Man with gun walking around midtown Memphis

[Worriedman]

9 hours ago, scatman said:

If it's an AR pistol does it not fall under handgun regulation? In which case, it wouldn't have mattered if the chamber was loaded, because it is a handgun. 

You are correct.

[Worriedman]

1 hour ago, BigK said:

I am asking this with genuine curiosity, not stirring the pot.

What good is it for it to be legal to carry an AR pistol if even us pro-2A folks don't want people to carry them?

I'm accusing myself of this same thinking. I'd NEVER carry an AR pistol around for all the same reasons above. BUT, I'm also ashamed of myself for not doing so if the reason is that I might scare the lib-tards.

I would not carry mine displayed, but you can bet your bippy if I go through Memphis, I have mine with me.  

I challenge anyone to show me a law in Tennessee from 1796 till 1989 that said it was unlawful to carry a rifle or a shotgun loaded. (there are plenty about handguns, pocket pistols, pistols, knives of all sorts, brass knuckles, sling shots, clubs etc.  but nowhere is a rifle or shotgun mentioned as a prohibited item.

You have to understand the conjunctive test set forth in Heller and upheld in Caetano (where 200,000 stun guns in use was allowed by SCOTUS as enough to put that type of weapon "in common use" to satisfy the Heller requirement), that for a weapon to be denied the citizen for self defense, it has to be dangerous AND unusual.  With 24.4 million AR 15s in the hands of the general public, that meets the criteria of "in common use".

In 1871 the Supreme Court of Tennessee said this:
“[W]e would hold, that the rifle of all descriptions, the shot gun, the musket, and repeater, are such arms; and that under the Constitution the right to keep such arms, cannot be infringed or forbidden by the Legislature.” Andrews v. State, 50 Tenn. 165, 179–80 (1871)

Did this tool act inconsiderately, yes, but I can promise, there are 42 states that would have found the action of carrying a rifle non-criminal if it was not used to threaten anyone.

I think he carried a pistol version because he knew he could not be arrested for that, I am of the opinion it was a photo-op to harm the quest for a return to the intent of the founding principals in Tennessee.

 

Edited November 30, 2023 by Worriedman

[Worriedman]

Miller v. Bonta (2023)
“Between 1607 and 1815 ... the colonial and state governments of what would become the first fourteen states neglected to exercise any police power over the ownership of guns by members of the body politic . . . . These limits on colonial and early state regulation of arms ownership outlined a significant zone of immunity around the private arms of the individual citizen.” More importantly, it is a conclusion confirmed by the Supreme Court. Bruen says, “[a]part from a few late 19th-century outlier jurisdictions, American governments simply have not broadly prohibited the public carry of commonly used firearms for personal defense.”
Case 3:19-cv-01537-BEN-JLB Document 175 Filed 10/19/23 PageID.21492 Page 27 of 79

[NoBanStan]

I'm sure it's been said a million times before, but I carry for protection, not conversation.  If i felt like like i needed to carry an AR just to go downtown.... I'm just not gonna go downtown.

The primary things I want to avoid:

• Having an anti-gunner accost me for carrying, possibly becoming escalated
• Getting stopped by the police. With my luck, I'll get jittery Jim with the itchy trigger finger
• Being targeted as the "shoot me first" guy by some criminal
• Getting sued frivolously. Because, even if it's legal, any misstep could make you lose. Either way, you're tied up in court with your finances damaged

Now, all that being said. This is me. This guy rolled his dice and it worked out.

[Worriedman]

25 minutes ago, NoBanStan said:

I'm sure it's been said a million times before, but I carry for protection, not conversation.  If i felt like like i needed to carry an AR just to go downtown.... I'm just not gonna go downtown.

The primary things I want to avoid:

• Having an anti-gunner accost me for carrying, possibly becoming escalated
• Getting stopped by the police. With my luck, I'll get jittery Jim with the itchy trigger finger
• Being targeted as the "shoot me first" guy by some criminal
• Getting sued frivolously. Because, even if it's legal, any misstep could make you lose. Either way, you're tied up in court with your finances damaged

Now, all that being said. This is me. This guy rolled his dice and it worked out.

My understanding is he got fired from his job today, have not verified that for sure but KWAM put it up this afternoon.

I get not wanting to be a target for exercising your God given rights, but us giving them up will just play into the hands of those who want us disarmed, of everything, and if you don't see that is the aim, we are looking at different things.

[TripleGGG]

20 minutes ago, Worriedman said:

I get not wanting to be a target for exercising your God given rights, but us giving them up will just play into the hands of those who want us disarmed, of everything, and if you don't see that is the aim, we are looking at different things.

This x10. 

[NoBanStan]

2 hours ago, Worriedman said:

My understanding is he got fired from his job today, have not verified that for sure but KWAM put it up this afternoon.

