The Texas Department of Public Safety has withdrawn its appeal of a Fort Worth federal court case allowing all adults to carry handguns without a license.
Last year, Texas passed its constitutional carry law, removing the requirement of firearm holders to obtain a license to carry from the state.
The legislation set a minimum age of 21 to carry a handgun, despite the fact that it is legal in Texas to own a handgun and carry a long gun at 18 years old. The Firearms Policy Coalition challenged that prohibition, arguing that it violated the Second Amendment.
Judge Mark Pittman of the U.S. District Court for Northern District of Texas, a Trump appointee, ruled in favor of FPC in August:
Based on the Second Amendment’s text, as informed by the Founding-Era history and tradition, the Court concludes that the Second Amendment protects against this prohibition. Texas’s statutory scheme must therefore be enjoined to the extent that law-abiding citizens 18-to-20 year-olds are prohibited from applying for a license to carry a handgun.
Despite the Court’s opinion, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton filed an appeal on behalf of Texas DPS in September.
Now, the agency has decided to withdraw that appeal, allowing all adults to carry without receiving a license from the state.
FPC says they are grateful for the decision.
“We applaud Texas for doing the right thing and accepting the district court’s ruling against its law prohibiting 18-to-20-year-old adults from carrying firearms in public,” said Cody J. Wisniewski, FPC’s senior attorney for constitutional litigation. “Not only do young adults have the same constitutionally protected right to bear arms as all other adults, they are also among the reasons we have a Second Amendment, Constitution, and Country in the first place.”
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