Posted on 12/16/2004 6:17:56 AM PST by Luis Gonzalez
I jumped in on a discussion at TCF regarding this news item. Companies that ban guns put on defensive.
Ronald Honeycutt didn't hesitate. The Pizza Hut driver had just finished dropping off a delivery when a man holding a gun approached him.What happens in these arguments is that most people wind up focusing solely on guns, with all the attendant concern about fear, violence, hostility, etc. that comes with them. In that context, both sides can point to anecdotes of either workplace violence (see "going postal") or parking lot attacks where the victim either was able or unable to defend herself late at night in a parking garage or dimly lit parking lot in a bad section of town. This is becoming more of a concern in recent years as states pass less restrictive concealed carry legislation. Two states, Oklahoma and Kentucky, have laws specifically protecting keeping guns inside a locked vehicle in workplace parking lots. (Note that Whirlpool has backed off.)
Honeycutt wasn't about to become another robbery statistic. He grabbed the 9 mm handgun he always carries in his belt and shot the man more than 10 times, killing him.
Honeycutt faced no criminal charges, because prosecutors decided that he acted in self-defense. But the 39-year-old did lose his job: Carrying a gun violated Pizza Hut's no-weapons rule.
"It's not fair," says Honeycutt of Carmel, Ind., who has found another pizza-delivery job and continues to carry a gun. "There is a constitutional right to bear arms. If I'm going to die, I'd rather be killed defending myself."
Employers have long banned guns from the workplace as part of a violence-prevention strategy, but those policies are being tested as states pass laws making it easier for residents to carry concealed guns - in some cases, crafting legislation that strikes down employers' attempts to keep guns off company property.
But unlike a number of gun rights activists I believe property rights trump all.And this is the springboard for the discussion which seems, to me, sadly lacking from the coverage of the issue. The following is a restatement and expansion of my comments at TCF.
Indeed, John.
Your right to defend yourself, i.e. your life, is a property right. What is the most dear thing you possess? Your own self. Your own body. Your own life. Just as it is your right to prevent someone from stealing your tangible property (e.g. land, a car, etc.) it is also your right to prevent someone from taking your life from you. Do you think the the term "taking your life" as a synonym for murder is a coincidence? Rights inhere to possession. A fundamental right from possession is control over how a possesion may be used.
This issue is a really good one for understanding rights. It regrettably gets lost in the hollering from both sides, and so a really good airing of the philosophical questions doesn't happen. Instead, we get complaints such as Honeycutt's "It's not fair". How is it not fair, sir? Did someone coerce you into entering into an employment agreement?
Everybody understands that "my right to swing my fist ends where your nose starts". This is a statement of balancing rights based on burden. Is it a greater burden for me to accomodate your rights, or the other way around? Is it easier for you to deal with a broken nose, or for me to not swing my fist?
The parking lot question is a little more difficult, because there's an economic burden in having difficulty finding a job with an accomodating employer. The burden a company would bear in accomodating gun-carrying employees (or customers for that matter) is more difficult to define, but it includes such things as a risk of violence, and all the liabilities which could come from that. Note that some gun-rights advocates are arguing for a law which makes a company liable for damages resulting from an inability to defend one's self, if a company has a no-guns policy.
But the person who is entering the property carrying a gun is the active party, and thus I think that from a philosophical point of view, it's less burdensome for that person to cease the activity than it is for the passive party (in this case the company owning the property) to accede.
Let's assume that the state steps in and passes a law which states that business owners may not prohibit carrying of weapons onto their property. The businesses' property rights have been diluted with no recourse other than the courts for restoration of their rights (in the eyes of the law #&151; I stipulate that the law may never actually take away a right, so there's no need to argue the point). This is a significant burden upon the right to control the use of their own property.
By contrast, the burden on the individual for restoring full exercise of his right to self preservation (via carrying a gun) is to simply leave the property, or not enter in the first place. This is really the same as saying that his rights have never been diluted in the first place, since it is a personal choice to enter such a property (where the owner states guns may not be carried). There is no coercion on the part of the state, or either party, in what is, in effect, a contract between two parties, the terms of which specify under what conditions a person may enter the property. By the act of entering the property, the individual implicitly consents to the terms of the property owner. If you don't consent, don't enter, or leave when you are informed of the terms.
