TexasCHLforum.com

Conagher wrote:

Charles L. Cotton wrote:

Conagher wrote:Hello Mr. Cotton.

I am new to your forum. I am a CHL for nine years and support open carry.

I would like to make a recommendation to address your concerns with open carry (bill writing, impact to CHL, etc,):

Give the OpenCarry guys a call and see if you can work out an understanding. I am sure you all are great guys and fundamentally have the same values and beliefs. My bet is you guys could work out a win-win situation to benefit all. It would be really nice to read your next post that started out as:

“Hey, I talked to Mike and John over at OpenCarry.org and we agreed to …”

Their contact information is:

OpenCarry.org co-founders:
John Pierce: John@OpenCarry.org - (276) 206-9615
Mike Stollenwerk: Mike@Opencarry.org - (703) 945-0824

Have a nice day and God Bless.

Welcome to TexasCHLforum and thanks for joining. Since neither TSRA nor NRA have taken a position on open-carry, I cannot get involved. I am on the NRA Board of Directors and I am Vice-Chairman of the TSRA Legislative Committee. It wouldn't matter how often or how loudly I proclaimed that I was doing this in my individual capacity and not as a representative of either of those organizations, no one would believe it.

Chas.

Thanks for the welcome and the reply. Not to challenge your reply but I am not sure I understand your response. I was thinking your original concern appeared to be reducing the risk of an "anit-gunner's dream" bill being submitted. Avoiding this seems to me to be in the best interest of the TSRA and the NRA. To my knowledge, neither organization has come out against open carry. I know J. Dark and A. Tripp have both corresponded with OpenCarry.org representatives. Still seems to me there is something to gain by all working together, but maybe I'm missing something.

Now I'm confused. If you are saying Alice Tripp and James Dark are corresponding with OpenCarry.org in some form of coordination, I can assure you that is not the case. Alice Tripp is the TSRA lobbyist and the Chairman of the TSRA Legislative Committee (I'm Vice-Chairman). We've talked at length about this issue. TSRA and NRA are not taking a position on open-carry as a concept and we have made that clear. In fact, a poster on OpenCarry.org posted an unfounded complaint about Alice's email explaining that the TSRA legislative agenda is full and we can't take on any more projects. His post was clearly an attempt to get OpenCarry.org members to drop their membership in TSRA because he didn't like what she wrote. His "I'll take my football and go home" attitude because he doesn't like the fact that he can't force a change in our legislative agenda is most unimpressive.

I agree that it's in all gun owners' best interests not to see the introduction of dangerous, poorly drafted bills. However, that doesn't change the fact that we don't jump into anything at the last minute. We prepare for and plan everything we put on our legislative agenda. Every bill we introduce has been thoroughly analyzed and cross checked to make sure there will be no unintended consequences, in the event it passes. We also evaluate every possible amendment that could be made to our bills, how we will counter those amendments, and what we will do in a worst case scenario. This is why we enjoy the success rate we have amassed for several sessions. Flying by the seat of your pants is irresponsible and we simply cannot be forced into that position. Even in the off-season, we are preparing for the next session, doing things that help pave the way for our legislative agenda.

Like it or not, and sometimes we don't, every time our name (TSRA or NRA) get's connected to a bill, organization or project, there is an assumption in Austin that this is "our" bill or project. So our political capitol gets used up on things other than our agenda. That is why we as an organization, and I as an individual, simply do not do anything that lends our names to something that isn't on our legislative agenda.

As a practical matter, as other posters have said, this thread provides a road map as to how a bill could be drafted, if anyone chooses to do so. If not, then we can all deal with what comes down the pike, if anything.

Chas.

Conagher wrote:Hello Mr. Cotton.

I am new to your forum. I am a CHL for nine years and support open carry.

