The standards to get a concealed handgun license in Texas are the strictest in the nation. A person must be 21 or older, submit a photo and fingerprints for background checks, pay the $140 fee, attend 10 to 15 hours of concealed-weapon classes, and pass both a shooting accuracy test and a written exam on laws pertaining to deadly force and gun safety.
In 2011 an open-carry bill died in the Texas House. Last year a package of gun-law bills, including one to legalize open carry, again failed to make it to a floor vote.
Proponents of open carry may have better times a-comin’, however. Both major-party gubernatorial candidates, Atty. Gen. Gregg Abbott and State Sen. Wendy Davis, have said they support the concept.
Many open-carry supporters believe that the U.S. Constitution allows them to carry guns openly and without registration. Today 44 states have laws allowing handguns to be carried openly, although 15 of those states don’t allow open carry of semi-automatic rifles. In 30 of those states — including Colorado, New Mexico, Louisiana, and Arkansas — no registration of firearms is required.
“[Texas] should be on the leading edge of that,” Grisham said.
Watkins agrees but adds that he opposes gun licensing requirements. “The Second Amendment says, ‘shall not be [in]fringed,’ not ‘ask your government for permission,’ ” he said. “And that’s what you’re doing when you get a license. You turn it into a privilege. It’s no longer a right.”
Grisham wants to see more firearm education, and he’s not talking about classes for new gun users. “I also want to educate law enforcement and the public about the lawful use of firearms,” Grisham said. “Just because you see a guy with an AR-15, there’s nothing to be afraid of. I wanted to make the sight of that normal.”
Grisham’s Open Carry Texas movement has held more than 2,000 rallies in the past year, attended by as many as 1,200 people. Open Carry groups are springing up across the state, including Come and Take It Texas (CATI), which holds rallies in Austin.
“Each time we do one of those, we’re lowering that stigma [against the open carrying of firearms],” Grisham said.
Other gun advocate groups, like the National Rifle Association, disagree. NRA leaders say the Open Carry movement is only hurting the cause of gun rights, calling the demonstrations foolish, frightening, and “downright weird.”
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On March 29, someone phoned the Plano police.
“I’d like to report a group of people on the overpass of Ohio and 121,” the caller said. “They have signs hanging over, and they have guns strapped around them. Assault weapons. And they are very threatening. The guns were very threatening, and the way they were shaking their flags was very threatening.”
The people were members of Open Carry Tarrant County and Open Carry Texas, on a SH 121 overpass, displaying their firearms and waving flags that read “Come and Take It” and “Don’t tread on me” — slogans from the Texas and American revolutions, the latter also associated with the Tea Party movement.
When officers responded to the call, one of them told Watkins and the other marchers, “Someone called and said you were shaking your guns.”
The caller had said, accurately, that the protesters were shaking their flags, not their guns. The difference can be important, especially if the caller was feeling threatened. Watkins considers that a breakdown in communications and said similar misinterpretations happen all the time.
Law enforcement officials, in many of their interactions with Watkins’ group, seem to be doing their best to explain to the demonstrators why taking loaded assault rifles into places like Chipotle, Wendy’s, Braum’s, and Jack in the Box might not be wise.
In YouTube videos, the officers seem mostly cordial and respectful.
One Department of Public Safety trooper even tells the group that their actions may be hurting their chances of passing an open-carry law.
“They look at you, at people like you, and say, ‘This is why we don’t need it [open carry] here,’ ” the trooper says.
John Pierce, co-founder of OpenCarry.org in Virginia, told The Dallas Morning News that carrying semi-automatic rifles into a fast-food restaurant made for poor public relations.
Earlier this summer, Open Carry Texas leaders decided to quit carrying assault rifles and long rifles into businesses without permission. Open Carry Tarrant County has continued to do it.
Watkins said he has always been a firm believer in upholding what he believes are constitutional rights. Since 2012, he’s served as the secretary of the volunteer committee for the Tarrant County Republican Party, volunteered for the campaigns of Ron Paul and Ted Cruz, and participated as a delegate to the party’s state convention.
He was recently elected as a Republican precinct chair in Tarrant County. His activities, according to his Facebook page, include “fighting for Liberty full-time.”
When he’s not fighting for liberty, Watkins works as a bartender and a sales associate for Steam Energy, a public utility company.
The Arlington City Council must have been tired of Watkins fighting for liberty on their street corners. In May they amended an ordinance to forbid pedestrians from passing out literature, including Second Amendment handouts, to motorists at intersections.
After two members were ticketed under the new provision, Watkins’ group began attending city council meetings. Mayor Robert Cluck and other council members listened patiently to arguments from Open Carry supporters about why the amended ordinance was a direct attack on the First Amendment.
“You’re nickelin’ and dimin’ our Constitution to death,” said Kevin Powers, one of the 40 Open Carry supporters who spoke at the council meeting on May 13. “You’re nickelin’ and dimin’ our freedoms to death.”
