While attempts to make New York adopt an objective standard for concealed weapons permits have failed for almost a dozen legislative sessions in Albany, gun enthusiasts will resume their campaign for a change in the law.

“We will be pushing for that legislation,” the president of the New York State Rifle and Pistol Association, Thomas King, said. “The exact specifics of the bill, we’re still working on.”

The change being sought is at the core of the constitutional right to bear arms. In New York, a citizen’s right to bear arms is frustrated, gun advocates say, by regulations limiting the ownership of guns. The proposed legislation would automatically oblige state authorities to grant licenses to all those who apply.

Gun control supporters, who say concealed weapons are incompatible with New York culture, call “concealed carry” legislation a danger to public safety.

Such safety fears have led New York to become one of eight “may issue” states, where officials can decide whether a person should be given a permit to carry a concealed weapon.

Forty states have “shall issue” provisions on their books, by which anyone who meets objective criteria — taking into account criminal background and marksmanship training — must be given a concealed weapon permit. Wisconsin and Illinois completely prohibit citizens from carrying firearms.

The laws vary between states because history has not clearly defined the meaning of the Second Amendment right to bear arms, as it has with other constitutionally protected freedoms, a constitutional lawyer and criminologist, Don Kates, said.

Mr. Kates, who has represented gun owners challenging the constitutionality of laws regulating firearms, said American leaders throughout history have been relatively ambiguous on the right to bear concealed arms. He called the matter a “complicated subject.”

“In no sense is that clear,” Mr. Kates, who co-wrote “Armed: New Perspectives on Gun Control,” said. “It’s a historical dispute, and I don’t think there’s any evidence to base either argument on.” Perhaps the only thing gun opponents and gun supporters can agree on is the unlikelihood that New York will become a “shall issue” state. “If New York tried to pass a law, you’d see the same type of blood-in-the-street type fear you’ve seen in all these other states that have passed right-to-carry laws,” a dean’s visiting professor of economics at the State University of New York at Binghamton, John Lott, said. Mr. Lott said these fears are usually proved wrong. Opponents of the “shall-issue” movement say the chances of New York allowing concealed guns are slim, and call the prospect “silly.”

“Oh yeah, that’s going to happen when hell freezes over,” a spokesman for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, Peter Hamm, said.

“Any state legislator who votes for such a thing will have hell to pay with his constituents,” Mr. Hamm said.

“If the New York State Rifle folks think they have the votes for ‘shall issue’ in New York, I will give them $100 out of my pocket. Go back to the roster, guys. This is not happening,” he added.

Mayor Bloomberg is certain to oppose any loosening of state firearm laws. He has made cracking down on illegal gun sales a high priority of his second term in City Hall, suing more than a dozen out-of-state gun dealers and lobbying Congress to make it easier to track guns used in crimes.