Guns in Public: Concealed Carry

We recognize that perceptions can be swayed by how a topic is framed and by the terminology used. In this, as with everything else in this guide, our goal is to be fair and accurate.

Overall Framing

In the debate about guns in public, the most prominent point of contention is concealed carry laws. Within that debate, the clearest line of division is between states that require a permit and those that do not. As a result, we framed this guide’s overall question as “Should carrying a concealed firearm in public require a permit?”

Factor Choices

In debates about concealed carry permits, the arguments that tend to determine people’s positions fall under three types of questions:

• As a matter of principle, to what extent can a constitutional right be regulated?
• As a matter of consequences, what are the effects of more versus less regulation?
• As a matter of fairness, do regulations impose problematically unequal burdens on different people?

In essence, these are the three Factors to Consider. The factors provide a structure in which the different sides’ arguments can meet head-on. For a fair-minded reader, this is more helpful than simply seeing a list of each side’s talking points, which usually talk past each other.

For more on Fairmind guides’ structure and authoring principles, see Fairmind Format.

Labels for Supporters and Opponents

We used the terms “supporters of carry permits” and “opponents of carry permits” because they are descriptive and avoid advocate-defined terms like “constitutional carry” (which implies the opposite is unconstitutional carry).

Order of Arguments

Within a Factor to Consider, we present the arguments from one side, then the other. For fairness, it might be best to alternate which side goes first as the factors progress. But having tested that, we found the inconsistent order confused readers. So for this guide, we chose the “supporters or carry permits” side to go first.

The reason is, the guide’s subtitle asks whether carrying a concealed firearm in public should require a permit. It’s natural to hear the case for “yes” before the case for “no”—the side arguing for the proposition goes first, the side arguing against responds.

That said, order is not endorsement. Appearing first in a factor does not mean an argument is stronger, more widely held, or editorially favored.

“Gun” versus “Firearm”

In American usage, “gun” and “firearm” mean essentially the same thing. “Gun” is the more common term. “Firearm” is typically used in legal contexts. In this guide, we mostly use “gun,” especially as an adjective (“gun debate,” “gun culture,” etc.). We use “firearm” in more legalistic contexts, including in the guide’s overall question (“Should carrying a concealed firearm in public require a permit?”), which is about what the law should be.

Our preference is to cite data and analyses from neutral sources. Regarding concealed carry laws’ effect on crime, the nonpartisan research organization RAND is exemplary. As part of its Gun Policy in America project, RAND researchers have compiled an extensive database of state laws and analyzed decades of studies. Where possible, we have gratefully relied on their work.

In some cases, we sourced data from organizations connected with advocates on one side or the other of the debate. We did so because they had the best data for the point being made in the text. For example:

• Under Facts, we have counts of states that do and do not require permits, including a mention that almost every state that requires a permit also requires training. The mention of training is based on data from Everytown Research & Policy, which is part of Everytown, an advocacy organization for gun regulation.

• Under Effect on Crime, it says more than 25 states switched from requiring a permit to not requiring a permit since 2010. This is based on data from Handgunlaw.us, which is aligned with the gun-rights movement.

In all cases when we used data from an advocate-aligned source, we verified its accuracy and that it was presented fairly.

A related but separate issue from concealed-carry-permit laws is “sensitive places” laws. They define places where guns cannot be carried (concealed or openly) by civilians:

• At the federal level, examples include federal buildings, post offices, prisons, and secure airport areas.²⁰

• At the state level, every state has at least some sensitive places. Near-universal examples include state government buildings (especially courthouses), schools, and polling places. States with longer lists might include bars, hospitals, and public transportation. And states with the most expansive lists might include parks, playgrounds, museums, libraries, casinos, large events, and public demonstrations.²¹ Some states also include exemptions or additional qualifications for certain locations and circumstances.

After the 2022 Bruen decision, some states that lost the more restrictive aspects of their permitting schemes tried to compensate by adding to their lists of sensitive places.²² Opponents say that if many places end up off-limits, then the right to self-defense is undermined. For example, if public transportation is designated a sensitive place, a person who relies on it to reach work, school, or other destinations may be unable to carry at all in daily life, because they cannot legally carry during the trip needed to get to those places.

We did not include the debate about sensitive places in this guide because the laws are distinct from carry-permit laws, and the arguments are somewhat different. Also, research about the effect of sensitive-places laws on crime is not extensive enough to draw useful conclusions.²³

Reciprocity laws determine whether a concealed carry permit issued by one state is recognized by another. For example, someone with a permit from their home state may or may not be allowed to carry while traveling in other states, depending on those states’ reciprocity rules.

We did not include reciprocity in the main content because it’s about how states’ laws interact with each other. This is distinct from the guide’s main focus: whether states should require a permit for concealed carry within their own borders.

