Thanks for an intelligent and balanced discussion. We might sharpen out focus by differentiating between a "Terry stop" an an arrest. The first requires only reasonable, articulable grounds, the latter probable cause to believe that a crime has been committed and that the subject has committed it. A police officer making an investigatory stop of someone carrying a weapon, may or may not make an arrest, depending of what the stop discloses.

Another point we might consider is that the subjective reaction of others to an open carry is not the gravemen of its legality. The standard has to be the reaction of a reasonable person under the circumstances, not that of the most timerous. I believe that you are simply wrong in holding that subjective reaction matters. That is not at all the same thing as "context." "Context," on the contrary, is quite consistent with an objective, or "reasonable man," test. Place, hour, appearance and behavior of the subject--all these go into determining both whether an investigatory stop was justified, and whether an act of open carry was intended to terrorize or alarm.

Open carry is legal in my state, with or without a license, except for one large city where it is legal with a license only. In practice, we do not customarily carry openly, except in remote areas, and would expect police attention if we did.

All of the legal niceties aside – do we really want to live in a society that forces an average citizen to consider the need to make a judgment call when she sees someone packing a pistol in public? Do we individually want to be forced to decide whether this is not the time and/or place for THAT person to openly display a weapon, and call the police? And do we want to further burden our cops and courts with complaints that may or may not pass a constitutional test?

I am impressed with both the original article and the first comment.

The article was reasonably well balanced, and interestingly quoted Workman rather than fascitelli from the anti-gun crowd who usually gets the greater number of column inches in Seattle media.

The comment does an excellent job of distinguishing the nature for and grounds of a Terry stop. It also highlights the "reasonable man" concept involved in such matters.

One thing that was missed by both, is that the State Constitution is not necessarily the operative issue here. Washington has a preemption statute that overrides local government authority when it comes to firearms law. This avoids the problem common in many states in which people carrying legally in one city may be in violation in the next town over.

Politically, I think that it is poor judgement for gun rights advocates to alarm folks by open carry. It is also very possible to create a backlash against gun rights at a time when major local and national cases are making their way through the courts. Finally, demonstrations open Starbucks to anti-gun lobbying which could just add to the number of chain operations exercise their private property rights to restrict guns.

I have been a CCW permit holder for many years, and I exercise that license on a regular basis. I hardly ever open carry. I do not agree with the education argument. I should rather corrupt someone by taking that person to a range. I see no more reason to advertise my being armed by open carry than I would advertise its likelyhood with a bumper sticker.

riverworld

Thank you, Mr. Berger, for your superbly researched, exceptionally well-written reporting and analysis on a complex issue in which the deliberate obfuscation of facts is all too often the ultimate weapon of the anti-gunowner, anti-Second Amendment fanatics -- especially those whose hidden agendas include not only forcible disarmament but prohibiting all forms of self-defense, thereby imposing compulsory pacifism and reducing us all to mandatory victimhood.

Indeed "The right to bear arms with your latte" is probably the best, most comprehensive mainstream-press coverage I have ever seen on this topic, "ever" spanning four of the nation's cultural regions -- the Northeast, the South, the Middle West and the Pacific Northwest -- and nearly seven decades. Thanks again.

It needs to be understood that the "reasonable person" envisioned by the alarm standard is a slightly portly, balding middle-aged white guy who sobs quietly while watching Glenn Beck and is not at all upset by seeing his mirror image toting a firearm in the suburban mall coffee shop.

On the other hand, if he encounters a young black man in baggy pants on a dark street carrying a gun he will involuntarily wet his drawers. This in turn will automatically trigger the aforesaid statutory alarm which has been discreetly wired with a dampness-activated sensor to his underwear and has a GPS locator with a satellite hookup to the nearest police station.

So the black kid will get his sorry ass busted while the stout white dude is left in peace to serenely sip his triple mocha with the non-fat whipped cream floating on top, as RCW 9.41.270 so wisely intended.

I stand corrected: I should have written "...hatemongering, hysterical demagoguery and deliberate obfuscation of facts are all too often the ultimate weapons..." My deepest apologies for the error.

