Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry signed into law Tuesday a bill that removes all permit requirements for state residents who can possess firearms to carry them openly or concealed without a permit. The law goes into effect on July 4. This system, called constitutional carry to reflect the right of American citizens to "keep and bear arms," is now the law of the land in 28 states. 

“Louisiana lawmakers and Gov. Landry have taken a bold step for public safety,” [Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms] Chairman Alan Gottlieb said. “Meanwhile, legislatures and governors in the remaining 22 holdout states are signaling that they do not trust their citizens with the most fundamental right of all, the right of self-defense. What a shameful message to telegraph to the people they are elected to serve.”

READ: And Then There Were 28: Louisiana Becomes Most Recent State to Pass Constitutional-Carry Law

Criminals already carry concealed firearms without regard for the law. Constitutional Carry simply puts law-abiding citizens on equal footing. #lagov #lalege pic.twitter.com/UJNNOK5OiZ

— Governor Jeff Landry (@LAGovJeffLandry) February 28, 2024

As a victory was being sealed in Louisiana, another was about to happen in Columbia, SC.

South Carolinians may soon be able to openly carry a weapon.

State lawmakers in both the House and Senate officially passed the Second Amendment Preservation Act, also known as South Carolina Constitutional Carry. The bill allows anyone who can legally own a gun to carry it openly.

The bill is headed to Governor Henry McMaster, who is expected to sign the bill.

Few things make Leviathan more terrified than free people.

"This is a permitless carry," Sen. Margie Bright Matthews said. "Why are we going to allow people to carry more guns, and this time without a [concealed weapons permit]? Why? I submit to you that the only reason why this was done and this was passed in this chamber on a partisan vote mostly is because this is an election year.”

"Why are we going to allow people" just drips with contempt for the people this person was elected to serve.

As Charles C. W. Cooke notes at National Review:

Constitutional carry does not allow excluded people to buy, possess, or carry firearms; those people remain just as prohibited as they were before. Nor does it prevent the police from checking to see if an arrested person is allowed to carry a gun. To believe that to remove the permitting process for eligible citizens is to make life more dangerous for the police is thus to believe either (a) that law-abiding people will suddenly become more dangerous if they aren’t required to apply for a permit, or (b) that the sort of convicted criminal who is willing to shoot a cop might somehow be dissuaded from doing so by the requirement that he apply for a small piece of laminated plastic that he is legally unable to obtain in the first instance. Neither of these arguments is persuasive to me — or, it seems, given the remarkable spread of permitless carry, to many other people, either.

The permitting process doesn't make anyone safer. It is more properly seen as a bulwark to prevent the "lower orders" from exercising a constitutional right. In my state of Maryland (haaack...ptoooie!) it runs about $500 to jump through all the hoops of training, fingerprinting, and getting a weapons permit. That is a deliberate decision that keeps people who live in dangerous areas from arming themselves or running the risk of becoming felons if they have to resort to self-defense.

Having Constitutional Carry is rapidly becoming the bright line that separates free states from those run by would-be totalitarians.