FPC Notches Win In Georgia Young Adult Carry Ban Challenge

The Firearms Policy Coalition recently won a small victory in the ongoing war against Georgia’s ban on concealed carry for young adults.

On Monday, a three-judge panel of the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a lower court ruling that dismissed a lawsuit challenging Georgia’s law banning 18- to 20-year-old citizens from carrying a firearm for self-defense.

In the case Baughcum v. Jackson, the court countered findings by the district court that ruled the individuals represented in the lawsuit didn’t have standing.

“We are confident that the case is not moot—at least as to one of the individual plaintiffs and the FPC,” the ruling stated. “Although Meyer and Long have turned twenty-one while this case has been pending, Baughcum is still twenty. So, his claim (and thus the FPC’s claim based on his membership in the organization) is not moot. Moreover, the FPC is a large membership organization and says it has other eighteen-to twenty-one-year-old members in Georgia, such that it continues to have associational standing to litigate this suit.”

FPC filed the suit on behalf of the three young adults. Since the case was filed, two of them have turned 21, making them eligible to apply for a concealed carry permit under Georgia law.

Cody J. Wisniewski, FPC Action Foundation vice president and general counsel, and counsel for FPC, said his organization was happy to receive the good news from the circuit court.

“We’re pleased that the Eleventh Circuit has agreed with FPC and the individual Plaintiffs that our challenge to Georgia’s unconstitutional age restriction can proceed,” Wisniewski said after the ruling. “The defendants have sought to avoid the actual constitutional issues underlying this case by attempting to distract the Court with theories about why we couldn’t bring this challenge. Now that the Eleventh Circuit has settled that question, we can proceed with what really matters—vindicating the rights of 18- to 20-year-old adults in Georgia.”

When it comes to Constitutionally protected rights, about the only one that is infringed upon for 18- to 20-year-old Americans is the right to keep and bear arms. With the 2022 Supreme Court Bruen decision upholding the right of citizens to carry firearms outside the home, states depriving adults aged 18 to 20 of this right are almost certainly running afoul of the Second Amendment.

This battle for young Americans’ right to keep and bear arms has a lengthy history, yet not much real progress has been made. In fact, in the courtroom the matter has repeatedly taken one step forward, then two steps back—usually after the process is dragged out long enough that the plaintiffs turn 21 and their rights are no longer infringed.