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I'm not a lawyer, but I can't see how a business owner of any commercial establishment that advertises to and serves the general public can legally refuse to serve a patron who is quietly going about his own business and breaking no public law. I'm assuming of course that what we're being told in this forum about this particular situation is true, i.e., that carrying a concealed weapon into an establishment that serves alcohol in Virginia is illegal, but that openly carrying a gun into such an establishment isn't illegal. Of course, I don't know if that's really true or not - it sounds crazy - but if it is true, why isn't that business owner required by law to serve that patron? The business owner is not running a private club in which the members have as the price of joining, agreed to check some their rights at the door before entering.
This seems very much akin to the restaurants in the South who once refused to serve blacks. They can't do that now. You can't just stomp on someones civil rights like that any more. What I think would be very interesting to see, is what would happen if a well-dressed, card-carrying NAACP-belonging, black patron, who was quietly minding his own business, openly carried a gun into this white(?) Virginia establishment. The owner wouldn't know whether to s*#! or go blind. But I do imagine that owner would think twice before he refused to serve that black patron and ordered him to leave because the price of violating that patrons civil rights are known to be very high. I'd pay money to see that confrontation.
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