I would like to make a recommendation to address your concerns with open carry (bill writing, impact to CHL, etc,):

Give the OpenCarry guys a call and see if you can work out an understanding. I am sure you all are great guys and fundamentally have the same values and beliefs. My bet is you guys could work out a win-win situation to benefit all. It would be really nice to read your next post that started out as:

“Hey, I talked to Mike and John over at OpenCarry.org and we agreed to …”

Their contact information is:

OpenCarry.org co-founders:
John Pierce: John@OpenCarry.org - (276) 206-9615
Mike Stollenwerk: Mike@Opencarry.org - (703) 945-0824

Have a nice day and God Bless.

Welcome to TexasCHLforum and thanks for joining. Since neither TSRA nor NRA have taken a position on open-carry, I cannot get involved. I am on the NRA Board of Directors and I am Vice-Chairman of the TSRA Legislative Committee. It wouldn't matter how often or how loudly I proclaimed that I was doing this in my individual capacity and not as a representative of either of those organizations, no one would believe it.

Chas.

I split a number of posts from this thread and moved them to a new thread Open-Carry: Pro/Con - Split from "No Open Carry Bill Yet" so we can keep the topic of this thread solely on OpenCarry.org's proposed bill, not the merits of open-carry. Most of us don't go back and read every post in a thread, me included, so I understand why people missed my request not to turn this into yet another pro/con discussion. But let's try to keep this discussion solely on how an open-carry bill should be addressed so as not to provide opportunity for anti-gun amendments.

Chas.

tarkus wrote:

Charles L. Cotton wrote:I recommend not promoting the model bill that OpenCarry.org offers on its website. It goes much further than is necessary to legalize open-carry. I understand that OpenCarry.org wants unlicensed open-carry, but even those who support open-carry are divided on the licensed v. unlicensed issue. Regardless of the approach taken, it would be much easier and safer to approach a bill by making minimal changes to the Penal Code to achieve the goal. For example, to legalize unlicensed open-carry, the only thing that needs to be done is to insert the word "concealed" in front of "handgun" in TPC §46.02(a). If the goal is to legalize licensed open-carry, then leave TPC §46.02 alone and simply repeal TPC §46.035(a) that requires concealment.

I agree it's safer to make small changes but I think they have to change the 46.035 failure to conceal rule no matter which one is their goal. If they only make the change to 46.02 then someone with a CHL can still be charged for violating 46.035 even though people without a CHL can open carry. It's like the requirement that someone with a CHL has to show ID and their CHL in situations where someone without a CHL doesn't have to show any ID. Or someone without a CHL driving past a 30.06 sign in a parking lot. We don't need more disadvantages to having a CHL.

I know what you are getting at, but they don't have to address TPC §46.035, if the goal is to legalize unlicensed open-carry. TPC §46.035(a) only applies when one is carrying pursuant to the authority of a their CHL. If unlicensed open-carry becomes legal, then a CHL would only be carrying pursuant to his/her cHL when they decide to carry concealed. TPC §46.035(a) would effectively be repealed, though not expressly so.

Tex. Gov't Code §411.205 that requires us to show our CHL when carrying does not have the same language that says it applies only when carrying pursuant to the authority of our CHLs.

As a practical matter, it wouldn't hurt to address TPC §46.035(a), so long as the only thing the bill did was repeal that subsection, but it isn't necessary. There is absolutely no reason to move all of TPC §46.035 into TPC §46.02 and every reason not to do so.

Chas.

TPC §46.035(a) wrote:Sec. 46.035. UNLAWFUL CARRYING OF HANDGUN BY LICENSE HOLDER. (a) A license holder commits an offense if the license holder carries a handgun on or about the license holder's person under the authority of Subchapter H, Chapter 411, Government Code, and intentionally fails to conceal the handgun.

Tex. Gov't Code §411.205 wrote: Sec. 411.205. DISPLAYING LICENSE; PENALTY. (a) If a license holder is carrying a handgun on or about the license holder's person when a magistrate or a peace officer demands that the license holder display identification, the license holder shall display both the license holder's driver's license or identification certificate issued by the department and the license holder's handgun license. A person who fails or refuses to display the license and identification as required by this subsection is subject to suspension of the person's license as provided by Section 411.187.

