Maryland, My Maryland

 Tom Knighton at Bearing Arms, Maryland Court Upholds Gun Ban for Adults Under 21

How many actual rights do we have preserved in the Constitution that have an age limit? Voting, of course, does, but what else? Even the 21st Amendment, which repealed Prohibition, didn't include an age limit on who could drink. Then again, it didn't actually say drinking was a right, either.  And yet, while we acknowledge adulthood at 18, and people can register to vote then, some states have decided that despite someone otherwise having the totality of their rights when they reach the age of majority, they can't have guns because...well, because.

One of those is Maryland, and the fight to overturn that law just got a setback. The Appellate Court of Maryland upheld last week the state’s ban on firearm possession by people aged under 21 in the latest example of state courts grappling with a 2022 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that dramatically expanded gun rights. 

On Thursday, the state’s intermediate appellate court found historical precedent for age-based restrictions on firearm ownership and ruled that Maryland’s permitting scheme was not invalidated in its entirety by the Supreme Court’s decision ending states’ discretion to limit firearm possession to people with a demonstrated need to carry. “Based on our review of this caselaw, we conclude that the burden that (the law) imposes on the Second Amendment right of 18-to-20-year-olds is consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation,” wrote Appellate Judge Kathryn Graeff. She was joined by Judge Rosalyn Tang and Senior Judge Donald Beachley, who was specially assigned.

In doing so, the court allowed charges to proceed against Terrell Henry Fields, who was 20 in 2019 when he was arrested in Prince George’s County for gun and drug offenses. The opinion states that Fields did not have a permit and hadn’t shown that he ever applied for one. The drug charges were dropped, and for nearly three years, the case was put on hold “several times” for “various reasons,” including the coronavirus pandemic, the opinion stated.

One day after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, Fields filed a motion to dismiss, arguing the ruling invalidated Maryland’s entire firearm permitting scheme. Of course, the Supreme Court declined to hear a challenge to Florida's age limit law, which is unfortunate as it would have had bearing on this particular matter.

But how did the state somehow make the case that such restrictions are part of the historic tradition of gun laws? The answer lies in the argument that the age of majority was considered 21 at the time of the nation's founding; thus, those who are under 21 were not intended to be part of "the people" in the Second Amendment.

That's kind of ridiculous, though, because despite that claim, I haven't been able to find any examples of age-based restrictions on the ownership or carrying of firearms from that time. If the age of majority was enough of a bar then, where are the laws illustrating that? It seems pretty clear that even if those under 21 were considered too young for certain things, the carrying of guns wasn't one of them.

So from 18-21 you are too immature to own guns or drink, but plenty old enough to vote for Democrats.