California court rules Concealed Carry is not a constitutional right

Thursday marked the day we may have started to further stray away from our 2nd Amendment Constitutional Right to Bear Arms. The 9th Circuit Court, which is based out of San Francisco and covers nine states, decided in a 7-4 ruling supported a California law stating that residents require a “good cause” when applying for a permit to carry a concealed weapon or handgun. And, according to the court, “personal safety” isn’t a good enough of a reason.

The case was brought to the Circuit Court by gun owners that resided in San Diego and Yolo counties who felt the policies violated their Second Amendment Rights.

A judge from the court, Judge William A Fletcher, said: “We hold that the Second Amendment does not preserve or protect a right of a member of the general public to carry concealed firearms in public.”

This is where a lot of gun rights people get infuriated. They argue that this should be protected under the Second Amendment to the Constitution. The “right to bear arms” has been pivotal to the success of the United States from the Revolutionary War through the World Wars.

Speaking against Judge Fletcher was Judge Consuelo M. Callahan, who said the Second Amendment does in fact state that individuals do in fact have a right to carry a handgun, either concealed or open-carry. Some California laws do in fact ban people doing an open-carry, and when these laws and the courts decision are taken together they “obliterate the Second Amendment’s right to bear a firearm in some manner in public for self-defense,” as Callahan put it.

UC Davis student, Katie Stephens told me: “From my experience the people who I have known with concealed weapon permits are those who are the most knowledgeable about firearms.”

People who want to be able to buy a gun, legally, have to go through a lot of red tape. Sometimes even taking up to a few months to actually get the guns because of background checks. If guns are purchased legally, by good law-abiding citizens, the system will work. It’s when guns are purchased by criminals from other criminals when problems come up.

Another UC Davis student, Geoff Koch, when asked about the Circuit Courts decision, told me: “I agree with the appeal court’s decision. I don’t think the right to carry a gun and the right to conceal a gun are the same thing.”

He added that: “The vast majority of gun control laws in California simply make purchasing and owning a gun California difficult for law abiding citizens.”

The other aspect a lot of people are worried about with concealed carry weapons stem from the amount of mass shootings we have had recently – noticeably Orlando. Though most mass shootings are carried out with assault weapons, more shooting deaths are caused by handguns.

Geoff weighed in on this, saying: “The mass shootings are the result of a failed mental health system, disenfranchised citizens, and poor inter-agency and inter-state background information systems. So I don’t think stricter and stricter laws are the answer, guns are tools, dangerous ones, but they do the work of the mind that carries them. Those minds are what are dangerous.”

This goes back to the fact that we don’t have a gun problem, we have a people problem. Screenings to check for mental health could have helped to prevent the terrorist attack and hate crime that happened in Orlando.

The beauty of the Constitution is that it is open to interpretation and is considered to be a “living document.” The Second Amendment says: “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.” The part that is most disputed comes from the mention of the word “militia.” The question of if it is for armed forces or just citizens.

The Second Amendment also doesn’t directly guarantee the right to concealed-carry a hand gun. Open/concealed is an implied right, but it’s very strongly implied. The point is that people should be able to bear arms. As long as we can bear, isn’t that fair?

But, when it comes to self-defense, is it simply against other individuals? Or, in the broader scheme of things, against the possibility of a tyrannical government rising in the next century?

Hopefully we never have to come to have to deal with a government like that, but with the way policy has been shaped in the past few decades, that may be happening, a little bit at a time, almost unnoticeably. Sound familiar?