It Isn't "Conceal and Carry"
I probably should despair of keeping the record straight, but what the heck...
The Minnesota Citizens Personal Protection Act 2003 of isn't a "conceal and carry" law. Actually, the law made very few changes in Minnesota's carry permit law. Most of the changes, by the way, restrict permit holders; carry while intoxicated is now prohibited by law (it only used to be prohibited by common sense — and it still is, of course, prohibited by common sense); permit holders carrying in schools is now prohibited without the explicit, written permission of the principal (there used to be no such restriction at all); permit holders now have to be 21 (previously, they could have been as young as 18); and so forth. The only positive change — and it is an important one — is that, now, permits are issued to qualifying adults as a matter of right, and not of bureaucratic fiat.
But "conceal and carry"? No change; no requirement to conceal. No legal requirement, that is — many permit holders will carry concealed, and for good reason. Concealed carry makes the criminals' job more difficult, and it doesn't scare nervous people. But it's not legally required, not in Minnesota. (Other states have different laws.)
Actually, at least for the time being, the majority of permit holders in the metro area carry openly.
Really.
The majority permit holders in the metro area, right now, are uniformed security guards. They carry on the same permits that the rest of us do — but, typically, they carry openly, and there are a lot more of them then there are of other civilian permit holders.
"Conceal and carry"? If that was the requirement of the law, all of those uniformed security guards would be lawbreakers.
Update, 8/15/2003: Well, keeping the record straight is one thing; going with the flow is another. I've registered concealandcarry.com and conceal-and-carry.com. Either link brings you to the courses page for the B2C course, on the theory that this is a mistake that would generally be made by people with little or no handgun knowledge.
Hmm...I may have to reconsider that. A lot of folks—particularly including reporters, strangely enough, just don't get it.