Despite Michael Bloomberg’s best efforts, we’re about to add New Hampshire to the roster of constitutional carry states.

From nh1.com:

A bill that would make it easier for Granite Staters to carry a concealed weapon on Thursday easily passed its final major legislative hurdle on its path toward becoming law.

The state House of Representatives voted 200-97 in favor of the measure, which would repeal the need for a permit or license to carry a concealed handgun. There were a large number of absent state representatives, due to the powerful snowstorm slamming New Hampshire.

Last month the New Hampshire state Senate, in a 13-10 party line vote, passed the bill.

Governor Chris Sununu’s made it clear he intends to sign the bill once it hits his desk.

The state’s previous law gave local chiefs of police discretion over who was worthy of exercising their constitutionally protected civil right to keep and bear arms. The new law removes that arbitrary hurdle. Oh happy day.

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51 COMMENTS

  2. It’s going to eventually get the point that a majority of states are constitutional carry, with the only holdouts being the handful of “slave states” that are run by what will be increasingly wild eyed, raving progressives.

    • HP,

      I disagree. I cannot see these states ever going Constitutional carry:

      West
      — Hawaii, Washington, Oregon, California, New Mexico, Nevada

      Midwest
      — Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, Ohio

      East
      — Pennsylvania, Maryland, New Jersey, Virginia, Delaware
      — New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island

      South
      — North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Texas

      All of those states, with the possible exception of Georgia and Wisconsin, have one or more of:
      — May issue concealed carry
      — Handgun registration
      — No open carry
      — wait times before purchasing handguns and/or long guns
      — numerous places where concealed carry is forbidden
      — stupid places where concealed carry is forbidden (like parks)
      — no statewide preemption of firearm possession
      — universal background checks

      As far as I have ever been able to see, a state that only has one of those might go to Constitutional carry. States that have two of those virtually never go to Constitutional carry. And states that have three or more of those never go to Constitutional carry.

      • I’m not overly optimistic about our chances here in Virginia, but I think we have none of the things on the above list. Currently constitutional open-carry, statewide preemption, carry in parks and restaurants that serve alcohol, complete statewide preemption, shall issue cc with relatively low cost and unburdonsome training, etc…

      • I could see several of those states going for it under the right circumstances, particularly NM, TX, and GA. All have very healthy gun cultures and large rural populations.

        • Vhyrus,

          I cannot see New Mexico going for Constitutional carry … they just have way too many people on the Democrat gravy train.

          I could see Georgia under the right circumstances … that will depend on what the Atlanta metro area does.

          As for Texas, that is a hard call. They recently rejected Constitutional open carry and only adopted licensed open carry with a lot of consternation. I guess it depends on how truly conservative their population centers are. I will be pleasantly surprised if Texas goes Constitutional.

      • You bring up very valid points. I suppose I’m being overly optimistic, if only because of how far things have come over the years with concealed carry in general, and how fast new states seem to be jumping on board with constitutional carry. You’re probably right, but let’s hope I am.

      • You are WAY off. Many of those you listed will have CC at some point. MN, MI, WI, VA, NC, SC, GA, TX, NM, etc. Maine passed it! You really do not understand the nature of these states and how quickly this ball is moving.

        • DDay,

          I may live in one of those states. And I may have been participating closely with pro-Second Amendment entities that push for Constitutional carry … and hear what goes on behind the scenes. And I may have close relatives and friends that share the sentiment in some of those other states.

          I would love for future events to prove me wrong. Unfortunately, I don’t see that happening because I do not equate Republicans’ recent gains with support for Constitutional carry. There are boatloads of Republicans who support universal background checks and oppose open carry as well as Constitutional carry.

          Look at it this way: states like Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, New Mexico, Nevada, Virginia, etc. that almost always elect Democrats for the Senate and Presidency (and even governor much of the time) have a large voter base that keep embracing the Democrat’s platform. Why would the voters in those states suddenly reject the Democrat’s platform en-masse? And Republicans who win on razor thin margins in those states — quite often only because Democrat voters failed to turn out to vote in force — why would they risk their precarious seats on Constitutional carry when they can keep the status quo with much less risk?

      • Yet one more reason to move out of CT to NH. Family is all that keeps me in CT, and every time Malloy talks it is encouragement to bail on CT.

      • New Jersey is quite possibly the most stupid state in the us besides California and New York. These states will definitely never go constitutional carry. That’s why I live in Vermont / New England. Hooray vermont !!!

