You have every right to ban or not ban such things as you see fit. Surly you would respect the rights of other business owners to choose otherwise.
(man pro-choice logic is addictive)
Sigh...I guess I'm going to succumb to thread-drift. :mrgreen:
As I mentioned, I think we need to differentiate between truly private property (ie your home) vs "private" property that is open to the public or onto which you invite selected employees and customers. (ie Businesses)
On my truly-private property, I have the right to exclude most things I don't like: ie smoking, excessive swearing, perfume, whatever. Anyone who does things I don't like in my house is invited to quit or leave. However, my invited guests do not give up their right to life by entering my home when invited to do so... I can't simply kill them and say "well, when they stepped in my house they became part of my property." So there is a
balance between the rights of the invited guest and the homeowner.
Yet there is a major difference between my home and invited guests, vs a business. No one HAS to come to my house to fulfill a basic need. On the other hand, if your biz is the only employer hiring in town, I may not have a lot of choice about coming in your biz as an employee. As a customer, if you're the only gas station within fifty miles, I might not have much choice about patronizing your biz.
A business is a different proposition from a private home. If you employ others, they are an essential part of your business...in a sense they are your partners, and should be treated as such. Ditto customers. In a perfect world it would be so...but employment of labor is usually a buyer's market and the employer often gets away with a lot of crap.
If you're not independently wealthy and don't have the capital to start a business of your own, you have to have a job to live. That, plus the fact that a business necessarily brings in non-owners (employees and customers) in order to function make it a bit different from truly-private property.
In balancing the rights of the owner vs the "guest":
1. The homeowner in his house has stronger rights against his guests', in most regards.
2. The business owner vs employee/customer balance is a little less slanted in favor of the property owner, because the property is privately owned but publically operated, and the employees and customers are essential to the survival of the biz.
"If you don't like it, find another job" is easy to say, but harder to justify, since every other employer in town might be just as bad or worse, or not hiring, etc.
Fundamental human rights protected by the Constitution need to be respected by the business owner, as long as they don't disrupt the conduct of business to a significant degree. Telling a Catholic they can't wear a cross at work has been determined to violate the 1st Amendment, for instance. Praying quietly at lunch is also an upheld right. OTOH, insisting on holding a loud, disruptive prayer meeting during lunch IN the employee lunch-room can be banned for being disruptive and disturbing other employees.
I think gun rights should be considered in a similar light. If there is not a very good, substantive reason that carrying a concealed weapon would disrupt business, then it should be protected as a right. If the biz is a chemical factory and an accidental-discharge could result in a huge disaster, then banning carry inside the biz would be reasonable.
OTOH banning someone from having a gun in their own car in the parking lot is an unreasonable intrusion by the business. The car is the employee's property. Banning them from having a gun in the car also bans them from having that protection going to and from work, arriving at home after work, etc.
Smoking...well that isn't a protected right under the Constitution. A biz owner can decide whether to allow it on his property or not. I think a wise biz owner would consider the wants of the majority of his customers and employees in making that decision.
Banning someone from smoking in their own car in the employee parking lot, now that is unreasonable under most conditions. If the parking lot is right next to the propane factory, you might have a case. :mrgreen:
G.