Bobson said:
In other words, Texas' apparently ass-backwards politicians felt it was important that they go out of their way to make police work even more dangerous than it already is. The question is, why? Who benefits from this? The only person who has a reason to hide a weapon from a cop, that I can come up with, is a criminal.
Actually that's not why it was done that way. The reason is more complicated than that.
At one time, in Texas, you could carry a concealed handgun without a permit only if you were "traveling". The definition of traveling was sort of nebulous at best though and it's actual interpretation varied from county to county, DA to DA, jury to jury. So, the legislature eventually removed the traveling restriction and opened up unlicensed carry to pretty much anyone, in their own vehicle or a vehicle under their control.
Well, since unlicensed carry had been legal in Texas for many decades, with the traveling provision, and that law had never required notification to LE, the removal of the traveling provision also left no requirement for notification.
So now the law wound up in a very weird place. You had a place where LICENSED carriers were required to notify LE, and UNLICENSED carriers had no duty to notify.
As an LEO who should you be more afraid of, someone with a permit or someone without? Statistically the permitted carrier is much less likely to be a danger so the law really was completely upside down.
So the legislature found itself in a weird spot and they took the most simple path, over the objection of some LE organizations. They simply made the permitted carrier law match the un-permitted carrier law. But that sent the LE lobbyists into a frenzy, for no legitimate reason and the legislature revised their work to simply remove any penalty, leaving things where they are today. But it's nearly always easier to remove or negate something in a law than to add new items, so that's how it went down.
Bobson said:
Frankly, it's just the safest route to take, for everyone involved, including the driver who's legally carrying.
This is pretty dangerous actually. If I have a gun, and I do not inform the LEO, and the LEO never knows about it, the gun stays safely in my door where it is not going to just fire itself. As soon as LE are aware of the gun there is always the temptation to "make things safe". Handling a gun, especially a model the LE might not be familiar with, is just asking for a negligent discharge. Guns fire when someone is messing with them, not when they are safely sitting untouched. It's much safer for everyone if that gun remains untouched.
And to your point about why someone would have a reason to "hide" a gun from police, that's not really it either. Why should I tell police if I am carrying a legal item in my car?
Should I inform them I have a lighter? a hammer? a box of Snickers bars? All of those are legal items. Why should I have to tell an LEO when I am in possession of a legal item? That whole pesky rights thing again....
And honestly, if a person is the type who might shoot a cop do you really think they are going to inform the cop they have a gun in the first place?
So the end result is that now both permitted and unpermitted carriers are treated the same, and that is as it should be. One can argue whether or not notification is a good thing, but having one group be required to notify and another group not have that requirement was very bad discriminatory law.