it’s necessary as she provides his Jack in the Box order: “Yeah, it gets crazy at night.”

@djspindizzy what neighborhood would you find this fast food spot at? #opencarry #fastfood #secondammendment ♬ Monkeys Spinning Monkeys – Kevin MacLeod & Kevin The Monkey

Good for that manager. That employee is behaving just like the American founders did when they toted rifles on their way to school.

Here is the SAF/FPC brief.

You can read it at your leisure.  One part stood out to me.

In 1770, Georgia mandated that individuals on Sundays carry arms to “any church, or other place of divine worship,” providing that an individual met their obligation by “carry[ing] with him a gun, or a pair of pistols, in good order and fit for service.” 19 THE COLONIAL RECORDS OF THE STATE OF GEORGIA: PART I, STATUTES, COLONIAL AND REVOLUTIONARY 138, 1768–1773; A DIGEST OF THE LAWS OF THE STATE OF GEORGIA, 1800 Ga. Laws 157 (Watkins, eds.)

This is an important point to me for at least a couple of reasons.  First, as we’ve discussed many times before, in order to understand the constitution, you must understand the milieu in which it was written.

The founders were accustomed to the open, public carry of weapons, and at times mandated it for sundry reasons.  It’s frankly amazing how many alleged “historians” try to understand history without reference to both primary and secondary sources.  If you haven’t read the news articles at the time of the founding, you have no earthly idea what you’re talking about.  If you didn’t read what men wrote, if you don’t study their laws, if you don’t read the sermons they heard, you don’t understand their history.  I have.  I’ve read that history, and I’ve read the sermons they listened to.

Second, this means open carry was common.  There is simply no other way to see this passage.  The text is clearly split into two parts: (1) guns, and (2) pistols.  And regarding pistols, they demanded a second sidearm as a backup.  You cannot appendix carry a long gun.  It would even be difficult to conceal two pistols without people noticing that you’re carrying.

Gentlemen openly display their weapons.  Only a history in which criminals have become increasingly common has it become customary to hide our weapons in our girth.

I listened to a video here (Guns Cranks) that was about as much Fudd lore as I could take, and I turned it off after just a few minutes.  Each and every reason they have to object to open carry has been fully addressed on these pages.  Furthermore, the instigator thinks he was smart and coy by trying to mock folks, like me, who have a southern accent.  To him, folks with a southern accent must be goofballs, uneducated Gomers, lacking wisdom and smarts.

He only made himself look stupid in my opinion.  I’m glad I’ve never run across these cranks before.  I’ll make sure never to link them again.

By the way, I was just thinking – you know where I’ve never heard the southern accent mocked before?  In professional society presentations on things like solutions to differential equations, particle transport calculations, and other engineering and scientific models and data.

Not once.  I’ve only been respected in such venues.  I was wondering, do any of the gun cranks know how to solve mathematical models like that?  Who’s the stupid one?

Source.

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont announced a series of proposed gun laws Monday in a state already considered one of the strictest for firearms ownership, including a statewide ban on open carrying expected to draw strong opposition from gun rights supporters.

Lamont revealed his latest plans to curb gun violence during a news conference in Waterbury with fellow Democrats, including Attorney General William Tong and mayors of the state’s largest cities, as well as state and local law enforcement officials.

Lamont and other officials said the legislation, which also includes new registration requirements for ghost guns and monthly limits on handgun purchases, is needed to help curb rising gun violence and crack down on illegal firearms around the state. Hartford, for example, recorded 39 murders in 2022, the most in two decades.

“That sense of anxiety and fear that many people sense — it doesn’t do us any good to say we’re in one of the safest states in the country … and people don’t feel safe,” Lamont said. “Over this last tough few years, the shootings are up. They’re up across the country. They’re up in our state.”

The governor’s proposals include a ban on the currently legal open carrying of firearms, while still allowing concealed carrying; limiting handgun purchases to one per month to discourage bulk purchases and illegal sales; and spending an additional $2.5 million on community anti-violence programs.

Tell us how many crimes were committed combined with open carrying of firearms?

This is a solution in search of a problem.  There is no problem – the problem is fake.  The perceived problem is that people feel unsafe.  People feel unsafe because you’ve funded the evisceration of the inner city with SNAP, subsidies and welfare, destroying the family in the process, and causing the corollary increase in crime.  People can’t defend themselves, or so you think.  You need more open carriers, not fewer.  And you need to fire progressive DAs who prosecute people who defend themselves.

That’ll fix the problems.