by The longest running series on this blog has been Every Picture Tells A Story which has been a collaboration between Rob Vance and myself. It started in October 2011 when Illinois was forced by the 7th Circuit to adopt concealed carry. I said at the time that shall-issue concealed carry was the new norm. The new norm now is permitless or unlicensed/unrestricted carry.
With the Bruen decision, we had to re-do the graphic as may issue was now off the table. At the time the graphic below was done, the formerly may-issue states had not begun to change their law to implement it with “all deliberate speed.” I am now calling this Every Picture Tells A Story, Vol. 2, No. 1. The numbering pattern of academic journals seems to be the most appropriate way to signify the evolution over time.
Of course, we now have states like New York that want to search years and years of your social media and other states like Maryland who want to expand the number of places you cannot carry. In essence, they are non-compliant with the Bruen decision. Eventually, one hopes the Supreme Court will slap down these states that are thumbing their nose at the Court.
In the meantime, here is Every Picture Tells A Story, Vol. 2, No. 2, which reflects the adoption of unlicensed concealed carry by the state of Florida today. I hope that this will change soon with the addition of Nebraska and perhaps one, if not both, of the Carolinas.
Rob added these stats to accompany the graphic:
| 26.8% | Non-compliant with 2nd Amendment per Bruen (CA,CT,DC,HI,MD,MA,NJ,NY,RI) |
| 0.0% | No Issue |
| 0.0% | May Issue goes away Post-Bruen |
| 30.6% | Shall Issue (CO,DE,IL,LA,MI,MN,NC,NE,NM,NV,OR,PA,SC,VA,WA,WI) |
| 42.6% | Unlicensed concealed carry |
Almost three-fourths of all Americans now live in a state with either unlicensed concealed carry or shall-issue concealed carry. I never thought I’d see this when I started the blog in 2010 as only 48 states had any form of carry back then.
Small steps, but they are still being made…
Some states (WA, OR, CO) are rushing to become non-compliant. Getting a CCW is essentially meaningless if every place is off limits or perhaps worse, if no one can easily determine where is off limits or not. CO broke major ground for the bad guys by repealing state preemption.
When I started teaching the Tennessee Handgun Carry permit class in 1998 only 4 states recognized a Tennessee permit. When I stopped in 2018, there were 40. The tide turned gradually. To me, the watershed was Illinois being ordered by the Federal Courts to go shall issue. Bruen was the tsunami making landfall.
By the way, Oklahoma is a SHALL ISSUE STATE.
No Oklahoma is not a shall issue state – since 2019 you can open or concealed carry if 21 or over, etc. https://kfor.com/news/local/a-push-in-oklahoma-to-legalize-constitutional-carry-for-18-year-olds/