NRA Asks Supreme Court to Strike Down Regulations on Handgun Purchases

The NRA is asking the Supreme Court to strike down regulations that limit handgun purchases to persons 21 years old and up. 

This appeal to the nation’s highest court comes after the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit declined to strike down the regulations. 

The NRA has seized on the fact that while the “decades-old regulations” prohibit anyone under 21 from purchasing a handgun, a person can legally possess that firearm at age 18. 

In other words, federal law requires a person to be at least 21 to purchase a handgun but once the gun is purchased another person only has to be 18 to legally possess and shoot it. 

As The Hill reports, “Parents or guardians can give their 18 to 20-year old [sons and daughters] handguns as a gift.” Many parents do this very thing for their 18 to 20-year-old daughters after they watch them pack their car and prepare to drive hundreds of miles away to college.  

The NRA wants coherence in the law. Therefore they argue that if 18 is old enough to posses and shoot a handgun, 18 should be old enough to purchase a handgun as well.

Follow AWR Hawkins on Twitter @AWRHawkins.