WASHINGTON, D.C. (November 24, 2025) — Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) today announced the filing of a critically important, merits-stage brief with the United States Supreme Court in Wolford v. Lopez, a case challenging Hawaii’s authoritarian “default-ban” on the right to carry in public places. The brief dismantles the Ninth Circuit’s historical distortions and exposes how anti-rights states are resurrecting racist, post–Civil War “Black Codes” in an attempt to bypass the Constitution and disarm peaceable Americans. The brief can be viewed here.
The case centers on Hawaii’s “vampire rule”—a presumptive ban that transforms every inch of private property open to the public—such as stores, restaurants, and parking lots—into a “gun-free zone” unless the owner explicitly allows someone to enter the premises armed. By flipping the centuries-old default that property open to the public is open to the public, Hawaii has effectively nullified the right to carry and defied the Supreme Court’s rulings.
FPC’s brief argues that the Ninth Circuit manipulated history to uphold this ban, relying on mischaracterized colonial anti-poaching statutes and, even more disturbingly, the 1865 Louisiana “Black Codes”—laws specifically designed to disarm newly freed slaves and force them back into servitude. FPC has been successful in fighting versions of the vampire rule in multiple states including California, Maryland, New Jersey, and New York.
“Authoritarian states want to resist the Constitution and the Supreme Court so badly that they are using racist statutes from some of the darkest chapters of American history to justify their immoral laws today,” said FPC President Brandon Combs. “FPC will not allow these authoritarians to gaslight the courts and American public into believing that ‘Black Codes’ are a valid basis for gun laws.”
FPC’s brief demonstrates that—
- The Right History Matters: The Second Amendment’s meaning was set in 1791. The Ninth Circuit improperly weighed irrelevant 19th-century laws equally with the Founding era, violating Supreme Court precedent.
- Racist Roots of Gun Control: The 1865 Louisiana law cited by the Ninth Circuit was a “Black Code” aimed at subjugating freedmen. As the brief states, these laws are “shameful” and “should be repudiated, not used as a basis for defining the scope of constitutional rights.”
- The ‘Vampire Rule’ is a Modern Fabrication: Hawaii’s law has no historical pedigree; it is a modern deviation inspired by a 2020 academic proposal designed to sharply reduce public carry rights.
- Anti-Poaching Laws Don’t Prove Carry Restrictions: The colonial laws cited by the state were about stopping trespassers from poaching deer on enclosed estates, not preventing law-abiding citizens from carrying arms for self-defense in public places.
This case is vital for all Americans, particularly those living in the “Axis of Authoritarianism”—states like California, New York, and New Jersey—jurisdictions that are actively trying to circumvent the Second Amendment by leaning on selective, post-Founding history instead of the constitutional tradition of 1791.
“Beyond the specific question in this case, the issue of which history applies is of monumental importance to the Second Amendment and every American,” Combs explained. “The Supreme Court must look to the correct history—and make that unmistakably clear to the lower courts.”
FPC is represented at the Supreme Court by attorneys David H. Thompson, Peter A. Patterson, and William v. Bergstrom of Cooper & Kirk as well as Cody J. Wisniewski of FPC Action Foundation.
To support this brief and dozens of critical lawsuits to eliminate gun control laws across the country, join the FPC Grassroots Army at JoinFPC.org.
About Firearms Policy Coalition
Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) — a 501(c)(4) nonprofit membership organization — exists to create a world of maximal individual liberty, defend constitutional rights, and restore the freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution. FPC pursues these goals through strategic litigation, legal scholarship, amicus briefing, legislative and regulatory advocacy, grassroots activism, education, and outreach. FPC’s legal arm, FPC Law, is the nation’s leading initiative dedicated to restoring the right to keep and bear arms across the United States. To learn more about FPC’s lawsuits and pro–Second Amendment efforts, sign up for FPC news alerts at firearmspolicy.org and follow FPC on X, Instagram, and Facebook.
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