NRA disregarding property rights yet again
Posted on July 10th, 2008 by bile Tags: 1st Amendment, 2nd Amendment, Anthony Gregory, Edwin Sotomayor, Florida, Florida Chamber of Commerce, Florida Retail Federation, guns, National Rifle Association, property, property rights, Walt Disney
Walt Disney World, backed by the Florida Retail Federation and the Florida Chamber of Commerce, has sparked a row with state lawmakers and the National Rifle Association over Florida’s “Preservation and Protection of the Right to Keep and Bear Arms in Motor Vehicles Act of 2008,” enacted July 1, which allows employees with concealed weapons permits to store their guns in their cars during work hours.
Disney maintains its zero-tolerance policy towards guns, warning that taking a gun onto company property could be grounds for termination. Disney’s Animal Kingdom security guard Edwin Sotomayor, accordingly, was fired on Monday following a Friday suspension; Sotomayor had announced to local media that he would be storing a gun in his car in accordance with the law but in violation of Disney’s policy. He refused to let his employer search the car.
“It seems if you work for Disney,” the NRA said on its website, “you give up not only your Second Amendment rights, but your First Amendment rights as well.”
This is stupid. The 2nd Amendment is derived from general property rights theory. As Anthony Gregory over at LewRockwell.com said of this:
They want to force Disney World to allow weapons on their private property. This is self-defeating. The right to bear arms, like all rights, must be rooted in self-ownership and private property. Otherwise, I could impose my “right” to bear arms on someone else’s land by forcing myself, armed, into someone’s home. That defeats the whole purpose. If you can’t respect someone’s right to keep guns off their private property, it’s hard to get others to respect your right to keep guns on your own. The current situation is intolerable all around: Even under Scalia’s standard, people can’t keep own, and carry any weapons they choose within the bounds of private property, and yet at the same time people can’t forbid weapons on their own property.
