Posted on 07/23/2004 6:56:58 PM PDT by TYVets
America Online Can Fire Gun-Owning Employees Utah High Court Rules Friday, July 23, 2004
Self-defense took a big blow this week when the Utah Supreme Court upheld the right of America Online (AOL), America`s largest on-line service provider, to fire three employees whose firearms were stored in the trunks of their cars in the parking lot of an AOL call center in Ogden, Utah.
In a decision that diminishes rights guaranteed under both the Utah and the U.S. Constitution, the court acknowledged the individual right to keep and bear arms, but said the right of a business to regulate its own property is more important!
Complying with this decision could potentially cost an employee his or her life--violent criminals certainly aren`t going to obey such a ban.
It may also diminish employees` abilities to hunt or target shoot after work.
The issue is becoming a hot legislative topic in the states. This year Oklahoma passed HB 2122 ensuring that employees with guns in their cars were not fired or harassed, and it was debated in several other states.
Please look to future editions of the Grassroots Alert for developing information on this issue.
As I understand the facts of this particular case, the employees removed a firearm from one vehicle and put it in another, while on company property. If that is correct, the issue of whether the trunk of a vehicle parked on private property is considered to be space owned by the land owner or the vehicle owner is irrelevant.
So can a property owner demand that law enforcement officers not carry firearms on their property, or do we have two classes of citizens now?
"How does my right to have whatever I have in the locked trunk of my car changed simply due to where I have chosen to drive?"
Get caught on school property and you're toast.
What we have here are employees with guns who evidently shot off their mouths, OR there are snitches......
The corporation (and therefore the property) is ultimately owned by shareholders, who delegate the exercise of their property rights to the company's management.
Time after time cases are won on this issue by kids in public schools who have been told they could not wear t-shirts with Confederate flags or religious messages.
Totally different. A public school is a government entity, and therefore explicitly limited by the Constitution.
There are also numerous cases, three of which I have been personlly involved in as a paralegal, where an employee as been told he could not have religious or political symbols in his office or cubicle, and the employee wins.
Courts are wrong all the time.
Since we are talking about the company's private property why can't they make such a decision? Should I as a private citizen have the right to prevent others from carrying firearms on my property? I would think yes.
>>Tell ya what, the next time someone uses your driveway to turn around in please run out and douse the car with gasoline and set it aflame. To really test your "property rights"<<
That's the difference about private property, the owner is allowed to install a gate to STOP everyone from using their driveway as a turn around. We can even forbid police cars from doing it by installing a gate.
Depends on where your house is. If there are deed restrictions like there are here in Texas you may not be "allowed" to install that gate. The concept that just because you own property you can do whatever you want with it went "bye bye" long ago. So, the assertion that has been made that a property owner (AOL in this case) can do whatever they want with their own property is just not true. The ideas that they can do whatever they want with other people's property (employees cars) is a stretch.
What about a mailbox on your property. Who owns that? Or, if AOL can say what people can do with what is inside cars on their property can you stop the mailman and demand he remove certain letters/parcels from his bag that you don;t want on your property while he is there?
Interesting case this AOL case.
>>an employee, when hired, signs something that says on the condition of his or her employment agrees not to carry weapons of any kind in his vehicle when the vehicle is to be parked on site. At that point, everything is up front and the employee can (and should) tell the employer to screw off and go work somewhere else.<<
BINGO! If you don't like the rules refuse to become a slave of the rules. Do not assist AOL in making a profit from your work.
No one's ever been mowed down by a gun locked in a trunk, either.
>>So can a property owner demand that law enforcement officers not carry firearms on their property, or do we have two classes of citizens now?<<
Short answer: Yes a property owner can demand that law enforcement officers not carry firearms on their property if the officers are not on official business.
AOL should change it's name to "internet for dummies"
I used it when I first got on the internet because I was very computer illiterate at the time and didn't know how to get on-line.
The first time I used an ISP elsewhere I cancelled AOL and went to an individual isp.
Most people on aol don't have the sense to do that.
>>What about a mailbox on your property.<<
Private mailboxes must be accessable from public property or if you have a slot in your door, you will find in your deed that you have given permission to the federal employee to enter your property for mail delivery purposes.
I owned a small ranch in Texas, (Lamar County)The private road from the highway also was the access to a half dozen other homes. It was shaped in a "Y" The ashpalt highway connect to the "V" portions.
At one time we discussed putting in electric gates to keep local teenagers from cruising the road. It was decided that I would just park a couple of my older non licensed trucks on the road to prevent thruway access. If you wanted to get to your home you needed to know which road to enter from. It stopped the kids from cruising and after two weeks I put the trucks back on my property.
AOL is against personal firearm ownership and I have always refused to do business with them for that stance.
True, but it is stopping from defending themselves on the way to and from work.
That's true, but corporations are not people and only have those "rights" which the people, via the government chooses to give them. What the goverment/pepple may give, they may take away. Corporations are artificial people only to the extent allowed by law. State law in most cases.
Yep, liable for not protecting their employees while at the same time preventing them from having the means to defend themselves. Meanwhile anyone intent on evil doing isn't going to be bothered by some corporate policy, assuming they are even an employee.
The Court likely decided correctly based on current law. But laws can be changed and corporate policies can be both stupid and oppressive. This one is both.
Nor can I remember anyone defending their life with one.
Eat your heart out Case, the Road Runner is after you, and you ain't no coyote.
5.56mm
Actually they were, and were instrumental in the earliest English and Dutch settlements in North America. Many of the colonial expeditions were corporate or corporate sponsered. Others were sponsered by the crown.
That said, corporations are creations of government, they are not people, other than to the limited extent provided by law.
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