(b) A person commits an offense if the person fails or refuses to display the license and identification as required by Subsection (a) after previously having had the person's license suspended for a violation of that subsection. An offense under this subsection is a Class B misdemeanor.

The folks at OpenCarry.org posted a notice today that there still is no open-carry bill introduced. They also suggest emailing Representatives and Senators requesting that they sponsor a bill like the one posted on their website. (OpenCarry.org Bill)

Although pre-filing of bills is allowed, the vast majority of bills are not filed until after the session begins. Only two pro-gun bills were pre-filed, one that repeals the requirement to show a CHL when asked for ID and one to amend the statute that the NICS people are using to prohibit Texans from buying long guns in non-contiguous states. So the lack of a pre-filed bill should not be a cause for concern for people who support open-carry.

I'm sure the motive for posting this message on OpenCarry.org is not the lack of a pre-filed bill, but the lack of a bill sponsor or a bill at all. Otherwise, they wouldn't be making a blanket request for any Representative or any Senator to sponsor one and then refer them to the one a Virginia law student wrote for OpenCarry.org. The lack of a bill or a sponsor obviously is a matter of concern to open-carry supporters.

We have dozens of threads and hundreds of posts on whether Texas should allow open-carry and this post/thread is not going to be another one. I am posting this only to address the wording and scope of the proposed bill, so please don't turn this into yet another pro/con debate on open carry. I am addressing only the method being used, not the goal they are trying to achieve.

I recommend not promoting the model bill that OpenCarry.org offers on its website. It goes much further than is necessary to legalize open-carry. I understand that OpenCarry.org wants unlicensed open-carry, but even those who support open-carry are divided on the licensed v. unlicensed issue. Regardless of the approach taken, it would be much easier and safer to approach a bill by making minimal changes to the Penal Code to achieve the goal. For example, to legalize unlicensed open-carry, the only thing that needs to be done is to insert the word "concealed" in front of "handgun" in TPC §46.02(a). If the goal is to legalize licensed open-carry, then leave TPC §46.02 alone and simply repeal TPC §46.035(a) that requires concealment.

By making the massive changes as set out in the OpenCarry.org model bill, i.e. repeal of TPC §46.035 and moving it to §46.02, the entire subject matter of §46.035 dealing off-limits areas are germane to the bill. This opens those subjects up to amendments that would not otherwise be germane if the only changes were those I set out above. As currently written, the OpenCarry.org bill is an anti-gunner's dream! It allows them to attach a wide variety of anti-gun, off-limits, provisions. If that were to happen, the bill sponsor would be in a position of having to "pull down" (a/k/a kill) his/her own bill, or let anti-gun provisions remain in the bill for floor debate and possible passage. No responsible pro-gun elected official would take that risk. I know, I've been in just that situation -- watching our own bill killed because of an amendment.

If any of our members have any input with OpenCarry.org, it would be to their benefit not to promote the bill they have posted. I have no doubt that the law student who drafted the bill was not aware of Texas' stringent germane rule and that his/her proposed bill could have such dire consequences. I also understand that this law student was probably trying to consolidate the various provisions under one subsection, but this is not the way to go about recodification. When recodifications are done, they are done with that explicit goal and they include language like "this recodification is not intended to make substantive changes to any existing statute or laws." This makes it clear that the subject matter addressed is not open for amendment, and that the bill is solely intended to rewrite the code to be more readable and "user friendly." If amendments are offered that would have a substantive effect, they are ruled "out of order" and are not added to the bill.

Again, I am not opposing open-carry as a concept (not in this thread anyway); I am expressing a very strong concern for the specific bill that OpenCarry.org is recommending. It would be in everyone's best interest for this bill to be withdrawn and a very narrow substitute offered. I am not suggesting that supporters of open-carry not answer OpenCarry.org's call to action, if that is what you believe is appropriate. However, I think it would be prudent to promote a much narrower bill.

Rodbender, based upon your posts here and on OpenCarry.org, it appears you may be in a position to pass these concerns along to OpenCarry.org so they will be received as constructive. If I made these same comments, I'm sure they would not be perceived as constructive.

Chas.