A federal appeals court on Friday struck down a key part of California’s gun laws, ruling that the state’s ban on open carry in most populated areas violates the Second Amendment because it is not supported by historical firearm regulations.
In a 2–1 decision, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit said California’s restrictions fail the Supreme Court’s current Second Amendment framework, which requires modern gun laws to be consistent with the nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation. The law prohibits openly carrying firearms in counties with populations over 200,000, a threshold that effectively covers most of the state.
The court concluded that banning open carry in this way places more than a minimal burden on conduct protected by the Second Amendment. Writing for the majority, one judge described the case as “straightforward,” emphasizing that open carry was not prohibited at the time of the nation’s founding and was historically understood to be constitutionally protected behavior.
If you’d like, I can make it more concise, more formal, or more opinion-neutral.