Last week Arizona joined the ranks of Alaska and Vermont when it passed a law that will allow concealed weapons to be carried by citizens without a permit. Currently forty-five states allow carrying concealed weapons. Illinois and Wisconsin prohibit the practice all together.

Most of the 45 states that require a permit to carry concealed weapons require a background check and firearm safety training.

North Carolina requires a background check and an eight-hour class in which permit seekers learn handgun safety as well as the law regarding the use of deadly force.

Last month the coffee house giant Starbucks caused a stir when it refused to ban the carrying of firearms in its stores after the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence called on the store to do so.

Who would have thought the darling of the latte drinking left would take such a pro-gun stance. The decision has many on the left bewildered and confused. They don’t understand how people can carry guns in their favorite coffee shop.

The law is more permissive of gun carrying that you might imagine. Open carrying, the practice of wearing a gun visibly on the outside of the clothing, is legal in almost every state.

There are restricted areas: schools, government buildings, anywhere alcohol is consumed, and stores that choose to prohibit guns. But for the most part you can open carry a gun out in public.

You can even carry a gun in the People’s Republic of Chapel Hill. The only restriction is that the gun must be over a certain length. I suppose the rationale is the longer the gun, the easier to see. Cary is the only town (that I know of) in North Carolina that prohibits the open carrying of firearms. You’d need a concealed weapon permit to pack heat in Cary.

I’ve been through the eight-hour concealed carry class. Passed the written test. Passed the shooting test. Passed the background check. Paid my $90 to the sheriff. Since November 2008 I’ve been a card carrying, concealed weapon permit holder.

Why would a college educated, peace loving individual such as myself feel the need to arm himself? Some, like our President, might say I’m just clinging to my guns. I cling to my religion too, but that’s another story.

No, I just believe that every individual has an inalienable right to self defense. Every human being has the right to protect his own life, those he cares for, and innocent persons.

It’s not just paranoia. There are real threats out there. I know firsthand.

In early 2008 I lived in a townhouse at Chapel Hill’s radical leftwing neighbor, Carrboro. It was a nice neighborhood, just a few hundred yards from brand new Carrboro high school.

One day while returning from class, I saw blue lights and police cars swarming the parking lot. I didn’t know what was going on at the time.

But the next day I read in the paper that the 16-year old son of my next door neighbor had been arrested for shooting and attempting to murder another teenager.

Later that spring my friend and colleague Eve Carson, UNC Student Body President, was taken from her home and shot dead by thugs.

To this day I cannot bring myself to take her phone number out of my cell phone. We later learned that these same thugs also murdered a Duke graduate student in his own apartment.   

Just this year, living in Raleigh, I experienced another incident. It was at night and I was wearing earphones, listening to a recorded class lecture online. As soon as I was finished, I heard a lot of banging around from the apartment above me. Later that night I was interviewed by police who wanted to know if I had heard a gunshot from the apartment above.

So, you see, I don’t think there’s anything paranoid, extreme, or strange about wanting to protect yourself. The city of Chicago, on the other hand, doesn’t think law abiding citizens should be allowed to possess handgun, even in their own homes.

Chicago has a 28-year-old ban on handguns. Otis McDonald, 76, a black Chicago resident, and three other families are challenging the constitutionality of Chicago’s 28-year ban on handguns.

He and other families refuse to leave their homes, even as street gangs and crime threaten them directly. Gunfire and drunks fighting in the streets are a regularity. McDonald’s very life has been threatened by thugs after he reported one instance of gunfire to police.

The gun ban hasn’t done much to keep the bad guys from getting guns. Otis McDonald and other law abiding Chicagoans want the right to have a gun to protect themselves.

He got his day in court, too. In early March Otis took his case to the United States Supreme Court. The case is McDonald v. Chicago.

Recently in 2008, the Supreme Court ruled that Washington’s handgun ban was an unconstitutional infringement on the 2nd Amendment. Since D.C. is a federal territory, the decision was not binding upon the states.

Now the Court has to decide whether the same rule should apply to the states. It’s hard to imagine the court would rule the right to keep and bear arms is such an important right only in federal territories, but not in the states.

McDonald will probably win, and win he should. Even as Arizona becomes one of the most gun-friendly states in the Union, the police unions there have said the best friend the police have is an armed, law-abiding citizenry on the streets.

Maybe that would help things in Chicago.  



Tar Heel Dispatch is written by Tyler Younts, a second-year law student at Campbell University. Younts, who grew up in Farmer, has a passion for writing and for politics and for writing about politics. E-mail comments to news@randolphguide.com or directly to Younts at tlyounts0209@email.campbell.edu