  4. Local police chiefs in NH will become more and more politically motivated towards anti-2A as more and more Mass tax dodgers leave the “Gay State” and head for the New Hampshire hills.

    Constitutional carry will make it very difficult for the Progs to deny the 2nd Amendment to the people in NH. Oh how this must make the liberal girls in Boston shudder when they go on vacation in NH.

    • The liberals in NH are not mainly from MA. All the most R/conservative areas in NH are right over the MA line in southern NH. The most liberal areas of NH are all along the VT border, the college towns of Durham, Keene, Lebanon/Dartmouth area, Concord and the sea coast.

      The UBER liberal MA AG Healy is from NH. So NH exported a very very liberal woman to be MA AG.

  5. There have been a lot of advancements in people’s ability to carry throughout the nation. However I would like to see more advancements in getting banned objects legal again, or less restricted. The hearing protection act will be a big one and a good place to start.

    • Too bad that whole “global warming” thing turned out to be a hoax. New Hampshire would have made a nice year round springtime destination by now.

      • The good side of the weather is we don’t have to deal with any of that catastrophic crap. No earthquakes, no tornadoes, no hurricanes, just snow a few months of the year. Very rare that we have any of those.

      • You do realize Global Warming’s premise means hotter summers and colder winters right?

        In the southern hemi they are having record hot summers, you know, where it’s summertime…

    • Once you get used to it it’s not so bad. Born and raised in NH, was absent from ’85 to ’95 for military service, I wouldn’t consider living anywhere else. Besides, nothing better than driving in the snow with a RWD car 🙂

      • “… nothing better than driving in the snow with a RWD car”

        Yeah, that can be a lot of fun!

  7. We are having a Nor’easter today. Winds gusting to 30 mph, 10+ inches of snow, 1/8 mile visibility. My guess is that Bloomberg’s snowflakes stayed home, since the result does not reflect the ratio of Democrats to Republicans in the House.

      • I doubt it. All my recent relatives came from Maine. However, one of the founders of Dover, NH in the 1600’s is said to be a relative.

        • That was sort of a tongue-in-cheek question. I’ve not previously seen your screen name. I just moved from MA last May.

    • Oh, my, how you suffer. As I type, this, it’s -33F, the wind is blowing 14mph with 21mph gusts, and the chill factor is -60F. The drifts from yesterday’s blow (40mph) were around 3′ high in spots, packed solid.
      I may have to bundle up.
      Of course, it IS Prudhoe Bay, and it IS February. But, still, I FEEL for you.

  8. My wife and I have our NH non res permits. We have family there, attend courses at sig as well as shoot some 3 gun matches. NH is open carry without a permit, but we both prefer concealed, so hence the permits. We might pass through Mass or CT driving up there so having the NH permits gives us some additional legitimacy if we get stopped. That said, it took us all of a 2 weeks to get our NH permits in the mail. Just filled out the 1 page application. Copies of our resident state permits and a check.

    • You are very mistaken. All three northern New England states are awash in legal firearms. Here in Maine, we’ve been enjoying constitutional carry since 2015, and we just shot down a UBC referendum in November.

    • VT, ME and NH are freer than most southern and western states when it comes to guns. Texas looks like a liberal oppressive hellhole by comparison.

    • We have one of the highest per-capita ownership rate of class 3 firearms, and just about the lowest firearm violence rate to boot. And Sig has its corporate headquarters here. It would be nice to have Constitutional Carry, though it is a shall issue state with a fee of $10. Not too burdensome and there is a sizeable and growing shooting community here, with IDPA and USPSA matches pretty much every weekend around NH, Vermont and Maine in the summer. For winter, driving with awd in the snow is a hoot, though power slides take a little more wheel input than with rear wheel drive.

  17. Local news tried running a “fake news” piece about somebody with connections to Sandy Hook being laughed at as she testified in opposition to the bill. Couldn’t have anything to do with her stand-up comedy act of “using a gun in defense is an NRA lie” joke.

    Feels so good.

  19. Something to note as a factual aside, the state law requires the local police chief to have a provable reason to not issue, and if he cannot supply such a reason must issue the license. Until the bill passes New Hampshire will continue to be a shall issue state, rather than a may issue, as the ending line seems to imply.

  21. How does NH version of Constitutional Carry apply to Non-Residents? I live in VT and am hearing this will only apply to residents. Not a true Constitutional Carry like Vt.

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