Actually, no. Open carry is considerably easier to regulate, as you can actually see who's carrying. Maybe the anti's just figured that concealed carry is going to happen anyway, so they might as well just go along with a plan to tax and regulate it.
Open carry as the default mode means everybody and anybody can do it - even those undesirable types. It's not until you start passing laws about who can carry, how they can carry, and when and where they can carry that you get control - and to do that you have to do away with open carry or everybody will see that you are enforcing the law(s) against some folks and not against others when the only difference is "some folks" are not the privileged class. That's they way it has been since after the Civil War of Northern Aggression when it became necessary to find reasons other than race to use in controlling firearms.
Else why so many states having "for good and sufficient reason" and "moral character" clauses in their laws granting the privilege of carrying concealed - often at the same time that they make the open display of a firearm a major crime? (Yes, Texas, I am looking at you.) Also, else why so many states are now becoming embroiled in the question of whether or not non-resident aliens qualify to be issued concealed carry permission slips? (Something about the right of "the People" as opposed to the rights reserved only for citizens.)
The notion that "[m]aybe the anti's just figured that concealed carry is going to happen anyway, so they might as well just go along with a plan to tax and regulate it" suggests that folks were, of their own accord, going to start carrying concealed while open carry remained unregulated and unhindered. Were thast the case even the military would have gone to concealed carry so as not to scare the peasants. The facts remain that the way to control who could have guns and carry them about in public was (and is) to make doing so a special privilege reserved for only the right/approved group(s).
The history of the CCW movement has essentially been the removal of restrictions on who is deemed privileged enough. The open carry movement seems to be geared more towards "We don't need no steenkin' badtches" rather than opening up who can get a badge. Since CCW will always remain a privilege it is easier to get folks to vote for equality of the privilege than coming out and saying every Tom and Jose and Achmed can walk around with a gun "just because".
Let's keep in mind that the question is the history of the CCW movement and not the question of ccw vs open carry, or even the question of what restrictions can be imposed without actually infringing.
stay safe.
