Guns in restaurants draw stares but little outcry

The AP reports:

The patrons at Champps, an upscale restaurant and bar chain, were eating ribs and drinking beer on a recent Saturday when customer Bruce Jackson stood up and made an announcement: He was armed, and so were dozens of other patrons.

The armed customers stood up in unison, showing off their holstered pistols and revolvers. Jackson said a word or two about the rights of gun owners to carry firearms in Virginia, then thanked everyone for their attention and sat down.

The diners returned to their burgers and Budweisers.

The Virginia Citizens Defense League organized the gathering at Champps to prove a point: that the presence of armed customers in northern Virginia restaurants would elicit little more than shrugs.

The Champps appearance - and several other restaurant visits throughout northern Virginia last month - were a response to comments from the majority leader in the state Senate, Democrat Richard Saslaw, who said armed patrons would be unwelcome in northern Virginia restaurants.

"In most urban areas, you walk into a restaurant with a gun on your hip, they're going to tell you to get out," Saslaw said.

In fact, with a few exceptions, the gun owners got their meals. The group went to eight different restaurants in April - including the Fuddruckers burger chain and the McLean Family Restaurant - and more often than not their presence failed to generate a stir. At two eateries, they were asked to leave.

All the restaurants were in Fairfax County, a bastion of suburbia and soccer moms outside Washington that is the wealthiest county in America, according to the most recent Census data.

"This is an area with a large population of government agents - FBI, CIA, local," said Champps' manager, Carey Vereen. "In terms of people seeing open carry, it's not a shock to our customers."

No word yet from the Obama campaign on this one.