Debate over whether to ban handgun sales to teens could soon head to the Supreme Court

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The Supreme Court may soon weigh in on whether people younger than 21 have the right to buy handguns, a decision that could upend decades-old federal restrictions and reshape the nation's gun laws.

In January, the right-leaning Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, based in New Orleans, struck down the federal government's decades-old ban on handgun purchases for 18- to 20-year-olds. That decision came after the 10th Circuit upheld the same prohibition in November. Meanwhile, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit is currently considering whether to uphold a Virginia district court judge's decision ending the age-limit ban.

"Whenever there's decisions that cross each other, you have a much better chance of getting a writ of certiorari at the U.S. Supreme Court," Alan Gottlieb, founder of the Second Amendment Foundation, told Fox News Digital. 

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"This issue is definitely making its way to the Supreme Court-and fast," said Pepperdine's Jacob Charles, a constitutional law professor with an expertise in Second Amendment issues. "This is a key federal law, and you just can't have that apply differently across the nation (at least for long)."

The federal ban on handgun sales to people under the age of 21 began in 1968 as part of the Gun Control Act passed that year. Fast-forward to the Supreme Court's 2022 decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen, and a tranche of lawsuits aiming to upend laws restricting gun sales to people over 21 are making their way through the courts. The gun-violence nonprofit news outlet The Trace compiled data showing that between June 2022 and August 2024, there have been more than 1,600 Bruen-based challenges to gun laws.

The Bruen decision rejected the strict scrutiny frameworks being used by lower courts to evaluate gun laws and instead established a "historical tradition" that required laws to adhere more directly to the text of the Second Amendment.

"The levels of scrutiny - rational basis, intermediate scrutiny, strict scrutiny - don't matter. What the Supreme Court's Bruen ruling said was, you have to look at the text and the history. That's what counts," said Gottlieb. "When the Bill of Rights was put together, there was nothing that prohibited 18-to 20-year-old young adults from being able to own or carry a firearm." 

Gottlieb and the Second Amendment Foundation have sued in several states to reverse their bans on hand gun sales to young adults under 21. 

Several cases challenging age limit bans, including cases filed in Massachusetts and Connecticut this month, are ongoing. 

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"Our track record, at least, is mostly wins, and part of the logic on that is that there's nothing in under the Bruen decision at the Supreme Court, which makes them look at the text and history of the Second Amendment." 

The Fifth Circuit decision cited the Supreme Court's Bruen ruling in its decision not to uphold the federal ban, as did two other circuit courts over the last year. 

One case in the Eighth Circuit invalidated a ban in Minnesota. Since then, the Commissioner of Public Safety in Minnesota filed a petition for the Supreme Court to rule on the case. That petition is currently pending.