the context of someone mentioning permit didnt exist until 1920s? That context? Its why i brought up checking in with LEO btw too
The switch was
not really “open carry to CCW” in one clean national move. It was three overlapping shifts: legal, social, and tactical.
Historically, your comment is basically right in the broad sense: in much of 19th-century American law,
concealed carry was treated as the shady form of carry, while open carry was often treated as the more legitimate form. Many 1800s cases and statutes allowed states to restrict or ban concealed carry while preserving some form of open carry. That is why older legal history often makes the distinction: concealed weapons were associated with ambush, dueling, gambling, criminality, and dishonorable violence. Open carry was more visible and, in theory, less deceptive.
But the “permit didn’t exist until the 1920s” claim is too simplistic. Modern carry-permit systems expanded heavily in the 20th century, but licensing and weapon-permit laws existed earlier in various forms. Duke’s historical-law research notes that weapons licensing laws existed from the 1600s through the early 1900s across many jurisdictions, including laws requiring licenses before carrying or owning weapons. So the correct point is not “permits didn’t exist,” but rather:
modern, bureaucratic, statewide CCW permit regimes became much more important in the 20th century.
The big social/legal flip happened later. As America urbanized, open carry became less normal in cities and suburbs. Police professionalization, mass media, urban crime politics, racial unrest, assassinations, and 1960s gun-control politics all pushed public carry into a more regulated framework. California is a good example: the 1967 Mulford Act restricted loaded open carry after the Black Panthers openly carried firearms in public and at the Capitol. That was not just about “safety.” It was also political optics and public alarm.
Then, from the late 20th century into the 2000s, CCW became the “respectable” carry model because it fit the modern compromise: armed citizens can carry, but the gun stays out of sight. To the public and police, concealed carry feels less disruptive than a visible pistol on the hip. To gun owners, CCW is also tactically preferable because it avoids advertising that you are armed, avoids social friction, and reduces the chance of some idiot calling 911 just because they saw a gun.
So the blunt version is:
Old America: open carry was honest, concealed carry was suspicious.
Modern America: concealed carry is socially tolerated, open carry is treated as provocative or abnormal in many populated areas.
That is cultural, not purely constitutional. Legally,
Bruen did not say states can abolish public carry. It said ordinary citizens have a right to public carry for self-defense and that “proper cause” or special-need systems are unconstitutional. But
Bruen also accepted that states can use objective licensing requirements, so long as they are not abusive or discretionary in the old “you need special need” sense.
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