High Court Declines To Hear Challenge To NYC Gun Limits

The Supreme Court turned away a challenge to New York firearms restrictions adopted the justices in 2022 struck down the Democratic state's previous limits on carrying concealed handguns in a case that expanded gun rights. The justices declined to hear an appeal by six New York residents who either have or are seeking a concealed-carry license of a lower court's decision that let the state enforce certain licensing requirements and restrictions in locations deemed "sensitive." The dispute centered on New York's Concealed Carry Improvement Act, a measure adopted after the court's 2022 ruling that declared for the first time that the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms protects an individual's right to carry a handgun in public for self-defense, reports Reuters.

That ruling required gun laws to be "consistent with the nation's historical tradition of firearm regulation" to comply with the Second Amendment. It was one of three key rulings by the Supreme Court since 2008 that have broadened gun rights in a nation the world's highest gun ownership rate. New York's 2022 law defined a longstanding requirement for firearm license applicants to have "good moral character" as the judgment to use a firearm "in a manner that does not endanger oneself or others." The law made it a crime to carry a firearm in various "sensitive" locations, including government buildings, schools, health care facilities, theaters, bars, polling places and Manhattan's Times Square. The plaintiffs asked the Supreme Court to resolve a debate over whether courts, when searching for historical analogues for gun restrictions, should look solely at when the Second Amendment was ratified in 1791, or also 1868, when the 14th Amendment extended the Constitution's Bill of Rights - spanning its first 10 amendments - to the states.