The Louisville Moral, I mean, Metro Council is at it again.

The council intends to pass the new smoking ban Jan. 10. The belief is that the smoking ban without an exemption for the racetrack — which competes for entertainment dollars with bars and restaurants — is constitutional.

Constitutional?! Does the Louisville Metro Council have even the foggiest notion of what private property is all about?

Apparently not.

Put bluntly, owning private property means that the owner of the property should be able to determine — for good reasons, bad reasons, or no reason at all — whether to admit smokers, nonsmokers, neither, or both. Customers or employees who object may take their money or labor elsewhere.

In doing so they would not be relinquishing any right that they ever possessed. By contrast, when someone is forced to enforce an unwanted smoking policy on his own property, the government violates his rights.