MBGuy wrote:srothstein wrote:For example, a person who is traveling can carry either openly or concealed. The law just does not apply to them.
Care to elaborate? I did some quick googling and apparently if you're travelling for an overnight stay you can open carry? That just doesn't sound right
Sure. If you read the Penal Code, Section 46.15 says that 46.02 does not apply to "a person who is traveling". Since 46.02 is the law saying it is illegal to carry and does not mention concealed or open, when it does not apply there is no requirement to conceal either.
Now, the problem is that there is no legal definition for traveling. To find out what a word means, you can look at the Code Construction Act (chapter 311 of the Government Code). There we are told that, basically, a word has its common meaning unless there is a technical meaning assigned somewhere by law. Since there is no definition of traveling in Texas codes, it has the common meaning. Now, to most of us, traveling means taking a trip that is not part of your usual activities (sucha s when i drove to Dallas this week). Some of us think it requires a certain distance or an overnight stay but there is really no general agreement. Ask any basketball player and they will say it means moving both feet while holding the ball.
So, we look to what the courts have said. There are a lot of cases with various definitions of traveling. Some require a distance, some require an overnight stay, some require crossing county lines, etc. Most of these come about by doing just the opposite of what we want. Instead of defining traveling, the court usually tells us what it is not.
And, the best answer was found in a Court of Criminal Appeals case from early in the 20th Century. They said that traveling is a fact to be decided by the jury at the time of trial. Using this as a guideline, courts will generally not touch the fact of whether or not you were traveling on an appeal. The jury decides the definition.
So, if you can convince the jury that what you were doing constituted traveling, you can carry your pistol openly. If the jury disagrees with you, then you were breaking the law.
But my point was that the law really does not give police officers that much of a special privilege. It does give them some, but it gives the same privilege to some others also. And, we need to fix the law so we can all carry Alaska style (with or without a permit as we decide).
, but it's the first I've heard of it.
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