This animation is an oldie but a goodie. It shows the spread of “shall-issue” laws since the 1980s.
To make it perfect, there should be a “thermometer” showing annual violent crime rates per 100,000.
It’d drop by nearly half in the time covered by the animation, by the way.
Most interesting to me is the spread of “unrestricted” CCW laws and how much that’s taken off recently. That and the fact the New England as a whole was pretty liberal about this civil right even back in the 80s (although Mass. is still a crap-hole to be avoided by anyone who needs to travel through the state – it made it hard for us to organize biathlons in Vermont because nobody wanted to take a chance transiting an expensive rifle through there).
And just think basically every state did it on their own without a judge with the exception of maybe Illinois did it with laws being passed and sometimes with judges trying to strike it down.
Walter Hanson
Minneapolis, MN