In Pennsylvania open carry and concealed gun laws can only be changed by the state , not local towns .Many cops have been sued on civil rights charges because they don’t know the law on open carry.
I am a gun-owner, possessor of several CCW permits (though not in my own state, NJ!). I am also an NRA member.
However, I think that Texas has it right. It is better to carry concealed: then the criminal never knows exactly who is armed and who is not. Also, no one is frightened, and there will be fewer accidents based on misunderstandings.
Pistols should also require a permit obtained by demonstrating a clean record. This is only common sense. It is also very effective.
The best way to predict human behavior is to look at an individual’s past performance. It is not fool-proof (what is!), but it is better than anything else we have come up with. There also should be an age requirement. I favor 20 for women, 25 for men who have not be in the armed forces or the police (because the male brain is not mature until age 25, and males have just too much testosterone before then, and tend to get into fights). OK, so no one will pass that part, because it discriminates. The law should discriminate where appropriate, but we can’t always get the best law imaginable.
No fundamental right is absolute! The right to free speech has limitations (lots of them, if you think about it). Even the right to freedom of religion has limitations (no polygamy; no human sacrifice; no cannibalism, &c.).
If you carry any of the fundamental rights to an extreme, you end up with craziness, like the ACLU (on the left), or like people who can’t take an airport inspection (on the libertarian side).
This is why lawmakers should be reasonable people, and not wackos. It is also why the populace must have some common sense, which they very much lack nowadays (or else 0 would not be President).
As for NJ, their gun policy is simply not honestly administered. They are a “may issue” state, with a nice self-defense statement in the state’s constitution, but in practice they just arbitrarily deny carry permits. Connecticut has almost the same laws, and also is called a “may issue” state: but the difference is that they actually do issue carry permits, and I have one. So I live in NJ, obtained a CT permit, but cannot get one in my own state. Obviously something is wrong here!