I'm still trying to get straightened out from the trip I took. But for the helluvit I'll tell you a little about it now & what I'd have had to go through to be legal in each state I was in.
I went to Kansas to spend a few days with a good friend (& co-blogger). From there I went to Dallas Texas to shoot with Kim du Toit & Robert Langham. After that I headed to Jacksonville, Florida to see a very dear friend of mine (whom Robert described as a "hot tall blonde" & I corrected him because she's not that tall*). From there I went (all too damn) briefly to Myrtle Beach, SC. Then I went to Jacksonville, NC to see another friend. From there I went to Charlotte, NC to see my kin & a few old pals. Then back to Colorado.
So the route I took had me winding from Colorado to Kansas through Oklahoma to Texas through Louisiana, Mississippi, back through Louisiana, back into Mississippi, through Alabama into Florida then through Georgia into South Carolina then North Carolina then Tennessee then through Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas & finally landed me back in Colorado.
I drove. That was 5,420 miles on my car & a little over $300 out of my pocket for gas. Why did I drive? Cause I feel positively naked without my pistols so there ain't no way I'm letting some TSA jerk steal my pocketknife & lighter.
But the laws in each state are different. Not that I follow such laws but it's always good to know what the laws are before you break them. Here's a summary of each state's firearms laws:
Those links lead to the NRA-ILA summary page for each respective state. It's a good general summary but you have to do some digging for the info you want. Packing.org is a little bit quicker to search so I'll list the links to Packing.org's summary page dealing with car carry:
Keep in mind I'm only talking about carrying in your vehicle. If I were to follow each state's law about car carrying I would have to pull over at each state line & make sure I was in compliance. Here’s what the trip would have entailed:
In Colorado I can carry open or concealed in my car. In Kansas I would have to make sure the firearm was visible. In Oklahoma I would have had to make sure the firearm was visible & unloaded! No round in the chamber & no magazine in the pistol. In Texas I would have to conceal it. Texas law is odd; the only reason anyone can legally carry a loaded weapon in a vehicle sans permit is if they're "traveling". Since I have Colorado plates I'm pretty sure I qualified as "traveling" but Texas firearms law is worthy of a post all by itself.
Louisiana & Mississippi both consider your car to be your property & let you decide where to carry inside your vehicle. Alabama threw me. No carry at all sans license. Let me re-phrase that; no useful carry without a license. The firearm has to be unloaded & inaccessible. Oddly enough if I stopped in Alabama & walked anyplace I could have strapped my pistol on my hip but would have had to unload & secure it as I climbed back in my car.
In Florida the recommended method of legally carrying without a permit is in your glove box or other securable container. A snapped holster would also work. Georgia requires the firearm to be visible. South Carolina requires the firearm to be in a secure container (i.e. glovebox, locked or unlocked). North Carolina wants it visible. In Tennessee it has to be unloaded & inaccessible.
Arkansas is tricky. I think I could carry under their peaceful journey exception but it never specifies open or concealed. & I believe if I stopped for the night in Arkansas that would end my peaceful journey affirmative defense.
So concealed or open in Colorado, open in Kansas, open but unloaded in Oklahoma, concealed in Texas, open or concealed in Louisiana & Mississippi, unloaded & inaccessible in Alabama, concealed & secured in Florida, open in Georgia, concealed & secured in South Carolina, open in North Carolina, unloaded & inaccessible in Tennessee, & I'm unsure about Arkansas but I think concealed would work as long as you didn't stop for the night.
When I drive by myself I stop for gas. That's it. I carry enough food & snacks to last the trip & I use the bathroom while I'm getting fuel. Since it's a safer idea to stop the car before handling weapons I would have had to stop at the Kansas border (I carry concealed most of the time in Colorado), at the Oklahoma border, at the Texas border, at the Alabama border, at the Florida border, at the Georgia border, at the South Carolina border, at the North Carolina border, at the Tennessee border, at the Arkansas border, at the Oklahoma border & at the Kansas border.
On the first day I drove from Colorado to Kansas (8 hours). On the second I drove from Kansas to Texas (8 hours). My third day of traveling was from Texas to Florida (17.5 hours). My fourth day was from Florida to NC (8 hours). My fifth was from NC to Tennessee (8 hours). My sixth was from Tennessee to Kansas (13 hours). My last was Kansas to Colorado (8 hours). If I'm adding things up right that's about 70 hours on the road. I did not want it to be 80 hours, or even 70.1 because of complying with nonsensical laws about how I store my property within the confines of my property. But those are the hoops I would have had to jump through if I wished to be legal in each state I passed through.
In Tennessee, Alabama & possibly Arkansas I would have been defenseless. In Oklahoma I would have been for all practical purposes defenseless. Hell, I might as well have been in Illinois or New Jersey. But in the four states I passed through where car carry was illegal or questionable all have a Right to Arms provision in the state constitution.
Oddly enough if you wanted to avoid Alabama on an east-west journey (or vice versa) you'd have to contend with Tennessee. If you wished to avoid Tennessee you'd end up with Illinois unless you took some back roads through Kentucky into Missouri or went into Virginia. There is no interstate route that can get you around Illinois & Tennessee & Alabama if you need to pass them.
