Legal News

Laptop? Check. Starbucks Card? Check. Handgun on Holster? Check.

By Ashby Jones

Whether and to what degree states and municipalities can regulate possession and use of guns is, as all LBers know, a question awaiting an answer at the U.S. Supreme Court.

But for now, the law in California allows people to openly display and carry unloaded weapons without a permit.

That said, some retail establishments aren’t crazy about the notion. It’s recently come up because some handgun enthusiasts have started visibly showcasing their firearms at retail outlets in coordinated displays of solidarity over their gun rights. In response, Peet’s Coffee and Tea and California Pizza Kitchen have reportedly banned weapons from their stores.

So far, Starbucks hasn’t followed the lead of Peets or CPK. As the AP story puts it, the ubiquitous Seattle retailer hasn’t “taken the bait.” Starbucks released a statement this month saying that it follows state and local laws and has its own safety measures in its stores.

The AP reports that many gun owners are applauding Starbucks, even though such owners would probably get more visibility and attention were Starbucks to block them. "Starbucks is a special target because it's from the hippie West Coast, and a lot of dedicated consumers who pay $4 for coffee have expectations that Starbucks would ban guns. And here they aren't," John Bruce, a political science professor at the University of Mississippi who is an expert in gun policy, told the AP. Click here for an AP story out Monday; here for a recent story from the Christian Science Monitor.

And the point of carrying a weapon on your belt while you order your latte and morning bun? Safety, it seems.

Dale Welch, a 71-year-old retired property manager who lives in Richmond, Va., swears by it. "I don't know of anybody who would provide me with defense other than myself, so I routinely as a way of life carry a weapon - and that extends to my coffee shops," he told the AP.

Turns out, though, that some police forces aren’t too thrilled by the movement. According to the Monitor, Sunnyvale, Calif., Deputy Police Chief Mark Stivers wrote in a memo last year: "To be very frank, I do not like the fact people can carry an unloaded gun in a holster in plain view in public. However the law says they can and we uphold the law."

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on March 01, 2010 (boomark / email).