As you report, gun owners are becoming emboldened in America (“Showdown,” July 5, 2008). The controversial “open-carry” movement argues that people should be allowed to carry their handguns openly, as the cowboys used to do. Having to hide them is neither natural nor fair. Most important, visible guns are more effective as deterrents than hidden ones, let alone the ones that are not within easy reach. As shown by John Umbeck in A Theory of Property Rights with Application to the California Gold Rush (Ames, Iowa: The Iowa University Press, 1981), open-carry practices explain remarkably low rates of violent crime among gold miners between 1848 and 1866. The open-carry movement is thus far from emboldened enough. Given their obvious benefits, visible guns should not only be allowed by federal law, but they should also be made compulsory for all adults, both male and female. On Umbeck’s evidence, America would be rid of most violent crime in a few short years.

Addendum (July 8, 2008)

To my surprise, I got a response to this piece less than an hour after I posted it on the World Wide Web. An open-carry movement activist himself, his feedback was most appreciative. We exchanged a bunch of messages by this morning, and I pointed him to my earlier piece on this subject, where Umbeck’s remarkable book is cited at length (“A Modest Proposal to Reduce the Rate of Violent Crime in the United States,” March 13, 1991). As modest proposals go, this one appears to have a bright future.