I get not wanting to be a target for exercising your God given rights, but us giving them up will just play into the hands of those who want us disarmed, of everything, and if you don't see that is the aim, we are looking at different things.

Well, let me be clear. I'm not for giving up the right. I just don't plan to exercise that particular right. If anyone else wants to go take a hike with their AR, i'm good with it. It's completely legal and you SHOULD do what you want. However, just keep in mind that there are public consequences such as... losing your job. It sucks, but it is true.
 

[Alleycat72]

24 minutes ago, NoBanStan said:

Well, let me be clear. I'm not for giving up the right. I just don't plan to exercise that particular right. If anyone else wants to go take a hike with their AR, i'm good with it. It's completely legal and you SHOULD do what you want. However, just keep in mind that there are public consequences such as... losing your job. It sucks, but it is true.
 

I'm right there with you. I may do it, but not one person will know I'm doing it. Same reason I don't show off a deer I just shot by driving it around all day. There are a ton of things I would never do, but I absolutely believe there shouldn't be a law against. 

[NoBanStan]

7 minutes ago, Alleycat72 said:

I'm right there with you. I may do it, but not one person will know I'm doing it. Same reason I don't show off a deer I just shot by driving it around all day. There are a ton of things I would never do, but I absolutely believe there shouldn't be a law against. 

Yup, you get exactly what i mean.

[deerslayer]

15 hours ago, Chucktshoes said:

Shame, condemnation, and exclusion from community are all reasonable methods of ensuring that respect for societal norms is maintained. 

If long gun carry is passed, do you think shame and condemnation will change the behavior of Memphis gangbangers who will inevitably start flaunting their AKs everywhere they go?

Edited December 1, 2023 by deerslayer

[10-Ring]

1 hour ago, deerslayer said:

If long gun carry is passed, do you think shame and condemnation will change the behavior of Memphis gangbangers who will inevitably start flaunting their AKs everywhere they go?

Absolutely not, they already do that. 

[deerslayer]

10 minutes ago, 10-Ring said:

Absolutely not, they already do that. 

Not routinely. 

[Grayfox54]

The long gun is usually in the car and readily accessible.

But if long gun carry becomes law, I can easily see the ganstas carrying them around the neighborhood just to intimidate the locals. So I have mixed feelings on the matter. 

Edited December 1, 2023 by Grayfox54

[Worriedman]

3 hours ago, deerslayer said:

If long gun carry is passed, do you think shame and condemnation will change the behavior of Memphis gangbangers who will inevitably start flaunting their AKs everywhere they go?

It is lawful in Arkansas and Mississippi, see anything on the news about gangsters doing it there?  And in 40 other states.

[Chucktshoes]

2 hours ago, deerslayer said:

Not routinely. 

You’re obviously not seeing the same video clips I am. 
 

The reasoning you’re using however is the same reasoning Brady and Everytown use for the laws they want. “If we don’t make a law against _______, then bad people will take advantage of a right and do bad things.” 
 

So if I understand you correctly, the position you’re advocating here isn’t disagreeing with folks like Bloomberg and Shannon Watts on principle. It’s merely quibbling over the details. 

Edited December 1, 2023 by Chucktshoes

[deerslayer]

32 minutes ago, Worriedman said:

It is lawful in Arkansas and Mississippi, see anything on the news about gangsters doing it there?  And in 40 other states.

No, but Memphis gangsters don’t live there.  

[deerslayer]

35 minutes ago, Chucktshoes said:

You’re obviously not seeing the same video clips I am. 
 

The reasoning you’re using however is the same reasoning Brady and Everytown use for the laws they want. “If we don’t make a law against _______, then bad people will take advantage of a right and do bad things.” 
 

So if I understand you correctly, the position you’re advocating here isn’t disagreeing with folks like Bloomberg and Shannon Watts on principle. It’s merely quibbling over the details. 

That’s funny.  Deerslayer the gun grabber.  I figured somebody would bring out the “blood in the streets” analogy.  Nice try.  Actually it’s the opposite of what you claim.  I am not advocating for any new laws.  I do have mixed feelings about changing a couple existing ones, though.  For the record, I hope it eventually passes and I hope nobody knows anything about it when it does.  But you’re kidding yourself if you think malcontents (of which Memphis has a large surplus) won’t take note and adjust their habits accordingly. 

Edited December 1, 2023 by deerslayer

[Worriedman]

12 minutes ago, deerslayer said:

No, but Memphis gangsters don’t live there.  

Really, you don't think West Memphis, AK runs in Memphis, TN?

[Worriedman]

A letter I started sending out to legislators today.
 