“The sidewalk is there for me, you,” Watkins said. “If you want to take pictures for the court or media purposes, freedom of press, freedom of speech, it’s the sidewalk, man.”
Open Carry Tarrant County took the issue to federal court, and U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor agreed, issuing a restraining order on July 14 to block the revised ordinance.
“The fact that plaintiff’s tactics or message may cause some people to be uncomfortable is not proper motivation for limiting [free speech rights],” O’Connor wrote.
Arlington city officials did not return phone calls seeking information on whether the city will appeal the ruling.
“It was a big victory for the First Amendment,” Watkins said.
Arlington City Council member Charlie Parker later told CBS News that Open Carry Tarrant County acted more like a gang than an activist group.
“They have no moral compass whatsoever,” he said. “There’s no integrity or honor or respect in this particular group.”
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Lol. The data you people use to calculate such ignorance. The other countries don’t collect data on how many people the goverment kills. Guns protect us from them and allow you to write this stupid B.S.
Tea Party Paranoids Tony (flimsy resume) Tinderholt and Kookie Konni (road rage) Burton are completely in favor of folks carrying large assault weapons in public. I can only hope that Burton is able to use some restraint if she runs into those dreaded local physicians and FWST “liberal” Op-Ed folks who are her sworn “enemies”–acording to her Facebook page. Tony apparently had a scream fest on behalf of the “open carry” folks while “addressing” the Arlington city council—Scary!
As a gun owner of 40 years, I find the behavior of Watkins and his group completely irresponsible. What they do, while legal, paints responsible gun owners with the tar brush of extremists and marginalizes any real attempt made to extend gun rights, which by the way are the most liberal of any country in the world. These outlandish and outrages exhibitions by Watkins and his group serve no real purpose other than drawing attention to a group of socially inept people that under the guise of open carry are chasing their 15 minutes by scaring the hell out of innocents in businesses and on the street. They continually show how inconsiderate they are by refusing to ask permission from or notify the police or business of where they will be or when. Please keep your guns but at home, or the range, or on your deer lease just don’t carry them on the street even though you can. Because I can is the worst reason for doing anything.
Hey fed-up….think any of these deep thinkers by any chance , could possibly be, just maybe, somehow, kind of close to considering, maybe entertaining thoughs of being a Bagger or simply a greed-head Repug? Really, lets hear it. Don’t you know his Mama’s proud of him? Precious, really precious.
*like* …………fed-up, Excellent comments I couldn’t agree more!
For the record, the NRA appologized to Texas open carriers saying that an “ignorant staffer” condemned the movement. The NRA has subsequently supported our efforts to pass pistol open carry.
So the NRA being outraged is such a far stretch of the truth it’s a blatant lie.
Outright lies and the NRA have a long, established history of going hand in hand.
Actually that would be “handgun frickin’ everywhere in hand.”
As a 50+ years firearm owner, I find that a community of people and their governments who cannot entrust each other with each others unalienable rights, nor wish protect each other right to act as they see fit, respect that they do so without causing harm, is a community that cannot be trusted at all.
If their not killing anyone or obstructing any other man/woman rights, they are fine. Where as, the officers automatically step out of their uniform when arresting without true cause of harm, thus are acting illegally.
The rule is this: Be cool, don’t be an a**hole, and your good.
some spelling errors
Cops who torment and mistreat people do so because they enjoy their abuse. It has nothing to do with right or wrong, good or bad. They do what they do because they enjoy what they do. Many cops are wired differently than other folks and many of them would pay to have their jobs instead of being paid, if they had the money. They love their work. I have four close friends who are cops,three recently retired. We all went to high school together fifty years ago and still go hunting & fishing pretty often. We have to have cops, they are what they are, regular people with different likes and needs, just like crooks. There is not a nickles worth of difference between most of them. Cops are much more lucky than the crooks. It’s better to be lucky than it is to be smart, or a hard working, stand-up, decent human being. That is what one of them told me once, years ago. I thought he was right for a long time but I got over it.
The coward Shannon Watts of momsdemand who blocks and deletes anyone not parroting her cause spreads lies. While running around with armed security she calls for Americans to be disarmed. She claims being a grassroots but is all Monsanto genetically engineered AstroTurf!! Our 2nd Amendment is inalienable and can’t be taken away from law abiding citizens. What will it take to get antigunners to realize it’s the criminals & gangs they should be focused on going after. Not pushing for more laws by definition criminals don’t obey.
The coward Shannon Watts of momsdemand who blocks and deletes anyone not parroting her cause spreads lies. While running around with armed security she calls for Americans to be disarmed. She claims being a grassroots but is all Monsanto genetically engineered AstroTurf!! Our 2nd Amendment is inalienable and can’t be taken away from law abiding citizens. What will it take to get antigunners to realize it’s the criminals and gangs they should be focused on going after. Not pushing for more laws by definition criminals don’t obey.