Re gun-toting in grizzly country: A back-country Alaska hiker encounters a guy on the trail headed in the opposite direction who's carrying a pistol. The guy carrying explains, "It's in case I run into a grizzly." The first hiker says, "No pistol can stop a grizzly." Gun-toter replies, "Oh, it's not for the bear" (aiming a forefinger at his own temple), "it's for me."

Here’s the truth of the wild west in the so called biggest and baddest of those wild west towns as per our dime novels and Hollywood fantasy as noted by John Pierce in a 2009 column. The big trailhead towns of the 1870s were rather peaceful, with a total of only 45 homicides between 1870 and 1885 in these towns: Abilene, Caldwell, Dodge City, Ellsworth and Wichita, according to historian W. Eugene Hollon (Frontier Violence: Another Look). The murder rate was 1 per 100,000 citizens. Stack that against a major city today, and you will soon be longing for those “days of yester-year when the Lone Ranger rides again” or something like that.

Perennial Practice Makes Perfect Precedent:

The 2nd Amendment was not preceded by a vacuum of 180 years of right-to-bear-arms laws, customs and traditions. Au contraire:

It would appear that the 2nd amendment put into
writing that which had been practiced for 145 years
by the citizens of old New Netherlands and New York,
and other states as well. My family has written
records of one ancestor in 1676 having weapons
in Ipswich, Massachusetts used during the
"New England Indian Wars" as well as 1668 in
a domestic dispute with his father`s weapon, which the
latter had in 1649.

Actually, in fact, this right to bear arms stems
from the Dutch tradition in New York State dating
to 1643,45,46. The English conquerors of
New Netherland never invalidated these written rights of the
Dutch to bear arms nor confiscated their firearms,
but actually kept them on as a ready-made frontier
militia, [e.g., Saratoga blockhouse 1690`s] as a
buffer against incursions of the French and their
Native American allies. The civilian Dutch were
recorded as having firearms under the English as
late as 1753 just before French began reinforcing
their fortified positions on the New York/Canada
frontier. (My family has been here since 1648.)

This first section primarily focuses on the Dutch
colonial firearm tradition and laws for
New Netherlands which extended from New York City
[New Amsterdam] to the border of Canada and west to
Lake Erie and Lake Ontario.)

Here`s a bite of a Copperhead from Rattlesnake Hill
[Mt. Defiance, Ticonderoga, NY]

Don`t Tread On Me

.
THE DUTCH/ANGLO/AMERICAN PRECEDENT OF THE RIGHT TO BEAR ARMS
Freemen Protect Their Families by Force of Arms
1643 August Dutch-Indian War in New Netherlands...
``On the other hand, the enemy [N.A.`s] is strong and mighty.
They have formed an alliance, one with another, with more than seven different tribes, well supplied with muskets, powder, and ball, which they have procured and daily receive from private traders,
in exchange for beaver, and with which they murder our people. The woods and thickets are now also useful to them, for they have removed all their women, children, and old men into the interior. The rest of the warriors daily menace our lives with fire and sword,
and threaten to attack the fort with all their strength,
now consisting of fifteen hundred men...Our population consists,
for the most part, of women and children. The freemen (not counting
the English) are about two hundred in number, who must protect,
by force of arms, their families, which now lie concealed in straw
huts, around outside the fort.`. Jameson, p.333, 'Representation of
New Netherland'; O`Callaghan, Hist. Of New Netherland, Vol.1, pp.290-291

The Right To Bear Firearms, Side-arms and Other Weapons For Self-Defence
1644 December 16 `the colonists [Dutch in New Netherland] and servants
should be bound, under certain penalties, to provide themselves with good fire-arms, and other weapons for self-defence...But it should be [in New Netherland] absolutely forbidden, that either the freemen should sell to the Indians, or the licensd traders to the freemen, any arms or munitions of war, on pain of heavy punishment to be inflicted therefor, lest the Indians, being strengthened thereby, may hereafter be encouraged to do us more injury than they can now, in their impotency, inflict.
But it shall be obligatory on the freemen to be provide,
each with a good musket and side-arms for self-defence,
as already mentioned in the 5th point. An inspection thereof
shall be had by the Director every six months.' . O`Callaghan,
'Hist. Of New Netherland', Vol.1, pp.422-423, 'Appendix E, Report and
Advice on the condition of New Netherland, drawn up from documents
and papers placed by the commission of the Assembly of the XIX.,
dated 15 Dec., 1644 in the hands of the General Chambers of Accounts'