So there are really two rights at work here. Right in property, and right of self-defense. By passing a law restricting businesses' ability to make policy, the state infringes on both.
So in the end, I wind up not liking it when I see gun-rights advocates arguing in favor of infringing on other rights. For when you argue that under some set of circumstances, the state may burden a particular right, you put the others in jeapordy of similar reasoning.
They are not superior, either. Otherwise, you are basically demanding a taking of property rights.
By that logic, a parking lot owner could not restrict who parks in his lot to only customers. Try again.
I'm a big supporter of 2nd Amendment rights. But those rights are not superior to property rights. If you don't agree with the terms a property owner puts on his private property, don't go on his property. It's that simple.
I beg to differ. The Constitution didn't give you any rights, it restricts the government's rights and actions and enumerates some (but not all) of the rights God gave you.
dirtboy wrote:
I'm a big supporter of 2nd Amendment rights. But those rights are not superior to property rights.
If you don't agree with the terms a property owner puts on his private property, don't go on his property. It's that simple.
The zoning board realizes the business owner is the one that requires the lot be put in. It's for his use. The zoning board doesn't tell business owners to put lots in for other businesses. The lots are put in, because of the demand for temp. storage of vehicles that particular business creates. Neither the zoning board, nor the business are going to allow jeopardizing parking space supply, by insisting on open parking.
Vehicles are the consideration, not what's lawfully in them.
They also are not superior. They are equal. Which means that you have the right to carry a weapon - but a private property owner has the right to say that you can't carry a weapon on his property.
If you don't agree with those Constitutional terms, do business elsewhere.
You're the one wanting to force association on private property - hardly a Constitutional position.
A parking lot owner can also deny the ability to placard vehicles on his lot. He can say that you cannot park on his lot if you have certain materials in your car. The point is, by building a parking lot, the property owner does not forfeit certain rights to say what can happen on his property.
There is one more reason that prevents an employer from firing someone, even in an 'at-will' state. An employer cannot legally fire someone in retaliation for exercising a legal right.
jones:
2nd Amendment rights to carry arms in vehicles are not inferior to parking lot property rights.
Yes, he does. You have the right to not work there if you so choose.
The infringement of property rights that you are demanding upon the property owner regarding carrying a gun is little different than what the Endangered Species Act does or what restrictive zoning does - it curtails the right of a property owner to his own full rights. No one forces you to go onto his property. If you find his conditions regarding weapons on company property onerous, find somewhere else to work. There have been times when I turned down jobs because I didn't like some of the workplace rules. You can do the same.
By your measure, I should also be free to say whatever I want at work without recrimination.
Really? I have a legal constitutional right to speak my mind. That doesn't mean an employer cannot fire me if I say something that violates company policy.
Now you've crossed over to outright hypocrisy.
You're assuming that it will be discharged in self-defense. It may also be the cause for the need to act in self defense.
"Hence, the way to deal with an employer who prohibits legal concealed carry is to carry in spite of the rule and don't let anybody know about it unless you have actually to use the weapon in self defense."
I keep reading that people who commit gun violence have no regard for the law or rules, it appears that you don't either.
That makes absolutely no sense.
The only reason to HAVE a parking lot, is for people to PARK their vehicles.
What else would one expect to find in a parking lot in Oklahoma if not parked vehicles?
When the property owner set his rules of access to his PARKING LOT, he set the conditions by which your vehicle, AND ITS CONTENTS, are allowed to remain on his property.
The workplace rule didn't say "No Guns In The Parking Lot, Unless They're In Your Car."
So, it's Constitutional "principles" now?
So, you're standing in support of the Constitutional Principle of separation of Church and State?
Try reading slowly jonesy, see if it sinks in.
You don't have a right to park on my lot, even if you're employed by me.
Your parking PRIVILEGE is GRANTED by ME to YOU pending your adherence to my rules.
Rule #1...I don't want weapons anywhere on my property, and that includes in your car while it is parked ON my property.
You don't like my rule?
Fine, I will not grant you the privilege to park on my property.
What?
No pearls of wisdom from you?
LOL. Anthing posted by Luis should be posted under humor.
Alphabetically speaking, my posts then would rank above yours.
"Humor" does precede "irrelevant" in alphabetical order, doesn't it?
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