WASHINGTON, June 25 (DC Times Online) — The Supreme Court in Washington on Thursday struck down Hawaii’s law requiring concealed-carry permit holders to get a property owner’s consent before entering certain privately owned places open to the public, ruling 6-3 that the restriction conflicts with the Second Amendment.
Justice Samuel Alito wrote for the majority in Wolford v. Lopez that Hawaii’s rule “violates the constitutional right to keep and bear arms.” He also said the law “hobble[s] what the Second Amendment protects: the right of Americans to carry arms for self-defense as they go about their daily lives.”
The decision voids what opponents had called Hawaii’s “vampire rule,” a policy that barred lawful gun owners from carrying on covered private property unless the owner expressly allowed it or posted notice.
Three liberal justices dissented.
The ruling adds to the court’s modern Second Amendment decisions, including District of Columbia v. Heller in 2008, when the justices struck down Washington, D.C.’s handgun ban, and McDonald v. City of Chicago in 2010, when the court applied the right to keep and bear arms against state and local governments.