Arms For Security and Defence
1645 in New Netherland: `Means were to be adopted to induce the
colonists to form towns and villages, and to provide themselves
with arms for their security and defence.` O`Callaghan, 'Hist. Of New Netherland', Vol.2, p.18

Right of Possession & Use of Arms For Their Own Defense, Including Ammunition
1650 in New Netherland: "IV. Whereas their High mightinesses
have learnt that the commonality of New Netherland either were
not obliged to cultivate, or had neglected the possession and
use of arms for their own defence, each of the said inhabitants
shal therefore be bound to provide himself with a good musket,
with powder and lead, necessary thereto, and be enrolled and
formed into a guard, causing the said guns to be stamped and inspected,
and all persons are forbidden to sell his stamped gun, or to deprive
himself or his family thereof." O`Callaghan, 'Hist. Of New Netherland', Vol.2, p.134, ``Provisional Order for the Government, Preservation and Peopling of New Netherland ``

Pre-Constitution Practices

1710 July "...each member of the 1709 expedition to
Canada might keep as his own forever the
Queen`s musket that would be furnished to him."
-Parkman, "Half", Vol. I, p.144

1775 Col. Prescott grabbed his musket on the way to Bunker Hill. - my family tradition
1775 -6 other of my ancestors had their weapons at hand at Bunker Hill [Breed`s]-family tradition.
1777 July Private Joseph Pulsifer, Company of militia commanded by Lt. Col. David Webster (Plymouth) marched to reinforce garrison at Ticonderoga on Alarm of July 1777, proceded [sic] as far as Cavendish where met troops in retreat from Ticonderoga.” [New Hampshire State Papers, Vol. XIV Revolutionary Rolls Vol.2] 187B

1777 7 other: my 7 ancestors had their own weapons at Battle of Saratoga II.

Post-Constitution Practices
1812 During the War of 1812, settlers [including my gggg-grandfather in Crown Point]
in the Adirondacks asked the New York Militia for help against raiding N.A.’s. They were told to fend
for themselves.
1814 September 4 “700 Militia [from Essex and Clinton [rallied] counties [NY] had assembled at Plattsburgh and were immediately placed on the front line first picket. They attacked the British first across the river, not waiting for the U.S. Army regulars to decide what to do.” . Crockett, p.268 , Crockett, Wm. H., A History of Lake Champlain. Hubart J. Shanley & Co., 1909, “Crown Collection”, New York State Library *
Precedent and Tradition of War Trophies
1865 Custer`s NY 7th Cavalry, Hammond`s Crown Point Co. C .& “Ticonderoga Cavalry”, my g-grandfathers, bought their weapons and Morgan chargers home from Appomatox-
1918 -My g-uncles brought home WWI German and English sniper rifles
1945 My uncles brought home German lugars and U.S. carbines, and were shown off in the 4th of July parades and at the local American Legion Hall exhibits.
1953 Rifles brought back from Korea by my relatives.
1975 I saw my vet friends and relatives brought home VC/NVA AK-47`s right through San Francisco Airport openly. It was an accepted practice and tradition to bring home war souvenirs unmolested .

Bearing of Arms
1957 As a 14-year old teenager, bought at the local U.S. Army Store, a semi-automatic 20 shot .22 rifle to shoot on the farm. Later, Under NY State law, I carried around the unloaded .22 LR breech open on the back seat window of my 1951 Dodge so troopers could see it.
2009 One can still park his/her shotgun outside a door of a store legally
in Vermont
2010 "The History Channel" broadcast and DVD shows WW2 American soldiers
bringing home German pistols, rifles, bayonets, etc.
as war trophies

[This does not mention the Mohawk et alii treaties
with the Dutch, English, and New York (1) prior
to the U.S. Constitution
guaranteeing them their right to arms forever.

[1. on the reservation.]

My family has borne arms since 1648, an unbroken
line of weapons on the mantle.\\
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