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Members of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled that a law prohibiting the sale of handguns to adults between eighteen and twenty years old is unconstitutional.
The conservative Fifth Circuit panel pointed to the Supreme Court opinion in the Bruen case, which established historical tests for laws limiting the Second Amendment, to conclude that the federal law banning handgun sales to young adults does not have any precedent in the early history of America.
“The text of the Second Amendment includes eighteen-to-twenty-year-old individuals among ‘the people whose right to keep and bear arms is protected,” the decision remarked.
Members of the panel added in the decision that “the federal government has presented scant evidence that eighteen-to-twenty-year-olds’ firearm rights during the founding-era were restricted in a similar manner to the contemporary federal handgun purchase ban.”
Second Amendment Foundation founder and executive vice president Alan Gottlieb reacted positively to the decision, saying the group was “delighted the Fifth Circuit took this action.”
“We have always maintained that young adults, who can vote, join the military, get married, enter into contracts and even run for office can also enjoy the full rights of citizenship which includes rights guaranteed by the Second Amendment,” he remarked. “If we can trust young adults to defend our country, we can certainly trust them to own any and all legal firearms.”
Bruen has led to the overturn of several other state and local gun control laws, since governments enacting such laws must prove that they align with laws at the founding era.
Several states have meanwhile faced legal challenges over their bans on young adults buying handguns. Attorneys with the Second Amendment Foundation recently submitted a lawsuit over a Hawaii statute which prohibits young adults from purchasing firearms or ammunition.