Of course I should throw in the disclaimer that if I was caught carrying contrary to any state's law I would be in a mess of legal trouble, so you should do some research & a lot of thinking before you decide to ignore the asinine laws in question.
I'll have more on the trip soon. I hope. As I said I'm still getting things straight from the trip. & I'll have pics & possibly some video (of the range trips, not the aforementioned hot blonde*). But if you decide to drive across multiple states don't think it's a legally easy thing to do if you wish to be able to defend yourself.
* In the interest of full disclosure the "not too tall hot blonde" is a very dear friend of mine. I met her in college & had a crush on her for years. She was the first girl I took out for Valentine's day. I recall I sent her flowers, took her out to my favorite fish camp (which in the south is saying something) & when I dropped her off at her apartment I walked her to her door. When I tried to kiss her she turned her head & giggled. All that & all I got was a giggle! But somehow my ego survived & we've been real close friends ever since. In fact I can't think of anyone I feel closer to which is surprising considering we never dated & haven't seen each other for years. I mention this simply to clarify that the 17.5 hour leg of the trip was not for some taudry, sordid, immoral but extremely pleasurable affair involving condiments, restraints, dehydration, firetrucks & a psychologist for months afterwards (& you cannot be half as dissappointed at that as I am - I mean she is hot even if not that tall :P ) but simply to see my best friend.
Posted by Publicola at January 18, 2006 03:32 AM | TrackBackThe Texas Lege actually had a fit of sanity and added a presumption to the code that one is traveling when in a car, shifting the burden to the state to prove that you weren't traveling if they try to charge you (rather than it being an affirmative defense).
Of course, the DA in Harris County (Houston) has said that his office intends to completely ignore the legislature on that. I'm not sure if that has been tested in court yet in Harris County.
Posted by: Phelps at January 18, 2006 09:21 AMAlso, the car-carry restriction in Texas only applies to handguns. Long guns can be carried in your car, loaded or unloaded, visible or concealed, at any time.
Posted by: Roger Ritter at January 18, 2006 08:02 PMBTW, even the backroad KY to MO route doesn't completely avoid IL. I know, because that's the route I used to get from SC to WA.
You cross the Ohio River from KY into IL just south of Cairo, drive a mile at most, then cross the Mississippi into MO.
Posted by: Heartless Libertarian at January 18, 2006 09:40 PMSo just how did you carry through this legal maze?
Posted by: Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner at January 19, 2006 06:57 AMThere is a route that misses Illinois & Tennessee & Alabama - from Ohio or Indiana through Michigan to Wisconsin. E.g., US-23 north from Toledo to I-75 to St. Ignace, then west. Probably not freeway all the way, but the southern route through the U.P. can be a fast, easy route with no traffic if you go at the right time. Of course, right now it probably looks more like a ski run than a road...
However, MI's car carry laws are as bad as Alabama, if not worse. Unloaded, inaccessible, and with the ammo stored separately and also inaccessible. It doesn't appear to be possible to carry a long gun in a pickup truck and be in strict accordance with the law, although at least in rural areas the cops will accept unloaded and behind the seat as good enough. Handguns have to be licensed; I'm not sure how that applies to travelers from out of state...
I think our car-carry laws are a holdover from Prohibition. Bootleggers would drive over the bridge into Canada, fill the trunk and back seat at a Canadian liquor store, and try to sneak back across, especially when the little lake north of Detroit froze over so you could drive across. Bootlegger gangs would also try to hijack each other's shipments. There were battles between whole squadrons of heavy luxury cars that started on the ice and spilled over into Detroit streets. The legislature couldn't change the root cause - a federal constitutional amendment had to be repealed to change that - so they strongly discouraged carrying firearms in cars in any way that allowed using them, and they've never changed the law back. (It's only been 72 years...)
What's Alabama's excuse.
Posted by: markm at January 19, 2006 11:28 AMHere... if you want to make things easy for you, for traveling around most of the country, get a Utah license:
http://www.packing.org/state/utah/image.php?stateimage=143
They have reciprocity with most everyone that isn't abjactly insane (OK, OK, so requiring a license at all is insane, but that's why I said abjactly insane ).
Yes they require a bit of training, but only initially and it isn't much. $59 new and only $10 to renew every 5 years.
It won't work for your state, you have to have your state's one for that (if your state treats you like a subject and makes you have one), but if you travel anywhere that your state doesn't have reciprocity with, then you can always give them your Utah license.
And fortunately, Utah is used to having people from out of state get their permits for this very reason. Right neighaborly of them, isn't it?
Posted by: Windaria at January 19, 2006 08:00 PMI suppose that Congress could abuse the Interstate Commerce Clause and do some good by passing interstate carrying laws.
What am I saying?! Congress will just screw it up even more.
Posted by: Alcibiades at January 20, 2006 01:15 AMJust don't drive through Ohio.
Posted by: Jay at January 20, 2006 06:35 AMwhile in the service years ago I went through AL with an unloaded revolver in the trunk, stopped at the welcome center on the way in and asked about how to legally place the gun in my car. Same answer: can't bring it in. ... then told me so long as I was just passing through, leave it in a case in my trunk, unloaded, and shut up about it
For over a decade, I haven't mentioned it again
on the other hand, I haven't been back to AL with a gun since
Posted by: skip at July 15, 2006 05:51 AM