Florida Carry - Open Carry Fishing Full Steam Ahead © 2019 Phillip Evans

Florida Carry Members are continuing to organize open carry events, where they will wear rifles, shotguns, and pistols openly while fishing, or going to or from.

Photo by Michael Taylor - used with permission

They have been harassed (especially Michael Taylor "Soloyaker") by police several times, contrary to state law.

Florida law allows citizens who do not possess a concealed weapons license, to carry pistols and long guns openly in clear view of the public, but only while those citizens are engaged in fishing, camping, hunting, or recreational shooting, as well as going to or from those activities.

There has never been any unlicensed citizen unlawfully shooting anyone while engaged in those activities, so I'd say those are the type of armed folks you can trust to be around in public.

Now, take a person who DOES have a license to carry a firearm (finger-printed, background checked, photographed, taken a mandatory training course, paid a FEE to exercise a right), who is engaged in merely walking down the street or walking in a park. 

If that same person wears their holstered pistol openly, they are now at risk of being body-slammed, cuffed, and taken to jail by the police for violating the law that generally forbids carrying openly.

If unlicensed citizens can be trusted to carry openly in public while minding their own business fishing or doing some other approved excepted activity, why can't licensed carriers also carry openly while minding their own business walking on a park trail or riding their bike on a wooded trail? 

If unlicensed open carriers has caused no panic or danger, there is no reason to fear that licensed open carriers will either.

But this is all about APPEARANCES, not safety. Republican lawmakers are skeered to death that open carriers will put a damper on tourism. Open carry has always been legal in my home state of Georgia, and I see plenty of tourists around Atlanta, even as I carry my visibly holstered pistol around them with NO ISSUES, even at crowded public events and festivals.

These public events will continue until the Republican lawmakers in Florida get a stomach for liberty and legalize open carry. It's legal in 45 other states, with 30 of those not requiring a license to do so.

The Florida Senate for years has consistently voted in Senate Presidents that they KNEW would not allow an open carry bill to get a vote on the Senate floor. They pretend to support the Second Amendment, but don't want a public vote on open carry to put actions to their words. Those who are timid are just full of hot air.

Florida Carry Members will now not only carry just pistols openly while fishing, as in the past, but have and will continue to carry long guns as well, in order to increase visibility for the fight to get open carry legalized.

The heat will be turned up further as some Florida Carry members will wear a Freedom Cover (gun-shaped cloth cover over their holstered pistol, making it technically concealed, but still showing an obvious "bump" on one's side) in public and at large events on public property, even while not engaged in an approved exception to the general ban on open carry. 

You know that these freedom fighters are hitting a nerve. Local politicians are calling on the Florida Legislature to essentially ban open carry altogether, using this wording:

"The amendment would prohibit anyone from openly carrying their gun while on the way to or from or while hunting, fishing, or camping, if it's within 1500 feet of a school, church, government building, or guarded beach."

Keep up the pressure you men and women who desire LIBERTY!

On Facebook, you can join their group for free by clicking HERE.

If you want to support the effort to pass pro-gun rights laws in Florida, you can become a paying member by signing up on their website:
https://www.floridacarry.org/

Georgia - Guns in Publicly Owned Stadiums is the Law © 2019 Phillip Evans

As the debate in Georgia about guns in publicly owned stadiums heats up, our lawmakers in the General Assembly under the Gold Dome in the State Capitol Building will have some decisions to make.

Free to use photo

Will they allow a state law they passed (thanks to Georgia Carry) in 2014 to stand, or will they take it back? Will they allow liberty to continue to bloom, or will they pour some weed killer on it? That is the big question.

Here's a little seven-point help for some of our Representative and Senator friends that may be weak in the knees on this:

1. Licensed citizen firearm carriers are 6-times more law-abiding than law-enforcement according to 20 years of recorded crimes:

From: https://www.gunstocarry.com/concealed-carry-statistics/

"Florida revoked 11,189 concealed carry permits for violations such as misdemeanors or felonies between 1987 -2017. This works out an annual rate of 10.4 permits revoked per 100,000.

Texas had 148 concealed carry permit holders convicted of a misdemeanor or felony in 2016. This works out to a conviction rate of 12.3 percent per 100,000. When the Texas and Florida data is combined it shows that CCW permit holders are convicted of felonies and misdemeanors at a rate of 2.4 per 100,000. While among police the rate is 16.5 per 100,000 officers. Texas and Florida have some of the highest rates of CCW permit holders but the figures are similar in other states with less permit holders."

In summary CCW permit holders are convicted of crimes at less than a sixth of that for police officers.

2. Most police officers are law-abiding, and so off-duty officers and deputies should be allowed to carry at Mercedes-Benz Stadium. Currently, the Atlanta Falcons does not allow them to be armed at games or any other events held there.

There's never enough police around when you need one in an emergency, and this will help to bridge that gap.

3. This has already been the law on the books for five years (HB 60 in 2014), and no one is above the law, even large sports teams.

4. None of the predicted "blood in the streets" or "wild, wild west" came true when being able to drink alcoholic beverages and carry guns in restaurants and bars became legal years ago.

And no drunken shootouts by licensed carriers has happened in other crowded venues we currently carry at, like at Stone Mountain Park during their large events such as their July 4th Fireworks Celebration.

5. Guns left in cars can be stolen and used to hurt innocent people.

6. Guns left at home leave people open to dangers from criminals while traveling to and from stadium games and events, not to mention leaving them defenseless in downtown Atlanta where crime is high, and while walking to and from their vehicles in the parking lot.

7. Multiple "rowdy fans" have been known to gang up on innocent husbands and dads and proceeded to beat and kick their heads into  a bloody pulp. Had those victims been armed, they might have saved themselves from the trouble of some permanent brain damage.

In short, guns in stadiums carried by law-abiding, licensed citizens and off-duty law-enforcement will make for a much more polite and civil environment.

Terrorists will also think twice about hitting a target that might not be as victim-rich as it once was.

See Part 1: https://pursuitofpatriotism.blogspot.com/2019/10/georgia-carry-challenges-atlanta.html

See Part 2: https://pursuitofpatriotism.blogspot.com/2019/10/atlanta-falcons-response-to-gun-ban.html