When I grew up, I did a lot of hunting. Firearm safety was paramount. My first two single-action revolvers had the transfer bar safety mechanism, allowing you to load six rounds safely. No matter; I loaded five rounds anyway. There was never a round underneath the hammer. When rifle hunting, it was rare that there was a round in the chamber. Typically, when I was coyote calling, I chambered a round before starting the calling process because I would be stationary. The other reason was that Wile E. didn’t appreciate the sound of a round being chambered, so unless I wanted to practice running shots, I chambered a round and put the safety on. With a shotgun and dove hunting, I typically had a round chambered because I was sitting in one place waiting for doves. For quail hunting, which entailed a lot of walking, I preferred my dad’s pump action because I could have the chamber empty and still get a quick shot off when jumping a covey.
Fast forward to the era of the concealed carry of a firearm (CCF). One would suspect that these simple safety mechanisms would carry over to self-defense. News flash: They haven’t. In fact, I would say that today’s world is the most unsafe I’ve ever seen. Almost every CCF I know carries a semi-auto pistol with a round chambered. Actually, it is a bit worse than that. Many people carry striker-fired pistols that have no grip safety or manual safety. One of the first things they do is modify the trigger to be lighter and smoother, far lighter than a double-action revolver, and they still carry with a round chambered. Why? The perception is that speed is a requirement for civilian self-defense.
The million-dollar question is: Do civilian Defensive Gun Use (DGU) statistics support such an assertion? In my book, I go through these statistics in depth, but the short answer is no; overwhelming no.
The next million-dollar question (due to inflation, perhaps we should change this to “the next billion-dollar question”) is why do civilians believe that carrying a round chambered is a requirement. As I show in my book, the pervasive influence of law enforcement and military personnel in self-defense training has its benefits and harms. One of the harms is the carry-over assumption that the threats that law enforcement and the military face are somehow the same as the threats that ordinary civilians would face. They are different. The dangerous situations that law enforcement, SWAT, and the military engage in differ from most civilian violent encounters. One of these differences is the firearm’s state and the speed at which it can be employed.
Civilian DGU statistics support a much simpler and safer carrying strategy. For example, the revolver has been slammed as a defensive weapon when sophisticated semi-auto pistols are readily available. However, these pistols require much more training than a revolver. The simplicity and safety of a revolver make it a far better choice for ordinary civilians who find themselves in a violent situation for the first time. Similarly, carrying a semi-auto pistol without a round in the chamber is also advantageous. You can remove the magazine, store the unloaded pistol in one vehicle lock box and the loaded magazine in another, and be legal to transport in most states. Law enforcement interactions are far safer when stored like this in your vehicle.
For those civilians still concerned about the speed of employment, training on the Israeli method of chambering a round is available. In addition, many videos and instructions are available on the Internet to help learn this technique. This technique is proven to be effective in dangerous situations.
For civilians who CCF, speed, safety, and legality intersect. Prioritizing speed above everything else is simply dangerous. Our best statistics should inform our choices, and they have shown that speed can be deprioritized to some extent. This information is good news. Civilians can carry safer and simpler weapons, train less due to simpler weapons, and be far better prepared legally. For those that want speed and firepower, the Israeli method can accomplish all three.