Doing Bars And Bartenders Right In Texas

When the governor of North Carolina ordered the closing of all restaurants and bars to in-service patrons on St. Patrick’s Day, my thoughts went to the servers and the bartenders. This is not because I’m a regular patron. Rather it is because the Complementary Spouse’s first cousin just started a new job as a bartender.

Toby is very good at what he does and is very service oriented. As a result, he makes good tips whether as a server or a bartender. Immediately becoming eligible for unemployment will only replace a fraction of his income.

The NC Executive Order only tells the Alcoholic Beverage Commission to study the situation and get back to the governor in writing on regulations that they might be able to waive or show some flexibility.

Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) goes further than Gov. Roy Cooper (D-NC) and actually orders some things that will help bars and bartenders.

From Gov. Abbott’s press release:

Governor Greg Abbott today issued a waiver that will allow restaurants to deliver alcoholic beverages with food purchases to patrons, including beer, wine, and mixed drinks. The Governor also directed the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission (TABC) to waive certain provisions to allow manufacturers, wholesalers, and retailers of alcoholic beverages to repurchase or sell back unopened product. 

These waivers are in response to the financial hardship caused by COVID-19 that has disproportionately affected the hospitality industry. 

“The State of Texas is committed to supporting retailers, restaurants, and their employees,” said Governor Abbott. “These waivers will allow restaurants to provide enhanced delivery options to consumers during this temporary period of social distancing.”

Under this waiver, effective immediately, restaurants with a mixed beverage permit may sell beer, wine, or mixed drinks for delivery as long as they are accompanied by food purchased from the restaurant. 

The buy-back waiver allows alcohol distributors and manufacturers to repurchase excess inventory from restaurants, bars, and clubs affected by event cancellations due to COVID-19.

So bartenders can still make drinks for delivery and establishments can sell back their excess inventory. This keeps more people employed and allows the reallocation of inventory. I like it.

North Carolina should follow the example of Texas. However, given my home state’s antediluvian approach to anything dealing with alcoholic beverages, I’m not holding my breath.

Love This Bill Number

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Rep. Jonathan Stickland (R-TX-House 92) is a pro-gun conservative and an advocate for constitutional carry in Texas. The Texas House of Representatives has recently opened their filing of bills for the upcoming session. My friend and fellow podcaster Rachel Malone alerted me to a new bill he has introduced.

I love his announcement of it on Twitter.

 I see what he did there!

The bill text can be found here.

Smart Move On GOA’s Part

My friend and fellow co-host of the Polite Society Podcast Rachel Malone was fired last month as Operations Manager of the Texas Republican Party. It seems a certain elected official took offense to her criticism of his 40 point “school and firearm safety” proposals especially since it contained a red-flag law proposal. As a result of Gov. Abbott’s complaint as conveyed by his henchman, the Texas GOP Chairman was forced to fire Rachel.

Stupid move, Greg.

If you want to control someone it is much better to keep them under your employ. Firing them allows that person to become a free agent and return to the grass roots firearms activism for which she is known.

While I’ve known it since Monday, it is now public that Rachel will be the new Texas Director for Gun Owners of America. In that role, she will lobby the Texas legislature directly on gun rights. I know Rachel’s ultimate goal is to bring constitutional carry to Texas.

From GOA:

Springfield, VA – Gun Owners of America (GOA) announces today the hiring of Rachel Malone as Texas Director. This signifies a new focus on GOA’s advocacy within the Texas State Legislature.

Texas is a key state for GOA’s work to advance gun freedoms. Texas is known for its rich heritage of gun owners, and it deserves strong advocacy for gun rights. Knowing this, Gun Owners of America is delighted to establish a permanent presence within Texas to preserve and defend Texans’ right to keep and bear arms.

Erich Pratt, Executive Director for Gun Owners of America, stated: “Texas is facing a battle, and GOA intends to be on the forefront. As the no-compromise gun lobby, GOA looks forward to working with grassroots activists all across Texas for victories in their state.

“I’m thrilled that Rachel Malone is serving as Texas Director for GOA. She has a strong background of fighting for firearms freedom, connecting with grassroots, and advocating within the Texas Legislature. I am confident in her ability to represent Texas gun owners in protecting the essential freedom of the right to keep and bear arms.”

