Appeals court upholds most of Maryland ban on weapons in schools, parks, other public places

A federal appeals court Tuesday upheld Maryland’s law banning guns in a wide range of public settings, from school grounds and government buildings to parks, sports venues and areas within 1,000 feet of a public demonstration.

A three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that most of the dozen places identified in Maryland law fall under the U.S. Supreme Court’s definition of “sensitive places,” where government has the authority to restrict the Second Amendment right to bear arms.

The only area where the appeals court said the sensitive places exception did not apply was in “private property held open to the public,” where the law prohibits guns without specific permission from the property owner. That restriction is unconstitutionally broad, Circuit Judge Roger L. Gregory wrote for the court.

“Maryland’s rule would effectively declare most public places ‘gun-free zones,” Gregory wrote. “But that likely stretches the sensitive places doctrine too far.”

In a partial dissent, Circuit Judge Steven Agee agreed with the majority that school grounds, government buildings and health care facilities are sensitive places where guns can be banned. But approving the state’s laundry list of other places where guns can be prohibited would stretch the sensitive places exception “into a broad license to prohibit firearms in locations where people gather for almost any purpose, so long as those purposes are separately listed to give the appearance of limited scope.”

Mark Pennak is president of the gun rights group Maryland Shall Issue, which was a party to one of the two challenges to Maryland’s law that were combined into the case ruled on Tuesday. He said that while he was pleased the court rejected the law banning firearms on private property open to the public, gun advocates were “considering our options” on how to proceed. The plaintiffs could ask for the case to be reheard in front of the full 4th Circuit, or they could appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown’s (D) office declined to comment on the ruling Tuesday evening. But in a statement later Tuesday night, Gov. Wes Moore (D) called the court’s ruling “a major win for public safety in Maryland.”

“We will continue working with law enforcement, community leaders, and partners across the state to keep illegal guns off our streets and prevent tragedy before it happens — while respecting the rights of responsible gun owners,” the governor’s statement said.

Everytown Law, the litigation arm of Everytown for Gun Safety Support Fund, also welcomed the court’s decision. Everytown for Gun Safety joined a handful of gun-control groups and 18 other states that sided with Maryland in the case.

“By upholding Maryland’s sensitive places law, the Fourth Circuit has joined a growing judicial consensus that it’s constitutional to protect our communities from the particular dangers guns present in locations like parks, school grounds, public transit systems, and bars,” said a statement from Janet Carter, managing director of Second Amendment litigation at Everytown Law. “It’s time for gun extremists to recognize that their efforts to undermine these life-saving protections are as futile as they are reckless.”

Maryland law, with some exceptions, bans guns in a range of places where people gather: in government buildings, in public transportation, on school grounds, within 1,000 feet of a public demonstration, in state parks and forests, in museums, in health care facilities, at stadiums, at racetracks, at amusement parks, at casinos and in locations that sell alcohol.

The prohibitions were part of the Gun Rights Safety Act of 2023. On the same day it was signed into law, it was challenged by Susannah Warner Kipke, the wife of Del. Nic Kipke (R-Anne Arundel), and the Maryland State Rifle and Pistol Association, on First, Second and 14th amendment grounds. A separate, but similar, challenge was filed by Katherine Novotny and Maryland Shall Issue, along with the Second Amendment Foundation.

Supreme Court lets stand ruling that upholds Maryland handgun law

U.S. District Judge George L. Russell III combined the complaints into one case, before ruling in August 2024 to uphold most of the Gun Safety Act of 2023.

Gregory wrote that the combined cases gave the appeals court its first opportunity to analyze the sensitive places exception to the Second Amendment under the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 ruling in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen. That case said courts must determine if gun regulations are “consistent with this nation’s historical tradition.”

In the case of the Second Amendment, that would be laws in effect in 1791 when the Bill of Rights was ratified. If there is no exact match to the law from history, it’s the court’s job to determine if the new law is “analogous enough to pass constitutional muster,” Gregory wrote

The Supreme Court specifically named government buildings and schools as sensitive places, Gregory wrote.

“Simply put, there’s no daylight between the delineated place ‘schools’ and the remaining property on which they sit, which often perform identical functions and serve the same populations as the school buildings themselves,” Gregory wrote. “Similarly, government buildings – while potentially capacious – have similarly been identified by the Supreme Court as places where governments have historically been able to control access to firearms.”

For each of the other places named in the law, the court found historical precedents that justified the constitutionality of the restriction.

But Agee said that — except for schools, government buildings and health care facilities — the majority “simply fails to follow how the Supreme Court has directed courts to consider the historical tradition of firearm regulation when examining whether a particular law violates the Second Amendment right to carry arms in public.”

“How the Supreme Court has undertaken this historical inquiry demonstrates that the absence of Founding-Era regulations appropriately analogous to a challenged law means that the challenged law is unconstitutional, regardless of the later historical record,” he wrote.

While the Supreme Court should clarify the application of the sensitive places doctrine, Agee wrote, it never intended for the exception to be “a smokescreen for inclined legislatures or courts to conjure up some metaphysical connection so that a handful of localized laws can serve as  ‘analogues’ for sweeping regulation of the core Second Amendment right.”

— This story was updated on Thursday, Jan. 22, to correct Circuit Judge Roger Gregory’s first name.