What Age to Legally Own a Gun?
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https://www.thetrace.org/2025/04/supreme-court-gun-carry-age-minnesota/
The Supreme Court won’t be settling the question of whether people between the ages of 18 and 20 can be barred from carrying guns in public — at least not for now.
On April 21, the court declined to hear Worth v. Jacobson, letting stand an appeals court ruling that struck down Minnesota’s age requirements for permits to carry concealed guns.
A stay had been in place during the appeals process, allowing Minnesota to continue enforcing its age requirements. By denying Minnesota’s request to consider the case, the justices effectively lifted the state’s de facto ban on 18- to 20-year-olds carrying handguns in public. Now, the state must start accepting permit applications from young adults.but
However, a 10th Circuit panel backed a Colorado age restriction last November, and earlier this year, the 11th Circuit upheld Florida’s ban on gun sales to people under 21. The 11th Circuit case is likely to be petitioned to the Supreme Court.
Megan Walsh, director of the Gun Violence Prevention Law Clinic at the University of Minnesota, said the cases raise several unresolved Second Amendment questions that she expects the justices will eventually want to resolve.
“I don’t think this is a final answer on age-limit cases from the Supreme Court,” she said about the Minnesota case. “It doesn’t necessarily mean that a majority of justices think that the 8th Circuit approach was correct. I think it might just not be the right vehicle for questions that are going to have to be answered by the Supreme Court sooner rather than later.”