 By the way, the picture above of Rachel was from the recent MAG-180 held in Wisconsin where Rachel passed everything with flying colors.

Congrats to Rachel on her new position and kudos to GOA for recognizing the gem that is Rachel in hiring her as the Texas Director.

Texas Grassroots Gun Rights Coalition Responds To Gov. Abbott’s “School Safety” Proposals

This past Wednesday, May 30th, Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) unveiled his School and Firearm Safety Action Plan in reaction to the murders at Santa Fe High School. Among the proposals included was an extreme violence or gun violence or red flag or whatever you want to call it protective order proposal. As many have commented, if the person is so dangerous that you have to take their firearms from them, then why are they still running around on the streets?

A coalition of Texas grass roots gun rights groups have responded to his proposals. As my friend Rachel Malone has pointed out, Gov. Abbott did not seek the advice of everyday Texans nor did he reach out to the many gun rights organizations within Texas.

The release from this coalition of Texas gun rights groups is below:

TEXAS GRASSROOTS GUN RIGHTS COALITION RESPONDS TO GOVERNOR ABBOTT’S SCHOOL SAFETY ACTION PLAN

Temple, TX, May 31, 2018– Seeing a need for increased grassroots representation in the discussion on school safety and firearms-related legislation in Texas, several grassroots gun rights organizations have come together to form the Texas Grassroots Gun Rights Coalition representing over 250,000 law-abiding Texas gun owners. The coalition currently includes Lone Star Gun Rights, Open Carry Texas, Texas Firearms Freedom, and Texas Gun Rights. The leaders of these groups offer valuable contributions to the discussion, drawing on their backgrounds and expertise in the legal, teaching, self-defense, and counterintelligence and
physical security professions.

Like all Texans, our hearts break for lives lost in senseless shootings and students who have to endure the trauma of seeing their friends shot. It’s because we care so much about the gift and treasure of precious human life that we devote so much time to work guaranteeing our ability to defend it. To that end, our own proposals for school safety would include the following:

1.) Acknowledge that evil will always exist and will always find a way to achieve its end in this world unless it is stopped by those capable of opposing it. As evidenced by the failure of existing laws to prevent school shootings, it’s clear that the government and first responders will never be able to prevent harm from coming to people. The closest that they can come, however, is in not hampering the ability of law-abiding citizens to protect and defend themselves from inevitable violence and harm.

2.) The American system of government is set up so that we err on the side of not punishing those who may be innocent – there is a high standard for denial of rights. Do not allow the focus to be on preventing anyone who might possibly be under suspect of causing harm from having access to firearms — this is likely to abridge the rights and decrease the safety of peaceful, law-abiding citizens. Suggestions to strip citizens of rights based on what they might do is dangerous to liberty and our founding principles of due process.

3.) Measures such as hunker-down drills, increased background checks, and laws forbidding weapons are not proven to make our children statistically safer. Let’s instead
put our efforts toward proactive solutions that are statistically proven to make our children safer.

4.) Before any solutions can even be entertained, we must ensure that we are asking the
right questions:

– Can we stop all attacks?
– Where do most mass killings occur?
– When they occur, what works to stop them faster?
– Where do killers obtain weapons?
– What are the observed, statistical benefits in areas that have implemented
currently proposed legislative changes? What is the tradeoff?
– When violence happens, who is best positioned to protect children? What are
they willing to do, and are we hindering their ability to be effective?

5.) Don’t let fear hinder us from finding a rational solution. No good laws are made from fear, panic, and other rushed and emotional responses. Psychotic killers are gradually normalizing the American public to acts of mass violence. Let’s remove barriers to reclaiming our tools of self-defense and normalizing the sight of guns used as a line of defense against acts of violence.

6.) Lack of respect for the value of life in modern culture lowers the innate hurdle to take innocent life for youth raised in that culture. As a long-term goal, work to restore a culture of valuing life while enforcing punishments for those who destroy it.

We know that we are not alone in developing proposals to address the immensely important issue of keeping our children safe. Yesterday, Governor Abbott released a proposal for school safety. We have serious concerns with many points, particularly relating to due process, expectation of privacy, and individual liberty. In hopes of ensuring the best possible final result that protects liberty, here are some specific concerns that we hope will be addressed as we move forward.

