– CJ, battling over open-carry in Texas
Alice Tripp of the Texas State Rifle Association was the first person to testify at a hearing about open-carry in Austin on April 7. She said that Texas is one of only five states that outright bans the open carry of handguns.
“It doesn’t make a whole lot of sense,” Tripp told Breitbart Texas. “45 other states are either silent in their law or completely allow open-carry… Texas would like to have a contemporary law that allows people, with a state-issued license, to have the option of not keep their handgun concealed… There are currently about 760,000 people in Texas with concealed handgun licenses. We’ve tracked the data and found that these individuals are actually 15 times less likely to commit a crime than Texans of the same age. You don’t get a license to become a criminal.”
She also mentioned that allowing citizens to open-carry with the appropriate permit would not necessarily cause an influx of gun owners.
“I don’t expect there to be a significant increase of open-carry folks. It’s not like all of a sudden everyone has a holster that matches their shoes,” Tripp said.
C.J. Grisham, President of Open Carry Texas, has also expressed strong support for open-carry policies since the incident at Fort Hood.
Grisham told Breitbart Texas, “If open-carry is such a problem, why are we one of only five states that don’t allow it? Open-carry is so important to state security and is not responsible for open crime. It is actually responsible for a decrease in crime. When a criminal sees a gun, it deters them from committing a crime.”
Indeed, a study by Gary Kleck found that 92 percent of criminals are deterred from committing a crime when they see a firearm – even if the firearm is not used.
Grisham told Breitbart Texas that he submitted a recommended bill to the state legislature in April that, if passed, would allow for unlicensed open-carry and concealed carry. The bill would also remove exemptions that allow state officials to carry a firearm in areas where normal citizens are prohibited from carrying.
“If a lawmaker can carry into a certain building, I should be able to carry in that building too. My bill removes those barriers that creates a special class of government officials,” Grisham said.
A former fetus, the “wordsmith from nantucket” was born in Phoenix, Arizona in 1968. Adopted at birth, wordsmith grew up a military brat. He achieved his B.A. in English from the University of California, Los Angeles (graduating in the top 97% of his class), where he also competed rings for the UCLA mens gymnastics team. The events of 9/11 woke him from his political slumber and malaise. Currently a personal trainer and gymnastics coach.
The wordsmith has never been to Nantucket.