Concealed-carry-permit laws have traditionally been handled by states, not the federal government. But in the 2025–2026 Congress, bills were introduced in the House and Senate that would preempt state laws to make permitless carry the standard nationwide.²⁴

We did not include this development in the main content because as of March 2026, neither bill had advanced beyond initial stages, and in prior Congresses, less sweeping proposals have repeatedly failed to become law. For example, the Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act has been introduced in every Congress since 2015 but has never been enacted. The Act would require states to recognize each other’s permitting systems so citizens traveling in one state would still be subject to their home state’s law. This is less of a reach than mandating permitless carry nationwide, and it has not succeeded.

Supporters of carry permits sometimes cite U.S. public opinion polls that indicate strong opposition to permitless concealed carry. For example, a 2022 poll by the Marquette University Law School found that 81% of Americans opposed permitless concealed carry. That same poll found that 62% of Americans favored concealed carry with a permit.²⁵

While poll results are interesting, we did not include a public-opinion argument in the main content for a few reasons:

• Public opinion does not determine advocates’ positions. Advocates use polling when it suits their purpose; otherwise they ignore or attack it. If the polling flipped, advocates wouldn’t change their views on concealed carry permits. They’d simply change their views on the relevance of the polling.

• Public opinion shouldn’t be a primary reason for your own decision. The purpose of a Fairmind guide is to help you think through the substance of an issue for yourself. Letting public opinion decide for you is the opposite of that.

Also, it’s worth noting that most polls on the topic are national, whereas concealed carry laws are decided state by state. Each state’s public opinion will differ from national opinion, making the national results less relevant than they might initially seem.

Supporters of carry permits sometimes argue that permitless U.S. states are outliers compared to every other western country, all of which require a permit if they allow concealed carry at all.²⁶ They say the U.S. is out of step with the rest of the world, and that other countries’ experience is worth learning from.

Opponents respond that the U.S. has a constitutional gun-rights tradition and a level of gun ownership that other countries lack. They see this situation as a good thing, not a reason to emulate others.

We did not include this angle in the guide’s main content because it’s secondary, and of disputed relevance, to the debate’s key factors to consider.

Supporters of carry permits often note that requiring a permit allows the state to include an electronic background check as one of the conditions. They say this helps flag people with criminal records who legally should not have access to a gun at all.

Although the claim is true, a background check has limited value as part of a carry-permit application process. Most people who would fail a background check are aware of this. As a result, they will not expose themselves to scrutiny by applying for a carry permit. In addition, many lawful applicants will already have undergone a background check when purchasing a firearm from a licensed dealer.

In comparison, the training requirement for a permit is unique to the permitting process and is usually the greatest burden for lawful applicants. It is also the main feature cited by supporters as the public-safety justification for requiring permits. For these reasons, we focused more on training requirements associated with permits rather than background checks or other less common conditions.

In debates about concealed carry laws, some critics argue that the spread of permitless carry reflects the influence of organized gun-rights groups, particularly the National Rifle Association, rather than broad public demand. They note that advocacy organizations with politically active members can have a disproportionate impact in state legislatures, driving outcomes independent of public opinion.

Others respond that the shift toward permitless carry has occurred mostly in states where voters and elected officials already hold strong pro-gun views, and that legislative outcomes in those states are consistent with their political cultures. They note that there are advocacy organizations on the other side of these debates, and that competition of interest groups is part of the democratic process.

We did not include this angle in the main text because it is more about how laws are made, not whether permits should be required. Although interest-group influence on legislative outcomes can distort how the public perceives issues like concealed carry, we concluded that whatever distortion may exist is secondary to—not overriding of—the arguments about the merits of concealed carry permits.

Opponents of carry permits sometimes argue that permits are pointless because criminals won’t get permits. Although it’s broadly true that criminals won’t apply for permits, stopping criminals is not the main point of concealed carry permits. For most current permitting systems, the main point is to require training so people who lawfully carry in public (that is, non-criminals) meet basic standards of competence and responsibility. This helps reduce situations where untrained carriers escalate conflicts or misuse their firearms in ways that endanger themselves, bystanders, or police.

To be clear, people against requiring permits are not against training. They object to government-mandated training. That is a key dispute, and the claim that “criminals won’t get permits” does not address it.

Some supporters of carry permits argue that permitless carry reflects a cultural drift toward a society where problems created by guns are allegedly solved by yet more guns. They ask, regardless of measurable effects, who wants to live in a society organized around that premise?

We did not include this argument in the main content because it is not specific to the permit question. It could just as well apply to any loosening of gun regulations, and its implied remedy goes beyond permitting. So we considered it beyond the scope of this guide.

The narrower, permit-specific version of this concern—that requiring a permit expresses a social norm about responsibility in shared public spaces—is addressed in the main content.

Until the Supreme Court’s 2022 Bruen decision, an important distinction in concealed carry laws was between “shall-issue” and “may-issue” permitting. A shall-issue system assumes the applicant is entitled to a permit unless disqualified; a may-issue system allows officials to deny a permit unless the applicant shows a special need.