First, from a process standpoint:

#1: From press reports it appears that everyday Texans were not represented in the Governor’s roundtable discussions to gather ideas for these proposals. It is troublesome
that Governor Abbott’s recommendations were made without the benefit of grassroots involvement that could have contributed a fresh set of ideas. We’d like to see more
grassroots input acknowledged and considered for out-of-the-box practical solutions.

#2: Important groups also may not have been solicited for their input — including (as best as we can tell) Students for Concealed Carry, Lone Star Gun Rights, Open Carry Texas,
and Texas Gun Rights. These groups have established themselves as stakeholders in any firearms-related legislation and should be included. We are confident that they will
be participating in continued dialog to help reach productive solutions. We need every tool in our toolbox to achieve the best possible result for our children.

From a proposed solutions standpoint, we offer the following solutions and responses to already posited recommendations.

Yesterday’s release:

#3: Focuses on the school marshal program to bring increased protection to schools. Despite the good intentions of this program, it was highly flawed from the start. Although
these proposals address some of the flaws, a much more effective solution is to simply drop the prohibitions on armed citizens carrying in schools by repealing Section 46.03(a)(1) of the Texas Penal Code. This would include allowing teachers and staff to carry in school should they wish to do so. Many individuals have their own high standards of training they maintain and would be happy to take responsibility for their
own safety instead of relying on a government program. The State of Texas can take action by passing a resolution calling upon the private firearms industry of this State to create non-required training programs tailored for stopping active shooters, and encourage competition across the marketplace;

#4: Pushes for unfunded mandates. Ultimately these types of measures are unlikely to be well-implemented, and/or adversely affect taxpayers;

#5: Pushes state safety mandates on charter schools, which are supposed to be deregulated for a reason. This emphasizes that public-private partnerships are actually
government-controlled despite the illusion of private entities having the freedom to run their organizations as they wish. It also shouldn’t go unnoticed that school shootings are
not happening in charter schools;

#6: Relies on federal funding. We’d prefer that Texans take responsibility for our own safety rather than be subject to inevitable strings and additional mandates forced upon
us by the federal government;

#7: Recommends the iWatch program which sounds more like a real-world version of Orwell’s 1984 “Big Brother Is Watching” concept. The example given in the plan includes
someone purchasing ammunition as an item that would trigger a possible alert on a person. We do not want people tracking when we purchase ammo — and we do not want
that innocent free-market action denigrated as an indicator of someone who may have ill intent. The program is nothing more than a feel-good effort that will create more
problems than it solves;

#8: Recommends deploying fusion centers to monitor social media. How will this not become like the TSA, but with scanners for our minds instead of our bodies? It’s security
theater with imaginary benefits and actual downsides.
We have already seen the deleterious effects these programs have had on European societies where thoughtcrimes
have become prevalent. According to the plan, innocent social media posts could be flagged for potential law enforcement action simply for talking about guns. That alone is wrong, but the risks of also stereotyping and wrongly targeting minority groups would cause great harm to those communities;

#9: Proposes “Red Flag” laws that allow a vengeful relative to threaten an individual’s gun ownership based on nothing more than a personal opinion that they’re unfit to own guns. That person could then be taken to court — without any probable cause that they’ve broken a law and without being able to defend themselves prior to having their rights stripped from them. Our justice system is supposed to prosecute and punish people who have broken an actual law — not those who are “likely” to commit a crime in the future. Wading into predictive judicial action is detrimental to a free society;

#10: Proposes changes in Safe Storage laws (Penal Code Section 46.13) which present a moral dilemma for parents who want their responsible almost-adult-child to have
access to a firearm for home protection. It forces them to choose between following the law or doing all they can to ensure their child’s safety. It treats every household under a
common standard without respect to individual circumstances.
People have been charged under this law only 62 times since 1996, leading us to believe that this change
would cause harm without adding any meaningful benefit. The proposed language doesn’t just tie it to the home; it also would apply to vehicles and makes access a felony, even if the access happened at a friend’s or extended family member’s house. Research has been clear that safe-storage laws increase violent and property crimes against law-abiding
citizens with no observable offsetting benefit in terms of reduced accidents or suicides. A perfect example of this is the Jessica Carpenter case out of California. Carpenter was babysitting when a drugged-out Jonathon David Bruce broke in and murdered two of the children before police arrived. Jessica was a trained shooter, but California safe storage laws prevented her from accessing her firearm. This is just one
example out of many and is not something we want to see in Texas;