Since at least June 2022, the United States Supreme Court has mandated that government restrictions on 2^nd Amendment rights impose on the government the burden to demonstrate that the restriction mirrors or is consistent with the “national historical tradition” that existed when the 2^nd Amendment was adopted in 1791.   Accordingly, I have been seeking the historical evidence of analogues from the era of the ratification with respect to long gun carry in Tennessee.

I can find no statute in Tennessee that existed prior to 1989 that criminalizes the carry of any long gun. 

There are various, albeit only a few, statutes that regulated in some fashion civilian possession of handguns, as well as knives, clubs, sling shots and brass knuckles.  However, even those statutes appeared to be regulations based on collateral factors such as the individual’s conduct and were not broad bans.  Indeed, even as of 1989, citizen possession and carry of certain “military” style handguns was exempted from the statutory regulation.   Thus, it is apparent that the General Assembly was precise in its desire to list each of those items and the circumstances attendant to the restrictions but yet no such list included long arms.  It is likewise clear that Tennessee’s approach, which has been referenced by the Supreme Court, is not one that was in line with the “national” historical tradition.

It is now clear that the General Assembly, or the majority of the members thereof, appear to have an animus against the inalienable and indefeasible right of the citizen to keep, bear and wear arms.  Indeed, in 2023, the State’s attorney general entered into a voluntary settlement of a federal lawsuit, a settlement which remains subject to federal court enforcement, whereby the State agreed in writing that state laws which restricted the rights of 18-20 year olds to carry handguns violated the 2^nd Amendment, the 14^th Amendment and constituted a federal civil rights violation.  Yet, despite that federal settlement and consent decree, the General Assembly has repeatedly refused to repeal or amend the statutes in question to eliminate the unconstitutional provisions.

Rifles and shotguns are items that are in common use today in the United States.  The case Caetano v. Massachusetts (2016), proscribed that if there were 200,000 stun guns in the possession of Americans, that this quantity satisfied the rule found by the United States Supreme Court in Miller (1939) and reiterated by it in Heller (2008) that only those weapons that are dangerous AND unusual could be denied the citizen and, more specifically, that firearms that are useful for military purposes and/or that are in common use are protected by the 2^nd Amendment.  In McDonald (2010), the Supreme Court said it was a conjunctive test, bolstering the previous rulings from the Supreme Court protecting those categories of arms.  Today, there are at least 24.4 million AR 15s in the possession of Americans and likely at least 200,000 within a sixty mile radius of Nashville.  If 200,000 stun guns was deemed to be a sufficient quantity nationally to achieve constitutional protections as “common use” then certainly 24.4 million is as well.

In Tennessee, our Supreme Court stated in Andrews v. State, 50 Tenn. 165, 179–80 (1871) - “[W]e would hold, that the rifle of all descriptions, the shot gun, the musket, and repeater, are such arms; and that under the Constitution the right to keep such arms, cannot be infringed or forbidden by the Legislature.”  It appears that by 1989, the General Assembly elected to ignore the state Supreme Court’s constitutional ruling.

The Tennessee Supreme Court holding in Andrews further held:
"The right to keep arms, necessarily involves the right to purchase them, to keep them in a state of efficiency for use, and to purchase and provide ammunition suitable for such arms, and to keep them in repair. And clearly for this purpose, a man would have the right to carry them to and from his home, and no one could claim that the Legislature had the right to punish him for it, without violating this clause of the Constitution…Bearing arms for the common defense may well be held to be a political right, or for the protection and maintenance of such rights, intended to be guaranteed; but the right to keep them, with all that is implied fairly as an incident to this right, is a private individual right, guaranteed to the citizen, not the soldier."

The Tennessee General Assembly and the members thereof have an affirmative duty, pursuant to their respective oaths of office, to follow the constitution and to protect the rights of the citizens, with a priority on those rights which themselves are expressly protected by the Constitution.   The United States Supreme Court in New York Rifle & Pistol Ass'n v. Bruen, 20-843. (2022) stated “In Heller and McDonald, we held that the Second and Fourteenth Amendments protect an individual right to keep and bear arms for self-defense.”  This is the Court’s holding and not merely dicta.  It is an affirmative holding that must be recognized as such by those who profess to uphold the Constitutions of the State and Union. 

We, as Tennesseans, expect the General Assembly to likewise protect and defend clearly established constitutional rights.  It, and its members, have failed to do so.  I am asking for your written assurances, assurances that we can share with the members of the Tennessee Firearms Association, that the General Assembly will no longer abdicate its constitutional obligations but that it and its members will move forthwith in 2024 to repeal any and all statutes, regulations, ordinances or orders for which there is no existing clear and convincing national historical tradition as a precedent.

It would be good ir it came from more than just one person...

[deerslayer]

10 minutes ago, Worriedman said:

Really, you don't think West Memphis, AK runs in Memphis, TN?

