MINNEAPOLIS — A federal lawsuit challenging Minnesota's age limit for permits to carry handguns in public is attracting intervention from national gun safety advocacy groups ahead of a key court hearing next month in St. Paul.
Three Minnesota residents under the age of 21, with the backing of three gun rights organizations, sued Commissioner John Harrington and their respective county sheriffs last year over the enforcement of a state law barring anyone younger than 21 from obtaining a permit to carry. More than one year — and hundreds of pages of legal arguments — later, both parties agree that they will not be able to settle this conflict on their own.
"They can vote, enter contracts and get married. They can join the military—in fact, they can be conscripted—to fight and die for their country. And as adults, there are no parents or other legal guardians generally responsible for their care and protection," wrote David Thompson, a Washington, D.C.-based attorney representing the plaintiffs, in a recent memo to the court. "Yet, the Minnesota law challenged in this case … categorically bars them from carrying a handgun in public for self-defense as other adult Americans have the undisputed right to do."
