By Tierney Sneed

(CNN) — A conservative federal appeals court said Thursday that a federal law banning the sale of handguns to 18- to 20-year-olds is unconstitutional, elevating a significant question about the Second Amendment’s reach in the wake of recent major Supreme Court rulings on gun rights.

It is the latest major ruling against an age-based firearm restriction and one that comes as the Supreme Court has been asked to weigh in on how the Second Amendment applies to older teens.

The new ruling from the 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals pointed to the landmark 2022 Supreme Court ruling known as Bruen that established a historical test for assessing the constitutionality of gun restrictions. It also reviewed the legal challenge against the more recent decision by the Supreme Court that refined the Bruen test while upholding federal restrictions on gun possession for people accused of domestic abuse.

“Ultimately, the text of the Second Amendment includes eighteen-to-twenty-year-old individuals among ‘the people; whose right to keep and bear arms is protected,” the 5th Circuit’s ruling, handed down by a panel of Republican appointees, said. “The federal government has presented scant evidence that eighteen-to-twenty-year-olds’ firearm rights during the founding-era were restricted in a similar manner to the contemporary federal handgun purchase ban, and its 19th century evidence ‘cannot provide much insight into the meaning of the Second Amendment when it contradicts earlier evidence.’”

CNN has reached out to the Justice Department for comment.

Courts are divided over bans for teenagers

Appeals courts, including the 5th Circuit, have in the past upheld the federal ban in question. But more recently, some courts have shown hostility towards gun prohibitions aimed at 18- to 20-year-olds. Many of the rulings against such limits, including the 5th Circuit opinion issued Wednesday, cite the participation of older teenagers in militias around the time of the Second Amendment’s framing.

Defenders of the laws argue that research shows young adults are more likely to commit gun violence, and some laws, like a Florida measure that raised the gun purchase age to 21, were passed after high-profile shootings by teenagers.

(An appellate panel ruling upholding that law was wiped away by the full 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals, which could issue a new ruling on the Florida law any day now.)

The Supreme Court has not addressed directly how to apply the Second Amendment’s protections to young adults in light of its recent precedents. Earlier this month, Minnesota state officials asked the high court to review an 8th Circuit ruling that struck down its limits on 18- to 20-year-olds publicly carrying guns.

Some of the litigation over the federal purchase ban for 18- to 20-year-olds has become mired in procedural disputes that have occurred when the person challenging the law has turned 21. There was a hearing Wednesday in another significant case challenging the federal law in the 4th US Circuit Court of Appeals.

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