Posted on 12/11/2004 6:07:04 AM PST by Mr. Mojo
Gun-toting, tough-talking, and anti-establishment to his muddy boot straps, Larry Mullens is an Oklahoman "good ole boy" personified.
He is also fast becoming a classic American folk hero as he takes centre stage in a revolt of gun owners that is reverberating in boardrooms across the United States. The son of one of the last of the old-style Wild West ranchers, he first fired a gun as a boy.
Now he carries his trusty Winchester in his pick-up on his way to work at a sawmill in case he comes across a coyote, a wild dog or even a wolf attacking his small herd of steers. Last year he lost five calves to wild dogs.
So it was perhaps not surprising that he was enraged when his previous employer fired him for breaking company security rules that banned guns from the company car park after they found a .38 pistol stashed behind the seat of his pick-up.
No one could have predicted that two years later he and his backers would claim an extraordinary revenge - a law allowing employees to keep guns in locked cars on company property.
Just two days after a gunman jumped on to a stage in Columbus, Ohio, and shot dead a heavy metal guitarist and three others before himself being shot dead, it might seem surprising to hear that elsewhere a state is extending gun owners' rights.
But in Oklahoma, as across much of rural America, gun control is seen as the work of naive and meddling minds.
"Having a gun is no different from having a hammer. It is just a tool," said Jerry Ellis, a Democratic representative in the state legislature who drafted and pushed through the law.
"Here, gun control is when you hit what you shoot at."
The passage of the law resounded like one of Larry Mullens's Winchester rifle shots through the boardrooms of America.
In recent years companies have been implementing anti-gun policies in an attempt to cut down on violence at the work place.
Now they fear the Oklahoman ruling will encourage the powerful gun lobby all over America to try to roll back the reforms.
Paul Viollis, the president of Risk Control Strategies, is appalled at the new law. Every week there are 17 murders at the work place across America, and most of them involve guns, he says.
"It's the most irresponsible piece of legislation I've seen in my 25 years in the business," he said. "I would invite anyone who'd allow people to bring firearms to work to write the first death notice.
"The argument that emp-loyees should be allowed to bring firearms to work because they'll be locked in the car is so absurd it barely merits a response."
Several companies are trying to block the law. Two days before it was due to come into force last month, a judge granted a temporary restraining order preventing it from taking effect. The next hearing is on Tuesday.
But the firms are fighting on unfavourable terrain. Contrary to the widespread impression that the nation is polarised between gun-loving Republicans and more liberal Democrats, in the heartland gun control spans party lines. The law passed unanimously in Oklahoma's Senate and by 92 votes to four in the House.
Mike Wilt, a Republican, voted against the law, not on security grounds but because he believes the state should not dictate gun policies to property owners. "Here in Oklahoma the issue of guns is not a wedge issue," he said. "We all go hunting together and we all tend to have the same beliefs."
Two weeks ago one of the principal plaintiffs, Whirlpool, a prominent supplier of white goods, withdrew from the case. It said it was satisfied that its ban on guns on its property was not affected. The gun lobby suspects that the decision had more to do with talk of a boycott of the firm.
Nowhere do feelings run more strongly than in Valliant, a small town where, on Oct 1, 2002, at the Weyerhaeuser paper mill, the row began.
Mr Mullens was one of four on-site employees who were sacked after guns were found in their vehicles in contravention of a new company ruling. They are convinced it was just an excuse to lay off workers and insist they did not know about the new security laws.
The firm, which is locked in litigation with the fired employees, rejects the charges and says everyone knew it had a zero-tolerance approach to security. "You don't need a gun to be safe at Weyerhaeuser," said Jim Keller, the firm's senior vice-president. "Safety is our number one priority.
"It's more important to tell someone they don't have a job than to have to tell a family that their loved one is not coming home from work. This is about safety; it's not about guns."
But the people of Valliant, where the high school closes down during the prime week in the deer-hunting season to allow pupils to shoot, will not be easily assuaged.
James Burrell, an assistant at the local gun shop, said: "Most people around here think the new law is already a right."
Mr Mullens has now found a new job, where his employer is less pernickety.
"People tell me to 'stick to my guns' because they are all carrying one too," he said. "The bottom line is that it is our constitutional right to have a gun in the car."
You toss around a thousand strawmen and try and imply that I'M the one setting them up?
No "profanity" jonesy.
Build yourself a bridge and get over it.
You are arguing that you have the right to lie to your employer.
Learn English? Go back to friggin' Cuba... You've got more in common with them than you do us.
Weyerhauser did not conduct an unauthorized search, they conducted an authorized search. They also did not burglarize the cars, the owners willingly opened their cars at the request of the company.
When they don't have a leg to stand on, they'll do anything they can.
666 Dead Corpse
Grow up...
Compensation from their masters? Better to be a Camp Guard than a camp detainee?
And your property, including the gun, is ON their property.
You are fired.
Are you arguing that if you put your loaded gun in a locked briefcase, bring it into the workplace, and lock the briefcase in your locker, you are violating a no guns in the workplace rule?
The pretense was drugs.
The one arguing that an employer has no right to control their property is you, not me.
There is a gun ON the premises, the gun is IN your car, which means that you have parked illegally, and in violation of the workplace rules set in place by the property owner.
You are fired.
I also noted that the dogs hit on tobacco.
If the police enter you house because they have reason to believe that you have drugs in your house, and during the course of their investigation they find kiddie porn, you're arrested.
You want employers to respect your property rights, yet you want to blatantly violate theirs.
No. A briefcase could be construed a holster type device as such do in fact exist. The same for putting a firearm in a jacket pocket. Now who's setting up straw men? Is this all you got? If so... then I have no more time for you. You are irredeemable. I hop[e the Brady Campaign continues to keep you as a spokesmen. You make it too easy to make you look like an idiot.
No. I'm not. Idiot.
The relevant point is that the willingness depended on the employees veiw that the search was legit, because the reason was for drugs. They claim, they thought their firearms were fine where they were.
Could be.
Some believe in 'licking the boot that feeds them' theory. Most conservatives don't.
Bait and Switch. Isn't that illegal? ;-)
Because that's what we do in a common law system. You are advocating a novel legal position- you are claiming that exercising one's right to regulate whether firearms come onto one's property violates public policy. Other than your opinion, what legal basis do you have for this claim?
And don't say "the Constitution." The only place in the Constitution where you could find a right to bring firearms onto others' property is in the infamous penumbra.
The clear words of the 2nd support the peoples position. - Our rights to keep & bear arms shall not be infringed.
And courts have ruled in hundreds, if not thousands, of cases that the Constitutional prohibitions against infringements of rights applies to government action only. And, of course, SCOTUS has never actually ruled on whether the 2nd Amendment recognizes an individual right to bear arms, but that's a discussion for a different day.
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