#11: Adds mandatory reporting of lost or stolen guns, creating dangerous unintended consequences. Texans have consistently opposed creating any type of gun registry for
legitimate reasons, chief of which is that it is not a government agency’s business knowing what firearms we own or have owned. Any gun owner is already free to voluntarily report theft or loss of any item, including firearms, and this should be encouraged, but not mandated.
Arbitrary reporting deadlines are a dangerous tactic allowing rabidly anti-gun prosecutors to bring charges against otherwise law-abiding gun owners with who are potential victims of criminal activity themselves. It should be noted that California Governor Jerry Brown vetoed a law very similar to this in 2013 stating he
was “not convinced that criminalizing the failure to report a lost or stolen firearm would improve the identification of gun traffickers or help law enforcement disarm people
prohibited from possessing guns;”

#12: Fails to mention ending gun-free zones for law-abiding Texans — the least expensive and most effective way to harden schools and provide responsible adults a fighting chance at protecting themselves and their students by mitigating harm from inevitable attempts at violence. Instead of looking only at law enforcement-based solutions, look at reducing barriers for everyday Texans who are teachers and
volunteers in schools to be able to carry a firearm if they choose. This includes, but is not limited to, repealing most provisions of Penal Code Sections 46.03 and 46.035.

As Governor Abbott has clearly stated, his proposal is a starting point and not an end point. We have 6 months between now and the next legislative session to engage in dialog with interested parties and the incoming House and Senate members. We commit to doing so with the intent of
ensuring that we find solutions that increase safety for Texas schools without reducing freedom and liberty.

About Open Carry Texas: OCT is a 501(c)(4) organization dedicated to the safe and legal carry of firearms in the State of Texas in accordance with the United States and Texas
Constitution and applicable laws. Our purpose is to 1) educate all Texans about their right to carry in a safe manner; 2) to condition Texans to feel safe around law-abiding citizens that
choose to carry them; 3) encourage our elected officials to pass constitutional carry legislation for all firearms; and 4) foster a cooperative relationship with local law enforcement in the furtherance of these goals with an eye towards preventing negative encounters.

Contact CJ Grisham
Cell 254-383-8238
Email cj@opencarrytexas.org
Website http://www.opencarrytexas.org

About Lone Star Gun Rights: Lone Star Gun Rights is dedicated to the restoration of our 2nd Amendment Rights. It is our firm belief that our right to bear arms comes from beyond government, and that government has no authority to create laws or regulations concerning it. Our mission is to ensure the liberty and safety of all Texans and Americans alike by enacting Constitutional Carry and repealing the existing infringements at both the State and Federal
levels.

Contact Derek Wills
Cell 281-935-7505
Email derek@lonestargr.com
Website http://www.lonestargr.com

About Texas Gun Rights: Texas Gun Rights is organized as a 501 (c)(4) non-profit, nonpartisan grassroots citizen organization made up of gun owners and lovers of liberty. With over 300,000 members and supporters, Texas Gun Rights is the largest “No Compromise” gun rights organization in the State of Texas. Not only do we work tirelessly to defend against attacks on our Second Amendment Freedoms, but we work to advance true firearms freedom in the form of Constitutional Carry legislation. We invite all Texans who believe in freedom, liberty, and
private property to join Texas Gun Rights.

Contact Chris McNutt
Cell 972-638-7314
Email chrism@nagrhq.org
Website https://txgunrights.org/join/

About Texas Firearms Freedom: We are dedicated to making activism accessible for the everyday Texan. Our mission is to pass Constitutional Carry in Texas and to reduce legislative
barriers to Texans freely owning and carrying firearms. We train passionate grassroots activists to make their voice heard in the Texas Legislature in order to affect positive change, giving them a community so they are not alone.

Contact Rachel Malone
Cell 512-937-3006
Email rachel@texasfirearmsfreedom.com
Website https://www.texasfirearmsfreedom.com

Tweet Of The Day

I haven’t said anything on my blog about the shooting at the First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs. Part of it because there is more and more coming out. Part of it is because I don’t believe in instant analysis. Finally, part is that I spent the whole weekend taking Massad Ayoob’s MAG-20 Classroom – Armed Citizen’s Rules of Engagement and I am decompressing from that intense experience.

