Boston Lawyer BlogSJC Weighs Age-Based Firearm Licensing
On March 2, 2026, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) heard oral arguments in Commonwealth v. Mikai P. Thomson, a case that could provide further clarity on the Commonwealth’s ability to implement gun control legislation following the Supreme Court’s landmark 2022 decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen. Thomson was convicted of, among other things, carrying a firearm without a license, after police officers found a handgun in his car when they pulled him over in 2021. Thomson now challenges his firearm conviction on the basis that the Massachusetts handgun license law, M.G.L. Chapter 140, §131, which requires license applicants to be 21 years old, is unconstitutional. During oral arguments, the SJC showed signs of sidestepping the Bruen issue as it applies to Thomson, and questioned whether Thomson, who was 20 years old at the time, had legal standing to bring his 2nd Amendment challenge.
Post-Bruen 2nd Amendment cases in Massachusetts
The Thomson case represents yet another chapter in this rapidly evolving area of the law. Since the Supreme Court decided Bruen in 2022, Massachusetts courts have grappled with its proper application. As we have noted, in Bruen, the Supreme Court adopted a history- and tradition-focused test for determining the validity of weapons regulations, directing Courts to look at whether the regulation is “consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of [weapons] regulation.” In United States v. Rahimi, which was decided in 2024, the Supreme Court upheld the regulation of a federal statute prohibiting persons subject to qualifying domestic violence restraining orders from possessing firearms and provided further guidance in how the lower courts should interpret the principles it outlined in Bruen. In its decision in Rahimi the Court noted that valid gun regulations did not need be a “dead ringer” in relation to historical analogues, or have a “historical twin,” to be valid.
In Massachusetts, following the Rahimi decision, the SJC decided two consolidated cases, Commonwealth v. Dean F. Donnell, Jr., and Commonwealth v. Philip J. Marquis, that dealt with the issue of whether the Commonwealth had the authority to require that non-residents obtain temporary licenses to carry a firearm within Massachusetts borders. In Donnell, the SJC confirmed the invalidity of “may-issue” licensing schemes in Massachusetts under Bruen, where licensing officials are afforded discretion over the issuance of a license. On the other hand, so called “shall-issue” licensing laws, where licensing officials are required to issue the gun license where the applicant satisfies objective criteria, may be allowed under Bruen. In Marquis, the SJC upheld the Commonwealth’s ability to implement licensing requirements on non-residents who are within Massachusetts’ borders.
Further, following Bruen and Rahimi, the First Circuit upheld a lower court’s denial of a preliminary injunction motion against a Massachusetts regulation banning assault weapons. In Capen v. Campbell, the 1st Circuit leaned on a 2024 case, Ocean State Tactical v. Rhode Island, where it had upheld a Rhode Island ban on large-capacity magazines. The First Circuit concluded in Capen that the assault weapon restriction was sufficiently consistent with historical tradition to affirm the lower court’s denial of a preliminary injunction against the ban.
Age Restriction Cases post-Bruen
In recent years, the federal circuit courts have been split in their interpretation of whether Bruen allows age restrictions. In Reese v. Bur. of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, & Explosives, a January 2025 decision, the Fifth Circuit found insufficient historical evidence to uphold a federal prohibition on handgun purchases by 18 to 20 year olds, finding such a ban to be in violation of the Second Amendment.
However, in McCoy v. Bur. of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives, a June 2025 decision, the Fourth Circuit upheld a federal regulation that prohibited the commercial sale of handguns to those under 21. In its ruling, the McCoy Court analogized the gun restriction to English common law “infancy doctrine,” which limited contract rights for under 21-year-olds. The McCoy Court emphasized the lack of judgment and reason inherent in members of this age group in justifying its decision.
Commonwealth v. Thomson
The Thomson case could give the SJC the opportunity to speak on the validity of age restrictions on firearms in a post-Bruen climate. However, the Commonwealth has argued that because Thomson did not ever attempt to obtain a license, and therefore was not denied a license based on his age, he lacks legal standing to bring his challenge. At argument, the SJC noted that there could have been other reasons that he would have been denied a license apart from his age. Therefore, it is possible that the SJC in fact declines to directly address the Constitutional validity of the law in question as it applies to Thomson, and instead may only analyze whether the law is constitutional on its face.
If the SJC invalidates the underlying gun law in dispute in Thomson, it could have the effect of weakening Massachusetts’ firearms regulation regime, which is among the strictest in the nation. Post-Bruen, Massachusetts has attempted to strengthen its gun laws, passing “ghost gun” prohibitions and further limiting the ability of people to carry firearms in polling places in the “Act Modernizing Firearms Laws,” which was signed into law by Governor Healey in July 2024.
The law in this area has been rapidly evolving in recent years, and we are likely to continue to see a string of Second Amendment challenges to Massachusetts’ strict gun laws at both the SJC and First Circuit. In the meantime, criminal defendants may continue to use the constitutional challenges that have recently been made available to them to contest statutes that criminalize the possession of firearms or other weapons.
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