Florida Attorney General declares open carry of firearms legal after appeals court strikes down ban.

 

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier. Politico/AFP/Getty.

Florida Attorney General declares the open carry of firearms legal after an appeals court struck down the 40 year ban. Politico. James Uthmeier made the statement after conflicting county-level decisions. The ruling stemmed from a 2002 arrest of Stan McDaniels, who was standing at an intersection with a copy of the constitution in his hands and a handgun in a holster on his hip. McDaniels said he wanted to appeal his case to the Supreme Court. The State Supreme Court upheld the conviction but the ruling was overturned by an appeals court in wake of the Supreme Court decision NYSRPA v Bruen. That case said that gun laws had to have a historical basis and the appeals court found that the ban on open carry did not pass that test. It will be allowed in Florida now to openly carry a firearm outside of certain restrictions, like businesses that do not allow open carry. 

My Comment:

This ruling is obviously correct in the wake of the NYSRPA v Bruen ruling. You can only restrict gun ownership unless there is a good historical basis for doing so. With the ban on open carry in Florida, that was obviously not the case. The ban is only 40 years old, and that surely does not count under the Bruen standard. 

I always thought it was strange that Florida had a ban on open carry. It's been a conservative state for awhile now and it otherwise has decent gun laws. As someone who grew up in Wisconsin, which has always had open carry (though CCW is a lot newer), it never made any sense for there to still be a ban on open carry in Florida. It's one of the reasons I haven't moved there yet, I never understood why the state would not let folks carry weapons. 

I know a lot of people think open carry is dumb, and I think there is some validity to that. CCW means that folks don't know that you are armed and can't simply shoot you first if they know you have a gun. But I do think that open carry is important for other reasons. It allows the carrying of rifles which you obviously can't do concealed, and that is useful during civil unrest. It also allows folks that are too young to buy handguns to at least carry a rifle in those situations as well. Plus it desensitizes people to gun ownership, which is a good thing. 

I do admire the man at the center of this case, Stan McDaniels. He fought this case for more than 20 years and that's an insane amount of dedication. He knew that the law was unconstitutional but he had to wait for two decades to get a chance to get the law overturned. Well, he finally succeeded and I hope he is a very happy person tonight. 

Of course this is just one law in one state. California, Connecticut, Illinois, New York and Washington DC all ban the open carry of firearms in most circumstances. Florida was the last red state holdout but until those states undo their bans it's still an injustice. 

I don' think this will have too much of an effect on Florida regardless. Open carry is a fairly rare thing unless you are out in the country regardless. I don't think it will affect the crime rate in any way and it's very possible that it might even reduce it. Though, given that CCW was long legal in Florida, I don't think there is much to gain. And to be honest, I doubt many folks will be open carrying regardless. I am just happy that another unconstitutional law is gone.