In what might come as a shock to the legacy press[1], it turns out there are plenty of young people[2] who value their Second Amendment rights and are willing to fight for them. Case in point: 18-year-old Hannah Brumbles of Deer Island, Ore. Last week, the Beaver State’s Bureau of Labor and Industries[3] (BOLI) ruled in the young woman’s favor after she challenged a Walmart policy that denied shotgun and rifle sales to young adults ages 18 to 20.
In the wake of the February 14 shooting in Parkland, Fla., retailers Dick’s Sporting Goods (who also owns Field & Stream stores), Kroger-owned Fred Meyer, L.L. Bean, and Wal-Mart adopted policies whereby the stores would refuse to sell shotguns and rifles to young adults ages 18-20. Existing federal law prevents Federal Firearms Licensees from selling handguns to those under 21.
At the time, UCLA Law Professor Eugene Volokh took to his popular blog, the Volokh Conspiracy[4], to explain that some state and local governments have enacted anti-discrimination laws that restrict businesses from denying lawful products and services to adults on the basis of age. Therefore, in some jurisdictions, firearms retailers would be barred from carrying out a policy that denied adults ages 18 to 20 the ability to purchase long guns in their stores.
NRA-ILA[5] and the Willamette Week[6] elaborated on Volokh’s point, noting that Section 659A.403(1)[7] of the Oregon Revised Statutes made clear that:
all persons within the jurisdiction of this state are entitled to the full and equal accommodations, advantages, facilities and privileges of any place of public accommodation, without any distinction, discrimination or restriction on account of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, national origin, marital status or age
