Pending Legislation Worries Restaurant, Bar Owners
Stephanie Carroll Carson, The Roanoke-Chowan News-Herald, June 20, 2012
North Carolina is considering legislation that would allow persons with state concealed-carry permits to bring their handguns into restaurants and bars. Business owners and the general public are concerned about the public safety implications of the proposed law.
State laws allowing concealed, loaded handguns in public have proliferated across the country in recent years. Despite the public’s opposition to these laws, more people can carry loaded guns in more places now than at any other time in modern history. LCPGV’s most recent publication, Guns in Public Places: The Increasing Threat of Hidden Guns in America, examines the dramatic shift toward permissive state laws that regulate who can carry guns in public and the surprising places in which they can carry them.
Guns in Public Places also highlights the encouraging recent victories against the gun lobby’s push to expand guns in public. For example, guns on campus bills were defeated in at least 11 states in 2011, and courts across the country have rejected Second Amendment challenges to strong concealed carry laws. These and other victories provide hope that the public’s common sense view that concealed, loaded guns do not belong in public places, will ultimately carry the day.
Read the complete publication here to learn more about gun regulation in your area.
