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Drinking in a public place while in uniform
June 17, 2006 by Ross Runkel at LawMemo
Postal Service regulations forbid drinking in a public place while in uniform. OK. What's a "public place"?
How about a Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) post?
The USPS thought so when it fired Gary Gose.
Understand that the VFW is a private club, and in order to get in to the place where Gose was drinking you had to be a member.
Undaunted, the USPS proposed that a "public place" is anywhere that Postal Service customers can be found.
Not so, says the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. That's an unreasonable interpretation. Gose v. US Postal Service (Fed Cir 06/14/2006).
So Gose is back carrying your mail.
He's probably not at the VFW. It seems that all of this got started when 30 people signed a complaint letter. I assume it was signed by folks who drink without being in uniform.
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Editor: Ross Runkel, Professor of Law Emeritus. email Ross@LawMemo.Com, Phone 503-399-8028. Copyright LawMemo, Inc.
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