
U.S.A. –-(Ammoland.com)- In Ohio, about one out of 18 citizens have a permit to carry a concealed firearm in public. That says quite a lot since a noticeable number of Ohio citizens are not eligible for a permit. Those statistics also hide a terrible truth. The concealed carry laws in Ohio disarmed over a million eligible adults. The results are exactly what you’d expect after we denied the right of armed defense to law abiding citizens.
Because of Ohio laws, thousands of additional victims, including hundreds of rape victims, were disarmed when they were attacked. Is it worth it?
5.4% of the Ohio population has their permit to carry a concealed firearm in public. About two-thirds of us are eligible to vote, so a conservative estimate is that six-out-of-ten citizens could get a carry permit if they wanted one. The people who don’t have a permit might be too young, or they might be so old that they don’t want to carry any longer and let their permit expire. Some citizens have a disqualifying legal offense. Considering all that, one-out-of-18 citizens in Ohio with a permit doesn’t seem so bad.. until we look at the rest of the United States.
About 20 million US citizens have their carry permits. That puts the national average at about one-in-15 people. Those national statistics don’t count the 17 million eligible adults living in constitutional carry states where government permission is not required to carry concealed in public. Critics argue that constitutional carry, also called permitless carry, is dangerous. Contrary to our imagination, the amount of firearms training goes up in states that removed the minimum requirements to carry a firearm. Inadvertently, the requirements for a state permit formed a floor. Civilian gun owners wanted more training to feel competent once that minimal requirement was removed. We don’t know how many people carry concealed in constitutional carry states, but we have some estimates.
The carry rate varies from state to state. Some states, like Hawaii, don’t grant permits for ordinary citizens to carry in public, yet the violent crime rate in Hawaii is higher than the national average. New Jersey doesn’t let ordinary citizens carry, yet New Jersey has five cities in the 100 most dangerous cities in the US. Gun prohibition doesn’t bring peace.
In contrast, Alabama has the highest carry rate of any state with about a third of eligible adults having their permit. Even that isn’t the highest carry rate we can find. About half the eligible adults in some Pennsylvania counties have their permits. Constitutional carry rates should fall somewhere in between.
Why does that matter to the citizens of Ohio? We all want to be safer. The Ohio permit requires 8 hours of training and costs about $120. That doesn’t seem like a lot, but the results are dramatic.
The costs we impose on honest citizens to carry in public reduced the number of people who got their permit. More law-abiding adults went disarmed. Compared to the states with high carry rates like Alabama, Ohio disarmed over 1.1 million honest adults. To put that number in perspective, the gun-control laws in Ohio disarmed the eligible adults in Columbus, Cleveland, Cincinnati, and Toledo combined. What do you think would happen if we disarmed the honest adults in those cities?
The good news is that the overall rate of violent crime in Ohio is lower than the USA average. The bad news is that the rate of crime in Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati is several times the national average. Even if every city in Ohio were exactly average when it comes to crime, our 1.1 million disarmed citizens became disarmed victims over four thousand times a year, including over 300 disarmed rape victims.
Those disarmed victims were the price we paid for gun control in Ohio. We can also examine Ohio’s murder rate and see what happens to those million honest citizens who were disarmed.
Ohio’s gun-control laws take the tools of self-defense away from 57 murder victims every year.
That is the cost of gun control in Ohio.
We can do better. The cost of a permit in Pennsylvania is about $19. Alabama charges slightly more, but recent legislation eliminated the fees for a permit in Alabama.
In Ohio, we disarmed 57 citizens who are no longer alive to tell us that gun-control disarms the victims. When it comes to saving innocent lives, being average isn’t good enough.
About Rob Morse
The original article with sources is here. Rob Morse writes about gun rights at Ammoland, at Clash Daily, and on his SlowFacts blog. He hosts the Self Defense Gun Stories Podcast and co-hosts the Polite Society Podcast. Rob is an NRA pistol instructor and combat handgun competitor.
One of the things Americans have never experienced, having no freedom. That can change in one election, it is a sad thing that many of those who live in this country today are willing to gamble their freedom away with their eyes wide open, and their minds closed to the truth that socialism/communism enslaves.
Anyone who legislates, judges, lawyers, enforces of funds any law that delays or denies any free American of his right to keep and bear arms is criminal to the point of treason and is culpable for any damage or loss or loss of life sustained by the citizen, the family of the citizen and the friends of the citizen. Assault, rape, murder by proxy is still assault, rape or murder. By denying or delaying the citizen’s right to keep and bear arms, they have empowered the criminal. Carry. Carry every day, all day, wherever you are even if you are… Read more »
What if Americans simply exercised their rights and told the politicians to go pound sand?? Then if the politicians get froggy, sue the bejeezus out of them or whatever else it takes?
Thank you for your article, Mr. Morse. However, don’t confuse the Communist (Democrap Party) Left with the facts. Their REAL agenda has NOTHING to with public safety. The Communist Left wants to disarm every citizen in the United States so that they have NO ONE to oppose their destruction of the Constitutional Republic of the United States and their replacement of same with a Centrally Controlled Communist Police State Government! THAT IS THEIR GOAL!!! You want my guns? MOLON LABE!!!
No statistics on anything but the CCW permits in Arizona. Since we’re a Constitutional Carry state, everyone over 18 can carry open and everyone 21 and over can carry concealed without any permits, authorization or permission so there is no tracking and no statistics; just the way it should be across the country.
South Carolina hasn’t updated the stats yet.
Active Permits as of January 1, 2019…….459,793
Population – 5,148,714 (2019)
Over 21 – 3,861,535 (Approx. 75%)
CWP percentage – 11.9%
We should not have to pay for a carry permit, but FYI, the FBI charges Law Enforcement and Private employers $18 (last time I checked) for a Criminal Background Check, part of your permit fee pays for that. If your State uses the FBI, then it should not be much more than that for the local Law Enforcement or you are getting ripped off.