The federal Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a California state law prohibiting adults under 21 from purchasing or owning most semiautomatic rifles is unconstitutional. Law enforcement and active-duty military members were already exempt from the ban.
In a 2-1 decision, the court based in San Francisco ruled that the ban violated the Second Amendment rights of citizens 18 to 20 who wished to purchase semi-automatic firearms.
The Second Amendment reads, “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
“America would not exist without the heroism of the young adults who fought and died in our revolutionary army,” U.S. Circuit Judge Ryan Nelson. “Today we reaffirm that our Constitution still protects the right that enabled their sacrifice: the right of young adults to keep and bear arms.”
A summary of the court ruling reads, in part: “The panel held that California’s ban was a severe burden on the core Second Amendment right of self defense in the home.” It also says that historically the Second Amendment has “protect[ed] the right of young adults to keep and bear arms, which includes the right to purchase them.”
Among the plaintiffs was the Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC), a non-profit organization dedicated to fighting gun laws that the organization sees as violations of the Second Amendment right to bear arms.
The group has successfully sued the state of California to revoke gun laws multiple times over the past few years, including Miller v. Bonta, which overturned a controversial ban on “assault weapons” in the state.
On Twitter, the FPC called the ruling a “huge win.”
“We are delighted that the Ninth Circuit has vindicated the rights of 18- to 20-year-old adults to keep and bear arms,” Haley Proctor, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, told the San Francisco Chronicle after the ruling.
California Attorney General Rob Bonta said that his office was reviewing the court’s decision to overturn the ban. The statement from his office added that they remained committed “to take all necessary steps to prevent and reduce gun violence.”
U.S. District Court Judge Sidney Stein was the dissenter in the vote.
He said that California gave “substantial and substantiated justifications for its enactment of the semiautomatic rifle regulation.”
Stein reasoned that the ban did not place a “severe burden” on gun rights for young adults because they were not entirely banned from possessing semiautomatic rifles as they could still obtain them from family members or borrow them from others.
He also alleged that those under 21 are “disproportionately more likely to commit violent crimes in general and gun violence specifically than older adults.” He wrote, “While 18 to 20-year-olds comprise less than 5% of the U.S. population, they account for more than 15% of reported homicide and manslaughter arrests.”
Nelson, however, disagreed with Stein’s logic, noting in his opinion that in total, only 0.25% of young adults are arrested for violent crimes.
“In other words, California’s law sweeps in 400 times (100% divided by 0.25%) more young adults than would be ideal,” he wrote. “Because it regulates so much more conduct than necessary to achieve its goal, the law is unlikely to be a reasonable fit for California’s objectives.”
The final ruling was still not a total win for the pro-gun crowd. The plaintiffs had also asked the court to strike down a California law that requires adults under 21 to obtain a hunting license to be allowed to purchase rifles or shotguns.
The court affirmed that law, saying the hunting license requirement was “reasonable” for increasing public safety through “sensible firearm control.”
Democratic state Sen. Anthony Portantino of La Cañada Flintridge, who authored both laws, said he was disappointed the semiautomatic ban was struck down but was pleased the hunting license requirement remained in effect.
“I remain committed to keeping deadly weapons out of the wrong hands,” Portantino said. “Student safety on our campuses is something we should all rally behind and sensible gun control is part of that solution.”