Hawaii's default rule banning lawful concealed carry by default on all private property was one of a handful of similar measures adopted by New York, Maryland, and California in the wake of the 2022 Supreme Court decision in Bruen, and the only one to survive a legal challenge at the appellate court level.
The Supreme Court struck down the law earlier today in Wolford v. Lopez, and as Second Amendment advocates celebrate, we can also relish the reaction from gun control groups like Giffords and Brady, who appear to have lost their everloving minds over today's decision.
“I will not mince words: This deeply dangerous majority opinion privileges guns over everything and all people in society. It is eminently reasonable that visitors receive property owners’ permission to bring firearms onto their private property open to the public. Yet the court has manipulated a legal test of their own design to launch this attack on public safety and our freedom from gun violence. What’s more, they are thwarting the will of the people and the legislature. This common-sense law is what the people of Hawaii wanted, but the court has complete disregard for that community will. Ultimately, the court makes it clear that it cares little about the threat of gun violence posed to the American people,” said Kris Brown, President of Brady.
It is not eminently reasonable to assume that the exercise of a fundamental civil right cannot be exercised on private property open to the public. That isn't the default for First Amendment activity, and in the vast majority of the country it's not been the default for Second Amendment activity either. Private property owners are still free to prohibit lawful carry, but they must let visitors know that the practice isn't allowed.
The Court did not "manipulate" the "text, history, and tradition" test to reach its conclusion either. If found that 18th century laws meant to curtail poaching are not analogous to Hawaii's prohibition on lawful carrying for self-defense, and neither was a 19th century law meant to deprive freed slaves and freedmen from carrying arms for personal protection. The Supreme Court has always held that the "how" and "why" of historic laws matter when trying to use them as analogues for modern statutes, and today's decision is a reflection of that stance.
The Court also made clear that community standards aren't more important than constitutional rights. If Kris Brown disagrees with that, then she's siding with the segregationists of the deep south in the civil rights era, not to mention the authors of the infamous Black Codes that wrote laws in the post-Civil War period aimed at keeping freed slaves as subjugated as possible.
The statement from Giffords is slightly less hyperbolic, but not by much.
“We are disappointed with the Supreme Court’s decision. Hawaii’s private property law wasn’t about banning firearms. Instead, it reflected the commonsense notion that property owners have a right to choose whether to allow firearms on their private property — places where their kids, neighbors and community members deserve to have peace of mind. Thankfully, the opinion still leaves open avenues for property owners to exercise that right. But ultimately, this case is another example of the Court’s conservative majority pushing its ‘guns everywhere’ agenda, and it will put far too many lives at risk,” said Billy Clark, GIFFORDS Law Center, Senior Litigation Attorney.
No, Hawaii's law was entirely about firearms, and the state has rejected the commonsense notion that private property owners have a right to choose whether to allow firearms on their private property by declaring many private properties "sensitive places" where guns can't be carried even if the property owners want to allow it. The default rule told the remaining property owners that if they don't object to the exercise of our Second Amendment right to bear arms, they must make that explicitly known, rather than defaulting to a position where our rights can be exercised.
I wish SCOTUS had a "guns everywhere" agenda, but we're four years post-Bruen and this is the first time the Court has said anything about where citizens can and can't bear arms. In that same time (in fact, in just this term), the Court has left in place laws prohibiting carry on public transportation, across state lines without a permit recognized in other states, and public parks. I'm encouraged by the language in Wolford that suggests the state has no business banning guns from private property, but today's decision doesn't explicitly strike down any law other than Hawaii's outlier "vampire rule."
Giffords and groups like Brady and Everytown have been claiming for four years that the Supreme Court's Second Amendment decisions will make the country a more dangerous place, even as homicides have dropped to the lowest levels ever recorded by the FBI. Today's reaction to Wolford is yet another example of their anti-2A hysteria that bears no resemblance to reality.
Editor’s Note: The radical Left will stop at nothing to enact their radical gun control agenda and strip us of our Second Amendment rights.
Help us continue to report on and expose the Democrats’ gun control policies and schemes. Join Bearing Arms VIP and use promo code FIGHT to receive 60% off your membership.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member