Florida law barring concealed carry under 21 ruled unconstitutional

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(The Center Square) – A Florida law prohibiting 18-to-20-year-olds from concealed carrying is unconstitutional, an appeals court ruled Wednesday.

The Florida Statute, which was established in 1987, disqualified law-abiding adults under age 21 from carrying a concealed firearm.

Judge Spencer Levine for the Fourth District Court of Appeal said the restriction would make the Second Amendment a “second-class” right.

“Eighteen- to 20-year-olds can defend the country without restriction but can only utilize their Second Amendment right to self-defense with severe restrictions. This burden on law-abiding 18- to 20-year-olds’ right to public carry—and specifically here concealed carry—which is not applicable to any other adults, is a burden that is facially unconstitutional as to 18- to 20-year-olds,” Levine wrote.

The case stemmed from the 2024 arrest of an 18-year-old who was charged with carrying a concealed firearm. The State Attorney’s Office argued at the time there was “nothing inherently unconstitutional about requiring a person to qualify for a permit to carry a concealed firearm or carefully restricting a few citizens from carrying a concealed firearm because of a concern for the public safety.”

However, the trial court did not find historical precedent for restricting concealed carry by adults younger than 21, Levine wrote.

Several Supreme Court cases have laid out a precedent for interpreting Second Amendment cases. In District of Columbia v. Heller, the Supreme Court ruled “we the people” encompasses the right of all Americans to exercise the Second Amendment, though it recognized longstanding prohibitions such as felons, the mentally ill, and other prohibitions.

A more recent case in 2024, United States v. Rahimi, further established that while there is historical background for groups of people subject to being disarmed, the court ruled that an individual or group cannot be subject to disarmament simply because they are not seen as responsible. Rather, the case decided that a court must first find that a person must represent a credible threat to the physical safety of another.

Finally, the 2022 case New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen introduced a two-step test for determining if a firearm regulation violates the Second Amendment: If a court determines the Second Amendment’s plain text covers an individual’s conduct, the constitution presumptively protects that conduct. Additionally, the government must demonstrate the regulation is consistent with the nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.