Sue non-CA sellers on Gunbroker

[aermotor]

Is this thread real life?....

[ProjectWind]

Oh my, do you know anything about lawsuits? I'm just a college student in a business law class, but what you are describing is NOT discrimination.

Edit: Ok well it's discrimination, but it's legal discrimination.

[383green]

Ok, let me clear up something. I have been refused on non-gun items. Many times it's not a matter of complying with gun laws. A scope does not fall into that catagory. If you attend an auction that is "Open to the Public", you place a bid and then the auctioneer says "sorry I won't sell to you because I don't sell to people of your political belief." (or whatever reason). It was a public auction and a bid was offered and accepted. (Buy it Now). To me that is discrimination. When you offer something for sale to the public, you don't have the right to discriminate against a lawful buyer. In my situation I used the "Buy it Now" on a scope. I sent my funds to the seller, he returned it and said "Screw you Californians". It is a open case of it was offered for sale, the price was accepted and paid. For all you guys out there that think this is right, correct, fair, I strongly disagree. To me it is a contact. You offered, and I accepted.

I agree that the seller acted like an utter ***, but what you have described is not legally actionable.

[fiddletown]

...I'm just a college student in a business law class, but what you are describing is NOT discrimination.

Edit: Ok well it's discrimination, but it's legal discrimination.

An excellent catch and important distinction.

Discrimination is not illegal. You do it all the time. Every time you decide to shop in this store rather than that, you have discriminated. Every time you decide to buy this rather than that, you have discriminated.

Businesses discriminate all the time too, and legally. Apple stores discriminate against people who want to buy a PC by only selling Apple computers. Many restaurant discriminate against Orthodox Jews or Muslims by not strictly following the dietary laws of those religions. Many restaurants also discriminate against persons not wearing shirts and/or shoes by not admitting them. Tiffany discriminates against poor people in the prices they charge. Businesses also discriminate whenever they hire one person instead of another who has applied for the job.

Discrimination is merely choosing one thing over another or rejecting a possible choice. Discrimination is the very essence of freedom and private property. It is the right to choose. It is the right to exclude. It is the right to decide how you want to use your property.

Discrimination is perfectly legal, unless some law makes it illegal. There are laws that make discrimination illegal on various, specifically identified and defined bases, illegal -- at least if you're a business open to the public or an employer or in some other specified category.

So it is illegal for you to refuse admittance to your business, if open to the public, to a Black person. Why? It's just not because doing so is discriminatory. It's because there are one or more statutes that specifically prohibit discrimination by a business open to the public on the basis of race.

But discrimination by a private party because someone lives in California is nowhere specifically prohibited.

[Rekrab]

Ok, let me clear up something. I have been refused on non-gun items. Many times it's not a matter of complying with gun laws. A scope does not fall into that catagory. If you attend an auction that is "Open to the Public", you place a bid and then the auctioneer says "sorry I won't sell to you because I don't sell to people of your political belief." (or whatever reason). It was a public auction and a bid was offered and accepted. (Buy it Now). To me that is discrimination. When you offer something for sale to the public, you don't have the right to discriminate against a lawful buyer. In my situation I used the "Buy it Now" on a scope. I sent my funds to the seller, he returned it and said "Screw you Californians". It is a open case of it was offered for sale, the price was accepted and paid. For all you guys out there that think this is right, correct, fair, I strongly disagree. To me it is a contact. You offered, and I accepted.

If the seller made no terms in his auction description and he kept your money you might have a case, but it would be in small claims, in a different state. Have fun serving him.

A better course of action is to leave negative feedback and report the seller to GB if he didn't make any stipulations in his description.

[CSACANNONEER]

The OP needs to accept the fact that we live in the USA and have certain freedoms! One of which is to do bussiness with who we want to. It sucks when ignorant sellers on GB help the antis so much but, it is their RIGHT to help the Brady Bunch if they want to.

[kcbrown]

Frankly, the way I see it, all the laws in California which regulate interstate commerce are Unconstitutional on their face. Why?

Section 8 of the Constitution:

The Congress shall have Power ... To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes

and the 10th Amendment:

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

Regulation of interstate commerce is a power delegated by the Constitution to the United States (i.e., federal government) and therefore is not a power reserved to any individual state.

Therefore, if a transaction is an interstate transaction, California has no legal say about the transaction itself according to the Constitution. California, as a state, may impose regulations on its citizens and therefore can penalize the buyer in an interstate transaction where the seller is out of state and the buyer is inside California, but may not penalize the seller. That power is delegated strictly to the federal government, and no law, even at the federal level, may say otherwise, because such a law would be a contravention of the Constitution, and that is allowed only by Constitutional amendment.

