Dive Brief:
- People would be allowed to carry guns into visitor centers, ranger stations, fee collection posts and maintenance facilities among other buildings in the United States’ national park system under a lawsuit filed last week by gun rights groups and a gun owner.
- “Gary Zimmerman is a law-abiding adult,” the lawsuit says of the plaintiff, a Fort Worth, Texas, resident who has a lifetime pass to the national parks. “He desires and intends to exercise his Second Amendment right to carry for self-defense at national parks, including at federal facilities located therein.… Due to a fear of prosecution for violating the laws and regulations challenged herein, Plaintiff Zimmerman is forced to disarm when visiting federal facilities located within a park.”
- The lawsuit calls a ban on guns in national park facilities unconstitutional and inconsistent with a U.S. Supreme Court decision four years ago in NYS Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen that found it unlawful for the government of New York to keep people from carrying guns unless it can show exceptional circumstances.
Dive Insight:
The Firearms Coalition and Second Amendment Foundation are co-plaintiffs with the gun owner in Zimmerman vs. Bondi, filed March 27 in federal district court in Texas.
People have been allowed to carry guns in national parks since 2009, when Congress said it was okay in Section 512 of the Credit Card Accountability Responsibility and Disclosure Act. That permission doesn’t extend to the park facilities.
The plaintiffs say the Bruen decision makes it clear the National Park Service must show there are exceptional circumstances for it to keep its ban.
“Governments may not simply ban guns wherever people may ‘congregate’ or assemble,” say the plaintiffs, drawing on a legal argument from Bruen.
In the historical tradition of firearm regulation, they argue, courts have only been able to identify three “sensitive places” where bans have been allowed: legislative assemblies, polling places and courthouses.
“The unifying principle allowing arms to be restricted in these locations at the Founding was comprehensive government-provided security,” the plaintiffs say. “The federal government does not comprehensively secure federal facilities located within national parks.”
Although people can carry guns in national parks, they remain subject to the gun laws of the states in which the parks are located, and they’re only permitted to carry their guns; they’re not permitted to shoot them – whether for target practice, hunting or other purposes.
The plaintiffs say the requirement for Zimmerman to put away his gun whenever he goes into a park facility leaves him unable to defend himself. When he visited Mammoth Cave National Park in Kentucky last August, for example, he was forced to disarm when he went to acquire permits, shop and tour the cave. “While in these locations, Plaintiff Zimmerman was unequipped to defend himself against attack,” the complaint said.
The U.S. Department of Justice didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on whether it plans to defend the ban should the case proceed.
