The Supreme Court's decision to grant cert in Wolford v. Lopez is good news for gun owners, and will hopefully result in the "vampire rule" adopted by five blue states in the wake of the Bruen decision being struck down as unconstitutional. The law in question prohibits lawful concealed carry on all private property unless the property owner explicitly posts signage allowing the practice; a statute that not only runs counter to the laws in the vast majority of states, but is lacking in any sort of historical tradition of gun ownership.
Most states have the opposite of Hawaii's law on the books: concealed carry is generally allowed on private property unless the property owner says otherwise. While the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed that the Second Amendment "encompasses a right to bear arms on private property held open to the public," it still upheld Hawaii's statute by declaring that a 1771 New Jersey law and a 1865 Louisiana law are historical “dead ringers” to Hawaii's prohibition, which was enough for the appellate court judges to conclude that these laws are part of a national tradition.
Oddly, the Ninth Circuit previously declared that California's "vampire rule" does violate the Second Amendment. The only difference between California's law and Hawaii's statute is that Hawaii allows property owners to give either written or oral notice that concealed carry is allowed, whereas California requires signage to be posted granting permission to carry on the property. That doesn't seem like a major distinction to me, especially since the 1771 New Jersey statute explicitly required that permission be given in writing.
Anyway, the Supreme Court has agreed only to address the specific question about whether that "vampire rule" is, in fact, part of that national tradition of gun ownership. So why is CNN declaring that the case could lead to private property owners being unable to bar guns from their premises altogether?
The Supreme Court agreed Friday to decide if states may bar people from carrying guns on private property without permission from the property owner, wading into a thorny Second Amendment dispute that could expand carry rights in malls, restaurants and stores.
There is virtually no chance that the Court is going do decide that business owners have no right whatsoever to prohibit lawful concealed carry on their property. Zero. Zilch. None. That means there's no chance this case could expand carry rights in malls, restaurants, and stores. At most, a good decision from the Supreme Court would simply uphold the standard that is in place in most of the country and has been the norm for all of our 250 years as a nation: if you want to ban guns from your property you need to let people know they're not allowed to be armed on the premises.
CNN notes that Wolford "deals primarily with permission to carry on private property but it also touched on prohibitions on carrying guns in bars and restaurants that serve alcohol, beaches, parks, and similar areas." True enough, but the cert petition doesn't challenge the Ninth Circuit's decision upholding those bans. It only addresses the "vampire rule" that was upheld by the appellate court. It's highly unlikely that the justices would move beyond the scope of the question presented in the cert petition and issue a ruling on the other "sensitive places" that were a part of the lawsuit.
But let's say for the sake of argument that when the Wolford opinion is handed down the justices declare that Hawaii's ban on concealed carry in bars and restaurants that serve alcohol doesn't comport with the text, history, and tradition of our right to keep and bear arms. Private property owners would then be allowed to decide for themselves whether or not they want to allow lawful carry in those establishments. Given that only five states have a blanket prohibition on carrying in places where alcohol is served, that would simply be maintaining the national status quo and not really an "expansion"of the right to carry (at least outside of those five states).
So why would CNN present its audience with such a twisted view of the implications of the Wolford case? Perhaps for the same reason it only quoted Everytown for Gun Safety's reaction to the Court granting cert and not any pro-2A advocates or organizations.
The appeals court was “absolutely right to say it’s constitutional to prohibit guns on private property unless the owner says they want guns there,” said Janet Carter, managing director of Second Amendment litigation at Everytown Law. “This law respects people’s right to be safe on their own property, and we urge the Supreme Court to uphold it.”
I'm sure Everytown and every other gun control outfit will be filing amicus briefs in defense of Hawaii's law, and they'll give the same undue importance to the New Jersey and Louisiana statutes that the Ninth Circuit did. But as Beck and O'Grady argued in their cert petition, "[t]he Ninth Circuit’s ruling stands alone." The Second Circuit Court of Appeals looked at the same statues and concluded they don't suffice to show a national tradition akin to the "vampire rule", and the two district courts that have considered the rule have also rejected them as a violation of our right to keep and bear arms.
The scant amount of evidence the Ninth Circuit used to uphold Hawaii's law is going to be a key consideration for the Court. How many laws from how many states suffice to conclude that a modern day statute is part of our national tradition of gun ownership? I would think the answer has to be more than two, even when we're not talking about historical twins but older laws that still addressed the same "how" and "why" of any aspect of our right to keep and bear arms.
In any case, the Supreme Court's decision in Wolford is not going to "expand carry rights in malls, restaurants and stores." At best, it will prevent states like Hawaii from turning the historical tradition of gun ownership on its head, but mall, restaurant, and store owners will still possess their own right to decide if they want their property to be "gun-free"... or at least off-limits to lawful gun owners who want to legally bear arms.
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