The Court’s decision in Bruen held that discretionary may-issue systems were unconstitutional, effectively eliminating them in their prior form. As a result, the main debate today is not about may-issue versus shall-issue, but about whether permits should be required at all.

For that reason, we did not include the shall-issue / may-issue distinction in the main part of the guide. We mention it here because many older articles and online discussions of concealed carry still use that terminology, so readers are likely to encounter it when researching the issue.

A common argument in gun-policy debates is the importance of defensive gun use (DGU): the idea that armed civilians can prevent or interrupt violent crimes against themselves or others. Some advocates add that the value of carrying lies partly in the capability itself—having the option to defend oneself in an emergency, whether or not it is ever exercised. In their view, actual DGU incidents and the value of the capability itself together outweigh any potential social costs of concealed carry.

We touched on DGU in Effect on Crime, where the opponents’ paragraph cites the 2022 Greenwood Park Mall incident and noted that most defensive uses never involve shots fired. But we did not develop DGU into a standalone factor in the main content because the broader argument bears more on whether concealed carry should be allowed than whether a permit should be required. Under either a permit or permitless system, qualifying individuals can carry and can use a firearm defensively if needed. A permit requirement raises the cost of access through fees and training, but it does not remove the underlying capability. The fairness concern about that added cost is addressed in Unequal Burden of Obtaining a Permit.

Both sides of the debate make arguments about the effect of concealed carry permits (or the lack thereof) on policing. For example:

• Identifying “The Good Guys.” On one hand, a permit allows an officer to know a person has been vetted to carry. On the other hand, the officer usually must first interact with the person to know whether they have a permit, which limits the value of the permit in the initial approach. More generally, police training emphasizes that officers should not assume a person is safe until a situation is secured. This reduces the practical importance of whether a person has a permit.

• Civilian Gun Training. Almost every police officer would say civilians who carry guns should be properly trained. At the same time, a large majority of police officers support a broad view of gun rights and are reluctant to endorse permit laws for concealed carry, including laws that require training.²⁷ Officers sometimes note that law-abiding carriers already have strong incentives to get training and to act responsibly, and that the main risks to police come from criminals or from people who would not obtain permits anyway.²⁸

• Endorsements. When states have debated adopting permitless concealed carry, in-state police leaders have been mostly against it, especially in urban areas.²⁹ In some cases, leaders were mixed,³⁰ but we could find no cases where they were fully supportive. (We are referring here to police leaders and groups who made official endorsements, not the general sentiment of rank-and-file officers, which tilts against permits.) National organizations such as the International Association of Chiefs of Police and the Fraternal Order of Police have supported safeguards such as background checks and training where permit systems exist, but they have not taken a consistent position against states that allow permitless carry.³¹ These groups have, however, opposed some reciprocity proposals that would require states with stricter laws to recognize permits—or lack of permits—from other states.³²

Because there isn’t a clear story from the law enforcement world, and it isn’t primary in the debate, we did not include concealed carry laws’ effect on policing in the main section.

Gun-rights advocates often cite research by economist John Lott, whose 1998 book More Guns, Less Crime argued that relatively permissive concealed carry laws reduce violent crime by deterring criminals who fear encountering armed victims. Lott has continued publishing in this vein, but independent evaluations of the “more guns, less crime” hypothesis have not been supportive:

• A 2005 National Academies of Sciences review found the existing research—including Lott’s original work—methodologically insufficient to support conclusions in either direction.³³

• More recently, RAND’s Gun Policy in America project, which has recently conducted a comprehensive review of the concealed carry literature, concluded that the best evidence from newer studies suggests weaker permit laws (including permitless laws) increase violent crime by a small amount.³⁴ That finding informs our treatment of the crime research in Effect on Crime.

Some gun-regulation supporters would argue that this entire guide rests on a flawed premise: that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to carry a gun in public. They point to the Amendment’s text: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” In their reading, the Amendment was originally understood as a civic right tied to citizens’ participation in a well-regulated militia, rather than as a broad private right of individuals to carry guns for personal purposes. On this view, the historical tradition also left substantial room for government regulation of arms.³⁵

In Heller, the Supreme Court considered this viewpoint and ruled against it. By a narrow majority, the Court held that the historical context of the words pointed to an individual right to keep and bear arms, not just for militia service.³⁶ In Bruen, the Court confirmed that the right applied to carrying a firearm in public.³⁷

Although some scholars continue to dispute this reading, the practical reality is that Heller and Bruen represent the law of the land. In turn, concealed carry laws must exist within that framework—which is why this guide also exists within that framework.

Another practical consideration is that 45 state constitutions include a right to bear arms.³⁸ So if a future Supreme Court were to reverse Heller and Bruen, individual gun rights would remain protected in most states under their own constitutions. That said, many of these state provisions explicitly allow their legislatures to regulate or restrict concealed carry.³⁹