Here in Texas, penal code 30.06 covers trespass by a license holder with a concealed handgun, and 30.07 covers trespass by license holder with open carry handgun. If a business wants to prohibit entry to people doing one or either of these, they have to post one or a combination of signs stating 30.06/30.07 code. The signs have to be posted conspicuously at entrances, have 1" block letters, and be contrasting with the background to carry legal weight. If in @Scoutbob’s case, it is done incorrectly, it doesn’t matter more than someone’s opinion of firearms… However, the business can ask you to leave. At that point, it’s time to take your business elsewhere… Texas family, please feel free to add to this if I missed anything.
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I’ve seen translucent 30.06 signs. The text was white over a clear window. It was difficult to see. I’m assuming that would not hold legal weight.
My fear with these signs is this. I would not want to be put under oath to say “I was aware the signs were there”, even if they were legal. I just avoid these businesses all together.
I don’t care much for the 30.07 signs. I always carry concealed. But I hate the 30.06 signs. They do nothing unless you are a business where carrying a firearm would be unsafe (I’m thinking theme park, or something like a haunted house. I don’t do haunted houses though 
).
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There’s a gas station here that has small 30.07/30.06 code black letters on clear signs stuck to the back of a tinted window… I was asked if I saw it… I ain’t seen doodoo, but once pointed out we did look up the requirements together. We were both really respectful and had a surprisingly pleasant conversation about it… The sign still there exactly how it was before, but the owner has never said anything more to me and I carry in there all the time. To me this is an example of having a sign to appease the “sensitive”.
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Most of the time I avoid businesses with 30.06/30.07 signs even if not legally compliant, unless I can read the room and sense an educational opportunity. I would hate to pass a store with pleasant people trying to do what they think is right incorrectly. What happens if I ignore and pass by then someone comes in carrying, gets asked to leave, and doesn’t take it well… not likely, but possible… While I may not support that business with my business, if open to help I will gladly help if they need it and are open to my help. I may not agree with not allowing carry of firearms, but I respect your right to deny me business.
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yes. Actually you could spell it “maul”, which might be more accurate in some cases. And that could be personal or vehicle mauling…
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Funny thing, I went back to the mall today. They marked the entrance I usually enter (still has multiple unmarked entrances) but they marked it like this (still not legal according to Texas law 
).
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Interesting! And only in Spanish. I wonder what their intention is with only this sign.
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I find it odd that a gun control statute is labeled “30-06”.
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A great deal of misinformation and jumping to conclusions has been posted in this thread by persons who evidently know little or nothing about the specifics of this particular incident and most likely have never even bothered to read, much less understand, the statutes being discussed.
Sections 30.06 and 30.07 of the Texas Penal Code are not “gun control” or “gun ban” statutes. They are instead criminal trespass statutes. Even the headings and titles of the statutes say so: “30.06 Trespass by License Holder With a Concealed Handgun.” They are intended to protect the rights of private property owners.
In Texas we cherish our God-given private property rights just as much as we cherish our God-given right to bear arms, even the rights of private property owners who do not want strangers, or even their best customers, carrying firearms on their property. Shopping malls are private property. If the owners of shopping malls don’t want persons to carry firearms on their property, then they don’t have to let persons carry firearms on their property. That is their right. The law says that if a person carries a firearm on that property in violation of the law, then the person has committed criminal trespass. If you don’t want go into a business owned by persons who prohibit firearms on their private property, then no one is forcing you to do so. Shop elsewhere. The same is true in my office: I don’t allow the wearing of Nike apparel in my office. If someone comes in wearing Nike apparel, I tell them to leave. If it comes down to it, I also tell them that if they don’t leave, I will call the police and charge them with criminal trespass. If they don’t like it that I don’t allow Nike apparel in my office, then they can go and engage the services of someone else.
As for the signs inside the mall and the fact that the statute says that signs have to be posted in a certain way and at the entrances, etc., to be effective under the law, there is nothing in the statutes that prohibit owners of private property from posting any other signs they want to post inside their property. Private property owners are free to post whatever they want on their private property, signs in English, signs in Spanish, signs in Chinese, signs in Greek, signs in Pig-Latin, even signs in sign language, whatever they want to do. Even if they don’t have any signs posted anywhere, including any signs at entrances and meeting the specifications of the statutes, they can still simply tell you to leave their property, and then if you refuse to leave, you can be prosecuted for criminal trespass. Again, these are criminal trespass statutes, not gun control or gun ban statutes.
As for the number of the statutes being 30.06 and 30.07, that is just coincidence. 30.04 is Burglary of Vehicles. 30.05 is Criminal Trespass (in general). 30.06 is Trespass by License Holder With a Concealed Handgun. 30.07 is Trespass by License Holder With an Openly Carried Handgun.
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Fun fact of the day. This mall was shut down because bad guys showed up today. Fortunately no one was hurt from what I understand.
They are signs to tell citizens not to carry. I understand the argument for business freedom, BUT business freedom and individual freedom can conflict at times.
I may have the constitutional right to own firearms, and the state right to carry concealed, BUT that can be taken away with businesses putting the 30.06 signs. If every business in Texas put these signs up, we lose the right to carry all together without any laws being broken.
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Well, first of all, your rights aren’t created under the Constitution or state law. Your rights come from God. The U.S. Constitution does not grant rights. What it does is to recognize those rights, to acknowledge that they exist, and to guarantee that those rights will not be infringed upon by the government. (Notice that I didn’t say, “by government and by private entities.”)
The rights of private property owners to regulate who comes on their property trump your rights to carry firearms on their property, period.
