The National Rifle Association and Second Amendment Foundation filed an amicus brief urging the U.S. Supreme Court to grant review in Beckwith v. Frey, a challenge to Maine’s 72-hour waiting period requirement for firearm purchases.
The First Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the law after concluding that the Second Amendment’s plain text is not implicated by regulations on the acquisition of firearms. According to that court, such laws are constitutional “unless plaintiffs demonstrate that the Act is abusive toward Second Amendment rights,” and Maine’s waiting period is merely “a burden on, but not an infringement of,” the right to keep and bear arms. The petitioners are now asking the Supreme Court to review that decision.
Our brief argues that the First Circuit’s approach revives the interest-balancing inquiry the Supreme Court rejected in Heller and Bruen. A law that delays the acquisition of arms burdens those wishing to exercise the Second Amendment right and therefore implicates the Amendment’s plain text. Once that showing is made, the government must justify the restriction with historical tradition—and it cannot. Waiting periods are a historical anomaly. As the brief demonstrates through contemporary newspaper advertisements and other primary sources, purchasers in both the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries could regularly acquire firearms immediately.
This brief underscores the NRA’s continued commitment to defeating unconstitutional waiting periods across the country. In addition to winning a final judgment last month holding New Mexico’s 7-day waiting period unconstitutional, NRA has ongoing challenges to waiting period laws in Florida and Illinois.
Please stay tuned to www.nraila.org for future updates on NRA-ILA’s ongoing efforts to defend your constitutional rights, and please visit www.nraila.org/litigation to keep up to date on NRA-ILA’s ongoing litigation efforts.
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