I agree with you… if they don’t allow us to carry they should have to protect us…
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Bottom line is if you or a loved one is injured by a firearm in a gun free zone, they are responsible because they could not garuntee your safety while denying you your constitutional rights. This include employers who declare their property gun free. If they cannot enforce and garuntee, they need to be held accountable!
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It is a very slippery slope to hold any person civilly or criminally liable for failure to “guarantee” your safety. The legal standard is usually the “reasonable person@ standard which, as we can see even in this group, differ greatly. While I disagree, many people believe prohibiting people from carrying guns is a reasonable concession to prevent violence.
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I’d agree in most cases that’s true. In the case of a private business however declaring a gun free zone they are taking away our best means of self defense and therefore have a much higher burden when it comes to protecting their customers.
If they remained neutral that would alleviate the issue but when they are being pro active in denying us our 2nd Amendment Rights on their property I think that burden definitely shifts to them.
It certainly should at least.
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The current law in most states regarding a business premises duty to a business invitee (a person"invited" to a business to purchase services or goods) is to exercise reasonable care to maintain the premises in a reasonably safe condition and exercise due care to protect the invitee from conditions that can result in injury. There is no duty to protect from open and obvious conditions and the business is not an an insurer of the safety of the invitee. (The invitee also has a duty to exercise reasonable care for his or her own safety).
A business meets its duty by exercising reasonable care to make the land safe or by warning the invitee of the danger so the invitee can decide whether to accept the invitation to do business there.
The legal issues we are faced with is what is reasonable, were warnings provided and is an active shooter an open and obvious situation.
Reasonableness is in the eye of the person. In the city of Louisville, you would be hard pressed to get 9 of 12 jurors to say that prohibiting firearms is not a reasonable step. Outside Louisville, including all of Louisville outside the old city, that position changes dramatically. But, could you get 9 of 12 jurors to agree that no gun zones are unreasonably unsafe?
Assuming you get past being unreasonably unsafe, you then have to look at the warning issue. If the building is posted, you have been warned of the safety issue. Likewise, if the prohibition is statutory, you are deemed to have been warned since all persons are deemed to know the law.
The final test is whether active shooters, mass murders and other events of this type are open and obvious. While statistics say they are not, the left and the press are professing that these events are happening more and more often and the public should almost expect for this to happen. If that is the case, these shootings are clearly open and obvious.
We will see how the case against Kroger goes in Louisville. This case is the exact opposite of what is being discussed in this thread where 2 patrons were shot and the family of one is suing Kroger for not having adequate security, including preventing people with firearms from entering. The measures that are discussed in the Complaint would lead to security similar to what is at an airport to do your shopping.
In the end, this all comes down to a choice in most matters. If you don’t want to shop at a gun free zone like Costco, go to Kroger, Walmart or Sam’s Club. Or, if you are in Kentucky, and many other states that do not criminalize entry in to gun free zones, ignore the signs and, if you are asked to leave, just leave. In most cases, I choose to not patronize a Kentucky location that is posted because there are too many other choices. If the company has a gun free policy but does not post, I do not care about their policy. If they choose to not follow our state’s law regarding posting, I do not care what their policy is.
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I absolutely understand what you are saying Mike.
“What IS” and “What Should Be” particularly under the law are often not only one and the same, but completely at odds with one another.
We would not tolerate as a society the same limits placed on any other civil rights by anyone subject to public accommodation laws and unlike those other protected rights, the right to keep and bear is the one that can literally save your life and the lives of many others.
We need a new approach and to change public sentiment on this subject and I think that’s how we start.
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I agree with you, but, the public accommodation of civil rights only applies to discrimination to protected classes, such as, familial status, race, color, religion, national origin, sex, age or disability. As long as all persons are prohibited from some action or behavior, then it is not a civil rights violation. Private entities can, and often do, prohibit 1st Amendment rights and that is allowed as long as it is not discriminatory based upon a protected class.
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But Scalia opened the door to full incorporation of the 2nd Amendment and the 14th grantees us all equal protection.
I think the argument is there for a good lawyer to make.
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Equal protection requires that all persons who are similarly situated be treated similarly. The First Amendment has always been incorporated along with the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth and Eighth. The Sixth, Seventh and Eighth are criminal in nature and are not pertinent to the discussion.
the Second, like the First, can be infringed upon so long as they are unilaterally applied. Businesses need to make accommodations for employees religious observations but do not need to do so in their place of business. They must allow the time to do so. I’m not aware of any business that allows open access to their facilities for public speech. If you walk into Walmart with your soapbox and the Bible they will ask you to leave, infringing on your freedoms of speech and religion. And as long as they do the same thing to someone who wants to preach the Torah or Quran, they are not discriminating.
We always need to remember that the Bill of Rights protects us, “the people”, from the government, not from each other or private institutions.
The Civil Rights movement and equality in Public Accommodations are specific to applying rights equally among persons who are similarly situated to prevent discrimination. If everyone is prevented from exercising their right, it is not discrimination.
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You know I can’t help but hate it when people use the same arguments I’ve been making for years successfully to defeat an argument I’m making currently.
You’re making me think through this again. 
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I know, right? Burns my butt when they do that.
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A unprotected minority that is diverse with many people of color too who carry!!
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Just happened to me tonight. I’d open carried into this Costco several times in the past month, today someone at the door stopped me and a manager was brought out to show me the member agreement.
So I walked away. I’m not saying I’ll never go in there again, but I think I’ll do more of my shopping elsewhere.
Not Walmart, any more.