Posted on 03/29/2006 10:04:37 AM PST by kiriath_jearim
Should you be able to take your gun to work?
08:17 AM CST on Tuesday, March 28, 2006 By Vicente Arenas / KHOU
There's a battle looming over your right to take a gun to work. The controversy centers on whether you should be able to leave a firearm in your car.
If Granger Durdin could take her gun everywhere, she said she would.
"With the crime rates the way they are and with being a young female, I sometimes feel a little bit more vulnerable and with a gun I have the protection that I need to be safe," said Durdin.
The 29-year-old manager is not alone.
"It's very important. You don't know when someone is going to come after you," said gun owner Brenda Lorisch.
In Texas, businesses have the right to keep concealed weapons out of buildings. Now there's a move to allow companies to prohibit them from parking lots, too and that has some concealed carriers upset.
"I believe that's an infringement on civil liberties," said gun owner Pat Warren.
There are no real statistics that will tell you how many people take their guns to work and leave them in their cars. But when it comes to firearms, people in the gun industry will tell you that most people who have licenses to carry them won't leave home without them.
"It takes away our right to protect ourselves going to and from work," said Cheryl Lamar, Hot Wells Firing Range.
Houston-based ConocoPhillips is challenging a law in Oklahoma that allows workers to leave guns in their cars parked on company property.
The company said it is simply trying to provide a "safe and secure working environment for its employees by keeping guns out of their worksites, specifically refineries, natural gas plants and distribution terminals."
11 News found a sign outside an area plant prohibiting weapons, but saw no such signs in the company's parking lot. Still it's clear guns aren't welcome there.
When asked if she thought that this could lead to workplace violence, "Yes, I've heard that. I don't agree," said Sue King, NRA board member.
King grew up around guns. She said ConocoPhillips' efforts are a waste of time.
"If you think back to the incidents of workplace violence that we occasionally, rarely have in this country and keeping the Oklahoma legislation in mind, you'll realize that those people who commit workplace violence are either outright criminals, they're mentally unbalanced or they are true psychopaths," King said.
"I feel that it's a problem," said Tomasita Garza, Texans for Gun Safety.
This group disagrees with King, saying there are other problems with leaving a gun in a car.
"The reason being no vehicle is safe. No matter what kind of deterrents you use to keep your car from being stolen, it can still be stolen," said Garza.
ConocoPhillips is one of several companies asking an Oklahoma judge to clear the way for employers to prevent workers from keeping pistols in the parking lot.
The company says it, "supports the second amendment and the rights of law abiding citizens to own guns".
It's that amendment that granger Durdin says it gives her a little more confidence and the right to protect herself wherever she may be.
"There's a battle looming over your right to take a gun to work."
You have no right to take anything to work they don't want you to have. Pretty stupid "battle".
"Don't take your gun to town, son; don't take your gun to town."
This article, despite it's moronic title, has nothing to do with taking guns into work. It is about whether or not you have the right to having guns in your car. Big difference. Who comes up with these ridiculously misleading titles? Is there a class devoted to that in journalism schools?
Yes, but not if you work for the postal service.
I agree, except it isn't about the right to have a gun in your car; it's about whether the guy that owns the parking lot has a right to say who's allowed to park in it.
Allowing me to keep my gun in my car in no way infringes on the employers equal rights of property in their ownership of the parking lot or buildings. They own everything from the tar down, I own everything from the tires up.
What I have in my car or truck is no more anyones business than what I have in my home.
"This group disagrees with King, saying there are other problems with leaving a gun in a car.
"The reason being no vehicle is safe. No matter what kind of deterrents you use to keep your car from being stolen, it can still be stolen," said Garza.
ConocoPhillips is one of several companies asking an Oklahoma judge to clear the way for employers to prevent workers from keeping pistols in the parking lot. "
Any company that has enough control over their parking lot to tell you what you can have in your car, should be able to offer some security for the lot.
It would sure make it easier to keep them from adding more water.
And my boss knows the contents of the trunk of my car how?
Yeah, but your castle is parked in your employer's parking lot. If nothing else, make the empoloyer exempt from prosecution from any shooting in the parking lot, then it makes a bit more sense to allow guns in cars parked on someone else's private property.
If your employer bans firearms from the workplace, then you either have to live with his rules or quit and get a job elsewhere.
You don't have a right to bring anything on to another's property without their consent.
Inside a business building is one thing, but in the car means that there are two property rights to balance. Does the owner of a parking lot have a right to know what is inside each car? I don't think so. Sure, they can deny access to anyone they choose, but they don't have an automatic right to know or even ask what is in the car.
I can, for example, allow or not allow someone to park in my driveway but that doesn't mean I can search their car, or even have a right to ask them what's in it. If I can't ask them what's in it then I've also got no business demanding that it contains no guns.
There are competing property rights here. I would submit that contents of cars are out of bounds.
If an employer can tell you what you can have in your car then he can wreak havoc with your life, what if he doesn't like baby seats, how do you get your kids to and from school or daycare? Can she ban the bible? or leather seats?, can they ban tire gauges, how about spare tires?
As a condition of bringing your car onto his property, he can require you to submit to a search of the vehicle. You are, of course, free to refuse and seek employment elsewhere.
Also, I have a Right to carry my firearm while in my car to and from work. Giving my employer the legal authority to ban my gun from my car strips me of the ability to effectively provide for my own defense while commuting.
Private citizens have no duty to help you exercise your rights. Your ability to defend yourself going to and from work is not your employer's concern.
Allowing me to keep my gun in my car in no way infringes on the employers equal rights of property in their ownership of the parking lot or buildings.
You have every right to keep your gun in your car. However, you have no right to use your employer's parking lot in violation of his rules.
They actually agreed. I guess they really DID want me working for them and were not just trying to engage in flattery.
"businesses have the right to keep concealed weapons out of buildings."
Their business, their choice...
If an employer disarms his employees and they are killed in a shooting, the employer should be sued for failing to provide security to the very people he made vulnerable in the first place.
It might be part of your right to have a job. 'Course, you only have a right to a job in a socialist society.
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