You also have the God-given right to free speech. But that does not give you the right to come on my property and cuss like a sailor in the presence of my wife and children. But by your flawed analysis, you should be able to do that. Under your right to free speech, you also have the right to wear whatever clothing you want, but that does not give you the right to come on my property wearing Nike apparel when I have prohibited the wearing of Nike apparel on my property. But by your flawed analysis, you should be able to do that. You have the right to practice your religion. But you don’t have the right to come on my property and indoctrinate my children with doctrine that I disagree with. But by your flawed analysis, you should be able to do that. Even if I just don’t like you, and even for whatever reason I choose that I don’t like you, whether it makes sense or not, you have no right, that’s zero, zip, nada rights, to come on my private property without my permission. And I have the right to remove you, or have you removed, from my property any time I so like, for whatever reason. But by your flawed analysis, you should be able to do that.
You have the right to perform other acts under God and under the protection of the Constitution from infringement by the government. But you can’t trespass on my property and do whatever you like just because you think you can.
Thank God for private property rights.
P.S. - Your statement is false that, " If every business in Texas put these signs up, we lose the right to carry all together without any laws being broken." (Emphasis added.) There is life and existence outside of other people’s businesses and their private property. You don’t “lose the right to carry all together without any laws being broken” while on public property or on your own property.
My doctor has the 30.06 and 30.07 signs posted at her office. So, I don’t carry in her office, though I do make sure I’m armed with a 5-inch fighting knife. I am willing to honor her private property rights in exchange for good medical care. At the same time, her prohibiting my carrying a firearm on her property and taking away my means of self-defense in that regard makes her responsible for my safety.
There is a store in my town that is the thrift store operated by the local women’s shelter charity. People donate items to them to sell in their store. Ironically, the organization has posted the 30.06 and 30.07 signs at the entrance to the store, thereby prohibiting women, including battered women, from carrying a firearm inside the store for their protection and the protection of their children with them. Imagine that, an organization whose purpose is to protect women from being battered, yet denies women the right to carry so that they can protect themselves. By my own election, I don’t go in that store.
Do you have the right to tell people to not enter your business based on race? There are limitations.
Is she? You could go to another doctor. By choosing her services, and acceding to her rules, haven’t you willfully given up your right?
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Uh, yes, she is. And no, I couldn’t go to another doctor. And no, I haven’t given up my right to be protected on her premises from her, from her family and others who know her, from her employees and their families and others who know them, and from her other patients and their families and others who know them, or anyone else, any of whom might possibly go wacko at any time and come in and start shooting or whacking on people. That’s one of the reasons that business owners have general liability insurance covering their premises.
I feel the signs, particularly the 30.06 sign are virtual signaling and making a political statement. If your firearm is well concealed then the business will never have anything to enforce. Thus, they are telling the anti-2a people that “we are doing our part to get rid of firearms”. There is latterly no other reason for the sign. I never shop at these places, and if I do I still carry.
The 30.07 is a little different in my opinion. The company has snowflake customers that will melt if they see a firearm. So as to allow folks to protect themselves and at the same time keep the woker’s from turning into a puddle on the ground, they post that sign.
I do shop at these establishments, but, if there is an alternative business selling the same product with no sign, that’s where I go.
There is a sign up at a carwash in our adjoining town. It has a universal no sign through the 30.06/30.07 signs and a universal green slash through a handgun sign. The wash dude always gets a NICE tip from me.
Open carry is rare to see here in Texas anyway. Since the law passed years ago, I saw only my second citizen carrying openly last week. I’m not sure if they had a LTC or were just exercising their Constitutional Carry rights.
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I guess that depends on the nature of the business, the reason the person is entering the business, and the kind of premises on which the business is located.
I’m in a professional service business that serves a select kind of clientele, not the general walk-in public. And as Ben Shapiro says, I’m not obligated to provide my professional services to anyone. I have standards that prospective clients must meet (intelligent, logical, not gullible, able to communicate, able and willing to stay the course, willing without complaint to pay my professional fee for my professional services, etc.; race is not one of my standards), and I don’t take as clients anyone who does not meet those standards. I also maintain a private office, not an open-to-the-public office. Sign on door says, “Private Office, Not A Public Place.” I’m not obligated to open my door to anyone.
While it may be virtue-signaling in rare cases, I disagree that it is virtue-signaling on the whole or even the majority of the time.
Lots of people, including business owners and their employees, are just scared of guns and nervous and scared of people who carry guns. Not being sexist, but the ladies especially are scared of them in the same way they’re scared of snakes and spiders and other creepy things. To them, your having a gun on your side, even under your shirt tail, that you could pull out at any time is no different than having a snake under your shirt that you could pull out at any time. Also, most people don’t know anything about guns, and they hold myths about guns, e.g., that a gun can easily just go off on its own. Those who live in quiet, law-abiding communities also hold to a false sense of safety, and they can’t figure a logical reason for anyone to carry a gun. They think nothing bad is ever going to happen to them, and even if a bad person shows up, the police will rush right in and resolve the matter. With all of that, they automatically assume that anyone who carries a gun must be kind of wacko.
The good news is that as the number of people who carry guns increases, the more accustomed to the idea of people having guns. Also, the more people who have them are trained and know how and when (and when not) to use them, the more the criminals know to go elsewhere.
As to any virtue-signally, what I dislike more is business that put up little signs that indicate that guns aren’t welcome in their business, but they are too coward to take a real stand and post the 30.06 and 30.07 signs. It’s like they don’t want you to carry in their business, but they are too cowardly to tell you straight out because they don’t want to lose your business.