## Facts

- Tab Bonidy lived near Avon, Colorado, where residents without home delivery had to retrieve mail from post office boxes inside the Avon Post Office lobby, which was open to the public at all times.
- Bonidy held a Colorado concealed-carry permit and regularly carried a handgun for self-defense.
- A federal regulation, 39 C.F.R. § 232.1(l), prohibited carrying or storing firearms on USPS property, subject to exceptions not applicable to Bonidy.
- Bonidy sought to (1) carry his handgun into the post office building to retrieve his mail and (2) at least store the handgun locked in his vehicle while parked in the USPS-owned lot next to the building.
- Bonidy and a gun-rights organization brought an as-applied Second Amendment challenge to the regulation as enforced in the building and parking lot.
- The district court upheld the firearms ban inside the building but struck it down as applied to the USPS-owned parking lot; both sides appealed.

## Issues

1. Whether the Second Amendment bars enforcement of 39 C.F.R. § 232.1(l) to prohibit carrying a firearm inside a post office building open to the public for mail retrieval.
2. Whether the Second Amendment bars enforcement of 39 C.F.R. § 232.1(l) to prohibit possessing or storing a firearm in a vehicle in a USPS-owned parking lot adjacent to and serving the post office.

## Decision

- The Tenth Circuit affirmed the judgment upholding the firearms prohibition in the post office building.
- The Tenth Circuit reversed the judgment invalidating the prohibition in the USPS-owned parking lot.
- The court held the regulation constitutional as applied to all USPS property at issue, including the parking lot.
- The court reasoned that the Second Amendment right recognized in modern Supreme Court cases had not been extended to government buildings, and that the connected, USPS-owned lot exclusively serving the facility fell within that category.
- Alternatively, the court held that even assuming intermediate scrutiny applied to the parking lot, the regulation survived because the government’s interest in security and order on postal property was substantial and the firearms ban was reasonably related to that interest.

## Legal Principles

- Government may treat post office property as a security-sensitive location for firearms regulation, consistent with the Second Amendment.
- A post office building may be regulated as a “sensitive place” where firearms restrictions are presumptively permissible.
- A USPS-owned parking lot that is connected to and exclusively serves a post office may be regulated as part of the same government facility for Second Amendment purposes.
- Even where a court applies intermediate scrutiny to Second Amendment restrictions on government property, a firearms ban may be upheld if it is reasonably related to a substantial government interest in safety and security.
- In evaluating an as-applied Second Amendment challenge, courts may consider whether the regulation burdens the core right of armed self-defense in the home and the availability of practical alternatives for compliance.

## Conclusion

The Tenth Circuit upheld 39 C.F.R. § 232.1(l) as applied to both the Avon post office building and its adjoining USPS-owned parking lot, concluding that firearms may be prohibited on this USPS property under the “sensitive places” framework and, alternatively, that the ban was justified by the government’s substantial security interest and a reasonable fit between that interest and the restriction.


Bonidy v. U.S. Postal Serv., 790 F.3d 1121 (10th Cir. 2015)