US Supreme Court declines to review Minnesota handgun possession age restrictions unconstitutional ruling – JURIST
The US Supreme Court declined to hear a challenge Monday to the appellate court decision that struck down Minnesota law prohibiting adults aged 18-20 from obtaining a permit to own guns and carry them in public.
“We are cautiously optimistic the denial will have a positive impact in SAF’s challenges to similar bans in other states. Our goal is to remove any impediments for adults – no matter their age – to exercise their Second Amendment rights wherever they live.” said Second Amendment Foundation founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb in a statement.
In July 2024, the US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit ruled that the state’s ban on young adults carrying handguns was unconstitutional. The court unanimously decided that adult citizens enjoy the right to bear arms under the US Constitution’s Second Amendment.
The court supported its decision by a 2022 US Supreme Court decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen. In the landmark decision, the US Supreme Court requires that firearm regulations engaging with the Second Amendment right must be consistent with the country’s firearm regulation traditions.
The concept of “firearm regulation tradition” relates to the “core of the Second Amendment right.” This core is often understood as the right to self-defense. Whether a law burdening the right to bear arms is consistent with the US firearm regulations traditions depends on whether the law is “narrowly tailored to achieve a compelling governmental interest.”
Earlier in January, the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit similarly struck down a federal statute that only allows people to purchase handguns after they reach the age of 21.
Following the establishment of the new legal approach to examine gun laws, the US Supreme Court struck down a New York law requiring individuals to apply for unrestricted handgun licenses. The US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit also recently upheld Massachusetts’s assault weapon ban on April 18.
On the same day the US Supreme Court declined to hear the case, the MN Gun Owners Caucus urged the US Department of Justice to launch an investigation into the University of Minnesota Law School for its gun control clinic, alleging that it was a “taxpayer-funded litigation activism aimed at dismantling one of our nation’s core constitutional freedoms—the Second Amendment.”
