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As demonstrated in Defendants-Appellees’ Supplemental Brief,
California Penal Code section 27510’s limited age-based restrictions on the
sale or transfer of firearms through federally licensed firearms dealers to
individuals under the age of 21 are consistent with the text of the Second
Amendment, as it was originally understood at the time of ratification.
Founding-era sources confirm that such individuals were considered infants
without the full panoply of rights at the time, and consistent with that reality,
jurisdictions have long restricted firearms access for individuals under the
age of 21.
Further, Plaintiffs’ argument still confuses duties with rights. See
Defs.’ Supp. Br. at 9-10. The fact that the first Militia Act included persons
below the age of 21 in the organized militia—and imposed an actual duty to
keep and bear arms in militia service—does not dictate that those individuals
had a corresponding right to keep and bear arms, much less to purchase them
rather than procuring them through their parents or guardians. See Young v.
Hawaii, 992 F.3d 765, 819 (9th Cir. 2021) (en banc) (noting that a “right to
carry . . . firearms” and a “duty to carry” are “quite different”). It follows
that potential service of members of the “unorganized” militia in the
“organized” militia—and any corresponding militia-related duties—does not
translate into a freestanding right of those under 21, who were generally
understood to live under the authority of their parents, to keep and bear
arms.
Response:Nothing in Heller, then, supports the conclusion that the phrase “the
people” in the Second Amendment was originally understood to include “all
Americans” under 21. See United States v. Huitron-Guizar, 678 F.3d 1164,
1168 (10th Cir. 2012) (collecting cases and declining to decide whether noncitizens are categorically excluded from the Second Amendment right
“because the question in Heller was the amendment’s raison d’être—does it
protect an individual or collective right?”—not who exactly was among “the
people”); Note, The Meaning(s) of “The People” in the Constitution, 126
Harv. L. Rev. 1078, 1079, 1086-87 (2013). But the historical record
demonstrates that the founding generation would have regarded those under
21 as infants who did not have an individual right to keep and bear arms.
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Jones, et al. v. California Att'y General Xavier Becerra, et al. (18-20 age-based ban)
All adults not otherwise prohibited from having firearms have the same rights as others. Age-based discrimination in this context is unconstitutional and morally wrong. These adults could be called to fight and die for their country, but the State of California had prevented them from accessing the full scope of constitutional rights entitled to them under natural law and the Constitution.
Individuals 18 years and older are considered adults for almost all purposes. For example, at 18 years old, U.S. citizens can (i) vote, (ii) fully exercise their freedom of speech, (iii) receive the full protections under the 4th, 5th, and 6th Amendments, (iv) enter into contracts, and (v) serve in the United States military. Indeed, male citizens over 18 years of age are designated members of the militia pursuant to federal statute, 10 U.S.C. § 246(a), and may be selected and inducted for training and service into the United States armed forces, 50 U.S.C. § 3803(a). As such, they are eligible to serve in the military, and to die for their country.
In addition, the “militia of the State” consists of both the organized and unorganized militia. Specifically, the State’s organized militia encompasses the National Guard, State Military Reserve and the Naval Militia. (Cal. Military and Veterans Code Section 120.)