This act on the Texas State Capitol on Veterans day was an obvious attempt to draw publicity and attention to the cause of those arrested, which is to extend the right to open carry in the State of Texas to include handguns.

You may agree or disagree with what they are doing, or they way they are going about it. You might also think that the choice of Veterans Day was inappropriate.

My interest is with the actual arrest itself.

It is obvious from the first moments of the video that the officers are going to tolerate a minimum amount of resistence before they make an arrest. That decision appears to have been made in advance, barring some unforeseen circumstances.

It is also obvious that the protesters are intent on provoking action by the officers as a means by which to make their point.

To their credit, the officers start out polite and professional, but they take the bait when Grisham presses them on under what authority and for what specific violation are they being ordered to leave the property. The officers reacted hastily from that point on.

The resistance to communications on the part of the arresting officers as well as the apparent lack of grounds for arrest and the unwillingness to discuss the grounds with any of the protesters is what drew my attention.

This is the kind of mindset that police states are dependent upon; a gang or thug mentality among the policing force which follows their instructions with little regard for their legality or adherence to their oath.

Whether or not one agrees with the protesters doesn’t matter. They have a right to be advised of the charges for which they are being arrested and they were not. The presence of a multitude of cameras was likely the only thing which kept the incident halfway civil.

The police were advised that the gun Mr. Grisham carried in his holster was a toy and that was ignored. Also, the police know that Mr. Grisham has antique pistols which are exempt from the law, and that could have been the gun that was being carried. That possibility was also ignored.

Several other members of the group did have the antique black powder handguns in traditional hip holsters. Nobody was arrested for having any type of gun in this incident. There were two members of the group arrested, both were charged with trespass.

Unless everybody at the capitol was charged with trespass that day, this should have been handled in a more restrained manner, in accordance with the Constitution. The police should have known this was a set up and they should have been better prepared.

Maybe, if they were accustomed to practicing law enforcement in a manner consistent with Constitutional requirements, preparations for events such as this would be largely unnecessary.