De Facto Carry Ban in Santa Barbara County

By Larry R. Rankin, Santa Barbara, California

Life member NRA, Life member GOA, Life member JPFO, Life member California Rifle and Pistol Association, Life member Law Enforcement Alliance of America, Past President of the Grassroots, NRA members’ council, Chairman of the First Friends of NRA dinner in Santa Barbara, Current Chairman of the California American Pistol and Rifle Association for the County of Santa Barbara.

I am to this day licensed to carry a loaded weapon in all of the states below:

1) Alabama, 2) Alaska, 3) Arizona, 4) Arkansas, 5) Colorado, 6) Delaware, 7) Florida, 8) Georgia, 9) Idaho, 10) Indiana, 11) Kentucky, 12) Louisiana, 13) Michigan, 14) Minnesota, 15) Mississippi, 16) Missouri, 17) Montana, 18) Nevada, 19) New Hampshire, 20) New Mexico, 21) North Carolina, 22) North Dakota, 23) Ohio, 24) Oklahoma, 25) Pennsylvania, 26) South Dakota, 27) Tennessee, 28) Texas, 29) Utah, 30) Vermont, 31) Virginia, 32) Washington and 33) Wyoming

You might not like what Sheriff Bill Brown of Santa Barbara County has to say, but he is honest and direct about it. Which makes you wonder why the NRA gave a “A” rating to a man who makes it clear he's proud that he has given out only three concealed carry permits in his many years of service. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that Sheriff Brown claims to be a life member of the NRA. Perhaps it is because Sheriff Brown is bright, well spoken and endowed with a certain measure of conceit that so often seems to be the inevitable attribute of a successful politician. It seems that there is something about a successful politician that the NRA finds hard to resist.

When I met with Sheriff Brown this March the 9th, to appeal my denial of my application of my active gun permit that I have had for over ten years (unsuccessfully) he was diplomatic enough to hear me out. He then very clearly and unambiguously laid out a policy of a de facto concealed carry ban in Santa Barbara County. A policy that does not recognize the right of self defense. A policy based on the model of a sovereign who knows what is best for his subjects, not a public servant elected to protect the rights of the citizens who elected him. A policy reminiscent of King George's government that was rejected by our founding fathers, not the constitutional model of government they bequeathed to us. A policy that supports the continued efforts to redefine the Second Amendment in sporting terms rather than in terms of a right of defense of self and property. And finally, if the NRA lawyers are listening, a policy that violates California law on concealed carry, which at least acknowledges that there might be someone qualified to receive a concealed carry permit other than persons associated with law enforcement. While California was careful enough not to craft an outright de jure ban on concealed carry, Sheriff Brown's policy is a ban as a matter of fact, if not of law.

Twenty years ago I might have understood how Sheriff Brown can state "I am a Life member of the NRA, a hunter, a gun collector and we have enough laws, without creating new ones" and yet prohibit concealed carry. But many years of data are available today from states that have allowed widespread concealed carry. Data that show a reduction of crime. Data that show that concealed carry holders are overwhelmingly safe and law abiding. These are facts especially important to the discharge of his duties as Sheriff. Facts that he should have made an effort to investigate before adopting a concealed carry policy. Facts that any NRA member knows. To continue a policy that he has followed for many years with no consideration of contemporary evidence is to demonstrate an arbitrary and capricious exercise of his power as Sheriff.

If enough sheriffs abuse California's concealed carry law in an arbitrary and capricious manner, the argument can be made that California's concealed carry law violates either the California of Federal constitutions. Is the NRA counting?

There is, additionally, another legal reform that the NRA should champion. One concern Sheriff Brown identified, and I have heard this from other sheriffs, is fear of personal legal liability if someone with a concealed carry permit commits a crime with the permitted weapon. Law enforcement is second only to the teachers' unions in political influence in the California legislature. Would not California law enforcement almost unanimously support the NRA were it to lobby for a law protecting sheriffs and police chiefs from liability for issuing concealed carry permits? Would you issue CCWs if it meant you might lose your job, your house, your kids' college money, and a lifetime of savings? If it meant declaring bankruptcy to avoid having a multi million dollar verdict haunting you for the rest of your life?

Sheriff Brown is no Patrick Henry ("Give me liberty or give me death"). But then how many of us are? We have to work with the men and women we have as law enforcement leaders. If the NRA were to lobby for the legal protection California police and sheriffs' needs, perhaps they might not be afraid to take an honest look at success other states have had with concealed carry.