Oldgringo wrote:"Keith B"
And as others have said, it will lead to a very real awareness of handgun carry and businesses restricting carry
Gentlefolk,
In our experience as CH licensees and our RV travels across the country the past four summers and fall, people don't OC where it's legal that we've seen...for various reasons. By the same token, we've not seen a whole lot of "gunbuster" or other "no-gun" notices in these OC states either.
I'm not sayin' OC is not good or evil, I'm just sayin'...I dunno'.
The difference is the places where open carry is currently legal have ALWAYS been legal (unless outlawed by municipal ordinances.) I came from Missouri where it is like this. So, since it has always been legal and no one carries,
What would happen in reversing the law here would be the media will splash it all over and everyone would start scrambling to prevent this from happening. I also would see the no-preemption clause being removed and the state would allow municipalities to outlaw open carry if they deemed necessary, so most places would jump on the band wagon and put it in their ordinances. In a metropolitan area like Dallas, you wouldn't know who had and hadn't banned in locally, so you could literally drive from say Allen into Plano and become illegal if you were open carrying.
Now, the only time I open carried in Missouri in my 38 years there (without a LEO badge displayed) was if I was on my own or other family property out of sight of the general public, or out in the country if I was target practicing, but that is legal here in Texas if you are practicing.
