Columbia Housing & Redevelopment Corp. v. Kinsley Braden

This is a detainer action brought by a landlord to evict its tenant for possessing a firearm in his apartment in contravention of the lease agreement. The landlord, Columbia Housing & Redevelopment Corporation (“Columbia Housing”), provides subsidized housing for the City of Columbia pursuant to the Housing Authorities Law, Tennessee Code Annotated § 13-20-101 to -709, and operates Creekside Acres, a multifamily, low-income public housing complex in Columbia, Tennessee. The tenant voluntarily entered into a lease agreement with Columbia Housing that contained a prohibition against firearms on the premises; nevertheless, the tenant defended the detainer action, contending that the lease agreement violated his rights under the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution. The circuit court ruled in favor of the landlord on the ground that the lease agreement was a valid and enforceable contract, and the tenant voluntarily waived any rights he may have had to possess a firearm on the leased premises. This appeal followed. Significantly, the landlord is a governmental entity “acting as a landlord of property that it owns.” See Dep’t of Hous. & Urban Dev. v. Rucker, 535 U.S. 125, 135 (2002). As such, its actions must comply with the Constitution, see Lugar v. Edmondson Oil Co., 457 U.S. 922, 930 (1982), and the unconstitutional conditions doctrine “prevent[s] the government from coercing people into giving” up constitutional rights. Koontz v. St. Johns River Water Mgmt. Dist., 570 U.S. 595, 604 (2013). Although laws “forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings” do not violate the Second Amendment, see D.C. v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570, 626 (2008), not “all places of public congregation” are “sensitive places.” See N.Y. State Rifle & Pistol Ass’n, Inc. v. Bruen, 142 S. Ct. 2111, 2134 (2022). Moreover, although public housing is government-owned, the leased premises at issue is the tenant’s private home, which is not the kind of “sensitive place” where the government may categorically ban firearm possession. See id. at 2128. Further, complete prohibitions on possession of handguns in the home for self-defense are “historically unprecedented.” See id. Therefore, we hold that Columbia Housing’s prohibition against handguns in the tenant’s “home” is an unconstitutional lease condition. As a consequence, the tenant’s possession of a handgun in his apartment, his home, did not constitute a breach of the lease agreement. Accordingly, the judgment of the circuit court is reversed, and this matter is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.