Gun rights update: 90% of states now have open carry
The number of states that ban the open carry of firearms has again been reduced to five. Before 2022, it was four, but New Jersey criminalized open carry, even with a permit, in 2022. New Jersey permit requirements and processes for obtaining a permit are being challenged in the courts. Connecticut banned open carry in 2023, making six states that generally banned open carry. Open carry with a permit is allowed in some rural parts of California. The California ban is being challenged in the Ninth Circuit.
On Sept. 10, 2025, Florida’s First District Court of Appeal published a unanimous opinion that the Florida ban on the open carry of firearms in public is unconstitutional under the Second Amendment and cannot be enforced in Florida. Florida Attorney General James Uthmeir supports the Florida case and has decided not to appeal it to the state Supreme Court. On a YouTube video, at about 1:13, reporter for 10 Tampa Bay, Jennifer Titus says “Florida’s Attorney General says he doesn’t plan to have the case heard again.” Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis says the court decision “aligns state policy with my long-held position and with the vast majority of states throughout the union.” This means the case becomes binding law in Florida.
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The general ban on the open carry of firearms in Florida was relatively new. It was enacted in 1987, after heavy lobbying by Janet Reno, who became famous for her part in the massacre at Waco, Texas, during the Clinton administration. The open carry ban was part of a legislative compromise that enacted the extremely successful shall-issue concealed carry permit scheme in Florida. Florida became an example, leading to many other states passing shall-issue carry.
Numerous attempts have been made in the Florida legislature to repeal the ban on open carry. Several have come close to passage, but all have failed.
The five states that now generally ban open carry are: California, Connecticut, Illinois, New Jersey, and New York. Florida was always an outlier in this group. The First District Court of Appeal is a Florida state court. State court decisions are not binding precedent for other states. This does not mean attorneys in other states will ignore this well-written and reasoned opinion. Six of the open carry states require a permit to carry handguns openly. The six states that require a permit to open carry are Hawaii, Minnesota, South Carolina, Maryland, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts.
Open carry was the most common method of carrying firearms at the time of the ratification of the Second Amendment in 1791. Concealed carry was not uncommon. The Second Amendment does not differentiate between open and concealed carry. Constitutional Carry, which restores the legal ability of people to carry either openly or concealed, is now the law in 29 states. Florida recently upgraded from permitless concealed carry to include permitless open carry. The North Carolina legislature has a vote scheduled for Sept. 22 to override the veto of their Democrat Party governor.
The state dividing the right to bear arms into “open carry” and “concealed carry” did not start until a generation after the Founding Fathers’ deaths.
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