I suppose it's possible that the Supreme Court has somehow managed to say something contrary to the above, but if so then they have blatantly and directly violated their role to uphold the Constitution as the supreme law of the land.


ETA: I suppose a gray area would be the case where the federal government has voluntarily granted states a power that was previously delegated to the federal government, but I strongly suspect that's a direct contradiction of what the authors of the Constitution had in mind, particularly since the federal government is allowed to do only that which is explicitly spelled out in the Constitution, and delegation of powers to the states by the federal government is not among the powers granted to it by the Constitution.

[fiddletown]

...the way I see it, all the laws in California which regulate interstate commerce are Unconstitutional on their face...

Fine, but that really doesn't mean anything until a judge agrees.

In any case, that's not the issue. The issue is sellers declining to sell to persons resident in California. That is their independent business decision and not compelled by any California law. Their business decision may be influenced by California law insofar as it makes selling guns to California residents and shipping guns to California more difficult. But it does not bar the transaction.

So a seller's choice not to deal with California residents remains a private business choice based no his not wanting the extra hassle. Or perhaps on other reasons. The seller really doesn't need a reason to not sell to Californians.

[kcbrown]

Fine, but that really doesn't mean anything until a judge agrees.

In any case, that's not the issue. The issue is sellers declining to sell to persons resident in California. That is their independent business decision and not compelled by any California law. Their business decision may be influenced by California law insofar as it makes selling guns to California residents and shipping guns to California more difficult. But it does not bar the transaction.

It doesn't bar the transaction for those transactions that would be California-legal. It does bar the transaction for those that wouldn't be, and that's the real problem.

Which is to say, I completely agree with you that the seller is free to decline to sell on non-prejudicial grounds, and in particular fear of potentially violating the law, but the seller should not have to be fearful of violating California law because it's an interstate transaction.

So a seller's choice not to deal with California residents remains a private business choice based no his not wanting the extra hassle. Or perhaps on other reasons. The seller really doesn't need a reason to not sell to Californians.

Oh, I quite agree with you here, but fear of violating California law should not be in the list of reasons at all. California simply has no business enforcing the law against anyone who is not in California, period.

[Dragunov]

Anyone ever discuss or are inclined to sue all those bastards who advertise guns etc on Gunbroker and say "No CA Sales". To me this is total discrimination against someone. It's like saying I won't sell to you because you are black, or jewish, etc. And in the lawsuit Gunbroker should take some responsibility for allowing it. If you advertise something for sale to the public, then it's for everyone. You can't pick and choose who you want to buy it. Or should I say you can't deny someone a lawful purchase and discriminate at will. The think the only way to stop this is to sue the seller and Gunbroker out of business. Or at least to get sellers to stop expressing their political views via discrimination.

This is ill advised. It simply would confirm everyones "stereotypical Kalifornian" and make them even MORE hostile to us. We need friends, not enemies. We have enough of the latter.

Others see us as:

"Whiney, arrogant, politically "correct", moneygrubbing, LITIGATION HAPPY, liberal tree hugging know-it-all-know-nothing hippies, who want to stick our noses in everyone elses butts and tell them their business."

"We can't run our own state, we have one of the worst school systems in the country, if not the worst. We won't check our borders and whine because we're broke. We don't even have enough sense to vote out the retards in our capitol and have infected the rest of the country with Nancy Pelosi, and soon to legalize pot (Shear stupidity in my opinion)."

This is how others see us. Don't take it personally, we're not all like that. It just seems like it to the outside. Unfortunately, I know people like the above and unfortunately, they have made it REAL tough on those of us who are decent people because THEY are the ones that get around the most. I don't want to be involved with perpetuating this stereotype.

[wheels]

If you google "why I hate Californians" you'll get 25,400,000 hits - wait, make that 25,400,001 hits ......

I think those numbers are just from New York...

[Kynoch]

I actually think it's a fairly good filter. I really wouldn't want to buy anything from the imbeciles who refuse to do business with Californians. I especially would not want to do business with those morons who seem to get off by the way they say they will not ship to "Kalifornia."

[Kynoch]

If you google "why I hate Californians" you'll get 25,400,000 hits - wait, make that 25,400,001 hits ......

Yeah, and about 25,357,007 of those are based on envy...

[Abominog]

It's not just firearms, and it's not just CA.

Due to CA's ludicrous laws, many companies simply won't do business in CA. Due to NY's liability situation, many companies won't sell to NY. CDNN for example won't ship handguns to NY.

From a dealer's point of view, it's just easier to say "no sales" than have to keep track of the laws. Time is money.

[tenpercentfirearms]

If you feel that strongly about it, contact your attorney ASAP. Or, and this is a crazy f'ing idea I know, buy from your local shop or someone that isn't anti Kalifornia.

What happens when they won't sell to Californians either?