The coward Shannon Watts of momsdemand who blocks and deletes anyone not parroting her cause spreads lies. While running around with armed security she calls for Americans to be disarmed. She claims being a grassroots but is all Monsanto genetically engineered AstroTurf! Our Second Amendment is inalienable and can’t be taken away from law abiding citizens. What will it take to get antigunners to realize it’s the criminals and gangs they should be focused on going after. Not pushing for more laws by definition criminals don’t obey.
The coward Shannon Watts of momsdemand who blocks and deletes anyone not parroting her cause spreads lies. While running around with armed security she calls for Americans to be disarmed. She claims being a grassroots but is all Monsanto genetically engineered AstroTurf. Our Second Amendment is inalienable and can’t be taken away from law abiding citizens. What will it take to get antigunners to realize it is the criminals and gangs they should be focused on going after. Not pushing for more laws by definition criminals do not obey.
Daytripper, just because you post something 4 times doesn’t make you right it just makes you sound shrill and needy. Also how can a man made inorganic product be genetically engineered? What so many people forget is that the governments regulate large numbers of things for the common good. Yes I know the word regulate is a hot button word for some of you but it’s true none the less. This is done to protect the general public because some people and companies can not be trusted to do the right thing. History is full of examples of this. The problem is that Watkins and his group are causing harm when they show up carrying their long guns. It scares employees, children and their parents. That can not be casually dismissed. They are not be considerate to the public. I don’t mean that in some nanby pamby way but by not showing respect for others in the community in which they are demonstrating.
Texas has legal concealed carry. Why does anyone need to openly carry a gun – rifle or pistol – into commercial areas? It makes no sense to most Texans – and we know guns, right? These folks are outliers and the Texas legislature needs to stop them. In fact, openly carrying long guns should be illegal in urban and commercial areas. It’s intended for hunting and rural living. These people are creating HUGE problems for not just every day people, but for business in this state. It needs to stop. Thanks for this piece.
These folks need to be stopped. They’re awful for every day folks, as well as for business. The legislature needs to outlaw open carry of long guns in commercial and urban areas. Texans know that long guns in a store or at an intersection is RIDICULOUS. Open carry of pistols is not necessary because we have legal concealed carry. If you feel you need a gun when you’re out and about, do it like the rest of us – CHL.
Those Tea Party candidates running for state offices i.e. Texas Legislature District 94–Tony Tinderholt and Senate district 10 –Konni Burton seem to think that supporting dangerous and unnecessary legislation for Open Carry is what the voters want. I can assure you, as a typical voter in these districts that I am offended at the immature embrace of this set of fringe characters. I would be very vociferous about any time wasted on such ridiculous legislation. The voters of Tarrant county deserve better. If one of these open carry people discharges a weapon in a public place accidently–especially a church or health care facility–I believe Tinderholt and Burton should be held legally responsible for the consequences.
In Ohio, an open-carry state, “patriots” carry their AR-15s, AK-47s into stores, like the Walmart in Beavercreek, . all the time. The other customers have greeted these gun carriers – who all have happened to be white men in their 20s and 30s – with a knowing nod of the head, a salute, two thumbs up,”God Bless You,” “Don’t Tread on Me,” etc.,
In August 2014, an unarmed 22 year old black man named John Crawford goes shopping at the same Walmart, selects a $43 Crossman plastic air rifle (pellet gun) off the shelf in the sporting goods dept, and carries it as he continues shopping. No one came up to him and thanked him for being an patriot like when white guys bring their loaded REAL semiautomatic rifles. Instead, someone called 911 about a black man at Walmart who had an assault rifle and was OBVIOUSLY UP TO NO GOOD. And he was aiming it at children. The police arrived and the official report states that Crawford was ordered to drop the weapon twice. After refusing to drop the weapon, and supposedly telling the police he would drop it only after he kills some crackers, a police sharpshooter fired a nonfatal shot at Crawford’s hand, making him drop the rifle, but Crawford dropped to the floor, picked up the rifle with the other hand, aimed it at the officers, and they had no choice but to open fire.
The community staged a protest – all white people – protesting against any charges being filed against the white officers, who WOULD SUFFER ENOUGH knowing they were FORCED to kill a young family man who pointed a toy gun at them and refused to put it down. The grand jury decided the officers were justified in killing the man.
The video was finally made public. All the details about refusing to drop the gun, killing “crackers,” having the gun shot out of his hand, picking it up and aiming it at the police DID NOT HAPPEN, but were put in the report to make the killing “justified.”. Crawford was killed TWO SECONDS after the police spotted him.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9FtNOV6Qhk
Gunlickers Unite!
And don’t forget to wear those camouflage Underoos your Mommies bought ya.
Gunlickers?
Now that is priceless!
Lug around “guns rights!”, “militia patriot!”, “tea party super hero!”, “just because I’m paranoid don’t mean I’m not out to shoot me!” banners or…
simply wear similarly adorned apparel.
Armed criminals in OC states thank gunnuts for the time-saving tip.