Wilkinson: Kavanaugh wants you to Bear his Assault Weapon

In 2014, Texas Open Carry enthusiasts began wandering into fast-food joints and city squares, lugging their big guns and generally freaking people out. Their actions appeared so deranged that the National Rifle Association — yes, that National Rifle Association — declared their behavior “downright weird.”


The NRA promptly reversed course, however, recognizing that as the nation’s leading church of gun worship, it didn’t want to lose parishioners to more spiritually pure congregations. Texas soon moved on to battles over campus carry and other efforts to impose militant gun culture where it is unwanted.


The status of open carry was not resolved in District of Columbia v. Heller, the 2008 ruling written by Justice Antonin Scalia that established an individual right to firearms. But it’s widely assumed that “bearing” arms as an individual means carrying them. So Heller’s individual right may eventually require allowing either concealed or open carry — or both.