By Lucretia Hughes Klucken
ALBANY, N.Y. — The Rockefeller Institute of Government published a column this week claiming permitless carry laws are associated with increased violence and suggesting states adopt additional gun restrictions to offset what the author considers the dangers of constitutional carry.
The column, written by Susan T. Parker, an affiliate scholar with the institute’s Regional Gun Violence Research Consortium, cites her newly published study examining permitless carry laws adopted in 11 states between 2015 and 2019.
Parker reported that violent crime increased by approximately 7% during the 12 months following adoption, firearm assaults increased by about 12% and firearm assaults in public places increased by roughly 15%.
Those are serious claims and should be examined. But statistical claims, especially those drawn from observational research, should never be treated as the final word in a constitutional debate.
The Rockefeller Institute column acknowledges that previous research focusing specifically on permitless carry has produced “null or mixed effects” and that some researchers believe it may still be too early to estimate the laws’ effects reliably. A separate 2026 review by the RAND Corp. classified the evidence concerning permitless carry and homicide, robbery and assault as inconclusive.
That uncertainty matters.
The new study examined laws passed in 11 states during a limited period and concentrated primarily on the first year after adoption. It found that firearm assaults began increasing before the laws officially took effect, which the author interpreted as an “anticipatory response” by gun owners.
That is an interpretation, not direct proof that lawful gun owners caused those assaults.
If an increase began before a law took effect, researchers must carefully examine other possible explanations, including changes in policing, reporting practices, drug activity, population shifts, local economic conditions and criminal behavior unrelated to lawful carry.
Correlation dressed in statistical language is still not automatically causation.
The column also reported that weapons-law offenses declined by about 14% and arrests for those offenses fell by more than 20% after constitutional carry was adopted. That result is hardly surprising. When a state stops requiring otherwise law-abiding citizens to obtain a government permit merely to carry a firearm, fewer people can be arrested for the former permit offense.
A reduction in arrests for conduct that is no longer illegal is not evidence that police have been prevented from enforcing laws against violent criminals.
Constitutional carry does not give felons, domestic abusers or other prohibited individuals permission to possess firearms. It does not legalize assault, robbery, murder or reckless gun use. It removes a licensing requirement for people who are already legally eligible to possess and carry a firearm.
Georgia’s constitutional carry law, for example, eliminated the license requirement only for a “lawful weapons carrier.” Existing restrictions on prohibited possessors and restricted locations remained in place. Georgians may also continue obtaining licenses voluntarily for reciprocity and other purposes.
Despite the unsettled evidence, the Rockefeller Institute column proposed expanding the number of places where lawful citizens cannot carry, adopting additional firearm-storage rules for vehicles and giving police access to state databases of legal gun owners.
That final proposal should alarm every American who understands the dangers of government surveillance.
A database containing the names of lawful gun owners begins to resemble a registry, regardless of the label placed on it. Such a system raises serious questions about privacy, misuse, data security and whether citizens exercising a constitutional right should be tracked by the government.
Criminals do not register their stolen guns. Gang members do not stand in line for carry permits. Violent offenders do not follow signs declaring a location gun-free.
The people most easily identified and regulated through such a database would be the people who already follow the law.
Safe firearm storage is responsible and should be strongly encouraged. Gun owners should take reasonable precautions to prevent theft and keep firearms away from unauthorized children. But policymakers should be cautious about creating one-size-fits-all mandates that could leave a firearm inaccessible during an emergency or turn a crime victim into a criminal because someone broke into a vehicle.
The column’s proposed expansion of so-called sensitive places raises additional constitutional concerns. Governments cannot avoid the Second Amendment by declaring nearly every place the public visits to be gun-free.
The U.S. Supreme Court held in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen that the Second and Fourteenth amendments protect the right of ordinary, law-abiding citizens to carry handguns in public for self-defense. The court said that right cannot be treated as a “second-class right.”
In June, the court reaffirmed that principle in Wolford v. Lopez, striking down Hawaii’s attempt to impose broad restrictions on carrying firearms on private property open to the public without the owner’s express permission. The court described the historical evidence as supporting the public’s right to peaceably carry handguns for self-defense.
Public safety deserves honest research, but constitutional rights cannot be suspended every time one study produces a preferred statistic.
If lawmakers are serious about reducing violence, they should focus on the people committing violent crimes. That means prosecuting armed repeat offenders, disrupting gangs, addressing illegal gun trafficking, improving mental-health crisis intervention and ensuring dangerous individuals already prohibited from possessing firearms are held accountable.
It should not mean placing additional burdens on citizens who have committed no crime.
The right to bear arms is not a privilege granted by a research institute, government agency or state licensing office. It is a right protected by the Constitution.
Law-abiding Americans should not be required to prove their worthiness to exercise it, submit their names to a government database or surrender their ability to protect themselves because researchers found a statistical association that other major reviews still describe as inconclusive.
Responsible gun ownership and public safety can exist together. But public safety must not become a permanent excuse for expanding government power while criminals continue ignoring the law.
Constitutional carry recognizes a simple principle: Peaceful citizens do not need government permission to exercise a constitutional right.
That principle should not be “offset” by rebuilding the same restrictions constitutional carry was enacted to remove.
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