I saw this tweet a bit ago. Former Bush speechwriter David Frum is calling for a lifetime ban on those who “raises a hand against a woman or a child”.

The anti’s are saying some of the stupidest stuff. They are calling for new laws when the laws that would have prevented the church murderer from legally obtaining a firearm were already in place. The problem was that someone in the US Air Force screwed up and didn’t report the results of the general court martial in 2013 to the FBI’s NICS check system. Note that this screw up occurred during the Obama Administration.

Campus Carry Updates In Texas And Georgia

Two events in Texas and Georgia illustrate the advance of campus carry.

In the first event, University of Texas President Gregory L. Fenves said he “would bow to state law” regarding campus carry. He adopted the recommendations of the Campus Carry Working Group who has advised him on how to comply with the law. His decision will allow licensed concealed carry holders to carry in classrooms at the University of Texas. However, he will still work to ban firearms from most on-campus residential halls.

From the Austin Statesman:

“I do not believe handguns belong on a university campus, so this decision has been the greatest challenge of my presidency to date,” said Fenves, who has led the Austin flagship campus since June 3. “I empathize with the many faculty members, staffers, students and parents of students who signed petitions, sent emails and letters, and organized to ban guns from campus and especially classrooms.

“However, as president, I have an obligation to uphold the law. Under the law, I cannot adopt a policy that has the general effect of excluding licensed concealed handguns from campus. I agree with the working group that a classroom exclusion would have this effect.”

Fenves is confident his decision will stand up to challenges. However, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has previously issued a non-binding advisory memo stating that dorms shouldn’t be off-limits to firearms.

Moving on to Georgia, the House Public Safety and Homeland Security approved HB 859 which would allow concealed carry in school buildings including classrooms. However, the bill excludes carry from dorms, sorority and fraternity houses, and athletic facilities. The bill was passed out of committee on a 10-3 vote and now goes to the House Rules Committee before it is voted on by the entire Georgia House of Representatives.

If the Georgia bill passes the House, it will go on to the Georgia Senate. Not being a Georgian, I’m not sure of the bill’s chances in the Senate. That body did remove campuses from an expansion of carry locations in a 2014 bill.

H/T Georgia Carry

On Texas, Whiskey, And Other Stuff

If you noticed that my blogging tailed off around midweek, it was because I was in Texas for my cousin Bill’s funeral. I flew down Wednesday evening and returned Friday night.

It was both a sad and joyous occasion. Sad because his wife Annie lost the love of her life. Sad because Bill was killed by a reckless driver who crossed the center line and hit him head-on. Sad because so many of us lost a friend.

It was joyous because everyone had a story or two to tell about Billy. These stories usually revolved around fishing because Billy was the consummate avid fisherman. Whether it was going on the “trip of a lifetime” to catch big yellow fin tuna which he ended up repeating a number of times or using somewhat controversial methods to catch a big rainbow trout at Yellowstone’s Fishing Bridge, they all epitomized Bill. When he went on his “trip of a lifetime”, he thought nothing of fishing 20 hours out of 24 when they were on the fish.

The wreath above was from his fishing friend Todd. I thought it was the perfect touch for the reception after the funeral where we all gathered to share a meal and tell Billy stories.

Bill had managed the food service operations for Aramark at the huge Dow Chemical plant in Freeport, Texas for many years. How Aramark handled things the day of his funeral says a lot about them as a company and the respect that Bill’s co-workers had for him. Aramark closed the food service operations on Thursday and gave all the employees the day off with pay so that they could attend the funeral. From the looks of it, virtually all attended the funeral.

The thing that stands out in my mind about Texas and Texans is how generous they are in times of crisis. Neighbors and friends were constantly bringing in food. Mike, their next door neighbor, was a retired Houston fireman and he cleaned the belongings out of Bill’s truck so as to spare Annie even more pain and grief. His fishing buddy Todd and his wife Lisa were there from day one of the tragedy. The list goes on and on.

Texas, in addition to great people, is blessed with some really good liquor stores. On my way to the airport I stopped at the Spec’s in Pearland to see what they might have in the way of Texas offerings. The Spec’s salesperson first asked my price range and then recommended the Rio Brazos Boxcar Texas Whiskey. Rio Brazos is a craft distillery located in College Station. It will be interesting to try given that the whiskey has a final filtering through coarse pecan wood.