I think if it does pass, nothing good will happen as a result around here.  I think a better issue to spend time and energy and political capital on is decriminalizing carrying past a no guns sign.  

Edited December 1, 2023 by deerslayer

[Chucktshoes]

10 minutes ago, deerslayer said:

That’s funny.  Deerslayer the gun grabber.  I figured somebody would bring out the “blood in the streets” analogy.  Nice try.  Actually it’s the opposite of what you claim.  I am not advocating for any new laws.  I do have mixed feelings about changing a couple existing ones, though.  For the record, I hope it eventually passes and I hope nobody knows about it when it does.  But you’re kidding yourself if you think malcontents (of which Memphis has a large surplus) won’t take note and adjust their habits accordingly. 

Whether the laws are new or previously existing, they must all be judged by the same standards of constitutionality and respect for the individual’s rights. 
 

I have a position based on principles. It’s not based utilitarian ideas of how I think undesirables should be best controlled. 

[deerslayer]

1 minute ago, Chucktshoes said:

Whether the laws are new or previously existing, they must all be judged by the same standards of constitutionality and respect for the individual’s rights. 
 

I have a position based on principles. It’s not based utilitarian ideas of how I think undesirables should be best controlled. 

And I agree with you, but I am realistic about the repercussions. 

[Frog4aday]

I saw the video on the AM Memphis news of the guy openly carrying the SBR/Pistol (AR configuration) and I thought, "He is probably the most logical person in Memphis considering the rampant crime & violence perpetrated there by criminals who have no fear of the cops or courts."

But...he obviously freaked people out. Why? School shooters? Mentally unbalanced whackos that go off their meds & randomly shoot people & things? Michael Douglas in "Falling Down" type situation? (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falling_Down )

The thing is, Memphis is ridiculous with violent crime. How does one protect themselves there? Bulletproof vest & a security detail? Carrying an AR everywhere you go? Maybe the guy starts a conversation that needs to be had. We are having it & it's interesting to me.

We carry guns & think that is fine. This guy did, too. But his was bigger & out in the open...and somehow that's not fine? And I get it! It is weird what he did. If we could all just have halos over our heads that told the world who we were ("good guy", "bad guy", "crazy guy", "oblivious guy") then we could know if the AR carrying dude was an issue or not.

The problem is bad people that abuse the rights we all want to enjoy. When a school shooter walks into a grade school with an AR, we want someone to confront & stop them. But when Bob the construction guy carries an AR into the Memphis Lowes to get some caulk b4 heading to the job site, we want to be okay with that because this is America & Bob is a good dude & should - in theory - be able to exercise his 2nd amendment right if he so chooses.

But concealed carry is just so much better in society. We have defensive means at our disposal BUT we aren't freaking everyone around us out. That's a win-win. I've been in parts of rural Colorado where people open-carry & it's just normal there. No one freaks out. But it is a different place than mid-town Memphis. Situational awareness is a thing for a reason.

My stand? Carry a gun in Memphis, but do so concealed. You aren't in rural Colorado, you aren't a rancher, you aren't hunting deer. Save the open AR carry for Fallujah. (Sadly, Memphis is closer to Fallujah than we like these days.)

[Worriedman]

14 minutes ago, deerslayer said:

I think if it does pass, nothing good will happen as a result around here.  I think a better issue to spend time and energy and political capital on is decriminalizing carrying past a no guns sign.  

We have run that bill a number of times and will again this year, you are up against the Chamber of Commerce on it.  You know, the ones who spend the most money every year buying politicians.

They couch their adversarial stance in Private Property rights, but that is a scurrilous argument as the Federal Government says any place that hangs out a sign and invites the public in is a public conveyance.

We have two separate TN Supreme Court cases that say off duty police officers are simply citizens, and if they can carry past signs why not enhanced permit holders at least. (that would make the state money).  But no, the Chamber and its whores refuse to allow you top protect yourself while making them rich.

[deerslayer]

22 minutes ago, Worriedman said:

We have run that bill a number of times and will again this year, you are up against the Chamber of Commerce on it.  You know, the ones who spend the most money every year buying politicians.

They couch their adversarial stance in Private Property rights, but that is a scurrilous argument as the Federal Government says any place that hangs out a sign and invites the public in is a public conveyance.

We have two separate TN Supreme Court cases that say off duty police officers are simply citizens, and if they can carry past signs why not enhanced permit holders at least. (that would make the state money).  But no, the Chamber and its whores refuse to allow you top protect yourself while making them rich.

I truly appreciate the work you do and the time you spend in Nashville.  I think the average gun toting, law abiding citizen would benefit from decriminalizing posted locations a lot more than we would from long gun carry.  I do hope (hesitantly) that long carry will pass, if for no other reason that in the gun rights legislation world, the best defense is a good offense. 

Edited December 1, 2023 by deerslayer