The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has put New York City’s tightest handgun rules back under the Constitution. On November 10, a three-judge panel held that the city’s one-handgun carry limit, two-gun registration cap, and 90-day purchase waiting period must be measured against the historical-tradition test set out in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen.
The ruling reopens Second Amendment challenges a district court had dismissed. Under the city’s licensing scheme, a lawful carrier is capped at a single handgun, registration is limited to two guns, and a buyer must wait 90 days between purchases. Those three restrictions now return for the analysis Bruen requires, rather than remaining off the board after dismissal.
Bruen rejected judicial interest-balancing. When a government burdens the right to keep and bear arms, it must point to a well-established historical analogue from the relevant founding era. A municipal code that rations how many handguns a citizen may carry, how many he may register, or how quickly he may buy another is not self-justifying. It either fits the Nation’s tradition of firearm regulation or it does not.
New York City has long treated carry and registration as allotments. The one-gun carry cap and two-gun registration ceiling convert a constitutional right into a local quota. The 90-day waiting period stacks delay onto that quota. The Second Circuit did not strike those rules from the bench. It required the city to defend them where the Supreme Court said they must be defended: in history, not in policy preference.
Handgun owners who challenged the licensing laws secured a partial win on appeal. The dismissed claims against the carry cap, the registration ceiling, and the waiting period go back with Bruen as the governing test—the same standard the Supreme Court used to invalidate New York’s proper-cause carry regime.
City officials remain bound by the same oath that binds every public officer: to support the Constitution. Local codes sit below that oath. When a licensing office tells a lawful adult he may carry one handgun and wait three months for the next, the Second Amendment is the measure of the law, not a suggestion from City Hall.
The case now proceeds consistent with the panel’s holding. New York City must produce a historical tradition that justifies one-gun carry caps, two-gun registration limits, and 90-day waits, or those restrictions fail. The right to keep and bear arms does not shrink at the city line.
References
- https://ww3.ca2.uscourts.gov/decisions/OPN/24-3308_opn.pdf
- https://www.courthousenews.com/nyc-handgun-owners-secure-partial-win-in-challenge-to-licensing-laws
- https://news.bloomberglaw.com/litigation/challenge-to-nycs-concealed-carry-gun-limits-revived-on-appeal
- https://bearingarms.com/camedwards/2026/11/10/nycs-handgun-restrictions-take-a-hit-in-second-circuit-ruling-n1234442
- https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.604923/gov.uscourts.nysd.604923.30.0.pdf