Finally, I need to say something about Southwest Air. I like the fact that they don’t charge for checking bags and I like their boarding system. Very few people try to cram everything they’ve brought into the overhead bins. As a result, boarding by number instead of assigned seat is quick and efficient.

Balanced Report On Open Carry In Texas….From NPR?

When the Complementary Spouse got home from work yesterday, she told she had just listened to a report on open carry in Texas that was rather balanced. The report was on NPR’s All Things Considered afternoon news show.

After I listened to it, I agreed. The report by John Burnett interviewed Cory Watkins of Open Carry Tarrant County, C.J. Grisham of OCT, Stephanie Lundy of Everytown Moms for Illegal Mayors, and Alice Tripp of the Texas State Rifle Association.

Alice Tripp made the point that open carry of ARs and AKs in restaurants was not helping get open carry of handguns passed in the Texas legislature. She is quoted as saying, “It’s not helpful. It’s not good manners. It’s not thoughtful. It’s not conducive to facilitating the legislative process.”

The report was balanced enough to note that both Republican Greg Abbott and Democrat Wendy Davis were in support of allowing Texans to open carry handguns. Coming from NPR, who woulda thunk it?

You can listen to the whole report at this link. I had tried to embed it but it just wouldn’t work.

Clowns To The Left Of Me, Jokers To The Right



The rest of that song by Stealers Wheel goes “here I am stuck in the middle with you.”

That is how I’m feeling about the whole open carry fiasco in Texas. I doubt that there are many readers of this blog that don’t support the extension of open carry in Texas to include handguns. Many states including my own North Carolina have unlicensed open carry.

What is incredibly frustrating is watching Shannon Watts and her fellow gun prohibitionists at Everytown Moms for Illegal Mayors making hay out of the bumbling ineptitude of groups like Open Carry Texas. Sonic, Chipotle, and god knows who’s next have issued “Starbucks-style” statement asking the open carry activists to leave them out of the argument.

Sebastian at Shall Not Be Questioned has done yeoman’s work in examining the folly of their actions. You can read some of those posts here, here, and here. There are more.

The attention whoring of these OC activists has caused such backlash that the NRA issued a statement last Thursday which said, in part,

Yet while unlicensed open carry of long guns is also typically legal in most places, it is a rare sight to see someone sidle up next to you in line for lunch with a 7.62 rifle slung across his chest, much less a whole gaggle of folks descending on the same public venue with similar arms.

Let’s not mince words, not only is it rare, it’s downright weird and certainly not a practical way to go normally about your business while being prepared to defend yourself. To those who are not acquainted with the dubious practice of using public displays of firearms as a means to draw attention to oneself or one’s cause, it can be downright scary. It makes folks who might normally be perfectly open-minded about firearms feel uncomfortable and question the motives of pro-gun advocates.

As a result of these hijinx, two popular fast food outlets have recently requested patrons to keep guns off the premises (more information can be found here and here). In other words, the freedom and goodwill these businesses had previously extended to gun owners has been curtailed because of the actions of an attention-hungry few who thought only of themselves and not of those who might be affected by their behavior. To state the obvious, that’s counterproductive for the gun owning community.

More to the point, it’s just not neighborly, which is out of character for the big-hearted residents of Texas. Using guns merely to draw attention to yourself in public not only defies common sense, it shows a lack of consideration and manners. That’s not the Texas way. And that’s certainly not the NRA way.

Chris Cox of the NRA-ILA backed away from that statement yesterday saying it was the personal opinion of some unnamed staffer and not the NRA’s official position. He apologized for any confusion it caused. Others such as Charles Cooke of National Review disagreed saying that it was what needed to be said. I think I and the majority of the gun blogging and gun podcast community would agree that it needed to said.

Bob Owens had an interesting observation on this at BearingArms.com. He noted that often in cases like this where a statement is retracted that it is the original statement which reflects the internal thinking of the organization. In other words, it was what we called back in my political science days “signalling“.


