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Press Release - Sue Tibbs’ Forces Hobson’s Choice on Open Carry

Mike

Site Co-Founder
Joined
May 13, 2006
Messages
8,706
Location
Fairfax County, Virginia, USA
OpenCarry.org
(A pro-gun Internet community of over 24,000 registered members)
For Immediate Release – March 10, 2011
---------
Sue Tibbs’ Forces Hobson’s Choice on Open Carry
OpenCarry.org Urges Rejection of Poison Pill Ballot Question
---------
It’s bad enough for state Representative Sue Tibbs (nominally an R) to oppose restoring
the right to open carry in Oklahoma and want to punt to voters’ opinion via ballot
question. But it’s ‘below the belt’ politics to push a gun rights ballot question on
voters when the only available answers are . . . anti-gun!

29 states allow open carry in public without any license,i generally at age 18.ii But Sue
Tibb’s House Bill 1796 asks voters only whether to restore the right to open carry in
Oklahoma to those citizens over 21 years of age who have paid for a license for the
privilege to conceal a sidearm.

“This ballot question is phrased to fail – it’s a setup,” says Russ Cook, Vice-President of
OK2A and founder of the online Oklahoma open carry petition.iii “Voters who do not
believe in the Second Amendment will vote no, and most gun owners will also
vote no against the licensing/registration requirement,” explains Cook, asking
“what will Tibbs ask voters to weigh in on next? Whether citizens should
have the right to vote if they pay a poll tax?”

HB 1796 is a “poison pill ballot question designed to fail so as to deter future open carry
reform in Oklahoma,” says OpenCarry.org co-founder John Pierce. “Open carry is the
Second Amendment,” adds Pierce, and “pro-Second Amendment voters will vote no on
HB 1796 because the American tradition rejects licensing schemes when it comes to
fundamental Constitutional rights.”iv

OpenCarry.org calls on the Oklahoma House of Representatives to adopt
Representative Steve Martin’s pre-filed floor amendment to strip out the poison
pill ballot question.v 43 states allow open carry, and Florida is widely expected to
raise this number to 44 this year. Oklahoma should ante up and make it 45!

Carry on!
###
Media Contacts:
John Pierce, co-founder and spokesperson, OpenCarry.org, John@OpenCarry.org,
276-206-xxxx

Russ Cook, Vice President OK2A, RussCook@mbo.net, 405-694-xxxx

i See http://www.opencarry.org/opencarry.html (count up all gold, orange, and olive colored
states to get to the 29 states which allow unlicensed open carry).

ii See http://www.opencarry.org/age.html.

iii See over 13,000 signatures at http://www.petitiononline.com/oc4ok/petition.html.

iv NOTE: A recent FBI study that essentially says that bad guys don't open carry (see Anthony
Pinizzotto, et al., Violent Encounters: A Study of Felonious Assaults on Our Nation's Law
Enforcement Officers, FBI (2006) (finding that violent criminals carefully "conceal" their guns
and "eschew holsters") at http://www.forcesciencenews.com/home/detail.html?serial=62).
Additionally, police in Georgia recently confirmed an instance of open carriers deterring an
armed robbery of a Wafflehouse just by open carrying while eating some chicken fried steak
and short stacks. See “Open carry deters armed robbery in Kennesaw” at
http://www.examiner.com/gun-rights-in-atlanta/open-carry-deters-armed-robbery-kennesaw
(“Captain Jerry Quan, the Commander for Precinct One, where the Wafflehouse is
located, confirmed Matt Brannan's story as one in which the open display of a pistol deterred a
well-armed robbery crew”).

v See http://webserver1.lsb.state.ok.us/cf/2011-
12%20SUPPORT%20DOCUMENTS/BILLSUM/House/HB1796%20FA1%20BILLSUM.DOC.
 

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