Following a 1998 shoot-out on county fairgrounds in which eight people were injured, Alameda county supervisors issued the ordinance which prohibited the possession of firearms outside county courthouses, government offices, and public health centers as well as prohibited guns shows on public property where guns were present.

"The shooting made us realize there was a need to ban guns from county property,” Richard Winnie, chief council to Alameda County, told the Associated Press in 1999. “If they want to have a gun show and do photo demonstrations, videos, lectures leading to the sale of guns and ammunition, they can do it. They just can't have the guns there." Gun show operators contend that it is impossible to hold a gun show without the presence of guns.

TS Trade Shows, run by Russell and Sallie Nordyke, had promoted gun shows in Alameda County for nearly a decade when the ban was passed. The Nordykes sued in federal court and appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court after their suit failed in the 9th Circuit.

The 9th Circuit Court based its ruling on a 2002 precedent established by a judgment on the California state assault weapons ban which held that the Second Amendment guarantees the collective right of states to maintain militias, but not the right of an individual to bear arms. The U.S. Supreme Court refused consideration of that case last year.

In respect to the First Amendment, the court found that a gun itself does not qualify as speech and that gun possession can only be considered speech when there is "intent to convey a particularized message, and the likelihood [is] great that the message would be understood by those who viewed it,” wrote Circuit Judge Diarmuid F. O'Scannlain. The court found that typically an individual simply possessing a gun does not qualify as speech. Furthermore, the court declared that because the law applies broadly, banning the possession on all guns on county property, it does not have the effect of “singling out those engaged in expressive activity.”

Donald Kilmer, attorney for TS Trade Shows, told the Associated Press that the group plans to continue the suit under the assertion that the ordinance denies gun-enthusiasts their right to association.

At the time of the ruling, more than 20 other California municipalities requested that the 9th Circuit Court uphold the ordinance. Similar ordinances have been passed in several other California counties and the refusal of the U.S. Supreme Court to make a further ruling may have paved the way for many others to do the same. California is currently the only state that allows cities and counties the right to ban guns on government property.