As Michael Bane emphasized today in his Downrange Radio podcast, our goal in the gun rights community needs to be winning. We no more win hearts and minds with these open carry demonstrations in restaurants than the US Air Force did with carpet bombing in South Vietnam. I would send a copy of Dale Carnegie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People to everyone in the Texas open carry leadership if I could.

I can’t, so in the meantime I will implore them to cut out the narcissistic displays, clean up their websites and Facebook pages, and, as Michael suggested, think before you do stupid. Those of us stuck in the middle would appreciate it.

While I’m On The Subject Of Open Carry

Rachel, my fellow co-host of The Polite Society Podcast and a gun rights activist in Texas, sent me this link about an agreement on a unified protocol and general policy regarding open carry events put out by a number of open carry groups. As Rachel notes, this is huge given the behind the scenes disagreements among the groups on the best way to push the Texas Legislature to approve open carry of handguns.

The joint release from Texas Carry, Gun Rights Across America, Ellis County Open Carry and Open Carry Texas announcing their unified policy:


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – Come and Take It Texas, Texas Carry, Gun Rights Across America and Open Carry Texas Joint Statement on OC of Long Arms – May 21, 2014


Over the past year, our members have done what no other organization has been able to do – put open carry at the forefront of the fight to restore gun rights for all Texans. As we have grown, we have had to adjust our efforts based on lessons learned through hundreds of open carry events, big and small.


Looking back, it has become clear that there is one area in which we have gotten the most resistance and suffered the largest setbacks: open carry of long arms into private businesses. This is not a new phenomenon. Early on, because of our efforts, the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission (TABC) sent a message to all TABC licensees warning them about allowing our members to open carry into their businesses. This resulted in places like Smashburger asking us to leave our guns at home. Since then, Starbucks, Wendy’s, Jack In The Box, Applebees and most recently, Chipotle have come out asking we not carry our firearms into their establishments.


Whereas, our mission is to get open carry of handguns passed in Texas, we must once again adjust in a way that shines a positive light on our efforts, our members, and our respective organizations. We are humbly and emphatically imploring our members to cease taking long arms into corporate businesses unless invited. Black Powder revolvers have proven to be very effective and align with our goal of legalizing open carry with a handgun. We do understand that not everyone will be able to afford one, but if you can, we are requesting you do so. Almost every leader has gone to Black powder for a reason. It works.


For all further open carry walks with long guns, we are adopting the following unified protocol and general policy to best ensure meeting our respective legislative mission to legalize open carry:

1) Always notify local law enforcement prior to the walk, especially the day of.
2) Carry Flags and signs during your walk to increase awareness.
3) Carry the long gun on a sling, not held.
4) Do not go into corporate businesses without prior permission, preferably not at all.
5) If asked to leave, do so quietly and do not make it a problem.
6) Do not post pics publicly if you do get permission and are able to OC in a cooperate business.
7) Do not go into businesses with TABC signs posted with a long gun (Ever).
8) If at all possible, keep to local small businesses that are 2A friendly.

We ask that members take a step back and make an objective assessment of what we are trying to accomplish and help us to get open carry passed for everyone. We must be willing and able to recognize what works and what doesn’t, but we need your help to make these efforts a success. It will be very difficult to spin holstered, black powder revolvers into a negative story. This is the goal we are currently striving for, open carry of handguns. We know everyone is working hard for this cause. It is simply time to focus on what has been proven to work. The conversation has shifted from open carry of handguns to rifles in businesses, negating our efforts and distracting us from our mission.


We are winning. Because we are winning, we have come under increased scrutiny by media and politicians. Let’s use that spotlight and make the most positive impact we can!


Carry on!


CJ Grisham, Open Carry Texas 

Terry Holcomb, Sr, Texas Carry 

Murdoch Pizgotti, CATI-TX 

Eric Reed, GRAA

Eric Reed of Gun Rights Across America points out some very valid points that are being ignored by the mainstream media and groups like Everytown would have you not know.

Now under Texas state law, a holder of a concealed handgun license is only required to abide by certain signs that have very specific legal verbiage. Up to this point, none of the above aforementioned businesses have posted these legal signs. So it remains legal for a concealed handgun licensee to concealed carry into these establishments with a valid Texas CHL.

The anti-gun groups have won nothing but a public statement by these businesses to make them just go away. As stated in the press release, gun rights is winning. The fight is in Austin, not at Jack in the Box or Chipotle.